Dateline Secrets Uncovered S16E04

Terra.Anatolia

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Transcript

00:00:00I loved her so much. She was everything. She was everything to me. Who could do

00:00:06that to my sister? Who would do this to Kathy?

00:00:10There's been, I think, murder across the street.

00:00:15The man came home, discovered his wife in bed, murdered.

00:00:19The police officer said we believe there was a burglary.

00:00:22Was the thought that this had to be some random person on the loose? I think we all thought that.

00:00:27Their three-and-a-half-year-old daughter was home when Kathy was discovered.

00:00:31She had been in the home all day, unattended.

00:00:33She was drawing a picture of the bed and a stick person.

00:00:38What did she see?

00:00:39She saw a bad man in the house. It was in Mommy's bed.

00:00:42Just heartbreaking.

00:00:43It is.

00:00:44The poor little angel.

00:00:46It was a case that had grown cold.

00:00:48She was three-and-a-half when the crime happened, and no one has been able to interview her since.

00:00:52So, I remember waking up, and I remember seeing her.

00:00:56And then, like, sitting in my bedroom, like, telling my dollies it would be okay.

00:00:59Something happened in that home that night.

00:01:02This was a case that we needed to solve.

00:01:12Hello, and welcome to Dateline Secrets Uncovered.

00:01:16Kathy Krausnick was a stay-at-home mom to her toddler, Sarah.

00:01:21They usually started their day together until the morning everything changed when Kathy was bludgeoned to death in her bed.

00:01:29Police thought little Sarah may have seen the killer, but it would take decades to unlock the secret of Kathy's murder.

00:01:37Here's Andrea Canning with The Bad Man.

00:01:44A blanket of snow covered the ground that cold morning, February 19, 1982.

00:01:51Here on this quiet street called Del Rio Drive, winter temperatures hovered just above freezing.

00:01:56Windows were shut tight.

00:01:58At night, furnaces turned up.

00:02:01Around 6.30 a.m., James Krausnick, a businessman at Kodak, left his house and headed to work in downtown Rochester, New York.

00:02:08His three-year-old daughter Sarah and his wife Kathy were still in bed.

00:02:13Later that day, a close friend, Gloria Winkowski, planned to drive them to a doctor's appointment.

00:02:19I tried calling her all day, and there was no answer at her house.

00:02:22Did you think that maybe James just ended up taking her to the doctor?

00:02:26By 5 o'clock, I figured, oh, he must have taken her.

00:02:29That's around the time James Krausnick arrived back home, only to make a horrific discovery.

00:02:36He ran to the house across the street, where a neighbor called 911.

00:02:40Brighton police officer Marcus Spaker was on patrol that day.

00:03:03As he rushed to the scene, his radio was malfunctioning, so he couldn't hear all the details.

00:03:08I went lights and siren because it was a cause unknown.

00:03:11And as I neared this location, I heard on the dispatch something about across the street.

00:03:17So you pull up here?

00:03:18Pulled up here and pulled into this driveway.

00:03:20Into this driveway.

00:03:21And the lady of the house was standing on that sidewalk.

00:03:24I walked up to her, and she immediately said, he thinks his wife's been murdered.

00:03:28Oh, my gosh.

00:03:31Across the street, the Krausnick's front door was wide open.

00:03:35So I ran across, yelling, is there anybody else in the house?

00:03:39No one answered.

00:03:40He made his way inside, not knowing what he might find.

00:03:44Off to the right in the dining room, he saw items on the carpet.

00:03:48A silver serving set.

00:03:49A woman's purse.

00:03:50The contents spilled out.

00:03:52At that point, I decided to go up the stairs.

00:03:55Up the stairs and into the main bedroom where he encountered a sight he would never forget.

00:04:02I walked in and looked to the right, and that's when I first saw the victim.

00:04:07She looked like she was sleeping with an ax buried into her head.

00:04:10Have you ever seen something like that in your whole life?

00:04:14Well, other than on 50s science fiction movies, that's about it.

00:04:18I never saw anything like that in reality.

00:04:20It was jolting and shocking, and it almost left me thinking, is this real, or is this a mannequin,

00:04:27and is this an evil trick or a prank that someone's trying to pull here?

00:04:33The officer lifted the blanket by the foot of the bed, and then he knew for sure this was no prank.

00:04:42It's something you can't unsee.

00:04:44Standing right here now, I can see the bed.

00:04:46I can see her, and I can see the eggs in her head.

00:04:49The victim was 29-year-old Kathy Krausnick.

00:04:54The officer called for backup.

00:04:56Investigator Richard Corrigan quickly arrived on the scene.

00:05:00Were you surprised that it was this neighborhood?

00:05:02This was a low-profile neighborhood.

00:05:04Probably the biggest crime there would be a high-priced bicycle out of a garage.

00:05:08So, yes, this is a quiet, quiet community.

00:05:11What details are being shared with you?

00:05:13A man came home, discovered his wife in bed, murdered.

00:05:18There was a small child that was in the house.

00:05:21A child at the scene of a brutal crime.

00:05:24It was the Krausnick's daughter, 3-year-old Sarah.

00:05:27Luckily, she was unharmed.

00:05:29Her father had found her in the house and scooped her up as he ran for help.

00:05:36The medical examiner soon arrived.

00:05:38What is the medical examiner telling you?

00:05:40It appears she'd been dead for a while.

00:05:42Rigor mortis had started to set in.

00:05:44She had been dead more than probably eight hours.

00:05:46That meant the little girl had been inside the home alone with her deceased mother for hours and hours.

00:05:53No one had been there to make her breakfast that morning, to dress her, to comfort her.

00:05:58We were worried about her physical well-being, as well as her mental well-being.

00:06:02I've had nightmares about it because the thought that the little girl was in the house all day with her mother.

00:06:09I just couldn't get my arms around that.

00:06:12What had she seen?

00:06:15What did she know?

00:06:16Questions that would hang over this family, this entire town, longer than anyone could have imagined.

00:06:23Who could be behind such a horrific killing?

00:06:29Investigators canvass the neighborhood for clues.

00:06:32Coming up.

00:06:34The police officer said we believed there was a burglary.

00:06:37I saw this man I had never seen before.

00:06:40I just burst out crying because I still didn't want to believe it.

00:06:44Why would they pick that house?

00:06:46Trying to figure out who, what, where, how, why.

00:06:48Who could possibly do this?

00:06:50When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:07:04Kathy Krausnick's family back in Michigan was learning the tragic news.

00:07:08Her younger sister Annette was away at college.

00:07:11I remember coming back to my dorm room and my father was calling me.

00:07:16He says, well, something horrible has happened.

00:07:19He says, your sister was bludgeoned to death.

00:07:22I'll never forget that phone call.

00:07:24The details were almost too much to absorb.

00:07:28The medical examiner believed Kathy had been killed with one blow to the head.

00:07:33Once and once only, with great force.

00:07:36All murder is awful.

00:07:38There's something about an axe that just, for some reason, seems to take it to another level of gruesome and just horrifying.

00:07:46Yeah, I would agree with that.

00:07:49It's an ultimate instrument.

00:07:50It's an instrument of force.

00:07:51Back on the street, neighbors were aware of all the commotion.

00:07:56Joanne Bouvier, who lived a few houses away, had just returned from work.

00:08:01As I passed the Krausnick home, I saw the medical examiner vehicle in their driveway.

00:08:07The police officer came in and said, we believe there was a burglary.

00:08:13Investigator Richard Corrigan had been canvassing the neighborhood for most of the night.

00:08:18Did anyone have any clues that would help you with your investigation?

00:08:23Nothing unusual was reported.

00:08:25It was a cold winter day.

00:08:28Joanne remembered seeing a jogger that morning by the Krausnick's house.

00:08:32I saw this man I had never seen before jogging toward me.

00:08:38He was slowly jogging.

00:08:40Did that mean anything?

00:08:42So many questions.

00:08:44What you do is you start trying to put together a biography of these folks or, you know, trying to figure out who, what, when, where, how, why.

00:08:52And who could possibly do this?

00:08:53This could have totally been a random crime.

00:08:56Correct.

00:08:57Or Kathy was targeted.

00:08:59Or someone could have just snapped, if you will.

00:09:03It was hard for Kathy's family to imagine anyone wanting to hurt her.

00:09:08Her little sister Annette had always looked up to her.

00:09:12She was just, she was everything.

00:09:15She was everything to me.

00:09:16By the time I was five years old, she was already telling me, you're going to college.

00:09:20No way.

00:09:21Yeah.

00:09:22If it wasn't for her, I don't think I would have went to college, actually.

00:09:26But she made it clear that there was no other path in my life but her baby sister was going to go to college.

00:09:32What was her personality like?

00:09:34She was giving.

00:09:36She was nurturing.

00:09:39She was caring.

00:09:40Everyone loved my sister.

00:09:42She was beautiful, too.

00:09:43I mean, when she walked into a room, heads would turn, literally.

00:09:47Candy Stevens grew up around the corner from Kathy's family in Mount Clemens, Michigan.

00:09:53She had the sweetest personality.

00:09:55She was happy-go-lucky, always smiling, always perky.

00:09:59It was back in high school when Kathy met her future husband, James Krausnick.

00:10:05The Krausnick family owned a carpet business.

00:10:08Everybody's carpet in Mount Clemens came from Krausnick's.

00:10:11Did it?

00:10:12Oh, yeah.

00:10:13They supplied all the...

00:10:14I mean, well, that's just where you went to.

00:10:15Yeah.

00:10:16That's where my first house, that's where my carpet came from, my parents' house.

00:10:19Everyone knew the Krausnick's, the Krausnick's, the Krausnick's, and they had a nice home on the water.

00:10:26They were just a beautiful couple, and Kathy loved Jim's social status.

00:10:32My mom, she always said, marry up, marry up, marry up.

00:10:36And so that's what Kathy was doing, and my mom was extremely happy that she was marrying Jim Krausnick.

00:10:46So as you're standing there and you're watching these two exchange their vows, Kathy and James, how are you?

00:10:52I'm crying.

00:10:53I remember literally crying because I was just so happy for my sister.

00:10:57I loved her so much.

00:10:59I wanted her just to go and have this beautiful life.

00:11:02They moved out west to Colorado, where James worked toward his Ph.D. in economics.

00:11:08That's where baby Sarah was born.

00:11:10Sarah was just a little ball of just happiness and joy.

00:11:14And my parents' first grandchild, Sarah was... it was great.

00:11:18Welcome to our family. Great addition.

00:11:21More good news came a couple of years later, when James announced he'd completed his doctorate.

00:11:27The whole family was ecstatic that Jim finally graduated.

00:11:30He was Dr. Krausnick, big-time Dr. Krausnick.

00:11:34James and Kathy and Sarah eventually moved to Rochester in 1981.

00:11:39James gets a new job.

00:11:40Correct.

00:11:41It was a promotion for Jim, more money, and Jim was finally going to be able to use his Ph.D.,

00:11:48and they were going to live the life they wanted to live.

00:11:52Back then, Eastman Kodak was the largest employer in Rochester, and it had offered James a great opportunity working as an economist.

00:12:01They bought the quaint home on Del Rio Drive in Upscale Brighton, and that's when Kathy met Gloria Wienkowski.

00:12:07We had just both moved to Rochester, and we kind of just clicked as friends.

00:12:13We'd have play dates at her house and at my house.

00:12:16Was Sarah her world, her whole world?

00:12:18Oh, my God, yes.

00:12:19Sarah was a sweetheart, and she looked just like her mama, and she was just so close to her.

00:12:25Kathy was always hugging her and kissing her, just like I did with mine.

00:12:29It was wonderful.

00:12:30What was Sarah like?

00:12:31She was a little doll.

00:12:32My daughter was a year younger, so she got along with Sarah really well.

00:12:36They play their dolls together.

00:12:38They did everything together.

00:12:40Remember, on the day of the murder, Gloria had been trying to reach Kathy to take her and Sarah to that doctor's appointment.

00:12:47But after not hearing from her all day and into the evening...

00:12:50I was getting very worried.

00:12:52Gloria kept calling.

00:12:54The policeman answered, and I thought it was Jim.

00:12:58So I said, Jim?

00:13:00And he goes, no, this is officer so-and-so.

00:13:02And I go, oh, my God.

00:13:04The officer confirmed harrowing news that her friend was dead.

00:13:08And I just burst out crying, because I still didn't want to believe it.

00:13:12Brighton was a bedroom town, just a beautiful little, you know, hamlet in Rochester.

00:13:18And nothing like that ever happened.

00:13:21Why would they pick that house?

00:13:23That house, with the little girl in it, all day, all alone.

00:13:28That breaks my heart.

00:13:30I can just see Sarah going over and wanting to grab her mom and just hug her.

00:13:34I mean, the poor little angel.

00:13:37What had happened on that cold, brutal morning?

00:13:41Police were about to speak with not just the husband, but that very young witness, Sarah, just three years old.

00:13:49That is a tough witness.

00:13:51A near impossible witness.

00:13:55Coming up.

00:13:56Her clothes were mismatched.

00:13:58It looked like she had maybe dressed herself that day.

00:14:00Just heartbreaking.

00:14:01It is.

00:14:02She saw a bad man in the house, and he was in mommy's bed.

00:14:06When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:14:10With the Krausnicks' home on Del Rio Drive now a crime scene, James Krausnick and his daughter, Sarah, were down at the Brighton Police Department.

00:14:27Little Sarah sat with neighbors while James spoke with detectives.

00:14:31What was James' demeanor by the time you were able to interview him?

00:14:35He was very quiet.

00:14:36I was, you know, concerned, worried about his daughter and what happened.

00:14:40You know, answering your questions.

00:14:42Basically, he was cooperative.

00:14:44Did he have any idea who would want to harm his wife?

00:14:46He indicated no one to us.

00:14:48Was anything out of the ordinary did he express when he was leaving the house that morning?

00:14:51He said everyone was asleep and he goes to work.

00:14:54He had some meetings.

00:14:55He had gone with some other coworkers to meetings outside their immediate office area.

00:15:00Another part of Kodak.

00:15:02I think he said he ate lunch by himself.

00:15:04And he came back and then he, at the end of the day, went home.

00:15:09James said he arrived home a little before 5 p.m., saw a windowpane smashed on the door that led from the garage into the house, and immediately knew something was wrong.

00:15:19He said he came home, found a broken door, went in, and discovered his wife in bed with the ax in her head.

00:15:29He said he didn't touch her, instead ran to his daughter's bedroom, where he found little Sarah snuggled up in the corner of her bed in a daze.

00:15:38And immediately ran to the neighbor with the child.

00:15:40So he takes her, his daughter, over to the neighbor.

00:15:43He leaves the home with the daughter, yes, and runs to the neighbor.

00:15:46While James talked with the police, neighbor Joanne was keeping Sarah company in another room.

00:15:52She was drawing, and one of the pictures that I recall her drawing was a picture of the bed, and it looked like a stick person kind of drawing.

00:16:07This toddler, this little girl, is...

00:16:12Walking a house with her murdered mother laying in the bed with an ax in her head, yes.

00:16:16It's just heartbreaking.

00:16:17It is. Our youth officer had a chance to talk to her a little bit, but, you know, it's a three-and-a-half-year-old who just said toddler.

00:16:24Could Sarah help the police find out what had happened?

00:16:27I have a hard time getting anything out of my three-and-a-half-year-old son about what happened at school that day.

00:16:33But if it was something horrible, he saw somebody get hit with a baseball bat, let's say.

00:16:38Maybe, yes, maybe he would.

00:16:42Sarah was able to give police some details.

00:16:45She told the officer that when she woke up, her daddy had already left for work.

00:16:49How no one was home to make her breakfast.

00:16:52And it appeared as though no one was there to help her get dressed.

00:16:55She was wearing a red sweater over a pink sweater and two pairs of socks.

00:16:59Her clothes were mismatched.

00:17:00It looked like she had maybe dressed herself that day, and we don't know.

00:17:04We were trying to determine if she was able to get anything to eat or drink during the day.

00:17:08She told police what she saw when she went into her parents' bedroom that morning.

00:17:13She saw a bad man in the house, and he was in mommy's bed.

00:17:17Really hard to hear that, that a, you know, three-and-a-half-year-old is giving this account.

00:17:21She also said that he might have had a hammer.

00:17:23I believe something to that effect, yes.

00:17:26In fact, the officer taking notes wrote down that Sarah later corrected herself, saying it was an axe that she saw.

00:17:34And Sarah seemed to have a description of the bad man.

00:17:37She said he had long blonde hair, had no clothes, no glasses, and stayed a long time in the house.

00:17:44It seemed, at first anyhow, that the little girl had seen her mother's killer.

00:17:49But as Sarah spoke, it became apparent she wasn't describing the killer.

00:17:54She was describing the crime scene with her mother in the bed.

00:17:58She probably didn't recognize her mother so soon, you know, being with all the massive trauma, that she probably didn't recognize her mother.

00:18:05I mean, I just hope that she didn't see it actually happen.

00:18:08You know, that's...

00:18:09I don't think so.

00:18:10By midnight, James and Sarah were driven back to the neighbor's house.

00:18:14And the police, as a matter of procedure, verified James' whereabouts that day.

00:18:19He'd been at work.

00:18:21Had his alibi checked out by this point.

00:18:24We had some people from Kloidecker, one or two, who actually showed up at the police department.

00:18:27He was at work that day.

00:18:31Police requested that the family monitor Sarah's conversations and any new drawings.

00:18:36The next day, James and Sarah went to Michigan to be with family.

00:18:40That's where they laid Kathy to rest.

00:18:43I was devastated.

00:18:46And here I am at my sister's funeral, my best friend, my mentor of my world.

00:18:50This is Kathy.

00:18:51This is the one who made everyone proud.

00:18:54Right.

00:18:55This beautiful, wonderful, loving person who could be so cruel to do that to her.

00:19:02And now Sarah was left motherless at just three years old.

00:19:07In the days after the murder, police noted that Sarah talked to her dad about that morning, saying,

00:19:12I couldn't find you.

00:19:13I didn't know how to call you.

00:19:15I didn't know what street to ride my bike on.

00:19:18Was she saying, where's mommy?

00:19:20I do recall her saying that a bad man hurt my mommy.

00:19:24That's what she would say.

00:19:26And police looking for Kathy's killer found out there was a very bad man who lived just a few miles away.

00:19:33Coming up.

00:19:34Was the thought that this had to be some, you know, crazed person on the loose?

00:19:38I think we all thought that.

00:19:39A new lead.

00:19:40A man with a violent past.

00:19:42Ed Larrabee is a name that came up.

00:19:44A known rapist.

00:19:45Yes, that is correct.

00:19:46He was very hostile.

00:19:47Yes.

00:19:48Get off his porch.

00:19:49Get off his steps.

00:19:50No way I'm going to talk to you.

00:19:51Sounds very angry.

00:19:52Yes.

00:19:53When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:20:09Welcome back to Dateline Secrets Uncovered.

00:20:12I'm Craig Melvin.

00:20:13Kathy Krausnick's murder shook her neighbors and police.

00:20:17They were haunted that her toddler, Sarah, was home alone for hours while Kathy lay dead.

00:20:24As investigators tried to make sense of a senseless scene,

00:20:28they were about to get an intriguing tip about a man whose disturbing past was no secret to police.

00:20:35Back to Andrea Canning with The Bad Man.

00:20:40The day after hearing about her sister's murder,

00:20:44college student Annette Schlosser says police officers knocked on her dorm room door.

00:20:49What were the police asking you in the dorm?

00:20:52What kind of questions?

00:20:53They would ask me if I knew anybody that would have been able to do this.

00:20:59You know, I don't really recall the exact questions.

00:21:02To be honest, I was still, I was in shock.

00:21:05I was just numb.

00:21:07And desperately afraid.

00:21:10She lived hundreds of miles from Brighton, New York,

00:21:13but Annette said she was terrified of the unknown killer.

00:21:16I would sometimes have friends come over and just stay the night because I was afraid.

00:21:22And I'd be looking out my window a lot.

00:21:26This changed you?

00:21:27Oh, absolutely changed my life.

00:21:29I don't even know who I would have been if this hadn't happened.

00:21:34She says none of it made sense.

00:21:37Her sweet, sunny sister killed in her bed.

00:21:40Little Sarah left all alone.

00:21:42Was the thought amongst the family that this had to be some, you know, crazed, like random person on the loose?

00:21:49I think that's what we thought.

00:21:51I think we all thought that.

00:21:53Investigators tried to put a face on who that random person might be.

00:21:58They checked in with neighboring police departments about recent burglaries and assaults in the area.

00:22:03A solid tip came in about a sex offender fresh out of prison.

00:22:08Ed Larrabee is a name that came up in this investigation?

00:22:11That did.

00:22:12A known rapist?

00:22:13Yes, that is correct.

00:22:14Who lived very close?

00:22:15Within a mile, if I'm not mistaken, yes.

00:22:18Close enough to cross paths with Kathy?

00:22:21An investigator went to interview Larrabee at his apartment.

00:22:24He was very hostile.

00:22:26He was hostile to my colleague, yes.

00:22:28Told him to F off?

00:22:29Correct.

00:22:30And get off his porch, get off his steps.

00:22:32No way I'm going to talk to you.

00:22:34You have no right.

00:22:35I'll have you arrested.

00:22:36He sounds very angry.

00:22:37Yes.

00:22:38Did anyone check out his alibi?

00:22:40Yes.

00:22:41Where was he?

00:22:42He was at work.

00:22:43But his alibi wasn't exactly airtight.

00:22:46Larrabee's shift started at 7 a.m.

00:22:49And the investigators had no idea where he'd been before that.

00:22:52If he doesn't talk to you, he's not going to tell you what he did before he went to work.

00:22:56Best you can do is try to place him best you can.

00:22:59If a person doesn't cooperate with you and you're asking me, could we tell you what he

00:23:02was doing?

00:23:03I don't know.

00:23:04He wouldn't talk to us.

00:23:05Frustrating, but investigators did have other ways to check him out.

00:23:10They learned that Ed Larrabee drove a yellow car, though none of the neighbors mentioned

00:23:14seeing it on the morning of the murder.

00:23:16Larrabee's fingerprints were also on file, but crime scene technicians found no trace of

00:23:21them at the Krausnick house.

00:23:22And even though Larrabee had a lengthy rap sheet, he had never been accused of murder.

00:23:27Larrabee's previous crimes had mostly been sexual offenses.

00:23:30There was no sign Cathy had been raped.

00:23:33His method of crime didn't seem to fit what we had.

00:23:36So the investigator ruled Larrabee out for the time being.

00:23:40He was more interested in what he could learn from the crime scene itself.

00:23:43He had a lot of questions when he studied photos of the inside of the house.

00:23:47What he saw didn't resemble any burglary he'd ever worked before.

00:23:51The bedroom had valuable items around.

00:23:54Nothing was thrown about, like drawers were emptied, dumped on the ground, or thrown open

00:24:00and gone through.

00:24:01You saw none of that?

00:24:02None of that at all.

00:24:04In the dining room, the contents of Cathy's purse were spilled out, but her wallet and

00:24:09credit cards were there for the taking.

00:24:11There was a pile of sterling silver neatly stacked nearby.

00:24:14One silver tray placed so carefully on the floor that the mail was still standing upright

00:24:19between the salt and pepper shakers.

00:24:22This was not the usual calling card of a burglar.

00:24:25Burglars, they're like Vikings.

00:24:27They pillage, they burn, they grab all they can.

00:24:30So this is, there was no, usually they'll grab a bag and they dump valuable items into it

00:24:35or in their pockets.

00:24:36This was not done.

00:24:37Maybe somebody was trying to take the tea set and they got interrupted or...

00:24:41Yes, but if you're interrupted and you go to the extent of murdering someone, why don't

00:24:45you complete at least what you're there for?

00:24:47Had there been burglaries in the area?

00:24:49Was that a concern?

00:24:50No, we hadn't had any serious problems in the area recently prior to the events.

00:24:56The investigator suspected the burglary was fake.

00:25:00Someone had staged it, starting with that broken windowpane on the door that led from the

00:25:05garage into the house.

00:25:07There was a wooden tool unrelated to the murder weapon sitting by the door.

00:25:12Investigators believed it had been used to smash the glass, part of the staging.

00:25:17So if a burglar was going to reach in, you would have to put your hand through broken glass

00:25:23and possibly risk cutting yourself.

00:25:25We should have had blood on it or someone should have injured themselves possibly.

00:25:28What if they're wearing leather gloves?

00:25:30It's possible, but it looked more like someone had broken a glass even though the door was already unlocked.

00:25:34If there was no burglary, that meant Kathy had not been killed by a random thief.

00:25:40In fact, the investigator suspected Kathy's killer had staged the burglary to cover up a very deliberate act of murder.

00:25:48Did that say anything to you as far as a profiling, if you will, of that an ax was used to the head?

00:25:55I mean, it's very personal and just gruesome.

00:25:59And final.

00:26:00This is a once angry, forceful, fatal blow.

00:26:06I'm just going to do this once and once only, and I'm very angry.

00:26:10Investigators needed to figure out who could possibly be angry at Kathy Krausnick.

00:26:16And then a new clue landed on their desk.

00:26:21That new clue suggested that Krausnick's marriage was not as happy as it seemed.

00:26:27Was Kathy hiding a secret?

00:26:29Coming up.

00:26:30There was a postcard that got sent in that made it sound like someone was having an affair with Kathy.

00:26:36Hints of an affair and a sudden surprising moment.

00:26:41Jim became very upset, jumped up.

00:26:43I don't want to hear this.

00:26:44I don't want to talk about it.

00:26:46And, you know, became very, very emotional.

00:26:49When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:26:53The broken windowpane, the family's silver neatly piled up next to a garbage bag.

00:27:06It didn't look like any burglary Investigator Quirigan had ever seen.

00:27:10He suspected Kathy's killer had staged the burglary to throw investigators off the trail.

00:27:16Which meant Kathy's murder wasn't random at all.

00:27:19You had a lot to figure out.

00:27:21We had a lot of unanswered questions.

00:27:25Then, a few days after the murder, a tantalizing lead showed up at the police station.

00:27:31There was a letter that got sent in that made it sound like someone was having an affair with Kathy.

00:27:36Really?

00:27:37And that was pretty much the gist of it.

00:27:39Brighton Police Detectives Stephen Hunt and Mark Liberatore, who worked the case years later, studied the letter carefully.

00:27:46It appeared to have been mailed locally and there was no signature.

00:27:49It was an individual who said that he had gone to the door that morning of the incident.

00:27:54The letter began.

00:27:55I am a friend of Kathleen.

00:27:57I waited for her husband to leave yesterday and I went to her house and she did not answer the door.

00:28:03And perhaps most chilling of all, the writer said three-year-old Sarah had come to the door.

00:28:08The child couldn't get the door open.

00:28:10Whether he could see the child or not, it didn't say.

00:28:13And whoever wrote the letter said that I'm a married man so I can't get involved.

00:28:18Was that alluding to that he had been with Kathy?

00:28:21We don't know.

00:28:22Yeah.

00:28:23It was kind of a mystery.

00:28:24So maybe, maybe that's what he was trying to say.

00:28:25I'm a married man.

00:28:26I was having an affair.

00:28:27Maybe.

00:28:28It's possible.

00:28:29Also possible that someone could have sent it to throw the police off and send them down another path.

00:28:34Who knows?

00:28:35What a cryptic clue.

00:28:39So what exactly was the state of the Krausnicks' marriage?

00:28:43Investigator Corrigan headed to the place where it all began.

00:28:46You'd get on a plane?

00:28:48Yes.

00:28:49And you'd go to Michigan?

00:28:50Yes.

00:28:51You know, family would possibly know better if they were arguing about something, you know, money.

00:28:54Anything?

00:28:55An addiction.

00:28:56Nothing was coming.

00:28:57Nothing?

00:28:58Nothing.

00:28:59Kathy's family told the investigator the couple were inseparable.

00:29:02Two peas in a pod who only had eyes for each other.

00:29:06But they said the recent move to Brighton had been a little rocky, especially for Kathy.

00:29:11The washing machine was broke and they didn't have money to fix it.

00:29:16And they only had one car.

00:29:18And Jim would take that to work every day.

00:29:20And just being alone in that house with no car.

00:29:22Right.

00:29:23And a toddler, that could get really overwhelming and lonely.

00:29:27Absolutely.

00:29:28In a new town.

00:29:29Exactly.

00:29:30Exactly.

00:29:31Exactly.

00:29:32I think that would be a lot for any mom.

00:29:35Yeah.

00:29:36I could almost feel her overwhelm this.

00:29:39Now, you know, I'm talking about it out loud.

00:29:41I can't even imagine what she was feeling.

00:29:43James agreed to meet the investigator, too.

00:29:46He brought his brother-in-law and dad for support.

00:29:49Did James express that they were happy, that this was a normal family?

00:29:52Yes.

00:29:53He indicated, you know, they were very much in love.

00:29:55No indication of a third party or affairs or a secret side.

00:30:01And no trace of any financial motive, either.

00:30:04Did James have a big life insurance policy on Kathy?

00:30:07Not that we found.

00:30:09The investigator noticed how quiet James seemed during the 90-minute interview.

00:30:13Until.

00:30:14His brother-in-law asked, so where's it going with the burglary or something like that?

00:30:19And that Jim became very upset.

00:30:22Jumped up.

00:30:23I'm not, I don't want to hear this.

00:30:24I don't want to talk about it.

00:30:26And, you know, became very, very emotional.

00:30:29And we had to calm him down.

00:30:31James said he was tired and ended the interview.

00:30:35That didn't surprise Annette.

00:30:37She said James hadn't been acting like himself in those early days.

00:30:40He'd barely spoken to the family, even pulling little Sarah away from her at the funeral.

00:30:45And I'm thinking, that's kind of odd.

00:30:48I know I'm upset and everything, but you wouldn't even let me talk to Sarah.

00:30:54After ending his interview so abruptly, James did talk to investigators several more times.

00:30:59And according to one police report, he begged them, please don't give up working on my case.

00:31:04I need to know who did this.

00:31:06But the investigator wondered how seriously to take him when he found out James had gotten his own attorney.

00:31:11The fact that he lawyered up put strong suspicion on him.

00:31:14I feel like the whole lawyer thing is so tricky because defense attorneys are going to tell you to get a lawyer.

00:31:20You know, just to protect yourself.

00:31:22And then police or, you know, people can see it as, you know, a sign of guilt.

00:31:27It's like you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't.

00:31:30Well, if you come home and you find your spouse murdered, why do you feel the need to get an attorney?

00:31:35Not everyone trusts the police.

00:31:36Well, but this is not a person who has had a lot of negative police contact throughout his life.

00:31:42It didn't fit the mold.

00:31:44As the weeks passed, the investigators' other leads started to fizzle.

00:31:48You ended up interviewing some 300 people in this case.

00:31:51Or more, yes.

00:31:52In this case.

00:31:53Yes.

00:31:54That's a lot of people.

00:31:55We've tried to turn over every stone, make sure you don't overlook anything.

00:31:58But you never, with all these interviews, you never come across the smoking gun or the smoking axe in this case.

00:32:04No.

00:32:05The case went cold.

00:32:08It seemed like any hope of finding Kathy's killer was melting away with the snow.

00:32:16Coming up.

00:32:17My mom would just cry every day.

00:32:19It just broke my heart.

00:32:20Nothing was being done and we just couldn't let that happen.

00:32:24Another killing, another town, and a suspect who was very familiar.

00:32:30He was a serial rapist.

00:32:31Who was living right near Stephanie.

00:32:33That's right.

00:32:34When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:32:45After the murder of his wife, James Krausnick decided to leave Brighton behind for good.

00:32:51He and Sarah moved in with his parents in Michigan.

00:32:54He took a job at the family carpet store.

00:32:56Annette saw Sarah when James brought her by to visit.

00:32:59Could you see if she had been traumatized?

00:33:01Or, I mean, she's so little.

00:33:03How do you know what is going on in that little head of hers?

00:33:07Yeah, we didn't know.

00:33:08We didn't know what that poor little girl was thinking.

00:33:11As Sarah got bigger, her mother's case was going nowhere.

00:33:14Five years went by, and then ten.

00:33:17You end up retiring?

00:33:18Yes.

00:33:19Yes.

00:33:20And this is not solved?

00:33:21Correct.

00:33:22Kathy's friends and family tried to keep the case alive.

00:33:25It was important to find who did it and bring them to justice.

00:33:32Gloria bugged any police officer who visited the local pharmacy she owned.

00:33:36And I always brought it up.

00:33:38Any policeman that came in, I would sit there and say, you know, what about the Krosnack case?

00:33:42You ever going to do something about it?

00:33:45We had a lot of time that passed and nothing was being done.

00:33:48And we just couldn't let that happen.

00:33:51Annette wasn't that frightened college kid anymore.

00:33:54She was older and wiser, and her sister's biggest champion.

00:33:58Is this getting contentious at all, the fact that there's been no movement that you're aware of?

00:34:05Well, contentious is a very good word.

00:34:08Every time a new police chief would come on, I would try to make contact, or they would contact me, and they would say, you know, the file's sitting here on my desk.

00:34:17It was there, but what was really happening?

00:34:19Right.

00:34:20We used to sit around my parents' dining room table a lot, and I remember my mom would just cry every day.

00:34:27It just broke my heart.

00:34:28She would just break down and cry.

00:34:30What Annette didn't know was that in a nearby town, less than 20 miles from the house where her sister was murdered,

00:34:36another woman had been murdered, and her family was grieving and waiting for answers, too.

00:34:41Ten years after Kathy's murder, a bubbly music teacher named Stephanie Kupchinsky vanished from her apartment in the middle of the night.

00:34:49And just like Kathy, she was new to town.

00:34:52This was her fresh start here?

00:34:54Yes, it was.

00:34:55It was.

00:34:56And she was cut down in the middle of it.

00:34:58Rachel Rear is Stephanie's stepsister.

00:35:01Her mother married Stephanie's dad several years after Stephanie disappeared.

00:35:05About six months after the wedding, two little boys discovered Stephanie's skull and remains in a creek in Holly, New York.

00:35:15Oh, my gosh.

00:35:16So it officially became a homicide.

00:35:18And the prime suspect was someone you might recognize.

00:35:23He was a serial rapist.

00:35:25Who's living right near Stephanie.

00:35:27That's right.

00:35:28Ed Larrabee was the sex offender investigators had interviewed years before about Kathy's murder.

00:35:34He'd been a maintenance worker at Stephanie's apartment complex.

00:35:37After Stephanie's disappearance, police found out several residents had complained about him.

00:35:42A couple women thought maybe he illegally entered their apartments.

00:35:46One woman thought he had been watching her sleep.

00:35:49By the time Stephanie's skull was discovered, Larrabee was back in prison, convicted of another sexual assault.

00:35:56He was gray-haired and sick when Detective Sergeant Stan Chiswick, the lead investigator on Stephanie's case, went to pay him a visit behind bars.

00:36:05And he met with you?

00:36:06He did.

00:36:07But he wasn't going to talk to us.

00:36:10And he basically told us and he wasn't going to talk to us.

00:36:15Just like he told investigators in Kathy's case nearly 30 years earlier.

00:36:19But the detective investigating Stephanie's murder was determined to get Larrabee talking.

00:36:24He and a colleague started writing letters to him in jail.

00:36:27Surprisingly, Larrabee wrote back.

00:36:30We built a relationship with him.

00:36:32And in order for us to build a relationship, you know, he had to trust us.

00:36:37So, I mean, he would ask for candy, little stuff that we would send him.

00:36:42He'd ask for something and then you'd give a little?

00:36:44Yes.

00:36:45You're slowly reeling him in.

00:36:46Yes.

00:36:48Eventually, Larrabee cracked.

00:36:50He confessed that he was Stephanie's killer.

00:36:55Did he have any remorse when he confessed to Stephanie's murder?

00:36:58Not at all.

00:36:59Not at all.

00:37:01He talked about it just very matter-of-factly.

00:37:07It was probably around midnight.

00:37:10I went to her apartment.

00:37:12And since I used to work there, I had master keys.

00:37:18Larrabee said he surprised Stephanie in her apartment.

00:37:21First, he raped her.

00:37:23After some thought, I decided that the thing to do was eliminate the witness.

00:37:32So you decided at that point you were going to kill her?

00:37:35Yes.

00:37:37Not long after he confessed, Ed Larrabee was charged with two counts of second-degree murder.

00:37:42And with that, the rapist became an alleged killer.

00:37:46Back in the day, detectives investigating Kathy Krausnick's murder had discounted Larrabee in part because he'd never been accused of murder.

00:37:53But here he was confessing to just that.

00:37:56And there was something else that possibly tied him to Kathy's killing.

00:38:01Ed Larrabee had committed at least one rape wearing a ski mask.

00:38:05Yeah, ski mask.

00:38:06He also, I think, wore hockey masks and other rapes.

00:38:11Yeah, it was pretty creepy and scary.

00:38:14Remember, Kathy's neighbor said she saw a jogger running near the Krausnick's house on the morning of the murder.

00:38:19She says there was one other thing she noticed about the jogger.

00:38:23He was wearing a royal blue ski mask.

00:38:26Could the neighbor have seen Ed Larrabee that morning running from the scene?

00:38:32Mark Henderson became Brighton's police chief nearly 30 years after Kathy's murder.

00:38:37The investigation had been in limbo for decades.

00:38:41Until one day in 2014, he got word of a possible break in the case.

00:38:46There was an individual in prison, and he wanted to confess to the Axe murder.

00:38:51It was Ed Larrabee.

00:38:53This is the biggest news your department has had in a really long time.

00:38:57Relative to the Axe murder, yes.

00:38:59Back in 1982, Larrabee had rudely told investigators he didn't want to talk.

00:39:04What would he say now?

00:39:06What happens?

00:39:07So the investigator who was assigned the case worked with the state police

00:39:11and reported back that the information that was being reported by Ed Larrabee

00:39:17did not match what was in the investigatory file.

00:39:22Larrabee's physical description of Kathy could not have been more wrong.

00:39:26Telling investigators she had short dark hair and glasses.

00:39:29He didn't even use her name.

00:39:31Investigators decided he was making the whole thing up.

00:39:34But instead of giving up, the new chief kept Kathy's case on the front burner.

00:39:39He asked the FBI for help and teamed up with Sandra Dorley, the Monroe County District Attorney.

00:39:45We were in a conference room for a couple hours and just went through every single piece of evidence that there was.

00:39:51I kept thinking there's got to be something that we could test for DNA.

00:39:54A lot of items had been bagged at the crime scene.

00:39:57A sock, a screwdriver, shards of glass from the broken door.

00:40:01You know, the axe had never been examined.

00:40:04I mean, obviously there was blood.

00:40:06The murder weapon.

00:40:07There was blood on it.

00:40:08So obviously that was, you know, something that we wanted tested.

00:40:11They packed it all up and sent it to the FBI.

00:40:14The hope was, and the FBI agreed, that they could process that evidence to those standards that were not around in 1982.

00:40:24And the police chief assigned investigators Stephen Hunt and Mark Liberatore to take a fresh look at the case file.

00:40:31It's several thousand pages of paper.

00:40:33One of the things you wanted to do in your new investigation was come to the house to see for yourself at the, not the scene of the crime, but as close as you can get to it decades later.

00:40:45Yeah, because pictures don't put it into perspective.

00:40:47Not when you're there and you can see distances and just feel it and just see it.

00:40:51The detectives thought it was obvious right away that the burglary was staged.

00:40:56Like the original investigators, they said the broken window on the door leading into the house was a giveaway.

00:41:02The perpetrator wanted us to think that they broke a window here in the door and then unlocked it.

00:41:08But if you really think about it and you look at the pictures from back in 1982, there's pieces of glass that are still in that pane.

00:41:14And if you put your hand in there and your button hook around trying to unlock it, you'd most likely get caught on one of the two pieces.

00:41:20There's a really, really large piece.

00:41:22Probably pulling the glass out.

00:41:23Right. Yeah, pulling the glass out, cutting your arm.

00:41:26And there might have been some fibers left behind on that, but there was nothing.

00:41:29So you think this was part of the script to just smash the window to make it look like this is where the intruder came in?

00:41:35Exactly. Right. Didn't make sense.

00:41:37Same with that silver tray set down so carefully on the dining room floor next to the garbage bag.

00:41:43And there was something new that struck Detective Hunt when he looked more closely at that bag.

00:41:48On the inside of this bag, there was a shoe print.

00:41:51And back in 1982, they looked into it, but they couldn't figure it out.

00:41:54They didn't have anything to compare it to.

00:41:56And they just chalked it up as like a moccasin style tread.

00:42:00But now that old clue was about to walk them toward a new lead.

00:42:04Coming up.

00:42:06Tracking down the killer's shoes.

00:42:09Turns out it's a brand police had seen before inside Kathy's house.

00:42:15You're thinking maybe these shoes could be a match to the tread on the garbage bag.

00:42:21Right.

00:42:22When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:42:25Welcome back to Dateline Secrets Uncovered.

00:42:34I'm Craig Melvin.

00:42:3532 years after Kathy Krausnick's murder, convicted sex offender Ed Larrabee confessed to the crime.

00:42:42But when the details he shared didn't add up, police concluded he was lying.

00:42:48The truth of who killed Kathy remained a frustrating secret until an old clue resurfaced pointing investigators to someone else they'd met before.

00:43:01Back to Andrea Canning with The Bad Man.

00:43:04Kathy Krausnick's murder investigation had been cold for decades.

00:43:11But police chief Mark Henderson insisted she was never forgotten.

00:43:15In time, the intensity of the crime faded.

00:43:20But the fact that there was a homicide and it had gone unresolved, you know, it was still thought about.

00:43:27And investigators weren't just thinking about the case.

00:43:30They were investigating.

00:43:32With fresh eyes, Detective Stephen Hunt discovered something.

00:43:36A connection to that shoe print on a garbage bag.

00:43:39I need to look into it.

00:43:40It was a good clue.

00:43:42The detective scoured the internet and tracked down the brand of shoe that he believed matched the shoe print.

00:43:47It looked like it came from a pair of dock sides.

00:43:50If there was an intruder and it was a burglary, would you expect them to be wearing dock sides?

00:43:54I mean, not that...

00:43:55In February when it's 30 degrees with nine inches of snow on the ground, no.

00:43:58Not that intruders have a uniform, but it didn't really...

00:44:01You're not wearing dock sides.

00:44:02It didn't really make sense.

00:44:03You can't run from the police quickly.

00:44:05Detective Hunt thought he might have an explanation.

00:44:08He remembered something he'd spotted in another one of the crime scene photos.

00:44:12A pair of boat shoes in the room where Cathy was killed.

00:44:15They look like dock sides and they belong to James.

00:44:19Seems like kind of a long shot, but you're thinking maybe these shoes could be a match to the tread on the garbage bag?

00:44:26Right, because I dug deeper and these are the shoes that he wore all the time.

00:44:31I talked with Cathy's sister, Annette, and she said if he wasn't wearing boat shoes, he wasn't wearing anything at all.

00:44:37Was this evidence that James was the one who staged the burglary?

00:44:41There was a profiler back in 82, FBI profiler that wrote up a little synopsis of the killer.

00:44:47Oh, I'm so curious. What did they say?

00:44:49My favorite quote is, is that the person who did this is an intelligent person, but not criminally intelligent.

00:44:56That could fit PhD economist James Krausnick.

00:45:01The district attorney noticed something else in the case file that seems suspicious about Cathy's husband.

00:45:07What we found interesting was within 24 hours, he packs up and leaves Rochester.

00:45:14I have to say if my spouse was murdered in our bed with an ax, I would be out of there.

00:45:20I would take my kids and leave because I'd be so terrified.

00:45:23But would you call the police and ask them, how are you doing on the investigation?

00:45:28Do you have any leads? What can I do to help you?

00:45:31James had not. After talking to detectives in those early days, he had never reached out to check in with them.

00:45:38Not once in 30 years. Investigators wanted to know what he'd been up to all that time.

00:45:43By 2016, he was living near Seattle.

00:45:46What was James doing in Washington?

00:45:48He was the vice president of sales for a lumber company out there.

00:45:52Sounds like he had a good job.

00:45:54Yes, I would say.

00:45:55He's a nice home as a fairway in his backyard.

00:45:59And he was remarried to wife number four.

00:46:02Oh, so he's been married three times?

00:46:05Correct.

00:46:06Since Cathy's death?

00:46:07Yes.

00:46:08I mean, that's a whole other can of worms to unpack right there.

00:46:12It is.

00:46:14Detective Liberatore interviewed James' ex-wives. His first wife after Cathy's death said the marriage had lasted less than a year.

00:46:23I remember her telling me that, you know, James just abruptly ended it.

00:46:26And, you know...

00:46:27Like, real abruptly, though.

00:46:28Yes.

00:46:29She came upstairs with some coffee. He's like, this isn't working. And she's like, what, the coffee? And he's like, no us.

00:46:35Oh, my gosh.

00:46:36And that was it.

00:46:37Had she expressed if he had gotten violent or if he was an angry person?

00:46:41None of that. Her expression to me was that, you know, she never experienced any of that.

00:46:46Neither had James' other ex-wife.

00:46:49You'd think, though, if someone's capable of killing their wife with an ax, that he might have a temper that would come through.

00:46:56Mm-hmm.

00:46:57Mild-mannered, reserved. That's how Cathy's family thought of James, too.

00:47:02You're thinking that there's no way James would ever kill Cathy.

00:47:05Absolutely. That's what I was thinking. No way.

00:47:08Why?

00:47:09Because I didn't think that he had that in him. He was... He didn't seem like that personality to me.

00:47:21Investigators wanted to decide for themselves, so they made a plan.

00:47:26They were going to show up at James Krausnick's door unannounced, tape recorder rolling, like ghosts from the past.

00:47:34Coming up, a conversation becomes a confrontation.

00:47:40Were you having troubles with your marriage?

00:47:42No.

00:47:43Okay.

00:47:44We had an absolutely wonderful marriage.

00:47:45We're getting information to the contrary.

00:47:47When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:47:59It's painful for her to remember.

00:48:01The carefree afternoons Annette says she spent playing with Cathy and baby Sarah before the murder.

00:48:07We would just all sit in the playroom and just play together.

00:48:10And we'd maybe order a pizza and we would just hang out.

00:48:13I mean, we were just... It was the most awesome time of my life.

00:48:18But after the murder, as the years passed, even though Sarah was living back in Michigan,

00:48:22Annette says her family saw less and less of her.

00:48:25Sarah was in grade school when James moved across the country to Washington State.

00:48:30His parents went too.

00:48:32They all just get up and move to Washington.

00:48:35And that was it.

00:48:37And we're thinking, why are they taking Sarah away?

00:48:41Annette says this was the moment the family dared to imagine Cathy's husband might be hiding something.

00:48:47I think my mom was the first one to say it.

00:48:50She says, I think Jim did it.

00:48:52What's the reaction from everybody?

00:48:54I know it made me think.

00:48:56If my mom believed it, it made me start thinking.

00:49:01Annette was thrilled when the new detectives told her they were reinvestigating the case and James was on their radar.

00:49:08It had been more than 30 years since James last talked to the police.

00:49:12You ring the doorbell, and does James answer?

00:49:16Ring the doorbell.

00:49:17Nobody answered for a bit.

00:49:18And we kind of did what the police always do.

00:49:20We kind of walked around the house a little bit.

00:49:21I started looking through doors and windows.

00:49:22He stayed at the door, but I started looking through the garage.

00:49:24And then the front door opens, and he comes walking out.

00:49:27Mark Lewatore.

00:49:29Hi, how are you?

00:49:30Probably probably a little bit surprised why we're here.

00:49:32Hopefully, he has some good news.

00:49:36It was the beginning of a 90-minute interview during which detectives did most of the talking.

00:49:42And the softspoken James gave brief, sometimes halting answers.

00:49:46Tell me, to the best of your recollection, of what happened 34 years ago, when you got home from work, from Kodak.

00:49:54So I think about this a lot.

00:49:55I'm never sure if I really remember.

00:50:00It seems as if the garage door was open.

00:50:03Do you remember which one was open, Mr. Krosnick?

00:50:06I would say that one.

00:50:08The detective had brought along a diagram of the house to help jog his memory.

00:50:12I remember that the back door was broken.

00:50:17And then, Mr. Krosnick, where'd you go after that?

00:50:20Just, I think, this way, you know, the stairs, the same.

00:50:26Okay, and...

00:50:27I think when I was in her room, I think Sarah came in.

00:50:32You think Sarah came in?

00:50:33I think.

00:50:34That was new.

00:50:36He originally told police he'd found Sarah in her room.

00:50:39She had a sweater on backwards.

00:50:42Oh, she did? A little sweater on backwards?

00:50:44Yeah.

00:50:45Okay.

00:50:46And then what'd you see?

00:50:48I know this is hard.

00:50:50James started to cry, but investigators pressed on.

00:50:57Did you touch her body?

00:51:02I don't know.

00:51:04Did you move any blankets to see?

00:51:06I just saw.

00:51:08Do you remember if you, like, checked for any signs of life, breathing, heart rate, any of that?

00:51:12I don't know.

00:51:13I think that's when Sarah came in.

00:51:17I just grabbed Sarah.

00:51:18James said that's when he ran to the neighbor across the street for help.

00:51:22I feel bad about it sometimes.

00:51:24I think I was scared.

00:51:27I would be too.

00:51:28Yeah.

00:51:28The investigators asked him to tell them about his relationship with Kathy.

00:51:39You guys have any issues financially?

00:51:42No?

00:51:43Everything was good?

00:51:44You guys weren't having any kind of issues in your marriage?

00:51:47No.

00:51:47The detectives started to question James about details of the crime, their suspicions about the burglary.

00:51:54If I'm going to burglarize the place and I'm going to go upstairs and put an axe in someone's head, I'm going to take the stuff, too.

00:52:00How about even going further if I'm a homicidal maniac?

00:52:03That way I'd be taking care of Sarah, too.

00:52:05Why leave anybody?

00:52:06Why would you're, I just, I don't understand who would want it?

00:52:12Exactly.

00:52:12And that's what we said.

00:52:13And that's when the investigators started to get more confrontational, challenging James' version of events.

00:52:19Do you remember if you slept in that bed that night or somewhere else in the house?

00:52:23Yeah, I slept in that bed.

00:52:24You did?

00:52:25And yet, police found a pull-out couch in the den with pillows and blankets piled up on a chair nearby.

00:52:31And an alarm clock set for the time James woke up to go to work.

00:52:34Were you having troubles with your marriage?

00:52:36You know, you can ask me a thousand times.

00:52:38I know, and you're the only, and Mr. Krausek, you're the only one we can ask.

00:52:42You've got to understand that.

00:52:43Okay.

00:52:45No.

00:52:46Okay.

00:52:46We've had an absolutely wonderful marriage.

00:52:48Okay.

00:52:50We're getting information to the contrary, both from reports back then.

00:52:54You know what?

00:52:54I don't, this doesn't make any, you can say anything you want to say.

00:52:57All right.

00:52:58But they're, that's baloney.

00:53:00Then out of nowhere, James said this.

00:53:03I didn't kill Kathy.

00:53:04I disagree.

00:53:05It's either me or somebody else.

00:53:06I disagree.

00:53:07I think you did.

00:53:08The detective shared his theory that Kathy and James had been struggling emotionally

00:53:13and financially.

00:53:15We weren't in, I got half a dozen records from collection agencies from back then.

00:53:19You don't have to, all that stuff is absolutely, I'd love to see that.

00:53:25Well, eventually you will.

00:53:27What was his body language like that you could see that?

00:53:30Body language, everything from, uh, can't sit still, um, banging his, uh, his hands on

00:53:36his, his legs.

00:53:37His breathing and his heart rate were so excited that you, literally his collar on his shirt

00:53:43was moving from him just sitting there.

00:53:45What's that telling you?

00:53:46We're causing him to be uncomfortable at his kitchen table.

00:53:48Yep.

00:53:49Is it guilt or is it the shock of two detectives showing up on his door decades after his wife's

00:53:56death?

00:53:57Probably both.

00:53:57Could be both, for sure.

00:53:59The investigators didn't hold back, pushing James to come clean.

00:54:04You know what you gotta do?

00:54:05You gotta think not about yourself.

00:54:07You gotta think about Sarah.

00:54:10You gotta think about your wife.

00:54:12Time out.

00:54:12Time to go.

00:54:14James had had enough and asked the detectives to leave.

00:54:17But the detectives weren't done.

00:54:19Because at the exact moment they were knocking on James Krausnick's door, two investigators

00:54:24from the prosecutor's office walked up to a house 2,000 miles away in Houston, Texas.

00:54:29We're approaching the front door now.

00:54:32It was Sarah's house.

00:54:34The little girl was a mother herself now.

00:54:36What would she have to say about that morning her mother was murdered and the father now

00:54:42under suspicion?

00:54:45Coming up.

00:54:46What has your dad told you?

00:54:48My dad doesn't like to talk about it very much.

00:54:51When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

00:54:54More than 30 years had passed since Sarah Krausnick sat at the Brighton police station drawing stick figures of her mother's murder.

00:55:09Now investigators wanted to talk to her again about her memories of what she'd seen back then, about the father who raised her.

00:55:17This is delicate.

00:55:19I mean, because of the history and so much time has passed.

00:55:23It was nerve-wracking.

00:55:25It was nerve-wracking.

00:55:27It was hard to know what Sarah thought of her dad all these years later.

00:55:31She was living hundreds of miles away in Houston, Texas.

00:55:34It was the day after her 38th birthday when two investigators from the DA's office knocked on her door.

00:55:41At the exact same time, investigators were talking to her father.

00:55:45At the same time, because...

00:55:48We don't want one talking to the other.

00:55:50You want the element of surprise for both of them.

00:55:53Yes.

00:55:54Sarah ushered the investigators into the living room.

00:55:57Again, we apologize.

00:55:58That's all right.

00:55:59It's a little shocking.

00:56:00Yeah, I'm sure it is, Sarah.

00:56:02I'm sure it is.

00:56:02Just talking about it this morning, strangely enough.

00:56:04Oh, were you?

00:56:05Yeah, to my daughter.

00:56:06The investigators explained why they were there.

00:56:09Her mother's case had been reopened, and they wanted to hear Sarah's story.

00:56:14And so began a remarkable conversation, in which you will hear a young woman confront her memories,

00:56:20her lifelong grief, and everything she thought she knew about her father.

00:56:25You were obviously a little girl when this happened.

00:56:27Sarah said her memories were hazy, jumbled, but she would do her best to remember.

00:56:32She made sure her own kids were out of earshot, and then began.

00:56:37So, I remember waking up, and my bedroom was across from their bedroom at the top of the stairs.

00:56:43And I remember going in there to get a tissue.

00:56:45This is how I remember it.

00:56:46Into your mother's bathroom?

00:56:47Yes.

00:56:48Uh-huh.

00:56:48And I remember seeing her, and I...

00:56:50At some point in time, I remember seeing somebody else with curly hair,

00:56:53and I don't know if I actually saw anybody else, or if I just saw her, and I didn't think it was her,

00:56:57and something like that.

00:56:58And then I just remember, like, sitting in my bedroom, like, telling my dollies it would be okay,

00:57:02and, like, waiting until someone came.

00:57:05She said she'd gone downstairs at one point, and seen what could have been broken glass.

00:57:10And I didn't know if it was, like, glass or ice, because there was snow outside.

00:57:13So I didn't know where to walk or what to do, and it was snowy, and I was confused,

00:57:17so I stayed upstairs with my dolls.

00:57:19She said she didn't remember who found her in the house.

00:57:22She did remember talking to the police.

00:57:25What has your dad told you?

00:57:26Um, my dad doesn't like to talk about it very much.

00:57:29Okay.

00:57:30Um, and I think he talked to me about it when I was a kid, when I would ask about it.

00:57:33My dad isn't a talk-about-it kind of a guy.

00:57:36She told the investigator she wasn't surprised her dad hadn't been in regular contact with the police.

00:57:42I think he can't change what happened.

00:57:44He can't change it.

00:57:45He wishes he could, but he's just going to try to move on

00:57:48and not dwell in it to be extremely sad all the time.

00:57:53You know what I mean?

00:57:54Sarah said she felt the same way.

00:57:55She had grown up a motherless child.

00:57:58That's what she knew.

00:58:00What happened in your life after your mother was killed?

00:58:03Where do you recall the next chapter of life for you?

00:58:06So then we moved to Michigan with my dad's parents, and we moved in with them.

00:58:11Then she described the move to Washington State, followed by college in Arizona and moving with her young family to Texas.

00:58:20Always there for her at the end of the phone was her dad.

00:58:22How close are you with your dad?

00:58:24I'm very close with my dad.

00:58:25Very close with your dad?

00:58:26Yes.

00:58:26Okay.

00:58:27Investigators had been doing all the listening, but half an hour into the conversation, they started doing the telling.

00:58:34Laying out for Sarah what they had discovered, their theory about the staged burglary, and something new.

00:58:40There were significant developments that were made by the forensic people that have helped to very precisely and narrowly define a time of death on a body.

00:59:01Oh, okay.

00:59:04James Krausnick told police that when he left for work, Kathy was alive.

00:59:08Back in 1982, the medical examiner said that could very well be true.

00:59:12But the investigators told Sarah that thanks to scientific advances, they could pin down exactly what time her mother died.

00:59:20And the answer struck right at the heart of everything Sarah had been told about the murder.

00:59:24There's no easy way to say it.

00:59:26There's reason to conclude that your mother was killed before your dad left for work.

00:59:33Now, your dad left for work about, uh...

00:59:36Do you think that my dad killed my mom as I was here trying to say?

00:59:39Well, we'll progress through the case.

00:59:41Can we just, can we...

00:59:44Because I feel like that's where, I feel like this is the vibe I'm getting.

00:59:47Okay.

00:59:47So can we, can we...

00:59:49Okay.

00:59:50The investigation has certainly started to point that way.

00:59:53This had to be just incredibly unsettling for Sarah that she's probably been told one thing, you know, by her dad her entire life.

01:00:01And now the police are telling her they think her dad's a killer.

01:00:04Correct.

01:00:05So that's why we thought it was very important to come down here and talk to a person.

01:00:09Yeah, it's probably like that hip, what a two-by-four right now.

01:00:11Okay, give me a second.

01:00:12Okay, absolutely.

01:00:14Not okay with this one.

01:00:15Okay.

01:00:18No.

01:00:19Take your time and...

01:00:20Sorry.

01:00:21That's the last thing in the freaking world I would ever imagine.

01:00:26Right.

01:00:27And I still don't believe you.

01:00:29Sarah's thoughts quickly jumped to what was at stake for her dad and her if he was arrested.

01:00:34I just think my kids are going to grow up without a grandpa.

01:00:37Well, no, not necessarily because that's still their grandpa.

01:00:42I know, but a grandpa that's in jail or something, you know.

01:00:45But let's take it slow.

01:00:47I don't want more taken from me than they already got taken from me.

01:00:50Right.

01:00:50I know.

01:00:51Sarah said she'd already lost her mother.

01:00:53She couldn't lose her dad, too.

01:00:55I don't want to investigate anymore because I don't...

01:00:58Right.

01:00:59But you suffered a terrible loss growing up without your mother.

01:01:02Well, yeah, that's not right either.

01:01:05Right.

01:01:05Because she deserves it.

01:01:06Yeah.

01:01:07That's not fair either.

01:01:07So you suffered a terrible loss, and your mother obviously lost maybe another 50 years if she could have lived and enjoyed life.

01:01:17And the investigator told Sarah some of what he'd learned about her mother by working on the case.

01:01:22The day before your mother lost her life, she took you sledding.

01:01:26Awesome.

01:01:27Did you know that?

01:01:27That's cool.

01:01:27No.

01:01:28Yep.

01:01:29If she got to live another day, that Saturday, you were going to go to the circus, too.

01:01:34That's very cool.

01:01:36Were investigators hoping the warm memories of her mom would make her turn on her dad?

01:01:41Maybe.

01:01:42Sarah seemed to waver.

01:01:44She agreed.

01:01:44It was strange her dad left town so soon after the murder.

01:01:48Well, you think you'd want to help if you're...

01:01:50Right.

01:01:50Why would you not want to help?

01:01:51It doesn't make any sense.

01:01:52Right.

01:01:53But she insisted the dad she knew was a good man.

01:01:57My dad is a wonderful person.

01:01:58There's no doubt that...

01:02:00We see a lot of wonderful people who make...

01:02:02Right.

01:02:02That's what I'm saying.

01:02:03If that is the case, there is absolutely no doubt...

01:02:08Yes.

01:02:08That...

01:02:09It does happen.

01:02:10I mean, good people do bad things.

01:02:12You took the word right out at all.

01:02:15Sarah briefly seemed to wrestle with the idea her dad could be behind the murder.

01:02:20If this happened, it was definitely a crime of passion, a split second.

01:02:24That's exactly right.

01:02:25Do you think your father would ever own up to doing something that he regrets like this?

01:02:30I have no idea.

01:02:32I can't comprehend.

01:02:33I just can't comprehend that he would do something like this.

01:02:37Sarah promised to think about what the investigators had told her,

01:02:41about what it all meant for her and her father.

01:02:44Because the walls were about to close in on James Krausnick.

01:02:51Coming up.

01:02:52We were trying to see if there was evidence of someone other than Kathy, of James, and the little girl.

01:02:59The results are in from the crime lab.

01:03:01What would the evidence reveal?

01:03:03When Dateline, Secrets Uncovered continues.

01:03:14Welcome back.

01:03:15Detectives confronted Sarah with the unthinkable.

01:03:19Her father, James Krausnick, was the prime suspect in her mother Kathy's murder.

01:03:24Sarah insisted he was a good man, but agreed to consider the evidence they presented.

01:03:30The pressure on James Krausnick was mounting.

01:03:33And the more investigators dug into his life, the more secrets they discovered.

01:03:39Back to Andrea Canning with the bad man.

01:03:44Detectives working the case were more convinced than ever that James Krausnick was the one who killed his wife Kathy.

01:03:50They went to see the prosecutor to argue their case.

01:03:53So all the bureau chiefs come in, we put a presentation together, and we presented it.

01:03:58District Attorney Sandra Dorley was all ears.

01:04:01I've always been a prosecutor and a district attorney who believes that all victims deserve justice regardless of how long, how much time has passed.

01:04:10D.A. Dorley had reviewed the results from the FBI lab.

01:04:13All those items of evidence they had sent off for testing told her a story.

01:04:18There was no outside DNA found on any of the items.

01:04:23That's what we were looking for.

01:04:24We were trying to see if there was evidence of someone other than Kathy, of James, and the little girl.

01:04:31And sometimes the lack of DNA, external DNA, tells just as big a story as DNA does.

01:04:40Absolutely.

01:04:41It told me that there was no outside person who came into that house other than the residents.

01:04:46Why do you think there was not an arrest all those decades ago?

01:04:49You know, I think they were looking for the smoking gun, the proverbial smoking gun.

01:04:53And I'm willing to take a chance.

01:04:55And that's been my reputation.

01:04:56In late 2019, the state filed second-degree murder charges against 68-year-old James Krausnick.

01:05:03By that point, almost 40 years had passed since Kathy's murder.

01:05:08Did you ever think in all this time that you would hear news like that?

01:05:13Never.

01:05:14I mean, that was huge.

01:05:16The case went to trial in September of 2022.

01:05:20Kathy's family members, including her elderly father, were there every day.

01:05:24Why was it important for you and your family to be there?

01:05:29We had to be there for Kathy.

01:05:33We wouldn't have been anywhere else.

01:05:35How did he get through all of this?

01:05:36He's in his 90s?

01:05:3895.

01:05:39Your mom never got to see justice, but was your dad determined to be there and see this through?

01:05:45I believe he was quoted, come hell or high water, I'm going to be at that trial.

01:05:51It's been 40 years, seven months, and approximately four days.

01:05:59That's how long Kathy's family has been waiting for justice.

01:06:05Monroe County Assistant District Attorneys Patrick Gallagher and Constance Patterson knew they had a big challenge ahead.

01:06:11I don't think anybody thought it was a slam dunk.

01:06:14Did we think it could be an uphill battle just because it was circumstantial?

01:06:17Of course.

01:06:18This case really was about looking at all the pieces in this case, looking at what doesn't fit.

01:06:25And the jury learned all about those little pieces.

01:06:29The clearly staged crime scene.

01:06:31The shoe print that looked just like James' boat shoe.

01:06:34The fact that no one else's DNA or fingerprints were found inside the home.

01:06:37And how James showed little interest in the investigation during the decades that followed his wife's murder.

01:06:44Our goal was to just have the jury use their common sense to see that there was only one answer here.

01:06:50And that was that James Krause committed this crime.

01:06:53And the state attempted to back up its claim by putting on testimony about Kathy's time of death.

01:06:59Forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Bodden, famous for working on high-profile cases, told the jury that in his opinion Kathy died before James went to work.

01:07:09We felt confident in Dr. Bodden's experience and his opinion that Kathy died before 630.

01:07:15I think his reasoning was easy to follow for the jury.

01:07:18But we also didn't want the case to rise and fall on that.

01:07:23Another piece of their puzzle, a burglary gone bad, made no sense.

01:07:28Case in point, the murder weapon.

01:07:30It belonged to the Krausnicks, had been stored in the family garage.

01:07:34Wouldn't you bring a weapon?

01:07:36If you're coming to commit a murder, wouldn't you bring something with you to commit that murder?

01:07:40What is the story that you told the jury about what happened on that February morning?

01:07:45What happened that morning is that James Krausnick snapped.

01:07:52At some point, we know that Kathy goes to bed that evening of February 18, 1982, and she never wakes up.

01:08:00I mean, snap and grab an axe? It just seems almost far-fetched.

01:08:04Right.

01:08:05I mean, this was so personal. This was... It couldn't be anybody else.

01:08:11But why? Why would this highly educated man with no history of violence kill his wife?

01:08:18The state had a theory that it all had to do with a secret James had been keeping.

01:08:22The week Kathy was murdered, James' employer, Kodak, was pressing him to provide proof of his Ph.D.

01:08:29Well, turns out, despite all the fanfare around his graduation, he'd never completed his degree.

01:08:36So that's a jaw-dropper.

01:08:38Yeah, that was definitely...

01:08:40He got the job at Kodak because of the doctorate?

01:08:43Yes.

01:08:44What a lie. What a huge lie.

01:08:46He was confronted about not having a Ph.D.

01:08:49And, you know, he knows that he moved his family to Rochester because he had this nice job.

01:08:54And if he loses that job, what's going to happen?

01:08:56And so he knew that within a short time, the truth was going to come out.

01:09:01How could that lead to murder?

01:09:04Prosecutors believed the stress at work had led to tension in the marriage.

01:09:08They called Kathy's friend Gloria to the stand.

01:09:10At the end, just before she was murdered, she told me that, you know, Kodak was bothering him because he lied to them about his Ph.D.

01:09:21And she said that by Thursday of the week, he was a bear.

01:09:27He wasn't very nice.

01:09:29She said he just didn't, he couldn't handle it anymore because he was just very upset about it.

01:09:34The state also told the jury there was more evidence that the marriage was under stress.

01:09:39Investigators believed James was sleeping on the pull-out couch.

01:09:43Plus, they'd found a pamphlet that included information on marriage counseling in the family car.

01:09:48You're saying this is all over a, you know, Ph.D. that he almost got but didn't and was struggling at work?

01:09:55I mean, it seems like a thin motive.

01:09:58A lot of times you just don't know why something happens.

01:10:01We don't know what happened that night before Kathy went to bed.

01:10:05What happens inside a home, you know, stays inside a home.

01:10:09And we never really know the truth behind a lot of domestic violence cases.

01:10:13That was some serious rage to put an axe into someone's head.

01:10:19Yeah, it's one of the most horrific things I've ever seen.

01:10:23The defendant is guilty of murder.

01:10:25But his defense attorneys had been listening, and they were focused on what the prosecution did not have.

01:10:33The prosecution said that, you know, he snapped.

01:10:36You know, his whole world was falling apart that week, the week of the murder.

01:10:40Great theory, except there ain't no evidence of it.

01:10:43Coming up.

01:10:45It wasn't Jim Krausnick who did it.

01:10:47We think it's Larrabee.

01:10:48Ed Larrabee, the one who confessed.

01:10:51He was stalking her, and as soon as Jim Krausnick left at 6.30, he was in that house.

01:10:57When Dateline, Secrets Uncovered continues.

01:11:09While Kathy's family had been in court every day, so too had James Krausnick's.

01:11:13In the gallery, right behind him, was his current wife, Sharon.

01:11:18And there was also Sarah, the little girl, now a grown woman in her 40s.

01:11:23She had listened to the suspicions about her dad, and was standing by him.

01:11:28Here you are, in the same room with Sarah.

01:11:31Yes.

01:11:32After all these years.

01:11:33Do you try to talk to her?

01:11:34She refused to look at us or talk to us.

01:11:38So, you know, I couldn't push it.

01:11:40So they sat close by, but an ocean apart.

01:11:45As the attorneys representing James, Michael Wolford, and Bill Easton,

01:11:49prepared to make their case to the jury.

01:11:51Jim Krausnick didn't do it, and there's no evidence that he did it.

01:11:54Wolford was his attorney way back in 1982, when the murder happened.

01:11:59When you're dealing with such an unusual case that's so old,

01:12:03what tone do you want to set with the jury, with your opening arguments?

01:12:07What do you want them to know, right out of the gate?

01:12:10Well, if you looked at Jim's entire life, here he was, seven years of age,

01:12:17and despite years of investigation,

01:12:20they could find one derogatory thing that occurred in his life.

01:12:24And that is that he misrepresented the Eastman Kodak Company,

01:12:28that he had his Ph.D. rather than a Ph.D. candidate.

01:12:32And that was really it.

01:12:35It is hard to believe that this family man finds out he's possibly going to get in trouble at work,

01:12:42goes home and, you know, kills his wife with an axe.

01:12:46He had the written dissertation that he presented was turned down on a three-to-two vote,

01:12:52and he had to rewrite it.

01:12:54It would take about a month to do it.

01:12:56And he just didn't get it done.

01:12:58And he misrepresented a Kodak, no question about it.

01:13:02But to suggest that that led him to kill his wife makes no logical sense.

01:13:07So the motive was lacking, according to the defense.

01:13:11And the rest of the state's case?

01:13:13There is no direct evidence.

01:13:17That was the case 40 years ago, and that's the case now.

01:13:22One of the things you wanted the jury to know was that James Krausenek loved his daughter,

01:13:27and that this man was incapable of leaving her there with her dead mother.

01:13:31Absolutely.

01:13:32Yeah.

01:13:33That is absolutely true, that it's inconceivable, I think, for anyone to do that to their kid.

01:13:41For James Krausenek, absolutely inconceivable.

01:13:45And if it did happen, if by some fluke of nature he possessed that kind of sociopathy,

01:13:53it would have to have been demonstrated during the course of his life.

01:13:57And while the state told the jury that Krausenek's marriage was under stress back in 1982,

01:14:03the defense disagreed.

01:14:05There was marriage counseling, you know, pamphlet.

01:14:08They think he wasn't sleeping in the bed.

01:14:11There was no evidence of that.

01:14:12It wasn't a marriage counseling pamphlet.

01:14:14It was a marketing brochure that covered a number of ills, you might say.

01:14:20You know, whether you wanted to lose weight, you know, stop smoking, and marriage counseling.

01:14:27And the shoe print detectives linked to a pair of James' dog sides in the couple's bedroom?

01:14:31Pure speculation, said the defense.

01:14:34Forty years later, it's, well, that could have been the shoe.

01:14:37No, it couldn't have been.

01:14:38They cannot say that it's that shoe.

01:14:42They can't even come near saying that.

01:14:44Then there was the testimony from the state's hired forensic pathologist, Dr. Michael Bodden,

01:14:49who testified that Kathy was killed before James left for work.

01:14:53I'm not buying it for a second.

01:14:54Dr. Bodden comes in and says, yeah, based on his experience, not a new methodology or

01:14:59anything that's come up since 1982, that he has the opinion that it's 6.30, before 6.30.

01:15:05And that's it.

01:15:07To counter Bodden's testimony, the defense called not one, but four separate medical examiners

01:15:12who unanimously disagreed with Bodden.

01:15:15Four other witnesses all say you can't eliminate the possibility that this death occurred after 6.30.

01:15:22Forensically, there is just no way to do it.

01:15:26We had, you know, the medical examiner for Monroe County who said, basically, she doesn't give

01:15:31opinions on time of death because there's so many variables that they're uncertain.

01:15:36Was this all smoke and mirrors to you?

01:15:37Yes.

01:15:38Yes.

01:15:38What is your theory of what happened?

01:15:41We have to acknowledge we can't answer that.

01:15:43And they can't answer it either.

01:15:45We know one thing.

01:15:47It wasn't Jim Krausnick who did it.

01:15:49We think it's Larrabee.

01:15:51Ed Larrabee, the man whose name came up several times in the investigation.

01:15:56We can speculate and say, you know, Kathleen was a very attractive young woman.

01:16:00And as he did with other women, stalked them.

01:16:04And he was stalking her.

01:16:06And as soon as Jim Krausnick left at 6.30, he was in that house.

01:16:12We're relying in part on the fact he did confess to it, number one.

01:16:16Number two, he was a four and a half minute walk from Del Rio Drive.

01:16:21And the defense believes Larrabee could very well have been the man spotted by Kathy's neighbor,

01:16:27Joanne, the morning of the murder.

01:16:29Joanne was a defense witness.

01:16:31I was just passing the Krausnick home.

01:16:36The jogger was coming toward me and he wasn't jogging with intensity.

01:16:43The defense noted that Ed Larrabee had worn a ski mask during some of his violent crimes.

01:16:48He was a big man.

01:16:51He was about at least six feet tall, 180, 200 pounds.

01:16:56He was wearing a gray sweatsuit and a royal blue ski mask.

01:17:02Now, who is this masked guy?

01:17:05The defense said the investigation was so shoddy back in 1982,

01:17:09they just dropped Larrabee as a suspect after he refused to talk with the police.

01:17:14They never went back to him.

01:17:17They never talked to his neighbors.

01:17:19They literally just forgot about Ed Larrabee.

01:17:23Police had a reason to discount Larrabee back then.

01:17:26He was a convicted rapist and Kathy had not been sexually assaulted.

01:17:30Now, the defense had an explanation for that.

01:17:33Back in 1982, while on parole,

01:17:36Larrabee was required to receive injections of a drug that reduces sex drive.

01:17:40We had a psychiatrist testify at trial.

01:17:43He was on chemical castration at the time.

01:17:46The chemical castration didn't eliminate the risk to women.

01:17:51It increased it because he was fueled not by sex.

01:17:56It was anti-women rage.

01:17:58When he couldn't rape her, it made it worse.

01:18:01And that's why he killed her in such a way.

01:18:03And, of course, there was the fact that Larrabee had confessed to the murder,

01:18:08a confession that was discounted entirely by police and prosecutors.

01:18:12What do you make, though, of the discrepancies with his confession?

01:18:17Mike, take it out.

01:18:18He's saying he sexually assaulted her.

01:18:20There's no evidence of sexual assaults with Kathy.

01:18:24He's getting details wrong.

01:18:26The details are wrong.

01:18:28He was within 10 days of his death.

01:18:31And he's debilitated mentally and he's debilitated physically.

01:18:34And it's 34 years after it occurred.

01:18:36In his closing argument to the jury, Krausnick's attorney said the case was overflowing with reasonable doubt.

01:18:43But the uncertainty of the mystery of Kathy Krausnick's death remains to this day.

01:18:51And we submit it has not been resolved by this trial.

01:18:56A 40-year-old case now in the hands of the jury.

01:19:01Coming up.

01:19:03It was very tense.

01:19:05Everyone wanted an answer to the case.

01:19:07Four decades later, what would the verdict be?

01:19:10When Dateline Secrets Uncovered continues.

01:19:23Kathy Krausnick had been killed in one quick, explosive moment of rage.

01:19:28And the impact had been felt for decades.

01:19:31Now, as a jury went off to decide the fate of Kathy's husband, James,

01:19:36Annette was well aware of what was at stake for her niece, Sarah,

01:19:39the young woman who had stood by her father this entire time.

01:19:43Well, who else was she going to support?

01:19:45He raised her.

01:19:46She had nobody else.

01:19:48This isn't you against her or her.

01:19:50It's just unconditional love.

01:19:53Kira, absolutely.

01:19:54The hours ticked by that Friday as the jurors deliberated behind closed doors.

01:20:00It was very tense.

01:20:02The notes that came out, we couldn't tell what they were thinking

01:20:05and which way they were leaning.

01:20:08The defense was on edge as well.

01:20:10We were worried because of a presumption of guilt that attaches to a husband,

01:20:16and everyone wanted an answer to the case.

01:20:19By day's end, the jurors hadn't reached a verdict.

01:20:22The judge sent them home for the weekend.

01:20:24Deliberations resumed Monday morning, but not for long.

01:20:28By 10.30, the jury announced it had a verdict.

01:20:30I was crying because the jury came in so quick.

01:20:35So I'm standing there, and I look, and we're all huddled,

01:20:38and there's Sarah, and she's standing there crying too.

01:20:41And I looked at her, and I said,

01:20:43No matter what happens, I will always love you.

01:20:47And for the first time in years, she's looked at me and said,

01:20:51Thank you for saying that.

01:20:53Members of the jury, how do you find in the matter

01:20:56of the people of the state of New York versus James Crosnick?

01:20:59Guilty.

01:21:02She says, Guilty, and I'll never forget the look on my father's face

01:21:08when he just went, his eyes got real big,

01:21:11and he got a smile on his face.

01:21:13Across the room, Sarah and James' current wife

01:21:17shook their heads in disbelief.

01:21:20James, who had been free on bail ever since his indictment,

01:21:23was handcuffed and taken into custody.

01:21:25We did it.

01:21:27We did it.

01:21:28Justice for Kathy.

01:21:31We did it.

01:21:32We got our justice for 40 years.

01:21:37Thank God we got it.

01:21:39The defense attorneys promised to fight back with an appeal.

01:21:42We believe that there was no justification

01:21:46for waiting 37 years for this indictment.

01:21:50We think the law is on our side,

01:21:52and we're confident we're going to have a reversal

01:21:55of this conviction.

01:21:59Six weeks later, James Crosnick was back in court

01:22:01for his sentencing.

01:22:03So was his daughter, Sarah, who'd lost her mother so long ago.

01:22:06And now, all these years later, was losing her father.

01:22:10My mother's killer got away with her murder,

01:22:13and my father's life has been taken

01:22:15by a failed justice system

01:22:16that convicted him of a crime he did not commit.

01:22:20It is absolutely inconceivable

01:22:22that a person capable of the heinous brutality

01:22:25exhibited in my mother's murder

01:22:26would be capable of suppressing

01:22:28that aspect of their personality entirely

01:22:31and not letting it leak out over time.

01:22:34My father is not violent, angry, abusive, controlling,

01:22:38afraid of failure, ego-driven, or anything similar.

01:22:42The justice system has failed my parents,

01:22:44myself, and both sides of my family.

01:22:47It has also failed this community.

01:22:49Kathy's 95-year-old father got up next

01:22:51and seemed to respond to what Sarah had just said.

01:22:54You brainwashed my granddaughter for 40 years.

01:22:59We've lost her love.

01:23:02We still love you, Sarah, and always will.

01:23:05And then it was James Krausnick's term,

01:23:08maintaining his innocence to the end.

01:23:10I did not murder Kathy.

01:23:13I love Kathy with all my heart and with all my soul.

01:23:19I contribute, continue to be haunted

01:23:21at why and who someone would have murdered

01:23:26such a beautiful person.

01:23:28The jury has found you guilty.

01:23:30With that, the judge sentenced him

01:23:32to the maximum time in prison, 25 years to life.

01:23:36Soon after, Krausnick was diagnosed with esophageal cancer.

01:23:41He died six months into his sentence.

01:23:43At the time of his death, his appeal was pending,

01:23:46which under New York law meant his conviction would be vacated.

01:23:49Those close to Kathy still think about Sarah,

01:23:52the little girl who waited alone in a house with her dolls

01:23:56and her murdered mother.

01:23:58A mother she never really had the chance to know.

01:24:01What do you want Sarah to know about her mom?

01:24:04I just want Sarah to know that her mother adored her.

01:24:08Sarah, she loved you.

01:24:10I want Sarah to know that.

01:24:11She adored you and she'll always be with you.

01:24:14Sarah, if you're watching, I love you.

01:24:22I will always love you.

01:24:24And just please, please call me

01:24:27and we'll get through this together.

01:24:30Get through the loss and the grief

01:24:35that never goes away,

01:24:37even after so much time.

01:24:40I just want people to remember Kathy

01:24:42as the loving, beautiful, caring person that she was.

01:24:50That's all for this edition of Dateline,

01:24:53Secrets Uncovered.

01:24:54I'm Craig Melvin.

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