- 2 months ago
When justice stalls, sometimes the public steps in. Join WatchMojo as we examine incredible cases where everyday people helped solve major crimes. From journalism students saving a man from death row to social media users identifying Capitol rioters, these stories showcase how ordinary individuals cracked cases that stumped professionals.
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00:00Will you please, please bring me back, my child?
00:04Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're looking at major true crimes that wouldn't have been
00:09cracked if civilians hadn't pointed authorities in the right direction.
00:12We came across a white van that had Florida plates, a small white van.
00:19Anthony Porter exonerated by journalism students.
00:22The death row inmate whose innocence led to a moratorium on the death penalty in Illinois
00:27has died.
00:27Back in 1983, Anthony Porter was wrongly convicted in the murders of two teenagers.
00:33In one of the most consequential civilian interventions in modern U.S. justice,
00:37death row inmate Anthony Porter was exonerated just days before his scheduled execution thanks
00:42to journalism students at Northwestern University.
00:45Porter had been convicted of a 1982 double murder in Chicago,
00:48despite shaky eyewitness testimony and no physical evidence.
00:52While courts prepared to proceed, students from the Medill Innocence Project
00:56re-investigated the case from scratch.
00:58They identified another suspect, I'll story Simon,
01:01and ultimately recorded a confession implicating him in the crime.
01:05He had this one particular picture, okay, and it said his name was Anthony.
01:12He said, ain't this the one that did it?
01:14Ain't this the one that did it?
01:15That's the one he pointed to, and that's the one they sent to jail.
01:18Prosecutors dropped all charges against Porter in 1999.
01:22While Simon's conviction was later vacated, Porter's exoneration stands out as a case of
01:27civilians serving justice when the courts couldn't.
01:30Fox 32 legal analyst Larry Yellen covered the case.
01:33It didn't happen because of DNA, which frequently turns the tide in cases these days.
01:38It happened because a witness recanted, another man apparently confessed to the crime,
01:43and shortly after that, George Ryan decided that there should be a,
01:48Governor George Ryan decided there should be a moratorium on all executions,
01:53the ending of all death throes executions in Illinois.
01:57The internet identifies January 6th insurrectionists.
02:01The FBI needs your help identifying a man involved in the Capitol riot,
02:05and he might have ties to the Berkshires.
02:08Investigators released these pictures today of a suspect
02:11wanted for the alleged assault of federal officers on January 6th.
02:15After the January 6th United States Capitol attack,
02:19federal authorities faced an unprecedented identification challenge.
02:22Thousands of participants had documented themselves online.
02:26At the FBI's request, civilians stepped in.
02:29Ordinary users compared CCTV stills to Facebook posts,
02:32LinkedIn profiles, tattoos, clothing, and geolocation data,
02:37submitting tips through official channels.
02:39Federal agents suggest social media sleuths helped identify a Portland woman
02:43who stormed the U.S. Capitol building on January 6th.
02:47Lilith Sayre was arrested last week and charged with illegally entering the U.S. Capitol building
02:52and or orderly conduct.
02:54Court filings and arrest affidavits repeatedly credit public tips as the starting point
02:59for investigations that led to hundreds of arrests.
03:02Crucially, these tips didn't sit in an online void.
03:05They fed directly into sworn affidavits, search warrants, and charging documents,
03:09where prosecutors cited public identifications as the first link in the evidentiary chain.
03:14In many cases, suspects were initially unknown to investigators
03:18until civilians connected faces to real names, workplaces, and travel histories.
03:23The 30-year-old had bright blue hair and, according to prosecutors,
03:27could be seen in several videos from the Capitol that day.
03:31Investigators were able to confirm Sayre's identity through public records
03:35and previous appearances, including this 2019 protest outside of Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler's house.
03:42A janitor breaks the Larry Eiler case wide open.
03:45It began in June with a call to the hotline set up by the special task force investigating the murders.
03:50Police say a caller told them that Larry Eiler was a violent man, capable of murder.
03:56Based on that tip, detectives did investigate Eiler and obtained a search warrant to confiscate
04:01Eiler's pickup truck and other evidence.
04:03On the morning of August 21, 1984, janitor Joseph Bala spotted suspicious trash bags
04:09in a dumpster area near Larry Eiler's apartment complex,
04:12specifically in a unit not intended for tenant use.
04:15Thinking it was illegal dumping, Bala pulled one bag out to inspect it.
04:19It split open, revealing a severed human leg, the dismembered remains of Daniel Bridges.
04:25Well, I'm a janitor in that building.
04:27I have to carry out the garbage and I need some room for the garbage.
04:30So therefore, you know, I find that ugly things, you know, in the bag.
04:36So I open it up one-on-one and I saw the leg, the human leg, you could tell, you
04:41know.
04:43So that's about it.
04:44Bala immediately called police and added a crucial detail.
04:48Other janitors had seen a tenant named Larry Eiler placing the bags there the previous afternoon.
04:53A police captain recognized the name and ordered officers to detain whoever was in Eiler's unit.
04:59Eiler was arrested within minutes.
05:01The body totally, totally cut off?
05:03No, the body was just, the arm was off, the neck was off, the leg was off, and he's got
05:09a step wound, I don't know, about seven, eight step wound.
05:13Elizabeth Smart's younger sister provided a crucial witness account.
05:16The Elizabeth Smart kidnapping in 2002 gripped the nation because it violated the sense of security all families hold dear.
05:24The 14-year-old girl was in her own bed at night with her parents at home and the door
05:28locked in a neighborhood where such invasions were unthinkable.
05:32Her younger sister watched and listened as the kidnapper entered the room and abducted the teen at knife point.
05:38When 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart was abducted from her Utah home in 2002, early leads were scarce.
05:44One of the most important witness accounts came from her younger sister, Mary Catherine Smart.
05:48Though traumatized and just nine years old at the time, she told police she had seen a man in the
05:53house and later helped identify him as Brian David Mitchell.
05:57The thinly built, gray-haired Mitchell was routinely removed from the courtroom after loudly singing hymns and Christmas carols.
06:05He said little things, you know, God has let him down, why would God put him through all this?
06:14He hasn't said much about it. I am concerned for him, though, about how people are going to treat him
06:20now because this came in.
06:21Her description became a foundational element of the investigation, shaping composite sketches and focusing attention on Mitchell years before Elizabeth
06:29was recovered alive in 2003.
06:32Mitchell was ultimately arrested, convicted in 2011 of kidnapping and unlawful transportation of a minor and sentenced to life in
06:39federal prison.
06:40To those who may not know your story, what would you tell them?
06:43I'm a survivor of a kidnapping and was held hostage for nine months, but that I have never allowed that
06:53to stand in my way of trying to make the world a better place for having me in it than
06:59not.
07:00DNA evidence confirms Deborah Jackson's identity.
07:03There was a body of a young white female, estimated to be in the 20s, laying at the foot of
07:13that cupboard right there, below the guardrail.
07:17You will see a trail through the grass where the body was dragged across the guardrail, through the grass, and
07:23then apparently dropped over the cupboard.
07:26For nearly 40 years, she was known only as Orange Socks.
07:30An unidentified young woman found murdered near Georgetown, Texas, in October 1979, left in a culvert off I-35 wearing
07:38nothing but orange socks.
07:39In August 2019, authorities finally confirmed her identity as Deborah Louise Jackson, 23, originally from Texas.
07:47Really, it was the picture in this instance.
07:50The final closure, you know, was the DNA that we were able to confirm.
07:55And helped Kosky, Haas & Fluke, and many others feel closure.
07:59Today, we can look at it and say, this is Deborah.
08:03The breakthrough came through forensic genetic genealogy work done with the DNA Doe Project in partnership with the Williamson County
08:09Sheriff's Office.
08:11Investigators built family connections from DNA, and Deborah's sister ultimately provided a direct DNA sample that confirmed the match.
08:18Importantly, this solved a massive piece of the case, but not the whole thing.
08:23Deborah's name was restored.
08:25Her killer remains disputed.
08:27We're mainly trying to establish a timeline of what happened to her from 1977 until her death in 1979.
08:36Anybody that has any information as to her whereabouts during those times, maybe places where she's worked, friends that she's
08:44visited,
08:44anything like that would be helpful to us to try to put her at different spots at different times, and
08:51hopefully that would lead us to, you know, the truth.
08:54Carl Koppelman finally turns Walker County Gene Doe into Sherry Jarvis.
08:58She came from Stillwater, Minnesota, more than 1,100 miles away, but once she got here, these places here on
09:05this map became a key part of her story.
09:08See, Jarvis arrived in Huntsville on Halloween Day, 1980, and witnesses reported seeing her at the Hitchens Post truck stop
09:14along I-75, where she asked for directions to another spot on this map, the Ellis Prison Work Farm.
09:20On November 1st, 1980, the body of a teenage girl was found in Sam Houston National Forest near Huntsville.
09:27She had been beaten and strangled, and investigators believed she was between 14 and 18 years old.
09:32Despite extensive efforts, including forensic testing and public appeals, her identity remained unknown, and she was buried under a placeholder
09:40name.
09:41Civilian forensic artist Carl Koppelman independently created updated facial reconstructions and widely circulated them online, renewing public interest in the
09:49case.
09:50It takes someone who doesn't mind doing tedious, mundane, you know, spend a whole day looking at pictures in yearbooks.
09:58Most people wouldn't have the attention span or the patience to do something like that.
10:03Law enforcement agencies, they have plenty on their plate, and they tend to deal with most urgent things.
10:09The cases of unidentified people aren't high-priority cases for them.
10:13In 2021, forensic genetic genealogy funded through private donations identified her as Sherry Ann Jarvis, a 14-year-old who
10:22had run away from Stillwater, Minnesota, who had left home in 1980.
10:26Authorities publicly confirmed her identity in June 2021.
10:29Today, flowers line the gravesite of what was once unknown white female, knowing today she has a name, Sherry Ann
10:38Jarvis, a name this town will never forget, and a name that can finally be laid to rest.
10:45After almost 40 years, Colleen Fitzpatrick identifies Mary Silvani's killer.
10:49So the investigation all started in July of 1982, when a woman was found shot to death on a hiking
10:56trail in Sheep's Flat, Nevada, above Incline Village.
10:59No means of identifying her at the time, so she became known as the Sheep's Flat Jane Doe.
11:05That is, until recently.
11:06When 24-year-old Mary Silvani was abducted on September 12, 1977, from the parking lot of the Circus Circus
11:13Casino in Reno, Nevada, she was sexually assaulted and shot to death.
11:17Her body was found the next day near Highway 20 in Washoe County.
11:21Investigators preserved biological evidence, but the case stalled for decades.
11:26In 2016, the Washoe County Sheriff's Office partnered with forensic genealogist Colleen Fitzpatrick and the non-profit DNA Doe Project.
11:33Our office was able to obtain a set of fingerprints of Mary Silvani from the Detroit Police Department.
11:39In the late summer of 2018, using these prints, detectives and criminals were able to confirm the identity of Sheep's
11:46Flat Jane Doe as Mary Silvani.
11:48Using crime scene DNA, Fitzpatrick and volunteer researchers built extended family trees to narrow possible suspects.
11:55Their work identified Bruce MacArthur Lindahl, an Illinois man who took his own life in 1981 after killing another victim.
12:02In 2018, authorities publicly named Lindahl as Silvani's killer, formally clearing the case through DNA confirmation.
12:09If you upload your stuff to the internet, it's available. But yet, that's the world we live in. Data is
12:16data. You know, we share data with everybody.
12:19Cracking the Zodiac killer's Z340 cipher.
12:22I hope you're having lots of fun in trying to catch me. That's part of the chilling taunt from one
12:28of the Bay Area's most notorious serial killers, now decoded after 51 years.
12:33In December 2020, more than 51 years after the Zodiac killer mailed his 340-character cipher to the San Francisco
12:41Chronicle in November 1969, three private citizens solved it.
12:45Software developer David Aranchak, Australian mathematician Sam Blake, and Belgian programmer Jarl van Eycke used modern code-breaking software and
12:53pattern analysis techniques to test thousands of transposition combinations.
12:57Chronicle reporter Kevin Fagan has been covering the Zodiac case for years. He read more of the Zodiac's message.
13:02I am not afraid of the gas chamber because it will send me to paradise all the sooner because I
13:08now have enough slaves to work for me where everyone else has nothing.
13:11On December 5th, 2020, they submitted their solution to the FBI, which confirmed its accuracy days later.
13:18The cipher contained no name and no new clues about the killer's identity, but it conclusively resolved the last major
13:25unsolved Zodiac cryptogram, a puzzle that had stumped investigators since 1969.
13:30In a statement, the Bureau said the FBI is aware that a cipher attributed to the Zodiac killer was recently
13:35solved by private citizens.
13:37The Zodiac killer case remains an ongoing investigation for the FBI San Francisco Division and our local law enforcement partners.
13:43The Zodiac killer terrorized multiple communities across Northern California, and even though decades have gone by, we continue to seek
13:50justice for the victims of these brutal crimes.
13:53Jackie Rosas saves a life from afar.
13:55In May 2013, Jackie Rosas, an 18-year-old from Cathedral City, California, saw a post that stopped her cold.
14:03She had followed a teenage girl's Tumblr blog for about a year and recognized a long pattern of emotional distress
14:09and online harassment.
14:10When the 16-year-old posted that she intended to end her life and saw no other way forward, Rosas
14:16believed the threat was immediate.
14:17With no last name and no location, she first contacted a hotline, then called police as advised.
14:24What followed was an eight-hour cross-country effort involving Cathedral City officers, a high school resource officer, and school
14:31officials who traced the girl through linked social media accounts to Union Township, New Jersey.
14:36Local police intervened in time and transported the teen for medical care.
14:40Haley Wilson's dad uses the internet to find her.
14:43Haley Wilson, a 17-year-old Amarillo girl, gone, vanished, unexpectedly run away.
14:50Her guitar's gone, you know, she's got, you know, a lot of little things that are personal to her that
14:55she took, and then I found a little note.
14:57The note says she left because she had nothing going for her, and to just please let her go.
15:03When Haley Wilson went missing, early investigative leads were limited, and the risk of the case slipping out of public
15:10view was real.
15:11Her father refused to let that happen.
15:13Rather than waiting passively, he turned to the internet, posting her information on forums, sharing updates across social media, and
15:21encouraging people to circulate her image and story.
15:23It's become a community effort with thousands reposting the video created by Ray.
15:31I do think that social media is my biggest hope right now for finding her because it's very powerful, and
15:38it moves very fast, and it travels from state to state, and it travels from country to country.
15:43That sustained online visibility generated tips and sightings that law enforcement followed up on as the search continued.
15:50Crucially, police later confirmed that information originating online contributed to narrowing the search and locating Haley alive.
15:57The authorities handled the recovery.
15:59The civilian ensured the case stayed alive long enough to be solved.
16:03We had just had such a great Christmas together, and we had spent time with the kids being off from
16:09school.
16:10We were spending more time together as a family.
16:13I mean, I just didn't see it coming.
16:16I don't know.
16:17Sean Power gets his laptop back.
16:19Hey, this is Sean Power.
16:21I'm sure that most of you have heard the interesting saga of my laptop.
16:26So in a nutshell, about five days ago, I lost the laptop.
16:33So it was initially lost, and I filed like a taxi report and everything, but I knew, I had this
16:38sinking feeling that I knew exactly where I'd left it.
16:40In 2011, Ottawa web consultant Sean Power was in New York City when his laptop and other belongings were stolen.
16:47Using tracking software, Power was able to pinpoint the device's location and even see it in use.
16:53Unable to pursue the matter locally or get help from police, he took his case to Twitter, posting the laptop's
16:59details and what he knew about the person using it.
17:01Two days later, this was last night at around 11 p.m., I get my first report.
17:06It didn't even sink in, like, I remember looking at it and thinking, hmm, I've got a prey report, that's
17:12interesting.
17:12And then just kind of moving on and doing other stuff for seven minutes until I realized, oh, s***, click,
17:19click, click, and then saw the guy's face.
17:20His followers helped dig up information on the individual and the bar where the laptop was being used.
17:26One of those online collaborators then went to the location, made contact, and recovered the stolen laptop, returning it to
17:32power.
17:33This unusual case showed how a civilian social media network can turn raw information into action, producing results police alone
17:41were not achieving.
17:42And thanks to all of you for even caring about this stuff and for, like, tagging along.
17:48It was certainly an adrenaline-filled night for me.
17:52That's it.
17:53So I'll talk to you guys soon.
17:55Koppelman identifies Linda Jane Hart.
17:57Whether it's doing forensic art or whether it's online sleuthing, I've kind of established myself and have become pretty well
18:07-known in that regard.
18:08On May 25, 1985, an unidentified woman was found along Beaver Ruin Road in Gwinnett County, Georgia.
18:15She had been stabbed multiple times and left in a wooded area.
18:18Investigators estimated she was between 30 and 40 years old.
18:22But despite extensive investigative efforts, no identification was made.
18:26She became known as the Gwinnett County Jane Doe.
18:29Independent forensic artist Carl Koppelman later created updated digital reconstructions based on autopsy reports and publicly available case files,
18:37circulating them online to generate renewed attention.
18:40In 2020, the Gwinnett County Police Department used forensic genetic genealogy, comparing crime scene DNA to relatives in public databases.
18:49The victim was identified in November 2020 as Linda Jane Hart.
18:53Her homicide remains unsolved.
18:55I've always been kind of interested in unsolved mysteries.
18:58That may be a common thread throughout my upbringing.
19:01I would follow crime stories and the evil people do to each other.
19:06Koppelman strikes again.
19:07Linda Pagano.
19:08It's the tale of two cases.
19:10A 17-year-old Akron girl who went missing in 1974,
19:14and the body of a Jane Doe discovered in Strongsville not long after.
19:19Could they be the same person?
19:21The answer could be right here.
19:23On July 19, 1980, a farmer discovered skeletal remains in a wooded area off Strongsville Road in rural Vernon County,
19:31Wisconsin.
19:32Investigators determined the victim had been shot in the head and left at the site months earlier.
19:36With no missing persons match and limited forensic tools available at the time,
19:40the woman remained unidentified for nearly four decades.
19:43A forensic artist put together this image using a piece of the skull.
19:48That's wild.
19:49And for the first time in more than 40 years, Mike Pagano said he felt like he was looking at
19:56his sister.
19:57The mouth is practically identical.
19:59Akron police followed up.
20:01We have never forgot about this case.
20:03In the 2010s, renewed attention to the case led to updated forensic analysis,
20:08including exhumation and DNA extraction suitable for modern testing.
20:12Karl Koppelman created a digital reconstruction that gained online attention.
20:16The Vernon County Sheriff's Office employed forensic genetic genealogy through GED match
20:21to name the victim as 30-year-old Linda Pagano of Illinois,
20:24announcing the match in December of 2019.
20:27No suspect has been publicly named.
20:29Hopefully we'll be able to go back to this family someday and say,
20:32here's your loved one.
20:34But a final answer could still be months away.
20:37The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner's Office would only confirm to me
20:40that they are moving forward with exhuming the body.
20:43Pagano says he just has a feeling.
20:45Something you feel down in here.
20:49Yeah.
20:50Justice at last for Andrea Bowman.
20:52Her biological mom, Kathy Turkanian, first named her Alexis,
20:57before giving her up for a better life than she could provide at the time.
21:02What she didn't know, couldn't know at the time,
21:04was that Dennis Bowman would end up being the one to cut her life down short.
21:09Now, he'll spend the rest of his life behind bars paying for his crimes.
21:13For decades, Andrea Bowman was known only as a missing child,
21:16abducted in Michigan in 1989.
21:18The case broke open not through a confession or eyewitness,
21:22but through civilian forensic genealogy.
21:25Volunteers working with genetic genealogy techniques
21:27identified Andrea's biological mother,
21:30confirming her true identity in 2019.
21:32For decades, her adopted family told investigators
21:35she had stolen $100 cash and simply run away.
21:39That you would chop her body up with an axe and keep it close to you.
21:45I'm not sure what that means.
21:47But you didn't get rid of the body completely.
21:50That discovery redirected investigators toward her adoptive father, Dennis Bowman,
21:55who ultimately confessed to her murder and to killing another woman.
21:58He was sentenced to life in prison.
22:01Once the victim's name was restored by cutting-edge technology,
22:04the truth followed and justice was promptly served.
22:07Mr. Bowman, you're here for sentencing today.
22:10Early Monday morning, Dennis Bowman, now 72 years old,
22:15walked nonchalantly into an Allegan County courtroom
22:18to be sentenced for the 1989 murder of his adopted daughter.
22:22Kamaya Mobley learns the shocking truth about her own kidnapping.
22:26Three years after learning that her life was built on a lie,
22:29Kamaya is sitting down to talk about how her life has changed.
22:33Gloria, what type of mother was she?
22:35Very easygoing, down to earth, kind of lenient.
22:39I feel like I had a regular good childhood.
22:42Honestly, I don't have nothing bad to say.
22:44In 2017, Kamaya Mobley discovered that her entire life was built on a lie.
22:50Raised as Alexis Manigo, she learned she had been abducted as a newborn from a Florida hospital in 1998.
22:56The truth came out after anonymous civilian tips alerted authorities to inconsistencies in her identity,
23:02prompting a DNA test.
23:03Generally, women who abduct babies are either in the midst of a really rocky romance,
23:08or they've lost a child.
23:10So here she kind of has both risk factors.
23:13That test confirmed she was the biological daughter of Shannara Mobley.
23:17Law enforcement handled the investigation and arrest of the kidnapper.
23:20But the case only reopened because civilians noticed something didn't add up and spoke up.
23:25It's a rare case where the victim herself had to emotionally process the crime in real time,
23:30while the justice system caught up decades later.
23:33How were you able to keep it a secret once Gloria told you the truth,
23:39that she was not your biological mother?
23:41You know, you're just like having another out-of-body experience.
23:44Like, hold up.
23:45People make it seem like I was protecting her, but you also got to understand,
23:49you're telling one, like, a 16-year-old this.
23:51So what do I do?
23:52Matthew Stewart turns in his brother Charles.
23:55This was a murder, as we talked about.
23:57It was initially pinned on multiple black men,
24:00and then in the end that that was not true.
24:03How did the racial components of this play out in Boston where it happened?
24:10Well, it was incredibly explosive because it set off this manhunt for,
24:13you know, a black man in a tracksuit.
24:15The 1989 murder of Carol Stewart initially triggered a massive and wrongful manhunt
24:20after her husband, Charles Stewart, falsely blamed a stranger.
24:23The case broke not because of police insight,
24:26but because Charles' brother, Matthew Stewart, went to authorities
24:29and reported that Charles had confessed to committing the murder himself.
24:32Boston, record emergency, 510.
24:34My wife's been shot, I've been shot.
24:36One of the most sensational stories in Boston's history began with a call to 911.
24:41Where is this, sir?
24:42I have no idea.
24:43Shock and Carol Stewart are in their car, bleeding from gunshot wounds.
24:47Okay, has your wife been shot as well?
24:48Yes.
24:49That civilian disclosure forced investigators to reevaluate the entire case,
24:54including financial motives and forensic inconsistencies.
24:57On January 4th, 1990, one day after an arrest warrant was issued,
25:01Charles Stewart abandoned his car on the Tobin Bridge and leapt into the Mystic River.
25:05His body was recovered the following day.
25:08The Suffolk County District Attorney formally closed the case soon after,
25:11publicly confirming that Carol Stewart had been killed by her husband.
25:14There were a lot of people, particularly in the black community,
25:17who felt like their stories had never fully been told.
25:21And I would call them and they'd say,
25:22you know, I've been waiting for somebody to ask me about this.
25:25I've always wanted to talk about this.
25:27Cecilia Pierce wears a wire.
25:29You may remember the name Pamela Smart from a very notorious murder case.
25:33It got national attention more than 30 years ago.
25:35Still remember this.
25:36A jury convicted her of encouraging her lover,
25:39who was then a high school student, to shoot and kill her husband.
25:43The murder of Gregory Smart in 1990 might never have been solved without Cecilia Pierce,
25:48a civilian who made a dangerous decision.
25:51After Pamela Smart began openly discussing her role in orchestrating her husband's murder,
25:56Pierce went to police and agreed to wear a wire.
25:58I mean, the tapes are the most damning piece of evidence you can have.
26:01Cecilia got Pamela Smart on tape.
26:02She wore a wire to help the cops.
26:05There were two conversations between Cecilia Pierce and Pam Smart,
26:09where Pam Smart was saying things to Cecilia.
26:11The police are going to come and talk to you.
26:13You can't tell the truth.
26:15If you tell the truth, you're going to get in trouble.
26:16The recorded conversations captured Smart detailing the crime
26:19and became the backbone of the prosecution.
26:22While students later testified and police built the case,
26:25the pivotal evidence was created by a civilian acting independently.
26:29That evidence led to Pamela Smart's conviction for first-degree murder
26:33and a life sentence, bringing the case to a definitive close.
26:37So you hear her 15-year-old boyfriend at the time served 25 years.
26:41He was released in 2015.
26:43But his family, the victim's family, is saying she still didn't say,
26:46I did it, that I had a whole hand in this.
26:49So they're not really feeling she needs to get out of this time.
26:52In the architecture of an apology, you really have to be direct.
26:55What you did, be specific, and take responsibility full-on.
26:58It was a little bit of a dancing around still.
27:00It was.
27:00YouTubers make a crucial discovery in the Gabby Petito case.
27:04On August 27, 2021, we got camera footage
27:10going through the Grand Tetons Park around 6 to 6.30 p.m.
27:22During the search for Gabby Petito in 2021,
27:25a breakthrough came from an unexpected source, a YouTube channel.
27:30Travel vloggers Red, White, and Bethune reviewed their own footage
27:33and realized they had inadvertently captured Petito's van
27:35parked near Spread Creek in Wyoming.
27:37Yeah, the van looked like it was pretty much kind of abandoned.
27:43We figured maybe they were out hiking or they were just chilling inside.
27:45There was no doors open.
27:47You know, it was just kind of, you know, neat to see a Florida plate,
27:51you know, on the other side of the country.
27:53It's not something you see all the time.
27:55They reported the timestamp and location to authorities.
27:58The FBI later confirmed the footage helped narrow the search area
28:02where Petito's remains were found days later.
28:04Police solved the case and identified the suspect,
28:07but this was a rare instance where civilian-generated media
28:10surfaced primary evidence investigators didn't yet have.
28:14Social media didn't solve the crime,
28:16but it helped point authorities to the right place.
28:19We actually weren't able to find any sites,
28:21and we ended up driving back through, saw it again,
28:24but here it is on the left, so.
28:27And I slowed it down so you can possibly see it a little bit better.
28:32Kind of freaky for a late Saturday evening,
28:35but we just kind of had a brain fart.
28:37Oh my God, there's that van.
28:38So if anybody can help, I know the FBI is looking for all the help
28:41they can get onto the case.
28:43Bonnie Haim is found by her son.
28:45On one hand, Bonnie's own parents believe that she was unhappily married
28:48and willfully abandoned Michael and her son.
28:50And yet some members of Michael's family are convinced that Bonnie is dead,
28:55murdered by Michael Haim.
28:56In 1993, Bonnie Haim disappeared from her Jacksonville home
29:00after a fight with her abusive husband, Michael.
29:02She had been planning to leave him
29:04and had secretly arranged a new life for herself
29:06and their three-year-old son, Aaron.
29:08Various belongings were found,
29:10but Bonnie herself was never seen again.
29:12Fast forward 20 years to 2014,
29:14when Aaron, now an adult, was renovating his childhood home.
29:18After demolishing the backyard pool,
29:20he discovered a plastic bag containing a human skull.
29:23Authorities dug up further remains and confirmed they were those of his late mother.
29:28Now, with a body and new forensic technology,
29:30investigators conclusively linked the crime to Michael Haim.
29:33He was arrested, tried,
29:35and ultimately sentenced to life in prison for his wife's murder.
29:38Through his attorney, Michael Haim declined our request for an interview.
29:42He has not been formally charged with any crime.
29:45However, authorities still consider him to be the prime suspect in Bonnie's disappearance.
29:49Todd Matthews identifies the tent girl.
29:52Whether it was the dreams or his determination,
29:55Todd eventually identified tent girl as Barbara Hackman Taylor,
30:0011 years after he first heard about her and 30 years after her murder.
30:05On May 17, 1968,
30:07Wilbur Riddle was looking for scrap along a Kentucky highway
30:10when he stumbled across the body of a young woman wrapped in canvas.
30:14No one came forward to claim her body,
30:15and she quickly faded into history as tent girl.
30:18In the 1980s, Riddle's daughter married Todd Matthews,
30:22and he became deeply intrigued by the mystery.
30:24When the internet appeared,
30:26Matthews scoured forums and found a missing persons post for one Barbara Ann Hackman Taylor,
30:31who disappeared in Lexington in 1967.
30:33He found and reached out to Barbara's sister,
30:36and she agreed to a DNA test.
30:38The DNA was a familial match to tent girl,
30:41finally identifying her as the long-missing Barbara Taylor.
30:44Once there was an announcement that this was indeed the tent girl,
30:47and I'll always remember those words,
30:49the tent girl is indeed Barbara Hackman Taylor.
30:52You know, that was just chilling.
30:54Reddit helped solve the hit and run of Susan Rainwater.
30:5766-year-old Susan Rainwater was struck and killed while cycling in Eatonville, Washington.
31:02With no eyewitnesses and minimal evidence,
31:05the Washington State Patrol had little to go on.
31:08The only physical clue was a small piece of black plastic found at the scene,
31:12a photo of which was shared on Reddit.
31:14One user quickly identified it as a headlight bezel from a late 80s Chevrolet Silverado.
31:19State troopers then received a tip describing a black pickup with front-end damage consistent with a collision.
31:24The truck?
31:25A 1986 Chevrolet K10.
31:28The Reddit post helped verify the tip,
31:30and police quickly found the truck and arrested its owner, Jeremy Simon.
31:34He was given a 53-month sentence as part of a drug offender sentencing alternative.
31:38A biochemist solves a medical mystery.
31:41The diagnosis, however, was stunning.
31:43Ryan had apparently been poisoned.
31:46Ryan Stallings was pronounced dead after suffering from a bizarre but serious illness.
31:51Toxicology tests revealed high levels of ethylene glycol, a chemical found in antifreeze.
31:56Naturally, medical personnel suspected poisoning,
31:59and his mother Patricia was arrested and sentenced to life.
32:02While awaiting trial, Stallings gave birth to another son.
32:05He also grew sick and showed symptoms similar to Ryan,
32:08but he was diagnosed with methylmalonic acidemia, or MMA,
32:12a rare disorder that mimics the biological symptoms of antifreeze poisoning.
32:17Their story was shown on Unsolved Mysteries and was seen by biochemist William Sly.
32:22He agreed to test Ryan's blood, and with the help of James Shoemaker,
32:26found that Ryan also had MMA.
32:28With this shocking new revelation, Patricia was released from prison.
32:31Unfortunately, we can't undo the suffering that the Stallings have endured during this entire ordeal.
32:38And I apologize to them both personally and for the state of Missouri.
32:43The internet finds the kitten kicker
32:45Back in August of 2013, a video was uploaded to Vine showing a person violently kicking a kitten off their
32:51porch.
32:52The video gained significant attention when it was shared on Reddit and 4chan,
32:55and users vowed to hunt down the unknown kitten kicker.
32:58So, that's exactly what they did.
33:00They quickly uncovered and disseminated the uploader's personal information,
33:04including his home address and phone number.
33:07They were identified as a teenager from South Carolina named Walter Easley,
33:11and he was arrested and charged with misdemeanor animal cruelty.
33:15He was sentenced to a pretrial intervention program, the details of which remain sealed.
33:20Twitter solves a hate crime.
33:21Police say social media is helping them in their effort to identify the suspects
33:26wanted in the attack of a same-sex couple in Center City.
33:29Social media can be a curse for investigators, but it can also be a blessing.
33:33Even back in 2014, police were turning to social media for help,
33:37like when they uploaded surveillance footage of a large group attacking two gay men in Philadelphia.
33:42User Greg Bennett quickly found photos of the group
33:45and deduced that they had been eating at a nearby restaurant.
33:47That's when a local sports commentator named Fan Since 09 took over.
33:51He and his followers banded together and used public photos on Facebook
33:55to track the assailants to a restaurant near Rittenhouse Square.
33:58Fan Since 09 then sent this info to the detective working the case,
34:02and they were successful in tracking down the suspects.
34:04But it was a picture of some of the potential suspects
34:07taken inside a Center City restaurant
34:09that led one man on Twitter to begin to put the pieces together
34:13to help identify the suspects.
34:15An events manager finds a kidnapping victim.
34:17She was in good health,
34:19but living in a backyard for the past 18 years does take its toll.
34:23In June 1991, 11-year-old J.C. Dugard was abducted in California
34:27and later had two children with her kidnapper, Philip Garrido.
34:31Fast forward to August 24, 2009,
34:34when Garrido brought the girls to UC Berkeley for a religious event.
34:37He and the girls went to the office of events manager Lisa Campbell,
34:40who found their behavior troubling.
34:42Garrido was, quote,
34:43"...erratic," and the girls, quote,
34:45"...sullen and submissive."
34:47She asked Garrido to return the next day and took down his name.
34:50Campbell then alerted campus police,
34:52who ran a background check and discovered Garrido was a registered sex offender on parole.
34:57Authorities investigated further,
34:58and Dugard, now 29, was discovered living in Garrido's captivity.
35:03She was finally reunited with her family,
35:05and Garrido and his wife were arrested.
35:07This was J.C. Lee Dugard when her childhood was stolen.
35:11This was J.C. Lee Dugard five years ago when she talked to me after her rescue.
35:16My world changed in an instant.
35:18A passing neighbor helps solve a major kidnapping.
35:21So we kick the bottom, and she comes out with the little girl,
35:25and she says,
35:29Imagine walking down the street when a woman starts screaming at you from a house,
35:33claiming that she has been abducted.
35:35That's what happened to Charles Ramsey.
35:36Between 2002 and 2004, three teenagers were kidnapped by Ariel Castro and held captive in
35:42his Cleveland home.
35:44On the morning of May 6, 2013, Castro left the home without properly securing the girls.
35:49Amanda Barry made her way to the bolted front door, where she screamed for help.
35:53Ramsey heard the screams and came running,
35:56and both he and Barry were able to kick out the door's bottom panel.
35:59Ramsey called 911 after securing Barry,
36:02and responding officers found the other two survivors inside the house.
36:06Castro was arrested and later took his own life in prison.
36:09Ariel Castro found dead in his jail cell.
36:11ABC's Alex Press has all the latest.
36:13Good morning, Alex.
36:14An amateur sketch artist identifies the Cali Doe.
36:17I feel like Tammy ran away.
36:20She wanted to start a new life.
36:21For 35 years, Tammy Alexander was known as Cali Doe after her murdered body was found
36:27in Caledonia in 1979.
36:29In 2013, her former classmate, Laurel Nowell, tried to reconnect.
36:33She contacted Tammy's half-sister, Pamela Dyson, who hadn't heard from Tammy since the
36:38late 70s.
36:39As their upbringing was tumultuous, she believed that Tammy had run away to start anew.
36:43Realizing that Tammy had never been reported missing, the two filed a report.
36:47As it happened, amateur sketch artist Carl Koppelman had recently created a facial
36:52reconstruction of Cali Doe.
36:53When he saw Tammy's missing persons report, he noticed a striking resemblance to Cali Doe
36:58and alerted authorities.
37:00Investigators contacted Dyson, collected her DNA, and confirmed that Cali Doe was her half-sister
37:06Tammy.
37:06This case could have been solved long ago, had she had a parent, had she had a family
37:12that cared enough to want to even make a missing persons report.
37:17Liz Carmichael is found thanks to a TV viewer.
37:19Liz Carmichael's car, the Dale, turned out to be a sham.
37:23Was this a case of someone simply failing to live up to their dreams?
37:27Or did Liz Carmichael deliberately set out to swindle millions from naive investors?
37:31Throughout the 1970s, America was going through a major oil crisis.
37:36So, Liz Carmichael promoted the Dale, a fuel-efficient and affordable vehicle that would help people
37:41get through the turbulent times.
37:42But the car was a giant scam, and Carmichael was charged with fraud.
37:46She skipped bail and disappeared before she could be prosecuted, and later appeared on
37:51an episode of Unsolved Mysteries.
37:52A viewer in Dale, Texas, immediately recognized her as a local flower vendor named Katherine Johnson.
37:58He contacted the show's tip line, and investigators were sent out.
38:01They deduced that Katherine was actually the missing Liz, and she was taken back to California.
38:07She was ultimately found guilty of her crimes and served two and a half years in prison.
38:11Within minutes of our broadcast, our telecenter received a tip from a viewer who recognized
38:16Liz Carmichael as a flower vendor named Katherine Johnson.
38:20Curiously, she had chosen the small community of Dale, Texas as her new home.
38:24Victim's Friend Cracks a Cold Case
38:26In 1984, Angela Samota, a student at Southern Methodist University, was assaulted and stabbed
38:33multiple times, leading to her death.
38:36The man knocked at the door, and he asked to use her restroom and her phone.
38:40She let him in.
38:41She called her boyfriend, and he knew something was wrong.
38:45With few suspects, the case quickly went cold until 2004, when Samota's best friend,
38:50Sheila Wysocki, claimed to have seen her ghost and was compelled to solve it.
38:54She hounded police with calls, but with no detective assigned to the case, barely any progress was made.
39:01They were not receptive to me at all.
39:03I actually was very harassing to them, and they did not welcome me at all with open arms.
39:10Wysocki began studying and earned a certification as a private investigator.
39:14As a result, she was able to look at the case more closely and eventually helped police find related DNA
39:19evidence.
39:20This was linked to Donald Bess, a career criminal who was ultimately convicted and handed the death sentence.
39:27The people that talk about closure, they've really never been through something like that.
39:33So the fact that people are like, don't you feel better?
39:37Don't you feel some accomplishment?
39:42No, she's still dead.
39:46It was a mystery that left police puzzled for two decades.
39:50In June 1995, two men lost their lives in a car crash in Greensville County, Virginia.
39:56A young man was killed in a car crash in Emporia, Virginia in June of 1995.
40:02The only clues to his identity were a Grateful Dead t-shirt he was wearing,
40:07two tickets to a Grateful Dead concert, and a note written to a Jason.
40:11While the driver of the vehicle was quickly identified, the passenger's identity remained an enigma.
40:17Due to the Grateful Dead concert tickets found on him, he was nicknamed Grateful Doe.
40:22Authorities later released composite sketches of the passenger's face,
40:25which were widely circulated by internet sleuth groups.
40:29After this composite was released, photos of a man named Jason were recently posted
40:34to the Grateful Doe Facebook page in hopes of identifying him.
40:37As a result of this heavy campaign, the images were recognized by two people
40:42who claimed to be the passenger's former roommate and mother.
40:45After DNA tests were carried out, he was positively identified as 19-year-old Jason Callahan,
40:51who left home in 1995 and never returned.
40:55We were friends. We were always on a pleasant,
40:57hello, how you doing? What's going on? What you been up to lately?
41:01The death of Paulette Jaster.
41:02Paulette Jaster was a young woman who disappeared from her town in Michigan in 1979.
41:08Apparently, Jaster had traveled miles away from home to Texas,
41:12where she was sadly killed the following year in a hit-and-run.
41:15With no form of identification found on her, police were unable to figure out who she was.
41:20At the same time, her family, hundreds of miles away, were left puzzled over her whereabouts.
41:26Her identity remained unsolved until 2014,
41:29when an internet user pointed forensic anthropologist Sharon Derrick in the direction of Jaster's family.
41:34Using her old pictures, Derrick was able to confirm Jaster's identity with three distinctive freckles on her cheek,
41:41closing a case that had been cold for over three decades.
41:45Margaret Davis solves her son's murder.
41:48Only a mother will know what it feels like to lose a child.
41:51There's part of your soul that just goes out like that, and it's just filled with pain.
41:56English software engineer Stephen Davis was murdered by gunmen in his Makati, Philippines apartment in July 2002.
42:04His mother, Margaret, had a hunch that her son's wife, Evelyn, was somehow involved in his death.
42:10While the police investigation stalled and eventually turned cold,
42:14Margaret spent thousands of dollars hiring a private investigator.
42:17With all the evidence gathered from Margaret's investigation, the police gave the case a second look.
42:22Margaret's investigator carried out 24-hour surveillance on Evelyn.
42:27There were two men who paid regular visits to her home.
42:31One was Evelyn's lover.
42:33The other, his friend, another security man.
42:36It was ultimately discovered that Evelyn was having an affair with one of the gunmen,
42:40and had masterminded the plot to have Stephen killed.
42:43This resulted in the conviction of Evelyn and all three gunmen in 2004.
42:48He loved you.
42:49That's you.
42:50I loved you.
42:51He loved you.
42:52Your children loved you.
42:53And look what's happened.
42:54I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't see you.
42:56I don't see you.
42:57Jessica Maple and the Burglars
42:59After her late great-grandmother's house was burgled and robbed of nearly all its furniture,
43:0512-year-old Jessica Maple cracked the case by finding key clues the police completely missed.
43:11Although officers had concluded that the burglar must have had a key to enter the house,
43:15Jessica discovered broken garage windows covered in multiple fingerprints when she returned to
43:21the crime scene with her mom.
43:22Her investigation also turned up all of the missing furniture at a nearby pawn shop,
43:27whose owner identified the men who'd brought them in.
43:30Why would you go to the pawn shop?
43:31Why would you go to the pawn shop?
43:33Well, I thought to myself, since it's a bad economy, people are going to want money.
43:36So instead of keeping the furniture, pawn shops, they give you money for selling them their stuff.
43:42Miss Maple didn't just stop there.
43:43She tracked down one of the burglars and got him to confess to the robbery.
43:48Talk about giving the cops a run for their money.
43:51Susan Galbraith takes on a brutal murder.
43:53To solve the vicious murder of Jessica Curran,
43:56Kentucky resident Susan Galbraith first sent letters to several celebrities and journalists.
44:01She was, however, only able to grab the attention of BBC reporter Tom Mangold.
44:06Mangold traveled down to Kentucky and paired up with Galbraith.
44:09Their investigation soon led them to Quincy Cross, who Galbraith actually questioned,
44:14but was unable to get a confession from.
44:16When Mangold eventually returned home, Galbraith created a MySpace page,
44:21hoping to get information from the public.
44:23Soon after, a woman named Victoria Caldwell reached out to her and confessed to being an
44:27accomplice to Curran's murder.
44:29Caldwell reached a plea deal with the authorities, in which she named Cross as the killer,
44:34and only spent six months in prison.
44:36The hit and run of Carolee Ashby
44:39On Halloween night 1968, young Carolee Ashby was crossing the road in Fulton, New York,
44:44when she was run over by a car.
44:46My mom had a horrible life of grief and pain because of all of this.
44:53The driver refused to stop and disappeared into the night,
44:56never to be identified for decades.
44:58Fast forward to 2013,
45:01a retired Fulton detective put up a Facebook post about the cold case.
45:04This eventually reached a woman who recalled being asked to provide a false alibi for
45:09one Douglas Parkhurst back in 1968.
45:12Parkhurst was questioned by investigators back then,
45:15but it wasn't until recently that police say he admitted to driving drunk.
45:19After being provided with this information, police questioned Parkhurst and he confessed
45:23to the crime, but was spared of any charges as the statute of limitations had passed.
45:28Parkhurst will not be in court since the statute of limitations on most charges has long expired.
45:34The only criminal aspect would be an intentional act,
45:37and we have no information, no evidence to support that this was an intentional act.
45:42In a sick twist of fate,
45:44Parkhurst was killed five years later by another hit-and-run driver.
45:48Car enthusiasts solve a hit-and-run.
45:51The community of readers on the automobile blogging site Jalopnik
45:54put their expansive car knowledge to the ultimate test in April of 2012,
45:59when 57-year-old Betty Wheeler lost her life in a hit-and-run.
46:04Hoping to get some help from the online community,
46:06police uploaded a picture of a small piece of metal they believed had broken off the vehicle
46:11in the collision, and Jalopnik readers got right on it.
46:15They linked the metal to an early 2000s Ford F-150 pickup in a matter of hours.
46:21They gave police a piece of information that was critical in identifying the driver and passenger
46:26of the vehicle. Both men were later arrested and convicted of felony hit-and-run.
46:31Yakov German tracks down a kidnapper and killer.
46:34The disappearance of the young Liby Kletzky sent shockwaves
46:38through his Orthodox Jewish New York neighborhood.
46:40This is every parent's nightmare, but this type of incident is extremely rare.
46:46Those waves were certainly felt by Yakov German,
46:49a property manager who took it upon himself to find the missing boy.
46:53Yakov traced Liby's movements using surveillance footage
46:55from stores and houses on his school route.
46:58This ended with footage from a car leasing company
47:01showing Liby getting picked up by Levi Aaron, a man from the same neighborhood.
47:06We see somebody opening a door, a kid going in, closing the door, a gold car.
47:11We see him from the other camera, going back to the front of the car,
47:14going into a seat, and we see the car going out.
47:17Yakov's efforts led the police to the perpetrator.
47:19Police found only remains upon Aaron's arrest.
47:22At 35 years old, Aaron still lived in his parents' home.
47:26A plumbing store clerk, he was religious.
47:28A Klansman gets his comeuppance.
47:30In 1964, two 19-year-old African-American students in Mississippi,
47:35Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah D.,
47:38were abducted and drowned by members of the KKK.
47:41The police investigation was allegedly clouded by their prejudice,
47:44and the case was closed after a few months.
47:47Some 40 years later, Moore's brother Thomas teamed up with a documentary filmmaker.
47:53They tracked down the man responsible for the killings,
47:56James Ford Seale, who was initially reported dead.
47:59Their case did not come to the forefront like the New Yorkers,
48:03civil rights workers.
48:05Ben Cheney was also amongst them,
48:06but the people they really wanted to solve the crime for was Schwerner and Goodman.
48:12They didn't have the, the Dean Moore case didn't have the benefit of those
48:15people associated with the case.
48:17So I took it up and found Thomas after about a year of looking for him.
48:21Thomas' and producer David Ridgen's discovery allowed the case to be reopened,
48:26resulting in Seale's arrest and conviction by a federal jury.
48:29He was sentenced to three consecutive life terms and died in prison in 2011.
48:36The murder of Maribel Ramos
48:3836-year-old Maribel Ramos was an Iraq War veteran living in Santa Ana,
48:42California with her roommate K.C. Joy.
48:45Ramos disappeared on May 2, 2013,
48:47and was reported missing by her loved ones the next day.
48:50While police investigated her disappearance,
48:53a friend posted details of the case on Yelp,
48:56asking users for any information.
48:58A few days later, Ramos' roommate Joy supposedly left a comment in the thread,
49:04in which he referred to the Army vet in the past tense.
49:07As if to suggest his possible involvement in the disappearance,
49:11one user in particular voiced suspicions about Joy.
49:14Those suspicions came true in the following days,
49:17as Ramos' body was found,
49:19and Joy was later arrested and convicted of her murder.
49:22Ellen Leach helps identify Greg May's remains.
49:26Greg May was a Civil War antique collector who shared an apartment with Doug DeBruin.
49:31May disappeared in 2001,
49:33and his antiques popped up afterwards at an auction house.
49:36This led police to arrest DeBruin,
49:39who, it was revealed, had been selling off May's collection.
49:42But with no sign of a body,
49:44prosecutors knew they didn't have a solid case against him.
49:47Then in 2005,
49:49a skull was found all the way in Missouri that puzzled authorities.
49:53They put together a facial sculpture from the skull,
49:56which was later matched with May's missing persons poster by Ellen Leach,
50:00a Home Depot cashier and online sleuth.
50:02I have solved eight cases to date.
50:08The first one was in 2005, which was Greg May.
50:11With this, prosecutors were able to build an airtight case against DeBruin
50:16and eventually convicted him of the murder.
50:19Celia Blay catches an internet predator.
50:21William Melchert Dinkle, a 47-year-old nurse from Minnesota,
50:25frequently posed as a 20-something-year-old woman in online chat rooms.
50:29He encouraged young, depressed adults to take their own lives,
50:33sometimes for his viewing pleasure.
50:36William's scheme was discovered by Celia Blay, a pensioner from England.
50:41Blay struck up a conversation with a teenager online
50:44and learned that she was being goaded by William.
50:47Sometimes it's a serious and helpful and supportive sight.
50:51Other times, there are people deliberately trying to push others over the edge.
50:56Celia devised a plan with the teenager
50:58and was able to collect evidence against William,
51:02with which she convinced U.S. authorities to lay charges.
51:05He was stripped of his nursing license
51:07and sentenced to jail time for assisting
51:10and attempting to assist in the deaths of two people.
51:13William Melchert Dinkle had to come to this courthouse
51:16five minutes from his house to face the allegations,
51:19all because a woman thousands of miles away wouldn't give up.
51:23Bradley Willman and the Predatory Judge
51:25In the late 1990s, Canadian private investigator Bradley Willman developed a Trojan horse disguised
51:32as a picture file, which he posted on several websites frequented by predators.
51:37Once downloaded, the file gave him unfettered access to the individual's computer.
51:41This allowed him to pore over their emails and other documents,
51:45then turn over important information to watchdog groups.
51:49His work culminated in the arrest of Ronald Klein,
51:52a California Superior Court judge who had an abundance of damning evidence on his computer.
51:58Klein was disbarred and sentenced to 27 months in prison.
52:02The Exoneration of Valentino Dixon
52:05In 1991, Valentino Dixon was arrested and charged with the fatal shooting of a man in Buffalo, New York.
52:12There's nothing quite like a fresh start.
52:15Just ask Valentino Dixon.
52:17Although the actual shooter was said to have confessed,
52:20and eight eyewitnesses reportedly absolved Dixon of the crime,
52:24he was eventually convicted and given a lengthy sentence.
52:27While in prison, Dixon began drawing golf courses,
52:30and soon got noticed by a golf magazine journalist named Max Adler.
52:34I'm glad that resonated with him, with what he was feeling,
52:38and that he had the audacity to reach out to me,
52:42and I'm just so thankful I got that letter.
52:44Adler published an article on Dixon's ordeal that in turn caught the attention of Marty Tankliff,
52:49a Georgetown University law professor who decided to take up his case alongside his students.
52:54The class was able to poke holes in Dixon's original trial,
52:57and helped secure him a new trial that ended in his exoneration.
53:01It's indescribable. I'm so grateful for the support and the love.
53:07You know, I never knew that I had this much support.
53:10When I walked out of that courtroom and everybody was there,
53:12I had some support, but I didn't know it was this huge.
53:15The murder of Abraham Shakespeare.
53:17For Abraham Shakespeare, winning a $30 million lottery was unfortunately the beginning of his troubles.
53:24Shakespeare bought himself that new car, fancy new house, and lots more.
53:29But as so often happens, this lotto winner's drama didn't stick to the script.
53:34That's because the money also brought unwanted attention.
53:38He started a private business with Dereese Dee Dee Moore, who took control of his finances.
53:43A few months later, Moore killed Shakespeare and buried him under a concrete slab behind her house.
53:50As the case garnered attention, users of the internet crime forum WebSleuths started digging.
53:56In the beginning, we thought he was missing, that he was hiding away.
53:59As the investigation continues, the evidence mounts that he could have died because of sinister means.
54:08Murder, we're talking here.
54:09Could be.
54:10They found that Moore had opened a fake account on the website to divert suspicion away from herself.
54:16The amateur sleuths were able to trace the IP address of the fake account back to Moore's personal computer,
54:21aiding investigators.
54:23Moore was found guilty of killing Shakespeare and received a life sentence.
54:28Cold, calculated, cruel.
54:30They all apply.
54:32Manipulative.
54:33Probably the most manipulative person that this court has seen.
54:37A true crime writer solves a 50-year-old case.
54:41In 2016, Monica Weller released Injured Parties, solving the murder of Dr. Helen Davidson.
54:47The book details her seven-year journey of apparently closing a 50-year-old case.
54:52Back in 1966, Davidson was found dead close to her home in Buckinghamshire after going birdwatching.
54:58Despite an extensive investigation, police were unable to come up with anything concrete
55:03and eventually ruled the crime a, quote, random motiveless killing.
55:08Weller, however, carried out painstaking research and soon concluded that the perpetrator was George Garbutt,
55:14a gardener who worked in the area.
55:15Although Garbutt took his own life five years after the incident,
55:19Weller theorized that he had killed Davidson after she spotted him with a male lover.
55:23This was at a time when homosexuality was still illegal in England.
55:27The murder of Jacob Wetterling
55:29In October 1989, Jacob Wetterling was abducted in St. Joseph, Minnesota and never returned.
55:35These are happy thoughts, but when you stop to think about how much time has gone by, it's kind of
55:48hard to swallow.
55:49The case bore similarities to the earlier abduction and assault of one Jared Shirell, who was ultimately freed.
55:56Wetterling's case grew cold over the years, until 2013, when Shirell teamed up with Joy Baker, a blogger, to solve
56:03it.
56:03This morning, Patty Wetterling finally knows what happened to her son, Jacob.
56:08Baker unearthed a string of similar assaults that occurred in nearby Painesville,
56:12and was convinced that they were all likely committed by the same person.
56:16Although police reportedly discredited their theory at first,
56:20they eventually looked at the case keenly and zeroed in on Danny Heinrich.
56:24You had the theory, and everybody told you that theory was wrong.
56:28Yeah, that's true, and it was disheartening.
56:32Heinrich, who was actually an early suspect in all aforementioned cases,
56:36led police to Wetterling's remains, and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
56:41Michelle McNamara's hunt for the Golden State Killer
56:43He was like a Hannibal Lecter, highly intelligent, highly sadistic, master manipulator.
56:49Joseph James D'Angelo, infamously known as the Golden State Killer,
56:54was responsible for the deaths of at least 13 people.
56:57However, the hunt for his identity would go on to claim one more life,
57:01that of Michelle McNamara.
57:03McNamara, a true crime writer, grew up fascinated with unsolved mysteries,
57:08and later zeroed in on a string of cold cases that took place in California in the 70s and 80s.
57:14Her unyielding investigation turned up a library's worth of evidence.
57:18I'm so sad and full of self-doubt, and then I'm not.
57:24Where, where can this all lead?
57:26To deal with the stress, she started taking a cocktail of prescription drugs,
57:31which led to her accidental death.
57:33However, her work revived interest in the case,
57:36and ultimately led law enforcement to D'Angelo.
57:39Police say the 72-year-old appeared surprised when they swarmed his home Tuesday evening.
57:44No incident, he didn't say it wasn't me, or anything like that?
57:50No, really no, really no conversation at all.
57:53The murder of Jun Lin
57:55Before this case became about the murder of Jun Lin,
57:58it revolved around a couple of Facebook videos that portrayed acts of animal cruelty carried out by an unidentified man.
58:05And so I was on Facebook one day, and I found a post.
58:09A lot of people have been feverishly posting about a video that was online.
58:15A group of online sleuths began investigating,
58:18and were able to identify the man in the videos as Luca Magnata.
58:23Magnata later lured Lin, a university student in Canada,
58:27over to his apartment, where he murdered him and uploaded a video online.
58:31It was no longer a game of online, this was real world.
58:36The sleuth group was able to link that video to the ones involving animals,
58:39and share their information with the authorities.
58:42A few weeks later, Magnata was arrested.
58:45They finally caught him.
58:47And it was just like the perfect way for Luca to go down.
58:51Luca was caught in an internet cafe because he couldn't stay away from his vanity.
58:58Which crime on our list shocked you the most?
59:00Are there any we missed?
59:02Be sure to let us know in the comments.
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