Dateline NBC 2026 05 01 A Window of Time

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00:00:02Tonight on Dateline.

00:00:04She was the light of our family.

00:00:07I can't tell you the pride I had in her.

00:00:11Why would anybody harm her?

00:00:15You just hear, there's a house fire, there's a body.

00:00:18Yes.

00:00:19Went into the bedroom and she was laying on her back.

00:00:22I could smell the shampoo in her hair.

00:00:26They said we're considering this a homicide.

00:00:29I'm just sobbing.

00:00:30I'm saying no, Tara, no.

00:00:33It was unbelievable that somebody did this on purpose.

00:00:36You all were roommates, you were close.

00:00:38Who were they asking you about?

00:00:39Just the people in her life.

00:00:40At the law school, at work.

00:00:42Then of course, her boyfriend.

00:00:44They take pictures of my body, they take pictures of my hands.

00:00:47I just lost it.

00:00:49Five or six persons of interest.

00:00:51And nothing quite fit.

00:00:55More than two decades.

00:00:57Finally, you have a name.

00:00:59I'm like, everybody get to headquarters.

00:01:02It's painful.

00:01:04I felt like I was the one on trial.

00:01:06A young law student found dead in a fire.

00:01:10Evidence burned in the flames.

00:01:12But the drive for justice burned far stronger.

00:01:16I'm Lester Holt.

00:01:18And this is Dateline.

00:01:27Here's Blaine Alexander with A Window of Time.

00:01:36Can't you just imagine her rushing off to class or somewhere to study or heading to a football

00:01:42game here at the University of Georgia, always pushing herself as far and as fast as she could

00:01:49go.

00:01:51She had this sort of jump to her walk, almost a lilt, as if she were bouncing through her day

00:01:57very happy.

00:01:58She was a brilliant person.

00:02:00She wanted to do the best she could in everything she did.

00:02:05What did she mean to you guys?

00:02:07Everything.

00:02:09She was a girl in a hurry.

00:02:11But her family would need patience and perseverance if they would ever find justice.

00:02:19Thursday night is party night in Athens, Georgia, just like it was 25 years ago.

00:02:24But on Thursday night, January 18, 2001, Tara Baker wasn't bar hopping.

00:02:29She was studying.

00:02:31This was her first year at UGA's law school, and she was buckled down at the law library

00:02:36with her friend Katie Lonstein.

00:02:39I don't remember what we were working on.

00:02:41I think it was probably a paper.

00:02:43She turned on her computer.

00:02:43It made all of its very loud noise because it had a big fan, and then she leaned in and

00:02:48she went shh like this with her little crinkly nose.

00:02:52They worked for a couple of hours.

00:02:54And then I hit 9, 9.30, something like that.

00:02:56I'd had enough.

00:02:57I wanted to go home for the day.

00:02:59So I packed up, and I knew she was staying until at least 10, because that was her grand

00:03:04plan.

00:03:05And she told me to call when I got home because she always worried about me when I walked home.

00:03:11Katie made it home safely, but she forgot to call.

00:03:14So Tara called me at about 9.40, 9.45, and she said, ma'am, you did not call me.

00:03:22And I said, I know, I'm so sorry, Tara.

00:03:24I'm home.

00:03:25I'm fine.

00:03:26Everything's okay.

00:03:27Then Tara went home herself around 10.

00:03:30Katie's sure of it because her friend always stuck to her plan.

00:03:35For Tara, this was home, a little place on Fawn Drive on the outskirts of Athens.

00:03:44Rain clouds were gathering the next morning as the call came into Firehouse 5.

00:03:48That little house on Fawn Drive was on fire.

00:03:52Firefighters arrived on the scene, kicked in the door, and found a living room full of smoke.

00:03:57What do you see when you come over here?

00:03:59See a red glow around this corner of this wall.

00:04:03Firefighter Doug Whitehead remembers this house like it was yesterday and what he saw in the kitchen.

00:04:08What is it?

00:04:10All four of those electric eyes were on high.

00:04:13The burners were turned off.

00:04:14The burners were on high, and the knobs pulled off and placed on the countertop.

00:04:19He then saw a locked bedroom and knew something was burning behind that door.

00:04:25You come inside this room.

00:04:26What do you see when you walk in?

00:04:28Smoke, fire, and I see where the fire had broken through the roof, and you could see daylight through the

00:04:34hole.

00:04:35What else did you see in here?

00:04:36We found a body on the floor.

00:04:37A body on the floor?

00:04:39Yes.

00:04:39What could you tell about this person?

00:04:41It appeared she maybe had just gotten out of the shower, and a comb had been run through her hair,

00:04:47and an electrical cord around her neck.

00:04:52This was no longer just a fire.

00:04:55They doused the flames, backed out, and called police.

00:04:59What was it that stood out to you when you got to the scene?

00:05:03There was a lot of fire still there, a lot of police officers, detectives, and media was starting to show

00:05:09up.

00:05:09Jerry Salters was a young patrolman back then.

00:05:13He was asked to stand guard in the kitchen.

00:05:15I had looked on the refrigerator, and I'd seen a bunch of pictures, and it was college-aged females just

00:05:22looked like they were having a good time.

00:05:23Basically, just friends, and really touched me that, you know, this is going to be bad.

00:05:30Police learned three young women lived in that house, Valerie, Ashley, and Tara.

00:05:35Officers had no way of knowing who lay dead in the bedroom, so they ran the plates on the only

00:05:40car parked in the driveway.

00:05:42The owner, Tara Baker.

00:05:44An officer called her mother, Virginia.

00:05:47And she said, Ms. Baker, there's been a fire in Athens at Tara's house.

00:05:53And I said, oh my goodness.

00:05:55I said, we'll be right there, because I thought Tara was going to be upset, and I wanted to go

00:05:59comfort her.

00:06:00Because she lost her things, you're thinking.

00:06:02Yes, and so I said, we'll be down there very soon.

00:06:05She said, you need to come right now.

00:06:08We have a body.

00:06:09Virginia lived some 80 miles away.

00:06:12She called Tara's boyfriend, Chris Melton.

00:06:15She asked me, is Tara with you?

00:06:19I said, no, Tara's not with me.

00:06:23Virginia told him what she had just heard.

00:06:26I remember all the noise in the room stopped.

00:06:29And then I recall someone saying my name and bringing me back around.

00:06:38Chris left his plumbing job, and a co-worker drove him to Athens about an hour away.

00:06:44So when you guys get to Athens, your first stop is the police department.

00:06:47That's correct.

00:06:48What did they tell you?

00:06:48When I walk in, they started informing me that, yes, indeed, there was a fire, and that there was a

00:06:56body found in the fire.

00:06:58And they need help to identify.

00:07:02And they're asking you.

00:07:05And I recall at first saying, I can't do this.

00:07:10And he says, you know, if you don't do this, her family's going to have to identify her.

00:07:16And that convinced you?

00:07:17That convinced me.

00:07:19Police took Chris to the crime scene, where someone brought him a photo of the victim inside.

00:07:24I could not make her out.

00:07:26It was horrible.

00:07:30And I could not positively say, yes, this is her.

00:07:34And then it did come to me that I had previously given her for an anniversary gift.

00:07:40I had given her diamond-studded earrings for our two-year.

00:07:45And she always wore them.

00:07:47And I told him, I said, if this is Tara, she's wearing diamond-studded earrings.

00:07:53Moments later, one of those emergency workers came back with proof.

00:07:58Delicate, heartbreaking proof.

00:08:02And he came up to me with a closed hand.

00:08:04And when he opened his hand, there was one of the diamond-studded earrings.

00:08:09The earring you gave her?

00:08:10Mm-hmm.

00:08:12And that's why I knew.

00:08:15That's why I knew it was her.

00:08:19Now, investigators had a name and a case that would become an Athens legend.

00:08:24I could smell the shampoo in her hair.

00:08:27And I can smell it to this day.

00:08:29But the search for a killer would be tainted by mistrust and lingering suspicion.

00:08:34This was a friend of yours.

00:08:36Yes.

00:08:36I think we were all in shock.

00:08:38I remember yelling that I love Tara, that I would never hurt Tara.

00:08:43It would take a new generation to bridge the divide.

00:08:46People were sending you tips.

00:08:47Mm-hmm.

00:08:48Like week after week.

00:08:49Yes, hundreds of tips a week.

00:08:51I was just staring at the ceiling in utter shock and disbelief.

00:08:56You couldn't even process it?

00:08:57No.

00:08:57Uh-uh.

00:09:11If Tara Baker's bedroom held any clues about what happened to her,

00:09:15crime scene technician David Liedahl knew getting them would not be easy.

00:09:20What was the condition of the room?

00:09:23Well, it was a crime scene investigator's nightmare.

00:09:26Because when that ceiling fell, all that insulation everywhere,

00:09:31it was about two or three inches deep and covered most of the room.

00:09:36So it became real difficult to try to get trace evidence,

00:09:40like hairs and fibers and things of that nature.

00:09:43Was it immediately clear to you that she didn't die in the fire?

00:09:47Once I moved some of the insulation away, I could see the stab mark in the neck.

00:09:52And she also had other injuries to her.

00:09:56Eyes were black and blue, swollen a little bit.

00:09:59They found a knife by her body and signs of blunt force trauma to her head.

00:10:04The cord around her neck came from her printer.

00:10:07At the time, did you know anything else about her other injuries?

00:10:12Sexual assault?

00:10:13We suspected, yes.

00:10:14She had no clothing on.

00:10:16And the position that she was in.

00:10:18Later at Tara's autopsy, the medical examiner determined she had been raped.

00:10:23But a sexual assault kit did not provide any useful evidence.

00:10:27As the crime scene technicians worked,

00:10:29detectives wanted to talk to anyone close to Tara, including her boyfriend Chris.

00:10:34When you were in there, they were asking you questions.

00:10:36But there were more than just questions.

00:10:38They asked you for your fingerprints.

00:10:40That's true.

00:10:41That's true.

00:10:42At the time, had they told you much about what had happened to Tara?

00:10:47No.

00:10:48Nothing.

00:10:50As Tara's family headed to the police station in Athens, they knew even less.

00:10:55I'm thinking to myself, maybe somehow she fell asleep and one of her candles caught things on fire.

00:11:00But it can't be her.

00:11:01She can't be gone.

00:11:02I kept telling myself there's no way it could be her.

00:11:05I'm just sobbing.

00:11:07I was using my sweater as a tissue and I'm just laying in my uncle's arms, just absolutely sobbing.

00:11:16I was like, this is not real.

00:11:17It's a mistake.

00:11:17It's not her.

00:11:19Meredith Schroeder is Tara's sister.

00:11:21She was 15 years old at the time.

00:11:25So we pulled up.

00:11:26There was some folks waiting for us outside.

00:11:29We walk in there.

00:11:30They lead us to this conference room.

00:11:33And we went in and we sat down and we waited for a while.

00:11:37And then this detective came in and he said, well, I'm going to talk to you all in just a

00:11:42minute, but you're going to have to excuse me.

00:11:44I've got to go get a cup of coffee because I've been out in the rain all day.

00:11:47That's what he said to you.

00:11:48That's exactly what he said to me.

00:11:49At this point, has anyone officially confirmed to you what's happened, that she's died?

00:11:55And when he left the room to get his coffee, that young woman that had called me was in the

00:12:02room.

00:12:02And she said, well, we've determined that it is Tara and we're considering this a homicide at this time.

00:12:09And I, I think all of us let out screams almost.

00:12:18And I remember going in, I guess it was shock.

00:12:22I was just couldn't, the nausea was incredible.

00:12:25And we kept asking, what happened?

00:12:28What happened?

00:12:29They wouldn't tell us what happened.

00:12:31They just said, she's gone.

00:12:34Tara's roommates, Valerie Lowe and Ashley Hall, were away that Friday morning.

00:12:38They rushed back to Athens.

00:12:40We were just trying to make sense of it.

00:12:42It was just, it was horrible.

00:12:44Yeah.

00:12:44And you're young students at the time.

00:12:45And then have something like this.

00:12:47Well, you just didn't think anything like that could, could happen to you.

00:12:51The next day, Tara was supposed to have been celebrating her 24th birthday.

00:12:56Instead, her grandparents were bringing her 10-year-old brother, Kevin, to Athens.

00:13:01And my dad sat on the bed and he said, there was a fire at Tara's apartment.

00:13:08My first reaction is, is she okay?

00:13:12Is she in the hospital?

00:13:13I want to go see her.

00:13:15And he said, no, she didn't make it.

00:13:20I walked in there and his little fists were balled up.

00:13:22He was just screaming, no, Tara, no.

00:13:25I just, his world was shattered.

00:13:29Meredith always referred to her as the North Star.

00:13:33That they would sit there, you know, kind of follow her path.

00:13:37Tara was the oldest of four and she had her own special bond with each of her siblings.

00:13:42Adam was the oldest boy.

00:13:44Adam and Tara were so close.

00:13:47Meredith was next in line.

00:13:49She was very doting and protective of me.

00:13:53I had very low self-esteem growing up and she would always be like, oh, isn't my sister so pretty?

00:13:57She would do my hair, tell me, you know, it's okay.

00:14:03Kevin was the youngest.

00:14:05Tara called him her baby darling.

00:14:07Tara was my person.

00:14:09If I knew she was coming home, I would pace the door looking outside like a lost puppy waiting for

00:14:15her to drive up.

00:14:17The people close to Tara say she had a strong sense of justice and an even bigger sense of humor.

00:14:23She was one of the funniest people I know and she just didn't try.

00:14:26Tara could tell you to go straight to hell and make you look forward for the trip.

00:14:31Because she would say it in such a nice way.

00:14:32She definitely was very much the person that would come and talk to the kid at the lunch table that

00:14:41was sitting by themselves.

00:14:42She always wanted to see everybody succeed.

00:14:45Tara met her boyfriend Chris in undergrad and they stayed together when she went off to law school at her

00:14:50top choice UGA.

00:14:52It was an honor for her to be here.

00:14:54She took it seriously.

00:14:55This was her dream.

00:14:57And she had her eyes on the future.

00:14:58She knew what she wanted to do.

00:15:00She knew where she wanted to go.

00:15:01She definitely did.

00:15:02I never have known a person who loved life as much as she did.

00:15:07When you say that she loved life, what did that look like?

00:15:10She got up every morning excited.

00:15:12Sometimes she would call me and just say, Mama, look up.

00:15:15Look at the sky.

00:15:16It's beautiful.

00:15:17It's a Tara day.

00:15:18The blue sky and the white clouds.

00:15:20God made it just for me.

00:15:21But now, on this dreary day in Athens, Georgia, there wasn't an ounce of beauty to be found.

00:15:27Nothing made sense.

00:15:29A murder.

00:15:29An arson.

00:15:31Just out of the blue.

00:15:32Or maybe not.

00:15:34A few weeks earlier, two of those buildings were on fire.

00:15:39Both of them?

00:15:40Two of them.

00:15:54It wasn't long before the killing on Vaughan Drive became front-page news in the Athens Banner Herald.

00:16:01Crime scene tech David Liedahl was on the scene until late into the night, combing through the charred remains of

00:16:07Tara Baker's bedroom.

00:16:09He'll never forget it.

00:16:11I could smell the shampoo in her hair.

00:16:15And I can smell it to this day.

00:16:18Never, it never left.

00:16:20A lot of times, of course, investigators talk about different moments from a scene or a particularly disturbing scene that

00:16:26just kind of really drives home how brutal this was.

00:16:31Yes.

00:16:31This was that moment.

00:16:33Yeah.

00:16:35It also told him something important.

00:16:37Tara was most certainly killed after she got out of the shower.

00:16:42Her roommates helped police develop a timeline of the crime.

00:16:46Tara was very much a creature of habit.

00:16:49Yes, she was.

00:16:49She had a very specific morning routine.

00:16:51Yes.

00:16:52Walk me through that.

00:16:53She'd get up at like 6.30, shower, and then make her cheese grits.

00:16:58That was her breakfast of choice?

00:16:59That was her breakfast, yep.

00:17:00Every day?

00:17:01Yep.

00:17:01And then go back and get ready.

00:17:03In fact, Patrolman Jerry Salters saw Tara's bowl in the sink.

00:17:09Seeing that bowl sitting there and going about her day, and just being in there and seeing that was pretty

00:17:16hard.

00:17:17After her last breakfast, she would have gone to blow dry her hair in her bedroom like she always did.

00:17:23Her hair is very thick, so she'd sit usually at the foot of her bed, flip her head over, and

00:17:27just sit there and just blow dry it.

00:17:30Investigators noticed another detail, sealed in by the fire itself.

00:17:35She had a clock in her bedroom, and the clock quit at 9.32.

00:17:41Because of the heat?

00:17:42Because of the heat, yeah.

00:17:43So that helps you kind of narrow down a window of time of death.

00:17:47Yes.

00:17:48Yes.

00:17:50Sometime between 7.30 and 9.30, they figured.

00:17:54Initially, as you're walking through, you don't see any evidence that, you know, somebody had gone through drawers or tried

00:17:59to take anything.

00:18:01None at all.

00:18:02It was later on we discovered that her laptop was taken.

00:18:06Truth was, the entire home felt violated.

00:18:09Tara's collection of memories, photos of all those people she loved, were charred, almost lost in the ruin.

00:18:18And when investigators saw melted fabric on the kitchen burners, they knew exactly how the killer started the fire.

00:18:26The suspect had taken a blanket and put it on the stove in the kitchen.

00:18:33And when he went back into the bedroom, he took the burning blanket and threw it on the bed.

00:18:38It was my blanket.

00:18:40So they used my blanket to do that, you know.

00:18:42I mean, that detail is just so chilling to me because blankets are just, they're comforting.

00:18:48Yeah.

00:18:50When you got to the stove and you realized what had happened, what the blanket had been used for.

00:18:55Someone had to really think this through.

00:18:57You know, it's almost like a switch flipped, you know, at that moment.

00:19:00We weren't college students anymore.

00:19:03Wayne Ford has been a reporter for the Athens Banner Herald since 1982.

00:19:08In the community at the time, there were some arson fires.

00:19:11So there was speculation, is it an arsonist, that he actually come into the house, maybe surprise Tara and kill

00:19:20her, and then go about setting the place on fire.

00:19:24And those previous fires were within a stone's throw of Tara's home.

00:19:28A few weeks earlier, two of those buildings were on fire.

00:19:33Both of them?

00:19:34Two of them.

00:19:35Just after the murder, police also got specific tips about a man walking alone in the rain around the time

00:19:42of the killing.

00:19:44And from what I was told back then, they reached out to their sources, you know, might have been involved

00:19:50in different criminal activities, and a name never came up.

00:19:55One of the first things investigators wanted to know, of course, was how did the killer get inside?

00:20:01The doors were locked when firefighters arrived, but Doug Whitehead noticed something.

00:20:07I can't tell you for 100%, but that screen was out of that window.

00:20:12The window screen right here?

00:20:13This window screen, and was propped against the side of the building.

00:20:16So you're thinking maybe whoever did this came in and out through this window?

00:20:19Maybe so.

00:20:21But the killing was so violent, so up close, it looked like a crime of passion, not a random act.

00:20:30Could you get a sense in those early days, maybe, of what direction police were going by the questions they

00:20:35were asking you?

00:20:36At the time, they were just asking about any male in her life.

00:20:39Whether it be at the law school or at work or, you know, in her personal life.

00:20:45Police heard about one law school classmate who had gotten himself a nickname.

00:20:51One day, one of the police people asked me if I knew who Suit Boy was, and I said yes.

00:20:58He was called Suit Boy because on Fridays he would dress in a suit in order to ask women out

00:21:04on dates.

00:21:05I knew that he, that Suit Boy, had asked Tara out at least once, probably just the one time.

00:21:11But she was with Chris, so she definitely said no.

00:21:14Asking girls out was one thing.

00:21:16What Katie told police next sounded much more suspicious.

00:21:20The Friday morning that Tara died, he had come in and he had had an injury on his head.

00:21:27An injury the morning of the murder?

00:21:29That would get police looking in Suit Boy's direction.

00:21:32But he wasn't the only one they needed to talk to.

00:21:36Tara's mother had an idea, one disturbingly close to home.

00:21:40It, at one point, occurred to me, what if it could have been her biological father?

00:21:59On behalf of the University of Georgia Law School.

00:22:01Three weeks after Tara Baker was killed, her family joined faculty and students for a memorial at her beloved law

00:22:08school.

00:22:09Tara's stepfather, Lindsay Baker, told them Tara had been living her dream.

00:22:14I never met anybody in my life more confident in who they were, what they were doing, and where they

00:22:22were going.

00:22:22They're my little Tara.

00:22:25In the end, she never even got to finish her second semester.

00:22:30As you go through your lives, practicing law, remember, that was Tara's dream.

00:22:36That's what her dream was.

00:22:37As you do it, Tara will practice law.

00:22:40To see him standing there and talking about his little girl and trying to choke back tears was just, it

00:22:51was tough.

00:22:53Everything was tough for the Bakers in those early weeks, especially the not knowing.

00:22:58As she grieved, Virginia asked herself repeatedly, who could have done this?

00:23:03She started to wonder about someone who was no stranger to the family, her first husband, Tara's father.

00:23:10He threatened me when I divorced him a lot, and his threats to me were hitting me in the head

00:23:16to the point that you couldn't recognize my face.

00:23:19Tara's family had been told few details about what had happened to her, nothing about the rape or stabbing, but

00:23:25they did know she'd suffered blunt force trauma to the head.

00:23:30Tara was eight years old when her parents divorced.

00:23:32Growing up, she thought of Lindsay as her dad and wanted no contact with her biological father.

00:23:38She refused to answer his phone calls. She just didn't want anything to do with it.

00:23:42They didn't have a relationship.

00:23:43Absolutely not.

00:23:44And she made that clear when she changed her last name, taking her stepdad's name and dropping her biological father's.

00:23:52But just days before she was killed, Tara got a letter from him.

00:23:56She was very upset that he had found her. She had been withholding her address from him. I don't know

00:24:03how he got it.

00:24:04But apparently they had a conversation, and he said that he did learn that she had changed her name.

00:24:11That was in the letter also, and the letter was forwarded from her previous address to this address.

00:24:16And she was a little concerned.

00:24:20Now the wheels were turning in Virginia's mind. Did the name change set him off?

00:24:25He had a tremendous ego, and he didn't like being rejected.

00:24:31She urged investigators to look into him.

00:24:34And they checked him out. They called him in at my request.

00:24:38Police spoke to him at least twice.

00:24:40They examined his alibi and could find no evidence he was in Athens at the time of the murder.

00:24:45By then, they were increasingly focused on someone else.

00:24:49Someone Tara did have a relationship with.

00:24:52Her boyfriend, Chris Melton.

00:24:54With Chris, because he was the boyfriend, you know, if these other factors were true,

00:24:59emotional killing, had access to the house, then, you know, Chris is a suspect.

00:25:06Police had done more than just take Chris's fingerprints.

00:25:09Two days after the murder, they had him back at the police station,

00:25:13where they took blood and hair samples, along with pictures of his body.

00:25:17What were police telling you about him?

00:25:19They didn't say anything at first, but then they were saying that he is a suspect.

00:25:23They told you that?

00:25:23Yeah.

00:25:25And they went a step further.

00:25:27They urged Tara's friends to steer clear of Chris.

00:25:31This was a friend of yours.

00:25:32I mean, you all had known each other since undergrad.

00:25:34Was that jarring for you to hear?

00:25:36Stay away from this guy?

00:25:37Everything was jarring back then, though.

00:25:39I mean, I think we were all in shock still.

00:25:41And, like, we didn't know who we were targeted.

00:25:43We didn't know, you know, so you're just scared.

00:25:46When we wanted to respect the process, so if that would have been a part of the process,

00:25:50then we were going to do whatever we were told to do, because we wanted an answer.

00:25:56Tara's family got the same warning from police, and the bakers stopped talking to Chris.

00:26:02Was your dad thinking that Chris was possibly in some way responsible?

00:26:08I think that he was, but he didn't flat out sit me down and say he did this.

00:26:12I just think that he was trying to make sense of it.

00:26:15And if that was what the police were telling him and pointing in that direction, then he was going to

00:26:21pursue it.

00:26:23My dad was so protective of his kids, and he was devastated as a six-foot-three, nearly 400-pound

00:26:35man

00:26:35that he couldn't protect his daughter from the evil that happened.

00:26:41He said, if you've got something on him, I want to know.

00:26:45If you've got, if he was tying a shoe down the street, I want to know.

00:26:50He did that with more than just Chris.

00:26:53Nothing was recovered from the crime scene to rule Chris in or out.

00:26:57No fingerprints, no DNA.

00:27:00Forensic investigators did find hair in Tara's hand, but testing determined it was her own.

00:27:07The killer didn't leave behind anything.

00:27:10He came in and killed Tara, then he left.

00:27:13With so little evidence, the investigation was stuck.

00:27:18And police would return again and again to the same place.

00:27:22I was yelling in the phone.

00:27:24I felt like they had nothing, not on me, but just for the case.

00:27:43The months were slipping by.

00:27:46In January 2002, the one-year anniversary of Tara's death came and went with no arrest.

00:27:53For the Baker family, the unanswered questions were agonizing.

00:27:58They knew police had to hold back details about the investigation, but they wondered if they were even getting basic

00:28:04facts.

00:28:05I was getting it very sporadically.

00:28:07Oh, this happened.

00:28:08Oh, well, this also happened.

00:28:10And then this happened.

00:28:11Every so often, the Bakers would pile into the car and drive the 80-odd miles to the Athens-Clarke

00:28:17County PD.

00:28:18I was in the car with them when they would drive up there to make the police talk to them.

00:28:23And I would just be, you know, sitting out in the lobby, twiddling my thumbs.

00:28:27So you remember this from a teen's perspective of your parents, just the frustration.

00:28:31The frustration, the anger, the feeling of helplessness that they couldn't do anything for Tara anymore.

00:28:38This is all that they could do.

00:28:40The investigation was constantly changing hands, and to the family, no one seemed to be in charge.

00:28:46Kevin went from a little boy to a young teen watching investigators come and go.

00:28:52You hit a wall, and then a new team starts over and said, okay, well, we'll figure it out.

00:28:58Well, we're going to start at the beginning.

00:29:00Virginia says some of the information they did get in those first few years was bizarre and flat-out wrong.

00:29:07The police came to my house and demonstrated how somebody had snuck up behind her.

00:29:15And one pretended to be Tara, and the other was, you know, the culprit,

00:29:19and pretended how she was, her throat was cut from behind, so she died quickly.

00:29:24They demonstrated this?

00:29:25They demonstrated that in my living room.

00:29:27It was a twisted game of charades.

00:29:29So officers were acting out?

00:29:31For your family, what they believe happened?

00:29:33Mm-hmm.

00:29:35To my mother.

00:29:35And then later walked it back.

00:29:37Said, no, that's not what happened.

00:29:39Later admitted that was wrong?

00:29:41Yeah.

00:29:43With every restart came renewed focus on the boyfriend, Chris.

00:29:48For the longest time, we were told, this is who did it.

00:29:51Whether or not we believed it, we were told.

00:29:53And so naturally, you don't reach out, you don't talk to that person.

00:29:57But police had, repeatedly.

00:29:59His answer never changed.

00:30:11Chris says each time he talked to police, he gave them his alibi.

00:30:15He had not seen Tara in days.

00:30:17The night before the murder, he slept over at his parents' house,

00:30:20almost an hour from the crime scene.

00:30:23That morning, he went to work, stopping at a few places along the way.

00:30:27When they question you again, are they asking you different questions, new questions?

00:30:31Most of the time, it's the same questions.

00:30:34It's like it landed on somebody else's desk, and now they're starting over.

00:30:39It happened again and again.

00:30:41The phone would ring, and the questions would start.

00:30:44Once they would reach out and talk to me, they would ask me questions,

00:30:47and I would return and ask questions myself.

00:30:49What about this, or what about that, you know?

00:30:51And they wouldn't give me answers.

00:30:54Did anyone ever come out and just tell you that you were a suspect?

00:30:58You know, as far as actually saying that, I don't recall them actually saying that I was a suspect.

00:31:06It was just in the actions.

00:31:08Chris says it was excruciating because all he ever wanted to do was spend the rest of his life with

00:31:13Tara.

00:31:14He says he knew she was special just a few weeks after their first date.

00:31:18They ran into each other at a crowded college bar.

00:31:21We end up back-to-back, and I feel her hand reach around and, like, tickle my arm with her

00:31:28fingernails.

00:31:30And then I reach back and I hold her hand.

00:31:33And it's kind of silly to say this, but I remember I gotta go to the restroom so bad.

00:31:38But you're holding her hand.

00:31:39Yes.

00:31:40And you don't want to let it go.

00:31:41And I'm not letting go.

00:31:43You could not have dragged me away.

00:31:46They never got their happy ending.

00:31:48Instead, Chris says he tried to go on with his life.

00:31:51He built up a small business as a plumber and did his best to put the pain behind him.

00:31:56But one time, when yet another investigator made yet another call, Chris didn't hold back.

00:32:02She asked me a question, and I had to take time to consider, you know, just, I need to answer

00:32:10the question.

00:32:11And then she aggressively flipped things around a little bit and said, well, didn't you say this or that or

00:32:19something?

00:32:19And then that's when I just kind of lost it.

00:32:23Do you remember what you said?

00:32:24I remember yelling that I love Tara, that I would never hurt Tara, and I needed her to know this.

00:32:32And I was yelling in the phone.

00:32:35And I felt like they had nothing, not on me, but just for the case.

00:32:41Still, Chris says he always picked up the phone when investigators called, because maybe it would finally be the call

00:32:48that mattered.

00:32:49I'm waiting on the phone call that says, Chris, we have somebody.

00:32:55We've got the person.

00:32:56We have this information.

00:32:58We can share this with you now.

00:33:00And then the next phone call I get is another question.

00:33:03Then, four years after the murder, someone new took over the case.

00:33:08Would he see something everyone else had missed?

00:33:11So let me make sure I have that straight.

00:33:12This is one of the very few people who has a key to this apartment.

00:33:16He was there at the crime scene, and police never interview him.

00:33:33It became a cruel ritual.

00:33:36Year after year, Tara's close friends came together to mark the anniversary of her death.

00:33:41You graduated, you moved on with your lives, and still, there were no answers.

00:33:48That was tough.

00:33:49It's been very difficult, you know, all these years not knowing, you know, the why and what truly happened.

00:33:56As the years passed, the relationship between the Athens-Clarke County PD and the Baker family deteriorated.

00:34:03One of the most egregious things we did was miscommunicate with the Baker family.

00:34:09Early on, there were some investigators that told them things about the case file that were just not true.

00:34:18David Griffith, a civilian crime analyst with the Athens PD, began looking into Tara's case four years after she was

00:34:25murdered.

00:34:25I'll never forget meeting Meredith Baker for the first time, introducing myself, and she's dismissive, and she tells me to

00:34:34my face,

00:34:35you're just another face in this long, drawn-out investigation, and next year, you probably won't be here.

00:34:42Wow.

00:34:42They felt burned.

00:34:43They felt burned.

00:34:44Yeah.

00:34:45Griffith resolved to turn the situation around.

00:34:47What was different about the way David Griffith handled this?

00:34:50Well, for the first thing, he was patient enough to listen to me yell at him.

00:34:53That's saying a lot.

00:34:55It does, and he kept us cool.

00:34:57By the time he got his hands on the Tara Baker case file, it was thousands of pages thick.

00:35:03Griffith hit reset.

00:35:04He started in a familiar place.

00:35:07In my mind, initially, it lent itself more to a domestic violence-type scenario,

00:35:13so I think that made me personally suspect Chris Melton initially.

00:35:18Maybe it was a lover's quarrel that went really sideways.

00:35:22A crime of passion supported by the fact that Tara's killer didn't arrive armed with a murder weapon.

00:35:28The knife came from a knife block in the kitchen.

00:35:32Disorganized is how we classified it.

00:35:35All of the tools that were used to commit the crime are sourced right there from the scene of the

00:35:41crime.

00:35:41What does that tell you about the type of person who could have done this?

00:35:45What it told me is that we weren't dealing with a criminal mastermind.

00:35:50Griffith re-examined Chris's alibi in a new round of interviews.

00:35:54The police interviewed Chris Melton's parents.

00:35:57His parents see him go to bed in his bed at their house.

00:36:00His father gets up at 5.30 in the morning and sees Chris's truck out in the driveway, so believes

00:36:06he's at home.

00:36:07Chris's assistant told police he picked Chris up for work at 7.15 a.m.

00:36:11So he has a pretty good alibi.

00:36:13He's got a pretty good alibi.

00:36:14And the best piece of his alibi is at the 9 a.m. hour, he's caught on camera making a

00:36:21withdrawal at a bank over by his parents' house.

00:36:25At that point, he's an hour away from the crime scene.

00:36:29Notes in the file indicated police saw the video of him making that withdrawal.

00:36:33They're allowed to view the video, but the bank employees won't give them the videotape and ask them to go

00:36:40through Wachovia's legal department to get a copy of the security footage.

00:36:46Did they follow up?

00:36:47Evidently, there was no follow-up because there's no mention of that videotape after that in the case file.

00:36:53So Griffith sent a detective back to the bank to get a time-stamped receipt for Chris's transaction.

00:36:59We were confident in the timeline that we had put together for Chris Melton, and we felt like he would

00:37:05have had to have been able to bend space and time to have killed Tara Baker.

00:37:10Griffith reinvestigated other possible suspects, Tara's biological father and that awkward law student they called Suit Boy, who gave police

00:37:18an alibi.

00:37:19Griffith ruled them both out.

00:37:22But as he was digging through the file, a name caught his eye, someone who had easy access to Tara's

00:37:28home.

00:37:31William Bryant Barrett has a master key, and that really makes us wonder, is William Bryant Barrett possibly the killer?

00:37:40When we start looking at his timeline, we know that he shows up on the crime scene at some point

00:37:47the day that her body's found.

00:37:50And local affiliates filming outside the crime scene actually capture him on video.

00:37:57What's he doing?

00:37:58He's watching from outside the crime tape as the firefighters work.

00:38:02And there was more.

00:38:03The night after Tara's murder, police asked him to help secure the building.

00:38:08He gets to talking with investigators about theoretically how somebody could have made entry,

00:38:13and he demonstrates how to open one of the windows with a knife blade.

00:38:18So let me make sure I have that straight.

00:38:19This is one of the very few people who has a key to this apartment.

00:38:23He was there at the crime scene.

00:38:25He shows investigators how to open and close the window with a knife blade.

00:38:29And police never interview him?

00:38:31No.

00:38:32How does that happen?

00:38:33I don't know the answer to that, Blaine.

00:38:36It was just one of the lapses in investigative effort that happened in this case.

00:38:40And in my mind, it's probably the biggest lapse.

00:38:44By the time police finally sat Barrett down for an interview, Jerry Salters had gone from patrolman to detective.

00:38:50He conducted the interview.

00:38:52There were some discrepancies on what time he was where and did he have time to commit this.

00:38:57I did move into more of an interrogation where I became accusatory with him just to really gain a response.

00:39:05And how did he respond?

00:39:06He didn't ask to leave.

00:39:07He stayed there.

00:39:08What did that tell you?

00:39:09It tells me either, one, he's being honest, or two, he's pretty good at lying.

00:39:16The maintenance man did give them something highly suspicious, something he shouldn't have known,

00:39:21what police call holdback information.

00:39:23It's details of the crime scene that only the killer would know and investigators would know.

00:39:30What does he say?

00:39:31He tells us about the ligature that was used and that she's badly beaten.

00:39:36And that's not information that's been publicly released.

00:39:39At least we believe so in the moment as we're conducting this interview.

00:39:43Did he volunteer this holdback information?

00:39:45He did during the course of the interview.

00:39:47But he disavows having anything to do with Tara Baker's death and sticks to his story.

00:39:53And again, there was no forensic evidence to link the maintenance man or anyone else to Tara's brutal death.

00:40:00Still.

00:40:01William Brian Barrett becomes person of interest number one.

00:40:06And what do you do?

00:40:06We flail for years believing that William Brian Barrett's involved in the death of Tara Baker and just not having

00:40:18enough to get a warrant for his arrest.

00:40:23So the infuriating cycle continued.

00:40:26Questions, no answers.

00:40:29Something would have to change.

00:40:31And when it did, somebody new was asking the questions.

00:40:34You are getting new information.

00:40:38Absolutely.

00:40:39Liz called me and said we have a name.

00:40:42I was just freaking out.

00:40:45I'm like, everybody get to headquarters.

00:41:01Tara was never far from Meredith's mind.

00:41:0418 years after her sister's murder, Meredith was 33 years old with children of her own.

00:41:10What were those years like for you?

00:41:12My wedding day was difficult.

00:41:15She should have been my maid of honor.

00:41:23Having my children was difficult.

00:41:26Explaining to my children they had an aunt Tara that would have absolutely adored them.

00:41:30For much of that time, Tara was never far from David Griffith's mind either.

00:41:35He had analyzed and agonized over the case, but it never led to an arrest.

00:41:40In 2019, as Griffith was preparing to leave the Athens-Clarke County Police Department, he decided Tara's family should know

00:41:47what he knew.

00:41:48So he called Meredith, who had become the family point person.

00:41:53There were things in the case file that we had not divulged to the family.

00:41:57I proposed that we divulge everything we knew about the case file to Meredith.

00:42:03He sits me down with a whole host of other folks, and he walks me through the whole timeline.

00:42:08Huh.

00:42:19He told her the horrific details the cord found around Tara's neck, and how she was stabbed, beaten, raped.

00:42:27And all of this is new information to you.

00:42:31Being presented in a chronological yes was all new, because I still did not have confirmation as to whether or

00:42:39not she was sexually assaulted.

00:42:41The facts, almost two decades later, were hard to face, but still better than not knowing.

00:42:48Virginia realized the absence of facts had sent her suspicions in the wrong direction, like her ex-husband.

00:42:54She says she never would have insisted police investigate him if she'd known the whole story.

00:42:58We didn't even know about, you know, the sexual assault at the time.

00:43:02Keep that in mind.

00:43:03We didn't know about the stabbing.

00:43:04Griffith told Meredith about his number one person of interest.

00:43:08He gave me the maintenance man theory, but it was still a theory at that point.

00:43:13He also shared something else, something no previous investigator had ever said.

00:43:19He told me absolutely Chris didn't do it.

00:43:22That was huge news.

00:43:24For years, their family had shunned Chris.

00:43:27I felt guilty knowing that he suffered in silence, and that we never reached back out, and knowing what all

00:43:36he had gone through.

00:43:38By now, any student who knew Tara Baker firsthand had long left.

00:43:43With each new class, her murder became more like a memory passed down through campus memorials or newspaper articles.

00:43:51That's how a young freshman named Cameron J. Harrelson first heard her name.

00:43:56It was an anniversary piece, like, that the Red and Black newspaper had done on her death at the time.

00:44:01You were a true crime fan yourself?

00:44:03Yes.

00:44:03A fan of Dateline, a fan of podcasts.

00:44:06A few years later, Cameron decided he wanted to launch his own podcast.

00:44:11And Tara Baker's case, he thought, was the perfect place to start.

00:44:14But first, he had to convince Virginia Baker.

00:44:18A random guy like me calling Miss Virginia Baker for the first time, I believe her first response to me

00:44:24was,

00:44:25who are you and who are you with?

00:44:27I said, I don't even know what a podcast is, so you're going to have to explain some of this

00:44:31to me,

00:44:31and why would I want to talk to you?

00:44:33And at the time, I had no podcast name, had no idea what I was doing, and said,

00:44:38I'm just me, and I want to learn about your daughter.

00:44:41He convinced me that he cared about Tara and wanted to tell her story.

00:44:45And that's all I've ever wanted, is to tell her story.

00:44:47Yeah.

00:44:48And he said, maybe we can bring in, you know, some clues.

00:44:52Maybe we can bring in, you know, some tips, maybe.

00:44:55The podcast also opened a door that Chris Melton thought was closed for good.

00:45:00How did you find out that there was a podcast about Tara's case?

00:45:05Meredith had actually reached out via email.

00:45:08What did you think?

00:45:10It was an emotional moment, because there's so much time had gone by since I'd heard from the family.

00:45:15The email led to a phone call.

00:45:19And that conversation was pretty, you know, pretty emotional, you know?

00:45:26And she was trying to urge you to talk, to talk on this podcast.

00:45:29She's like, would you participate and help us move forward?

00:45:34And absolutely.

00:45:36You would.

00:45:37I would.

00:45:38Cameron launched the podcast in July of 2020.

00:45:42Welcome, welcome, welcome.

00:45:44The story of Tara Louise Baker will be the focus of Season 1 of Classic City Crime.

00:45:50Family and friends told Cameron all about Tara,

00:45:53and also vented their frustration and anger at the investigation.

00:45:57What would you say to the police department?

00:46:01Don't ever do this to anybody else.

00:46:04And if you don't know what you're doing, get help.

00:46:07My goal is to remind people of her life, tell people what happened, show them the investigation,

00:46:15and then hopefully as a result of that, law enforcement could solve it.

00:46:19It's not my job, it's theirs.

00:46:21He interviewed Chris about the years he spent under suspicion.

00:46:24Did police continue to follow up with you and interrogate you?

00:46:28They did come after me.

00:46:30I would go and give hair samples, blood samples, tissue.

00:46:35And Cameron asked about his feelings for Tara.

00:46:38She was just such a beautiful person on the inside.

00:46:42When she smiled, she bit the tip of her tongue.

00:46:46And it just, I really thought that was the best.

00:46:48And people were listening.

00:46:51Over two years, the podcast audience grew to hundreds of thousands.

00:46:55It wasn't just people listening.

00:46:58People were calling in.

00:47:00People were sending you tips.

00:47:01Like week after week.

00:47:03Yes, hundreds of tips a week.

00:47:06And vetted a lot of that.

00:47:07And the things that we believe were vetted enough, we took to the air.

00:47:10Still, after dozens of episodes and all those tips, no new leads for police.

00:47:17Two years in, Cameron ended it without any real ending.

00:47:21And I did not think it would be ethical for me to continue producing content with Tara's family just for

00:47:29the heck of it.

00:47:30Without answers?

00:47:31Without answers.

00:47:31But then he had another idea.

00:47:34One that would put Tara's case in an even bigger spotlight.

00:47:37This is not just a law.

00:47:40This was appropriations.

00:47:41We're talking money.

00:47:55By the spring of 2022, the Athens-Clarke County Police Department had a new leader.

00:48:00You're the police chief now.

00:48:01You're at the very top.

00:48:03Yes.

00:48:03In 2001, he was that rookie cop standing in Tara Baker's kitchen.

00:48:08By 2006, he was a detective interviewing potential suspects.

00:48:12Now, he was Chief Jerry Salters.

00:48:15He'd always carried Tara's case with him.

00:48:18As the chief, I want the community to feel safe and know that they have a police department that cares

00:48:25about this community and will do anything to solve the case.

00:48:28Still, to Tara's mom, it all felt like deja vu.

00:48:32Even with a new chief, there was no movement in the case.

00:48:36And I called a station and asked to speak to him.

00:48:39How was that conversation?

00:48:40Oh, that poor man.

00:48:44You gave him an earful.

00:48:45Oh, I did.

00:48:47And it was not all kind.

00:48:49I don't think you can unhurt someone.

00:48:51But I do believe that letting the family gain trust in the police department and our intentions with the case,

00:48:59I think it went a long way.

00:49:00But good intentions only go so far.

00:49:03And Tara's family was becoming resigned.

00:49:05They might never find Tara's killer.

00:49:07But while Cameron J. had stopped reporting on Tara's case, he still had a few ideas.

00:49:14I said, well, Tara was such a fierce advocate for justice that wouldn't it be amazing if we could make

00:49:21sure that she effected change for others?

00:49:24He wanted to find a way to get more resources dedicated to cold cases.

00:49:28And so I started researching.

00:49:29In the process of doing that, I'm Googling online and just so happened to see that there's another unsolved murder

00:49:35in the town next door to where I grew up.

00:49:39And their family's kind of sort of advocating for the same thing.

00:49:42So I called that family the Coleman family.

00:49:4718-year-old Rhonda Coleman was found murdered in 1990, and her case was never solved.

00:49:53And so we united forces then.

00:49:55Together, Cameron helped the Coleman and Baker families push for a new law, one that would create and, crucially, fund

00:50:03a brand new cold case unit in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

00:50:07At what point did this go from, okay, we're doing a podcast to, hey, we're pushing for new legislation to

00:50:14be passed?

00:50:14It was a shock.

00:50:18I never envisioned doing anything like that.

00:50:20I thought we were just going to do this podcast and that would be the end of it.

00:50:23And I went with Cameron and my children to the Capitol, and we lobbied with the congressmen and some of

00:50:30the senators from the state.

00:50:32So you're going into the Gold Dome.

00:50:34You're shaking hands.

00:50:34You're talking to people.

00:50:35Yes, absolutely.

00:50:36You're telling Tara's story.

00:50:37Yes.

00:50:38The campaign worked.

00:50:40In the spring of 2023, the Coleman-Baker Act passed, and Georgia's Governor Brian Kemp signed it into law.

00:50:46Today we're helping to restore hope for those still grieving, hope for justice, and hope for closure.

00:50:52And so what did the Coleman-Baker Act do?

00:50:55It, number one, funded a cold case unit at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to the tune of $5 million.

00:51:02And that's big because this did not exist before.

00:51:04No.

00:51:05There really was no recourse.

00:51:06And this is not just a law.

00:51:06This was appropriations.

00:51:07We're talking money.

00:51:08What was your hope with this bill?

00:51:10That it would solve cases for other families.

00:51:13I felt like Tara's case had gone on so long, there was no hope for that.

00:51:17But I wanted to see it help someone else, and I wanted to see it be part of her legacy.

00:51:22Still, Tara's family applied for her case to get a second look under the new law, just in case.

00:51:28And soon, Meredith found herself walking into the office of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to meet yet another team

00:51:34of investigators.

00:51:35I'm like, okay, I guess we're doing this.

00:51:38This is just kind of our last Hail Mary.

00:51:41See if anything comes of this.

00:51:42If not, you know, we tried.

00:51:46Yeah.

00:51:47So you were assigned two agents.

00:51:49Yes.

00:51:49What were their names?

00:51:50Liz and Jeremy.

00:51:52Special agents Liz Bigham and Jeremy Howell.

00:51:56So what are you thinking when you get this assignment?

00:51:58I better solve this?

00:51:59I mean, it was a privilege that I was trusted enough, and they had enough confidence in me to be

00:52:08assigned the case in the first place, honestly.

00:52:10The case has always had this mythology here in Athens.

00:52:13So it was exciting to have an opportunity to see the evidence, to see the case file, to read it

00:52:20and go through it.

00:52:22I can remember the file drawer that it sat in.

00:52:24It was the bottom file drawer in the hallway, and it took up the entire file drawer.

00:52:28It was such a large case.

00:52:30Tell me about that first meeting, your first conversation with them.

00:52:33I was shocked by, they were professional, but the amount of empathy that they expressed.

00:52:40You felt something in that meeting?

00:52:42I believed the words that they were saying.

00:52:45But Meredith and her family had seen this movie before.

00:52:48So you're thinking, okay, great, they're sincere, they're kind, they care, but what are they going to do?

00:52:53Right.

00:52:53What were they going to do?

00:52:55Well, they were about to take a new look at an old piece of evidence, and it would change everything.

00:53:02We were all obviously really excited about the fact that we had a lead.

00:53:20It had been 22 years in the making, the case that just couldn't be solved.

00:53:25Now, Georgia Bureau of Investigation Special Agents Liz Bigham and Jeremy Howell were stepping up to the plate, determined to

00:53:33do what their predecessors could not.

00:53:35This is a case that has been examined, re-examined, looked at any number of different ways since 2001.

00:53:43Why might this time be different?

00:53:45I think what makes it different is that we're given the gifts of time, resources, and a supervision structure that

00:53:58allows us, pretty much uninterrupted, to be able to start this process and see it through.

00:54:03I knew something was happening when they started calling me, asking for information that I had, files that I had.

00:54:11Finally, a law enforcement agency was asking to see six years' worth of work.

00:54:17And not just local, but the state law enforcement.

00:54:19State agency, yes. It was huge.

00:54:22Were you optimistic going into this?

00:54:24I'm wildly optimistic about cases such as this.

00:54:27The agents also had the advantage of modern-day science and a cutting-edge crime lab.

00:54:32There's a big difference between 2001 and 2024.

00:54:35Yeah, there's new and modernized techniques that we can utilize in order to re-examine certain things.

00:54:40We knew there was a ton of evidence that was kept at the Athens-Clarke County Police Department,

00:54:45so we wanted to make sure that if there was anything that could be done with that at the lab,

00:54:49that we got that process rolling.

00:54:51We came to the conclusion that, call it, maybe 10 or so pieces of evidence could go back to the

00:54:56lab for additional testing or re-examination.

00:55:00Evidence like that cord around Tara's neck, along with the knife and knife block from the kitchen.

00:55:06There was also a power block connected to the printer.

00:55:09The hope? That forensic science had evolved enough to reveal fingerprints investigators couldn't detect back in 2001.

00:55:18Liz called me and told me that they were going to be resubmitting things to the GBI crime lab.

00:55:22And I was like, oh.

00:55:23She said that they were resubmitting the knife block, that they were resubmitting the knife, that they were resubmitting the

00:55:28transformer power block.

00:55:29I was like, okay.

00:55:30Did you send those items off? Any luck? Did you get anything?

00:55:33No.

00:55:34Nothing new?

00:55:35No.

00:55:35No, and I'm not surprised with that, given the dynamics of this scene.

00:55:40You mean the fire, the fact that there was water?

00:55:42Yeah, your fire, exposure to water.

00:55:44Everything that you don't want to have happen in a crime scene happened in this crime scene.

00:55:48So it made it difficult to get those, anything from those items?

00:55:51Absolutely.

00:55:52We started getting notifications that, all right, there's nothing on this, there's nothing on that.

00:55:58I'm like, okay, all right, that's fine. I suspected that would be the case.

00:56:01The agents then turned to another piece of old evidence, Tara's sexual assault kit.

00:56:07Back in 2001, that kit yielded no clues.

00:56:11And then it's just kind of sat there since 2001.

00:56:16Now, two decades later, the agents wondered whether DNA science had caught up with the evidence.

00:56:21Our DNA manager had been exposed to some training and had some experience with a different way to test a

00:56:31sexual assault kit.

00:56:32And it was essentially testing for male DNA.

00:56:36And he just said, hey, you know, this has never been tested for male DNA.

00:56:40Let's try it.

00:56:41That's something that wasn't available back in 2001.

00:56:43That was not available.

00:56:44These techniques were not available back then.

00:56:46She said that they were resubmitting the rape kit.

00:56:48And I went, huh?

00:56:49You didn't even know that existed.

00:56:51I didn't know that it was still there.

00:56:52I told her, I said, I thought that all the evidence, DNA evidence, had been exhausted.

00:56:58And she said, I don't think they knew what they had.

00:57:01So she's laying this out for you.

00:57:02And it's like this treasure trove of new information.

00:57:06I was just in disbelief.

00:57:07And I'm at work.

00:57:08I'm standing in the conference room with the door closed, listening to her.

00:57:10And I'm like, OK.

00:57:12I think that's the first time that I had a glimmer of hope.

00:57:16Like, this could happen.

00:57:17There might be something there.

00:57:20It could be a long process, the agents warned, likely nine months before they had any results.

00:57:26So I was like, OK, all right.

00:57:29But what's nine months to 25 years?

00:57:31Yeah.

00:57:32What is the waiting period like for you each, waiting for that result to come back?

00:57:37I mean, of course, we were on pins and needles in the sense that we were really hoping we would

00:57:42get something from it.

00:57:43And we were just kind of waiting for that phone call.

00:57:46In a case where months had turned to years, then decades, finally, something happened in record time.

00:57:53Just two and a half months later.

00:57:56The results of that test come back.

00:57:57What did they show?

00:57:59I mean, essentially, it was that we had male DNA.

00:58:02We were all obviously really excited about the fact that we had a lead.

00:58:07A lead at long last.

00:58:09And there was something else, something that would bring these agents back to the beginning.

00:58:14Do you all re-interview Chris Melton?

00:58:17We do.

00:58:18If there was ever a time to be 100% on the record, it is now.

00:58:26I was thinking, here we go again.

00:58:43Finally, a break in the Tara Baker cold case.

00:58:46And it was big.

00:58:47DNA from an unknown male recovered from Tara's sexual assault kit.

00:58:53While investigators were looking into that, the lab called back.

00:58:56They'd also detected Chris Melton's DNA.

00:58:59Given that Chris was Tara's boyfriend, his wasn't that surprising.

00:59:03But the agents still wanted to talk to him.

00:59:06Do you remember what you thought when you got a call from the GBI?

00:59:09I was thinking, here we go again.

00:59:13We've gotten some information back from her sexual assault kit.

00:59:16So there's been some DNA that's come back to you.

00:59:19The DNA raised questions about the timeline, questions Chris had been asked before.

00:59:25Specifically, when was the last time he saw Tara before she was murdered?

00:59:30We've got lots of questions.

00:59:31Some of them were kind of invasive.

00:59:34They wanted verification of when the last time we had seen each other or been intimate.

00:59:40It was almost two weeks.

00:59:43What I can recall, like 10 days.

00:59:4510 days was not the answer agents were expecting.

00:59:49They were like, well, hang on.

00:59:51That's not going to, that doesn't work out right.

00:59:54That was a problem for two reasons.

00:59:57It's highly unlikely DNA would still be detected 10 days after a sexual encounter.

01:00:02This evidence is, it doesn't last long where it was.

01:00:09And even more confusing, back in 2001, Chris told police they had seen each other five days before she was

01:00:16killed.

01:00:17Was it five days, 10 days?

01:00:18You know, originally you said that you hadn't seen her in five days and then it changes to 10 days.

01:00:25I just remember 10 days.

01:00:26I don't know why I say that.

01:00:28If there was ever a time to be 100% on the record, it is now.

01:00:36Time had gone by.

01:00:37So many decades had gone by.

01:00:39And I was confused.

01:00:42I genuinely didn't do anything to her.

01:00:45Were you concerned about that discrepancy?

01:00:47Not necessarily because it's been 24 years and memories change and fade.

01:00:52They weren't concerned because they knew Chris had a solid alibi.

01:00:55What's more, they had explosive new information about that other DNA profile from the unknown male.

01:01:02The lab ran it through the FBI database and got a hit.

01:01:07Liz called me and said, we have a name.

01:01:11I was just super excited.

01:01:13I was just freaking out and calling my boss, calling Jeremy, called our analyst.

01:01:21And I'm like, everybody get to headquarters.

01:01:22And she was like, we have a match.

01:01:26And I was just staring at the ceiling.

01:01:30In utter shock and disbelief.

01:01:33You couldn't even process it?

01:01:34No, uh-uh.

01:01:36His name, Edric Faust.

01:01:38Had you heard it before?

01:01:40No.

01:01:40Seen it before?

01:01:41No.

01:01:41What's your next step?

01:01:42We just wanted to learn everything we could about Edric.

01:01:46They learned Edric Faust had a rap sheet, convictions for criminal trespassing, aggravated assault, battery, attempted robbery, and carrying a

01:01:54concealed weapon.

01:01:56The biggest thing that we were kind of taken aback by is that he lived 585 feet from Tara's residence.

01:02:03Wow.

01:02:04Mm-hmm.

01:02:05Very close.

01:02:06You could essentially stand in Edric's front yard and see the back door of Tara's residence.

01:02:11Now they needed to figure out if Faust and Tara knew each other.

01:02:15You want to establish if there's any sort of known relationship, any known connection, any chance meeting between the two.

01:02:23You're kind of cross-referencing their daily routines to see where they might have overlapped, where they might have intersected.

01:02:28Absolutely.

01:02:29Naturally.

01:02:29We could find no connection or relationship between Edric and Tara.

01:02:36Meaning no reasonable explanation why his DNA would have been present.

01:02:39Absolutely.

01:02:39No reasonable explanation whatsoever.

01:02:42And if Faust was Tara's rapist, they believed he was also her killer.

01:02:46At that point, we felt comfortable arresting him.

01:02:50So in May of 2024, more than two decades after her murder, officers arrested Edric Faust in a Walmart parking

01:02:57lot.

01:02:58They took him to the Athens-Clarke County PD, where Agents Bigham and Howell sat down to talk to him.

01:03:04Hey, how are you?

01:03:06Good.

01:03:06Good, hey, Ms. Faust.

01:03:07He was cordial.

01:03:08He answered our questions, you know, for a while.

01:03:14How are you, Ms. Faust?

01:03:15I am 48.

01:03:19Are you sure?

01:03:20Okay.

01:03:22Hey, what's a good home address for you?

01:03:25Having dispatched with the pleasantries, Bigham turned up the heat, and Faust's demeanor changed.

01:03:30We've got he's launched.

01:03:32Mm-hmm.

01:03:33They are for a myriad of charges that range from arson to murder.

01:03:41Where?

01:03:42Mm-hmm.

01:03:43For me?

01:03:44Mm-hmm.

01:03:44The agents held off on telling Faust about the DNA evidence.

01:03:48Our game plan going in was to visit if there was any known relationship between the two.

01:03:56And so you wanted to see what he would say?

01:03:58Yes.

01:03:59Did you know her?

01:04:00Uh-uh.

01:04:01No connection to her?

01:04:02No, no.

01:04:03That's when they told Faust they had his DNA.

01:04:07My DNA?

01:04:11Man.

01:04:12It's been a long time.

01:04:14We've made so many advancements in things.

01:04:18If you can help us understand why your DNA is in that house, help us.

01:04:26He never gave them an explanation.

01:04:28Instead, he said he needed a lawyer.

01:04:30He ended it with, you can go ahead and take me to jail.

01:04:36And did you, in fact, take him to jail?

01:04:38We obliged.

01:04:40Authorities charged Edric Faust with Tara's murder, rape, and arson.

01:04:44That cleared the maintenance man, who, for years, had been the number one person of interest.

01:04:50When they came and said, we made an arrest, I didn't know how to breathe.

01:04:56Mm.

01:04:57I was like, how do I react to this?

01:04:59For over two decades, investigators have worked tirelessly to find answers for the family and friends of Tara Louise Baker.

01:05:06And bring some amount of closure and healing to this horrific event.

01:05:12I was elated.

01:05:15I was shocked.

01:05:19I was emotional.

01:05:21Then you hear the name, Edric Faust.

01:05:24Yes.

01:05:25What did you think?

01:05:26Who's this guy?

01:05:28Who is Edric Faust?

01:05:30I was like, I don't know who this person is.

01:05:32I've never seen this person before in my life.

01:05:34Just the fact that this person was in my peripheral the whole time was terrifying.

01:05:39He was close by.

01:05:40Mm-hmm.

01:05:41This is somebody who had been living just right by your house.

01:05:45Yeah.

01:05:45I'm like, did I see him?

01:05:47Like, is this somebody I passed in the street?

01:05:48Yes.

01:05:48Maybe waved hello to at some point.

01:05:50We certainly wouldn't have thought that anyone would have been stalking us or watching us.

01:05:55We were in a safe college town.

01:05:58Meredith learned about Faust's criminal past,

01:06:00including that he'd stabbed someone in the neck just two weeks after Tara's murder.

01:06:05What are you thinking as you're reading this?

01:06:07How is this person still around?

01:06:10Tara's gone.

01:06:11She was denied a life.

01:06:13And this guy has lived 25 years of wreaking havoc and ruining other people's lives.

01:06:19Like, why?

01:06:20Why?

01:06:21Tara's loved ones hoped their questions would be answered at trial.

01:06:25I was ready to see the person who created and caused all this to have to face its consequences.

01:06:32I figured that I was going to have to be involved somehow because I was her boyfriend.

01:06:37Have a seat.

01:06:38Little did he know just how involved he would be.

01:06:42Chris Melton's DNA.

01:06:44Chris Melton told law enforcement.

01:06:46Chris Melton's actions.

01:06:47It just seemed like I was the one on trial.

01:06:50Why didn't you cry?

01:07:04Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen.

01:07:06We are about ready to begin the trial of the state of Georgia versus Edric Faust.

01:07:10For 25 years, you all were wondering and waiting, and now you're in the same room as this person.

01:07:16I can't even explain the feeling.

01:07:17I tried not to look at him most of the time.

01:07:21Other times, I felt like my glance was burning through the back of his head.

01:07:26When the trial of Edric Faust began in early February of 2026,

01:07:30Tara Baker's family and many of her friends were there in court.

01:07:34Katie Lonstein had envisioned this moment for years.

01:07:3825 years of this, I wanted a monster, and I got a boring man in a tan shirt.

01:07:46District Attorney Kalki Yalaman-Chile led the prosecution.

01:07:50What is the key thing that you need to drive home to the jury?

01:07:53The DNA.

01:07:54The DNA and the lack of any type of connection between Tara Baker and Edric Faust.

01:08:02Assistant DA Chris Bolden handled the opening statement.

01:08:05Who killed Tara Baker?

01:08:09Ladies and gentlemen, Edric Faust killed Tara Baker.

01:08:13And now, the final chapter begins today.

01:08:19Remember how neighbors told police they saw a man walking near Tara's house the morning of the murder?

01:08:24To see somebody walking.

01:08:26Those witnesses took the stand.

01:08:27The person had on an orange shirt of some sort.

01:08:30It's the memory that stands out.

01:08:32Male, female?

01:08:33Yeah, male, young male.

01:08:36White, African American?

01:08:37African American.

01:08:38The prosecution explained to the jury how Faust's DNA was found on Tara's body,

01:08:43and then the jury heard Faust tell the GBI he never met Tara.

01:08:53You need to make it clear to the jury that there's no reason that his DNA would have been within

01:09:00proximity of Tara Baker.

01:09:01That's correct.

01:09:02It seemed like a fairly straightforward case, until it wasn't.

01:09:06The prosecutor knew Chris's DNA was also detected,

01:09:10and knew the defense was planning to make Chris the center of its case.

01:09:14So the prosecutor addressed that head on.

01:09:16Let's talk about what Chris was doing on January the 19th of 2001.

01:09:21Chris was investigated so thoroughly at the beginning of this case.

01:09:28We felt like all of that evidence was really strong for us to show Chris's alibi,

01:09:34and that, in fact, it was not possible for him to have been the individual who murdered Tara.

01:09:40Witnesses testified they saw Chris throughout that early morning,

01:09:43and on bank security video time-stamped around 9 a.m.

01:09:47This witness was the branch manager in 2001.

01:09:51We watched Chris entering the bank, coming in and filling out the withdrawal slip,

01:09:56and then going to the teller and getting the cash.

01:09:59The prosecutors knew they had to put Chris on the stand.

01:10:02He told the jury about every place he went that morning and answered questions about himself and Tara.

01:10:08How was the state of you and Tara's relationship, you know, in those months leading up to her murder?

01:10:17Everything was wonderful.

01:10:19It was difficult for us not to see each other as much as we would have liked,

01:10:25but we were both in the understanding that we were pursuing future paths for us to have a better future

01:10:34together.

01:10:35And then it was the defense's turn.

01:10:38Anyone listening to false attorney Ahmaud Cruz...

01:10:41This is Chris Melton.

01:10:42...might have thought it was Chris Melton on trial.

01:10:44Chris Melton stated Chris Melton's behavior.

01:10:48Chris Melton's DNA.

01:10:49Chris Melton's actions.

01:10:51In his opening statement, Cruz said Chris Melton's name nearly a hundred times.

01:10:56I found out more about Chris Miller than I did Edric Faust.

01:10:59And in Cruz's cross-examination of Chris, this was his first question.

01:11:03Why didn't you cry?

01:11:07When?

01:11:08Just now.

01:11:09Why didn't any tears fall out of your eyes?

01:11:14They are falling out.

01:11:16During trial, the defense attorney barely challenged the DNA evidence against his client.

01:11:21Instead, he focused on Chris Melton's emotions, his alibi, and his changing story about when he last saw Tara.

01:11:28Did you have sex with Ms. Baker the day of her death?

01:11:30No, sir.

01:11:31Chris was now sure he last saw Tara on Sunday, five days before the murder.

01:11:37From the beginning, I've said I saw her the weekend prior.

01:11:43From the beginning, you've said that?

01:11:45Yes, sir.

01:11:46That you've seen her the weekend, and that has always been what you said?

01:11:51There was a time that I was confused, and it was 20-plus years later.

01:11:58The defense asked Chris to look at a photo of Tara taken after the murder.

01:12:02This was the photo that you were shown to ask to identify Ms. Baker?

01:12:08No.

01:12:09This was not the photo?

01:12:10I don't believe that was the photo.

01:12:11It was a photo Chris had never seen before.

01:12:14He must have cherry-picked some of the worst pictures that I have ever seen.

01:12:20From the crime scene?

01:12:21It seemed to be more of an autopsy picture.

01:12:32I just, I had never seen something so bad.

01:12:37Mr. Mellon, you were just shown the photograph of Ms. Baker's ceased, and you have not shed a tear.

01:12:48I felt like I was being tortured.

01:12:52And you felt like that crossed the line?

01:12:54Yes.

01:12:55Attorney Cruz showed the jury a few pictures as well.

01:12:59Photos of Chris's hands, taken during his second police interview, two days after Tara's death.

01:13:05These are Chris Melton's hands after Ms. Baker's death.

01:13:09Chris Melton said he punched a wall in anger and frustration two days after the murder.

01:13:14My injuries came from punching the wall.

01:13:18And a detective backed him up, telling the jury that on the day of the murder,

01:13:22Chris's hands showed no signs of injury.

01:13:25Were those marks on his hands on January 19th of 2001,

01:13:30when you interviewed him and then fingerprinted him?

01:13:33They were not.

01:13:34Okay.

01:13:34If they had been, would you have taken pictures of them the way you did on January 21st?

01:13:40Yes.

01:13:40Okay.

01:13:41Then, the defense homed in on the hair found in Tara's hand.

01:13:45You will hear evidence in this case that there is not a shred of evidence that puts Mr. Foss,

01:13:53let alone a black person, in Ms. Baker's home.

01:13:58All of the evidence, including the gift Ms. Baker left in her hand for police,

01:14:06it's Caucasian hair.

01:14:08The defense attorney told the jury that the Caucasian hair found in Tara Baker's hand

01:14:13was a gift for police.

01:14:15What was he trying to do there?

01:14:16He was trying to convince the jury that Mr. Melton was the perpetrator of the crime.

01:14:21Because it was Caucasian hair.

01:14:23That's correct.

01:14:24But prosecutors made sure the jury knew what investigators had known for years.

01:14:28That the hairs in Ms. Baker's hands were her own hairs.

01:14:33The number one rule is you don't lie to a jury.

01:14:36You don't overpromise.

01:14:38And the moment he said that, I wrote down on my pad, they're hers.

01:14:43That's her hair.

01:14:45So either he doesn't know that, or he is intentionally misleading the jury.

01:14:51Tara's family thought the whole defense was a weak attempt at smoke and mirrors.

01:14:56But with the case headed for the jury, not everyone agreed.

01:15:00This is just shocking.

01:15:02And then, like I say, it's so unbelievable.

01:15:19For those with eyes on the Athens-Clarke County courtroom,

01:15:22the trial of Edrick Faust had seemingly taken a detour.

01:15:27It just seemed like I was the one on trial.

01:15:29I couldn't believe it.

01:15:31I couldn't believe it.

01:15:31It was maddening.

01:15:32But outside the court, the defense's words appeared to be landing.

01:15:38We met protesters, including some of Faust's family members,

01:15:41who believe he was wrongly accused.

01:15:44This is just shocking.

01:15:45And then, like I say, it's so unbelievable.

01:15:48Justice for Edrick Faust.

01:15:50I want Edrick Faust to walk free.

01:15:52And, like Faust's defense attorney, they pointed the finger at Chris Melton.

01:15:56He lied, he lied, he lied because he had not seen her in 10 days.

01:16:00Chris, there are some people who may be watching this who believe that you killed Tara Baker.

01:16:07What do you want to say to those people?

01:16:09I would say that I did not kill Tara Baker.

01:16:14I did not kill her.

01:16:16I loved her.

01:16:17Ladies and gentlemen, the state has rested.

01:16:19Back inside the courtroom.

01:16:20Defense rests.

01:16:21Defense rests.

01:16:23Almost immediately.

01:16:24Yeah.

01:16:25No witnesses.

01:16:27Was that a shock to you?

01:16:28Yes.

01:16:29Yeah, absolutely.

01:16:30For closing arguments, both sides gave it their all.

01:16:33They falsely accused him.

01:16:35And they tried mightily.

01:16:39Mightily.

01:16:41To bury the truth.

01:16:42There is not one shred of evidence, not one single shred of evidence that indicates that

01:16:51Chris Melton was angry with Tara, would hurt Tara, or wanted her dead.

01:16:59Then, the jurors had the case.

01:17:01They asked to review testimony.

01:17:03DNA reports.

01:17:0412 hours later.

01:17:07To the judge, the jury is ready to deliver the verdict.

01:17:10I was so terrified, so terrified that we were going to come out the other side no different.

01:17:17As he waited in the courtroom, Kevin Baker was suddenly the heartbroken little boy of 25 years ago.

01:17:24That person that is a grown man, that is married, that has a family, those layers peeled off,

01:17:30and that 10-year-old boy was left sitting there.

01:17:33And inside, it was that 10-year-old boy crying in that same hotel room.

01:17:37The jury finds the defendant on the following counts.

01:17:42Count one, malice murder, guilty.

01:17:46That first guilty just rocked everything back, rocked us all back.

01:17:54I was writing it down as they were, like, count one, guilty.

01:17:57Count two, guilty.

01:17:59Guilty on all counts.

01:18:01Murder, rape, and arson.

01:18:05When they read the verdict and said guilty to all 12 counts, my heart lipped, but I couldn't show any

01:18:15emotion.

01:18:16I did not want to make it any harder on his family by showing joy or, you know,

01:18:24because I know how hard it would have to be to think that somebody in your own family could be

01:18:30capable of this type of thing.

01:18:33Police warned Chris to stay away from the courthouse for the verdict.

01:18:36He heard it hunched over a cell phone.

01:18:54But for Tara Baker's family, still no peace.

01:18:58The trial had triggered a social media storm, and the verdict only made it worse, with Chris, Tara's family, even

01:19:05Tara herself, all under attack.

01:19:09There was a lot of online social media commentary.

01:19:13Yes, which made everything so much worse.

01:19:15I mean, some of it got bad.

01:19:16Some of it was painful at times.

01:19:18Oh, it was horrible. I can't believe people can be that cruel.

01:19:20Did that almost kind of cast a shadow of sorts over this moment that you'd waited so long for?

01:19:26More than a shadow.

01:19:28A blanket of pain.

01:19:31Chris's life and business were upended.

01:19:34The anger on social media forced him to take down his company's website.

01:19:38My beloved sister.

01:19:40At false sentencing, Tara's brother Adam spoke directly to his sister's convicted killer.

01:19:45Tara and I were more than siblings.

01:19:49We were best friends.

01:19:51Today, sitting in this courtroom face to face, I can honestly say, I have forgiven you.

01:19:56I'll harbor no hate in my heart.

01:19:58I've given that all to God.

01:20:00I mean, Tara's been gone for 25 years.

01:20:01It doesn't change that 25 years.

01:20:03It doesn't change the 25 years that are to come.

01:20:05She's still gone.

01:20:06Yeah.

01:20:07But to know that we finally got justice, I can't describe that feeling.

01:20:14Fost was sentenced to two consecutive life terms, plus 45 years in prison.

01:20:20We asked Fost and his defense attorney for interviews.

01:20:24Fost did not respond.

01:20:25His attorney declined.

01:20:26Free agent votes.

01:20:28Free agent votes.

01:20:30Fost is appealing his conviction, and his supporters are raising money for him.

01:20:35The chief of police hopes the community can move forward.

01:20:38As a chief, I'm responsible for the safety of this community and also building meaningful

01:20:43relationships.

01:20:44And during times like this, when you have a verdict, where people think one thing or the

01:20:50other, I think you just have to trust in the courts.

01:20:53That's where you used to be taller.

01:20:55Not long after sentencing, Meredith had dinner with Chris and met his wife, Jenny.

01:21:00They talked for hours.

01:21:02I've had multiple conversations where I apologized for the silence.

01:21:06What did he say to you?

01:21:09Don't apologize.

01:21:10It's painful.

01:21:13But there's no animosity whatsoever.

01:21:20At UGA, posing at the arch is a graduation rite of passage.

01:21:24It's where Tara's friends come to remember her.

01:21:27What do you think about Tara now as you stand here by this arch?

01:21:31One, she's thrilled that this case has been solved.

01:21:34But two, she's probably mad at us because it took 25 years.

01:21:39I have never had my life changed so much by someone that I've never met.

01:21:43And Tara Baker did that for me.

01:21:46And for so many people, that is Tara's legacy.

01:21:50What made Tara special was the ability to connect with every single person she comes in contact

01:21:58with.

01:21:58That's one thing that I keep hearing is that she made so many people feel special.

01:22:03Yes, I've heard so many people tell me that if they hadn't seen her in a long time, when

01:22:08they saw her again, she would make them feel like it was the happiest day of her life.

01:22:16That's all for this edition of Dateline.

01:22:18And don't forget to check out our Talking Dateline podcast, in which we'll go behind the

01:22:23scenes of tonight's episode.

01:22:25Available Wednesday in the Dateline feed, wherever you get your podcasts.

01:22:29We'll see you again next Friday at 9, 8 central.

01:22:34I'm Lester Holt.

01:22:36For all of us at NBC News, good night.

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