DNA Evidence Catches Killer Couple | The New Detectives | Real Responders

paper was light gold in medieval times i want tobacco sugar [Music] that everything we thought we knew about the world might turn out to be completely wrong in pennsylvania the night manager of a fast food restaurant is found brutally murdered the apparent victim of a robbery gone bad for 15 years police are unable to identify a suspect but then an elite group of forensic experts agreed to take on the case a man disappears from his lubbock texas home all indications point to foul play but until police can find the victim's body they are powerless to prove murder [Music] when the trail of clues stops homicide investigators are often left with few options but an elite group of forensic experts known as the vidoc society can heat up a cold case and apply their expertise to deliver collective justice [Music] on february 4th 1984 in the philadelphia suburb of falls township pennsylvania the manager of a fast food restaurant arrived for the early morning shift he was alarmed to find that the front door was unlocked recently there had been a string of robberies in the area nothing appeared to be missing [Music] but in the kitchen he discovered the night manager terry brooks lying on the floor she had been brutally murdered within minutes officers and forensic technicians from the falls township police department arrived at the scene they found the 25 year old victim lying face up on the kitchen floor a large knife jutted out of her throat a plastic trash bag had been used to cover her face judging by the coat she was wearing it appeared terry brooks was preparing to leave for the evening [Applause] in the restaurant office police found that the cash drawers and money bags had been cleaned out [Music] the victim's shoes were found lying by the desk though this was just one of several restaurants to be robbed within a few months it was the first to end in murder [Music] technicians searched for any clues to the killer's identity they found nothing [Music] no signs of a forced entry were found around the unlocked front door based on the evidence police theorized that after terry brooks left the restaurant she was ambushed by the robber and then forced back inside [Music] her death had been a violent one terry brooks had been beaten strangled and then stabbed in the throat she had been dead several hours hair and skin scrapings were found in the victim's hands and fingernails indicating she had put up a fierce struggle but in the days before dna testing was available examiners could only conclude that the samples had not come from the victim [Music] looking for any clue to help them identify a suspect investigators interviewed the victim's parents terry they said was a cheerful young woman who made friends easily she had put herself through college and worked hard hoping to own her own restaurant one day [Music] recently she had quit her job as a waitress for a better opportunity as the manager of the fast food restaurant she had just gotten engaged to a co-worker from her previous place of employment though terry was living at home her parents didn't know her fiance very well the engagement had been sudden [Music] they couldn't think of anyone who might want to hurt their daughter terry's fiance 22 year old scott keith also had no idea who could have committed such a brutal act on the night of the murder he was home sleeping he had to be up early the next day around 6am the following morning he drove by her house on his way to work he knew terry had worked late and he wanted to be certain she had arrived home safely [Music] when he noticed her car wasn't in the driveway he became concerned and woke up her parents when they discovered terry had not been home they called the restaurant that's when they learned she had been murdered though robbery appeared to be the motive behind the murder police returned to the restaurant to speak with the manager [Music] they collected all of the employee files looking for evidence that the killer may have been a disgruntled employee the manager could think of no one on his staff that had a problem with him or terry [Music] everything suggested that terry brooks had been a random target and for police those are the toughest cases to solve desperate to generate a lead examiners scrutinized all of the evidence collected from the crime scene they were in luck a single latent fingerprint was found on the trash bag that covered the victim's face it was matched to one of terry brooks's co-workers at the restaurant detectives brought in the employee for questioning and to give blood and hair samples but she didn't seem capable of the violence inflicted on terry brooks and the employee had an explanation for the print before leaving on the night of the murder she had replaced all of the trashcan liners she said that she hadn't noticed anything unusual that night we were told however she did recall an incident a few days earlier [Music] near closing time two men came into the restaurant they appeared drunk and were causing trouble terry tried unsuccessfully to defuse the situation when she threatened to call the police the men became verbally abusive they made several threats before leaving the employee didn't know the men and hadn't seen them since that night police finally had their first big break in the case now they needed to identify the killers before they struck again [Music] several area store owners had similar encounters with individuals who fit the description of the two men but no one seemed to know who they were or where they could be found [Music] the identity of the prime suspects in terry's murder continued to elude police soon the investigation into her murder turned cold and it would remain that way for the next 14 years after 14 years it seemed that the 1984 murder of 25 year old restaurant manager terry brooks would never be solved but in 1998 police in falls township pennsylvania decided to re-examine all of the unsolved homicides in their jurisdiction detective sergeant wynn cloud came across the terry brooks case file there was a lot of physical evidence available and i examined all that and it was all good physical evidence and and preserved well i believe that this had a very high solvability sergeant cloud enlisted the aid of homicide detective nelson whitney and deputy district attorney laurie markel after reviewing the case files the team found a hole in the investigation conducted more than a decade earlier at that time there were several fast food restaurant robberies that were occurring in this area and the investigation conducted in the 80s had really focused on that idea so we decided that in addition to looking at the possibility that the murder was a robbery homicide we would also learn more about terry and investigate the possibility that the murderer had been someone who knew her investigators tracked down the people who knew terry and her habits well they located her former manager [Music] when he viewed the crime scene photos for the first time one in particular caught his attention detective nelson whitney explains so one of the things that terry would do every day uh would be to clean out the ashes out of the ashtray and place it in a little ledge above the desk she would close the the ledger on the desk she would put the phone in a certain position put the ruler in the calculator away the photograph of the desk from the crime scene clearly showed that the ashtray was in the middle of the desk that it had ashes in it there was an open book there a ruler was out a calculator was out terry was also known to kick off her shoes when she did desk work the information was at odds with previous suspicions that terry was accosted outside the restaurant and then forced back inside [Music] and that opened up the possibility that she knew her killer and had even let him inside the store but so far that was only a theory and one that put investigators no closer to identifying terry brooks's killer police needed more help for that they turned to an elite crime solving team headquartered just a few miles away in philadelphia there in the historic downtown club building some of the greatest criminal theorists have been meeting every other month since 1990. this is the home of the bedok society a non-profit private brain trust of the nation's most esteemed law enforcement officials forensics experts psychologists and government agents [Music] dick laventhal is the director of communications for the doc society [Music] the society is named after eugene francois vidak frenchman that lived from 1775 to 1852. we credit him with being the father of modern day detective practice he's truly our inspiration he's a man that thought out of the box he was the first detective who began to keep files and records on criminals methods of operations the society is limited to 82 full-time members one for each year of vidoc's life originally they assembled to discuss historical cases and mysterious unsolved crimes that soon changed very quickly we segued into an organization whose reason for existence was to look into unsolved homicides and try to solve the anguish of families when there's a loved one who's been murdered to have an unsolved homicide accepted by the vidoc society investigators must first present their case to its members at the next vidoc gathering sergeant cloud did just that i presented this on a factual nature i did not give any theories so i wouldn't taint any of their opinions everything i gave them were what facts i gathered from the case from the crime scene and when i after i was done presenting to them i was approached by probably 30 members possibly even more but 30 that were real interested in it the doc society co-founder richard walter offered to donate his expertise to the case my area is crime assessment and profiling and basically crime assessment is the act of looking at the crime scene what's there as well as what's not there at that crime scene then taking that information and reconciling that with known patterns of behavior that we know in terms of criminal activity so we know a great deal about the offender from the crime scene [Music] for walter the violence observed in photographs suggested the killer was motivated by vengeance or anger not money walter believed that the killer was someone close to the victim and the robbery was staged to throw investigators off his trail from the lack of organization observed at the crime scene detective cloud also learned that the killer likely had little more than a high school education he probably worked as a menial laborer perhaps a cook at a pizza or hamburger joint because of his rage experts theorized he likely had difficulty maintaining relationships with women investigators turned to the victim's parents hopeful they could identify someone who resembled the profile terry's father was dying of liver disease the couple didn't know anyone who resembled the profile however they recalled that on the morning of the murder terry's fiancee scott keith had acted strangely though keefe appeared upset to learn his fiancee had been murdered he refused to go to the hospital to help identify the victim he said he didn't want to be late for work for terry's parents scott's actions that morning had always led them to believe he was hiding something police agreed to find out what that was investigators interviewed terry's old friends none spoke highly of scott they were all surprised to learn terry was engaged to him [Music] scott was possessive and jealous and he was in financial trouble that allegedly resulted from a drug problem [Music] things became more strained when terry took a pay cut to manage the fast food restaurant just before she was murdered terry had talked about ending the engagement [Music] based on the information detective cloud began delving into scott keefe's background what he found was an uncanny parallel to the psychological portrait generated by vidoc society experts right down to his job our ultimate suspect worked at a pizza joint had been for years he had several relationships personal relationships but they were very rocky with the help of the budok society investigators had finally identified a suspect in the 15-year-old slaying of terry brooks now it was up to falls township police to prove it with the help of the budok society an elite non-profit group of law enforcement officials police in falls township pennsylvania had finally identified a suspect in the 1984 murder of terry brooks now investigators turned to physical evidence collected nearly 15 years earlier to prove it the biological evidence collected at the time of the autopsy was forwarded to the nearby drug scan laboratory [Music] there new dna technology unheard of at the time of the murder had become a sophisticated crime solving tool forensic scientist diane marshall examined the evidence [Music] the samples had been carefully stored and dna is very stable over time genetic tests revealed that the skin found under teres fingernails had not originated from her [Music] marshall looked for dna samples on the murder weapon to see if she could produce a match but after so much time it appeared that no traces of blood remained and i took apart the knife where the blade actually joined into the wooden handle and i was digging around there with a scalpel a clean scalpel and i removed like really this crusty old material that was in there and then i did process that specimen for dna i determined that there was two different dna types there one which matched the victim and one which matched an unknown suspect and that dna type from the suspect was the same that it was recovered under the fingernails [Music] investigators had finally uncovered evidence that could link a suspect to the murder though all the circumstantial evidence was pointing to scott keith they didn't have the proof needed to obtain his dna samples [Music] they would have to find another way to get the evidence they needed [Music] detective whitney suggested they focus on his trash [Music] once trash has been placed on the curb it is considered abandoned property in the eyes of the law police can legally examine and collect its contents on trash day investigators arranged for a garbage truck to make only one pickup the trash in front of scott keefe's house [Music] a few blocks away police took possession of the garbage and hand delivered it to the crime lab hoping to find something that contained dna samples diane marshall zeroed in on several cigarette butts recovered from the trash when one smokes a cigarette one deposits their saliva on the filter included in that saliva are epithelial cells which come from the lining of your mouth marshall successfully extracted cellular material from two different brands of cigarette butts found among the debris so i isolated the dna from the saliva deposit on the filters of each of the brands of the cigarettes and i noticed that one particular brand had one specific dna type it did not match any of the evidence from the crime scene but dna from the second brand did on the 15th anniversary of terry brooks's murder scott keith was brought in for questioning and to provide blood samples according to detective nelson whitney he never realized he was a suspect we told him that he was an important witness that he was because of his close relationship with our victim someone who can give us information that no one else could that would help us in our case and he was only too happy to help after answering a few questions detectives asked if he would mind taking a polygraph test as a matter of routine keefe agreed [Music] the blood samples were rushed to the lab yeah i think that's right hours later while awaiting the dna tests vidoc society co-founder bill fleischer carefully reviewed the polygraph results the polygraph records these physiological changes as part of our individual defense mechanisms known commonly as fight flight in a polygraph situation we ask questions if those questions pose a threat to your well-being because you lie to them and there's the fear of being detected in lie your body immediately reacts physiologic heart starts a big faster blood's redirected to different organs in your body your mouth gets dry your knees get weak the butterfly in the stomach your palms get sweaty though the suspect denied any involvement in terry's murder fleisher concluded that scott keefe was being deceptive now examiners looked to scientifically verify that keith was a murderer when his dna samples were compared to those recovered from the victim examiners found a match police confronted the suspect with the test results scott keith had no choice but to confess [Music] keefe stated that he often stayed with his fiancee at the restaurant when she was working late on the night of february 4 1984 terry brooks decided to end their engagement flew into a rage and killed her he then staged the scene to make it appear that the murder was the result of a robbery gone bad after so much time the victim's family finally had answers [Music] deputy district attorney laurie markel terry brooks's family had to live for 15 years with not knowing who had killed her or seeing that person face any measure of justice it meant a great deal to be able to on the morning of february 5th 1999 go to mr and mrs brooks and say we've arrested the person who killed your child he's in custody we've amassed considerable physical evidence against him and he's confessed scott keefe pled guilty to murder and was sentenced to life in prison in the terry brooks case a misleading crime scene led investigators to some wrong conclusions [Music] but in some cases detectives face a more daunting set of circumstances no crime scene at all [Applause] on sunday may 19 1991 jim dunn and his wife received a late night call at their yardley pennsylvania home [Music] the caller identified herself as alicia hamilton the girlfriend of the dunn's 24 year old son scott upset alicia said scott had disappeared from their lubbock texas home jim told alicia not to worry he was expecting a call from scott any day [Music] but scott never called and jim dunn's attempts to reach his son were unsuccessful though concerned he knew that scott was probably busy with his hobby buying and restoring cars this is jim don scott's father i hadn't talked to scott in about a week and we'd been talking we all usually talked at least once a week and of course scott was always had some kind of a project going he was looking for money to help him buy a new car or buy a new body for a car so he could change the motors from one to the other but after a few days passed with no word jim dunn contacted his son's boss at a car stereo installation company in lubbock texas the boss said scott hadn't shown up for work in several days [Music] when he last saw him scott hadn't been feeling well and asked to leave work early he left his tools and his car at work and had his girlfriend alicia hamilton come pick him up [Music] scott said he hoped to be back at work in a few days the boss told jim dunn that alicia hamilton called the shop a few days later she believed scott had left her for another woman but scott's father didn't believe his son would simply abandon his prized cars he contacted lubbock police to report his son missing but there was little investigators could do as an adult scott dunn had the right to be missing more importantly there was no proof that a crime had taken place still detective tal english agreed to look into the case he basically told me how unusual it was for scott to to be gone at all just to disappear like this and the two things that he was really concerned about that concerned him was his he had left his tools at his work and he had left his car there and i had not taken either one those those two items were extremely important to him and jim knew that he wouldn't just leave that later that evening detectives contacted scott's live-in girlfriend alicia hamilton she had last seen him just hours before he disappeared she said she brought scott home from work after he complained of feeling sick she put him in bed and made him some tea she wanted to stay and take care of him but alicia was already late for her waitressing job scott insisted that she go alicia said goodbye and went off to work she hadn't seen him since [Music] though she had no idea where scott had gone alicia had discovered something unusual while rearranging the furniture she found that a piece of carpet underneath the sofa had been neatly cut out unsure of the significance investigators asked to look around the residents in the bedroom they found the missing piece of carpet it had been duct taped to the floor and was covering a bare patch of the rug alicia hadn't noticed it before underneath the patched carpet investigators noticed large reddish reddish-brown stains they appeared to be blood [Music] when we saw that it looked like a crime scene we kind of backed up that's when our identification section was called in they came out and we wanted them to photograph the scene prior to actually anything being moved tests confirmed that the stains were human blood [Music] though it was unclear if the blood had originated from missing 24 year old scott dunn the finding indicated that something violent had happened inside that bedroom a concerned father's intuition had exposed a possible homicide while looking for answers in the disappearance of 24 year old scott dunn police in lubbock texas made a troubling discovery in the master bedroom of the apartment the young man shared with his girlfriend detectives discovered blood stains underneath a section of carpet authorities scoured the room for more evidence under a light source technicians found copious amounts of blood throughout the room on the walls and ceiling they found smears and streaks of more blood it was a telltale sign that someone had tried to clean up evidence of a brutal crime blood samples carpet fibers and the duct tape from the bottom of the carpet were collected they also retrieved scott dunn's hairbrush for possible dna samples at the crime lab examiners successfully generated scott dunn's dna profile from hairs collected from his brush when that was compared to the ones extracted from all the blood evidence they found a match for detective tal english there was no doubt scott dunn had met with foul play [Music] but the investigation was about to face a crushing setback [Music] prosecutors wouldn't touch the case according to the district attorney's office texas law required a body to actually open a homicide investigation [Music] and we didn't have that we had evidence indicating that there was probably one that occurred but without that body it was going to be difficult to actually open it texas authorities intensified their search for proof that scott dunn had been murdered [Music] his girlfriend alicia hamilton was questioned again though she couldn't explain the blood evidence alicia remained convinced scott had run off with another woman as the questioning continued however she thought of something else she and scott had been having problems with a neighbor a man named tim smith according to alicia tim had been harassing her in recent weeks alicia said she met tim at a local nightclub a few months back she admitted that she began dating him outside of her relationship with scott when she realized the mistake she had made she tried to break it off with tim but he couldn't seem to let go he began to follow her and would show up at the apartment she shared with scott she tried according to her to distance herself from him tim wouldn't let that happen he lived in the same apartment complex at an apartment that was further down from where their apartment was and was hanging around a lot and she just couldn't get rid of him though authorities didn't officially have a crime they now had a potential suspect before looking closer at tim smith however they first needed to rule out that scott had left town with another woman investigators tracked down a woman who had been spending a lot of time with scott prior to his disappearance she admitted she and scott had become close friends but nothing more just before he disappeared scott told her that he wanted to end his relationship with alicia but he admitted to being nervous about the confrontation alicia's ex-boyfriends had warned scott she was controlling and abusive one stated she was constantly looking for proof that he was being unfaithful something as innocent as a greeting card from an old friend would set alicia off into a jealous rage [Applause] she threatened her old boyfriends with physical violence and sometimes she tried to make good on those threats [Music] scott feared how alicia would react to the news that the relationship was over alicia hamilton wasn't the caring and concerned girlfriend she had presented herself as being but that hardly proved she had anything to do with scott's disappearance police paid a visit to tim smith the man alicia claimed had been harassing her and scott he was in the process of packing up his apartment when detectives asked where he was going he gave a startling answer he and alicia hamilton had just bought a place and were moving in together tim smith denied any involvement in scott dunn's disappearance then officers noticed a roll of duct tape it appeared similar to the tape found in scott dunn's bedroom [Music] at the lubbock police department crime lab criminalist scott williams compared the tape found at tim smith's apartment against the tape found in scott dunn's bedroom we look at the physical characteristics this would include looking at the color the texture any type of embossing on the duct tape and of course in duct tape there are fibers or strands running through the duct tape we look at the the spacing and what those fibers are made of all of the characteristics matched next the chemical composition of the adhesive was analyzed the two samples were identical in every way and there was something else i noticed on the side of the roll of duct tape that there was fibers and hairs adhered to the side i asked david young a person who does our hair analysis to determine if these could have had some other common origin in the case trace evidence examiner david young compared the hairs on the roll of duct tape found in tim smith's apartment with ones from scott dunn's hairbrush [Music] he found one consistency after another it basically tells us that at some point in time scott dunn was around that roll of duct tape and therefore since we linked the duct tape to the part of the crime scene it helped put scott dunn with that roll of duct tape that was possibly at the crime scene as well police now had a physical link between the possible crime scene and tim smith's apartment tim smith was now the prime suspect in a missing person's case and his relationship with alicia hamilton could not be ignored but scott dunn's fate remained a mystery until authorities could produce his body they would be unable to prove murder [Music] police in lubbock texas suspected that missing 24-year-old scott dunn had been murdered his girlfriend alicia hamilton and a man named tim smith were emerging as the prime suspects [Music] but without the victim's body they were unable to prove that harm had come to scott dunn [Music] the case threatened to go cold but scott's father jim dunn refused to let his son's case slip away i'd continue to press the issue in for almost a year and was trying to find out as much as i could about lisa hamilton who she was and also then the case that just actually had stalled because the district attorney i had spoken to him a couple of times and he said don i don't know why you're calling me he said you don't even have a body you don't have a crime uh he said it's just a missing person determined to find justice for his son jim dunn traveled to albuquerque new mexico alicia hamilton's hometown [Music] he began digging into her past looking for anything that could demonstrate she was capable of murder he found nothing he prepared to return home to pennsylvania [Music] empty-handed i came back to the hotel i just relaxed and was kind of beaten down from not really finding out anything that would really help me that much and flipped on the television set and just caught the very end of a tv show here was these detectives and a whole group of people called the vidoc society investigating unsolved homicides and i said my goodness those people are right in philadelphia which is like 25 miles from where i live i was in texas jim dunn contacted the group members of the vidak society invited him to present the case at their upcoming gathering after the presentation was finished vidoc society co-founder bill flescher spoke one-on-one with jim dunn you could see that he was beside himself that he was a distraught father he definitely believed that his son had been murdered he felt that alicia hamilton was involved in some manner in scots disappearance and murder and he was looking for help he was a human being that was in need of help from from professionals authorities realized they had to first prove that a murder had taken place without a body that would not be easy vidak society members turned to renowned crime scene reconstruction expert tom bevel for help crime scene reconstruction is especially useful in cases for example where you don't have a body where there's a question as to what might have taken place do we just have a person with a a minor bleeding wound that has left on their own power or do we have a case in which there's a serious injury such as possibly death for answers bevel needed to determine what type of object had caused the blood spatter patterns found in scott dunn's bedroom [Music] though most of the blood stains had been smeared in an attempt to clean up the scene some cast off patterns remained intact [Music] using an object coated with blood he was able to recreate the size and shape of the stains observed at the crime scene they were consistent with having been caused by a blunt object like a bat or a pipe having established that scott dunn was violently beaten bevel next looked to determine if the 24 year old could have survived such an assault for that he would need to establish how much blood had been shed he poured blood onto a similar piece of carpeting until the dimensions of the stains matched the ones found on the floor of scott dunn's bedroom [Music] he concluded that no one could have survived the amount of blood loss necessary to replicate all of the stains when presented with the findings prosecutors finally agreed to take on the case society experts had helped transform a missing person's case into a homicide investigation it was the break lubbock police had been waiting for now investigators focused on finding evidence that could physically link alicia hamilton and tim smith to the murder they began reviewing files for anything they might have overlooked they found something some of the hairs recovered from the duct tape found at the crime scene had not originated from scott dunn tim smith was brought in for questioning the following day he continued to deny any involvement and eager to cooperate he provided police with a hair sample alicia hamilton provided one as well [Music] examiners compared the samples taken from tim smith and alicia hamilton to the unidentified hairs collected from the blood-stained duct tape found in scott dunn's bedroom [Music] examiners concluded that the unidentified hairs had originated from the two suspects for authorities the findings provided enough evidence to arrest alicia hamilton and tim smith [Music] the couple currently living together were taken into custody and charged with murder investigators believe that when scott dunn tried to end his relationship with alicia she became enraged unable to handle the rejection she lashed out and beat the young man to death police believe she then turned to her other boyfriend tim smith for help in cleaning up the scene and disposing of scott's body a jury found alicia hamilton guilty of murder and sentenced her to 20 years in prison tim smith was also found guilty of murder he received 10 years probation scott dunn's body has never been found his father jim dunn was asked to join the vidac society to help the parents of murdered victims he agreed and because of my involvement there i think as a result of being involved with the v-docs designing being actually a member of the vedoc society that i can can return a little bit and give them thanks in a different way and at the same time maybe help someone else that was in the same position i was 10 years ago when scott was murdered the vidoc society says its only client is truth [Music] in that respect they are no different from the law enforcement and forensics experts they help out but when killers are cunning and the truth is elusive vidocq society experts provide the new perspective to bring cold cases back from the brink

Channel: Real Responders

Views: 471,824

Keywords: bombs, bomb, bomb disposal, mail explosive, explosive disposal, police documentary, the new detectives, forensic science, investigation, detectives, police investigation, cold cases, criminals, crimes, true detectives, sherlock holmes, real crimes, real detectives, private detective, the new detectives 2020, the new detectives full episodes, the new detectives 2021, the new detectives new episodes, the new detectives serial killers, the new detectives real responders

Id: qMQAPh3lsYM

Length: 50min 7sec (3007 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 19 2021