A Vacation Gone Terribly Wrong | Deadly Paradise | the FBI Files S1 EP5 | Real Crime

Palmira a tropical island in the South Seas for most of the year it's uninhabited but by strange coincidence in June 1974 six sailboats all converged on this tiny island it should have been shangri-la but when bad blood develop piracy and the only law was the law [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] a small uninhabited island almost a thousand miles from nowhere it's hard to believe such a paradise really exists for most sailors on the South Pacific Palmyra is a stop on the way to somewhere else but for a few is a destination of its own a place to disappear from the world that's just what happened to Mac and muff gram although it wasn't their intention I'm Jim Kallstrom former director of the FBI's New York office crime on the high seas falls under the jurisdiction of the FBI the disappearance of the Grahams and they yacht suggested trouble in paradise the problem was there was not a shred of evidence to prove it Palmyra Atoll is a series of small islands in the South Pacific formed by a coral reef which surrounds the lagoon it is owned by the United States and during World War two it housed a US Navy base the remains of the deserted base is still in the island today it is located approximately 1,000 miles from Hawaii and is a stopover point for sailors and yachtsman on their way to Samoa oftentimes large beautiful sailboats can be seen at the broken-down docks in its Laguna but on June 26 1974 a small sailboat named the Isle made its way past the docks and into Palmyra's makeshift bar she had just completed a difficult 19 day journey from Hawaii carrying a crew of two the boat was not suitable for the trip and now limped into the lagoon barely seen with the ship's motor had frozen up about halfway to Velma before leaving Hawaii the owners had repaired the Ayala which was a wooden boat by covering it with a coat of fiberglass the fiction created by these two materials caused a crack to form in the hall on the way to Palmyra the Iola had begun to take on water they had little money and very few provisions the plan was to live off the fruits of the island until later in the year they had made a deal with some friends to bring supplies to the island which they would exchange for a crop of marijuana they intended to build when they arrived at Palmyra they were unhappy to see a handful of visitors at the dock area they had hoped they would have the island to themselves when they came ashore they were greeted by a welcoming committee it wasn't at all what they had expected they introduced themselves as Stephenie Stearns in royality even though the name buck was tattooed on his right arm in plain view when one of the yachtsman commented on it Stephenie claimed that buck was his nickname something about Roy was different from the other yarders he seemed rougher perhaps even a little dangerous shortly after Roy and Stephanie arrived another boat appeared in the channel a beautiful 38 foot catch called the sea wave it wasn't long before the new arrivals made their way over to the dock [Applause] Mack Graham was 53 years old his wife element nicknamed muff was a few years younger like Roy they were surprised to find so many people on what was supposed to be an uninhabited island where they plan to spend the better part of the year when Roy noticed Mack was a smoker he asked for a cigarette and took most of the pack this gesture would be considered impolite anywhere but on an island it was particularly so who supplies are limited and can't easily be replaced for Mack and the others this was their first insight into the kind of person Roy Allen might be Roy also boasted about his plans to raise marihuana and traded for supplies soon everyone began settling into their new life in paradise Mack brain began to explore the island the ruins of the Navy base in the sandy shores CQ CQ CQ t a rehearsal made sure to keep in touch with the outside world a shortwave radio and regularly scheduled times what Mac would contact his friend Kurt Schumacher in Hawaii and telling about his latest disguise just like you know Tom so you're out on the Mississippi or so I mean and so he would explain what he did each day you know he'd go on excursions just him wear this machete through the jungle and exploring all the things down there Oh Roy and Stephanie on the other hand things weren't going quite as well Roy found the island was not well-suited for growing marijuana living aboard the isle that was difficult the boat was small cramped their supplies were all but gone and they began to barter their possessions with the owners of the other boats for food is applied to the Grahams and the others Roy and Stephanie were a nuisance they were not properly supplied to be out on the high seas this far from civilization the other yachters had enough supplies for themselves with some extra for emergencies but not enough to supply Roy and Stefan [Music] the Grahams were known for the hospitality to hit invited the other visitors to Palmyra aboard New Zealand others warned them not to allow Roy and Stefan [Music] but Mac wanted to make an attempt to be important on July 5th two weeks after the Greens of and long after everyone else on the island had already had the tour of the seaweed Roy and Stephanie received an invitation to visit they eagerly accepted well the Seawind was a real yacht you know it was a that was a beautiful looking boat to begin with and nice lines and and Mac had kept it in just perfect shape a seabird was everything that I always you know it had a fully stocked large it was equipped with every high-tech navigational device on the market it had plenty of room and the surrendered sales stephanie commented on its size and human comforts she was enchanted by the big bump in the forward cabin Roy remains sullen when Roy began to find the cramped quarters and damp bedding of the Iowa to confining he decided to move into a makeshift tent on beach Stephanie would stay aboard the boat by now Warren Stephanie had bartered most of their possessions with the other yards for food and supplies other than trading or flat-out begging they had literally diese the others the situation was getting worse by the day most of the marijuana seedlings they had counted on for money had been eaten by insects although Palmyra has abundant natural resources including fish crabs bird eggs and coconuts Roy had little knowledge of how to survive off the land to catch fish he would shoot them with his 22 caliber revolver like clockwork Mack continued his weekly radio conversations with Curt and he kept him informed about Earl and Stephanie they had moved way down the end of the lagoon and would have nothing to do with the other group and its are things like they start planting marijuana again to see if they could grow it he he needed I think they were running low on food so I needed coconuts took a chainsaw and couldn't cut a coconut tree down to get into the coconuts that's kind of stupid it also infuriated my brain that Mac loved the island and had no tolerance love as destructive your problem you don't have to do that to get one of these once you just climb up and get it down one day he confronted it could play became angry and told Mac to mind his own business [Music] the hostility between on July 13 muff gram wrote her mother a letter she hadn't been enthusiastic about living on an island in the first place and having Roy and Stephanie there only added to her misgivings nearest mother three boats are here now but one is leaving and will take this letter with them that leaves us alone with a hippie couple who plan to stay here and live off the land it's just our luck they decided to roost in Palmyra Roy and Stephanie had run out of sugar cigarettes and I don't know what they've party of the boats next they will ask us [Music] muff sent her letter back to civilization with Bernard and Evelyn Leonard we were leaving Palmyra after a brief stay [Music] the Grahams had previously made arrangements to receive letters over the radio from Kurt Schumann who read them to match during a regular weekly shortwave contacts during that period of time I was receiving mail from both of their mothers his mother and her and they would then I would read this to them well as one of the boats down there would leave they would take the mail with them and eventually mail it went back in Honolulu or wherever so there was communication going back and forth and an interesting thing about it is one of the letters I read the mother and I think she was in her 80s she says that she was afraid for them she says you should leave that place something will happen to one day when Mac was talking to Kurt he told him that Roy had sent a message with one of the years back to his friends and they were supposed to bring Roy and Stephanie supplies to Palmyra and he told his friends to reply through Curt's shortwave radio Mack asked him if he had heard any news but Kurt had heard nothing and when Mac talked to him about Roy and Stephanie there was something about their description that worried it and in between these conversations he had occasionally mentioned the the other boat and I told him I said you know that doesn't sound too good these people say you know you better be careful and he said well he says no I can take care of myself I'll be all right I think you ought to get out of there myself or one of the other leads Roy and Stephanie's tempers during the first weeks of August the sound of angry voices would frequently be heard across the lagoon the other visitors to the island saw Roy as a violent and quick-tempered man who was dangerous and should be avoided then midway through August another boat came to Palmyra and spent a few days Norman Sanders and Thomas Wolfe were on their way to Samoa the night before they were set to leave include cocktails and mom the talk turned to the Iola sanders was a sailing expert he told them he had offered Roy advice about getting the Iola system no he said he'd suggested Roy and Stephanie should go there but Roy had just become angry and refused to hillier wolf caution of the Grahams that it would be easy for an unsuspecting couple to disappear a place that Palmyra in response Mac opened a drawer without a 357 Magnum he assured the others that he could take care of himself I'm tougher than he is Mac said confidently wolfen Santos out of Palmyra the next the the group of people that were down there the various boats one by one course were on their way somewhere and they one after another left visitors had come and gone pretty regularly for the last two months but with a departure of Woolf and Sanders on August 17th things changed this was the end of the season and most Sables would be stopping by comrade Mack enough Graham were alone in the island with Stephanie and Boyd on August 27th Mack talked to Curt Schilling joined Stephanie and the Grahams had been alone on Palmyra for 10 days state tensions between Mac and muff graham and law and Stephanie had increased muff knew Roy had a gun and a chain and at one point had been seen with an acetylene torch there scared she wanted off pal Monty but Mac stubbornly didn't want to move the boats had moved to opposite sides of the lagoon and the couple's pretty much ignored each other but then something unusual nice talking to him and while we're talking he hears female voice yelling saying so you know calling to him and he says what's this company so he says hang on a minute I'll go topside and see and he says I'll be done she's coming over and her dinghy and she says she has a cake for him and he says I guess they're going to declare a truce or something that was a term the words he used he says I better check this out carefully I said okay so same schedule next week same time so be careful Melanie see you later was it one week later shoemaker was at his radio for their regularly scheduled conversation for the first time since Mack and muff had left - why there was no response from the ceiling I was concerned about that and I cried for quite a while about 20 minutes a half an hour trying to make contact so the next contact was a couple of days later and then I tried again nothing and then for the next few weeks I I tried you know in intermittently from time to time and then it was at that point that I decided something happened unable to convince the authorities that something had gone wrong she make her had a friend fly over the island the aerial survey seemed to confirm his worst fears was deserted there were no boats in the bar no Iowa no sirree no sign of life well I had a feeling that all that time that something that had happened the the boat had been taken over I was very strong feelings about that simply because of all of the incidents that they related to me and he related and I mean it just pointed to that one thing but I couldn't convince anyone that that was a problem shoemaker did have one resource available to him the radio having no idea where they had gone Zi you spread the word to yachtsman in the Pacific to be on the lookout for the sea the days weeks and then months passed with no word about the fate of Mac and luf gram or the secret [Music] two months after the last communication with the grams Bernard and Evelyn Leonard who had been given the last written message from the Grahams were at the Ala Wai Yakov in Hawaii bernard noticed a 38-foot catch with very distinctive men yes it had been repainted but Bernard was certain it was the Seawind he also recognized a familiar figure on deck Roy Allen knowing the tensions that had existed between the grounds Roy and Stephanie and also anyone that the Grahams had not been heard from in some time Leonard immediately called the Coast Guard the Coast Guard had been aware of the missing secret yes and let it explain that the owners were not on the Coast Guard officers felt this might lead to something outside of their jurisdiction they called the FBI the call was answered by Special Agent Calvin Shishido who worked out of the FBI's Hawaii field office my assignment there was just the general mix of general Criminal Investigations Security Investigations backgrounds it was such a small office that we couldn't specialize we had to handle everything that came at us she too agreed to meet the Coast Guard and the Leonard's at the marina although what he heard was not conclusive enough to warrant FBI involvement perhaps the owners were onshore or perhaps they had sold the boat perhaps it wasn't even the sea where after arriving moments later the Leonard showed him the yacht in question there seemed to be no one ability so he pointed out the areas where there was an attempt to disguise the boat you know it had been repainted the gunnels had been repainted the the nameplate was taken off it was removed and painted over and other things that he pointed out to show that it was actually the sea winds and what was the seaweed although there was still no direct evidence of foul play Kishida was growing suspicious there was no visible activity on the boat so shishito instructed the Coast Guard officers to post a lookout a lookout spotted Loy and Stephanie the next move from the floating dock towards Shore you think he immediately alerted the Coast Guard who in turn called special agent shishito but another boat owner hailed Stephane Roy and told him that the Coast Guard had been looking around their boat that day the field Roy noticed a Coast Guard patrol boat in the marina that seemed to be moving towards them [Music] they change direction and headed for the nearest dock [Music] after letting Roy off Stephanie started to roll back to the ceiling [Music] two plainclothes policeman approached a boy when he spotted them without hesitating I turned and drove off the end of the back and began to swim away the officers found a wallet and in it was the identification of this Roy Allen and it had a photograph and I believe mr. Leonard found looked at the picture and said that was Roy Allen meanwhile the Coast Guard told had spotted Stephanie in the rowboat and began to give chase she turned and started to wrote poetry hoping to reach the doctor [Music] when she reached the dock she jumped out in the end but there was no way the patrol vote was right behind with Bernard Leonard of the Indo Coast Guardsman father [Music] they saw her dart into a hotel stairwell they found her hiding behind a potted pond she immediately recognized Leonard from Palmyra as the Coast Guard officer took her into custody one question was for most on Leonard's mom what had happened to the graves [Music] Stephanie Stearns was taken to the Coast Guard offices for questioning on the way there Bernard Leonard and Stephanie found themselves alone in the rowboat when he asked if Mac and muff was still alive she shook her head Mac and muff she told him that apparently drowned at least they never found the bodies Leonard was incredulous how could that have happened Stephanie explained that she and Roy had been invited to the Seawind for dinner that the Grahams never showed up the next morning she and Roy found the Grahams overturned inflatable Zodiac boat washed up on shore the shark-infested Lagoon after searching fruitlessly for the bodies they decided to take their own boat back to but it got hung up on the reef so they went back and took the abandoned seaman Leonard listened to Stephanie but he didn't believe her story in the Coast Guard officers she started telling his story again this time to Special Agent shishito and the Coast Guard is speaking tour she kept going on and on and I kept reminding her that she had the right to remain silent and that anything she said could be used against you in a court of law and she would just keep on talking [Music] Stephanie told him she had arrived at the Seawind with Roy just about in time for dinner provokin strangely quiet they called out that no one answered they went below and continued their search but got no reply they assumed the drams had gone out fishing for dinner and made themselves at home until they returned according to Stephanie the Grahams never showed up so they both decided to spend the night on the sea where they believe the Grahams would show up anytime but the next morning when the Grahams hadn't returned she said that became very work we went out to look for muffin that as soon as it's light but all they found was the Grahams overturn zodiac washed up on shoulder and a can full of gasoline they turned the inflated boat over who started the motor then she said they spent the next two days searching for the ground or any sign of what might have happened to them but they found nothing the Grahams in simply vanish shishito found her story implausible together and we went over there when she explained how the attack in possession of the sea went why her story was quite different from the one she just told Leonard no one would have believed us they would have taken this time she said they had left Palmyra aboard the Seawind towing the Isle which got caught up on a reef and sank Stephanie was tripping over the first line but I knew there were at least you know two conflicting stories as to how they got in possession of the boat at this point we became very worried about the Grahams condition we didn't know what had happened to them and we certainly was you know was not going to get any real true information from Stephanie's Turner's the FBI has jurisdiction over crime on the high seas shishito determined he had enough evidence to arrest Stephanie Stearns for interstate transportation of stolen property then his attention turned to Stephanie's boyfriend Roy Allen who had evaded the police at the marina she was still at large Shido checked and there was no record of a Roy Allen but he had the wallet with Roy Allen's picture and art Leonard also told the shooter that Roy had taken marijuana plants to Palmyra and had intended to grow them to safe drugs and a photograph of joy gave him a start of nice what I suspected that people with you know traveling on the Iola which is not really a seaworthy boat going around and planning marijuana on the islands and so on must be involved in drug running Aikido took the photograph to the Drug Enforcement Agency and showed it to several of the agents they were surprised when I looked at the picture they told her it was buck Walker and they'd been looking for him and so we got all a background data on buck Walker and that's when our search for buck Walker began and that now we're looking for buck Walker instead of Roy Allen buck Dewayne Walker was a convicted felon and a fugitive he had been awaiting sentencing on a drug conviction and he and Stephanie fled Hawaii on the Iola headed for Cal Mara as the search for Walker began with a new location she Tschida was also concerned about the grounds he knew Stephanie was lying and changing details about what had happened on he didn't trust her story about the fate of the grounds there was always the possibility that the Grahams were alive and stranded on the island shishito made arrangements for himself in some other agents to travel to Palmyra to see if they could find them we decided to go to Palmyra to see if maybe the Grahams were were stranded there you know in need of food and or they could have been tired up for me you know and you know in Mobile and their lives were in danger so we decided to go out there to look around and and we did on the island they found the remains of the camp but Walker had abandoned they took photographs and examined the site thoroughly a search of the island produced no sign of the grams however shishito did make a couple of curious discoveries I remember picking up a hatch cover and of course later was identified as a hatch cover coming off of the eye or the hatch cover was important because no scene would lead for high waters without his hatch cover without at the boat could take on water which will cause it to see this toll shishito that Roy and Stephenie had intended to scuttle the island using these clues shishito began to develop his theory as to what happened to the ground my thinking was that they had tied the couple up and put them on the Ayatollah and sank the Iola and that was the only explanation we had because we couldn't find the Iola and there was no way the aisle wallah could be in Hawaii because they certainly wouldn't be sailing the sea when and the I all by themselves she should have found something at an old navy warehouse that piqued his interest I think one of the things too that I noticed was that in an old workshop a warehouse there was an old air rescue boat or sea rescue boat and it had a place for three containers where they put provisions and off the three to receptacle areas were you know the cans were missing and the third was still left there and of course now we're looking for two people in my mind you know it's especially suspiciously thought that these two cans because you know it was large enough that they could have been you know containing the remains of the couple [Music] meanwhile the search for buck Walker continued when a vendor date of 1974 after spending ten days hiding out on the lava flows on the Big Island of Hawaii but resurfaced in a tiny hamlet off the beaten track he rented a room and went to a restaurant for a drink [Music] same moment across extractant arena formed offices he's eating lunch as they paid the bill they showed their waitress a picture of properly she said he'd just been in the restaurant looking very attractive but she'd sent him to a bar across the street [Music] the officers spotted and contacted the FBI [Music] but was arrested on the fugitive charge he was read his rights and handcuffed without a struggle FBI you're under arrest but the questioning buck revealed nothing that could help the investigation he answered questions with a frank yes or no or with stone silence the investigators couldn't find even the slightest piece of information that would help them find the grams while stephanie was in prison awaiting trial she she'd have found more proof Stephanie and Butler alignment while she was at prison we found out that she had some photographs developed so when the photographs were developed and brought back to prison we seized the photographs and examined them among the photographs showed that the Seawind or Stephanie Stearns was on the Seawind taking a photograph of the aisle on the full sale with buck walker on board the Iola so we knew that at one point Stephanie was on the Seawind and Buck Walker by himself on the Iowa this was different than the stories both buck and Stephanie told officials shishito was convinced that the Grahams had been murdered but without any bodies and no hard evidence the US attorney assigned to prosecute the case did not believe they could make a homicide charge stand up in court we could but it's strictly circumstantial and we might not win the case and if we lose the case and later you know years later what if the body should pop up and we get some real good evidence as to murder on the part of the buck walker and Stephanie Stearns he would say we couldn't try them again so I thought well you know that makes a lot of sense buck Walker and Stephanie Stearns were charged with interstate transportation of stolen property it was an open-and-shut case [ __ ] Stephanie been caught with possession of the Seawind in Hawaii and had made numerous attempts to change its appearance look at educated under his name as a homemade buk buk and Stephanie were both found guilty buck waka received 10 years for his previous drug conviction and five years for theft of the seelye Stephanie Stearns received two years for her role in the boat shaft the xishi Doe was still convinced the couple had killed Mack and muff gray and at Summit on or around Palmyra was the evidence to prove it he could only hope that someday it might surface and then he could charge buck and Stephanie with murder On January 21st 1989 a young South African couple Robert and Sharon Jordy were visiting bail money almost seven years had passed since Mack and muff Graham disappeared that afternoon Sharon went for a walk down the beach and made a startling discovery [Music] washed up on the shore was an aluminum caste and decided she found human bones in the scope [Music] around one of the bones was a wristwatch she had heard the story of Matt the muff gram and immediately contacted the Coast Guard calcio was catching up on paperwork when he overheard part of a phone conversation first to hear the words human bones and then Palmyra where's Palmyra the agent was nude never heard of the case shishito was on his feet immediately he was on the phone and asked the agent agony was the coastguard shishito quickly took the phone and told the Coast Guard to ask the couple who discovered it bones to stay on the island and wait for them when I first heard that of course I was really excited because I thought whoa somebody found some bones on Palmyra and it had to be the Grahams and I thought this is it shishito and a team of investigators flew to Palmyra to examine the new findings if the bones Sharon Jordan found belong to either one of the Grahams the FBI might be able to establish the cause of death Ashida was shown the gruesome discovery a skull human bones a wristwatch and some wire all lying next to an open metal box identical to the kind shishito noticed in the rescue boats on his previous visit to the island he speculated that the wire had been wrapped around the case and it somehow come loose then when the case came ashore it had opened and the bones had spilled out since the second container had been missing from the Navy rescue boat shishito felt the other victim might still be inside divers were sent to search the surrounding waters looking for a container like the one found on the beach but in the shark-infested waters the divers found nothing when shishito got back to Honolulu who sent the container wire skullenbones to the FBI laboratory in washington d.c his reputation this boat belonged to a Caucasian woman in her late 40s or early 50s dental records showed that it was must grams the skull also had signs of charring around the left eye socket and a hole in the left temple the FBI concluded that the contour of the hole was consistent with a gunshot wound but due to the age of the wound could not say conclusively that it was caused by a bullet the aluminum box was examined by the FBI elemental analysis unit they found evidence of charring on the outside of the box next the FBI needed to determine if the skeleton had been in the box they cut out a rectangular section and subjected it to a battery of tests the rectangular piece of metal was found to contain traces of human protein conclusive proof that the box had once held a body the FBI later did a tremendous job as far as the container was concerned because they came back with a report that indicated that there were human remains in the container that the remains had been burned and that while it was inflamed the container was in about two inches of water and they found traces of human protein fabric in the container and everything to indicate that a human body was disposed of in the container of white flame as shishito had suspected muff gram had not simply drowned she had been murdered the FBI now believed it had enough evidence to prosecute buck and Stephanie for the murder of muff gram having served her jail term for the theft of the Seawind Stephanie now had a white-collar job in California she was arrested and taken into custody Buck Walker was still serving time in prison or so shishito thought when I sent our agents in the state of Washington a lead to put a detainer on buck Walker I found out that he was an escapee and for I thought oh no not again you know are we gonna have to do this search although we found that there was only one woman that had visited him and that she had visited him the day before his escape the trace was placed on the woman which led them to her car parked in a motel in human Nevada the FBI was notified and set up a stakeout when buck and another man came out of the motel and approached the car the FBI he was considered an armed and dangerous fugitive wanted both for murder and jail [Music] on the front seat of the car they found barbiturates and several thousands of dollars in cash [Music] but Walker was arrested and charged with the murder of Mothra Stephanie Stearns was also arrested and charged with the same crime though they would be tried separately because of the publicity the story had generated in Hawaii the trials were moved to San Francisco both cases were assigned to federal prosecutor Elliot and no key the motive for the crime was never in doubt the motive was they were without a seaworthy vessel the only other couple on the island was leaving shortly they were running out of food and they didn't know when any other vessel would get there if at all because this was becoming the end of the so-called season when you could expect people to visit the island so you had people running out of food and provisions with an inability to get anywhere enoki knew he could show buck and Stephanie had opportunity and motive to kill the Grahams but first he had to prove in court that month Graham was murdered he also needed to completely discredit buck and Stephanie's story that the grams of drowned as an Okie began constructing his theory of the case shishito was busy putting holes in buck and Stephanie's defense the FBI had already found evidence of human protein on the sides of the aluminum box but since the bones were found next to it additional proof that the body had actually been in the box therefore ruling out the possibility of muff drowning his buck and Stephanie had claimed he contacted San Francisco's chief medical examiner Lloyd Stephens finding the skeleton together is supportive that Miss Graham was in that box and therefore held together it's not possible for me to really say that she couldn't have stayed together if she had been out of the box how are the problems that would be required is that skeleton has to stay together even after its disarticulated and that's an extremely strong argument that that could not have occurred if she had died and just been laying on the lagoon bottom the second is that the skeleton has to come ashore together and that's just not really possible she she do also decided to test the buck and Stephanie's story that the Grahams do need a zodiac has been found overturned of course you know a later investigation showed that if the boat had capsized the way they said they found it the the outboard motor would have been inoperable because of the salt water going into the engine itself and of course we made a test to find out whether the zodiac could actually tip over accidentally and we try to force it to turn upside down banging into things with you know with three or four men sitting on one edge of the boat and it just wouldn't tip over you know key also asked medical examiner voyage Stevens to examine muff Grahams skull in order to corroborate the FBI's findings that and murdered enoki knew that having two highly respected sources would strengthen his case Stephens found flat abrasions to the skull consistent with prolonged confinement in a box such as the aluminum container the key issues for us was the flattening of the skull which represents that it had been placed against a hard flat surface primarily across the left side of the face and what I'm pointing to is the nose the eye sockets and what would be the cheek in life and of course the teeth one of the things that was evident bought the skull of Miss Graham is that this whole area about the face had been planed down so that it was a flat surface and if you can imagine if I take this goal and put it across a flat surface and let's just say this table is coated with sandpaper and I work it back and forth for a period of time eventually I would shave it down until it was a flat surface there was a second plane showing that the skull had changed position and again had been exposed to a flat surface with motion for a long period of time we used that as an argument that the skull had been within the box and moving if the body had been buried in the coral sand then it would not be a change that we would expect to see and coffin wear is not seen if somebody's buried in dirt or in coral it's seen if they're in a hard surface container there were minimal animal bite marks and insects on the skull which were consistent with remains that had only been exposed to the surface life for a short period of presumably the time after the box had surfaced and opened but what about the charring on the skull in the middle box did this show an attempt to destroy the body one of the questions we had been asked is whether we could prove that the skull had been burned with an acetylene torch people who were at Palmyra and Buck and Stephanie were there saw a book with an acetylene torch the FBI believed this is what caused the burns to the skull if an Okie could have Stephens corroborate this who could further implicate Percy is exposed to a flame there may be burning of the outer portions of the skin but until the waters evaporated the tissue can't burn and it takes a heat period to boil the water off or evaporate it before the tissue can actually burn suddenly torches of course run fairly hot and they would do that process fairly rapidly the marks on the skull clearly showed the use of an extreme source of heat further evidence that mufe had been murdered the forensic evidence overwhelmingly proved that muff gram had been murdered a trial date was set a trial involving people who live on the high seas present some unique challenges the FBI had to subpoena about 40 witnesses and then make sure they were in San Francisco at the time of the trial special agent Howe Marshall was assigned to the case I first became involved when I transferred to Honolulu in 1981 from Los Angeles witnesses were flying in from all over the world literally Sharon Jordan and her husband and two children came in twice from South Africa and one of the hard situations was they were a lot of these people were voting people who did not keep in touch last we heard of some of them they were in a Bay in Hawaii in a boat with no fixed address it was a matter of getting them to San Francisco sometimes having a wait two or three days sometime postponing yet weather conditions and things like that that required us to be sure they were there when we needed him and luckily everybody showed up that the need to show up and everything went smooth there were only two possible suspects and Buck had an extensive criminal record but did buck commit the murder alone or was Stephanie also involved she was the last person known to have contact with her grams on the day she brought them a cake Eliot enoki believes Stephanie had one strong advantage on her side well she had one option she could blame Walker and although she didn't directly do that her attorney certainly did in the way the case was argued and presented so that gave her a very big option that Walker simply did not have or if he had it was a much more difficult sell because of the circumstances and the personalities involved he's the one with the prior record much bigger than she is you know the testimony about him shooting fish with his gun I mean it he had a lot of things on his side of the ledger that were not on her side of the ledger one of the other substantial differences is that it's definitely testified in the case Walker did not and so she directly refuted any claim of knowledge or involvement in any kind of homicide but certainly through her testimony left a large room for her attorney to argue that mr. Walker had the opportunity and the means to commit a murder a jury found buck Walker guilty after only a few hours of ratios and he received his sentence of life in prison Stephanie Stearns was defended by famed attorney Vincent Bugliosi who was convinced to her innocence she was acquitted of all charges when he convinced a jury that buck not only acted alone but sought to conceal the crime from his girlfriend we may never know what really happened in Palmyra on that day in late August though the forensic evidence paints a grisly picture well empirically I believe that that miss Graham was killed exactly as the charge was made and that is that she was shocked that there was an attempt to burn her body that her extremities were probably fractured to get her into the box and that she was cast into the ocean and then eventually came a grill and I think that that probably happened to the husband as well Matt Graham's body has never been found when investigators believe is a very high likelihood that is in the other box [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: Real Crime

Views: 1,849,864

Rating: 4.6790905 out of 5

Keywords: real crime, crime documentary, true crime, the fbi files, the fbi files full episodes, the fbi files season 1, fbi documentary, serial killer documentary full episodes, fbi investigation, murderer documentary, classic documentary series, James kallstrom, Deadly Paradise, the FBI Files S1 EP5, A Vacation Gone Terribly Wrong

Id: tFvCh3dVVB4

Length: 52min 13sec (3133 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 19 2019