Murderous Attraction | FULL EPISODE | The New Detectives

a st louis teacher collapses in front of her class her organs are shutting down and her students are panicked frantic doctors struggle to uncover the source of her mysterious condition but science makes a shocking revelation what once was thought an illness is now believed to be a crime in columbus ohio a woman is found shot in the head the death is ruled a suicide but something is not right and detectives refuse to let the matter rest to find answers investigators must decipher a pattern unraveling the mystery that leads to murder the meticulous work of forensic experts can often find even the smallest traces left by a killer and put an end to their murderous attraction in this episode some of the names have been changed september 26 1993 st louis missouri donna bowley a seventh grade math teacher and mother of two teenaged sons was in the middle of her lesson she hadn't been feeling well all summer but thought it was just the flu and uh kenneth let's move on down to number nine she hoped it would pass once the school year began but it didn't it got worse she collapsed in front of her class paramedics arrived to find donna struggling to breathe they had no idea what was wrong with her or why she collapsed medics tried to stabilize her but her body was shutting down she was losing consciousness donna was fighting for her life in the emergency room doctors fought to save her but it wasn't enough even with their best efforts donna was still struggling she was now paralyzed with no feeling in her arms and legs she was immediately hooked up to a ventilator to help her breathe critical care specialist dr gregory becker we had no idea what was wrong with her she was uh she had non-specific symptoms she developed a numbness of the of the lower extremities and confusion uh had a seizure their oxygen levels were dropping and she appeared to have respiratory difficulties we were uh baffled really with what was going on jim boley donna's husband rushed to check on his wife the attending doctors assured him they were doing everything possible but the prognosis wasn't good donna was in critical condition jim told doctors donna had been feeling ill but it had never been this bad donna was in cardiac arrest doctors desperately tried to get her heart beating again all right let's do it again turn it up higher all right here we go and clear one two three she had a variety of symptoms that we couldn't pigeonhole in a single diagnosis doctors stabilized donna and took her to the icu but they still had no idea what was causing donna's symptoms when we come to a situation like this where a patient is getting more and more ill right in front of us as well shotgun a variety of tests but the test results showed nothing jim stayed by his wife's side he brought her flowers cards and her favorite milkshakes he did everything he could to care for her as the mysterious disease ravaged donna's body the search for the diagnosis continued one of the full battery of tests that we did was a urinary heavy metal screen when it came back her urinary excretion of arsenic was sky high astronomical donna's body was being poisoned the amount of arsenic in her system was 420 times the normal amount apparently why were the levels so high and how did it get into her system concerned others were exposed to the arsenic doctors immediately informed donna's family and also called police jim boley told doctors he had no idea how this could have happened and wanted a full police investigation officers arrived at the hospital and interviewed doctors nurses and all those who cared for donna but no one had ever seen anything like this before st louis county police detective tony grimmell was the lead investigator on the case i found out that from the hospital that donna boley's level of arsenic was right at the lethal dosage and that she was on the fence and could possibly die since arsenic poisoning is rare detective grimmell needed to do research on the toxin i determined as much as i could about arsenic and found out that it it is in pesticides and herbicides it's also found in the environment and well water detective grimmell had hoped to speak to donna but that would be impossible at that point in time that not only was she in critical condition but she was paralyzed from the neck down and unable to speak unable to communicate with donna the detectives would have to find their answers another way they asked hospital personnel to contact them if they came up with any new information nurses were stationed in donna's room around the clock to monitor her condition in color okay detective grimmell's next step was to determine whether he was dealing with accidental exposure or something criminal this is the first type of arsenic case that i've ever been involved in the questions that we didn't have answers to is how did she get an inner system what type of arsenic it was where it came from to find the answer the detective turned to an expert at the st louis county medical examiner's office he met with chief toxicologist dr christopher long arsenic symptoms are so common and typical of like the flu or possibly food poisoning that most physicians tend to focus on that area to see if there's some sort of biological reason why you have these symptoms and they don't really consider arsenic or heavy metal poisoning but arsenic poisoning is much worse than any flu it attacks the body's red blood cells eating away at them until the body completely shuts down everybody has arsenic in their system but in normally low levels that don't offer any symptoms or any problems but the levels in donna's system suggested something else due to the high levels it appeared to be administered to her either self-administered or administered by someone else although environmental factors such as a tampered water supply were not ruled out investigators had to look at all the possibilities including attempted suicide or murder detectives visited the bowly home hoping to develop leads investigators interviewed donna's husband and her teenaged sons jim boley said donna had no history of depression she never spoke about taking her own life and never attempted suicide but the family mentioned donna had trouble with several students who were angry with her over grades jim also said donna had trouble with a teacher who used to work with her and donna was an easy target he felt that since she kept a cup of water on her desk at all times that anybody at school could have administered the poison to her by dropping it into her glass or cup on her desk while at the house investigators took a sample of the family's tap water it was sent to the lab for analysis they collected canisters jars and utensils detectives also collected household products and cleaners they were looking for anything that either contained arsenic such as pesticides or any kitchen items that may have been contaminated this was done to remove anything from the house that might make the children ill if there was any arsenic in it and also to include or exclude any of these items as being used in poisoning of donna in the bathroom police found hypodermic needles jim told investigators the hypodermic needles were used by one of the boys for medication they were taken with the other items to be tested okay i appreciate it thanks detective grimmell went to the school to follow up on the family's suspicions the principal said although donna was often sick she was in good spirits and was not depressed he also told the detective the problems with the former co-worker and the angry students were not serious and none of them had been at the school in months there's nothing negative in either of these children rimmel now believed if donna was poisoned it did not happen at school at the identification bureau of the st louis county police department the household items were tested for arsenic the syringes found in the bully home were quickly ruled out as the husband said they were used for prescribed medication for one of the boys and all the other tests came back negative none of the household items contained the deadly poison the water was also cleaned detective grimmell was at an impasse and there were no leads in sight i didn't believe that in a family of four one person could have accidentally ingested a lethal amount of arsenic at home and the others have no signs of arsenic in their system so what i was looking at was self-inflicted where it was an attempted suicide or that it was used as a weapon and an attempt to kill her and the one person who could shed light on the investigation was the only person who wasn't talking st louis school teacher donna boley collapsed in her classroom and was now lying in intensive care high levels of arsenic were found in her system detectives believe donna was either trying to kill herself or someone else was trying to kill her after following up leads at both her school and her home they came up empty detectives began asking questions if someone wanted her dead who could it be and what was their motive she does she's pretty busy and stressed out they decided to look into the bowley family's financial records it didn't take long before detective tony grimmell found a life insurance policy on donna and it was recently increased from two hundred thousand to six hundred thousand dollars and there was something else accounts showed that the family carried twenty thousand dollars in credit card debt the case was heating up and then detective grimmell received a call it was done as nurse and she was calling from the hospital she said that despite intensive treatment to rid donna's body of the poison she was getting worse and she said she noticed a pattern after each of jim bully's visits his wife suffered a relapse despite donna's serious condition detective tony grimmell had to find a way to communicate with her she was paralyzed from the neck down and she couldn't speak basically all she could do was shake her head yes and no and she had eye contact she couldn't write because of her paralyzation she looked pretty bad the detective needed to speak to donna alone even though dinah couldn't talk she could communicate and made arrangements to to communicate with her at the hospital the hospital had been using a alphabet board in order to communicate with donna she could shake her head yes and no so she could answer questions that required a yes and no answer but if there was anything more specific she had to spell it out using the alphabet board the first thing i talked to donna about was to see if she had administered this to herself if she had attempted to suicide and she said she had not uh i asked her a series of yes and no questions as much as i could i asked her if she thought she got the poison at home she indicated no if she got it from friends she indicated no detective grimmell didn't want to tire donna even though he still didn't get the answers he needed he would have to come back as i started to leave she started shaking her head no started crying i was concerned from she was i don't want to say frantic but she was upset clearly upset uh i was afraid maybe she was in pain having some problems i called a nurse in uh to check with her she said she didn't want me to leave that she wasn't in pain that there was something else i needed to know and the first thing she spelled out for me was that she was afraid jim her husband was involved jim is that your husband jim okay do you feel he's involved in this slowly and painfully nodding at each question and letter of the alphabet donna recalled a curious incident two months before it happened on a busy morning as the family was rushing through breakfast and donna was preparing for her class jim bowley always did the cooking it was his idea to take some of the burden off of his wife he gave donna a glass of milk to settle her stomach and reminded her to drink it it was then donna saw pink residue at the bottom of the glass donna's story placed her husband under suspicion this coupled with the recent increase in donna's life insurance made jim boley the prime suspect in his wife's poisoning but investigators were a long way from proving he was trying to kill his wife detective grimmell asked donna for a hair sample it was sent to the lab to establish a poisoned timeline and there was one more thing jim's visits i called the hospital to tell them that mr boley wasn't allowed to see his wife anymore i contacted security and put a freeze on visits uh because i thought there was a possibility he was also administering some of this at the hospital after my interview i went out to the waiting room from the hospital the first thing he asked me was what did she tell you i told him that she told me a number of different things and that he and i were going to have to talk again and we were going to have to talk at the police department more evidence surfaced when donna's relatives discovered a gym bag hidden at the bully home they brought it to police detectives were puzzled by what they found inside ads for local escort services love notes these notes where'd you find these contents also included photos of naked women and sexual paraphernalia and the bag was it was out we obtained cell phone records and found out that he was using two dating services and that he was using his cell phone for this at the toxicology lab of the st louis county medical examiner's office donna's hair was tested hair grows about an inch a month and because the arsenic attaches to the follicles and stays there scientists can get an accurate timeline of the poisoning her hair provided answers to the questions when how much and for how long donna was ingesting arsenic chief toxicologist dr christopher long performed an atomic absorption test the arsenic analysis you can't see that because it's done on a molecular level and you can't see the little molecules or electrons the computer can determine the difference in the light absorption print out a concentration and it's all done on computer the results came in from her hair we clearly showed that at the far end there was no arsenic that was somewhere five or six months earlier from that point on the arsenic levels in her hair increased and they increased dramatically every month up till and including the time of her hospital admission this would show that she had been exposed over a period of time and the dose was being increased over that time the toxicologist reported his findings to investigators it was really an opportunity to put the science to work to show how toxicology is part of the picture and and sometimes we can be a very important part of the picture in determining if somebody's a bad person or not police ask jim bowley to come in to answer questions right here jim jim bowley seemed to be the perfect husband he worked as a high school counselor coached baseball and was a scout leader i told him that she was pointing the finger at him that he was now the prime suspect and i advised him of his rights he was more than willing to cooperate and he tried to explain away the pink milk uh and her feeling that he was a suspect she's got poison in her system bully claimed that his wife's illness had caused her to have hallucinations detectives asked him about the six hundred thousand dollar insurance policy on donna about his financial difficulties and about his extramarital affairs talking for hours jim bowley seemed to have an answer for everything but he explained those away and he was good at explaining things away bully's background was in psychology he seemed in control so detectives took a new approach notice throughout this thing that whenever he's talking he's in control and as big as life but when we talk he shrinks back in this chair have you noticed that yeah he seems real confident and comfortable when he's talking and very uncomfortable when you're talking right i think what we should do is go back in there and just hammer him and and just get up on the podium and don't let him talk at all just give him everything we've got this time they would be verbally aggressive and not let him redirect blame i've been listening to you all night long now it's time for you to listen to me well i think no no no wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute i've listened to you laying out the case against him investigators didn't let bully answer for an hour and a half at the end of all that hour and a half or so when he first did speak he asked me how much time do you think i'm going to get which in itself was a tacit admission but not a confession after over eight hours of questioning investigators still couldn't get volley to confess to poisoning his wife with nothing solid to hold him detective grimmell went to the district attorney louis prosecutor bob mccola had to make the decision actually we had very little evidence it was one of those where you knew that the guy did it but whether we were going to be able to prove it or not at that point was kind of up in the air but detectives wouldn't give up and continue to keep pressure on boley to get a confession but jim boley still wouldn't crack and without stronger evidence police feared the man they suspected of poisoning his wife would walk free someone was trying to kill donna boley 420 times the lethal dose of arsenic was discovered in her system and police believe they knew who was responsible donna's husband jim detectives were mounting a solid case against jim boley they discovered he was patronizing sex services and bought a six hundred thousand dollar life insurance policy on his wife wanna have a seat there detectives brought jim in for questioning hoping to break him but he had been stonewalling them for hours yeah i'm going to talk about donna and we'd like you to tell us what happened to her detective tony grimmell went to the prosecutor's office to try to get an arrest warrant you need to do the right thing and you and i both know what that is look at yourself look at this place you're at now at the same time goalie finally confessed he had been poisoning donna i didn't want to kill her i only wanted to make her a little sick i i you got to believe me i just wanted to make her a little sick she was really stressed it's been a long summer but he wouldn't admit he was trying to kill her yes lieutenant barnard over the police department detective rimmel's there applying on a warrant could i speak with him please st louis detective tony grimmo was seeking the arrest warrant tony foley's over here confessing to bearer right now he used that for the reason of the party scene and his wife haven't had much quality time together he wanted to make her sick so she would stay home from work and he could burn up his sick time and stay home with her and care for her and have some quality time with her jim boley was taken into custody he told investigators where he had hidden a box of rat poison in the house he took police to the garden store where he purchased the poison i'm glad he even pointed out which brand he bought this is the product that you bought yeah for months boli had carefully prepared potions of arsenic to feed to his unsuspecting wife he told police he dissolved the poison in water before adding it to donna's food or drink time to hit the bed investigators asked police chemists to check boley's story in the lab they found the poison gave water a pink tint when the mixture was added to milk it did not color the milk but it did leave a small pink residue for years jim boley had been living a double life with expensive adulterous affairs police say when it caught up with him boley carefully planned to get rid of donna and collect enough money to continue his other life but it didn't work medical and forensic science were able to stop him from killing donna st louis prosecutor bob mccola had a strong case the charge that we filed assault in the first degree is the most serious charge there is short of death he carries a punishment of 10 to 30 years or life in prison in addition to that we filed an armed criminal action charge because he used poison in order to commit his commit his crime and that gave the potential of another life sentence jim boley was found guilty of trying to kill his wife by poisoning he was sentenced to life imprisonment st louis medical personnel and detectives intervened and saved a woman's life but tragically in ohio the intervention came too late columbus ohio lies at the center of america's heartland in early 1994 the city's police found themselves at the center of a brutal and mysterious case at 2 51 a.m police received a frantic 9-1-1 call the caller identified himself as richard a he said his wife had just committed suicide the operator asked him to stay calm and wait for emergency personnel who were on the way sergeant 18 180 181 on a 47a 43 47. columbus police department officers arrived at the address no one was there to meet them they called out but there was no response tentatively the officers entered the residence is clear it looked as if the house was empty in the master bedroom robert a was at the foot of the bed he seemed dazed confused and unable to move on the bed a woman lying on her back with a gunshot wound to the left side of her head she's my wife a blue steel 38-caliber revolver was resting on her blood-smeared chest responding police officers questioned robert a are you okay sir he told him he went into his bedroom and found his wife he had no idea what happened how much you had to drink tonight sir officers noted he appeared to have been drinking medics were called to the scene without disturbing the body they examined the within minutes homicide detectives arrived at the house they are required to investigate any gun related death detectives were briefed by the officers at the scene detective eric pillia was the lead investigator on the case a small dark-colored revolver was laying on top of her chest and there was an extensive amount of blood that had come from the wound and run down her body along her appendages and pulled in several areas the detective interviewed janet's husband robert he still appeared to be in shock and was non-responsive my first impression of the husband was that he was either extremely distraught to the point of being in shock or extremely lethargic or drugged unemotional just kind of dazed when a composed himself he told investigators earlier that evening he and his wife watched some television after dinner fell asleep she was leaving for a business trip to cincinnati early the next morning robert told investigators janet was nervous about her trip she was deathly afraid of public speaking she wanted to get a good night's sleep so she kissed him good night and went upstairs to bed a said he stayed up a little later and watched a kickboxing movie on television so he fell asleep on this couch here he explained that he had fallen asleep on the couch he had woke up decided to go to bed went upstairs turned on the light to the bedroom and found his wife laying there with a gunshot wound to her head he said that he then went and checked for a pulse he was shocked when he found his wife had committed suicide he had been asleep and didn't even hear the shot at first glance the investigation appeared routine a tragic suicide a distraught husband left to pick up the pieces of his life but few investigations are ever routine and detective pillia knew this one would be no different in columbus ohio robert a woke up to a nightmare after falling asleep on a couch while watching television he got up and went upstairs there he found his wife janet shot in the head at point-blank range there was a smear of blood across her chest and a revolver was next to her hand a told detectives janet was nervous about a business trip she was to take the next day he feared that might have caused her to take her life a said he kept a gun in the house for self-protection he normally kept it under the sofa where he had been sleeping but it wasn't there he said janet must have taken it earlier or while he was asleep watching the game detective eric pillia asked robert a what he remembered right here i asked him you know did you touch the body at first he said no then he said well i checked for a pulse and explained that he had been a medic in vietnam i asked him specifically um how he did that and he said that he had touched her neck at the check for a pulse crime scene investigators photographed the scene documenting the position of janet's body her arms and the blood swipe across her upper chest they rearranged her hair to get a better look at the blood pattern the gun was collected along with other evidence in searching the room detectives also noted a flashlight on the dresser janet's body was taken to the coroner's office for examination officers checked for any signs of forced entry they found none at the franklin county coroner's office the medical examiner swabbed the victim's hands and examined the rest of her body he took blood samples for a toxicology screening janet's head was x-rayed to determine the angle in which she was shot and the path of the bullet all the physical evidence supported a self-inflicted injury and the autopsy report classified janet a's death as a suicide but to the seasoned homicide investigators something still didn't seem right robert a's story wasn't adding up i made a mental note um when he told me that he had turned the light on um that's not something normal that seemed uh abnormal to me that someone would turn the their wife sleeping in bed and they're gonna go and turn the light on and wake them up as they're going to bed that just kind of seemed funny to me at that time investigators decided they needed to find out more about janet's state of mind they spoke to her parents to see if janet suffered from depression or was upset about anything janet's parents said she was fine in fact she had been looking forward to her business trip the parents comments didn't seem to support the coroner's findings according to homicide detective carl rankin it seemed that janet a wasn't a very good candidate for suicide and that she did in fact have things to look forward to even as soon as the next day the detective asked about janet's relationship with her husband robert a was insisting to go to cincinnati also and the fact that janet didn't want him to go they spoke about taking care of the dog and that janet a didn't really feel comfortable even leaving the dog with robber day janet told her parents robert had been seeing another woman for several months just three weeks before her death janet said she was planning to divorce him this strengthened investigators suspicions that janet a may not have taken her own life but they needed proof so they went back to the crime scene and started from scratch they re-examined photographs and noted janet's head wound was on the left side when they interviewed friends and family members they discovered that janet was right-handed the gun was also positioned very awkwardly in her hand according to detective rankin the butt of the gun was facing the opposite way of the hand the barrel was in fact pointing upward this would be a difficult shot for a right-handed person at the crime lab toxicology results on janet's blood came back it appeared she had taken a massive dose of sleeping pills perhaps she had tried to kill herself with pills and when that didn't work she got the gun but there was one problem the toxicologist's opinion was that janet ache after taking that many drugs would not have been able to to form a thought pattern to have been in bed taken the drugs gone downstairs taking a gun out of the out of below the sofa where robert a was sleeping walked back upstairs gotten back in bed and shot herself despite trouble in the marriage and a minor domestic incident detectives had little else i'd talk to you back here okay but that changed police got a break when a call came in from a woman who said she was the last person to talk to janet the night she died the woman was janet's close friend but she hadn't come forward because she was afraid of robert's violent temper she told police that the night janet died she had come over to borrow a dress that's nice janet was excited and looking forward to her trip to cincinnati janet died she called and talked to her friend at 11 30 p.m was whispering and said robert was angry and arguing he wanted to go on the cincinnati trip with her but janet had refused the friend told investigators that janet then abruptly said robert was coming into the room and she had to go janet quickly hung up very violent temper it was the last time anyone heard from her pieces were falling into place detectives were now ready to confront robert a you know we've been wondering they told him they needed the truth why would they be arranged for a polygraph test and ask him to take it why would it be right out on the dresser i don't know i want to talk to my lawyer robert i don't have any problem with you talking to your attorney to prove that janet's death was not a suicide but cold-blooded murder detectives needed hard evidence and that evidence was right in front of them in the crime scene photos at that time it was determined that if we were going to have any substantial evidence out of the blood spatter evidence contained within the photographs that we were going to have to consider going outside of the department and hiring an individual to take a look at these photographs up to this point detectives beliefs were just another theory but the coroner's report was conclusive if they hoped to reopen this case they needed a lot more than theory they needed science to back up their suspicions janet a's death had been ruled a suicide but detectives were troubled by the evidence she was right-handed but the gun was found near her left hand her husband robert a was the only other person in the house friends and family said the couple's marriage was rocky weeks before her death she said she intended to divorce him detectives were certain it was murder and robert a was the prime suspect but to prove their case they had to turn to a forensic specialist columbus police contacted a renowned blood spatter expert they took the crime scene photographs to corning new york where professor herbert mcdonald is director of the laboratory of forensic science they just objectively wanted me to look at the pictures and see if i could form an opinion based principally up on the bloodstain patterns that were present in the pictures dr mcdonnell something in the pictures didn't make sense you can't have a gun after you've shot yourself in the head fall down on your chest and then somehow reach up underneath it and smear blood across it just it's the sequence is wrong the obvious thing is it was a homicide and not a suicide i'm lying in this position it was the information the detectives had been waiting for and the proof they needed detectives presented their new findings to the medical examiner the cause of janet a's death was changed from suicide to undetermined detective carl rankin presented the evidence this is very unusual for a detective to come back in and ask to have something changed on the death certificate uh especially something as important as from a suicide to at least undetermined the way was cleared to charge robert a for janet's murder detectives discussed their evidence with franklin county prosecuting attorney jeff allen once we had professor mcdonald's report i was convinced that we had a case that we could take to a jury so that was probably the main factor in my determination that we had a case that we could prosecute elbow we could i think clearly show based upon herb mcdonald the toxicologist the friends and family members who had had recent contact with janet a that however the defendant the only other person in the house was the person who had shot jan today she did not do it herself a warrant was issued for robert a's arrest for the murder of his wife he was taken into custody without incident i believe that they'd been arguing i believe that robert a wanted 100 percent to go to cincinnati and he was demanding it the couple argued janet went up to bed yeah she took sleeping pills to get a good night's sleep i think robert a laid on the couch drunk getting in more of a stupor and getting more mad as time went by and i think robert a reached under the couch and he got the gun that he knew was there the very first interview he says i turned the light on well i don't know about that i i think that he may have even had a flashlight with him to make sure that he didn't make a mistake in what he was about to do and i think he took that gun and i believe he walked up the stairs after killing janet a he put the flashlight on the dresser robert repositioned janet's body he got blood on his hand so he wiped it across her upper chest he planted the gun to make it look like a suicide but underneath the gun her blood had already dried without the blood pattern analysis done by herb mcdonald without the toxicology without having as good a crime scene a set of photographs as we had there would have been no reopening of this case there would have been no trial and there would have been no conviction the jury at robert a's trial heard the forensic evidence they found him guilty of janet's murder he was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison killers go to great lengths to create scenarios that shift blame leaving behind few traces of their guilt but no matter how small or well hidden forensic investigators live to expose these tell-tale traces and avenge the victims of murderous attraction you

Channel: The New Detectives

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Id: jEtAZP2CE9U

Length: 49min 52sec (2992 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 27 2021