- I'm craig melvin and this is
"dateline: Secrets uncovered".
- She was very carefree, loving.
She was amazing.
I just can't tell you the feeling that
Went through-- went through my mind.
I couldn't think of anybody that would
Ever want to do what they did to her.
- Amyjane was an angel,
Traveling the world with her church to help children.
- They loved amy. They loved amy so much.
- But back home, something sinister lay waiting.
- It was a pretty horrific crime scene.
- A bright, young life snuffed out.
- Who would do that?
It doesn't make any sense at all.
- Months later, a mother out for a walk vanishes.
- Karen's gone. I don't know where she is.
I just cry. - One murder,
One disappearance in the same small town.
But soon, police would discover a freakier connection.
- One of the detectives had got his hands on an image
Of amyjane brandhagen and karen lange together.
- Oh, my god.
- The dead teenager and the missing mom arm-in-arm.
- In that moment, most of us knew that
That wasn't coincidence.
- Was someone stalking the women of this tight-knit church?
- This sounds more like a zodiak-type killer.
- Absolutely.
- A race to connect the dots revealing a truth darker
Than anyone imagined. - I don't get that.
I mean, it's just evil.
♪♪
- Hello and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
Whispers of a serial killer would send tremors
Through any city.
But in a quaint cowboy town like pendleton, oregon,
The shock waves were seismic.
It started with the brazen murder of a beloved teenager.
Then, nearly a year later, another terrifying attack.
The search for answers would lead police
To a killer's secret hideout
And into a very dark mind.
Here's keith morrison with "someone was out there".
♪♪
- There are children born into this world
For whom the dance never ends,
For whom joy seems uncontained,
For whom exuberance is uncontainable.
- Amyjane! What are we doing right now?
- We're riding on the roof of a car.
- Whoo!
- There was this young woman,
A sprite, really, in a young woman's body,
Who loved adventure and people...
And who danced to music no one else could hear,
Which is why...
- It haunted me. Thi-this case haunted me.
- Haunted the police. Haunted the whole town.
- Is there a serial killer around?
- A serial killer with plans for two women
In one particular church?
In one particular photograph?
- I was like, this is insane
And everybody needs to find this person.
- Yes.
But it began with that girl, that sprite.
- Just the freest spirit that you could think of.
Like, literally not having a care in the world.
- Kate cook is talking about her friend
And fellow missionary amyjane brandhagen.
Talking about her now that it's happened,
That's it all over.
Kate and amyjane went to india and nepal together.
Small town girls, kate from wisconsin,
Amyjane from oregon.
She was always ready to give
And pour her heart out to people
And just give everything that she had to offer.
♪ the god of creation ♪
- They were there, three months,
For something called youth with a mission,
Or ywam for short.
Like tourists, they went to the taj mahal.
And like preachers, they spread the word.
To children, mostly, for whom amyjane was
Magnetic, irresistible.
- When they would see her, they would run up to her
And they'd go "didi, didi," which means "sister, sister."
You know? Like, so excited.
- And when the three-month mission trip was over...
- She hated it.
She was like "I don't want to go home."
♪♪
- Home, for amyjane, was a universe away
From vibrant, teeming india.
Here it is, pendleton,
Safely tucked into a small valley
On the vast, rolling flanks of eastern oregon.
Cowboy country. [cheering]
- Ladies and gentlemen,
Welcome to the pendleton roundup!
♪♪
- Home to one of the nation's biggest rodeos,
The pendleton roundup, which, each September,
Celebrates the town's rough and tumble past
As a brawling and bordello-filled cowtown.
[cheering]
- And then, then good conservative citizens
Wave goodbye to departing cowboys
And settle into a safe and predictable life.
And fill the pews every Sunday morning without fail.
People like bill caldera, who was like family to
Amyjane and her parents, dave and cathy brandhagen.
- They brought amyjane home when she was three days old,
And we were there when-when she-when she was brought home.
- Bill knew and adored the remarkable little girl
From the very beginning.
The brandhagens asked bill to speak for them
After what happened, when they sorely needed
Their church family of pendleton free methodist.
Like youth minister jed hummel and his wife lisa,
Who encountered the dancing sprite
When she was in middle school.
- If she got the feeling that you were left out,
She'd find you
And make sure you knew that you had a friend.
- Mind you, when she was far away in india,
The people who loved amyjane worried a lot
And didn't breathe easy until she returned home
To the safety and security of pendleton, where...
- She was waiting for god to tell her what to do next.
Whether it was going to be to travel the world
Or go back to ywam or go to school.
- She wanted more freedom, too,
So she moved out of her parents' house
And got herself a little apartment
In downtown pendleton,
Worked two jobs to pay for it,
Including a job cleaning motel rooms
At the travelodge across from city hall.
- She was excited to get this other job,
But she wasn't so sure about working at the hotel.
She was a little nervous about it.
- After all, she had never done that sort of thing before,
Or answered to a boss who,
Well, this one sounded gruff.
But she went and she scoured and scrubbed those little rooms
That looked out on downtown pendleton.
And then, it was August 14, 2012.
- In his office down the hall from the 911 operator,
Bill caldera listened and felt the dread flood in.
- It just gave me a feeling in the pit of my stomach
That something was not good about this call.
- Bill, remember, was a close friend
Of the brandhagen family, attends the same church.
But was also a policeman.
And that day, with the chief on vacation,
Lieutenant bill caldera was the man in charge.
- As soon as one of my patrol sergeants arrived on scene,
He requested my-my presence, which I knew then
We were probably dealing with a homicide.
- But as he raced to the motel,
He couldn't know what had just been started there
Any more than whose life had just ended.
- What this veteran investigator
Was about to find would leave him stunned.
- I just can't tell you
The-the feeling that went through--
Went through my mind.
- A crime that may be impossible to solve
Thanks to a suspect list
That could include anyone and everyone.
- Within the first hour of being at the crime scene,
Upwards of 50 people walked by.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- If god had a plan for pendleton, oregon
On the afternoon of August 14, 2012,
One could hardly have imagined it would be this.
- Lieutenant bill caldera prepared himself
As he drove over to the travelodge
And then climbed the stairs to room 231.
All the preparation in the world
Could not have been enough.
Lying on the bathroom floor, her lifeless body punctured
By the startling scarlet of a dozen stab wounds,
Was the sweet free-spirit he'd known since she was a baby,
19-year-old amyjane brandhagen.
- It just felt like that somebody had
Kicked me in the pit of my stomach.
I just can't tell you the-the feeling
That went through-- went through my mind.
- Yeah, almost like she was your kid, in a way.
- Very much.
- Lieutenant caldera took it upon himself
To notify amyjane's parents.
- And that was probably the toughest thing
That I've ever had to do in my career.
And...
I can't tell you the feeling that we all had.
We broke down in tears.
- But why would anyone want to kill amyjane,
Of all people? - I was just crushed.
Like how is this even possible?
I'm just speechless. And, um--
And then I just sat crying in the bathroom
For probably the next hour.
Like, not understanding, like, craziness.
- As word spread through amyjane's church family,
So did the questions.
High school youth pastor chris thatcher.
Early on, was there any indication
Of who may have been responsible?
- I don't think anybody had any idea.
I think that's what made this so hard is that
So many of us, we know each other.
We're family here.
- But there was the dismal work to do.
Lieutenant caldera returned to the motel
Where amy was murdered.
It would be pretty hard for you to take part
In an active investigation.
- No, I wouldn't have.
I couldn't have.
Not with my relationship.
- Lieutenant caldera turned the case over
To detective sergeant rick jackson.
- It was a pretty-pretty, uh, horrific, uh, crime scene.
- It was obvious amyjane fought for her life.
Her glasses lay in the bathtub.
Blood spattered the walls.
Dna of a male, presumably her attacker,
Would be found under her fingernails.
But the medical examiner said it was not a sex attack
And it wasn't robbery either.
Amyjane's purse and cellphone were
Still right there on the bedside table.
And nobody saw a thing. Even though...
- I mean, this was during broad daylight
With a motel room door-- with motel room doors open.
- The only potential witness,
If he was a witness at all, was a painter working
At the motel who said he saw a young man with longer hair,
Darker skin, perhaps hispanic or native american,
Walking near the back parking lot.
It may have been the person who did it
And it may not have been. - Sure.
- It might have just been somebody passing by.
- Sure. Why-- while we were there, sh-shoot,
Within the first hour of-of an-of being
At the cr-- at the crime scene,
Upwards of 50 people walked by.
I mean, there-- this is a pretty busy area of town.
- Busy, yes, and studded with cctv cameras.
Banks, bridges, city hall,
Walking trails along the river that runs through town.
Detectives painstakingly went through the footage.
- There was nothing.
- They took dna from dozens of motel guests
To check against the sample
Taken from amyjane's fingernails.
It wasn't any of them.
So, detective jackson went to the people
Who knew amyjane well,
Or perhaps romantically.
Those stab wounds were all focused around her heart,
Which often indicates some kind of crime of passion.
But...
- I think most of the males we spoke to really
Viewed themselves as her protectors.
- Pendleton police chief stuart roberts hurried back home
From his abbreviated mexican vacation
And encountered a case going nowhere fast.
- Everybody that knew her
Characterized her in the same way.
She knew-- she knew no stranger.
She didn't have an evil bone in her body.
- As the investigation entered its second week,
Amyjane's family prepared a memorial service
At the church where they'd raised their daughter.
- Amy loved thunderstorms.
And it was one of her favorite things to do was
To go out barefoot and dance in the rain
Because she just loved it.
The morning of her memorial service,
There was a loud clap of thunder
That came over town about 6:30.
And, um, several of us heard it.
I think we knew.
- Up there dancing in the rain somewhere, huh?
- I think she was.
- And together we pray, in jesus' name, amen.
- Hundreds crowded into amyjane's church, and many,
Like jed and lisa hummel, were amazed by
The strength of amyjane's parents.
- They were hurting deeply. - Yeah.
- But they weren't looking for vengeance.
- Me, on the other hand, I was just ticked.
I was, like, this is insane
And everybody needs to find this person.
- Oh, they were certainly trying.
Even at that very moment.
- We had about 10 to 12, uh, undercover officers
In about tomor-- the memorial service,
Looking for anybody that would strike us as-as-as odd.
- But no one stood out.
- Hang in there, caleb! Hang in there!
- A month after the murder, the famous roundup
Filled the streets as usual.
And then they emptied again.
[thunder booming]
And as the autumn wind turned raw,
Detective jackson's investigation chased down
Every lead and got nowhere.
- We call them rabbit trails.
We ran hundreds of rabbit trails down.
- The holidays came and went.
Holidays for other people.
Not detective jackson, not chief roberts.
- It haunted me. Thi-this case haunted me.
- And then a spring breeze
Dipped into the pendleton valley,
Curled its warming fingers into secret corners
And came out whispering a name.
- Out of the blue, a tip.
And it was a name the police knew well.
Had cops found their killer?
- We go out and find his girlfriend.
And she's going,
I always believed he could have done this.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Six months after the murder of amyjane brandhagen,
Investigators finally caught a break.
A county jail inmate looking for a deal
Got word out to the cops.
He claimed to know who killed amyjane.
- I mean, we've gone for months with nothing
And now this.
- There were two of them, said the inmate.
Ira draper and eric torres,
Both well known to local law enforcement,
Who soon confirmed the men were in the area
The day of the murder.
They found torres first.
And it looked like they were onto something.
Torres said yes, he was in on it,
But he didn't kill her.
It was the guy he was with,
He said, draper, who went into the motel room
And came out very bloody.
- He basically tells them, yeah,
I was driving the getaway car.
- It was his buddy who did the killing, he said.
Ira draper.
- So, we go out and find his girlfriend.
She's going, I always believed he potentially
Could have done this.
He-he-he's aggressive and he has these journals.
And they're journal entries about,
Uh, defiling women
And-and killing and burying them.
- They found and questioned draper who said
He understood why he was a suspect.
- But after a few minutes with draper,
Jackson had a familiar sinking feeling.
- He was very much so enamored by the fact
That the police, um, were giving him attention.
- And he was playing you.
He was just playing it for all it was worth.
- He was getting a little bit of street cred for it.
- And the dna confirmed it was all an act.
Two unpleasant men, the police said,
Who seemed to be enjoying themselves
At the expense of the cops.
So, back to zero.
By August 2013, it had been almost a full year
Since amyjane brandhagen's murder in pendleton.
Investigators had exhausted hundreds of leads
And themselves.
- I knew it was having an impact on-on
My physiological health a-as well as my mental health.
- On August 8, the chief took his family
Out of town for some r&r.
And the very next day, a woman named karen lange,
Happened to be a member of amyjane's church,
Announced to her husband dan she was going for a walk.
- And she came down
And I'll never f-forget what she said.
She said, "well, you know, I was thinking that
"we can maybe go out for dessert afterward."
- Karen was an accomplished singer and pianist.
Dan, vice president of the local community college.
Her walk along the river levee near downtown pendleton,
The river walk, was an almost daily habit.
It was 4:30 p.M., lots of sun left
On the warm August afternoon.
- And the last words she said to me were,
"well, I guess we'll just have a nice, boring evening."
- Dan went back to tinkering on his motorcycle,
Lost all track of time.
It was dark when his son walked into the room
And asked an innocuous question.
- "uh, where's mom?"
I said, "well, hmm, I don't know.
"I'll give her a call." so, I went--
I've-- I tried to make the phone call
And I couldn't get ahold of her.
- But it was after 9:30 p.M.
Karen usually walked for less than an hour.
She'd been gone for five.
In some people, anxiety stokes panic.
Dan is not like that.
It's a coping mechanism. He stays calm.
He made another call.
- Long day, 10 o'clock at night, my phone rings.
I answer, "hey." "hi, dan."
- Remember jed and lisa hummel,
Friends of amyjane's from church?
Karen always parked her car in front of their house
When she took her late afternoon walks.
- He says, um, "is karen at your house?"
"no."
And I-I'd just got home and I asked lisa
If-if she had been over.
And I said "no, I haven't seen her.
- And I had looked outside and sure enough,
The car was still there.
So, we went out to the car and she wasn't there.
- So, jed and lisa grabbed flashlights and walked
A couple of blocks from their house down to the river levee.
And there in the parking lot sat a pendleton policeman.
What should they do, they asked him?
- And he just thought it was unusual enough
That he got ahold of dan.
- As the officer left to talk to dan,
Jed and lisa kept looking through the dark
Along the riverbank.
- There's a fear of not finding anything
And there's a fear of finding something.
- When I got to the-- where the policeman was,
We were talking and he said you seem to be
Awfully calm for your wife being missing.
And at that point I thought, holy mackerel,
You know, if there's something--
If there's something the-- bad-bad that happened to her,
I could be a suspect.
- From his patrol car, the officer was able
To pull up images from cameras
Stationed around the river levee.
No sign of karen.
Then her cell provider sent a ping to karen's phone.
It turned up across the main road
About a half a mile from the river
In the parking lot at walmart,
Where again the officer could not find karen.
What was going on?
Around and around the river walk they went,
Pointing their puny flashlights at a sea of dark.
- I did go home at about five.
I wrote a f-- uh, uh, an email
Saying, "karen's gone, I don't know where she is."
I just have to go to bed.
And I went and I just cried.
- He did not sleep long.
The phone call that startled him awake brought news.
Some good, some very, very bad.
- Amyjane's murder and karen's disappearance,
Could they be connected?
Investigators are about to uncover
A disturbing clue.
- I think in that moment, most of us knew that
That wasn't coincidence.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm craig melvin.
Almost a year after amyjane brandhagen's murder,
Fellow church member karen lange vanished
While walking in a nearby park.
When her husband dan raised the alarm,
Friends launched a frantic search that continued
Through the night. Where could karen be?
Soon, a horrific discovery would answer that question
And launch a whole new mystery.
Here's keith morrison with more of "someone was out there".
- Dawn took its own imperious time
On the morning of August 10, 2013.
By that time, going on 6 a.M.,
Karen lange had been missing more than 12 hours.
And then finally, the morning sun
Lit up the banks of the umatilla river and...
- The policeman called and he said, "we found your wife."
- She was found, and alive!
But what the policeman said next was terrifying.
- Well, when he said, "we found your wife
"and she's alive..."
That was a great relief.
But, um-- but he certainly made it sound
Like it was a tough-tough thing.
- Oh, it was.
Karen had been struck from behind by some
Heavy, blunt object.
Her skull was crushed. The wound was massive.
Right away, the detective called the chief
On vacation in the mountains five hours away
And described the way they found her.
- Did he think she was dead already?
- He thought she was dead.
Uh, a tremendous amount of blood.
He indicates that he reaches for her wrist
To see if she has a pulse
And her leg moves and she gasps.
- But it didn't look like she'd be alive for long.
The detective drove dan lange to the hospital,
Told him to prepare for the worst.
As he arrived at the emergency room,
Dan ran into a nurse he knew.
- And, uh, she took one look at me...
And it was so heartbroken
That I, of course, broke down.
And then I had a chance to see karen.
- The doctors gave her a slim chance,
One in a hundred, maybe.
She was airlifted to a bigger hospital
In portland for specialized care.
And as dan kept watch at her bedside,
He remembered an odd comment karen made
A few days before she was attacked.
Her boys were in college, nearly grown.
She wasn't sure what her purpose was anymore.
And she told dan...
- "I really wish that I could be, you know,
"more useful if I'm going to remain here."
- On planet earth. - On the planet earth, yeah.
And I would assure her with, but god has a plan
And you will be used.
- But what kind of use was this?
If she lived, she might never regain consciousness.
If she regained consciousness,
She might never be the same.
How useful could that be?
And then suddenly, the case of the murder
Of amy brandhagen and the attack on karen lange
Seemed to take on a new and terrifying meaning.
Chief roberts returned from his vacation
To be handed this photograph by investigators.
It had been taken four years earlier.
- One of the detectives had gotten his hands on an image
Of amyjane brandhagen and karen lange together
Dated August 14. - Oh, my god!
- Amyjane brandhagen was murdered on August 14.
Karen lange was assaulted on August 9,
One year after amyjane's murder.
- Like somebody is targeting them or somebody
Within the church has some strange motivation?
- It could be a member of the congregation
Or it could be somebody
Who they provided outreach services to.
- In pendleton at the free methodist church,
The word spread quickly.
- I think in that moment, most of us knew that
That wasn't coincidence.
And I can't tell you how we knew.
- Well, small town, same church.
- Small town, same church, we all knew each other.
- In a town where murder is rare,
Two women, one photo,
And dates that lined up like a message.
Had to be a connection.
- Oh, it certainly crossed my mind.
And I think it-it crossed everybody's mind.
- So, once again, detective jackson and the others
Scoured hours of video recorded by dozens of cameras
Stationed around town looking for a suspect.
Good luck.
When amyjane was murdered in broad daylight,
Those videos turned up exactly nothing.
But then-then luck turned.
They saw this recorded by one of the cameras
Stationed around the river walk,
6:31 p.M. Karen lange,
There she is right there, out for her walk.
And following her, a man watching her
With what looks like a pipe hidden
Behind his back right there.
- They cross a small footbridge.
There was a short stretch there of maybe 50 or 60 yards
Where there's just no visibility from any direction
Unless you're actually on the path.
And right there is where he attacks her.
- Is that where her-- where she was found?
- She was found about 30 feet down the path.
- And then they found this video recorded by
Another camera about an hour after the attack.
The same man enters a park bathroom
And minutes later emerges to use a drinking fountain.
- I immediately said it's the same guy.
We've got to show it's the same guy.
- Wait! Same guy as who?
Chief roberts remembered after amyjane was murdered,
The only witness who saw anything
Reported a young man with dark hair
Wandering near the motel.
- Basically, the description was fairly generic.
Male, 20-something,
Dark hair, a little bit longer,
And with dark-toned skin.
Now, we have the second crime a year later,
Almost to the anniversary,
And here's a male profile or image
On-on our network camera system that fits.
It fits. - But who was he?
And why was he targeting women from the same church?
Within hours, a very unusual
Kind of pendleton roundup was underway.
The order was clear.
Find him, fast.
- The evidence that was about to send this case
Into overdrive. - It gave me chills.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
♪ son of god ♪
- When the free methodists of pendleton, oregon
Went to their weekly worship services
That Sunday in August, 2013,
They offered their prayers for karen lange
Lying in a portland hospital in a coma,
Her husband dan a constant presence at her bedside.
The prognosis was poor. But dan,
Optimistic by nature, struggled to hang on.
- It's just a faithful attitude that says
No matter what happens, it's god's plan.
And his plan is to prosper us.
Even if I were to lose karen,
I had to hold on to that
And realize that.
- In those first two days since karen was found
In the brush alongside the pendleton river walk,
Shock spread like bad electricity.
- Someone came up to our senior pastor and said,
You know, I think I'm glad I'm not part of your church.
After all these things that have happened.
- Yeah. - And you're thinking
Is there a-a serial killer around.
- Not fear, exactly.
Not yet.
But someone was out there, was among them,
Had killed once, perhaps twice.
And so, the unease grew.
Dark places were avoided.
- The odds of a stranger picking two people
That were as connected,
Difficult to wrap your mind around.
- Umatilla county district attorney dan primus.
- Yeah, I mean, this sounds more like
A zodiak-type killer.
It's like one of those weird puzzles.
- Absolutely. As you're working
These investigations, you're thinking of
All those things and trying to determine
Wh-what connection is there between
Karen lange and amyjane brandhagen.
- It seemed very likely to the police and the d.A.
The man seen in the surveillance video
Was the one who attacked karen lange,
And that he might also have been the killer
Who stabbed amyjane to death
In that motel room, one year earlier.
But who was it?
The chief asked his street cops to look at that video.
Anybody recognize him?
And what do you know, one of them did.
- He looked at the image for a second
And said "that's danny woo."
- How did he know?
Because he'd encountered him four times in the previous year.
Minor infractions, though, so they never confirmed
That his name actually was danny woo.
But there was one thing that might help id him.
- He had a very distinct tattoo on the inside
Of his left wrist, which read "semper fi."
- He's a marine.
- That was my initial reaction.
- But while chief roberts didn't know
Who the man really was
Or where he was now, or why he targeted
Two women who once taught bible school together,
He knew they had to track him down right away.
- This was a community on edge.
- And now he's out there. - He's out there.
And we've got to find him. There could be more victims.
- The chief canceled all time off,
Called in every available officer.
A manhunt was on.
And then, a bit of luck.
The very same sharp-eyed detective who found karen
Noticed something odd nearby.
A wooden panel on the back of an old batting cage
Beside the river walk looked not quite right.
So, the officer reached behind the loose panel
And found a pipe
That appeared to have blood on one end.
The dna confirmed it was karen's blood.
And then, when the crime lab compared a dna sample
From the other end of the pipe with the material found
Under amyjane's fingernails...
- I get that call on a Sunday afternoon.
Now, we've connected the dots.
- The man who assaulted karen and amyjane brandhagen's killer
Were one in the same.
Right away, the police chief shared the news with the d.A.
- I was at home.
Uh, chief asked me if I was sitting down.
He told me that, uh, the dna from the pipe matched
The dna found underneath amyjane's fingernails
And, uh, it gave me chills.
- But though chief roberts' officers scoured the town,
Even distributed flyers with woo's picture on them,
They found nothing.
Hours piled up, days, more than a week, no danny woo.
But anxiety, oh, yes.
- You didn't leave garages unlocked.
- No. - Sheds, doors,
Windows. - Mm-mm.
- Cars. - Yeah.
You do.
You feel kind of like there's a serial killer in town.
- And then a call from the local convention center.
Two catering company employees told the dispatcher
They'd gone in through a side door to the kitchen.
- And here sits this person who they readily recognized
As this danny woo that we had disseminated
The-the images of.
And he was sitting there, drinking a coke.
And he basically picked up his stuff and disappeared
Into the facility.
- So, he's in the building, somewhere.
It's a big building. - It's a big building.
- Within minutes,
The police surrounded the convention center.
A search dog trained to bite joined in.
They set up a command post
Outside one of the center's windows.
- And the dogs just woof, woof, woofing at the door.
And the oregon state trooper behind us says
"I can see a light hanging out of the ceiling."
- Looking through a window.
- I take about two steps back from where I'm standing
And I can see it.
So, I give them the command to-to enter.
They enter, go straight to the-- this location in the stairwell,
And there he is.
- Minutes later, the suspect,
The man known as danny woo,
The man who may have murdered one woman,
Possibly even two,
And terrorized the town of pendleton,
Walked out in handcuffs
And into the flashing cameras of the local paper.
Later, officers took this video of his hiding spot
In an air conditioning duct in the convention center ceiling
Where he had a blanket, a radio,
And some clothes.
- It looked like a nest.
And, uh, it looked like he'd been there for a while,
Coming and going, hiding in plain sight.
He'd been here all year.
- But now what?
Would he talk? Lawyer up?
Or even would he reveal who he really was
And why it appeared he was targeting
The woman of the free methodist church.
- Revelations that would leave this town
And these investigators shattered.
- I didn't know whether to cry;
I didn't know whether to scream;
I was just dumbfounded.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back.
Following a trail of blood and dna evidence,
Investigators identified danny woo as the prime suspect
In the murder of amyjane brandhagen
And the vicious attack on karen lange.
Cornered in his hideout, woo was quickly arrested.
Now, it was time to turn up the heat
On the suspected killer.
But even these seasoned officers were unprepared
For the secrets woo would reveal.
Here's keith morrison with the conclusion
Of "someone was out there".
- Here he was, the man they knew as danny woo,
The man detective sergeant rick jackson
Had been chasing for a year.
- Jackson was out hunting elk when they caught danny woo
And rushed in, still in his camo,
Hoping finally to get answers to his year of questions.
- The chief and the d.A. Watched from a nearby office.
- I didn't expect him to say anything.
I expected him to ask for a lawyer.
I wasn't sure how he was going to respond
To-to any of their questions.
- But d.A. Premus and all of them
Were in for a big surprise.
- Sure enough, not danny woo.
Lukah chang, 23 years old,
The son of christian missionaries,
A deserter from the u.S. Marines,
Who drifted into town without any plan
And stayed in that downtown motel,
Where he encountered a maid named amyjane.
- Soon, chang was broke, living on the street,
Spending his days at the town library
Across the street from the travel lodge.
- When detective jackson
Tried to get into this young man's head,
The conversation veered off into a cold
And disturbing place.
As a missionary's son,
Was lukah chang rebelling against his parents?
Against god?
Detective jackson asked the question
On just about every mind in pendleton, oregon.
- That was it? To see how it felt?
- I didn't understand that.
I've never heard that from a killer before.
- But why the second attack?
Did he target those two women
Because they taught bible school together?
Because they appeared in that photograph together?
- "but that was just about it," said lukah chang.
- He was a brick wall.
If the real answer was buried in his religious past
Or his failed military career or some other secret corner,
We were not to know. Ever.
- And then, having had his say,
The man the police had been chasing for so long
Was safely tucked away in a jail cell,
Soon to plead guilty to murder and attempted murder
And to begin serving 35 to life.
- I can't even describe the relief.
It's like the world is lifted off your shoulders.
- I didn't know whether to cry;
I didn't know whether to scream;
I di-- I-I, you know,
I just didn't-- I was just kinda dumbfounded.
- Across the state in portland,
Dan lange told his comatose wife, karen, they caught him.
Though, of course, she couldn't hear that.
And then, then a few days later, dan turned on his video camera,
And, well, see for yourself.
- Karen, can you raise your hand again?
Yeah. Can you raise that hand up?
There you go. Yeah, very good.
- To the astonishment of her doctors,
Life flooded back.
- I'm f-- doing very well. I feel great.
- And just a year after that vicious attack,
Here she was, karen lange,
The woman whose ordeal wound up catching a killer.
Not exactly the purpose she expected
When she talked to her husband, dan, that day.
- Like, I-I told him-- not that long ago,
I said don't ever pray for more to do with your life.
'cause boy, do you get answered on that.
- Yeah.
- Her recovery took a long time, of course.
Three hospitals, surgeries to rebuild her skull,
Months in a protective helmet.
But of that awful night? She has no memory at all.
What was the sense that you recall, at least,
Of coming out of this blackness
Into-- back up into life again?
- Well, a lot of it was just a feeling
That I didn't know what was wrong.
I didn't know why I was in a hospital.
I didn't know I was in portland.
- The lange's troubles are not over.
A few months after dan brought karen home
From portland, he was diagnosed with cancer.
So, a skeptic's question.
You know, you two have been through so much
In the last year,
That, I mean...
[knocks on wood]
Has this not damaged your faith?
Ha-ha-- are you not angry at god for picking on you?
- No.
- I mean, if there's a plan for you,
It's your plan to be
So brutalized by an attack and by cancer?
- Well, the beauty is that we also see the blessings,
Uh, see how it's had such a positive effect
On-on people, and-and how it could be so much worse for me.
I see it as we need to go through it.
It will be a season of-of recovery for us.
- And then in September 2014,
It was pendleton roundup time again,
And the mc's voice boomed through the arena.
Miracles happened.
- No one in pendleton knows that better
Than our singer today.
For our national anthem, please welcome
Ms. Karen lange to the arena.
[cheers]
♪ oh say can you see ♪
♪ by the dawn's early light ♪
- I looked at it as an opportunity
To-to really just
Thank the people of pendleton for all the support,
And-and, uh, things that they did
For-for me and for my family.
♪ of the brave ♪
[cheers and applause]
- Two years later, karen found herself
In the arms of the community again,
When dan died.
And pendleton was once again a smaller, sadder place,
Without dan and the girl
Who always reached out to the lonely,
The strangers,
Just like the one who drifted into town
And killed her.
Pretty remarkable, huh?
I mean, isn't he exactly the sort of person
That she would have sought out?
- I find that very ironic, and it's also the same
Person that if she were here today,
She would say "take the way of forgiveness,
"it's the better way."
- Let's pray, come, lord jesus.
- And, every Sunday, the faithful still fill the pews
At the pendleton free methodist church.
And a barefoot sprite who loved to dance
Lives on, at least in memory.
- Amy's life was great.
And I think that the people who knew here would want
To live better lives because of knowing her
And knowing who she was.
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm craig melvin.
Thank you for watching.