Narrator: Up next, she doesn't appear to have an enemy in the world.
She loved people, people loved her,
and that's the way she always was.
Narrator: But for someone, that love turned to hate.
What a sick little bastard he is.
Narrator: A watery paradise becomes a watery grave.
You had to wonder if the person was actually thrown
into the water alive in that condition.
Narrator: But the water doesn't wash away everything.
It's very difficult to carry out a crime like this
without leaving behind some sort of evidence.
♪♪
Narrator: The intercoastal waterway along Florida's East coast
is a maze of rivers, lagoons, and barrier islands
that once served as hiding places for pirates, gun runners,
and all sorts of people outside the law.
These days, it's mostly a dream destination
for outdoor enthusiasts.
Harrell: Great surfing, fishing.
Great place to live.
Schools.
I live over there myself.
Small-town feel, beautiful place to live.
Narrator: On July 23rd, 2000, a local judge noticed
something unusual floating in a river close to his property.
He thought it was a manatee, a freshwater mammal
that can weigh up to half a ton.
Barnett: It floated up in the river and was a pretty good distance
from his backyard, so he couldn't really tell
with any certainty what it was.
Narrator: But this was no manatee.
It was the body of a young woman.
Harrell: It was a Sunday afternoon.
I was the on-call agent that day,
so everything happening death-wise,
I was getting a call.
This was my fourth call of the day
to respond to a dead person.
Narrator: The victim was unclothed, had nothing to identify her,
and had apparently been in the water for days,
which destroyed some evidence.
There was no evidence of trauma.
There's no gunshot wounds, no broken bones.
Narrator: Whether she'd been raped or engaged in consensual sex
before the murder was impossible to say.
Decomposition was going to create trouble with evidence,
but local police, who had some experience
pulling bodies out of the water, were ready.
Laufenberg: We had our dive team out there,
and they they go down with a body bag into the water
and put the body bag up around the body
and pull it out to the water's edge,
and that body bag is made to wick out the water.
The water seeps out of the bag so that everything stays intact.
Narrator: The victim had been bound around the hands and feet.
The rope itself was a nylon-type rope
that you would commonly see on sailboats or boating.
It had a double-diamond pattern to it,
and the ends were burnt
to apparently avoid fraying of the ends.
Narrator: And the rope had some unusual knots --
what are known as cow hitches.
These were knots that were done in a very specific way.
That was a knot that's consistent
with being in the Navy.
Narrator: And there was something intertwined in this rope --
a strand of hair.
It was thicker and coarser
than what a human hair normally is.
Narrator: The victim also had duct tape
wrapped around her eyes and neck.
But it's white instead of the standard silver-gray color.
Usually, duct tape is gray or it's in some other colors now,
but at that point time, white duct tape was very rare.
Harrell: I wouldn't really think it was that,
in itself, that big of a deal.
Yeah, it later became part of a big deal,
but at first it's just tape.
Narrator: The killer clearly planned for his victim
to sink to the bottom of the river.
He weighed the body down by filling shopping bags with rocks
and tying them to the body.
But the bags were too flimsy.
Laufenberg: The grocery bags had some distinctive markings on them.
It had the design of a baby club on it.
And it also had a set of numbers on it
that was unique in of the fact that these numbers represented
the person operating the machine when it was made.
Narrator: The location of the body also revealed a potential clue.
To find out how it ended up where it did,
investigators did what's called a drift test.
It's done with coconuts.
You know, you throw a bag of coconuts overboard
bound by a net --
the person's weight or whatever --
and it was a true test at the time.
It floated right up to the area where the body was.
Narrator: And where it was was one of the deepest parts of the river.
Local people called it the black hole.
If you lived in this area for an extended period time
and you were active on the water --
boating, fishing, anything like that --
you would be aware of the black hole area.
Narrator: This indicated the body was dumped from a boat,
not from a bridge or from the shore.
The clues were starting to come together.
The use of a boat, the unusual knots in the rope,
the body in the black hole.
Investigators knew something about their killer.
The problem was that they knew nothing about their victim.
♪♪
Narrator: Police were trying to identify
the body of a young woman
who'd been found murdered in the water
off Florida's Atlantic coast,
but she'd been in the water for so long,
a lot of evidence was lost.
The medical examiner couldn't even determine
an official cause of death.
We knew the manner of death being homicide,
but we didn't have an exact cause of death.
So there's an assumption that she was drowned.
Narrator: At the same time, a local family
was looking for their daughter.
Her name was Misty Morse.
Morse: She was a carefree spirit,
and she was also a friend magnet.
Her mother and I always called her a friend magnet.
Everywhere she went, she would instantly make friends.
Narrator: On the night of July 19th, Misty,
who had recently moved back in with her mother,
said she was going out to meet some friends.
Misty appeared to be going out.
She was getting dressed.
She wanted to know what mom thought of her outfit
before she left.
Narrator: When Misty didn't return home
for a couple of days,
her mother wasn't overly concerned.
She's 22 years old.
It was not all that unusual for her
to go spend the night with some friends or something,
so her mom didn't think anything of it.
Narrator: But after four days passed, Misty's family grew worried.
Across town, and unbeknownst to them,
investigators were employing a rare forensic technique
to identify their victim.
It's called de-gloving, and it involves removing skin
from the victim's hands while keeping the prints intact.
They'd make an incision around the wrist of the individual
and pull the entire outer layer of skin off of them,
and it makes like a glove.
One of the forensic technicians
then slide their hand into that skin
and roll the fingerprints for us.
Narrator: Amazingly, the de-gloving worked.
The prints from the dead woman matched Misty Morse,
whose prints were on file after a misdemeanor arrest.
When police arrived with the tragic news,
Misty's family already suspected the worst.
Harrell: Linda Morse opened the door, and when she opened the door,
she immediately looked at me and said something like,
"It's her, isn't it?"
I remember being dumbstruck. I just stood there almost numb.
It's like I was in a fog or I was there, but I wasn't there.
Narrator: Detectives' first question -- who would want Misty dead?
The answer -- no one,
at least no one her family and friends knew of.
I had no clue.
I had absolutely zero clue.
Narrator: Since the killer tied the body up
and transported it to the river,
he'd have had plenty of time and privacy.
I just believe that it was obviously
somebody that knew her.
It was somebody that was really familiar with the area.
Narrator: And he almost surely had a dog.
Test results had come back from the strand of hair
found with Misty's body.
That's a big deal we know. So there's a dog involved.
And DNA -- I mean, that's the exciting thing about it,
especially in 2000.
You know, you got human DNA.
You didn't have any dog DNA stuff
going on at the time to speak of.
Narrator: And there was someone in Misty's life
who had a dog and a possible motive.
His name was Brent Huck, and they dated off and on for years.
Misty and I met for lunch,
and she was telling me all about this new guy she just met,
and he was good-looking, and he had money.
He came from a well-to-do family on Merritt Island.
My understanding is that he received
an allowance every month,
so it wasn't as though he truly had to work.
Narrator: Brent readily agreed to come to the sheriff's office
for an interview.
There, he told detectives that
although his relationship with Misty was over,
they continued to see each other.
Misty was a friend with benefits,
as I remember him saying.
Narrator: But officially Brent and Misty were no longer dating.
In fact, she had recently started
seeing another young man.
He's a tough guy.
He's known for being a tough guy,
tatted up, that type of thing.
I expected the worst out of him,
and I expected the guy just not to speak with me.
Narrator: But he did speak.
And what he told police ultimately put them on the trail
of another man with a clear motive to harm Misty Morse.
♪♪
Narrator: A one-time boyfriend of Misty Morse
emerged as a potential suspect in her murder.
I went there, of course, hoping this was our guy.
I'm working on this case and there was something there.
Narrator: But this young man had none of the things investigators
were looking for in the suspect, and he was cleared.
He doesn't have a boat,
he doesn't have the boating experience,
and he certainly doesn't have the dog.
Narrator: But this one-time boyfriend did have a lead
on another potential suspect,
a man who showed a lot of interest in Misty
and who police found was no stranger to the law.
Harrell: Here's a guy that's got a felony arrest,
sexual battery in his background,
lives with his sister, no work, no gainful employment.
The guy's going nowhere.
And this, I'm thinking, is our best suspect --
just a criminal.
Narrator: His name was Teddy Underwood,
an ex-convict with a violent past.
Harrell: This is the guy.
He has the history, he has the look,
he has the life --
I mean, everything that you're looking for,
he is just checking off all the boxes.
Narrator: Except for the boxes
that in this case made all the difference.
Teddy Underwood didn't have a boat,
he was unfamiliar with the water,
he didn't have a dog, he didn't even have a car,
and he was eliminated as a suspect.
Whoever we're looking for has resources.
Narrator: Which led investigators back to Brent Huck.
A background check showed Huck had no prior criminal record,
but he had been in the Navy, and that didn't go so well.
Harrell: He had problems in the Navy,
attitude problems, was discharged.
Narrator: Brent didn't advertise his discharge to friends.
Instead, he bragged that he was a Navy SEAL, which was false.
Brent had talked about being a Navy SEAL.
I remember even on one of his vehicles,
he had a little Navy SEAL sticker.
But all his friends of his,
they all thought he was a Navy SEAL.
Well, Brent didn't even pass the swim test for the Navy.
Narrator: And Brent had one of the key things investigators
were looking for in a suspect.
He was comfortable on the water and with boats.
Barnett: He loved boats. He wanted to be a boat Captain.
I think he had actually captained some boats
back and forth from the Bahamas
or from South Florida to this area.
And he was very comfortable being on the boat.
Narrator: Brent appeared to be the only person with the resources
to perpetrate this particular crime.
But was there evidence to prove it?
Investigators went to Brent's house,
which happened to be right on the river
where Misty's body was found.
Harrell: His parents were away.
They had other property in the Bahamas.
He was the only occupant of the house at that time.
He answers the door. This dog tries to rush out.
Narrator: Brent and his dog were only too happy to welcome the police.
Harrell: I'm standing there with my partner, watching this,
and I remember looking at each other
'cause we knew we were looking for at least someone with a dog,
and bingo.
Yeah, here's the clue number one.
Narrator: And so began an extensive search for possible evidence,
starting with the dog.
And believe me, I felt bad getting the standards
of that dog.
I had to pull 50 hairs from the dog.
-Oh, gosh. -Yeah, I felt bad.
-How'd he take it? -Oh, he was a champ.
-Oh. -He was a real good dog.
Narrator: What detectives wanted to know
was whether anything in the house
could connect Brent to the crime scene.
Brent was the kind of guy that thought
that he was smarter than everybody else.
Narrator: But he wasn't smart enough to realize
what detectives were looking for,
and he allowed them to search his house.
I went into Brent's bedroom, and on the dresser
I found a crumpled-up piece of white duct tape.
Harrell: A crime scene detective brings out
the crumpled-up piece of white duct tape,
and Brent's, you know, jaw hits the floor.
You wish he had that all on tape
because you could never ask for it to be any better.
The tape appeared to be identical to the tape
found with Misty's body.
I started getting the feeling that we were
really onto something in this residence.
Narrator: In the kitchen, investigators found a grocery bag
that turned out to be identical to the ones
used to weigh down Misty's body.
It had the same number system stamped onto it,
so we knew at that juncture that that bag was manufactured
by the same person on the same lane on the same shift.
Narrator: But none of this evidence was conclusive.
Detectives needed something more
and were looking to Brent's dog to provide it.
♪♪
Narrator: Brent Huck was emerging as the only suspect
in the Misty Morse murder.
Police divers now search the river
near the dock by his house.
In the water, they found a piece of nylon rope
that looked remarkably familiar.
Laufenberg: That rope was a double-diamond pattern,
nylon rope, similar in consistency
to the rope we found on Misty Morse.
Narrator: And knots in the rope were the same unusual cow hitch knots
that had been used to bind Misty's hands and feet.
People in the Navy, this is a knot that's taught to them
as a routine part of their basic training.
Narrator: But most damning was the DNA.
Brent's dog was a German Shepherd Rottweiler mix.
The breed was consistent with the dog hair
found at the crime scene.
And a mitochondrial DNA test indicated the hair from that dog
was consistent with the hair found on Misty's body.
The problem for Brent Huck was not that one single piece
of evidence definitely tied him to the crime, because it didn't.
His problem was the combination of all that evidence.
The state proved the case on the strength
of the forensic evidence.
This wasn't just a circumstantial evidence case.
Now, a circumstantial evidence of guilt is evidence of guilt.
Narrator: In October of 2002, Brent Huck was charged with kidnapping
and first-degree murder.
What was his motive?
Oddly enough, he gave it up to police
during his initial interrogation.
He told investigators that the night Misty was last seen,
he was at a bar with several friends
when he heard a disturbing rumor.
That presented a problem.
Brent Huck had just gotten engaged
to a woman from West Palm Beach.
Harrell: She was a socialite, if you will,
the same caliber of society that his mother,
I think, was more used to.
Narrator: Brent admitted he became angry
and called Misty from the bar.
The prosecution argued that Brent was enraged
that Misty's rumor of pregnancy --
and it was just a rumor --
the autopsy showed she was not pregnant --
would break up his engagement.
In their first phone call on her final night, they argued.
In the second call, Brent said they patched things up.
Prosecutors believe he picked Misty up
and brought her to his house.
And once there, she was at his mercy.
He overpowered her, bound her hands and feet,
tying her with a distinctive cow hitch knot
and double-diamond rope.
A single dog hair, later linked by DNA to his dog,
was intertwined with that rope.
He taped Misty's eyes and mouth shut with the unusual
white duct tape later found in his house,
he weighed her body down with the same kind of plastic bags
also found in his house,
then he threw her into the black hole,
mistakenly thinking all evidence of his crime
would sink to the bottom of the river.
Barnett: I think that she was tossed overboard
while she was still alive.
What kind of evil person this must be.
No remorse, no compassion for another person.
Harrell: He thought that he's getting rid of this problem,
but it's so stupid.
You think and look back at all these mistakes that he made.
But you know what?
The guy was drinking all the time.
He's smoking pot, he's stupid.
You know, he's just one of these guys --
he's just making himself dumber by his lifestyle.
Narrator: Following a two-week trial, the jury deliberated
just 3 1/2 hours before finding Brent Huck guilty.
It was funny to me. I mean, the way he reacted --
he was stunned.
His expression, he just literally went.
Like, "How dare you convict me? This isn't possible.
My dream team is gonna get me off."
Clearly not.
He was as shocked or stunned as I was pleased and relieved.
Narrator: In the end, it came down to this single dog hair
intertwined with the rope used to bind Misty's arms and legs.
This was an ironic twist because Misty had given
Brent the dog as a gift.
She had a puppy, and she couldn't take the puppy
where she was moving, so he kept the dog -- Cheba.
Narrator: The Morse family and investigators all agreed
Brent's conviction might not have happened
if it weren't for the dog.
To have the dog hair be a significant portion
of solving this crime for Misty and it having been her dog,
I just thought that was an amazing aspect to the case.
That's a big part of what was used to convict him,
in fact, was that dog hair.
♪♪