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[eerie guitar music playing]

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[Kathryn] In 1991…

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there was this couple out on horseback
going through the Killing Field.

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And they can smell something.

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-The police are called.
-[police sirens wail distantly]

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And another decomposing body's found

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underneath a tree in the Killing Field.

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[reporter 1] A fourth body found
in the same location.

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She is unidentified at this time.

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We know she is a white female,
approximately five foot two inches tall.

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Police believe this latest victim,
they're calling her Janet Doe,

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was somewhere between 30 and 50 years old.

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[Kathryn] You'd already had
these three girls

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who'd been found in the Killing Field,

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and you had this questionable death
with Ellen Beason.

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And it's like déjà vu.
It's happened again.

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It was shocking another body was found.

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[reporter 2] The body is one of four
that turned up in this League City field

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between 1983 and 1991.

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[Skip] Some killer was creating a kind
of tour of his own personal graveyard.

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What was going on?

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[Richard] Had a serious impact
on the community.

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Especially young women.

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[Marla] It did make you scared.

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I can remember watching the news
crying one night

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because I didn't want to grow up.

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I didn't want to get any bigger,
because I was scared.

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Bodies keep showing up.
The girls keep disappearing.

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And we got to do something.

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[Nina] This person's still walking around,
still snatching ladies up.

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Why?

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The fear was actually palpable.

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It looked like a work of a brilliant
but depraved serial killer.

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[ominous music playing]

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[birds tweeting]

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[somber music playing]

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The Killing Field cases on Calder Road
were kind of a black eye for League City,

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having these unsolved homicides.

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But Tim Miller had a few ideas
about who he thought may be responsible

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for the death of his daughter
and the other three victims.

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[Tim] Clyde Hedrick worked
for a contractor on Calder.

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I mean, Clyde hung out
in League City a lot,

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at the Texas Moon
and all the different bars.

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[director] Was Clyde
ever looked at as a suspect

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in the Calder Road killings at the time?

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I couldn't answer that because
of the nature of the open investigation.

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There's really not much that I can say.

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I can tell you generally that

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the police are not quick
to eliminate suspects.

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[Richard] As an investigator,

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we can't just take
the word of somebody and…

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run full speed at that person.

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We have to do methodical investigation
and continue to follow the evidence.

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[ominous music playing]

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[Skip] The first three bodies were
discovered within a period of two years,

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all within 50 yards of each other.

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About five years later,

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a fourth body was found
on that same patch of land,

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but it was a hundred yards away.

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Is she connected to the other three,
or is she some other killer's victim?

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Somebody who read
about the Texas Killing Fields

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and decided to add his victim to the pile.

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Girls' bodies were found
in an advanced stage of decomposition.

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They used dental records
to identify Laura Miller

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and Heide Fye.

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But Jane and Janet Doe didn't match
with any missing person cases in the area.

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[Lise] League City had very few resources,
small police department.

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They couldn't seem to identify her.

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And despite the fact that in 1991,

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there is DNA evidence
that could be tested,

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the evidence is not kept very well
by League City Police.

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They don't have anything to test.

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[reporter 1] For now, the key to solving
the Killing Field murders

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may lie with these
two reconstructed heads.

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[Richard] The League City
Police Department

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tried a number of different techniques

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to identify Jane and Janet Doe.

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One was rebuilding the skull,

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try to put clay on the skull to see
what they might've looked like in life,

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hoping that would be
something to generate leads.

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[reporter 2] If you have any information,

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if Jane or Janet Doe look familiar,
call the League City Police Department.

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[Lise] A lot of people are really outraged
that these women aren't even identified.

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And how can it be that no one
can figure out who killed them?

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The attention did have the effect
of putting more pressure

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on the League City Police
to do something about those cases.

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[newscaster] Tonight, investigators take
a closer look at the similarities

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in the cases,
and they take their case to the FBI.

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The fact that it was a serial killing case
gave the FBI the authority to investigate.

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I went and interviewed the head
of the FBI's task force in Houston.

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Now, if you're a reporter,
you never get into the FBI offices.

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Why was I being invited
to go talk to the FBI director?

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Because these guys didn't know what to do.

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They were stuck.

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The basic hope
was to get out some publicity

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that someone would come forward and say,

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"I know who's doing all this."

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[reporter] Profiling is a technique where
special agents dissect a crime scene.

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They use the information
to identify the killer's characteristics.

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The FBI pulled together a profile
of the Killing Fields killer.

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It, in many ways, fit this guy
who lived on Calder Road.

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[Skip] The profile that the FBI made

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suggested that the killer
probably lived close to the Killing Field,

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that he kept clippings
from newspapers of the case,

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that he had a superior attitude,

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and that he had troubled relationships
with women.

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The League City Police said,

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"We've got a man that owns these two
properties adjoining the Killing Field."

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"Who's bright, who's had
bad relationships, who's hit animals."

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And the FBI agent said,
"He could be your guy."

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League City Police Department called me.

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And they said, "Hey, we've been looking
towards this one guy Clyde Hedrick."

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"But we've got another guy
on the radar now, Robert Abel."

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Robert Abel was this brilliant
former scientist for NASA.

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He had helped create
the modern Saturn rocket

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that got astronauts to the moon.

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[Lise] By the time Janet Doe's body
was found in 1991,

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Robert Abel owned the land
where the Killing Fields was.

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He turned part of it into riding stables.

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Robert drew suspicion
because he was really cooperative.

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He offered to help police,
provide equipment, clear brush,

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do whatever he could.

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[Kathryn] He kept insinuating himself
into the investigation,

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which is something
that sometimes killers do.

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[Lise] And there were some things
about Robert Abel's history

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that made him suspicious.

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[Skip] He had three ex-wives.

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One ex-wife said
that he said he would kill her

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if she did not provide him sex
like he wanted.

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[Kathryn] His ex-wives had said
that he used to beat the horses,

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and that when one of the horses would die,

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he would leave it out in the field to rot

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the way the girls' bodies
had been left out in the Killing Field.

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[ominous music playing]

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Come on.

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Come on.

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[Kathryn] Tim had really been looking
at Clyde Hedrick

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because of the Ellen Beason case.

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And he had talked to the police about him.

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[Lise] Now, Clyde has always denied

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that he committed
any of the Calder Road murders.

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The momentum to try to investigate him
for the other crimes wasn't there.

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[Kathryn] Because of the FBI profile,
when Janet Doe was found,

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Clyde Hedrick was kind of put
on the back burner.

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Everybody thought at that point that
Abel was the better suspect in the case.

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[Tim] All of a sudden,
a person I had really suspected,

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it's like, "Oh my God.
I wonder if I was wrong."

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[reporter] Supported by an FBI profile
and testimony from two former wives,

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police said the killer
was Robert William Abel.

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[Skip] The League City Police Department
writes an affidavit that goes public,

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that Robert Abel, the NASA scientist,

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could actually be a sexual serial killer,

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who had done these killings
to these four young women

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in the Killing Fields
next to his trail ride business.

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And what happened,

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because there'd been so much publicity
at this point about these killings,

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in police departments
up and down the I-45 corridor,

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detectives were wondering
if Abel was the guy

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who had done
one of their unsolved killings.

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Are you responsible for the four bodies
that were found on this property?

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Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

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[Skip] A team of officers
go over his property,

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trying to find trophies, locks of hair,

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something that would no doubt
connect Abel to the crimes.

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[Kathryn] And they found odd things.

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Old newspaper articles
about the Calder Road killings.

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They found human teeth…

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with gold crowns.

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And there was a gun found,
a .22 caliber gun.

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And Jane Doe had been shot
by a .22 caliber gun.

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But when the autopsy was done,

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the Galveston County medical examiner,
Dr. Korndofer, had boiled the bullet

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when he boiled the bones.

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And it had stripped it
of any evidentiary evidence,

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so they couldn't match it up with the gun.

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I don't think there was a smoking gun
that said Robert Abel didn't do this.

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I think it was just that they didn't find
any evidence that he actually had.

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The police couldn't do anything.

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I wanted to meet this NASA scientist
who'd been accused in a court document

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of being a serial killer.

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So, I called him,
and I assumed he would hang up on me.

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And he says, "Come on down."

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[Robert] Back in this area here

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is the site of the Laura Miller discovery.

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[Skip] We went out to the Killing Fields
and went from one grave to another.

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That girl, Heide Fye,
was allegedly discovered right here.

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[Skip] He had a notebook full of clippings

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and four photos he had taken
of where the bodies were found.

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And I said, "A lot of people would suggest
you're showing me your trophies."

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And he said, "No, I'm showing you

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the research I've done
to try to help out."

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[Robert] All of a sudden, these people
come along and say I fit some profile

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of a criminal, a specific criminal.

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The serial killer on these four girls.

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[Skip] And he just seemed…

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haunted as I was.

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And I thought,

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"Is he putting on a show for me?"

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Or is he just being a scientist,

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looking for evidence
to try to prove what happened?

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What was going on on his property?

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At the end of the day,

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the police had no evidence
that Abel had done any of this.

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[man] He's a suspect.

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He may not be responsible
for killing these women,

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and he may be responsible
for killing these women.

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So he's still in the pool.

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He's still swimming
in the pool of suspects.

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[Skip] In League City,
he continued to be a suspect.

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But what happened? Nothing.

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The nightmare, in many ways,
is that the parents still grieve.

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I can't tell you how many times
I searched this property

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00:14:09,308 --> 00:14:13,020
just hoping I could find Laura's clothes
or Laura's little necklace.

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I would go out there during lunchtime.
I'd go out at night.

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I was out there the middle of the night
screaming at the top of my lungs.

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I said, "I am out here.
Come and get me, you coward."

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I shot six times in the ground.

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[gunshots]

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Hopefully somebody would call the police.

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Nobody came. Nobody came.

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[dramatic music playing]

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I remember going out there
many, many times,

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and walking up to that cross and saying,
"Laura, please don't hate your daddy."

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"I can't come out here anymore."

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"I have to say goodbye.
I have to put my life back together."

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Literally, I'd be walking away and…

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I'd just hear a little voice say,
"Dad, don't quit. Please don't quit."

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That was kind of like the beginning of,

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"Maybe I can do something
to help these families

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when they have a missing loved one."

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[Kathryn] Once I got out
to the EquuSearch office,

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he spent the whole day with me,

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talking about Laura's death
and what it'd done to him and his family.

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00:15:29,179 --> 00:15:32,766
And also, you know,
why he had founded EquuSearch.

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He was doing what he was doing
to try to save others.

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Why don't you just walk away from it, man?

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Just walk away from it.

238
00:15:44,695 --> 00:15:47,447
Everybody knows me as Tim, Mr. EquuSearch.

239
00:15:49,825 --> 00:15:53,036
And I've lost my identity.
I don't know who Tim Miller is.

240
00:15:54,705 --> 00:15:55,872
But I haven't quit.

241
00:15:56,915 --> 00:15:58,792
It's taken its toll, but I haven't quit.

242
00:16:01,920 --> 00:16:03,338
I tried to say goodbye.

243
00:16:06,091 --> 00:16:07,009
Can't do it.

244
00:16:08,969 --> 00:16:12,347
I made that promise to God and Laura
I'd never leave a family alone.

245
00:16:18,520 --> 00:16:20,897
I just didn't know
it was going to be this many.

246
00:16:20,981 --> 00:16:22,983
[crickets chirping]

247
00:16:32,701 --> 00:16:33,952
[ticking]

248
00:16:34,619 --> 00:16:37,497
[Bob Smither] My daughter went, uh,
on a run this morning.

249
00:16:39,041 --> 00:16:41,793
And she's been gone
a lot longer than I expected.

250
00:16:43,086 --> 00:16:45,505
[911 dispatch] She left at 9:00,
and it's 10:04?

251
00:16:46,673 --> 00:16:48,842
[Bob] Right. And she can't run this long.

252
00:16:50,427 --> 00:16:55,265
[Skip] In April of '97, Laura Smither,
a 12-year-old ballerina,

253
00:16:55,348 --> 00:16:58,226
went jogging from her Friendswood home

254
00:16:58,310 --> 00:16:59,936
and completely disappeared.

255
00:17:06,777 --> 00:17:10,614
She was supposed to be back in 20 minutes
because we were making pancakes.

256
00:17:10,697 --> 00:17:15,243
She was gonna be home for breakfast.
She wanted exercise before breakfast.

257
00:17:16,244 --> 00:17:18,330
[Gay] We were so naive back then.

258
00:17:19,331 --> 00:17:23,293
I immediately started making
some phone calls to call people to say,

259
00:17:24,169 --> 00:17:27,798
"Laura's missing. We can't find her.
Please come help us search for her."

260
00:17:29,549 --> 00:17:31,551
Everything was upside down.

261
00:17:32,886 --> 00:17:34,179
Nothing made sense.

262
00:17:35,222 --> 00:17:37,099
We had no idea where she was.

263
00:17:37,849 --> 00:17:40,185
Couldn't find her. Couldn't find her.

264
00:17:44,106 --> 00:17:47,150
[reporter] The day began with
this heartbreaking sight, Gay Smither,

265
00:17:47,234 --> 00:17:48,110
drenched by rain,

266
00:17:48,193 --> 00:17:52,697
passing out flyers and hoping
someone would stop and listen and help.

267
00:17:54,157 --> 00:17:56,618
[Gay] The days
after Laura first went missing,

268
00:17:58,161 --> 00:17:59,621
they're kind of a blur

269
00:18:00,413 --> 00:18:02,874
of real terror in my mind.

270
00:18:03,542 --> 00:18:09,005
It's not something
that anybody wants to admit has happened.

271
00:18:09,089 --> 00:18:11,091
I was just hysterical.

272
00:18:11,883 --> 00:18:15,971
Walking, searching,
and just screaming Laura's name.

273
00:18:16,054 --> 00:18:18,348
Laura!

274
00:18:19,641 --> 00:18:22,269
Laura!

275
00:18:23,478 --> 00:18:25,605
Laura!

276
00:18:28,191 --> 00:18:29,484
We didn't find her.

277
00:18:31,111 --> 00:18:32,863
She was almost 13.

278
00:18:34,573 --> 00:18:38,034
[reporter] Residents say things like this
don't happen in their small community.

279
00:18:38,118 --> 00:18:41,121
This was a town called
one of the ten safest places to live.

280
00:18:41,204 --> 00:18:43,331
People did not lock their doors.

281
00:18:44,958 --> 00:18:47,711
[Lise] Friendswood is
one of these little towns

282
00:18:47,794 --> 00:18:49,421
along the I-45 corridor.

283
00:18:50,380 --> 00:18:55,719
It's a particularly safe town
by reputation.

284
00:18:56,595 --> 00:18:58,096
It was founded by Quakers,

285
00:18:58,180 --> 00:19:01,433
by people who believe
peace is the way, right?

286
00:19:03,393 --> 00:19:06,563
So when this 12-year-old
disappears while jogging,

287
00:19:07,522 --> 00:19:09,274
there is a huge outcry.

288
00:19:10,066 --> 00:19:11,651
[Jared] If you are responsible,

289
00:19:11,735 --> 00:19:13,904
I speak for this team when I say

290
00:19:14,487 --> 00:19:16,406
there is a maximum commitment

291
00:19:16,489 --> 00:19:19,951
to find you and do everything
the law permits.

292
00:19:20,035 --> 00:19:22,037
[dramatic music playing]

293
00:19:24,748 --> 00:19:28,835
Usually, in these cases, it's the,
"Well, your daughter's a runaway."

294
00:19:28,919 --> 00:19:33,298
This was the unusual case
where the police jumped on it right away.

295
00:19:34,507 --> 00:19:38,220
[Tim] Friendswood Police Department,
Harris County Sheriff's Department.

296
00:19:38,303 --> 00:19:40,347
And now the FBI was involved.

297
00:19:41,973 --> 00:19:45,310
When she went missing,
our task force stopped our narcotics work

298
00:19:45,393 --> 00:19:46,937
and began searching for her.

299
00:19:48,063 --> 00:19:50,857
It was a major,
major event in our community.

300
00:19:55,153 --> 00:19:56,738
[officer] Try to form a line.

301
00:19:59,241 --> 00:20:02,410
[reporter] Friendswood community
has banded together to help in the search.

302
00:20:02,494 --> 00:20:05,288
Volunteers are combing
through the thick brush, the mud.

303
00:20:05,914 --> 00:20:07,165
[barking]

304
00:20:09,125 --> 00:20:11,586
[Gay] Whoever has her
could take another child.

305
00:20:11,670 --> 00:20:15,173
We don't want your families
to go through this.

306
00:20:15,799 --> 00:20:18,343
[Skip] The town came together,

307
00:20:18,426 --> 00:20:21,638
and 6,000 people went on a search for her.

308
00:20:22,931 --> 00:20:25,767
Within days, 6,000 people,

309
00:20:27,018 --> 00:20:29,229
including a contingent of Marines.

310
00:20:32,399 --> 00:20:35,443
[woman] I guess it's the fear
of the unknown, what you'll come across.

311
00:20:36,736 --> 00:20:37,946
This poor family,

312
00:20:39,155 --> 00:20:40,448
they need an answer.

313
00:20:41,741 --> 00:20:43,743
[dramatic music playing]

314
00:20:49,374 --> 00:20:51,251
Well, we brought our dogs out

315
00:20:51,334 --> 00:20:56,298
and was gonna run them right around,
you know, for exercise around this pond.

316
00:20:57,841 --> 00:21:00,385
We picked up a, you know, foul odor.

317
00:21:01,636 --> 00:21:05,682
And we thought it was a dead animal
in the water or something like that.

318
00:21:05,765 --> 00:21:07,684
And my son, Jason, he says,

319
00:21:08,351 --> 00:21:09,728
"Animals don't have socks."

320
00:21:12,939 --> 00:21:18,236
[Jared] The evidence at the scene includes
a… silver ring bearing her initials,

321
00:21:18,862 --> 00:21:22,115
and it is apparent
that the young woman wore braces.

322
00:21:22,741 --> 00:21:26,119
It is the opinion of my department
the young woman found

323
00:21:27,162 --> 00:21:28,830
is Laura Kate Smither.

324
00:21:32,792 --> 00:21:36,046
[Gay] She went missing
on April the 3rd, 1997.

325
00:21:37,297 --> 00:21:39,549
And it was on April the 20th.

326
00:21:41,676 --> 00:21:43,178
So, 17 days…

327
00:21:44,262 --> 00:21:45,138
of hell.

328
00:21:53,396 --> 00:21:55,148
[clocks ticking]

329
00:22:04,240 --> 00:22:05,992
[mournful music playing]

330
00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:14,000
Been a while since we looked at this one.

331
00:22:17,962 --> 00:22:19,964
-Look at that little face.
-Oh yeah.

332
00:22:20,590 --> 00:22:21,633
[Gay] So sweet.

333
00:22:22,175 --> 00:22:23,676
I love that picture.

334
00:22:24,969 --> 00:22:26,012
[laughs]

335
00:22:27,514 --> 00:22:32,394
I do see God's hand in my life,
that I was meant to be Laura's mom.

336
00:22:34,020 --> 00:22:35,855
That was the very first little recital.

337
00:22:35,939 --> 00:22:38,149
And she had four costume changes
that production.

338
00:22:38,233 --> 00:22:39,484
Yeah, I remember.

339
00:22:42,821 --> 00:22:44,197
[Gay] Laura was a year old.

340
00:22:45,532 --> 00:22:48,993
And her mom had died with breast cancer.

341
00:22:49,577 --> 00:22:53,998
Her dad, Bob,
he was an emotional wreck, obviously.

342
00:22:54,082 --> 00:22:56,960
It was just a very,
very hard time in his life.

343
00:22:57,502 --> 00:23:03,508
So, one of the grandmothers said,
"We need to help him find a nanny."

344
00:23:03,591 --> 00:23:05,051
That's how we met.

345
00:23:07,595 --> 00:23:10,557
Laura captivated me immediately,
and we bonded.

346
00:23:12,058 --> 00:23:14,644
I remember sitting on the floor
with her that day that I met her.

347
00:23:15,854 --> 00:23:17,897
It was just a connection.

348
00:23:19,190 --> 00:23:20,483
I just loved her right away.

349
00:23:21,734 --> 00:23:24,487
Little Red Riding Hood, probably.

350
00:23:24,571 --> 00:23:25,655
[Gay laughs]

351
00:23:26,906 --> 00:23:28,700
[ticking]

352
00:23:32,662 --> 00:23:34,247
Four months later, we were married.

353
00:23:37,584 --> 00:23:38,543
Whirlwind.

354
00:23:38,626 --> 00:23:39,836
[laughs]

355
00:23:39,919 --> 00:23:43,506
And I look back on that
and think I was crazy.

356
00:23:43,590 --> 00:23:44,674
I was crazy.

357
00:23:46,134 --> 00:23:47,802
I adopted her the following year.

358
00:23:50,138 --> 00:23:51,639
She was touched by light.

359
00:23:53,349 --> 00:23:56,144
I feel honored to this day
to have been Laura's mom.

360
00:23:57,228 --> 00:23:58,188
I just wish it…

361
00:23:58,771 --> 00:24:01,232
had not been cut short the way it was.

362
00:24:03,693 --> 00:24:05,320
When this happened to us,

363
00:24:06,404 --> 00:24:08,740
we were given a life sentence.

364
00:24:09,949 --> 00:24:13,244
Laura's murder is our life sentence too.

365
00:24:16,623 --> 00:24:21,127
[reporter] Laura's murder is only one
of at least 35 still unsolved cases

366
00:24:21,211 --> 00:24:25,340
in a three-county area involving
missing or dead young women.

367
00:24:28,885 --> 00:24:31,679
[Gay] The search for Laura
had shone a spotlight

368
00:24:31,763 --> 00:24:33,723
on our area for the missing.

369
00:24:35,308 --> 00:24:36,768
[camera shutter rapidly clicking]

370
00:24:42,690 --> 00:24:46,819
It awakened so many questions

371
00:24:46,903 --> 00:24:49,656
about what was happening
and how things were being done.

372
00:24:51,199 --> 00:24:55,703
[Lise] A reporter at the Houston Chronicle
writes about those unsolved murders.

373
00:24:55,787 --> 00:24:58,248
She ends up publishing a map,
and she includes

374
00:24:58,331 --> 00:25:01,417
unsolved cases all along the corridor,

375
00:25:02,001 --> 00:25:04,045
really to draw attention
to a larger issue,

376
00:25:04,128 --> 00:25:08,383
which is women being treated as prey,

377
00:25:08,883 --> 00:25:12,679
and that their murders too often
don't get enough attention.

378
00:25:14,013 --> 00:25:17,684
We had learned by then
that there were other cases

379
00:25:17,767 --> 00:25:20,270
that didn't get any help at all.

380
00:25:24,732 --> 00:25:26,734
[busy signal beeping]

381
00:25:29,487 --> 00:25:31,739
[Nina] It really made us feel bad

382
00:25:31,823 --> 00:25:35,785
that my aunt Heide was being portrayed
the way that she was.

383
00:25:36,494 --> 00:25:40,915
Hitchhiker, runaway, cocktail waitress.

384
00:25:42,625 --> 00:25:46,713
Those all tend to have, like,
a negative spin on it.

385
00:25:47,463 --> 00:25:50,049
They really reacted as though

386
00:25:50,133 --> 00:25:55,471
she was not important enough
to use the resources to find her.

387
00:25:56,389 --> 00:25:57,557
[dial tone humming]

388
00:25:57,640 --> 00:25:59,559
[Tim] I never forget some things

389
00:25:59,642 --> 00:26:02,395
that League City Police Department
said about the girls.

390
00:26:03,104 --> 00:26:06,149
Heide was a drug addict,
Laura was a known runaway,

391
00:26:06,232 --> 00:26:09,068
and Jane and Janet were just drifters.

392
00:26:11,446 --> 00:26:13,990
Guess that's given somebody
a license to kill them?

393
00:26:15,450 --> 00:26:18,161
They're throwaway children?
I said, "No, Laura wasn't throwaway."

394
00:26:24,834 --> 00:26:26,085
[Lise] Teenagers who are engaged

395
00:26:26,169 --> 00:26:30,006
in some sort
of criminal behavior or just using drugs,

396
00:26:30,089 --> 00:26:33,718
their disappearances will not
be taken as seriously

397
00:26:33,801 --> 00:26:36,095
as someone who is younger,

398
00:26:36,179 --> 00:26:39,766
who is believed to not be doing
that kind of risky behavior.

399
00:26:42,226 --> 00:26:43,770
That's still true today.

400
00:26:44,520 --> 00:26:49,192
It's implied that that person
did something that caused their murder.

401
00:26:50,234 --> 00:26:52,362
They were a person who,
for one reason or another,

402
00:26:52,445 --> 00:26:54,656
who is less important to our society.

403
00:26:57,950 --> 00:27:01,204
[Skip] Laura Smither
just seemed so vulnerable.

404
00:27:02,789 --> 00:27:06,918
She was a good girl from a good family
and a good neighborhood.

405
00:27:08,503 --> 00:27:10,672
The reaction was so much stronger.

406
00:27:12,006 --> 00:27:14,258
There was this sense of despair,

407
00:27:15,259 --> 00:27:18,221
that if you couldn't save Laura Smither,
who could you save?

408
00:27:19,722 --> 00:27:23,685
These men that come to get our children,
these men who come to get our daughters

409
00:27:23,768 --> 00:27:25,144
cannot be stopped.

410
00:27:32,652 --> 00:27:36,531
[reporter] Flags fly at half-staff
as nearly the entire town of Friendswood

411
00:27:36,614 --> 00:27:38,908
is in mourning over the loss
of the 12-year-old.

412
00:27:40,493 --> 00:27:42,203
This is now a homicide investigation.

413
00:27:43,371 --> 00:27:45,873
[Kathryn] When the news breaks
about Laura Smither…

414
00:27:49,001 --> 00:27:52,130
everybody's talking
about the Killing Field again.

415
00:27:53,172 --> 00:27:55,883
And then everybody's talking about I-45.

416
00:27:57,218 --> 00:27:59,595
And everybody's talking
about why these girls keep dying

417
00:27:59,679 --> 00:28:02,140
and why they can never figure out
who's killing them.

418
00:28:03,099 --> 00:28:06,853
There is somebody that's taking children,
that is murdering little girls,

419
00:28:06,936 --> 00:28:09,480
and… and it's gotta stop.

420
00:28:09,564 --> 00:28:12,900
It's affected my daughter very much.
It's affected our entire town.

421
00:28:12,984 --> 00:28:14,902
Um, how can it not?

422
00:28:20,450 --> 00:28:21,951
[Richard] It had been six years

423
00:28:22,034 --> 00:28:24,579
since any of the bodies
had been found on Calder Road.

424
00:28:25,747 --> 00:28:29,876
And so there was a fear that,
"Oh my goodness, the person's back."

425
00:28:31,335 --> 00:28:32,920
Women are being abducted again.

426
00:28:34,213 --> 00:28:35,840
No one's being held accountable for it.

427
00:28:35,923 --> 00:28:39,218
So there was a lot of fear
and a lot of anxiety.

428
00:28:39,302 --> 00:28:40,887
If your child ever disappeared,

429
00:28:40,970 --> 00:28:43,514
do you have a sample
of their DNA and fingerprints?

430
00:28:44,140 --> 00:28:45,850
Friendswood was so panicked

431
00:28:45,933 --> 00:28:49,729
that the school district
passed out this kit

432
00:28:49,812 --> 00:28:54,108
where parents could fingerprint
their own children and put a lock of hair,

433
00:28:54,192 --> 00:28:56,778
so that if the child went missing,

434
00:28:56,861 --> 00:28:59,655
they would at least have fingerprints
and hair evidence to use

435
00:28:59,739 --> 00:29:01,365
to help identify the body.

436
00:29:03,117 --> 00:29:06,120
[reporter 1] Who killed 12-year-old
Laura Smither and why?

437
00:29:06,621 --> 00:29:09,457
It's a question that haunts
police chief Jared Stout.

438
00:29:09,540 --> 00:29:12,877
The community needs to get
their level of awareness up.

439
00:29:12,960 --> 00:29:16,214
[reporter 2] Police and firefighters
work on the task of draining the pond.

440
00:29:16,297 --> 00:29:19,759
They're looking for anything that will
place them closer to the elusive suspect.

441
00:29:22,220 --> 00:29:25,848
[Kathryn] The police ran a list
of all of the sex offenders

442
00:29:25,932 --> 00:29:29,644
in Galveston and Harris County
and the adjacent areas,

443
00:29:30,228 --> 00:29:32,230
and they ended up
with a couple thousand or more.

444
00:29:34,065 --> 00:29:38,694
[Gay] I didn't even have that term
in my vocabulary, "sex offender."

445
00:29:38,778 --> 00:29:40,822
It just wasn't part of my reality.

446
00:29:40,905 --> 00:29:43,199
Well, it became my reality.

447
00:29:44,242 --> 00:29:48,454
The volume of sex offenders
that were in our area was huge.

448
00:29:53,668 --> 00:29:55,378
[Marla] Especially being a female…

449
00:29:57,129 --> 00:30:01,259
your parents talk to you
about safety, being careful,

450
00:30:01,926 --> 00:30:03,886
going out with your friends,

451
00:30:04,470 --> 00:30:08,182
being on the road
when you did come of age to drive.

452
00:30:08,266 --> 00:30:10,268
[inhales and sighs sharply]

453
00:30:11,769 --> 00:30:15,940
I can remember when
my mother got married to Clyde,

454
00:30:16,566 --> 00:30:21,737
my dad asked me
if Clyde had ever hurt me or my brother.

455
00:30:23,406 --> 00:30:26,325
And at the time,
I really didn't understand.

456
00:30:30,121 --> 00:30:31,747
[gasps] This is them.

457
00:30:34,083 --> 00:30:38,588
When my mother lived
at the apartments in Dickinson,

458
00:30:39,255 --> 00:30:41,382
we would go there to visit.

459
00:30:44,677 --> 00:30:45,511
[gasps]

460
00:30:47,096 --> 00:30:48,389
And there's the pool.

461
00:30:51,893 --> 00:30:54,604
Clyde had taken me
and my brother swimming.

462
00:30:55,438 --> 00:31:00,568
My brother was on one end
of the pool, and I was near Clyde.

463
00:31:00,651 --> 00:31:03,613
And he's like, "Hey, go underwater.
I gotta show you something."

464
00:31:04,322 --> 00:31:06,324
And, "Okay."

465
00:31:07,575 --> 00:31:09,493
[thunder rumbling]

466
00:31:09,577 --> 00:31:11,287
So, I went underwater.

467
00:31:11,370 --> 00:31:14,457
And that's when he pulled
his pants down and exposed himself…

468
00:31:16,250 --> 00:31:17,585
underwater.

469
00:31:19,795 --> 00:31:21,589
And I ran back to the apartment.

470
00:31:21,672 --> 00:31:25,384
My brother ran right after me.
I ran into the apartment.

471
00:31:25,468 --> 00:31:26,886
[door opens]

472
00:31:28,721 --> 00:31:29,889
I told my mother.

473
00:31:35,144 --> 00:31:36,395
They got into a fight.

474
00:31:37,438 --> 00:31:38,648
Clyde denied it.

475
00:31:43,319 --> 00:31:47,031
My mother believed
whatever he said to her.

476
00:31:49,867 --> 00:31:51,786
And it hurt because it didn't matter.

477
00:31:55,498 --> 00:31:56,457
I'm done…

478
00:31:58,459 --> 00:31:59,502
with this place.

479
00:32:02,797 --> 00:32:06,592
[Lise] If we look at the characteristics
of the people who are the suspects

480
00:32:06,676 --> 00:32:09,011
in the cases along the I-45 corridor,

481
00:32:09,095 --> 00:32:11,055
we do see some themes.

482
00:32:13,641 --> 00:32:18,938
We see men who were dominant,
violent people who were transient.

483
00:32:19,730 --> 00:32:21,482
People like Clyde Hedrick.

484
00:32:23,192 --> 00:32:26,737
Hedrick fits the profile of some
of the people we've been talking about

485
00:32:26,821 --> 00:32:29,907
who were attracted to Houston
in the '70s and '80s

486
00:32:29,991 --> 00:32:31,659
by the construction boom.

487
00:32:34,036 --> 00:32:36,747
He had already done time
in prison in Florida.

488
00:32:37,915 --> 00:32:40,751
He was accused
by various ex-wives and ex-girlfriends

489
00:32:40,835 --> 00:32:42,962
of being very abusive and violent.

490
00:32:50,052 --> 00:32:51,137
[Marla] There it is.

491
00:32:53,723 --> 00:32:54,724
That was it.

492
00:32:57,852 --> 00:33:00,980
This place has changed a lot.
That was never there.

493
00:33:01,063 --> 00:33:02,773
The trailer was there.

494
00:33:03,357 --> 00:33:05,317
I just hate saying his name.

495
00:33:05,401 --> 00:33:06,902
You have no idea what it does.

496
00:33:11,615 --> 00:33:14,577
I moved out after I graduated high school.

497
00:33:15,995 --> 00:33:19,832
And my mother told me
that she had left him.

498
00:33:22,585 --> 00:33:24,920
My mother came to where I was living,

499
00:33:25,004 --> 00:33:27,965
and she said
she wanted to show me what he had done.

500
00:33:28,966 --> 00:33:33,804
So, my uncle and my mother
asked me to go back to the trailer

501
00:33:33,888 --> 00:33:35,056
down in Galveston.

502
00:33:36,307 --> 00:33:38,934
It was absolutely destroyed.

503
00:33:43,272 --> 00:33:45,733
But that's not what they really
wanted to show me.

504
00:33:47,777 --> 00:33:51,530
My mother pointed out
a certain spot on the wall.

505
00:33:52,656 --> 00:33:57,453
She explained that
there was a hole in the wall.

506
00:34:00,164 --> 00:34:03,459
And Clyde would look through the hole,

507
00:34:04,752 --> 00:34:06,128
looking in on me.

508
00:34:09,173 --> 00:34:13,052
All those times that I felt like
somebody was watching,

509
00:34:13,677 --> 00:34:15,721
I wasn't actually crazy.

510
00:34:17,389 --> 00:34:19,308
My uncle took me and my mother

511
00:34:19,391 --> 00:34:22,978
to the police down in Galveston
with the photos that he developed.

512
00:34:24,855 --> 00:34:27,608
One man in his office

513
00:34:28,526 --> 00:34:31,695
took my statement
and then sent me on my way.

514
00:34:32,196 --> 00:34:34,156
I did my part.

515
00:34:35,866 --> 00:34:37,576
They could have arrested him.

516
00:34:39,787 --> 00:34:42,123
I could have testified

517
00:34:43,791 --> 00:34:46,293
about all the things that he was doing.

518
00:34:48,045 --> 00:34:49,797
And nobody did anything.

519
00:34:53,217 --> 00:34:55,219
[ominous music playing]

520
00:34:57,304 --> 00:35:00,516
To me, when a man
has seriously harmed a child,

521
00:35:01,016 --> 00:35:04,353
they should never have
the opportunity to harm another child.

522
00:35:05,938 --> 00:35:12,319
And yet, the man who had taken
and killed Laura was still out there.

523
00:35:14,822 --> 00:35:17,074
[Kathryn] It was
the beginning of a really bad year.

524
00:35:20,703 --> 00:35:22,705
[dramatic music playing]

525
00:35:30,504 --> 00:35:32,381
[Jan] It was just like any other day.

526
00:35:33,132 --> 00:35:36,635
My daughter Kelli,
she did drop Alexis off.

527
00:35:37,761 --> 00:35:38,846
I remember saying,

528
00:35:38,929 --> 00:35:43,309
"I love you, honey. Have a good day.
I'll talk to you this afternoon."

529
00:35:43,392 --> 00:35:48,480
And those were the last words
that I spoke to her.

530
00:35:51,567 --> 00:35:53,694
[reporter] Kelli Cox
is a mother, a daughter,

531
00:35:53,777 --> 00:35:56,363
and she has mysteriously disappeared.

532
00:35:56,447 --> 00:35:58,866
[Kathryn] In July of 1997,

533
00:35:58,949 --> 00:36:00,784
unbeknownst to everybody in Houston,

534
00:36:01,452 --> 00:36:05,206
a woman named Kelli Ann Cox
disappeared up in Denton, Texas.

535
00:36:07,499 --> 00:36:11,921
[Jan] She was going on this tour
of the city jail

536
00:36:12,004 --> 00:36:13,714
with her criminal justice class.

537
00:36:14,673 --> 00:36:16,383
When she got out to her car,

538
00:36:16,467 --> 00:36:19,386
she couldn't get the key to work.
She couldn't get into the car.

539
00:36:19,470 --> 00:36:21,513
[reporter] Kelli used
this phone to call her boyfriend

540
00:36:21,597 --> 00:36:23,265
to bring an extra set of keys.

541
00:36:23,349 --> 00:36:26,352
This is the last place
anyone heard from or saw Kelli.

542
00:36:27,353 --> 00:36:30,314
I mean, it's like she was there
one minute, and then she was gone.

543
00:36:30,397 --> 00:36:32,650
[dramatic music playing]

544
00:36:36,946 --> 00:36:38,614
[reporter 1] Detectives searched her car,

545
00:36:38,697 --> 00:36:41,700
but leads in this mystery
seem very limited.

546
00:36:42,952 --> 00:36:46,288
[reporter 2] Police say while she still
hasn't made contact with her family,

547
00:36:46,372 --> 00:36:48,707
they can't say for sure
if a crime happened.

548
00:36:48,791 --> 00:36:53,879
I think it's really premature to speculate
on whether or not there are any suspects.

549
00:36:53,963 --> 00:36:56,006
What are you doing? What are you doing?

550
00:36:56,090 --> 00:37:01,178
[Jan] And then it was like almost a month
to the day after Kelli's disappearance,

551
00:37:02,429 --> 00:37:04,348
Jessica Cain disappeared.

552
00:37:05,933 --> 00:37:07,935
[dramatic music playing]

553
00:37:12,898 --> 00:37:16,360
[reporter 3] The Tiki Island teenager was
last seen leaving a Webster restaurant.

554
00:37:16,443 --> 00:37:18,988
Her truck later found abandoned
on the Gulf Freeway,

555
00:37:19,071 --> 00:37:20,572
her purse still inside.

556
00:37:20,656 --> 00:37:23,325
[woman] She would not go somewhere
without calling.

557
00:37:23,409 --> 00:37:25,953
She'd call one of us at least.

558
00:37:26,036 --> 00:37:29,123
And that's why we know something's wrong,

559
00:37:29,206 --> 00:37:30,708
and we gotta find her.

560
00:37:31,208 --> 00:37:35,129
[Jan] Jessica Cain was
with her theater group.

561
00:37:35,212 --> 00:37:39,341
After she left,
it was like, poof, vanished.

562
00:37:45,556 --> 00:37:48,017
[Tim] We just started out on horses.

563
00:37:48,100 --> 00:37:52,396
They asked me to run down there
where Jessica Cain's vehicle was found

564
00:37:52,479 --> 00:37:54,982
and see if we can find a spot
for a command center.

565
00:37:57,484 --> 00:37:59,320
Another huge search.

566
00:38:02,740 --> 00:38:06,327
[reporter] Grieving parents,
Bob and Gay Smither, joined the search.

567
00:38:07,077 --> 00:38:09,830
[Gay] I'll never forget
seeing Jessica's dad.

568
00:38:11,248 --> 00:38:13,917
I knew exactly what he was going through.

569
00:38:14,710 --> 00:38:19,006
Of course, at that point,
I was just hoping for a different outcome.

570
00:38:20,215 --> 00:38:24,720
[Marla] In '97,
when Jessica Cain disappeared,

571
00:38:24,803 --> 00:38:27,348
my dad lived on Tiki Island.

572
00:38:28,015 --> 00:38:32,102
She was my brother's
ex-wife's good friend.

573
00:38:32,186 --> 00:38:33,812
She was her good friend.

574
00:38:34,855 --> 00:38:36,774
I joined in the search party.

575
00:38:37,399 --> 00:38:40,444
We'd wear vests,
and we had walking sticks.

576
00:38:43,197 --> 00:38:45,783
Lost a lot of sleep
when Laura Smither disappeared.

577
00:38:45,866 --> 00:38:47,951
Lost a lot of sleep
when Jessica Cain disappeared.

578
00:38:48,035 --> 00:38:50,704
Lost a lot of sleep in the last 38 years.

579
00:38:51,914 --> 00:38:53,916
[dramatic music playing]

580
00:39:00,005 --> 00:39:01,924
[Skip] No matter what they tried to do

581
00:39:02,007 --> 00:39:04,551
and no matter how much
of a police presence there was…

582
00:39:04,635 --> 00:39:07,262
My heart is breaking today.

583
00:39:07,846 --> 00:39:10,224
[Skip] …someone was able
to get through the lines.

584
00:39:10,307 --> 00:39:12,643
[officer] The search
for Jessica will continue.

585
00:39:13,143 --> 00:39:14,645
How do you explain it?

586
00:39:16,397 --> 00:39:20,359
[newscaster] There's somebody amongst us,
or something, some monster there.

587
00:39:20,943 --> 00:39:22,069
How do we stop him?

588
00:39:23,404 --> 00:39:25,447
Of course I was feeling,

589
00:39:25,531 --> 00:39:29,743
"My God, it's the same person
that got our girls out there on Calder."

590
00:39:31,745 --> 00:39:35,207
You know, how could there be
this many serial killers in one area?

591
00:39:35,290 --> 00:39:39,169
You know, all kind of crazy stuff's
going through your head.

592
00:39:39,753 --> 00:39:43,590
[reporter] The Tiki Island teenager
has been missing since early August 17th.

593
00:39:44,758 --> 00:39:47,344
[Kathryn] When you have a suspicion
growing in a community,

594
00:39:48,220 --> 00:39:50,931
when you have people
looking over their shoulder all the time

595
00:39:51,515 --> 00:39:53,600
and wondering who really is the killer,

596
00:39:53,684 --> 00:39:55,686
it kind of eats away at you.

597
00:39:59,940 --> 00:40:04,945
[Marla] I was in the area of searching
in Jack Brooks Park for Jessica Cain.

598
00:40:07,156 --> 00:40:08,866
She was a young female,

599
00:40:10,367 --> 00:40:12,536
going home from being out.

600
00:40:14,246 --> 00:40:16,081
She was clearly alone.

601
00:40:20,002 --> 00:40:21,336
It made me think of…

602
00:40:22,129 --> 00:40:23,505
what happened to my mother.

603
00:40:26,216 --> 00:40:28,719
All the things that he did to her.

604
00:40:31,638 --> 00:40:35,517
I know partly she was scared,
but when he left,

605
00:40:35,601 --> 00:40:37,269
he would take off,

606
00:40:37,352 --> 00:40:39,354
and she would always let him back.

607
00:40:43,442 --> 00:40:46,278
One time, he came back,

608
00:40:46,361 --> 00:40:48,989
and he was covered in blood
and had a bloody knife.

609
00:40:51,617 --> 00:40:52,659
And he…

610
00:40:53,202 --> 00:40:55,329
He told my mother, "I did it again."

611
00:40:56,205 --> 00:40:58,207
[ominous music playing]

612
00:41:02,085 --> 00:41:04,338
After what happened to Ellen Beason,

613
00:41:06,465 --> 00:41:08,175
and with his criminal history,

614
00:41:09,384 --> 00:41:11,303
and what he did with me,

615
00:41:13,263 --> 00:41:14,348
I don't know.

616
00:41:22,606 --> 00:41:24,358
[crickets chirping]

617
00:41:26,652 --> 00:41:30,364
[Richard] We didn't know if Laura Smither,
Jessica Cain, and Kelli Cox

618
00:41:30,447 --> 00:41:32,574
connected with the Calder Road killings.

619
00:41:33,367 --> 00:41:36,495
But of course, we had to consider
the possibility that they were.

620
00:41:39,540 --> 00:41:41,291
If it was the same person,

621
00:41:41,375 --> 00:41:43,919
why would there be
such a lapse of time from '91,

622
00:41:44,002 --> 00:41:47,130
when Janet Doe was found, until '97?

623
00:41:49,132 --> 00:41:51,426
He's now utilizing a different M.O.,

624
00:41:51,510 --> 00:41:53,971
not putting the bodies in a field.

625
00:41:55,556 --> 00:41:57,724
We had a lot more questions
than we had answers.

626
00:41:57,808 --> 00:41:59,601
[Gay] After Laura went missing,

627
00:41:59,685 --> 00:42:03,397
thousands of leads were called in
to the Friendswood Police Department.

628
00:42:03,981 --> 00:42:07,192
They had a lot of serious suspects
that they were looking at.

629
00:42:09,945 --> 00:42:13,448
But they had nothing to link them
or eliminate them.

630
00:42:13,532 --> 00:42:15,534
[reporter] With the recent killing
of Laura Smither

631
00:42:15,617 --> 00:42:17,327
and the ongoing search for Jessica Cain,

632
00:42:17,411 --> 00:42:21,331
Robert Abel has been worried police
will try to connect him to the crimes.

633
00:42:21,915 --> 00:42:26,211
Police claimed that he remains a suspect
in the four League City killings.

634
00:42:28,171 --> 00:42:31,466
[Lise] There was still a lot of talk
in the community about Robert Abel.

635
00:42:32,676 --> 00:42:36,847
So, it's understandable that Tim Miller
thought Robert Abel had to be the killer.

636
00:42:37,514 --> 00:42:41,977
We had every reason to think that,
"My God, it could be connected."

637
00:42:43,312 --> 00:42:47,232
[Skip] No one worked harder at trying
to prove Abel was a killer than Tim.

638
00:42:47,733 --> 00:42:49,568
[Tim] That was
that metal building back there.

639
00:42:50,485 --> 00:42:52,321
[Skip] He wanted there
to be lots of excavations

640
00:42:52,404 --> 00:42:54,156
and digs throughout Abel's property.

641
00:42:54,239 --> 00:42:56,742
He wanted the police
to interrogate him harder.

642
00:42:57,534 --> 00:43:00,537
[Kathryn] That 17 months
when he didn't know where Laura was

643
00:43:00,621 --> 00:43:02,706
absolutely tore his heart out.

644
00:43:03,707 --> 00:43:07,085
And the idea that other families
are going through that…

645
00:43:08,837 --> 00:43:12,966
and the knowledge that the police
often don't do what they need to do

646
00:43:13,050 --> 00:43:16,803
in order to find people
and find those bodies is so…

647
00:43:17,929 --> 00:43:19,640
hard for him to accept.

648
00:43:19,723 --> 00:43:22,100
So he goes out, and he does it himself.

649
00:43:23,185 --> 00:43:26,104
[Skip] A lot of his frustration and grief

650
00:43:26,188 --> 00:43:29,524
got channeled into
this kind of vengeance toward Abel.

651
00:43:29,608 --> 00:43:32,361
And he decided he was gonna torment Abel.

652
00:43:32,444 --> 00:43:35,238
And he'd call him, leave voicemails.

653
00:43:36,490 --> 00:43:40,285
I have a person that was
gonna come out there and take you

654
00:43:40,369 --> 00:43:44,122
to Las Vegas and beat your ass
all the way up there,

655
00:43:44,206 --> 00:43:45,082
and kill you.

656
00:43:46,750 --> 00:43:48,960
And then put you in a sand dune.

657
00:43:51,046 --> 00:43:53,465
Tim was convinced
he was on the righteous path.

658
00:43:54,466 --> 00:43:56,009
[Tim] All right, put a mark--

659
00:43:56,093 --> 00:43:58,929
Put a mark right
at the fence line right there.

660
00:43:59,554 --> 00:44:01,515
I searched that property so many times,

661
00:44:01,598 --> 00:44:04,810
thinking now maybe there's some
more bodies that are buried out here.

662
00:44:06,603 --> 00:44:10,982
He got out this sort of ragtag army
of volunteers to do a dig.

663
00:44:11,566 --> 00:44:15,320
We are sifting
through every grain of dirt.

664
00:44:16,154 --> 00:44:18,365
[Skip] He had borrowed someone's backhoe.

665
00:44:19,241 --> 00:44:23,412
Somebody brought a group of cadaver dogs
that could smell dead bodies.

666
00:44:24,371 --> 00:44:27,457
The dogs were let loose,
and they all converged on one spot.

667
00:44:27,541 --> 00:44:28,834
[dogs barking]

668
00:44:28,917 --> 00:44:30,085
They'd found something.

669
00:44:30,752 --> 00:44:33,588
And so, everyone began digging
right around the area.

670
00:44:34,756 --> 00:44:38,927
And they uncover a woman's purse
and women's clothes.

671
00:44:41,054 --> 00:44:44,808
Tim thought that they were items
belonging to another victim.

672
00:44:44,891 --> 00:44:47,686
But he couldn't prove it.
No one could prove it.

673
00:44:50,147 --> 00:44:53,442
Finally, Abel was so horrified and scared

674
00:44:53,525 --> 00:44:57,154
that he filed for an order of protection
to keep Tim away from him.

675
00:45:06,913 --> 00:45:11,293
Abel spent years living this tragic life.

676
00:45:11,376 --> 00:45:13,587
He was the pariah of League City.

677
00:45:15,130 --> 00:45:17,007
Abel finally said enough is enough.

678
00:45:17,090 --> 00:45:19,593
He shut down his Stardust Trail Rides.

679
00:45:20,093 --> 00:45:24,014
Moved back to his family ranch
in another county in Texas

680
00:45:24,097 --> 00:45:26,057
to get out of League City altogether.

681
00:45:27,017 --> 00:45:29,019
[ominous music playing]

682
00:45:35,317 --> 00:45:36,902
[Richard] In the summer of '97,

683
00:45:36,985 --> 00:45:39,946
there was still no arrest made
in the Calder Road cases.

684
00:45:41,198 --> 00:45:44,117
And now we've got
two other young women abducted,

685
00:45:44,201 --> 00:45:46,411
Kelli Cox and Jessica Cain.

686
00:45:46,495 --> 00:45:49,247
I know someone knows something.

687
00:45:49,331 --> 00:45:55,378
Anyone who knows about Jessica,
please take this pain from our heart.

688
00:45:55,462 --> 00:45:57,923
[Richard] And the murder of Laura Smither.

689
00:45:58,006 --> 00:46:01,259
We're coping as best as you can.

690
00:46:01,343 --> 00:46:04,346
Every agency in the area was helping.
It wasn't from a lack of effort.

691
00:46:05,347 --> 00:46:07,224
Houston Police Department
came down to help.

692
00:46:07,307 --> 00:46:12,479
There was-- Everybody was pitching in,
and just couldn't catch a break at first.

693
00:46:21,363 --> 00:46:22,572
[911 dispatcher] Webster 9-1-1.

694
00:46:22,656 --> 00:46:25,367
[woman] Yes, ma'am.
Y'all need to come to Waffle House.

695
00:46:25,909 --> 00:46:28,787
Somebody just came in and said
that someone was abducted.

696
00:46:33,041 --> 00:46:34,668
[Kathryn] It was all over the news.

697
00:46:34,751 --> 00:46:38,421
A woman had been
at a convenience store that night.

698
00:46:40,590 --> 00:46:43,510
A man was standing there,
kind of watching her.

699
00:46:45,595 --> 00:46:47,764
She got back in her van to leave.

700
00:46:50,183 --> 00:46:52,894
And her car started to act up on the road.

701
00:46:53,478 --> 00:46:54,729
She pulled over.

702
00:46:55,355 --> 00:46:58,483
And the guy from the convenience store

703
00:46:58,567 --> 00:47:01,069
walks up with a smile
on his face and says,

704
00:47:01,152 --> 00:47:04,364
"You've got a flat tire. Can I help you?"

705
00:47:07,409 --> 00:47:11,454
And the next thing she knew
was that he was behind her

706
00:47:11,538 --> 00:47:13,331
and that he had a knife at her throat.

707
00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:18,837
He forced her into his truck
and gunned the engine,

708
00:47:18,920 --> 00:47:20,714
and he started down I-45.

709
00:47:22,173 --> 00:47:23,884
[911 dispatcher]
They're at the Waffle House?

710
00:47:24,384 --> 00:47:26,052
[woman] They're outside
in the parking lot.

711
00:47:27,596 --> 00:47:29,514
She needs an ambulance. She can't walk.

712
00:47:29,598 --> 00:47:31,349
[police sirens wailing distantly]

713
00:47:32,267 --> 00:47:34,477
They got her out of the middle
of the freeway, they said.

714
00:47:37,480 --> 00:47:39,441
The woman's name is Sandra.

715
00:47:41,943 --> 00:47:46,948
What Sandra did was the turning point
of the investigation.

716
00:47:47,490 --> 00:47:50,452
[911 dispatcher] Need units
to route to 959 West Nasa Road.

717
00:47:50,535 --> 00:47:52,203
Female jumped out of a white dually.

718
00:47:52,287 --> 00:47:55,790
Unknown LP,
last seen headed 45 northbound.

719
00:47:59,210 --> 00:48:01,212
[ominous music playing]