(tense music)
- [Narrator] A young woman doesn't drive home after work.
And is found raped and murdered.
(siren wails) (tense music continues)
- She was supposed to be here for a few weeks
and she was killed during her second week here in Colorado.
- [Officer] Negative.
- [Narrator] A witness helps to make a composite sketch,
but the killer isn't found.
- This is not what officers were hoping for.
(tense music continues)
- Police have very little to go on.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Years pass and technology advances.
It's a case no one could forget.
(tense music continues)
- I have to dig in there and figure out if I can solve this.
- [Narrator] A killer who walked in the shadows
is on the radar.
(tense music continues)
- They're not gonna let her memory fade
and they're not gonna give up looking for her killer.
- [Narrator] Once he had the advantage.
Now he's the unsuspecting one.
- He nearly got away with it.
He could have just disappeared into the night.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] When justice stalks the predator.
(tense music continues)
- The unsolved ones, we have to stand up.
- And approach these cases in a way outside the box.
- Let the world know is those out there
that did commit a murder,
you know there are people that are coming after you.
- There's just a lotta good people trying
to do the right thing.
- Because it's something
that you have to be passionate about.
- Solve this, bring some peace to the family at least.
Just doing my job.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] It's a sharp biting winter night
in Englewood, Colorado.
Helene, a punctual, reliable young woman
should have come home straight after work.
(tense music continues)
Her routine every day is like clockwork,
but they're still waiting for her.
(tense music continues)
- Her shift at the radio station ends at 5:30 PM.
From there, she walks two blocks to a bus stop
at the corner of 14th Avenue and Broadway
and catches a bus to Englewood.
She gets off in front of a pizzeria
at Union Avenue in Broadway and walks six blocks
to a home where she's staying with her aunt and uncle
and a classmate.
This gets her home at about 6:30 PM.
(tense music continues)
- Right away the people waiting for her
believe that something is wrong.
They waste no time.
They drive to her bus stop,
go along the streets where they know she'd walk,
and call her work.
They walk up and down the street looking for any clue
as to what may have happened to Helene.
- [Narrator] When they can find no answers,
they call police.
(tense music continues)
It's 10:30 PM when an officer arrives
to take a missing person's report.
- [Glen] They've done everything they can at this point
and are forced to just wait.
- [Narrator] At 11:00 PM Helene's friend, Kitsey Snow,
writes an entry into her journal.
"This day has been the longest and worst day of my life.
I'm writing because I don't know what else to do.
We waited for Helene to come home and waited."
Kitsey Snow.
The night drags on for the people who love Helene.
At 1:00 AM, her friend writes another journal entry.
"Still nothing.
Will this night ever end?"
Kitsey Snow.
- They have some difficult decisions to make
and at 3:00 AM Kitsey makes another entry.
- [Narrator] "We are trying to decide
when to call her mum and dad.
We know something is very wrong.
I think we should call them.
If it was my daughter, I'd want to know."
(tense music continues)
- Their instincts have been right all along.
Something is very wrong.
Tragically, it couldn't be worse.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Approximately 9:00 AM the next morning,
a woman and her son drive along Daniels Park Road
in Northern Douglas County.
- The boy says, "Mom, there's a body out there."
It's an empty field of brown scrub with patches of snow,
but in the distance there's something
that appears to be a body.
(tense music continues)
- A female passerby had noticed her body in the field
and alerted a county man who was driving a snowplow,
a county worker, and he called the police.
- [Narrator] 9:18 AM, Douglas County Sheriff's Department
receives the report of the body,
found about 1.6 miles south
of the Colorado Highway, I-470.
(siren wails) (tense music continues)
(camera shutter clicking)
- By 9:41 AM, investigators are roping off the scene.
The coroner arrives nine minutes later
and pronounces the unidentified victim dead.
By 10:20, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation arrives
on the scene to join police.
(tense music continues)
- Helene's hands had been tied behind her back.
She was naked from the waist down.
She was still wearing her coat and her turtleneck sweater.
- [Narrator] It is clear that the victim
has been stabbed and sexually assaulted.
Officers examine the scene for clues
when an unexpected ID is made.
(tense music continues)
- [Glen] One of the Arapahoe County sheriff deputies
who works part-time at a local radio station arrives
and immediately recognizes the new intern
at the radio station, Helene Pruszynski.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Helene Pruszynski is born in 1958.
Her parents are Henrietta and Chester
and she's the youngest of three children.
Her brother, Chet, and her sister, Janet,
who considers Helene her best friend.
She's a huge baseball fan
and memorizes the team's players and positions.
Her father, a veteran, works as an engineer.
In 1972, he takes a new job
and the family moves to Hamilton
when Helene is a high school freshman.
Helene attends Hamilton-Wenham Regional High School.
She's an A student, active at school, aspiring journalist,
and belongs to a singing group called Club Harmony.
She's known as kind, strong, involved, and happy.
She attends prom with her boyfriend, Jonathan Shailor.
Helene looks to be on track
for an exceptionally bright future.
- She was everything that you'd want your child to be.
She was a leader.
She was beautiful.
She was kind.
She was talented, smart.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Helene Pruszynski goes to study journalism
at Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts.
- In late 1979,
Helene and classmate, Kitsey Snow,
leave the confines of their home
to put their learning into action
and get some work experience in Denver, Colorado.
(tense music continues)
- She came out here to do an internship
with her friend Kitsey.
They lived with Helene's aunt down in Englewood, Colorado.
(tense music continues)
- Helene is thrilled to be working
in the news department of a Denver radio station
and is quickly assigned a big story,
a follow up to the killing of a Secret Service agent
in the field office.
In fact, the day before her murder,
her boss singles her out for praise.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In the dirt along the edge
of the two-lane road,
they find tire tracks,
one set from a motorcycle
covered by a set of impressions from a car or truck.
- There were some cowboy boot tracks leading
from the road to her body.
They were able to determine around about size of the boot
and that it was a a Western boot.
(tense music continues)
- Her hands are bound with vinyl straps.
Investigators later collect hair and semen evidence.
- [Narrator] There is a pool of blood under her body
on the ground
and a large bloodstain on the back of her coat.
- In 1980, there wasn't such a thing as DNA, right?
And the Colorado Bureau of Investigations came out
to the scene.
In those days, they processed scenes like this
for local agencies 'cause the sheriff's office,
we just didn't have that technology.
We didn't have crime scene investigators.
So they came out and they processed the scene.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Detectives take plaster casts
of the tire tracks and footprints.
Also gathered from the scene are an empty milk carton,
some bread, and an old can.
- In a restroom at a nearby park,
there's clothes burning in a toilet.
Officers recover what's left of a pant leg,
a box container for a stove,
and several burnt rolls of toilet paper.
- They just found some burned clothes
in a bathroom near where she was killed,
but they weren't able to ever determine
if they were related or not.
And they think, ultimately, they decided no,
they were not related.
(tense music continues)
There wasn't a lot of information about that in the case,
but it was definitely a red herring, so to speak.
- Around noon, Helene's aunt and uncle
and Kitsey Snow have heard on the news
about a woman's body being found
and they're desperately trying to stay positive.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] But police arrive at 1:30 PM
to break the news that
the victim is, in fact, Helene Pruszynski.
- Helene's parents fly in and arrive at the house
around 4:00 PM.
When they see a priest waiting, they know the worst.
Later, Kitsey writes in her journal...
- [Narrator] "I couldn't cry, just shake.
I couldn't stop shaking."
Kitsey Snow.
- The news of the murder breaks
and then the police get a lead.
(tense music continues)
- A woman driving on Daniels Park Road
around 10:20 PM the night Helene disappears,
sees a man, 20 or 30 years old, possibly Caucasian,
medium-length brown hair over the ears
with possibly a mustache.
- Authorities realize how crucial
this chance sighting is and they put her under hypnosis.
(tense music continues)
She recalls even more detail.
- A witness had seen some type of muscle car,
possibly a Mustang, yellow or white,
and they were able to do a composite sketch
of the face of the person,
the man who was seen at the trunk of the car.
- [Narrator] Armed with a detailed sketch,
the authorities now have something concrete
that they may be able to use to catch a killer.
(tense music continues)
(dramatic music)
(tense music)
A young woman is found in a field,
brutally raped and murdered,
but a passerby gets a clear view
of a man in the vicinity of the killing.
Using hypnosis, a highly detailed composite sketch
is made public
Police comb the area around Helen Pruszynski's bus stop
where they believe she was likely to have been abducted.
- You're racing the clock when you've got a homicide
and every officer knows it.
You want to get a lead in the first 48 hours
while people's minds are still fresh
and the evidence hasn't yet been degraded or destroyed.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] The radio station where Helene
was interning offers a reward for the capture of the killer.
- [Announcer] Is offering a reward
for anybody who knows any information.
- [Narrator] And officers are inundated
with tips from the public.
- Police canvass all possible areas
and follow up on each and every lead.
With such a detailed composite sketch,
someone must have seen something.
(tense music continues)
- A mass is held for Pruszynski
in St. Paul's Church in Hamilton, Massachusetts
and a memorial mass the following month.
Pruszynski's friends and family,
her former classmates, her teachers,
they're all in total shock.
- [Glen] The autopsy reveals that Helene Pruszynski is raped
and stabbed multiple times in the back.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Forensic officers process a swab taken
from the victim.
Forensics also examined the footwear casts taken
from the crime scene.
(tense music continues)
- They appear to have been left by a Western-style boot
with a size range of 9 to 11.
As police try to put all the clues together,
an eerie similarity to two other cases becomes obvious.
(tense music continues)
- There were several murders
up and down the Broadway corridor
during that time in Colorado.
It was a dangerous area.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In 1968 and 1970,
there are two other similar murders in the same area.
- In just a few weeks earlier,
a woman is raped not far from Pruszynski's bus stop.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] The very night Helene Pruszynski vanishes,
another woman is grabbed when she tries
to get off a nearby bus.
(tense music continues)
It seems likely that all of these cases
could be related to Helene's disappearance and murder.
- But is there any connection
between the women who were attacked?
(tense music continues)
- She was supposed to be here for a few weeks
and she was killed during her second week here in Colorado.
- Which makes it likely her killer was a stranger.
A random attack is one of the the most difficult cases
to solve, especially in 1980
before DNA is used the way we've come to expect.
(tense music continues)
- The composite sketch isn't getting any results.
As the days pass, police have very little to go on.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] "We're doing everything we can
to run down leads,
but after that, you know the way it goes,
especially when the victim is new in town."
Carl Whiteside,
deputy director of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
Investigators believe there is a link
between Helene Pruszynski's murder
and the two other slayings
in the Denver metropolitan area years earlier.
- But there's nothing they can do
to prove their theory or find the killer.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Despite the preserved samples
taken from the body,
technology does not allow authorities to connect the dots.
The case stalls and the tragic killing look fated
to be filed away with other unsolved murders.
- But despite all appearances, this story isn't over yet.
Pruszynski's family and friends
are not gonna let her memory fade
and they're not gonna give up looking for her killer.
- [Narrator] "I saw Helene's parents
and I just promised them that I would not stop
for as long as I was living
and doing everything in my power to find Helene's killer."
Kimberly La Tourette, friend of Helene Pruszynski
The following year,
the investigation into Helene Pruszynski's murder goes cold
and it will stay cold for almost two decades.
- But as we know,
some of the most daunting cold cases have a way of thawing.
(tense music continues)
- Helene's case was well known in the sheriff's office
and in the area in Douglas County.
Whoever worked on it was passionate to find her killer
and bring them to justice.
Director of CBI at the time was forward thinking.
They saved the DNA and stored it properly
over the next several decades.
- And because family, friends,
and police never forget this brilliant young woman
who had her life cruelly ripped from her,
the unbelievable happens.
(dramatic music)
(tense music)
- [Narrator] The case of a brutal rape and murder
of a bright young student goes cold.
Her friends and family vow
to never stop haunting for the killer.
Evidence taken from the crime scene waits on the shelf
while technology slowly advances.
(tense music continues)
- By the late 1980s, DNA is commonly used to solve crimes,
but its reach is still limited
and Pruszynski's case remains a cold file.
(tense music continues)
- But the search for her killer comes into view again
when a dark avenue of investigation comes to light.
- There were several possibilities or similarities
to other cases, but they weren't Helene's killer.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In 1976, Kenyon Battles Tolerton tries
to abduct Janelle Shepherd from a mall's parking lot
by hiding in the backseat of her car,
but is foiled by a passerby.
Tolerton is arrested.
He's also a suspect in the murder of Holly Andrews, age 16,
who disappears on December 26th, 1976
after leaving her mother's home in Littleton.
Her naked body is found by skiers the next day.
She has been sexually assaulted and stabbed to death.
(tense music continues)
In 1980, the same year as Helene's murder.
Donna Waugh's half-dressed corpse is discovered
in a field in Arapahoe County, Colorado,
an area less than an hour from where Helene's body is found.
- Tolerton is out on probation
when he is charged with the first-degree murder
and rape of Donna Waugh.
In 1981, he pleads guilty to second-degree murder
to avoid the death penalty.
But by 1991, he is again out on parole.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In September, 1993,
14-year-old Cissy Foster's partially-clad body is found
in a remote area of Denver.
Like Helene Pruszynski,
she is raped and stabbed multiple times.
- [Glen] Police arrest Tolerton when they find a link
to Cissy Foster's murder
from a blood sample taken from Tolerton
when he was serving his 1980 sentence.
- [Narrator] In 1994, he is sentenced
to life plus 48 years for the murder of Cissy Foster.
- Authorities make the connection
that the killings perpetrated by Tolerton
and Pruszynski's rape and murder are eerily similar.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Almost two decades later,
Douglas County's sheriff forms a taskforce
that includes the Englewood Police Department and the CBI.
They reopened Helen Pruszynski's case.
(tense music continues)
There's a re-examination
of all the evidence from 20 years earlier.
(tense music continues)
- They have Helene's coat from the crime scene,
but discover it's never been submitted for DNA testing.
- They were able to take that coat, take that DNA,
and send it to a private lab who extracted the DNA
from that sample and create a DNA profile.
- [Narrator] The results are uploaded
to the FBI's Combined DNA Index System, known as CODIS,
a national DNA information repository.
- There are millions of profiles
from known criminals and unsolved crimes
where state labs and local crime labs compare DNA profiles,
like the profile of Kenyon Tolerton.
- There was some hope there, right?
Oh, great.
We have this new tool and maybe we can catch him that way.
Unfortunately, when they put Helene's killer's DNA
in CODIS, there was no match.
- But not only is Tolerton ruled out,
there are also no matches for her killer at all.
This is not what officers were hoping for.
(tense music continues)
- But in 1998, it's still a limited process
that works best at comparing specific DNA profiles.
In terms of casting a wide net,
the technology just isn't there yet.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Years pass and the case
is reexamined again and again
when finally there's a result.
- DNA leads to eight women who may have been related
to the killer, but it's another dead end.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In 2017, genetic genealogy
has been integrated into DNA searches.
- DNA can now be uploaded to an open-source database
and officers can now find people
who are related to a perpetrator.
From there, a family tree can be built up
with the person being sought residing somewhere within.
(tense music continues)
- When that family tree is large, it's a massive task.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] In 2019, Douglas County Sheriff's investigator,
Shannon Jensen, begins that work
in the Helen Pruszynski case.
The DNA produces a match of 3,000 individuals
who are related to the killer.
- As a detective, I remember feeling a little overwhelmed.
I have to dig in there and figure out if I can solve this.
So it's a little overwhelming.
You need to be meticulous and tenacious and patient.
(tense music continues)
- And it really comes down to old-fashioned sleuthing
with a huge swath of people.
There are, understandably, some false starts.
(tense music continues)
- We have law enforcement databases,
a couple that I used in particular,
that you could just type in someone's name
and try to get their address and information.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Detectives find another
possible suspect in Arizona.
- She sees him toss a water bottle into the trash.
She grabs it and sends it to the lab.
(tense music continues)
- The detective work is painstaking, time consuming,
and it must be done.
(tense music continues)
This time, there's no match.
He's not the man.
So she goes back to the list and tries again.
- [Narrator] Meanwhile, Jessi Still,
a Georgian woman with a fascination for true crime,
buys a DNA kit and loads her information
onto an ancestry site.
(tense music continues)
- But within two months, she is contacted
by the Douglas County Sheriff's Department in Colorado.
Ms. Still is identified as a distant cousin
to a suspect in Helene's murder case.
- Still is aware of ethical concerns
over genetic DNA sites being used
for criminal investigations.
But she opts in on the website,
allowing law enforcement to use her DNA profile.
- [Narrator] "First, I thought maybe it
was a joke or a prank.
Nobody ever wants to think about being related
to the killer."
Jessi Still.
(tense music continues)
No one in Still's immediate family knows the suspect.
- So she was raised by her aunt
and she told me a story about these two boys
that her Aunt June had had.
There was a talk show back in the 90s
that wanted to reunite family members for Thanksgiving.
Because of the talk show, they had found her long lost son.
So he came out.
She told me he was very different.
He acted funny.
He was strange.
He came and then he just bailed.
And she said there was a newspaper article written about
that visit and it had both of the son's names in them,
but I can't remember what they are.
My aunt might have the article.
So she went back to her aunt and she said, "Yes,
my aunt has the article."
I said, "Great. Can she share it with me?"
She said, "Yes."
So she sent me the article
and it had both of her sons' names in it,
William and James Clanton.
I had this feeling in the morning,
and it sounds a bit corny or cliche,
but I had come to work and I just had this feeling
that I was gonna know the name of her killer very soon.
(tense music continues)
I was filled with adrenaline.
My mind was moving faster than my body.
I wanted to run their names
and get their criminal histories,
which I did right away.
I was frantic, in other words,
I wanted to figure out which one of these guys
was her killer.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] DNA reveals that William White Jr.
has a history of deviant sexual behavior,
but is not a match.
But White's younger brother, Curtis Allen White,
has been convicted of raping a woman at knife point
in Arkansas in 1975.
He moves to Colorado in 1979.
In 1982, he starts going by a new name,
James Curtis Clanton.
Detective Shannon Jensen traces Clanton's life,
and after almost four decades,
the dots finally connect.
(tense music continues)
- I went back to my law enforcement databases
and we ran their names and learned quickly
that Mr. Clanton was in Colorado during that time
near where she was abducted and killed.
(tense music continues)
- [Glen] She tells Lieutenant Tommy Barella,
who is an experienced officer,
but new to cold case work,
"I know who he is."
(tense music continues)
- What they need now is a plan
to find James Curtis Clanton, a truck driver,
and to collect a sample of his DNA
to back up their theory.
(tense music continues)
(dramatic music)
(tense music)
- [Narrator] The Helen Pruszynski case
has an incarcerated serial killer
as her likely rapist and murderer,
but DNA rules him out.
Detectives form a task force and enter the DNA
of Helene's killer into a database
where the search comes back without success.
(tense music continues)
But when a genetic DNA produces a match,
officers believe they have this public enemy
in their sights.
(tense music continues)
- Detectives need to collect DNA
to confirm the killer's identity.
Douglas County deputies trace Clanton to Florida
and follow him for days, waiting for their chance.
- Then Clanton goes into a bar near his home
outside Lake Butler, 30 miles north of Gainesville.
He doesn't know a police are on his trail.
(tense music continues)
- It was decided that, although Thanksgiving was coming,
they asked if they could stay out there a few more days
to see if they could get anything else from him.
That's when he went into that bar on a Sunday afternoon
and had a beer outta that beer mug.
(tense music continues)
- The bartender has been alerted and when Clanton leaves,
he carefully stores the mug under the bar.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Detectives seize the mug
and bring it to Colorado for testing.
And this time it's a match.
(tense music continues)
Just before 2:00 PM, two Douglas County Sheriffs stand alone
in a quiet road outside Lake Butler, Florida
waiting as Clanton drives up in his truck.
- Detectives come up with a ruse
to make Clanton commit to certain facts.
It's a preemptive strike
against possible claims Clanton might come up with
to protect himself,
like that he had consensual sex with Pruszynski.
- [Narrator] James Curtis Clanton is informed
that they suspect his identity has been stolen
and that someone has mixed him up
in a multimillion-dollar securities fraud case.
- These detective, I mean, right off the bat,
they look like IRS agents.
They went up to him and they came up with this ruse.
We just wanna make sure that, you know,
you're not connected to this in any way
or, you know, you're not a victim.
(tense music continues)
- Clanton agrees to an interview
to confirm he is not involved.
- [Narrator] The officers continue on with the ruse.
- After an hour, the officers believe
they have what they need to cover their bases.
Then they reveal what the interview has really been about.
They slide a picture of Helene across the table
and ask if he recognizes her.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] James Curtis Clanton denies it
and requests an attorney.
It is then he is advised,
"We actually have your DNA in her and on her,"
Sergeant Attila Denes.
(tense music continues)
- [Glen] He's arrested for first-degree murder
and kidnapping, handcuffed, and taken to a Florida jail.
(tense music continues)
- He made a phone call to his daughter
and said, "I did something a long time ago.
I got caught.
I'm gonna go away for a while."
(tense music continues)
- After 40 years, they have a killer in custody.
And it turns out that composite sketch
from 1980 was incredibly accurate.
(tense music continues)
- Clanton waives extradition
and agrees to be flown back to Colorado to face his charges.
But there's another big surprise.
- At the airport, Clanton tells Lieutenant Barella
that he wants to talk.
Barella takes out his phone, hits the record,
and reads Clanton his rights.
Unprompted, Clanton tells him
that he knew the interview the previous day
was about murder.
- [Narrator] "'Cause I knew that was gonna come up
and get me one day."
James Curtis Clanton.
- Completely unprompted, Clanton makes a big confession
to the officer.
- [Narrator] "I killed the girl
they're accusing me of killing,"
James Curtis Clanton.
- He was planning on kidnapping
and raping a woman that night.
He had identified a victim first
who got off the bus before Helene.
She looked right at him and seemed too confident,
so he decided not to attack her.
And he saw Helene get off the bus
and he decided to make her his victim.
(tense music continues)
- Clanton tells a horrifying story
of abducting Pruszynski on the street,
threatening her with a knife,
and binding her hands while inside his vehicle.
He tells her he's gonna ransom her to her parents.
She tries to tell him they have no money.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] James Curtis Clanton drives Helene Pruszynski
to a remote woodshed and rapes her.
Then he pulls to the side of Daniels Park Road,
walks her through the field, makes her get on her knees.
- He said, "Don't turn around and don't call the police.
Don't turn around.
I'm gonna leave.
I don't want you alerting anybody that this happened."
And then he proceeded to stab her in the back nine times.
He told investigators that he blacked out
or flashed, so to speak.
Just stabbed her and kept stabbing her and stabbing her
and left her there to bleed out.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] "And as it happened with me
on several occasions, for some reason or another,
I just kind of step out of myself and watch myself do that."
James Curtis Clanton.
(eerie music)
Clanton describes a childhood of abandonment
and abuse at the hands of a pedophile in a foster home.
- I showed him that newspaper article
with the picture of his mom.
I let him read it and then he looked up at me
after he was done and he said,
"That's the first picture of my mother I've ever seen."
- He admits to the abuse and murder of small animals.
In 1975, he rapes a woman at knife point
and then the police pick him up.
He's sentenced to 10 years
and then receives parole after four years,
due to a prison oversight.
(eerie music continues)
- A former counselor tries to help Clanton
and finds him a place to live.
In a tragic twist of fate,
it's mere blocks from Pruszynski's bus stop
and her home with her aunt and uncle.
(tense music)
- Clanton manages to escape justice
for Helene's rape and murder.
But then in Florida in 1998,
he's arrested for domestic violence battery
and then in 2001 for domestic violence assault.
- [Narrator] "That rage has always stayed with me.
I mean, it's, I think every time something hurts me
that bad that I can't deal with it.
I learned anger covers up pain.
That's pretty much the basis of everything I've ever done."
James Curtis Clanton.
(tense music continues)
- Now, the man who was compelled to keep on hurting women
has finally been stopped.
But that's for the courts to decide.
Clanton has managed to get paroled before.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] James Curtis Clanton heads back to Colorado,
the scene of his crime 40 years earlier,
to meet the fate he always knew was waiting for him.
(dramatic music)
(tense music)
Rapist and killer, James Curtis Clanton,
is captured and returned to the place of his brutal crime.
This is done by a group of dedicated officers
who are part of an investigative team that spanned 40 years.
(tense music continues)
- And now Clanton will have to face the consequences.
- After prosecutors agree
to take the death penalty off the table,
James Curtis Clanton pleads guilty
in a Castle Rock, Colorado courtroom.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] Clanton's hearing is delayed
by the COVID-19 pandemic.
- But several months later,
he appears before the district judge virtually.
By pleading guilty, he agrees to a life sentence,
and that portion is wrapped up in about 15 minutes,
but there's much more ahead.
(tense music continues)
- A sentencing hearing serves multiple purposes.
It is a place where the victim
and the perpetrator can be heard.
(tense music continues)
- Helene's best friend, her sister Janet,
has survived her parents, their brother, Chet, and Helene.
- Janet was the only living relative
in her nuclear family that was still living.
That's why it was so important to me to be able to tell her,
hey, we got him.
- [Narrator] Over a dozen people who loved Helene speak
for over three hours.
- It was a very emotional time.
Many of us law enforcement officers cried,
and when Janet got up and read her statement
to James Clanton,
it was very moving
and you could see on the video that he actually cried too.
I do think there was some genuine remorse there,
but, you know, Janet had a really hard time talking to him.
She left the room after that.
She didn't even wanna look at him.
(tense music continues)
- [Narrator] "It gives me some peace knowing
that this beast is in jail,
but I don't think we'll ever have closure
because Helene is not here."
Janet Pruszynski-Johnson.
- Pruszynski's choir group also attends the hearing.
- At one point, they came out here
and retraced her steps and tried to find her killer.
They were very vigilant and persistent
with the detectives over time,
making sure that her case was not forgotten.
They came out every year to do choir singing.
This was the last year that they were gonna do it,
and coincidentally, in 2019, her case was solved.
So it's pretty amazing the timing of everything.
(melancholy music)
- Helene's close friend and housemate, Kitsey Snow,
who sat up journaling into the night
and praying for good news that never came,
reads from the very same journal.
- [Narrator] "This has been the longest
and worst day of my life.
I'm writing because I don't know what else to do.
We waited for Helene to come home and waited."
Kitsey Snow.
- Pruszynski's boyfriend of four years earlier,
Jonathan Shailor, also bears witness.
He provides a photo slideshow
accompanied by her singing with her college acapella group,
the Wheatones.
- Helene Pruszynski's friends and family
finally have their day in court.
James Clanton doesn't speak for himself,
but his attorney issues an apology on his behalf.
(melancholy music continues)
- [Narrator] Clanton's capture and conviction depended
on so much.
- Advanced genealogy technology allows investigators
to reach back into the past
and connect it to the current day.
- [Narrator] "This new tool gave us the opportunity
to reopen the case and identify a suspect.
It's been a remarkable tool to utilize."
Detective Shannon Jensen.
- Regulations to protect people are important,
but the use of genetic DNA is a crucial tool
when finding the perpetrators of violent crime
when all other means have been exhausted.
(tense music)
- He nearly got away with it.
He could have just disappeared into the night.
- Technology is nothing without determined detectives doing
that old-fashioned police work and pushing forward
through thousands of matches.
This case is a triumph for cold case investigators.
(tense music continues)
- Former Douglas County District Attorney, George Brauchler,
said it well.
- [Narrator] "I don't want anyone who thinks
they've gotten away with murder
to be able to sleep with both eyes closed.
I want them to read stories like this
and think they're coming for me because we are."
George Brauchler. (uplifting music)
- Clanton could run, but he couldn't hide forever.
- [Narrator] Because James Curtis Clanton
commits his crime in 1980,
his conviction must adhere to the rules of that time.
Despite his life sentence,
he can apply for parole after 20 years.
He will be 83 years old.
(uplifting music continues)
"I had to win. I wanted to win for Helene."
Detective Shannon Jensen.
- I felt at times that she was with me, right?
That she was in this case.
She wanted all of us to find her murderer.
I felt like she made this happen.
She was there
and there were times when I felt that.
That added to my drive.
She drove me.
She pushed me throughout this case.
(uplifting music continues)
(tense music)