DNA Helps Solve Murder Case Over a DECADE Later (S5, E10) | Cold Case Files | Full Episode

[music playing] I turn on my lights and sirens and he pulled right in here and we stopped. He had condoms on both visors. He had condoms in the center console.

MIRIAM GARCIA (ON TV): Investigators believe they have caught a man responsible for the murder of a San Diego woman. [music playing] ANDREA FRESHWATER: This is not a life-without-parole case. He is legally entitled to the possibility of parole.

So that's really where our impact is, it's with the parole board? NARRATOR: Inside a prosecutor's office, the family meets about the possible parole of a killer. The family members comments, even though they're directed at the judge, do they have any affect, or-- or what can the effect be on-- ANDREA FRESHWATER: I-- I think it's-- it's not likely that we'll see him paroled.

Certainly not while he has any sort of meaningful length of his life left. NARRATOR: For this family, the parole hearing is an ordeal they must endure to make sure the man who took one of their own stays behind bars. I just want to say, too, I'm really glad that we could all come together for her.

This is what we can do for her. There's not much we can do now for her, and I think this is really important. [sniffles] So, I'm glad.

And DA, he took care of it. WOMAN: That was the one bill. I don't care.

NARRATOR: One detective, more than any other, is responsible for ensuring that justice was done. It's a story that began more than 18 years ago. RON THILL: When we walked in, we turn around and look, and this whole wall and the door was just covered with blood.

NARRATOR: It's 11 o'clock on a Saturday night when Detective Ron Thill and Sergeant Ed Petrick step into a bloodbath. RON THILL: Certainly one of the-- Body gave up. --bloodiest scenes I've ever seen.

Yeah, that was-- that was definitely a vicious fight. NARRATOR: The body of 27-year-old Janet Moore lies naked on her apartment floor. RON THILL: Remember, she was stabbed 31 times.

She had multiple wounds everywhere on top of her head, on her sides, on her arms, her hands, her-- ED PETRICK: Her breasts-- --legs, and her breasts. Remember how bloody everything was. NARRATOR: Not all the blood, however, appears to have come from the victim.

RON THILL: I remember seeing the-- the bathroom and how bad that was. In the kitchen, in the sink, there was blood. Remember how the-- the blood was on the-- on that door, right here?

So when you have blood in other places, especially on a purse, and on a drawer that's been ransacked, well certainly, the-- the victim didn't do that. So we felt pretty sure that the suspect had some type of-- of lacerated wound. NARRATOR: The blood evidence is sent to the crime lab for analysis, and a detective's hunch is confirmed.

Two different blood types are present at the scene. RON THILL: I mean, this was a major, major injury, we felt, to the-- to the suspect because of the amount of blood that was all over the apartment. NARRATOR: Type O is consistent with the victim.

Type A, police believe, belongs to her attacker. Semen evidence is also recovered. But with no murder weapon and no witnesses, an unknown A blood type is their best lead, even if it occurs in 40% of the general population.

"San Diego Police Department is requesting the assistance of hospitals and emergency medical facilities in checking their medical records. " RON THILL: When we sent this letter out, the reason for it was because we knew that the-- the suspect had cut him or herself. "Specifically, the emergency treatment of--" RON THILL: We sent them out to 51 different medical facilities, trying to identify anybody that was treated for-- for any type of laceration.

We got several responses back and matter of fact, that-- one of the local hospitals identified, uh, 13 people that had been treated for lacerations. We followed up on it and we exhausted all those leads. NARRATOR: As Thill and Petrick search for their A blood type, the San Diego homicide squad is open for business.

In the summer of 1988, business is wickedly good. ED PETRICK: Yeah, I used to joke that somebody had snuck a micro-switch under my pillow, because it didn't matter what time I went to sleep. As soon as my head hit the pillow to go to sleep, the phone rang and called me back out NARRATOR: Janet Moore's case takes a back seat to fresher homicides, and in time, goes cold.

RON THILL: This is, uh, the cold case homicide office. This is my desk. For years, I've sat here and I've looked at that building where Janet Moore was killed on June the 11th of 1988.

NARRATOR: For Ron Thill, now an investigator with San Diego's cold case squad, Janet Moore's murder has never been far from his mind. RON THILL: Everyday, you look at that, and you're thinking, what can I do, um, how can we-- we identify the guy who killed her, and what can we do now that we couldn't have done back in '88? NARRATOR: In 2000, Thill gets a second chance at the San Diego crime lab.

DAVID CORNACCHIA: There were some grant money set aside to where you could go back and to look at old unsolved cases. NARRATOR: Criminalist David Cornacchia examines evidence from Janet Moore's rape kit, as well as unknown blood samples found at the crime scene. DAVID CORNACCHIA: I got the same DNA profile from the bloodstain as I did from the sperm fraction of the sexual assault swabs.

NARRATOR: Detectives believe they have IDed the genetic profile of their killer. A run through the DNA database, however, fails to produce a match. RON THILL: Well, you know, it's-- you want a hit it as soon as you can get it.

But on the other hand, you're realistic enough to realize that, uh, it's not always gonna happen. NARRATOR: Little does Investigator Thill know, the breaking news will come four years later and 2,000 miles removed. BARB HART: I would go days without sleep, you know, not knowing where I'm gonna put my head, not knowing where I'm gonna get my next meal.

I-- I get money and I pretty much blow it all on drugs. NARRATOR: In 2004, Barb Hart makes her money as a prostitute. The one-time hooker has seen it all.

21-year-olds, guy looking for a new piece of tail, or something new, to 50, 60, 70-year-old men. They'd ask if you want a ride, you get in the car. Then I'd ask them, well, what all do you want?

When they tell what they-- what they would expect from me, and then I tell them how much. You know, he gives me the money and take care of our business, get dressed, drop me off. It just got to the point where it became very easy.

It was quick, easy money. And I found out that more money, which meant more drugs, you know, I-- you know, so I got to keep my high. NARRATOR: Barb was walking home one night after a night of partying.

But a van slides up beside her. BARB HART: And he asked, would you want a ride? And I said, sure.

So I got in, and you know, there was no discussion of any type of sex or anything. And I-- he asked me where I wanted to go. I said-- I-- I didn't him exactly where I was staying, because I never do.

So I told him a couple of motels away from where I was actually staying, and he didn't stop. NARRATOR: The man drives to a secluded dirt road, parks, then demands sex. BARB HART: At that point he took off his pants, he forced my pants off, and I tried squirming away.

And then he had his hands right on my hips. He pushed me back down, and he gave the motion of his hands. If I don't do what he says, he's gonna choke me.

So right there and then, I was like, I stopped fighting. NARRATOR: Barb is raped, then released. BARB HART: He gets out.

He opened my door, and he grabs my arm. And he says, thanks, bitch, for the [bleep] but you gotta go. We're in an area in southeast Volusia County, that Turnbull Bay and Pioneer Trail.

This is a-- a primary for an attack to occur because no one's gonna hear you scream, and nobody's really gonna come and help you. NARRATOR: Investigator Cindy Gambrell learns of the alleged sexual assault after Barb files a report and undergoes a rape exam. CINDY GAMBRELL: And, uh, we had a little difficult time keeping up with her and keeping in touch with her.

And that makes it harder, too, because when we get information or we get composites and we can't track down the victim, it puts a snag in the investigation and puts everything on hold and makes it harder to-- to locate the suspect. If I got people-- cops tracked me down, and told me to get in touch with this investigator, and I still didn't. You know, I just-- I was too concerned about getting high to give a rat.

NARRATOR: Barb slips back into the shadows and detectives lose track of their victim. What the crime lab finds inside Barb's rape kit, however, stuns detectives, and jump starts a cold case more than 2,000 miles away. RON THILL: DNA from our scene matched the DNA from a reported sexual assault in Florida.

We didn't know who the person was, just that the-- the two DNAs were the same. CINDY GAMBRELL: Some police officers or agencies don't really look at a prostitute making an allegation of sexual assault as they would if someone else did. A lot of times, I think it's looked at as a failure to pay, um, a discrepancy over money, and-- and it's kind of sad that sometimes, it's looked that way.

I try not to do that. A couple of things, and then Cindy's gonna go-- NARRATOR: Investigator Cindy Gambrell is looking for a prostitute named Barb Hart, a rape victim who suddenly gone MIA. CINDY GAMBRELL: In sexual battery case, I had to put it on the back burner because I had trouble contacting my victim.

NARRATOR: Barb Hart's rape case got switched to the front burner when Gambrell gets a call from the San Diego Police Department, and Investigator Ron Thill. CINDY GAMBRELL: I had gotten information that, uh, a detective had called from California reference to one of our sexual battery cases, that we had a DNA connection. RON THILL: We were notified that we had an evidence-to-evidence match.

By evidence-to-evidence, where our DNA from our scene matched the DNA from a reported sexual assault in Florida. We didn't know who the person was, just uh, the two DNAs were the same. When we first talked, he thought we may have had a suspect in our sexual battery case, so he was very happy.

When I had to break the bad news to him that, no, we don't have a suspect. All we have is a victim right now. NARRATOR: Gambrell tells Thill she will try to find her rape victim, now seen as key to solving a murder in San Diego.

Barb makes things easy by getting herself arrested. BARB HART: I first met with her when I was incarcerated at Volusia County Jail. We set up an appointment to go out to the jail and interview her again and create the composite of the suspect that we were looking for.

This is a composite of the guy that attacked me. He, like I say, he had a really sharp jawline and you know, he's got that innocence, sleepy look to him. But it was just the devil coming out.

She also described the van as extremely dark blue, almost black, and she used, I believe, the word midnight blue. Midnight blue, almost black. It had panels and no windows in the back.

It-- he had-- he had garbage, I mean, you step on this garbage and you go to your knees. I mean, it was disgusting. She indicated when, uh, she was in the vehicle, she saw a lot of, uh, tools, and hammers, and saws, and things like that in the back of the truck.

NARRATOR: Jailhouse walls are thin, and Barb's story soon makes the rounds in the County lockup. Another girl that I was also incarcerated with, that I overheard her talking in the cell about this man. So her and I start talking.

And she brought the picture to him, and she can't believe how well I did. She said, that's him. She had told me of another person that may have been a victim.

And I spoke to her, and then, it was-- it was like a domino. NARRATOR: Gambrell learns of several other prostitutes who claim they were picked up and raped by a man in an extended blue van. CINDY GAMBRELL: All of them described it at the same way.

It was like a Jekyll-and-Hyde. It was like a dark cloud came over, and he was very mean and abusive, and he would jump on them and start choking them. And a lot of were very terrified that they-- they were gonna get killed.

NARRATOR: With a potential serial rapist on the loose, Gambrell begins running surveillance in the area where hookers are known to stroll. We are more or less looking for the vehicle to see if we could find a vehicle driving in the area. I think I put more pressure on me than anybody was putting, because I want-- I knew he connected to a murder and that's why I really wanted to get him arrested before he actually killed someone here.

NARRATOR: Daytona Beach Officer Jason Kilker patrols the area. Gambrell appeals to him for help. JASON KILKER: She showed me a-- a photograph of-- what a composite may look like, driving a dark blue van with no windows, and that was about all the information there was.

He was very open. He was very eager to-- to listen to what I had to say, and he was very eager to-- to help. What am I supposed to look into?

I mean, if you see a blue van driven by a white male? Could be any 50,000 of them out here. I mean, it could be anyone, could be anywhere, any time.

Right now, we are about to enter probably one of the most heavily-trafficked areas for narcotics and prostitution in the entire city. It is a constant fight against the crime that those two acts bring. NARRATOR: It's 1:15 AM on a Sunday morning, and Daytona Beach Officer Jason Kilker is on patrol when a vehicle catches his eye.

As I was driving down the road, just driving regularly, there's a dark blue van. It had no-- it-- it had windows but they were blacked out, and just, uh, it fit the profile of what Cindy had told me. So I-- NARRATOR: He runs the tags, which come back expired to a man named Mark Elder.

JASON KILKER: Right here at this intersection, I turned on my lights and sirens, and he pulled right in here, and we stopped. NARRATOR: Officer Kilker asks to search the van and Mark Elder consents. JASON KILKER: The first thing you see when you look into his van is condoms and underwear.

He had condoms on both visors. He had condoms in the center console. [camera clicking] It's everywhere.

Every element of what Cindy had told me, I'm looking at it. NARRATOR: Inside the van, Kilker finds something else of potential value. JASON KILKER: And when I stepped up into the van and I looked, right in the cup holder, there's a little roach, that he'd been smoking marijuana driving down the street.

NARRATOR: Kilker bags the butt, which Elder admits to smoking. Then Kilker her gets on the phone with Investigator Cindy Gambrell. JASON KILKER: I said, hey, uh, you remember that whole, uh, sexual battery was connected by homicide, all that thing you were telling me about a while back?

She says, yeah? I said, yeah, I think I went ahead and, uh, just solved that for you. I was really elated and I said, just make copies of everything for me.

Take some good photos of him. And I said, but make sure he doesn't get suspicious why we're photographing him and why we're photographing his vehicle. I want him to think the only problem he has right now is what you stopped him for-- the expired tag and the marijuana cigarette that you found in his car.

We don't wanna alert him that we're looking at him for anything else. I just tried to lull him into this false sense of security, and he's thinking everything's fine. He-- he shook my hand.

He said, thank you very much, because I let him go. And-- then he got in his van and he drove away. NARRATOR: Elder is put under 24-hour surveillance.

About a month later, his seized marijuana butt will provide the evidence necessary for another chat. This time, the topic is murder. DAVID CORNACCHIA: This is a photograph of the marijuana cigarette when-- the way I received it.

NARRATOR: On August 2, San Diego Criminalist David Cornacchia is asked to examine a marijuana butt. DAVID CORNACCHIA: And there's a scale in the photo, and each of these units represents one centimeter. So as you can see, there's just not much material there to work with.

NARRATOR: The butt was taken from the van of Mark Elder, a suspect in the 1988 murder of Janet Moore. Cornacchia knows it's a long shot, but he ran some tests, looking for any traces of saliva. DAVID CORNACCHIA: Well, I was pleasantly surprised, I got a full DNA profile, and that profile matched the profile from the Janet Moore crime scene.

NARRATOR: San Diego Investigator Ron Thill gets the news. RON THILL: Finally, we have somebody that we-- we know, uh, it's our guy. And OK, now let's get to it and let's get it on.

MIRIAM GARCIA (ON TV): Investigators believe they have caught a man responsible for at least four violent rapes in the Daytona Beach area. DNA evidence also linked Elder to the murder of a San Diego woman 17 years ago. Right now, Mark Elder is behind bars here at the Volusia County Jail.

NARRATOR: On August 5, Mark Elder sits in an interview room, confused. Investigator Ron Thill is about to clear that up. RON THILL: The first thing I noticed was his fingers.

See? The two fingers of him sticking up. NARRATOR: The injury to Elder's hand takes Thill back to the crime scene in 1988.

RON THILL: We knew that our crook had injured themselves, somehow, enough to bleed significantly all over the apartment. So we were looking for some type of injury, even back in 1988, that would cause that amount of bleeding. NARRATOR: Thill doesn't buy Elder's explanation for his injury, but doesn't press the issue of murder.

At least, not immediately. RON THILL: Once he started talking, then I felt a little more comfortable in getting him to-- to talk more and more about his life, and then get into the San Diego issue, which ultimately, we did. Then when it dawned on him that I was, in fact, a law enforcement officer from-- from San Diego, he said, you mean to tell me that you came all the way out here from San Diego?

And I said, yes. And I think that's when a lot of the lights came on, uh, in his own mind. And, uh, he thought, I think I know what this is about.

Then I showed him a picture of Janet. And then said, do you know this woman? And, uh, no, I'd never seen her.

I said, did you ever have sex with her? And he said no, I've never had sex with her. Well, we knew we had his semen inside of our victim, so I knew he's lying.

And I'm sure that he knew I knew he was lying, but at this point, he's committed himself and he stays with that. And so it certainly doesn't hurt it, because it shows that he's a liar. NARRATOR: Investigator Thill pulls out another photo of his victim.

This one from the crime scene. RON THILL: He asked me if she was dead. And it was fairly obvious that she was.

And he looked at me, and he-- he said, I can't. NARRATOR: The conversation might be over, but Mark Elder's got a lot of explaining to do-- MAN: You've a warrant in California for the charge of homicide. NARRATOR: --at his very own murder trial.

ANDREA FRESHWATER: This is Janet Moore. This picture was taken in-- in 1978. It was a picture of her from her high school graduation.

NARRATOR: On June 15, Andrea Freshwater lays out her case against Mark Elder, beginning with DNA found inside the victim and throughout her home. ANDREA FRESHWATER: And he bled all over her apartment. Um, there was blood in the bathroom, all over, blood in the kitchen.

Um, he had gone through her purse, he had gone to her drawer. There-- there was blood dripping on the drawer. So, it was-- it really was the DNA.

It was a-- a very solid case. NARRATOR: The jury also hears from several Florida prostitutes, women who, like Janet Moore, Elder allegedly raped. BARB HART: You know, I put myself in the car myself.

Nobody put me out there. You know, it was my decision to do that kind of work. And-- but that doesn't give him the excuse to hurt me.

When each one was asked, why didn't you report? I thought nobody would believe me. I thought nobody would care.

As blunt as they were, they turned out to be very sympathetic women, very likable women. NARRATOR: The jury is convinced and finds Mark Elder guilty of Janet Moore's murder. JUDGE: People's state of California versus Mark Francis Elder.

NARRATOR: Inside a San Diego courtroom, Mark Elder waits for sentencing, and Janet Moore's family gets a chance to speak to the convicted killer. SHERI MOORE: Plenty can be said over the time and heartbreak that has-- my family has experienced over the past 18 years. [sniffles] I speak here to ensure that this person, this inhumane person, who has-- has no other chance to harm anyone but himself.

The images I saw in this courtroom are burned forever into my mind. I will never forget what Elder did to my sister. He is inhuman.

Please do not let this monster hurt one more woman. Please do not let him take someone else's big sister. NARRATOR: Mark Elder remains silent, and unmoved, as his fate is handed down.

JUDGE: For the crime of first degree murder, that the sentence will be 25 years to life in prison. [audience clapping] NARRATOR: For those who loved her, Janet will be forever missed. The man who took her life forever despised.

SHERI MOORE: For me, it was almost easier as a mystery in one sense, because I never had to look at the face of who it was. That's the hardest thing was to attach a face, to such hideousness. It's really difficult.

NARRATOR: For the one-time prostitute who helped put Mark Elder behind bars, the sentence allows her to move on, for good. BARB HART: I'm glad I came forward, because now I know that he's not to hurt another girl, and possibly killing other girls. WOMAN: This is the next one.

MAN: What number is that? This Is-- Yeah, that's the next one. OK.

We're all done here. And I still need to go through these two. Here?

Yeah. That's the, uh, Sutton case. NARRATOR: For San Diego Investigator Ron Thill, Janet Moore's homicide represents one case closed.

Hundreds more to go. We're into 1973 now. This is, uh, a drawing, an artist's sketch, of a suspect wanted in this particular murder case.

So-- RON THILL: We are dedicated to-- to finding killers of people from the past. And if there's one thing that-- that this whole thing really brings home is that, for one, these people, myself included, really care about our victim, whether they're prostitutes, whether they're bank tellers, whether they're senators, whatever. I think we definitely ought to look at this one, the stab wound.

We care about people and we wanna catch their murderers, despite what a lot of people think. And we appeal to the-- to the public to-- to help us do that. Uh, we want people to come forward and talk to us, and nobody deserves to die, no matter what their station is in life.

DENA DAHL: You wake up and you realize it's not your husband. So who is it? And he said, it's me.

And I knew it was him. And the whole time, I was just frightened. I was frightened for my life.

After a while, he finally left. And he told me, if I went to the police, he would kill me. JEFF REYNOLDS: Stopped by my parent's place, picked up a boat, and a buddy of mine was with me.

We went by my house 'cause I wanna change-- change shoes. NARRATOR: In 1988, Jeff Reynolds is 24, newly married to his high school sweetheart, Jana. JEFF REYNOLDS: And her car was on the carport.

I thought nothing of it, and walked in. Noticed the back door had been broken into. I walked in and hollered for her.

And I found her. NARRATOR: Jeff finds his wife lying naked on their bed, in a pool of blood. ROGER HAYSE: He was very shaken, upset, almost screaming in the phone, if I can remember his-- his nature.

And-- and that's all he said to me. I came home from work and found my wife mutilated. I need officers and-- and paramedics here.

FRANK COOPER: First thing I see when I walk to the bedroom doorway is-- is this beautiful young lady laying there on her back, with severe cuts, shoulder-- shoulder has been cut a number of times, her right wrist had almost been amputated. This-- NARRATOR: Frank Cooper is a crime scene technician, and one of the first investigators on the scene. Over the last few minutes of her life, in my opinion, was, uh, total fear.

And she fought valiantly for her life until she couldn't fight anymore. NARRATOR: Cooper collects the victim's clothes and bedding, and takes them for forensic analysis. Meanwhile, Mount Vernon officers combed the neighborhood, looking for any trace of the killer.

MIKE VLATITAGE: We'd go down the street, and down the alleys. We were looking in trash cans. And we were just basically looking for anything that might have any kind of implications of being involved in this.

NARRATOR: The neighborhood search turns up nothing. By the end of the year, detectives are unable to charge anyone with the crime, and the case goes cold. KEN MCELROY: First thing that we did was pull the case file out and read everything we could find.

And it was in-- it was in disarray. We determined-- NARRATOR: Ken McElroy is a detective with the Mount Vernon Police Department. In the summer of 2001, he and crime scene technician Roger Hayse are asked to reopen one of the town's most famous unsolved homicides-- the rape and murder of Jana Reynolds 13 years earlier.

KEN MCELROY: Once we were familiar with the case file, then, uh, Detective Hayse started pulling out the evidence piece at a time, re-examining it, uh, looking at it with alternate light source. ROGER HAYSE: In the back of mind, I was hopeful that I could find something that, you know, was missed, or was not available at the time back in 1988. From the knee area of the left leg of the thermal bottoms, we got a stain here.

A bigger stain in here, and one here. Up around the crotch area, we got a stain here, here, and moving down to the right leg area, down past the knee, you got a stain here, here, here, and here. NARRATOR: Hayse IDs 23 different stains on Jana Reynolds clothing, all possible sources of DNA.

The clothing is sent to a lab for additional testing. KEN MCELROY: We asked for presumptive tests first. We wanted to make sure that the illuminating, uh, stains that Detective Hayse had detected was, uh, seminal fluid.

And they came back and said, yes, it is seminal fluid. Seems to be not degraded, and we probably can get you a-- a profile from that. Uh, within, probably, two weeks, we had a profile of, uh, the person who had left the stains on the thermal bottoms and the panties.

NARRATOR: Jeff Reynolds is eliminated as a source of the seminal fluid, as are several long-standing suspects. With nowhere else to turn, detectives dig into old crime reports, looking for any similar types of attacks. DENA DAHL: It was good.

I mean, I was married to my high school sweetheart, a person I thought I'd be married to the rest of my life. Um, I enjoyed my life at that point. NARRATOR: It was the night of October 22, and Dena Dahl was alone in her trailer home.

DENA DAHL: Laying on my couch, listening to Bon Jovi, um, try and go to sleep. And I heard, you know, forceful push on my door, and looked at from the couch and he was standing there. NARRATOR: Dena struggled with her attacker.

DENA DAHL: That's when he, you know, pushed me back down on the couch and proceeded to attempt to rape me. Uh, he wanted me to do oral sex on him, and-- and, um, I just kept my mouth clamped down. Um, after a while, he finally left.

And he told me, if I told anyone, if I went to the police, he would kill me. NARRATOR: Dena filed a report, but no arrest was made. A couple of months later, she saw a set of eyes outside her window.

DENA DAHL: I just looked up from doing dishes, and saw his eyes, and he was standing. And I screamed, and I screamed for my husband. And, uh, by the time he got out there, he was gone.

NARRATOR: Dahl called the police, and several squad cars began to patrol the area. MARTY TERRY: As I was driving east on-- on west, I saw a Black male walking, pretty-- pretty good clip walking down the street, a pretty good pace. And I stopped the car and got out, uh, approached him.

And as I did, I recognized him as-- as Joe Tucker. Um, asked him what he was doing, and, uh, he just told me that he was out for a walk at that time of night. It was a cool evening, and really, he should not have been sweating like he was for just out for a walk.

NARRATOR: Tucker was questioned. At the time, however, detectives could not connect him to the peeping tom report, and Tucker was released. A couple of months later, Dena Dahl found yet another strange man in her home.

MARTY TERRY: Dena was coming from her neighbor's home, which is this trailer right here. And she was coming across to her trailer, which was parked right along this area here. Dena heard, uh, the front door open, and she asked who it was.

DENA DAHL: I said-- well, I said, who is it? And he said, it's me. And I knew it was him.

And I hit the back door. He chased me around, all the way around, down to the road, and up into the neighbor's backyard before he caught me. And then he pushed me to the ground, and, um, attempted to rape me.

And the whole time I was just frightened. I was frightened for my life. NARRATOR: The suspect fled on foot, as Dahl called police.

The investigation, however, went nowhere. A decade later, McElroy reviews the Dena Dahl case, and sees an MO that closely tracks the attack on Jana Reynolds. Playing a long shot, he asked the crime lab to run the peeping tom, Joe Tucker, against evidence from the Dahl rape, and his unknown profile in the Reynolds case.

Tucker proves to be a match in both. KEN MCELROY: Basically, I got a call from a scientist that was working on this. And then, I remember where I was at.

I was, uh, we had a bomb threat called in to our high school. We knew what phone-- what payphone had been called from. And I was dusting the payphone for prints when I got a call on my cell phone.

And, uh, basically-- basically Kristen told me that, uh, we got a match. NARRATOR: McElroy digs into Tucker's personal history and discovers a connection between his suspect and the murder victim. KEN MCELROY: Jana Reynolds and Joe had worked together, uh, a few years prior to that at a local fast food establishment here in town.

And Jana only worked there a couple of months. Uh, it was the only job she had through high school. She was 16 when she worked there.

Joe Tucker was a cook and, uh, Jana Reynolds waited on, you know, took orders. And, uh, so their paths had crossed. NARRATOR: The connection between Tucker and Jana Reynolds provides McElroy with ample motive for the murder.

He puts a call in to Jana's husband to tell him of the impending arrest. JEFF REYNOLDS: Uh, he called me on the phone and told me he was gonna go make an arrest. They were going after him.

It could be over, you know, finally. After all these years, you know, we've finally got somebody who they think has done it. NARRATOR: Detectives pull a warrant for the arrest of Joe Tucker.

But will their suspect talk? And if so, what will he say? girl Do you know of any cold cases?

Tell us at aetv. com. KEN MCELROY: We knew Joe Tucker was going to be at work, Monday morning it was supposed to be.

So we went to his place of employment. And then, uh, they called him into the main office of the business he was working at. NARRATOR: On May 8, 2002, Detective Ken McElroy travels 300 miles to Springfield, Missouri.

His mission-- arrest the man suspected of raping and murdering Jana Reynolds 14 years earlier. KEN MCELROY: Once he came through the door, he seen me. His head kinda dropped and I told him, Joe Tucker, you're under arrest for Jana Reynolds.

Once we arrested Joe and hand him back to the Springfield Police Department, um, we took him into an interview room. I read him his rights. Watch his foot.

Should or should not talk with 'em? He decides he's going to, so he signs his name. NARRATOR: Joe Tucker decides he can talk his way out of his handcuffs.

The suspect soon realizes he might have made a mistake. KEN MCELROY: If you noticed, his head was down. Uh, there was a pause, and, uh, I thought, you know, he may actually tell us about it there for a few minutes.

He goes back to-- to denying it right to the end. He just denies everything. We got this DNA in this.

We got all this other stuff. I was trying to overwhelm him with-- with some evidence here. If you did this, let's talk about it, and let's avoid this having to go in front of a jury.

Because you're gonna lose with the amount of evidence that we have. Let's just talk about it. One of the things he'd said to me right before I left was, uh, you know, God will point out who did this.

And I told him, you know, I just kind of looked at him and said, Joe, I think he already has. NARRATOR: McElroy and Hayse leave the room, and give Tucker a chance to think. On closed circuit camera, they watched as their suspect starts to pray.

KEN MCELROY: We're watching this from another room, and we're wondering at this point in time, is he really praying, uh, about this case? Or, um, but-- or is he, uh, wondering how many other cases is he going to get tagged with since they have my DNA? We've always thought Joe, uh, has done more than, uh, one homicide and a couple of rapes.

We think that, uh, Joe has done more than that. REPORTER: Tucker's lawyers argued today-- NARRATOR: Tucker waives extradition, goes back to Illinois, and is sent to Menard Prison on a parole violation. REPORTER: --for his hair samples.

NARRATOR: While he awaits trial in the Reynolds murder, Tucker finds himself a lawyer. Unfortunately for Tucker, it's of the jailhouse variety. KEN MCELROY: He sought out a person in Menard who had a reputation for having legal knowledge, and he asked this person to help him, uh, prepare a defense for, uh, this case, Jana Reynolds case.

They told Joe, write down everything you did in this case. So Joe writes down, basically, how he kills Jana Reynolds. It's on one page.

NARRATOR: Tucker's jailhouse lawyer tells Joe one page is insufficient. So Tucker goes back to his cell and writes some more. KEN MCELROY: So Joe goes back and writes several more pages, five or six more pages.

He even draws a diagram of the house, Jana Reynolds' house. NARRATOR: The jailhouse lawyer takes Tucker's letter and quickly turns into a jailhouse snitch, offering up the handwritten confession to detectives. KEN MCELROY: He showed them to me, and I was a little skeptical at first, but as I read the letters, seeing that-- uh, knowing the evidence and what the case like, I-- I knew it.

I knew that the person who wrote these letters Probably was the killer. NARRATOR: On April 11, 2006, a jury deliberated for less than four hours before finding Joe Tucker guilty of murdering Jana Reynolds. The only real courtroom drama-- would Tucker ever be eligible for parole, or would he die inside an Illinois jail cell?

DENA DAHL: She was like me. She was terrified. NARRATOR: At Joe Tucker's sentencing hearing, the state brings out its star, witness Dena Dahl.

Even though the statute of limitations has run on her case, Dahl wants to tell the court about the night she claims Joe Tucker attacked her. DENA DAHL: You're trying to go to sleep. You wake up and you realize it's not your husband.

And you're blocked in. I mean, you're-- there's nowhere to run really. Um, and the only thing you think about is survival.

And maybe just let it get over real quick and he'll go away. Unfortunately for her, he didn't. NARRATOR: Dena Dahl has the desired effect on the jury.

They returned with a sentence of life without parole. Detective Ken McElroy is in the courtroom with the Reynolds family, including Jana's husband, Jeff. KEN MCELROY: Jeff Reynolds hugged me, I was gonna break a rib.

And, uh, the whole family is very appreciative. This is probably the most rewarding day I've had during my career as a law enforcement. It was, uh, very rewarding, and, uh, overdue.

NARRATOR: For Jeff Reynolds, the verdict means he can lay to rest a piece of his past and give thanks to a detective who did more than just a day's work. JEFF REYNOLDS: I think of him as a friend. I mean, he's just been very strong for me.

Um, very good friend.