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This program is about unsolved mysteries.

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Whenever possible, the actual family members and police

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officials have participated in recreating the events.

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What you are about to see is not a news broadcast.

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In November of 1991, an exuberant high school dance

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in Santa Clara, California, was marred by unexpected tragedy.

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When a 15-year-old boy was struck by a car,

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he would die within an hour, the victim of a baffling,

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unknown illness.

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The death of Frank Santos Jr. was the latest blow

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for his family, which has been tormented by an incurable heart

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disease for more than 30 years.

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Perhaps some watching tonight can finally

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provide a clue that will help this courageous family.

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Join me for another edition of Unsolved Mysteries.

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MUSIC

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December 31, 1960, the American territory of Guam,

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3,000 miles west of the Hawaiian Islands.

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Shortly after midnight, Donna Tilla Santos and a 34-year-old

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husband Francisco were sound asleep.

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About 1.30 that morning, he starts snoring,

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and he never snored in his life, ever since we were married,

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and never experienced any snoring.

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So I start waking him up, because that's very unusual.

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He won't wake up.

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I started crying, and he still won't wake up.

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I lift him up halfway, and I let him lean against me.

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But then all of a sudden, he took his last breath,

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and that was it.

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He was gone.

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Francisco's death was initially attributed to a stroke,

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but was later determined to be the result of heart failure.

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Donna Tilla was left to raise seven young children

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by herself.

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For Donna Tilla Santos, the death of her husband

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was only the beginning.

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In the past decade, five more family members

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have fallen to a mysterious, undiagnosable disease.

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Today, Donna Tilla lives in Yuba City, California.

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She hopes that by presenting her story,

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someone will be able to help identify this deadly affliction,

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which has plagued the Santos family for three generations.

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By 1970, Donna Tilla had remarried

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and moved with her children and new husband

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to Northern California.

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Then in April of 1981, the Santos family

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experienced another sudden tragedy.

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27-year-old Doris, the youngest daughter,

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was found unconscious in her bedroom.

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She was half on, half off the bed, you know?

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Normally Doris keeps herself all covered up.

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So I tried to wake her up, you know, to scoot in,

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you know, cover herself up.

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She wouldn't, you know, she didn't respond.

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So I ran over, and I called my mom.

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He starts knocking on my door and says,

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Mom, wake up, because something's wrong.

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Doris don't want to wake up immediately.

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Jump out of bed, went into her bedroom,

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and I start waking her up, and she won't wake up.

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I told my son, Steve, I said, call the paramedic

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and the priest immediately.

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Doctors determined that Doris had died

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of acute congestive heart failure,

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resulting from the ventricles inability

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to pump sufficient amounts of blood to the body.

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Doctors drew no parallels between Doris's death

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and the condition that killed her father.

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Within two years of Doris's death,

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23-year-old Ronnie, the baby of the family,

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began experiencing chest pains.

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At the time, he was engaged to his high school sweetheart,

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Dana.

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Ronnie was found to have a virus of the heart

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muscle, which could be controlled by medication.

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I was scared, but I thought, well,

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he's under a good doctor's care, and things will be fine.

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I didn't.

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It was not related to what had happened to Doris,

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because it was a virus of the heart muscle.

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And hers was congestive heart failure.

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And as far as I knew, his father died of a stroke.

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So they obviously weren't related in my mind.

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By the following September, Ronnie and Dana had married.

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Under a doctor's supervision, Ronnie

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was able to live a normal, active life, which included

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weekly games of softball.

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It was a Monday, and I was sitting out and talking to a friend.

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And they had played half of an inning.

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They had been out in the field, and they came in.

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Not there hadn't been much action.

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He hadn't been running around or anything.

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He'd just kind of been fielding a few balls.

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He came in, and he was standing by the backstop,

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talking to a few friends, leaning on a bat.

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Ronnie!

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Let me go call help.

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Ronnie!

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He was groaning and moaning, and I couldn't

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figure out what was wrong with him.

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And I was just standing there screaming.

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All I could do was scream and point.

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I had no idea what was happening.

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Ronnie!

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Ronnie!

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Ronnie Santos never regained consciousness.

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He was pronounced dead on arrival.

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He was shot dead in the back of his head.

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He was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital.

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The cause of death, cardiomyopathy, and irregular heartbeat

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probably the result of a viral infection.

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I still can't believe at 24 he was gone.

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It's such a shock to think that it's just too young.

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Too many things to live for.

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A year later, the Santos family was

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forced to face yet another funeral.

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This time, the victim was the eldest son, 33-year-old Frank,

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who collapsed while sitting at home watching television.

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His mother and I were out running errands,

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and we received a phone call.

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And I just remember she got off the phone, and she said,

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she was in a panic state, and she said, we've got to go.

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We've got to go.

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Something's wrong.

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Something happened to Frank.

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We were driving back to my house,

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and his mother was on the passenger side, and she was praying.

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And I saw the shadows from the lights of the paramedics truck.

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And then it hit me, and I knew something was wrong.

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I ran into the house, and I stopped right at the dining room,

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looking into the family room.

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And I saw the paramedics working on my husband,

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and I knew he was gone.

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It was just a great shock.

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I can't believe my other son is leaving,

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and I can't believe I'm leaving.

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I'm so sorry.

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I can't believe my other son is leaving.

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And I thought to myself, he cannot leave.

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He's my oldest son, and he's not supposed to die.

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But he was gone.

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Tragically, Francisco Santos and three of his children

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had died of heart disease before reaching the age of 35.

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Physicians searched for answers, and soon discovered

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that heart disorders had plagued Francisco's side of the family

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for a number of generations.

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I think that what's most mysterious about the family

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is the fact that none of the family members who died

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were thought to have abnormal hearts prior to dying.

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And most of them have had postmortem examinations,

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and there were no serious problems found at postmortem examination.

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Frank's death was also attributed to cardiomyopathy,

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but doctors were unable to identify the specific disease

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that would soon claim two more members of the Santos family.

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In August of 1987, another brother, 30-year-old Ralph,

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fell asleep on the sofa and never woke up.

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His death was also attributed to a viral infection of the heart.

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He left behind a wife and two young sons.

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Then in November of 1991, 15-year-old Frank Santos Jr.

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was struck down at a high school dance.

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The mysterious malady had skipped to the next generation.

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Frank's mother was called to the gym.

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She had now lost a husband and a son.

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I walked in, and I knew right when I saw him laying there still

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and the paramedics were administering CPR.

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I knew he was gone.

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Frank Santos Jr. was buried next to his uncle Ronnie.

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Nearby are the graves of his father, his Aunt Doris,

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and his uncle Ralph.

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The funeral was a time for Steve Santos,

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the family's only surviving son,

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to reflect on his own uncertain future.

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I was thinking, I might be next, you know,

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or my sister's going to be next, you know, one of us.

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I'm very certain that this is a problem that is in the genetic code,

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and we have just not been smart enough to figure out exactly what this problem is.

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It's not like we've seen 100 or 150 families like this

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with the exact same findings that we can look very, very carefully.

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This is a very unusual situation.

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Despite the years of pain and hardship,

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and despite the loss of six loved ones,

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the Santos family has remained remarkably resilient.

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Drawing from each other, the strength and hope that modern medicine

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has been unable to provide.

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It just brought us that much closer to each other.

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Now I have a three-month-old daughter.

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You know, I fear for them, just like I fear for myself,

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for my sisters.

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You know, now that it's hit their generation, you know,

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I fear it pretty much.

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Every day I think about my children, my grandchildren,

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what's going to happen, and I'm not praying.

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I'm hoping I'm praying that they will die.

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I just hope that this is going to stop.

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It's enough already.

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Next, controversy surrounds a fatal car fire.

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Was it an accident or a murder?

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On October 25, 1987, in the small town of New Rockford, North Dakota,

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an angry confrontation erupted between Kathy Bonderson and their husband

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over their teenage son who had gone out without permission.

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What am I supposed to do about missing a night at work?

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You're the one that grounded him in the first place.

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Somebody has to set some limits for the boy,

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and obviously it's not going to be you.

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It was after two AMS, and I was told that I was going to be a real criminal.

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And obviously it's not going to be you.

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It was after two AM, Kathy's husband had already conducted a cursory search

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and given up.

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He'll be home when he's ready.

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This is ridiculous.

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It's 2.30 in the morning, and we don't know where our son is.

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Fine.

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You go look for him then.

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OK.

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I will.

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Yeah, well, I hope you have a heck of a lot better luck than I did.

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Kathy, a dedicated employee at a local convalescent home,

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had never missed a shift at work.

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Yet this night, she was so concerned about her son that she called in sick.

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Around 2.30 AM, the boy was on his way home with his girlfriend

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when he saw his mother's car heading out of town.

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That was my mom's car.

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She's a hope she didn't see me.

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Another vehicle was following close behind Kathy's.

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Her son assumed that his mother was driving her car,

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but in fact, he was unable to clearly see the driver in either vehicle.

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An hour later, a car was reported burning out of control

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on a lonely country road, just a few yards west of a railroad crossing.

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Close the line.

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Close the line now.

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Make sure the pressure's way up.

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The pressure's up.

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Leave on the hood.

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Somebody give the hood.

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I got it.

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I got it.

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The heat was intense.

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So intense that 15 long minutes passed before firefighters

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could get close enough to look inside.

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No one on this side.

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Glass, check the other side.

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A body was in the seated position on the floorboard

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of the passenger side of the vehicle.

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Come in here.

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The victim was later identified as 35-year-old Kathy Bonderson.

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Daybreak, finally the car had cooled down enough

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to remove Kathy's charred body.

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At the time, Edward Almaras was the sheriff of Eddie County.

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As I remember it, the firewall was completely burned.

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The steering column, the dash, the front seat.

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The only thing that was left was the steel.

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Listen, I'd like to have the boys flush it out

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so if there's any fragments left from the body.

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The fire had to start up front someplace.

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There could have been a short, a wire pinch,

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something because that car was doing some bending

257
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also when it went across those tracks.

258
00:15:35,120 --> 00:15:38,120
Kathy's car was found here.

259
00:15:38,120 --> 00:15:41,120
Sheriff Almaras believed that as Kathy approached

260
00:15:41,120 --> 00:15:44,120
the railroad crossing, she inexplicably swerved to the right

261
00:15:44,120 --> 00:15:49,120
and lost control when she careened over the exposed tracks.

262
00:15:49,120 --> 00:15:56,120
The car made a abrupt turn as if it was trying to avoid something.

263
00:15:57,120 --> 00:16:00,120
Then straightened out went across the tracks.

264
00:16:00,120 --> 00:16:06,120
There was marks on the tracks which showed us that the car

265
00:16:06,120 --> 00:16:12,120
very definitely went over the tracks, not the crossing, but the tracks.

266
00:16:12,120 --> 00:16:16,120
Almaras believed that a high-speed impact with the raised tracks

267
00:16:16,120 --> 00:16:19,120
not only caused the car to burst into flames,

268
00:16:19,120 --> 00:16:22,120
but also threw Kathy to the passenger side of the car

269
00:16:23,120 --> 00:16:26,120
Sheriff Almaras felt that he had an open and shut case.

270
00:16:26,120 --> 00:16:30,120
Kathy Bonerson was no doubt the victim of a tragic accident.

271
00:16:30,120 --> 00:16:33,120
Yet oddly, her car keys are found virtually undamaged

272
00:16:33,120 --> 00:16:35,120
on the floorboard of the vehicle,

273
00:16:35,120 --> 00:16:38,120
even though the car's interior had melted.

274
00:16:38,120 --> 00:16:41,120
Within two days, a theory emerged which would pit Sheriff Almaras

275
00:16:41,120 --> 00:16:43,120
against an investigator from the North Dakota State Highway

276
00:16:43,120 --> 00:16:46,120
and the car's interior had been damaged.

277
00:16:46,120 --> 00:16:49,120
The car was in a state of emergency.

278
00:16:49,120 --> 00:16:53,120
The Sheriff Almaras against an investigator from the North Dakota State Highway Patrol.

279
00:16:53,120 --> 00:16:57,120
Four years later, the two lawmen still disagree,

280
00:16:57,120 --> 00:17:01,120
and the question remains, did Kathy Bonerson die in an accident

281
00:17:01,120 --> 00:17:04,120
or was she murdered?

282
00:17:09,120 --> 00:17:13,120
The day after the fire, Captain William Byrum of the Highway Patrol

283
00:17:13,120 --> 00:17:18,120
visited the scene to file a standard report.

284
00:17:18,120 --> 00:17:22,120
Byrum found no tire tracks to indicate that

285
00:17:22,120 --> 00:17:25,120
not-of-control car had veered off the road.

286
00:17:25,120 --> 00:17:28,120
Further, the tall grass in the area seemed undisturbed.

287
00:17:28,120 --> 00:17:31,120
The truck, which was not on the road,

288
00:17:31,120 --> 00:17:34,120
was not on the road,

289
00:17:34,120 --> 00:17:36,120
and the car was on the roadside.

290
00:17:36,120 --> 00:17:39,120
The car was on the roadside,

291
00:17:39,120 --> 00:17:42,120
and the road was on the roadside.

292
00:17:42,120 --> 00:17:45,120
The truck was on the roadside,

293
00:17:45,120 --> 00:17:48,120
and the area seemed undisturbed.

294
00:17:48,120 --> 00:17:51,120
He noticed the same marks on the railroad tracks

295
00:17:51,120 --> 00:17:54,120
which Sheriff Almaras had discovered.

296
00:17:54,120 --> 00:17:58,120
Byrum, however, believes they were not made by Kathy's car.

297
00:17:58,120 --> 00:18:03,120
The marks I found were a reddish color.

298
00:18:03,120 --> 00:18:05,120
We talked with the firemen,

299
00:18:05,120 --> 00:18:09,120
and the hoses that were used that night were a red rubber hose,

300
00:18:09,120 --> 00:18:12,120
and they had been in and around that area,

301
00:18:12,120 --> 00:18:15,120
and they had drugged the hoses over the tracks.

302
00:18:15,120 --> 00:18:18,120
Felt that what I was looking at was something

303
00:18:18,120 --> 00:18:21,120
that had been put there by them.

304
00:18:21,120 --> 00:18:25,120
The next day, Byrum and the State Fire Marshal

305
00:18:25,120 --> 00:18:28,120
examined Kathy Bonderson's car.

306
00:18:28,120 --> 00:18:33,120
I see that it's totally burned,

307
00:18:33,120 --> 00:18:37,120
but I see absolutely no damage,

308
00:18:37,120 --> 00:18:40,120
structural-wise, from impact,

309
00:18:40,120 --> 00:18:45,120
which is normal to find in this type of an accident.

310
00:18:45,120 --> 00:18:50,120
But I couldn't find any. I found none. Zero.

311
00:18:50,120 --> 00:18:53,120
The fuel line looks okay, and the fuel filter stores the paint on it.

312
00:18:53,120 --> 00:18:56,120
Surprisingly, the fuel tank still held

313
00:18:56,120 --> 00:18:59,120
twelve and a half gallons of gasoline.

314
00:18:59,120 --> 00:19:04,120
The fuel line from the tank itself to the carburetor

315
00:19:04,120 --> 00:19:06,120
was intact.

316
00:19:06,120 --> 00:19:11,120
No cracks, no dents, no damage whatsoever.

317
00:19:11,120 --> 00:19:14,120
It doesn't appear that we had any impact on any rail.

318
00:19:14,120 --> 00:19:17,120
Based on the evidence, the fire marshal came to his own,

319
00:19:17,120 --> 00:19:19,120
disturbing conclusion.

320
00:19:19,120 --> 00:19:22,120
It appeared the fire started in several different areas,

321
00:19:22,120 --> 00:19:26,120
which would not be normally found in an accidental fire.

322
00:19:26,120 --> 00:19:31,120
There's no question in my mind this fire was not an accident.

323
00:19:31,120 --> 00:19:34,120
This fire was intentionally set.

324
00:19:37,120 --> 00:19:40,120
Three weeks later, Captain Byron requested that

325
00:19:40,120 --> 00:19:43,120
Kathy Bonderson's body be exhumed for an autopsy.

326
00:19:43,120 --> 00:19:45,120
Sheriff El Maris objected.

327
00:19:45,120 --> 00:19:48,120
Byron threatened to obtain a court order.

328
00:19:48,120 --> 00:19:51,120
El Maris, back down.

329
00:19:51,120 --> 00:19:55,120
You know, it ticked me off when I was forced

330
00:19:55,120 --> 00:20:02,120
into signing the petition to exhum the body.

331
00:20:02,120 --> 00:20:09,120
And then after we got the full wrap-up from the doctor

332
00:20:09,120 --> 00:20:16,120
in Minnesota, the one who performed the autopsy,

333
00:20:16,120 --> 00:20:20,120
he couldn't come up with any cause of death.

334
00:20:20,120 --> 00:20:24,120
One of the very important facts from the autopsy

335
00:20:24,120 --> 00:20:31,120
proved that Kathy Bonderson was dead before the fire started.

336
00:20:32,120 --> 00:20:35,120
According to the pathologist's findings,

337
00:20:35,120 --> 00:20:38,120
there was no carbon monoxide in Kathy's lungs,

338
00:20:38,120 --> 00:20:42,120
suggesting that she was not alive when the fire was ignited.

339
00:20:42,120 --> 00:20:46,120
I asked him, you know, if she could have been killed

340
00:20:46,120 --> 00:20:50,120
from a blow on the head, and he says yes.

341
00:20:50,120 --> 00:20:52,120
Well, if you're ever in a bouncing car,

342
00:20:52,120 --> 00:20:55,120
you know, where your head is going to hit.

343
00:20:55,120 --> 00:20:58,120
Tests conducted on fragments of Kathy's clothing

344
00:20:58,120 --> 00:21:01,120
and the vehicles carpeting revealed that each contained

345
00:21:01,120 --> 00:21:05,120
traces of gasoline, supporting the possibility of arson.

346
00:21:05,120 --> 00:21:08,120
Further several days after the incident,

347
00:21:08,120 --> 00:21:11,120
an empty gasoline jug was found just 300 yards

348
00:21:11,120 --> 00:21:14,120
from where the car was burned.

349
00:21:14,120 --> 00:21:19,120
Still, Sheriff El Maris would not change his findings.

350
00:21:19,120 --> 00:21:22,120
There's been no proof offered.

351
00:21:22,120 --> 00:21:27,120
Nothing in my investigation brought up anything that even

352
00:21:27,120 --> 00:21:32,120
would give you an inkling that there's might be a homicide

353
00:21:32,120 --> 00:21:35,120
rather than a car accident. Nothing.

354
00:21:36,120 --> 00:21:43,120
There are too many other facts leading me to believe

355
00:21:43,120 --> 00:21:46,120
that it was not an accident.

356
00:21:48,120 --> 00:21:51,120
And I have to work with facts.

357
00:21:57,120 --> 00:22:01,120
Captain Byram is convinced that someone murdered Kathy Bonderson

358
00:22:01,120 --> 00:22:05,120
and set her car on fire to make it look like an accident.

359
00:22:05,120 --> 00:22:09,120
If so, who killed her and why?

360
00:22:27,120 --> 00:22:34,120
8.51pm, November 13, 1991.

361
00:22:34,120 --> 00:22:37,120
A chilling call from the police.

362
00:22:37,120 --> 00:22:41,120
The police found that Kathy's car was burned.

363
00:22:41,120 --> 00:22:43,120
The car was burned.

364
00:22:43,120 --> 00:22:47,120
The police found that Kathy was a car accident.

365
00:22:47,120 --> 00:22:50,120
The police found that Kathy was a car accident.

366
00:22:50,120 --> 00:22:53,120
The police found that Kathy was a car accident.

367
00:22:53,120 --> 00:22:57,120
8.51pm, November 13, 1991.

368
00:22:57,120 --> 00:23:01,120
A chilling call came into the Balejo, California police.

369
00:23:01,120 --> 00:23:05,120
Loomis driver said they pulled the store and see a subject tied on the floor.

370
00:23:05,120 --> 00:23:08,120
Possibly subjects inside.

371
00:23:08,120 --> 00:23:11,120
Hold on, hold on.

372
00:23:11,120 --> 00:23:14,120
Patrol cars immediately rolled to the scene of what they believed

373
00:23:14,120 --> 00:23:18,120
was a robbery in progress at the Loomis Armored Car Company.

374
00:23:24,120 --> 00:23:27,120
As police made their approach, they saw that the security door

375
00:23:27,120 --> 00:23:30,120
of the main building was partially open.

376
00:23:30,120 --> 00:23:33,120
A bag of money lay near the entrance.

377
00:23:33,120 --> 00:23:36,120
The officers moved cautiously and were fearful that somewhere

378
00:23:36,120 --> 00:23:39,120
a gunman might still be lurking.

379
00:23:53,120 --> 00:23:57,120
Inside police discovered that this was far more than a simple robbery.

380
00:23:57,120 --> 00:24:00,120
Just beyond the door, a security guard lay dead.

381
00:24:00,120 --> 00:24:04,120
His hands had been bound with rope and he'd been shot through the head.

382
00:24:18,120 --> 00:24:22,120
In another part of the building, police found two other guards

383
00:24:22,120 --> 00:24:25,120
one was dead, the other mortally wounded.

384
00:24:25,120 --> 00:24:29,120
Like the first victim, they had each been bound and shot in the head.

385
00:24:34,120 --> 00:24:38,120
The guards were identified as 49-year-old Martin McCumber,

386
00:24:38,120 --> 00:24:41,120
29-year-old Dennis Jacobson,

387
00:24:41,120 --> 00:24:44,120
and 25-year-old Alfonso Lontayo.

388
00:24:44,120 --> 00:24:47,120
McCumber left behind a wife and children.

389
00:24:47,120 --> 00:24:51,120
Lontayo was engaged to be married in six months.

390
00:24:52,120 --> 00:24:56,120
This one will forever stick in my mind as being a very brutal

391
00:24:56,120 --> 00:25:00,120
and senseless killing of three innocent people who were trying to make a living.

392
00:25:00,120 --> 00:25:06,120
And the way they were killed and just the brutality of the incident

393
00:25:06,120 --> 00:25:10,120
will be something that will stick in my mind for a pretty long time.

394
00:25:11,120 --> 00:25:15,120
The brutality of this crime was not its only hallmark.

395
00:25:15,120 --> 00:25:19,120
Police were surprised to find that the killers had left behind

396
00:25:19,120 --> 00:25:22,120
an abundance of physical evidence.

397
00:25:22,120 --> 00:25:25,120
All of that evidence has been used in our recreations.

398
00:25:25,120 --> 00:25:27,120
Watch closely.

399
00:25:27,120 --> 00:25:31,120
Perhaps someone in the audience will be able to help identify the killers.

400
00:25:33,120 --> 00:25:36,120
Immediately after police units had secured the crime scene,

401
00:25:36,120 --> 00:25:39,120
detectives were called in.

402
00:25:41,120 --> 00:25:45,120
We looked inside numerous duffel bags that had been left behind.

403
00:25:45,120 --> 00:25:48,120
Inside these duffel bags, we found a pair of shoes.

404
00:25:48,120 --> 00:25:51,120
We found some tools and some lighter fluid.

405
00:25:51,120 --> 00:25:55,120
The lighter fluid itself is still somewhat of a mystery to us.

406
00:25:55,120 --> 00:25:57,120
Try as we might.

407
00:25:57,120 --> 00:26:02,120
We have not been able to conceive of the purpose of bringing that lighter fluid to the facility.

408
00:26:03,120 --> 00:26:06,120
A price had been handwritten on the lighter fluid container.

409
00:26:06,120 --> 00:26:10,120
So far, no match for the writing has been found.

410
00:26:11,120 --> 00:26:17,120
The shoes were a brand called Honours, sold exclusively at Target chain stores.

411
00:26:19,120 --> 00:26:24,120
Detectives were surprised to find that the murder weapon had been left behind.

412
00:26:24,120 --> 00:26:29,120
This revolver is an 8-inch blue-steel called Trooper.

413
00:26:29,120 --> 00:26:35,120
We were able to determine that that weapon had been reported as previously lost or stolen

414
00:26:35,120 --> 00:26:38,120
in the Los Angeles area in approximately 1969.

415
00:26:39,120 --> 00:26:43,120
By the next morning, the FBI had been called in.

416
00:26:43,120 --> 00:26:46,120
At every turn, more evidence was discovered.

417
00:26:46,120 --> 00:26:52,120
Inside the compound, investigators found an orange duffel bag stuffed with hundreds of thousands of dollars.

418
00:26:53,120 --> 00:26:58,120
Nearby, they found the bolt cutters, which had been used to break in through the wire fence.

419
00:27:01,120 --> 00:27:07,120
As we traveled along the fence line of Loomis, we located a pair of gloves that were maybe

420
00:27:07,120 --> 00:27:11,120
15 to 20 feet from that cut hole in the fence.

421
00:27:11,120 --> 00:27:18,120
Beyond that, we began locating ski masks, gloves, camouflage, or fatigue-type clothing.

422
00:27:18,120 --> 00:27:21,120
We found another one of those large bags.

423
00:27:21,120 --> 00:27:24,120
Inside that bag was abundance of currency.

424
00:27:24,120 --> 00:27:26,120
It, too, appeared to have been abandoned.

425
00:27:27,120 --> 00:27:35,120
In a park across the street, investigators found a pair of gloves, a ski mask, and an AK-47 assault rifle.

426
00:27:36,120 --> 00:27:41,120
Nearby, where this AK-47 was found, we found an impression in the ground.

427
00:27:41,120 --> 00:27:47,120
This impression leads us to believe that the responsible laid in that area for some time following the crime,

428
00:27:47,120 --> 00:27:51,120
hoping that the police would leave and he could finish his escape.

429
00:27:52,120 --> 00:27:56,120
Judging from the evidence, the authorities theorized that there were four robbers.

430
00:27:56,120 --> 00:28:02,120
Hair samples found on the ski masks indicated that at least one of them was white and one black.

431
00:28:02,120 --> 00:28:05,120
Eye witnesses would later confirm this.

432
00:28:11,120 --> 00:28:17,120
Exactly one week to the hour after the murders, authorities set up a roadblock near the armored car facility,

433
00:28:17,120 --> 00:28:21,120
hoping to find people who travel the area regularly.

434
00:28:21,120 --> 00:28:27,120
They learned that a white male was seen running north from the building at around 9 p.m. on November 13th.

435
00:28:27,120 --> 00:28:32,120
A black male was seen around the same time running north on a different street.

436
00:28:38,120 --> 00:28:43,120
Working backwards, authorities began to piece together what happened on the night of the murders.

437
00:28:46,120 --> 00:28:52,120
At approximately 8 p.m., four heavily armed men dressed in combat fatigues approached the Loomis building.

438
00:28:53,120 --> 00:28:56,120
One security guard was on duty inside.

439
00:28:57,120 --> 00:29:02,120
40 minutes later, two other guards arrived, transporting a significant amount of cash.

440
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:09,120
They made radio contact with a guard inside the building, who was stationed in a lookout booth called the Turret Room.

441
00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:16,120
Several Loomis trucks were parked on the inside of the fence.

442
00:29:16,120 --> 00:29:22,120
This would have provided the responsibles with easy cover, so as not to be seen by the police.

443
00:29:22,120 --> 00:29:29,120
Once the truck arrived and the gate began to open, it would have been possible for the murderers to enter the facility,

444
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:35,120
coming in underneath the opening gate quickly before the guards had a chance to respond.

445
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:44,120
The guards were on duty in the open area, and the guards were on duty in the open area.

446
00:29:44,120 --> 00:29:49,120
The guards were on duty in the open area, and the guards were on duty in the open area.

447
00:29:53,120 --> 00:29:58,120
The guards were on duty in the open area, and the guards were on duty in the open area.

448
00:30:03,120 --> 00:30:07,120
You're going to hand them behind your head. Head behind your head. Come on.

449
00:30:10,120 --> 00:30:13,120
They could have held the guards as hostages, ordering the guard to exit the Turret Room,

450
00:30:13,120 --> 00:30:18,120
which he may have done thinking that that would save the lives of his friends.

451
00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:27,120
Once all three of these guards were overpowered, they were then bound.

452
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:34,120
Once the guards were bound, that allowed the responsibles to focus their attention on the truck.

453
00:30:40,120 --> 00:30:41,120
Get down!

454
00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:57,120
There was no reason to kill them other than if for some reason they could possibly identify the robbers.

455
00:30:57,120 --> 00:31:01,120
That would be the only reason that they would have to be killed.

456
00:31:01,120 --> 00:31:09,120
Now, this leads to a great deal of speculation, whether one or more of the employees who were killed actually knew one of the robbers.

457
00:31:12,120 --> 00:31:22,120
When a gunshot was fired, they activated an interior alarm which caused them to panic and flee.

458
00:31:31,120 --> 00:31:35,120
They filled the bags so full of money that they could not carry them.

459
00:31:35,120 --> 00:31:38,120
They were not aware of how heavy money actually is.

460
00:31:39,120 --> 00:31:44,120
Despite the blaring alarm, the killers fled and got away scot-free.

461
00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:49,120
The stark irony is that they also got away with absolutely no money.

462
00:31:52,120 --> 00:31:55,120
These three victims of this crime were more than just guards.

463
00:31:55,120 --> 00:32:00,120
They had wives, children, girlfriends, fathers and mothers that they left behind.

464
00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:05,120
These people's lives, their survivors, have been permanently impacted.

465
00:32:06,120 --> 00:32:11,120
Nothing can be ever done to undo what's been done to those people.

466
00:32:11,120 --> 00:32:17,120
And probably the closest we can ever come to rectifying the impact on their life is to help solve this crime.

467
00:32:36,120 --> 00:32:39,120
The next victim is a woman.

468
00:32:57,120 --> 00:33:04,120
Next, a woman is stricken with a rare form of amnesia and loses 16 years of her memory.

469
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:09,120
The first victim is a woman.

470
00:33:14,120 --> 00:33:21,120
Imagine what it would be like to awake one day from a deep sleep and discover that your most precious memories are gone forever.

471
00:33:21,120 --> 00:33:26,120
That's exactly what happened to a 39-year-old housewife from Dundalk, Maryland.

472
00:33:26,120 --> 00:33:32,120
She's been stricken with amnesia, a medical mystery which has confounded science for centuries.

473
00:33:32,120 --> 00:33:36,120
She is not searching for a lost loved one. No crime has been committed.

474
00:33:36,120 --> 00:33:40,120
What she has lost is every single memory from a 16-year period.

475
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:45,120
The mystery of Sarah DeGenerro is a mystery of the mind.

476
00:33:53,120 --> 00:33:59,120
It began on Friday the 13th, August 1976, when Sarah stopped by her local bank.

477
00:34:00,120 --> 00:34:08,120
Sarah had a long history of debilitating migraine headaches, but this day, the pain was beyond anything she had ever experienced before.

478
00:34:11,120 --> 00:34:22,120
The pain was so bad. If my head had exploded, you know, if dynamite had gone off on the left side of my head, it would have probably felt the same way.

479
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:27,120
There was so much pain. The only thing I could do was leave there.

480
00:34:29,120 --> 00:34:34,120
The attack left Sarah confused and disoriented, unable to see out of her left eye.

481
00:34:34,120 --> 00:34:37,120
Somehow, she managed to make her way home.

482
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:41,120
Honey? Honey, what's wrong?

483
00:34:41,120 --> 00:34:46,120
Three hours later, Sarah's husband, Paul, found his wife sprawled across the bed.

484
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:49,120
Honey, wake up.

485
00:34:49,120 --> 00:34:52,120
She was partially paralyzed and babbling incoherently.

486
00:34:52,120 --> 00:34:54,120
Honey, honey, talk to me.

487
00:34:54,120 --> 00:35:05,120
I tried to tell him. You know that I was down at the bank and my head exploded, but I couldn't say it.

488
00:35:05,120 --> 00:35:13,120
A blood vessel had burst in Sarah's brain. Doctors recommended an extremely delicate and risky operation.

489
00:35:13,120 --> 00:35:19,120
The alternative was bleak. Sarah would likely be incapacitated for the rest of her life.

490
00:35:20,120 --> 00:35:23,120
They're bringing the pressure down.

491
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:26,120
OK, the clip is on.

492
00:35:26,120 --> 00:35:33,120
Surgeons use a relatively new and experimental procedure called micro-surgery to repair the broken blood vessel in Sarah's brain.

493
00:35:33,120 --> 00:35:38,120
All right, we've got the first aneurysm flipped. It looks like there's another aneurysm here, though, that we didn't...

494
00:35:38,120 --> 00:35:41,120
Then they discovered that her condition was worse than they had imagined.

495
00:35:41,120 --> 00:35:45,120
There was a second ruptured vessel which had failed to show up in X-rays.

496
00:35:46,120 --> 00:35:53,120
Sarah was on the operating table for nine and a half grueling hours as doctors struggled to save her life.

497
00:35:57,120 --> 00:36:00,120
Hello, Sarah. How are you doing?

498
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:05,120
Listen, the doctor says we can remove some of those stitches now that are in your head.

499
00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:12,120
During the first few days of recovery, Sarah knew something was not quite right and became frightened.

500
00:36:12,120 --> 00:36:19,120
She noticed that in just three days, Paul's 1960s crew cut had grown out and he appeared to have put on weight.

501
00:36:19,120 --> 00:36:24,120
Sarah's daughter, Kelly, sensed immediately that her mother had changed.

502
00:36:24,120 --> 00:36:29,120
What Kelly did not know was that her mother did not even recognize her.

503
00:36:29,120 --> 00:36:33,120
I can remember the day that my father took me to the hospital.

504
00:36:33,120 --> 00:36:41,120
It was after my mother was out of intensive care and she was in her private room and it also happened to be the day that she was getting her stitches out.

505
00:36:41,120 --> 00:36:50,120
So as the nurse was removing the stitches from her head, I was to one side of her and I kept watching her and she would be looking over at me just out of the corner of her eye

506
00:36:50,120 --> 00:36:54,120
and not really saying anything to me at all the whole time that I was there.

507
00:36:56,120 --> 00:36:58,120
I was wondering who I was.

508
00:36:59,120 --> 00:37:03,120
Sixteen years of Sarah's memory had been erased.

509
00:37:03,120 --> 00:37:11,120
In her mind, she was only 23 years old and had three youngsters waiting for her at home, not four teenage children.

510
00:37:12,120 --> 00:37:27,120
Most people who have an aneurysm that ruptures do experience some memory loss, but the memory loss tends to be around the event itself, not a prolonged period of time that is lost.

511
00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:39,120
In Mrs. DiGenerro's case, 16 years, a time when children were being born and were growing, to be deprived of that is really unusual.

512
00:37:41,120 --> 00:37:45,120
Two and a half weeks after surgery, Sarah was released from the hospital.

513
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:56,120
The neighborhood seemed oddly out of kilter. What had once been a dirt road was now a paved street, where there were once empty lots, new houses stood.

514
00:37:58,120 --> 00:37:59,120
This is here.

515
00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:01,120
Kids, kids are here.

516
00:38:02,120 --> 00:38:10,120
Doctors had warned Sarah that following the surgery, she might feel slightly disoriented, but no one had prepared her for what she found.

517
00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:12,120
Right over here.

518
00:38:13,120 --> 00:38:19,120
There was nothing in the house like it was before. Everything was just different.

519
00:38:20,120 --> 00:38:21,120
Yeah, it's fine.

520
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:30,120
But I figured that if I just kept quiet, eventually I'd have things figured out.

521
00:38:31,120 --> 00:38:34,120
Do Eloise and Bob still live in Towson?

522
00:38:35,120 --> 00:38:40,120
Two days after returning from the hospital, Sarah began to understand the full magnitude of her problem.

523
00:38:41,120 --> 00:38:43,120
And it is 1960, isn't it?

524
00:38:44,120 --> 00:38:45,120
No.

525
00:38:46,120 --> 00:38:48,120
It's 1976, Mom.

526
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:50,120
You're kidding us, right?

527
00:38:52,120 --> 00:38:55,120
Yeah, I'm just fooling you guys. I knew that.

528
00:38:56,120 --> 00:39:06,120
Terrified by her inexplicable memory loss, Sarah made a conscious decision that no one must know. Not her family, not her friends, not even her doctors.

529
00:39:07,120 --> 00:39:13,120
Whenever she was alone, Sarah sifted through family photographs, searching for clues about her past.

530
00:39:14,120 --> 00:39:18,120
She became obsessed with discovering who she was and where she had come from.

531
00:39:19,120 --> 00:39:22,120
I didn't have all the knowledge that I had before.

532
00:39:23,120 --> 00:39:29,120
I would try to get back everything that was lost in my brain.

533
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:33,120
Sarah found herself mystified by the most ordinary household appliances.

534
00:39:35,120 --> 00:39:39,120
When Sarah was 23, few families had automatic dishwashers.

535
00:39:40,120 --> 00:39:45,120
Microwave ovens had not yet been invented. Personal computers were unheard of.

536
00:39:46,120 --> 00:39:50,120
Even the family cars seemed like something out of the space age.

537
00:39:50,120 --> 00:39:57,120
I'd never seen anything like that in my life. I mean, it was this big, streamlined car. It was unbelievable.

538
00:39:58,120 --> 00:40:05,120
The magazines, they used to give pictures of cars of the future. That's what the Pontiac Grand Prix looked like.

539
00:40:07,120 --> 00:40:10,120
Sarah internalized the history of the car.

540
00:40:10,120 --> 00:40:16,120
The magazines, they used to give pictures of cars of the future. That's what the Pontiac Grand Prix looked like.

541
00:40:19,120 --> 00:40:25,120
Sarah internalized her fears and tried to go about life as if nothing had happened. Yet everything had changed.

542
00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:34,120
Sarah's taste in music, fashion and dance was out of a 23-year-old, not a woman approaching middle age.

543
00:40:35,120 --> 00:40:41,120
I can remember coming home from school or coming home from work and the stereo would just be blasting.

544
00:40:42,120 --> 00:40:47,120
The first thing I would do would be to come in the back door and just turn the stereo down because it would just drive me crazy.

545
00:40:48,120 --> 00:40:54,120
It's been a real role reversal at some points, you know, and just the music that she listens to.

546
00:40:55,120 --> 00:41:00,120
It's music of my generation and it's a bit much for me at times.

547
00:41:04,120 --> 00:41:08,120
For nearly four years, Sarah managed to keep up her charade.

548
00:41:09,120 --> 00:41:13,120
Finally in November of 1979, Sarah discovered that she was not alone.

549
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:18,120
Kelly, Kelly, come here and sit down.

550
00:41:19,120 --> 00:41:23,120
An article in the local newspaper gave her the courage to reveal her secret to her family.

551
00:41:24,120 --> 00:41:28,120
I just read an article about people who have aneurysms, right?

552
00:41:28,120 --> 00:41:32,120
And for years now I thought there was something wrong with me.

553
00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:38,120
Everything was out and she, you know, was willing to admit that she did not know who we were or know who I was.

554
00:41:39,120 --> 00:41:51,120
Sometimes I wish that she could remember me as when I was younger and I was growing up because I think I did get some characteristics from her such as being athletic, but I think she would have really enjoyed remembering of me.

555
00:41:51,120 --> 00:42:05,120
We always hope that we can learn from the experiences of our patients and by that process continue to grow intellectually.

556
00:42:06,120 --> 00:42:14,120
But from time to time, an event will occur that remains inexplicable, a mystery.

557
00:42:14,120 --> 00:42:22,120
Today with the help of her family, Sarah is trying to reconstruct the years she thought she had lost forever.

558
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:32,120
I didn't know as much as I did at one time and wasn't able to do the things I could do before.

559
00:42:33,120 --> 00:42:38,120
Nothing was going to get me down. I was going to relearn everything.

560
00:42:38,120 --> 00:42:46,120
You know, handicapped people are, everybody goes, oh, isn't that a shame? And they were going to do that to me.

561
00:42:50,120 --> 00:42:57,120
Despite tremendous advances in the field of medicine, scientists tell us that we understand even less than 5% of how our memory functions.

562
00:42:58,120 --> 00:43:09,120
Sarah DiGenerro is still adjusting to life with 16 years of missing time. Though she carries on bravely, her doctors do not foresee the day that Sarah will recover her lost memories.

563
00:43:10,120 --> 00:43:34,120
On our next Unsolved Mysteries, three suspicious deaths all investigated as possible suicides haunt a freelance journalist who now believes he has been targeted for murder because he may know too much about possibly illegal, multi-million dollar gold transactions.

564
00:43:35,120 --> 00:43:48,120
On June 26, 1990, in Rochester, New York, one of the largest armored car robberies in United States history went off without a hitch. The total haul, over $10 million in untraceable bills.

565
00:43:50,120 --> 00:43:55,120
Join me next time. Perhaps you may be able to help solve a mystery.