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The End

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Tonight on Unsolved Mysteries

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For decades, many believed that this man, Albert DeSalvo,

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was one of the most notorious serial killers in history,

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the Boston Strangler.

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Now shocking new DNA evidence seems to dispute DeSalvo's guilt,

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raising a disturbing question.

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Is the Boston Strangler still on the loose?

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A 22-year-old college honor student seems to have it all,

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until he is blamed for causing three deaths in a fatal traffic accident.

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Free on bail, he has disappeared.

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Authorities need your help to bring him to trial.

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An ambitious young mother returns to the workforce

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and crosses paths with a hot tempered coworker.

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The woman is then brutally murdered.

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And now authorities need your help to catch her alleged killer,

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Carlos Berdeja.

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Also, the doctor accused of poisoning his patients

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and fleeing to Zimbabwe has been captured.

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This update and more on Unsolved Mysteries.

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MUSIC

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On a previous broadcast, we brought you the story

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of one of the most infamous serial killers in history,

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the Boston Strangler.

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At that time, we questioned whether the man held responsible

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for murdering 11 women, Albert DeSalvo, was in fact guilty.

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Recently, major new information has come to light

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that potentially proved DeSalvo did not commit at least one of the murders.

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Join us as we examine the latest theories and evidence in this intriguing case.

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Perhaps the real identity of the Boston Strangler will finally be revealed.

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MUSIC

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Today it is quiet, but 40 years ago these very streets exploded in horror.

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MUSIC

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The year 1962, the place Boston, Massachusetts,

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the first known serial killer in American history was on the prowl.

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Victim number one, Anna Schleser's 55,

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strangled with her bathrobe and raped with a blood object.

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Victim number two, Helen Blake, 65, sexually mutilated and strangled.

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Her bra twisted into an enormous bow under the chin.

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Victim number three, Nina Nichols, 68, strangled.

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Her nylons tied into yet another gruesome bow.

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MUSIC

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It was only the beginning.

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Over the next two years, eight more women fell victim to the psychopath.

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All but one were brutally choked to death in their own homes,

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their bodies posed in hideous positions.

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The city buckled under a frenzy of fear and paranoia.

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Stepping into this maelstrom was Albert DeSalvo,

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already facing a lengthy prison term for an unrelated series of rapes.

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DeSalvo admitted that he was a Boston strangler.

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A wave of relief and calm passed over the residents of Boston.

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Order had been restored.

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The sadistic killer was finally behind bars.

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But many believed DeSalvo had reason to falsely confess.

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First day, I put my arm around backwards, right?

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And then I put the pillowcase around the neck.

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The first thing that Albert hoped to get out of being known as the Boston strangler

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was the fame of it, because he desperately wanted to be famous,

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even if it were something terrible.

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His second goal was to avoid a prison sentence.

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He had apparently been convinced that if he confessed to the stranglings,

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he would be sent not to prison, but to a very fancy private institution

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where doctors would study him.

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Do you remember tying any knots in it?

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Yeah, I did. I did.

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But if he was lying, DeSalvo's confession was uncannily accurate.

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I think many investigators were convinced he had to be the killer.

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At least two.

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If you had heard him go in a detail and tell you exactly how the furniture was

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and what it was adjacent to and so forth,

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you know, nobody could tell you that unless they were there.

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After eight years of research on this case,

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one thing I'm certain of, and that is that Albert DeSalvo was not the Boston strangler.

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There are a number of very good suspects.

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None of them happened to be Albert DeSalvo.

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On November 24th, 1973, Albert DeSalvo called his former psychiatrist from prison,

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stating he was ready to tell the truth about the Boston strangler.

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But he was murdered that night before he could meet with the psychiatrist.

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Now, startling new DNA evidence suggests the real killer or killers were never actually caught.

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Was Albert DeSalvo the Boston strangler?

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Evidence found on the last victim suggests that the answer is no.

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Mary!

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Mary!

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Mary.

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On January 4th, 1964, Mary Sullivan was found by her roommate,

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strangled to death and sexually assaulted.

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In a final morbid gesture, a happy New Year card was placed at her feet.

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The killer left semen on Mary's body that the police collected in 1964.

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Forensic technology at the time wasn't capable of determining to whom it belonged.

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Mary Sullivan officially became the 11th and final victim of the Boston strangler.

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Albert DeSalvo later confessed to her murder.

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But recently, two families have formed an unlikely alliance to challenge that assertion more forcefully than ever before.

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The family of Mary Sullivan and the family of her alleged killer, Albert DeSalvo.

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I never believed my brother was the Boston strangler from day one.

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I just want the name cleared. That's all.

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Albert was not perfect. Albert did some bad things. Albert was not a murderer.

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Mary's sister Diane also believes that DeSalvo was not the killer.

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I mainly come here to say hi to Mary.

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And I'm going to try to do what I can.

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I'm going to do everything I can to find her murderer.

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To find the murderer, Mary.

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To the DeSalvo and Sullivan families, there was an obvious solution to the controversy.

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One of the most powerful forensic tools ever created, DNA profiling.

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If the Boston police departments still have the biological evidence from Mary Sullivan's crime scene, her killer could be found.

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I made several inquiries to the Boston police department and they told me flat out that they did not have any physical evidence left in the Boston strangler case to test for DNA evidence.

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Casey Sherman and his mother Diane were then forced to turn to the only evidence available to them, the body of Mary Sullivan.

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We had to do the exhumation of my aunt's body. It was a horrible experience. We didn't want to do it, but it was our last and only recourse we thought.

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And it was the only chance to find her killer.

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To supervise the exhumation, the Salimons asked for the help of world-renowned professor of law and forensic science, James E. Starrs, and a team of experts.

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We were obviously looking for any seminal fluid and we do know that seminal fluid will fluoresce under UV light.

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So we looked and seminal fluid fluoresced and it also was in the right location for seminal fluid. It's on pubic hair.

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Could this be the evidence a team had been hoping for? A chilling clue reaching across decades to identify the killer.

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A sample of her pubic hair was transferred to forensic molecular biologist David Foren and his team.

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So we examined that and went after that as far as could we get any DNA from it. We had to be extra careful because obviously her hair is going to have her DNA in it.

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So one of the tricky parts becomes isolating DNA only from this material that's stuck in the pubic hair and not from the hair itself.

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Dr. Foren successfully isolated a DNA sequence from the sample.

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Foren then compared it to Albert DeSalvo's by using DNA taken from his brother Richard.

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The results were virtually indisputable. The DNA found on Mary Sullivan's body did not belong to Albert DeSalvo.

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Some went to our surprise and no instances did we find anything from Albert DeSalvo. It wasn't there.

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On the other hand we did find DNA sequences that are from someone and they're not someone we can account for despite how hard we tried.

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A well of emotions came over me because there have been a lot of times where I didn't know if we had done the right thing.

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But when he said that there was DNA they believed from Mary's killer on her body and that DNA didn't match Albert DeSalvo.

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It was just complete vindication as far as I was concerned.

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For those who say that Albert DeSalvo did do it, the shoe is on their foot now. It's for them to come forward and show the evidence to prove that Albert DeSalvo did do it.

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As of now we've got evidence indicating in all scientific probability that he didn't do it.

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If Albert DeSalvo did not kill Mary Sullivan then who did?

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Before DeSalvo's confession put an end to the investigation the police were pursuing a number of promising suspects.

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The original investigators of Mary's murder found a strange piece of evidence in her bathroom implicating Mary's allegedly abusive ex-boyfriend.

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They found an ascot caught up in the toilet.

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When my sister dated this person that's all she bought him for presents. He loved ascots.

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So I could see him definitely cutting that ascot up in the bathroom and I could absolutely see him killing Mary.

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The second suspect is based on an eyewitness account. A neighbor saw a man in Mary's apartment at the approximate time of the murder.

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So they give any of you a hard time at work huh? What'd they say?

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Mary Sullivan's roommate had a boyfriend who matched the neighbor's description.

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The other girls. Why don't you just beat them up?

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The roommate's boyfriend may have also had access to Mary's apartment.

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Explaining why there were no signs of forced entry.

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At the height of the Boston Strangler case my aunt was well versed in what was going on.

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She wouldn't let a stranger into the apartment.

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She would have had to have known that man or that man would have had to have gotten into the apartment with a key.

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So?

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The day before Mary's murder her roommate had spent the entire day with the prime suspect and Mary's killing.

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I want a steak.

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Okay so I'll go to the dining room.

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What are these for?

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They're the keys to the apartment. An extra set. I'm gonna go pat on my nose.

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Her apartment key had gone missing the day before she was killed.

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Now this key hadn't fallen off the key chain. It was taken off.

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Do you live in Vermont?

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No.

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The suspect was brought in for a lie detector test.

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Did you take a key from Mary Sullivan's apartment?

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No.

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Did you kill Mary Sullivan?

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No.

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Face front please.

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According to police his responses were deemed untruthful.

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Once to Sal will confess however investigations into this suspect and Mary's ex-boyfriend were closed.

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And what about the other murders?

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Author Susan Kelly's extensive investigation has revealed that the police had promising suspects in many of these cases as well.

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If Albert wasn't the Boston Strangler who was the Boston Strangler?

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From what my research indicates there wasn't one. There were many.

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On June 14th 1962 the maniac claimed his first victim. 56 year old Ann Slessers.

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Earlier that day a painting crew was working at her apartment.

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16 days later the same painting crew arrived at the apartment building of Helen Blake. She became victim number two.

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The only thing that connected those murders was a painting crew working on the exteriors of the women's apartment buildings at the approximate times they were killed.

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Two of the members of the painting crew their alibis couldn't be corroborated by their boss or by their fellow workers and that's an unusual connection.

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As was first uncovered by Susan Kelly's research police also had a suspect for victim number six.

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20 year old Sophie Clark.

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The suspect in the Sophie Clark case was seen entering her apartment building.

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He was seen fleeing her apartment building covered in sweat.

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Police identified the man and learned that he had dated Sophie at least once.

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He was given lie detector tests on two separate occasions and according to authorities failed both.

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Victim number seven was 23 year old Patricia Bissette.

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In this case too Susan Kelly discovered that police had a viable suspect.

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Patricia?

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Patricia's boss who discovered her body.

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The detectives found out that Patricia Bissette was having an affair with her happily married boss at the time she was killed.

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Well I found her eye tops of your report.

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It shows that she was one month pregnant when she was murdered.

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Not only do you have motive but you have a suspect there.

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Like the suspects in Mary Sullivan's murder investigations into every one of these individuals stop code when Albert DeSalvo confessed.

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That there were more than one strangler.

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There's a possibility that some of the older women died at the hands of the same person.

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Each of the young women who died was murdered by a different individual who had his own motives.

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If you hated a woman back in the early 1960s you could kill her,

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loosely wrap a stocking around her neck and hope that the police would think it was the boss and strangler.

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I mean clearly the killers that were murdering these women they had a diagram on how to commit a Boston strangling

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because all the grizzly details were printed in the papers at the time.

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If you wanted to commit a murder here was your diagram.

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The Sullivan family continues to hope that Mary's killer will one day be held accountable.

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I went closure from my mother.

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My mother has had to live nearly 40 years without any answers in this case.

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We want to publicly identify Mary's killer, look him in the eye and tell him what he stole from us.

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The

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headlight came right right into the driver's side window.

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I woke up about 10 minutes later I had glass my eyes.

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I couldn't really see much just because of all the glass and I just kind of looked around and kind of clicked to me

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that there's no way everybody could have made it out of there.

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And saw my friends on the road.

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It was ugly.

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It was real ugly.

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Matt Wagner had somehow survived the devastating four-car accident on state route 270 outside of Pullman, Washington.

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Three of his closest friends were not so lucky.

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Brandon S. Clements is best friend Ryan Sorensen and Ryan's girlfriend Stacy Morrow.

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Stacy was my daughter Stacy Gretchen Morrow.

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She was 21, got in turn 22, a student at Washington State University and just one of the most beautiful young ladies I ever knew.

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Shortly after the fatal crash, Stacy Morrow along with Brandon and Ryan were honored at a Washington State University Memorial.

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I didn't know what to do and I had mixtures of course of sadness and just rage that something like this would happen.

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I mean nothing's been the same since.

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It was just a nightmare.

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A nightmare that could have been easily avoided and was totally unnecessary.

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Police believe that Fred Rick Russell, a 22-year-old honor student, had recklessly caused the accident.

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He was charged on three counts of vehicular homicide and four counts of vehicular assault.

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But Fred has his share of supporters.

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Do I believe that that accident was caused primarily by my son? I don't.

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I think there were a lot of causes and I think there were a lot of people responsible for what happened on that road that night.

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That doesn't make it any better or any worse.

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That's just an interpretation of the facts.

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My sense of what Gregg Gressel is doing in this case is that he is defending his son beyond a reasonable amount

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and is making statements that are trying to cloud the issue, spread the responsibility and excuse his son

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to try to get this young man off the hook for the deaths of my daughter and Brandon and Ryan.

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Could Fred Russell have been innocent of the charges against him?

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Russell is from a respected family whose father is a chair of the Criminal Justice Department at Washington State University.

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He doesn't believe Fred is solely responsible for what happened that night.

226
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But the victims' families vehemently disagree.

227
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This tragic case has put the college town of Pullman, Washington in a warring camps.

228
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Many believe it only the driver that night.

229
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Fred Russell can stop the outbursts of rage and grief, but Fred Russell is nowhere to be found.

230
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Investigators have pieced together Fred's activities in the hours leading up to the deadly crash.

231
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I think I will have a drink today.

232
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Several witnesses claim they saw Fred and his friend Jacob McFarland drinking at a local bar.

233
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I'm driving! I'm driving!

234
00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:07,000
At approximately 10.15 p.m. Fred and Jacob were seen leaving the bar.

235
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Fred then got behind the wheel and headed onto Route 270.

236
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Pick it up! This is ridiculous! Lady, pick it up!

237
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According to police reports, Fred came upon a slower moving vehicle in front of him.

238
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Lady, you're moving at like 10 miles an hour.

239
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Although he was in a no-passing zone, Fred illegally tried to go around the car at 90 miles an hour.

240
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Police believe that Fred's Chevy Blazer first struck a geoprism heading in the opposite direction.

241
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Then a Cadillac carrying seven college students.

242
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Brandon Clements, Ryan Sorensen and Stacy Moro were killed on impact.

243
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Matt Wagner and three other students were critically injured but survived.

244
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The Blazer then smashed into a third vehicle before bursting into flames.

245
00:23:17,000 --> 00:23:22,000
Amazingly, Fred Russell and his friend Jacob escaped relatively unscathed.

246
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Two hours after the accident, Fred's blood alcohol was tested at a nearby hospital.

247
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It measured .12, well above the legal limit.

248
00:23:39,000 --> 00:23:45,000
Later, Fred Russell was arrested at his home and charged with three counts of vehicular drugs.

249
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After the accident, Fred was charged with three counts of vehicular homicide.

250
00:23:54,000 --> 00:24:00,000
Fred Russell's bail was set for $5,000, which his father, Greg, had no problem posting.

251
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Fred would remain free until his trial.

252
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In fact, he was even allowed to drive to and from work.

253
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That was pretty hard to take, you know.

254
00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:14,000
When you lose your three friends, it feels like somebody murdered him.

255
00:24:14,000 --> 00:24:17,000
He shouldn't be able to be out in public anymore.

256
00:24:18,000 --> 00:24:26,000
That the bail is so low is to be nothing other than a slap on the wrist is almost insulting to victims and their families.

257
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We believe that he poses no flight risk.

258
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:34,000
Now, whether there was a personal connection between Judge Frazier and Greg Russell,

259
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the Dean of the School of Criminology at WSU, I don't know.

260
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I do believe, though, that Greg Russell's standing in the community was one of the reasons why Frederick Russell was allowed to be out on bail

261
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and why that bail was so low.

262
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I would imagine that 99.9% of the time, most judges in this country, in the same situation, would have done the same thing.

263
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Public anger began to grow as Fred's team of lawyers prepared his defense.

264
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A motion was filed disputing the blood alcohol finding.

265
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And challenges were made as to whether Fred was really responsible for the accident.

266
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I was shown toxicology reports of the deceased driver of the Cadillac.

267
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That indicated there were drugs and alcohol in his system.

268
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I was shown toxicology reports of other occupants that showed that there were drugs and alcohol in their systems as well, meth and marijuana.

269
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There was absolutely nothing in the system of the decedents that contributed in any way, either to the collision or to their subsequent death.

270
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I think that the accusation by Greg Russell that is clearly intended to cloud the issue of his son's responsibility in this case is sinful.

271
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Within weeks, Fred Russell and his supporters claim that he became the target of the community's growing outrage.

272
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The death threats that he indicated that he received were two phone calls in early July.

273
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And then we received information that a card was left at the front doorstep of the residents that he was at indicating that he wouldn't live to see his trial.

274
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Four weeks later, Fred Russell disappeared. Both his lawyers and family claim to have not heard from him since.

275
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Shortly after he jumped bail, Greg Russell and several local newspapers received the letter signed by Fred. It read in part.

276
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I left because I had no choice. Since the first day after the tragic accident, horrible things have been printed about me.

277
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Now people are so enraged that they would rather see me dead than receive a fair trial.

278
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I maintain my innocence, but my life has been repeatedly threatened, so I cannot stay.

279
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:28,000
Fred Russell's whereabouts are currently unknown.

280
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I think Fred has an expensive lifestyle. I think Fred's accustomed to good things.

281
00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:45,000
Being able to go out and party and drink and socialize, I would find it impossible for Fred to make his ends meet without assistance in some manner from some family member or friend.

282
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Since that letter, nobody in the family to my knowledge has heard anything from him. We don't know anyone who has heard from him.

283
00:27:54,000 --> 00:28:03,000
I would hope that if anyone did, if any of my friends knew, if anyone in the family heard from him, that they'd tell us.

284
00:28:04,000 --> 00:28:17,000
What I would say to Fred Russell is, we'll get you. You can't hide forever. And I've got a long time left in this life and I'll find you.

285
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:26,000
I'll find you.

286
00:28:26,000 --> 00:28:46,000
10-Year-Old Joanna Molina of Merced, California

287
00:28:46,000 --> 00:29:06,000
10-Year-Old Joanna Molina of Merced, California will soon be reunited with her mother Jean. Jean Molina has recently moved to Tustin four hours to the south and is now ready for her oldest child to join her.

288
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Jean was real happy because Joanna was going to come and live with her and we made arrangements to take her down that weekend.

289
00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:31,000
Two months earlier, feeling a need to take a sabbatical from her marriage, Jean had taken a job as a cook. It would be a chance to assert some independence. However, other forces may have prompted her move as well.

290
00:29:32,000 --> 00:29:44,000
She had had a dream that I was going to badly beat her up and she felt that she should get out of my house. And I never understood why she would have a dream like that and believe that dream.

291
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When her parents and Joanna stopped by Jean's new home, no one was there. Not knowing where else to turn, the Hitchcocks checked the restaurant where Jean worked.

292
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Excuse me, Miss.

293
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:01,000
Yeah, I'll be right with you.

294
00:30:08,000 --> 00:30:09,000
Yes.

295
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:10,000
Is Jean here?

296
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:11,000
Jean Molina?

297
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:13,000
Jean, no. She didn't come in today.

298
00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:16,000
Maybe we made a mistake.

299
00:30:16,000 --> 00:30:22,000
I was just really not sure what to do. If she said she was going to be there, she would have been there.

300
00:30:23,000 --> 00:30:33,000
The next morning, the Hitchcocks rushed to Jean's room hoping to find a sign of her. Sadly, there were no clues to where she might be.

301
00:30:34,000 --> 00:30:47,000
It was very difficult because at that point we were so worried. And Joanna, she kept watching me. She wanted to see how I was reacting, how frightened I was, or how bad the situation was by my reaction.

302
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:49,000
Oh, excuse me, sir.

303
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:55,000
The Hitchcocks immediately went to the Anaheim Police Department to file a missing person's report.

304
00:30:56,000 --> 00:30:58,000
Yesterday we were supposed to meet with my daughter.

305
00:30:58,000 --> 00:31:07,000
Deep down I did know that something was very wrong. But I tried not to think about it because I knew that it would just make things worse.

306
00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:08,000
Thank you.

307
00:31:11,000 --> 00:31:17,000
Joanna and the Hitchcocks returned home empty-handed without a single clue to Jean Molina's whereabouts.

308
00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:26,000
Over the next several days, they would anxiously wait by their phones, hoping for news that Jean was safe and unharmed. Sadly, that call would never come.

309
00:31:27,000 --> 00:31:42,000
Jean Molina was raised in Merced, California. Following a tour of duty with the Navy, Jean returned home and began a family. She married Frank Reed and had three children, Joanna, Elizabeth, and John.

310
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:47,000
Though she and Frank had their ups and downs, it was a fulfilling marriage.

311
00:31:48,000 --> 00:31:59,000
We had a lot of fun. We had a lot of respect for each other. She just had all of the things that I've always wanted. I mean, she was, she made me want to be married for a long time.

312
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:07,000
But when her youngest child was two years old, Jean felt her need for some changes in her life and decided to go back to work.

313
00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:16,000
Merced is such a small town and she didn't feel she could go far here, so she went to Southern California.

314
00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:21,000
Jean's experience as a cook in the Navy helped her land a job with a restaurant chain.

315
00:32:23,000 --> 00:32:30,000
Within six weeks, she had been promoted. She was going to be training all of the new hires at each restaurant as they opened up.

316
00:32:31,000 --> 00:32:39,000
She had planned to take Joanna with her, so it was kind of, it was kind of a neat experience for her. She was really excited about it. She was real happy.

317
00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:45,000
Then just when everything was going so well for her, 33-year-old Jean Molina vanished.

318
00:32:49,000 --> 00:32:57,000
The very day the Hitchcocks drove to Tusnton to see Jean, a gruesome discovery was made in Westminster, a town 10 miles away.

319
00:32:58,000 --> 00:33:04,000
A badly battered body of an unidentified woman was found near an abandoned construction site.

320
00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:10,000
It was one of the more vicious crime scenes that we've investigated and we've investigated an awful lot of homicide.

321
00:33:12,000 --> 00:33:18,000
Just after daybreak that Sunday, a husband and wife witnessed a man acting suspiciously near his car.

322
00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:30,000
He picked up some type of large object and we later found that to be a piece of asphalt and with both hands above his head just thrust it down hard.

323
00:33:31,000 --> 00:33:40,000
And then looked up and saw her and in her words she panicked and jumped back in this compact vehicle and sped off in the scene at a high rate of speed.

324
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:49,000
We didn't feel that Robbery was a motive. She had some money on her. She had a ring on her finger.

325
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:58,000
We felt that probably under the circumstances the suspects that did this knew her in some way.

326
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:01,000
They were trying to prevent us from finding out who she was.

327
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:10,000
She was so badly damaged that we couldn't tell if she was a female Asian, white, Hispanic.

328
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:20,000
An autopsy revealed that she had been sexually assaulted, strangled and bludgeoned before being run over by a car.

329
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:31,000
Three days after Jean Malina vanished, her landlord read a newspaper article about the unidentified female victim found in Westminster and thought it might be Jean.

330
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:36,000
He immediately contacted authorities who contacted Jean's husband.

331
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:49,000
Possibly the most difficult thing in my life I ever had to do to go down and identify somebody who was beaten so badly she was unrecognizable.

332
00:34:50,000 --> 00:34:53,000
This ring was found with a victim.

333
00:34:53,000 --> 00:35:00,000
It wasn't until Frank was shown the ring the victim was wearing that he was certain his beloved Jean had been murdered.

334
00:35:01,000 --> 00:35:02,000
I'm really sorry.

335
00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:09,000
Frank had called me and told me that he had had to identify the body. I didn't handle that very well.

336
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:17,000
That was a horrible week and it was the day it was worse but somehow at least I can't say it was a relief. It was just, it made me angry.

337
00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:26,000
Despite Jean's dream about her husband beating her, investigators were able to quickly eliminate Frank Reed as a suspect.

338
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:33,000
I've kind of come to believe that the dream wasn't about me. It was a dream about something else and she had foreseen what was going to happen to her.

339
00:35:35,000 --> 00:35:39,000
Detectives went to the restaurant and questioned Jean's co-workers.

340
00:35:40,000 --> 00:35:41,000
Thank you for your time.

341
00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:42,000
The reason we're here.

342
00:35:43,000 --> 00:35:50,000
One of the things we found out was that she had worked on July 16th just about till 11 o'clock at night.

343
00:35:53,000 --> 00:35:58,000
One witness stated that she did come back after signing out on the time card.

344
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:02,000
She did come back and talk to this particular individual for a few minutes.

345
00:36:03,000 --> 00:36:06,000
That individual was short order cook Carlos Verdeja.

346
00:36:07,000 --> 00:36:08,000
Surprise!

347
00:36:08,000 --> 00:36:09,000
Hey!

348
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:10,000
Hey!

349
00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:11,000
I'm glad you made it.

350
00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:18,000
Investigators theorized Jean might have left with Verdeja to celebrate her daughter's impending arrival.

351
00:36:20,000 --> 00:36:21,000
I thought they were all going to come with us.

352
00:36:22,000 --> 00:36:25,000
She'd already bought a bed for her daughter. She'd already stocked up the refrigerator.

353
00:36:26,000 --> 00:36:31,000
I mean this was an exciting time for her. This was something that she was really, really looking forward to.

354
00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:38,000
Police would soon learn that Carlos Verdeja reportedly admitted committing a previous murder.

355
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:40,000
He's got a temper.

356
00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:42,000
Okay, can you tell me what that means?

357
00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:47,000
You know, I was working one day and was just joking around with him.

358
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:51,000
Carlos, we'll never go out with you on account of your ugly.

359
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:54,000
The line cook thought it was just miniscule. He was just kidding with him.

360
00:36:54,000 --> 00:36:59,000
And he said the guy just went off and pulled a butcher knife out and threatened him with a butcher knife.

361
00:37:01,000 --> 00:37:02,000
It's not funny!

362
00:37:02,000 --> 00:37:03,000
You'll be the housewife!

363
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:05,000
Oh, you're going to kill me?

364
00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:09,000
Yeah, I killed a doctor.

365
00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:16,000
Berreira then came back in, according to the person that we interviewed, the next day and had some kind of paperwork with him,

366
00:37:17,000 --> 00:37:21,000
stating that he was wanted someplace in Mexico for an additional homicide.

367
00:37:22,000 --> 00:37:24,000
He came in the morning, but he didn't show up at night.

368
00:37:24,000 --> 00:37:30,000
Jean's co-workers also informed police that Carlos Verdeja had abruptly resigned from his job.

369
00:37:31,000 --> 00:37:32,000
Yes, that was Sunday.

370
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:40,000
When investigators went to Verdeja's residence, they learned that he and his common law wife had vacated the premises the day of the murder.

371
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:42,000
He left his clothes behind.

372
00:37:42,000 --> 00:37:43,000
Some of his clothes, you see.

373
00:37:43,000 --> 00:37:49,000
That afternoon, another neighbor caught Carlos Verdeja behaving oddly around his car.

374
00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:55,000
Berreira was then seen attempting to clean out parts of the vehicle.

375
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:06,000
The sedan registered to Carlos Verdeja was later found abandoned nearby.

376
00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:10,000
The car provided a wealth of physical evidence in the case.

377
00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:17,000
Evidence not only in the vehicle, but on the undercarriage of the vehicle that secured in my mind,

378
00:38:17,000 --> 00:38:24,000
what's beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was the vehicle that had been used to run over Jean Molina.

379
00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:28,000
Authorities have been searching for Carlos Verdeja ever since.

380
00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:34,000
They believe he may have additional wives and families in Mexico who are helping him evade capture.

381
00:38:36,000 --> 00:38:41,000
Well, I hope they catch him, and I just hope to be able to tell him what I think of him.

382
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:45,000
You're a coward. You hide under the skirt of your mother's skirt.

383
00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:50,000
You're a coward, and you hide beneath your mother's skirts.

384
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:55,000
Carlos Garcia Verdeja is wanted for the murder of Jean Molina.

385
00:38:56,000 --> 00:39:01,000
Verdeja is 37 years old, 5'7", tall and weighs 180 pounds.

386
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:07,000
He is adept at creating aliases and should be considered extremely dangerous.

387
00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:19,000
On a previous broadcast, we profiled a suspected serial killer who fled halfway around the world to avoid being charged with murder.

388
00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:24,000
In a remarkable twist of fate, he is now in custody.

389
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:29,000
The story of Michael Swango was a bizarre one.

390
00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:34,000
As a medical student, he used his hospital internship to secretly kill.

391
00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:39,000
When mysterious deaths occurred on his watch, hospital officials became suspicious.

392
00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:44,000
When co-workers became ill, they believed Swango was poisoning them.

393
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:47,000
Swango represents the ultimate betrayal.

394
00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:51,000
We trust doctors. We put our lives and health in their hands.

395
00:39:52,000 --> 00:39:56,000
And Swango held himself out as someone who was willing to help, but in fact, he was looking to hurt.

396
00:39:57,000 --> 00:40:01,000
Using various aliases, the doctor spent years evading the law.

397
00:40:02,000 --> 00:40:06,000
And when police began to close in, he quietly fled to Zimbabwe, Africa.

398
00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:13,000
Soon after, authorities issued a warrant for Swango's arrest for the only thing they could, fraud.

399
00:40:14,000 --> 00:40:16,000
He had lied on a federal job application.

400
00:40:17,000 --> 00:40:19,000
That warrant would eventually come back to haunt him.

401
00:40:22,000 --> 00:40:23,000
Update

402
00:40:24,000 --> 00:40:31,000
Three years later, Swango was fleeing Africa to Saudi Arabia, but had to stop in the U.S. to renew his visa.

403
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:39,000
At Chicago O'Hare Airport, an alert customs agent ran his name through the computer, found the warrant, and Swango was arrested.

404
00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:47,000
It was June 1997, and little did officials know that they had captured possibly the most prolific serial killer of the century.

405
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:57,000
Nothing compares to Swango, the unbelievable strange motives that he had, and the length of time for which he did it, and the number of times he got away with it.

406
00:40:58,000 --> 00:40:59,000
I mean, nothing compares.

407
00:41:00,000 --> 00:41:09,000
While serving time on the fraud charge, federal prosecutors had three years to develop a murder case against Swango that could put him away for life.

408
00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:19,000
We had to prove that there was a homicide. Normally, that's not a problem in a murder case. You have a dead body, there's a bullet, there's a stabbing, there's a strangling, beating.

409
00:41:20,000 --> 00:41:24,000
In this case, people had passed on, and it had been assumed that they died naturally.

410
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:33,000
Exhumed bodies, complicated toxicology tests, an eyewitness, and even Swango's own diaries sealed the deadly doctor's fate.

411
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:42,000
Page after page of his personal writings are filled with morose texts like, I love it, sweet husky close smell of an indoor homicide.

412
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:49,000
We can tell from Michael Swango's writings that he simply liked to kill people.

413
00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:55,000
For him, the thrill was doing the killing and getting away with it.

414
00:41:56,000 --> 00:42:02,000
And that's why it was difficult to establish a pattern with him, because he was something of an opportunistic killer.

415
00:42:03,000 --> 00:42:05,000
He would kill whenever he had the chance to kill.

416
00:42:13,000 --> 00:42:18,000
The End

417
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Join me next time. For more fascinating stories from the realm of Unsolved Mysteries.