13x30 - Dollars and Sense

[bunniefuu]

Up next, a body is
burned beyond recognition.

There was nothing to identify
this person.

But unique
construction material provides a

clue.

This plaster is not like
normal plaster.

I was saying, "what is this?"
It was something I had never

seen before.

But who was the victim?

And who wanted him dead?

I have to somehow
artistically interpret what has

changed from the fire.

Just after midnight
one Christmas Eve, motorists

along route 83 near Baltimore
reported a brush fire just off

the southbound Lane.

A volunteer firefighter was
first on the scene.

He climbed down the
embankment, which is a steep

embankment, and walked his way
towards the fire.

When he got there, at first he
thought it was a mannequin or

something of that sort.

But as he got closer, he
realized it was a human being.

Body on fire...

After the fire was

extinguished, the victim was
unable to be identified other

than to say he was a black male.

There was no wallet.

There was nothing on this person
to immediately identify who this

body actually was.

The scent of
accelerant was unmistakable.

We had found a can, that was
severely burned, next to the

body, that we believed was used
to include an accelerant to help

aid the fire.

Around the body, further up the
hill, we found a lighter that

appeared to have been freshly
dropped at the scene.

Underneath the body
was a partially melted sheet of

plastic tarp.

It was a 2-person job.

That one person carrying a dead
human body down that embankment,

over a guardrail, and the
distance that it had to go,

especially with the icy
conditions... no way one person

could have done it.

It had to be a 2-person job.

There was every indication
that we had what we call a dump

scene, where they dump the body.

The medical
examiner discovered the victim

had been shot three times in the
head.

The b*ll*ts exited the man's
skull.

Since no soot or debris were
found in the victim's lungs, the

medical examiner knew the man
was dead before the fire

started.

It was clear that the hands
were duct-taped, the feet were

duct-taped, that this person was
being burned beyond recognition.

So investigators
took the unusual step of trying

to generate a composite sketch
from what little remained.

We knew and recognized that
until we can identify this

victim, we're not gonna be able
to really get our wheels moving

in the investigation.

Fortunately, the
skull was intact.

So measurements such as the brow
lines, height of the cheekbones,

the length and width of the jaw
survived.

The victim had received three
g*nsh*t wounds to the head so

that the teeth, for the most
part, were gone.

And there was significant
burning on the one side of the

face, charring on the other side
of the face, and then a swelling

from the intense heat of the
fire.

A small part of the
victim's cornrow hairstyle

remained intact, which helped
detective lang create a more

realistic likeness.

Within two days, detective lang
finished his work.

It's a little bit of science
and a little bit of art.

Luckily for
investigators, if the fire had

burned just a little longer, it
wouldn't have been possible to

get this image.

Another 15 minutes of fire,
and it would have been a very

different case.

The image was
released to media outlets

throughout the region.

Three days after the crime, a
woman from Harrisburg,

Pennsylvania, called, saying the
drawing resembled her boyfriend,



She commented that the
composite did not depict an

earring that was in his left
ear.

That was a feature I
intentionally left out of the

composite.

Investigators were
already familiar with

Wesley person.

This wasn't the first time
that I came across

Wesley person.

I dealt with Wesley person about
six years before this.

I was the prosecutor of Wesley
for a drug-trafficking case.

Person's prints
were on file from that arrest

and were compared to partial
prints that survived the fire.

Most of his fingers had been
burned away, with the exception

of two of his fingers that were
partially protected by the

garment that had been pulled
over his body and used to bind

him up.

The prints matched
Wesley person.

Investigators now knew the
identity of their victim, but to

expose his K*llers, they had to
find the actual m*rder scene.

There was no
mystery as to how Wesley person

was m*rder*d.

He was shot three times in the
head, execution style...

Then, his body was set on fire
along a highway in Maryland.

They had no witnesses.

All they had, essentially, was
these charred remains right off

the side of the road.

That was really about it.

Investigators
learned that Wesley's cousin was

one of the last to see him.

The two went Christmas shopping
together, and he said that

Wesley was carrying a large
amount of cash.

It was a nice wad of money.

I can't say how much it was,
'cause I don't know, but he

pulled out a nice wad, and when
he was peeling, he was looking

to see if he had a $20, but he
didn't.

And all he had was $50s and
$100s.

Wesley's cousin
said when they were finished

shopping, Wesley left with
friends, whom he didn't know.

He said there seemed to be some
tension among them.

They go to the back of the
car, and they're talking.

And when they're talking back
there, it's an intense

conversation.

It wasn't an argument, but
you can see that he was talking

like he was either frustrated or
angry.

But they weren't loud.

The three men drove off.

And the next day, Wesley person
was dead.

Police questioned Wesley's
family and learned that the men

matching the description were
Wesley's longtime friends

Justin glover and
Lawrence murrell.

Both men were in their early


brushes with the law but had
never served time and had no

violent offenses.

They had known each other for
a very long time.

From my understanding, they had
known each other going back to

when person lived in New York.

When questioned by
police, both men denied any

involvement in Wesley's m*rder.

They said they dropped Wesley
off at his house and that was

the last time they saw him.

Shopping bags of recent
purchases from that morning that

Wesley had were found in the
house.

We feel certain that
Wesley person did make it back

to the house.

Police obtained a
search warrant and checked every

room.

We luminoled that house top
to bottom.

We could find nothing,
absolutely nothing, in that

house that gave us any
indication that he was shot and

k*lled there.

Police also checked
Lawrence murrell's car, the one

Wesley person got into after
Christmas shopping.

We checked the trunk and the
interior of the car for any

evidence for a sh**ting scene,
any evidence of trace blood or

anything.

Couldn't find anything in the
car.

Then, investigators
found a potential clue.

At Wesley person's autopsy, they
found some material inside the

plastic tarp next to his body.

The medical examiner finds
that in the small of the

victim's back was a great deal
of construction debris that came

out of the fire unscathed.

It consisted of
small bits of painted drywall

and some chunks of plaster.

They were about the size of a
thumbnail.

But this plaster was not like
normal plaster.

What made it
abnormal were these threadlike

strands embedded in every piece.

I was saying, "hmm, I wonder
what that is?

Is this something that's
important, or what is this?"

It was something I had never
seen before, so it was my own

curious nature that led me to
pull it out of the sample and

then look for it in other
samples.

Trace analyst
Cassandra Burke extracted these

threads and viewed them at


As soon as I looked at them
under the microscope, I could

tell they were animal hairs.

Prior to the 1940s,
animal hairs were commonly used

as a binding-and-strengthening
agent in plaster.

This meant the m*rder site was
probably in a house built before



Unfortunately, there were
thousands of them.

On the day
Wesley person went missing, his

cousin told police Wesley had
been carrying a large amount of

cash and left the shopping mall
with his friends Justin glover

and Lawrence murrell.

But police wondered, why did
Wesley person have so much cash,

even though he was unemployed?

A background check revealed
Wesley was being investigated

for bank fraud by a local credit
union, as were his friends

Justin glover and
Lawrence murrell.

They were involved in a bank
scheme, and essentially what the

bank scheme involved was using
falsified records to obtain

loans.

And they would take the loan
money and pocket it.

The alleged scam
utilized a front person, usually

a young woman looking to buy a
used car.

After getting a loan from the
credit union, she wouldn't buy

the car.

Instead, she'd split the money
with Wesley person and his

partners.

When the loan wasn't repaid, the
credit union couldn't repossess

the car for nonpayment because
no car had been purchased.

The scam ruined the woman's
credit rating, but Wesley and

his partners walked away
unscathed.

A lot of people in the
banking community were giving

out loans without a lot of
background investigation.

During a 2-year
period, Wesley person and his

two partners embezzled about
$120,000.

Was it possible that a
falling-out among the three scam

artists was the motive for
m*rder?

Disrespect always plays a big
part in a lot of the murders

that I've seen in this
community.

If these guys were pure
businessmen, they wouldn't have

k*lled him.

A background check
of Wesley's friends revealed an

interesting coincidence.

Lawrence murrell was involved in
the construction business.

He'd buy distressed residential
properties in Harrisburg,

Pennsylvania, fix them up, then
sell them for a profit.

The victim was wrapped in
plastic... construction plastic,

plastic that would be consistent
with someone who's rehabbing a

house.

This also might
explain the unusual plaster

found with Wesley's body.

Could one of murrell's
construction projects be the

actual m*rder site?

We found five properties
listing him as the owner in

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

When we began looking at these
properties, we were able to

determine that three of those
properties were vacant at the

time of the m*rder.

The property that
needed the most work was on

south 13th street in downtown
Harrisburg.

Records showed it had been built
in the 1930s, around the same

time builders used animal-hair
plaster, like the kind found

with Wesley person's body.

We were hoping for slugs.

We were hoping for b*llet holes
in the walls.

We were hoping for anything we
could get.

We were unsuccessful.

Investigators
sprayed luminol in the basement

of Lawrence murrell's
construction property on

south 13th street and ran into
an unexpected problem.

As we're looking at that,
crime-lab techs are explaining

to me that in Harrisburg, their
soil is iron-rich, and iron in

itself will give false positives
during a luminol test.

But in the
basement, investigators found a

pile of debris swept into a
corner.

They gathered everything and
sent it to the forensic lab.

Under a microscope, scientists
found pieces of drywall with the

same blue-and-pink paint layers
as the drywall found underneath

Wesley's body.

What are the odds that you
and I both went to home depot

and bought the same paints all
the time and painted our walls

the same colors year after year
after year?

But were both
samples the same paint?

Analysts put both samples under
a scanning electron microscope.

We are using the microscope
and all of the features of the

microscope to be able to see
what's included in that chemical

composition of the paint.

The chemical
structures in both samples were

identical.

Scientists also found
animal-hair plaster.

But this wasn't just any animal
hair.

The animal hair in the plaster
found underneath Wesley's body

had something in common with the
animal hair in the plaster from

the renovated house.

I was able to say that they
were animal hairs that were from

the same animal.

They knew that they had the
right residence.

They knew that they had the
right people.

But the ultimate
proof came from a piece of

ductwork from the basement
floor.

Testing showed it contained a
tiny speck of human blood.

And DNA testing left no doubt
who the blood had come from.

It ended up being the blood
of Wesley person.

We had found our crime scene.

We had the victim's blood there.

Investigators felt
they knew who planned this

attack.

Justin glover's an idiot.

Lawrence murrell is the smart
one here, and he's the one with

the brains to be able to put
this thing together.

But could they
place Justin glover and

Lawrence murrell at the scene?

Both Lawrence murrell and

Justin glover denied any
involvement in Wesley person's

m*rder.

They both claim they had alibis
for that night.

So investigators checked the
men's cellphone records.

Glover's phone is trackable
because he is constantly either

receiving calls or he's making
calls.

And from those cellphone calls,
we're able to see what tower the

closest tower that that
cellphone was going to hit off

of.

Glover said he was
with his girlfriend.

He made a series of telephone
calls to his girlfriend from his

cellular telephone, which was
not consistent with being with

her the whole night.

The cellphone records show
that glover was in the area

where the burning body was later
found.

And a check of
Lawrence murrell's cellphone

records showed he was in the
area, as well.

At 4:30 in the morning, his
cellphone is used right near the

capital of Pennsylvania, right
near the capitol building, as

the cell towers tell us.

Murrell was
checking his voice-mail.

Oddly, so was someone else...

At the exact same place and
exact same time.

At 4:30 in the morning,
Justin glover's checking his

voice-mail messages at the
capitol building.

It shows, when you look at the
cellphone records, that they

were together.

Harrisburg,
Pennsylvania, is about 65 miles

from where Wesley person's body
was set on fire in Maryland.

Ten weeks after Wesley person
was k*lled, Justin glover and

Lawrence murrell were arrested
and charged with his m*rder.

Prosecutors believe
Wesley person cashed a check for

a fraudulent bank loan without
telling his partners, and, in

doing so, signed his own death
warrant.

I know you got a check.

What check?

I ain't got no check, man.

Wesley person never paid them
the money that they were owed.

Justin glover, Lawrence murrell
were supposed to receive at

least $1,000 each from each of
these loans.

Where's the money, man?!

Prosecutors believe
glover and murrell found out and

wanted revenge.

They picked him up in
Harrisburg, then took him home

so he could get the money they
believe he'd stolen from them.

Then, they forced Wesley back
into their car and drove him to

the home on south 13th street in
Harrisburg that murrell was

renovating.

The evidence shows this was
where they shot person three

times in the head.

His blood spattered onto a piece
of ductwork on the basement

floor.

The two men cleaned up the scene
but didn't see the blood on the

ductwork.

They wrapped the body in
construction plastic, unaware

that bits of animal-hair plaster
were wrapped with it...

Plaster that tied the body to
the house.

After driving 65 miles to the
outskirts of Baltimore, they

hauled the body down an
embankment, doused it with fuel,

and set it on fire.

But the fire didn't consume
Wesley's entire body.

Enough remained to create this
likeness, and the animal-hair

plaster and construction plastic
ultimately led police to the

m*rder scene.

Without that last pile of
debris, without that piece of

ductwork, Wesley person's case
would be unsolved today.

Justin glover and
Lawrence murrell were convicted

of first-degree m*rder and
sentenced to life in prison

without parole.

For them guys to do something
real devious like that, it

really put a hurt on everybody
in my family.

The m*rder was
planned and so was the cover-up.

But they simply couldn't hide
all the evidence.

First thing I think of when I
think of this case is

exceptional forensic
investigation... hands down, the

best forensic work I've ever
seen, in any case I've been

involved in.

This is one case that
probably encompasses about every

genre of forensic science that's
out there.

Oh, this was probably the
most interesting case I've had

yet.

You would think that their
friendship would trump money,

but it appears as if, I guess in
this case, money trumped

friendship in this case.