04x04 - Cement the Case

[bunniefuu]

Narrator: shirley and ed andronowich were regulars in

A neighborhood bar a few blocks from their home in

Winnipeg, canada.

On one of their nights out, ed decided to leave early.

Shirley wanted to stay.

There was a brief argument, and ed went home alone.

It was shirley andronowich's last night alive.

Ed and shirley andronowich had been married for years.

Ed was a construction worker.

Shirley was a housewife.

They lived in the fort rouge section of winnipeg, canada,

With their three teenage daughters.

They went out that night together.

And just, as usual, they went out for a good time.

And, I guess, a few hours later, my dad came home.

He was tired.

He didn't want to be there anymore.

She just wanted to stay.

And his friends were there, so she stayed with his friends.

Narrator: shirley left the bar around midnight and walked

Home.

I heard her come home that night.

She was by herself.

I don't know if she was drunk, but you could tell that she had

Been drinking.

Narrator: ed and shirley argued again when she came home.

Ed said shirley went for a walk to calm down but never returned.

The next morning, an employee at a nearby high school discovered

A woman's body in the school yard.

It was a very gruesome scene.

There were some very senior homicide detectives that were

There that were a little taken aback of what was discovered

There.

They came to the door.

And I went and got my father.

I went upstairs.

Then I got called downstairs.

And the police looked at my father and said, "do you want to

Tell her?" And he just kind of hung his

Head and kind of nodded.

And they told me.

They told me that, you know, "we found your mother, and she's

Been k*lled."

Narrator: shirley andronowich had been sexually assaulted,

Beaten, and mutilated, with bite wounds over much of her body.

It appeared that she had been strangled, then hit with a large

Piece of concrete.

There was a destruction of the facial features.

And there was an obvious sexual as*ault had taken place.

So this was a definite gruesome scene.

I've been a prosecutor for years, and I have never seen any

Case with as much brutality to a human body.

Narrator: in a written statement, ed andronowich

Admitted that he argued with his wife that night but said he had

No idea what happened to her after she left their home.

[ g*nshots ] homicide investigators

Bob marshall and ron oliver decided to question

Ed andronowich again to learn more about what happened on the

Night shirley andronowich was m*rder*d.

At one point, he was sort of asked, in a sort of a helpful

Sort of a question to him, if he had any idea who may have k*lled

His wife.

About : in the morning...

Narrator: the answer andronowich gave was a

Bombshell.

He said he was the m*rder*r.

He actually had some knowledge of some of the aspects

Of the crime.

For example, he knew where the body was.

He knew that it was in behind the grand park high school.

And I was angry with the police.

I mean, they thought it was my dad.

And I was angry with people who thought it could even be my

Father.

Because I knew it wasn't.

And not only should they just, you know, knowing my father,

Know that he could not have done that, but trust my word, even

Though I was only .

Narrator: to make absolutely sure, police questioned

Andronowich again on the following day.

And again, he confessed.

Ed andronowich was charged with second-degree m*rder.

Narrator: ed andronowich was held in a winnipeg jail after

Confessing to the m*rder of his wife.

Although parts of his confession were inconsistent with the

m*rder scene, andronowich said he had been drinking on the

Night of the m*rder and his memory wasn't entirely clear.

Police began their forensic investigation by turning to

d*ck munroe, a forensic geologist with the winnipeg

Police department.

The m*rder w*apon was a -pound concrete block found near the

Body.

His trunk was full of concrete particles.

That was exciting at the outset because you saw all this

Concrete.

But the trick was, can you match the concrete to the block?

Can you put that block in his trunk?

Narrator: the process was tedious since there were

Hundreds of particles recovered from andronowich's trunk, all

Very small.

Because the m*rder w*apon was rough and because it was a

Broken piece of concrete, you're looking for, like a jigsaw

Puzzle, a piece that would fit onto it -- did you get a

Physical match?

Narrator: but munroe was unable to find a match.

Next, police sent photographs of the victim's bite wounds to

Dr. David sweet, a forensic odontologist at the bureau of

Legal dentistry in vancouver.

Ed andronowich wore dentures, which were also sent for

Analysis.

The question that came up, obviously, was -- can artificial

Teeth, in the form of a complete upper and lower denture,

Actually bite hard enough to remove human tissue?

Narrator: dr. Sweet performed a metric analysis, measuring the

Width and arch of andronowich's dentures, to see if they were

Similar to the bite wounds on shirley andronowich's body.

But dr. Sweet could find few similarities.

I think at that point, we were all leery of whether we had

The right person or not.

I know I had a question in my own mind as to whether we had

The right person.

Narrator: during shirley andronowich's autopsy,

The medical examiner had swabbed the areas around the bite wounds

For possible forensic evidence.

The swabs were rolled in a moistened filter paper, and the

Paper turned white -- a positive presumptive test for the

Presence of saliva.

The next step was to determine the blood type of the saliva.

We had a new technique at our disposal called "elisa," which

Allowed us to type saliva in the "a," "b," "o" blood-typing

Factors.

Narrator: the elisa test revealed that the perpetrator

Had type-b blood.

This did not match ed andronowich's blood type.

Therefore, mr. Andronowich, being of blood type-a, could not

Have left the b-type saliva found on the swabs from the

Breast.

Thereby, meaning he did not -- he could not have been, in my

Mind, the m*rder*r.

Narrator: after two months in prison for a m*rder he confessed

To but apparently didn't commit, andronowich was

Released.

You feel better today?

This ain't news here, sir.

Are you happy to be outside?

This ain't news here.

Okay.

Narrator: why had he confessed?

Andronowich, back at that time, had a terrible problem

With alcohol.

And when the detectives interviewed him and they asked

Him such questions as "did you have a fight with your wife,

Last night?" He responded and said, "well, I might have."

When they went on and pressed him and said, "well, did you hit

Her?" He said, "I might have."

Narrator: memory lapses while drinking are called "blackouts"

And happen because alcohol interferes with the

Neurotransmissions that form memory in the brain.

And when they come out of the blackout, it's the

Realization -- the recollection all of a sudden that something

Bad may well have happened.

And it's very common for alcoholics to feel remorse,

Express guilt, even imagine that they have done terrible

Things during the blackout period.

Narrator: now the police investigation had to start all

Over again.

Narrator: the m*rder w*apon was a -pound piece of

Concrete.

To forensic geologist richard munroe, it appeared to

Be about five years old and looked as if it had once been

Part of a bumper block used in parking lots.

Munroe decided to visit the m*rder scene to survey the area.

He went around midnight to evaluate the scene the way it

Appeared at the time of the m*rder.

Standing where the body was discovered, munroe wondered what

Exactly took place.

If the victim had been strangled and was unconscious,

What happened next?

Where did the concrete block come from?

Then munroe saw it -- an illuminated area about feet

Away.

In the shadows, munroe found a piece of concrete.

About feet away was another piece.

Both were similar to the m*rder w*apon.

The k*ller had been drawn to the area by lighting, his only

Visual cue.

[ Banging ] to prove his theory, munroe

Needed to find out whether the m*rder w*apon and the pieces in

The school yard had once been part of the same block.

Munroe performed a petrographic examination.

Petrography is the term for identification of minerals.

Concrete is made of sand, cement, water, and pieces of

Stone, which is poured into molds to form the bumper blocks.

As it dries, the mix design settles into a distinctive

Pattern, which is visually different in each concrete

Block.

When munroe compared the m*rder w*apon to the other concrete

Pieces found in the school yard, the mix design and position of

The stones were identical.

The fit was almost like a glove.

When you get broken aggregates -- in your sand and

Gravel inside your concrete -- it'll break.

And it's usually an irregular surface.

And you'll have some -- they're called clasp mold stones -- that

Will break out of the concrete mold.

And what you try and do is fit that in.

And it's not just one fit -- it's a collection of fits.

Narrator: munroe suspected that the m*rder w*apon might

Contain a fingerprint.

But lifting a print from a porous surface, like concrete,

Is extremely difficult.

It's almost like a fingerprint is sitting on top of

A bed of nails.

So your latent material, which is very, very thin, is sitting

On top of something that is very, very tenuous.

Narrator: as a last resort, munroe decided to try a

Technique usually used to find prints on nonporous surfaces,

Called superglue fuming.

Superglue is made of cyanoacrylate ester.

A drop of superglue is placed into a chamber along with the

Item containing the print.

And the chamber is heated for up to six hours.

By heating the superglue, fumes condense and adhere to

Biological materials, such as the oils of a fingerprint.

Under a laser light, the biological material fluoresces,

Producing a clear image of the print.

Munroe followed these steps with the concrete, placing both the

Superglue and the concrete in a vacuum chamber.

But the color of the concrete is the same as the cyanoacrylate.

In order to see a print, munroe needed to find a chemical that

Would attach itself to the cyanoacrylate.

After a number of tries, munroe finally found one that worked.

It was a biological stain known as "sudan black."

Munroe found what he was looking for -- the k*ller's fingerprint.

But it was badly smudged.

Unfortunately, with the circumstances of the event --

With the end of it being used as a pile driver and the repeated

Blows on the victim -- there was a certain amount of slippage

Taking place with the -pound block on the hands.

Narrator: but the discovery of the related concrete pieces

In the school yard was important.

It revealed that it was a crime of opportunity and that the

Perpetrator may have been on foot.

But a full year passed, and the trail was turning cold.

One year after the crime, local television stations and

Newspapers carried stories about the unsolved m*rder, hoping to

Jog someone's memory or conscience.

The media campaign led to the break police were hoping for.

Narrator: one year after the brutal m*rder of

Shirley andronowich, an informant came forward,

Saying that his roommate had returned home on the night of

The m*rder with stains on his jeans and boots that looked like

Blood.

I'm gonna take a shower.

Narrator: they lived in an apartment building across the

Street from the m*rder scene.

Mark jarman was a -year-old unemployed construction worker.

The informant also revealed that jarman had burned his clothes

The day after the m*rder.

Samples of jarman's blood and saliva were sent to the forensic

Lab.

Tests revealed that mark jarman had type-b blood -- the same

Blood type as the saliva found on the victim.

Photographs and impressions of jarman's teeth were also sent

For analysis.

Jarman had a distinctive wear pattern that had ground the

Biting edge of the upper and lower teeth into a flattened

Surface.

There were also some unusual spaces between the teeth, and

Several chipped areas had not been restored.

As a result of some of the testing that I did and the

Comparison with the suspect's teeth, I was able to determine

That his teeth were consistent with causing these marks.

Or another way to explain that is, his teeth could not be

Excluded in this case as causing those marks.

Narrator: finally, police had a shopping list they found in

The school yard on the night of the m*rder.

It was a big school yard, and police weren't sure whether the

Shopping list had any connection to the m*rder.

On the shopping list was a fingerprint.

That print belonged to mark jarman, placing him in the

School yard around the time of the m*rder.

After initially denying he was involved, mark jarman eventually

Confessed.

Jarman said he was at the same bar as shirley and

Ed andronowich on the night of the m*rder, but he didn't speak

To them.

He said he ran into shirley andronowich later near

The high school while she was out walking.

Didn't I see you at the bar before?

Narrator: jarman said they talked and had consensual sex.

Jarman said he k*lled shirley andronowich when she

Threatened to tell her husband.

Jarman said he emptied the contents of her purse to make

The scene appear to be a robbery.

But investigators didn't believe jarman's entire story.

Staff sergeant dan rahn is a blood-spatter expert, who

Studied the crime-scene photos and noticed an inconsistency in

Jarman's story.

The distance blood travels from a head wound struck by an object

The size and weight of a cement block is to feet --

Creating medium-velocity impact spatter.

On the papers found within to feet of shirley andronowich's

Body, rahn discovered medium-velocity impact spatter.

The pictures of the evidence actually showed that the

Contents of her purse had been strewn around -- at some

Location -- in a position where they were exposed to the

Bloodletting.

Narrator: which meant that shirley andronowich's purse was

Ransacked before she was m*rder*d, not afterwards.

Mark jarman was convicted of first-degree m*rder and

Sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for

Years.

He took my mother.

I was years old.

It's almost half my life, you know, I've been without her now.

And you can't -- I don't know how I'm ever supposed to forgive

Somebody for doing such a terrible thing to me.

There isn't a punishment severe enough that we can give this guy

For taking something like that from us.

Not a day goes by when she doesn't come into my mind.

I just think about what it would have been like if she was still

Here.

I miss her.