13x08 - Constructive Criticism

[bunniefuu]

Up next, a violent
thunderstorm provides cover for

a brutal m*rder.

It was an absolutely brutal
crime scene.

Obviously, this was a case of
an overkill.

There are plenty of
suspects with clear motives, but

they all pass polygraph tests.

It's not 100% reliable.

If investigators
didn't find the one tiny clue

left at the scene, they might
never have solved it.

The real-estate-development
business in Texas always seems

to be active.

Darrell north, a manager for a
multibillion-dollar development

company, had no shortage of
work.

Darrell north was in charge
of building budget suites for a

company out of las Vegas, and he
had been in charge of building

several in this area.

Darrell had a
reputation as a fair-minded boss

who set high standards.

I asked a subcontractor, "was
Darrell hard to work for?

Was he mean?"
And he said, "no, he was not."

He said, "he expected quality
work."

I have seen dad fire numerous
subcontractors over the years.

My dad had the ability to get
his point across very clearly.

He was very pointed.

He was very direct.

Darrell was always
punctual, so when he didn't come

home from work one day and
didn't answer his phone, his

family was concerned.

When I got to the jobsite, it
was after 11:00 at night.

The lights of his trailer were
on, and his car was out front.

And I knew his car hadn't been
moved because it was dry

underneath his vehicle, where
everything else was just

drenched.

The door was padlocked.

His son knocked on the door but
got no answer.

I climbed up on the rail with
a flashlight, trying to shine

the flashlight into that dark
office to see if dad had a heart

attack or something had
happened.

Mark saw his father
on the floor.

And I saw dad laying against
the door, and he was just laying

facedown, not moving.

Paramedics and
police declared Darrell north

dead at the scene.

He'd been stabbed repeatedly.

Blood was spattered everywhere.

It was an absolutely brutal
crime scene.

As would be typical with any
case where there's multiple s*ab

wounds, there was a tremendous
amount of blood.

There was blood in
two of the three rooms.

It was obvious a life-and-death
struggle had taken place.

There was also a hole-punch
that was discovered in very

close proximity to Mr. north's
body, that was bent.

That would lead me or any other
investigator to believe that

either Mr. north may have been
struck with that hole-punch or

Mr. north may have struck his
assailant with that hole-punch.

There was a trail
of blood from the filing

cabinet to Darrell's body, then
to a desk.

On top, police found the
machete... the type used to

clear brush from construction
sites.

It was perfectly clean.

It actually wasn't
blood-soaked, but we didn't know

if it might have been used and
then cleaned off and placed

there.

Darrell north's
secretary told police there were

normally two machetes in the
trailer.

There was a second machete
that had gone missing.

Police assumed this
was the one used in the attack.

The extra wounds on the back
of the head, which almost

decapitated him, indicated a
tremendous desire to make sure

that the person was deceased.

Darrell's wallet
was still in his pocket.

Nothing had been stolen.

There was no sign of forced
entry.

This and the level of v*olence
indicated a very personal crime.

Out of the 40 cases that I
worked, this was the only one

that had that type of rage
exhibited.

Darrell hired many
contractors, so his decisions

could either make or break some
of them.

Someone's anger had spiraled out
of control.

But police and Darrell's family
had no idea who it was.

Darrell north's
autopsy revealed he'd been

stabbed 46 times with two
different weapons... a clear

case of overkill.

"Overkill," as we define it,
is wounding a person way beyond

what would be required to k*ll a
person.

So we frequently see not just a
few wounds, but many, and it's

all indicative of rage that is
going on between the two persons

involved in the as*ault... the
victim and the assailant.

A machete missing
from his office was believed to

be one of the m*rder weapons.

The other was believed to be a
knife.

We had a single sharp edge
and a blunt edge.

We could predict that it was the
larger knife... some of the

wounds were at least an inch,
inch and a half in width on the

body surface.

The level of
v*olence limited the family's

options in terms of funeral
arrangements.

It was just an absolute
disaster.

It was awful.

Just absolutely awful.

And I made my mother promise
that she and my sister would not

go up to the funeral home and
see him.

The family tried to
help investigators by

identifying anyone who might
have had a reason to harm

Darrell.

I thought it must be a
stranger, you know, that maybe

was robbing him or something.

I could not in my wildest
imagination, you know, believe

that someone would do that.

Darrell's secretary
told police that everyone left

the construction site early on
the day of the m*rder because of

the severe rainstorm.

She said Darrell stayed behind
to meet with a contractor named

Curtis pope.

Curtis pope was a pool
contractor.

Darrell was basically mentoring
Curtis into the construction

business.

He stayed approximately 20, 25
minutes.

He left Darrell.

Darrell said he was going to
wait out the rain and let the

traffic die down before he
headed home.

Darrell's wife told
police Curtis pope could not be

the k*ller.

Curtis pope had done some
repair work on our pool.

I said, "please don't spend your
time looking at Curtis pope.

He did not k*ll Darrell.

Please spend your time looking
for the person that did."

Pope was distraught
over Darrell's m*rder.

He came through the receiving
line crying, and I thought he

was so touched by Darrell's
death.

And he said, "I loved Darrell.

He was better to me than my own
father."

Pope was 40 years
old, married, with a young

daughter.

He did, however, have a police
record consisting of arrests for

petty theft.

Since he was the last-known
person to see Darrell alive, he

was automatically considered a
suspect.

Pope agreed to take a polygraph
examination... And passed.

It's not likely that somebody
could come in and intentionally

be untruthful and still pass a
polygraph test.

The next suspect
was Bob Johnson, a roofing

contractor.

Darrell fired Johnson just two
weeks before his m*rder.

He was upset that he wasn't
going to continue to work there

because, according to him,
Darrell had promised him

continued work.

Darrell's family
never met Johnson, but they'd

heard of him.

Darrell had mentioned that he
had had some problems with him.

He usually didn't bring his
problems home, and so since it

was something that he had shared
with me, I thought it was

probably serious.

Incredibly, just
two days after Darrell's m*rder,

Johnson called asking to get his
job back.

The superintendent felt like
it was odd that Bob Johnson was

calling there, "when can I come
to work" after the fact... after

Darrell's been m*rder*d, because
his belief was that Darrell

didn't want him there.

Johnson said that
on the day of the m*rder, he was

with his child in a Dallas
hospital.

This was verified, but he still
had time to commit the m*rder.

The alibi wasn't sufficient
enough in my mind to totally

exclude him.

But like
Curtis pope, he, too, passed a

polygraph examination.

The polygraph is just a tool.

It's not 100% reliable.

That's why it's not admissible
in a court.

If it hadn't have rained,
maybe we could have gotten

fingerprints, but you can't
focus on what we could have had.

You got to find what you do
have.

Investigators
needed forensic evidence to

solve this crime, and hoped to
find some of it at the scene.

Darrell north's
m*rder was so violent that

forensic tests were needed to
make sense of what happened.

We had numerous types of
bloodstains.

They included passive blood
drops.

We had smears, transfers, and,
frankly, there was so much blood

that you'd be hard-pressed to
try to classify some of it as to

how it got there.

We took many samples.

We took 23 samples of blood from
various different parts of that

crime scene.

They first had to
determine if all the blood had

come from Darrell north.

When the assailant is
wielding a knife and he stabs a

victim, oftentimes that knife
blade hits bone and it stops.

And oftentimes the k*ller's
hand continues its movement and

it slides down the blade and can
cut the assailant.

The other clue they
looked for was shoe prints.

With so much blood, both the
k*ller and the victim would have

stepped in it.

Crime-scene technician
Jim varnon found several shoe

prints and tried to enhance
them with a special dye.

Amido black works because it
stains proteins, and it's

applied to a protein stain, in
this case, a bloodstain.

A footwear impression in blood
or fingerprints, latent prints,

in blood can be enhanced with
this substance.

In several of the
enhanced prints, analysts could

clearly see the word "Justin," a
well-known brand of Texas-made

boots.

We knew that these footwear
impressions in blood that had

the pattern of a Justin heel was
most likely going to be from our

assailant, because it did not
match the only other bleeder at

that crime scene, which was our
victim.

Unfortunately, these boots
weren't unique.

How common are they?

You're probably not from here if
you don't have a pair.

And it was
impossible to tell the size of

the boot from the print.

In a Justin boot heel, it is
possible that you're going to

have one physical size that
would overlap into several

different boot sizes so that
you're not going to be able to

tell the precise size of the
boot by looking at the size of

the heel.

Nevertheless,
investigators asked both

suspects, Bob Johnson and pool
contractor Curtis pope, if they

owned a pair of Justin-brand
boots.

Bob Johnson owned a pair, but
the heel of his boots was larger

than those at the scene.

Curtis pope also owned a pair of
Justin-brand boots, which

appeared to be new, and
willingly turned them over to

investigators.

In this case, my result was
inconclusive.

I could not eliminate or
identify the boot as having made

that mark.

When investigators
talked with pope about his

boots, they noticed something
they hadn't seen before... some

bruising under his eye.

He had some darkness under
his left eye.

There was no cut, but it was a
slight bruising.

A background check
revealed pope's business was

faltering.

He had a reputation of just
not being very good at what he

did, as far as the construction
of these swimming pools.

Pope's business
records indicated he was deeply

in debt, wasn't able to pay his
suppliers, and the only big

client he had left was
Darrell north.

If Darrell fired pope during
their meeting, it would have

been the end of pope's company.

Pope's finances were in
terrible shape.

He was on the fine edge of
disaster all the time.

With a warrant,
investigators searched pope's

home computer and found
something suspicious.

Someone on that computer had
visited a website on how to beat

a polygraph and had, in fact,
paid money to download a book on

how to beat it.

As testing
continued on the bloodstains on

the floor of the crime scene,
investigators noticed one blood

drop on Darrell north's pants
that they had previously

overlooked.

There was a vertical drop on
the back left pant leg of

Darrell north while he's laying
on the floor.

The shape of the
drop was perfectly round,

meaning that the origin of the
blood was stationary and hit the

fabric at a 90-degree angle.

The significance of such a
drop falling and hitting the

pants perpendicularly while
Mr. north is on the floor is

that it would mean that the
assailant was standing above

him, bleeding on him, after he
has been att*cked.

So it puts a sequencing to the
events.

Max Courtney cut
out the stain and submitted it

for DNA testing.

Investigators found five other
drops of blood at the scene,

perfectly round, in between
Darrell's body and the door.

And I said, "why not let's
just test these five particular

drops of blood that we know or
we feel like didn't come from

- Darrell north?"
- Tests confirmed the

blood was not Darrell north's.

There was only one question that
remained... who left the blood,

one of the two suspects or
someone else?

This tiny drop of
blood on the back of

Darrell north's pants told an
important story.

Since the blood hit Darrell's
pants at a 90-degree angle, it

meant the k*ller was standing
over Darrell's body while he was

bleeding from his own wound, and
he continued to bleed as he left

the scene.

When we observed those
vertical drops of blood leading

away from Mr. north's body, that
was a very significant thing for

us to find, because we knew then
that the k*ller's DNA was going

to be present on that scene.

And there was a
possible explanation for how the

k*ller was injured... the dented
two-hole paper-punch unit found

near Darrell north's body.

Darrell may have used it to
defend himself, causing an

injury... a facial cut or
nosebleed.

To identify the k*ller, DNA
samples were collected from the

two suspects, Bob Johnson and
Curtis pope.

DNA testing revealed it was
Curtis pope's blood at the crime

scene.

If Darrell north had not
taken some steps to defend

himself, causing him to bleed,
this case wouldn't have been

solved.

Would have never dreamed that
firing somebody would cause

somebody to, you know, go
postal.

Darrell's family
couldn't believe that the man

whom Darrell had mentored in
business and treated in many

ways like a son could have done
this.

Not until the day they came
out here to the house and told

me that it was his DNA that had
been identified did I really

believe.

The bruises police
noticed under pope's eye were

probably the result of the
fight.

And I was able to examine his
arms and his hands for injuries.

He didn't have any.

There was no cuts.

On the night of
Darrell north's m*rder, the

Dallas-fort worth area was hit
with a driving rainstorm,

causing flash floods and power
outages.

The storm was so bad, Darrell
sent his construction crew home

early.

But he stayed behind because he
had a 5:00 P.M. appointment with

Curtis pope.

They were going to discuss
quality problems with the

swimming pool pope was
installing at the hotel.

Pope was having financial
problems.

His company was headed towards
bankruptcy, and Darrell north

was his only large client,
although it's unclear whether

Darrell knew this.

Are you firing me?

Yes, I am.

No one knows what
the two men said to each other,

but prosecutors believe
Curtis pope snapped and att*cked

Darrell with a knife.

Sit back down!

Darrell was caught
off guard and struck pope in the

face with a paper punch, causing
the nosebleed.

Pope stabbed Darrell over 40
times.

As he lay dying on the floor, a
drop of blood from pope's nose

fell onto Darrell's pants.

And he continued to bleed as he
left the scene.

Mr. pope might have been able
to come up with an explanation

about how some of the other
drops of blood got in the

trailer on that particular
night, but there's no way he

could have explained away how
his blood was dripped onto

Darrell north's pants.

We knew we had eliminated any
possible innocent explanation

for his blood being at the
scene, and we felt like we had

him.

Curtis pope was
arrested and charged with

first-degree m*rder.

He posted bail, but on the first
day of his trial, pope didn't

show up.

We learned through an
informant that he was headed

toward Canada.

That afternoon,
police in watertown, New York,

just 25 miles from the Canadian
border, stopped a car from

driving the wrong way down a
one-way street.

It was Curtis pope.

He tried to run, but was
arrested at a shopping center.

Curtis pope was returned to
Texas.

He stood trial and was convicted
of first-degree m*rder.

He was sentenced to life in
prison.

There is nothing good about
Curtis pope.

I just think he's a sociopath
and an endangerment to society.

It was an unusually
bloody crime scene, but

Darrell north unwittingly
provided the evidence needed to

convict his k*ller.

He probably bloodied
Curtis pope's nose.

We have always thought Darrell
helped to convict Curtis pope.

The forensic evidence in this
case was absolutely the linchpin

of the entire case.

This case stands out to me
because it is one of the best of

the uses of DNA combined with
bloodstain-pattern analysis

where, working together, the two
show who the blood came from and

provide a scenario by which it
possibly got there.