Latest / The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories / Serial Killer Documentary - The La Madera Spree Killer
Transcript
- 0:08Speaker 1: This time on Killers Caught on Camera, a terrifying day
- 0:12Speaker 1: amid the heat and dust of New Mexico.
- 0:18Speaker 2: When we're dealing with a person who just committed a
- 0:21Speaker 2: mass shooting, we don't know what the mentality of this
- 0:24Speaker 2: person is.
- 0:27Speaker 1: And in snowbound Colorado, a shocking discovery.
- 0:32Speaker 3: The scene itself looked like some sort of altercation had
- 0:34Speaker 3: taken place that was quite violent.
- 0:38Speaker 4: It might be blood.
- 0:41Speaker 5: It just sounds like something bad is happening to her.
- 0:45Speaker 1: We know what happened because the video tells us what happened.
- 0:48Speaker 4: I heard some gunshots.
- 0:49Speaker 6: Drop it!
- 0:49Speaker 7: Whatever it is, drop it!
- 0:52Speaker 4: That does not prove that I killed my wife. The
- 0:56Speaker 4: camera doesn't lie.
- 1:04Speaker 1: In northern New Mexico... In Rio Arriba County is La Madera.
- 1:11Speaker 8: La Madera, New Mexico, is a very small community, a
- 1:15Speaker 8: very rural area. There are a lot of families that
- 1:18Speaker 8: live there. Everyone virtually knows everyone else.
- 1:21Speaker 5: 911, what's your emergency? Ma'am, I really need you to
- 1:38Speaker 5: take a deep breath and tell me I can't understand you.
- 1:40Speaker 5: What's going on?
- 1:42Speaker 4: A 911 call comes in. It is clearly panic. There's
- 1:45Speaker 4: a lot of yelling. There's a lot of screaming.
- 1:47Speaker 5: Then essentially the call goes dead.
- 2:03Speaker 1: Deputies arriving on the scene were met by distressed neighbors.
- 2:09Speaker 4: Were you here?
- 2:10Speaker 9: Yeah, I was here for the first one.
- 2:14Speaker 8: The first law enforcement agency that arrives is the Ruririba
- 2:17Speaker 8: Sheriff's Office.
- 2:19Speaker 4: They discover three victims.
- 2:22Speaker 10: Max was shot, and I was over the checkers here.
- 2:25Speaker 1: The victims were identified as Max Trujillo. his stepson, Brendan Herrera,
- 2:34Speaker 1: and Brendan's mother, Maria, known to friends and family as Brenda.
- 2:43Speaker 5: Brendan's still alive, making noise.
- 2:45Speaker 10: We need an ambulance here.
- 2:48Speaker 2: One individual, the mother, Brenda, was still alive at the time,
- 2:52Speaker 2: so they were trying to get medical attention for her.
- 2:55Speaker 2: RA7 sensor, we're going to have two possible 10-7, 141.
- 3:00Speaker 4: Barely breathing. We're going to need 55 here.
- 3:04Speaker 2: The other two individuals, Brendan and Max, were deceased at
- 3:08Speaker 2: the time that law enforcement got there.
- 3:11Speaker 1: The deputies on scene urgently needed to locate the shooter.
- 3:16Speaker 4: Sheriff's office.
- 3:19Speaker 2: Officers are thinking about if there's a suspect still inside
- 3:22Speaker 2: of the residence.
- 3:23Speaker 5: Sheriff's permit!
- 3:25Speaker 4: Are they at risk right now as well? A lot
- 3:28Speaker 4: of weapons here.
- 3:32Speaker 11: Did you hear anything that they were fighting about?
- 3:42Speaker 1: More residents appeared on scene.
- 3:45Speaker 4: This is a crime scene. You're going to have to
- 3:46Speaker 4: go over here. I'm really sorry, guys. This is a
- 3:48Speaker 4: crime scene. You're going to have to stay over there, okay?
- 3:54Speaker 4: We have the medics coming over here.
- 3:57Speaker 1: This was Brenda's teenage daughter, Carissa.
- 4:03Speaker 6: My mom was such a selfless person. She was very inspirational.
- 4:11Speaker 6: She was my best friend. I wouldn't go anywhere without
- 4:16Speaker 6: my mom. She was very caring. She wore her heart
- 4:23Speaker 6: on her sleeve.
- 4:25Speaker 1: Max was a steelworker and got together with Brenda just
- 4:29Speaker 1: before Carissa was born.
- 4:31Speaker 6: My dad's personality was so goofy. I mean, this man
- 4:34Speaker 6: would light up a room. Anytime he would come in,
- 4:37Speaker 6: he would just joke, and he would laugh and make
- 4:40Speaker 6: us laugh, and I loved his personality so much. He
- 4:45Speaker 6: was a good man. They were best friends. They would
- 4:50Speaker 6: support each other no matter what. You could tell they
- 4:54Speaker 6: had true love.
- 4:55Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
- 5:00Speaker 1: Also living at the property were two of Carissa's brothers,
- 5:03Speaker 1: Damian and the third victim, Brendan.
- 5:08Speaker 6: Brendan and I, it was a couple years apart. He
- 5:12Speaker 6: was just the best, most genuine soul you'd ever meet.
- 5:18Speaker 1: At the crime scene, Carissa had troubling information for the deputies.
- 5:24Speaker 10: The day of the incident, I remember just hanging out
- 5:28Speaker 10: at home.
- 5:52Speaker 6: Brandon had his day off, so he was in his
- 5:54Speaker 6: room watching movies. Damian was not working. He had just
- 5:59Speaker 6: dropped out of college. He quit his job, so he
- 6:02Speaker 6: was struggling. I remember just looking out the front door,
- 6:09Speaker 6: and I mean, I see my dad walking to the
- 6:14Speaker 6: door to come inside, and all of a sudden, I mean,
- 6:17Speaker 6: I saw him point the gun, and you just hear
- 6:20Speaker 6: the shots go off, and My dad just fell. My brother, Brendan,
- 6:27Speaker 6: had heard it, and he ran out the same time
- 6:29Speaker 6: my mom did it. My mom was just on the
- 6:32Speaker 6: ground with my dad and told me to call 911.
- 6:36Speaker 6: She was trying to talk, and he went and grabbed
- 6:38Speaker 6: the phone from my mom and threw it across the
- 6:42Speaker 6: roof of the house. So we had no phone to
- 6:45Speaker 6: finish calling. Damián started just fighting with Brendan. He just
- 6:51Speaker 6: overpowered Brendan. And he just had the gun by his neck,
- 6:56Speaker 6: between his neck and his shoulder, and he just pulled
- 7:02Speaker 6: that trigger. My mom heard the gunshot, and she was
- 7:12Speaker 6: just pleading, just don't do it, just don't do it.
- 7:17Speaker 6: And he just looked at her and pointed the gun
- 7:19Speaker 6: straight at her. And she said, please don't do it.
- 7:23Speaker 6: And he just let that one go too. I just
- 7:32Speaker 6: knew if I didn't get out of there, I was
- 7:35Speaker 6: going to be next. And I needed to get help.
- 7:40Speaker 6: I just ran. I ran to whatever house I could
- 7:42Speaker 6: find first.
- 7:47Speaker 4: Max Trujillo Sr. was shot in the back.
- 7:51Speaker 8: Brendan Herrera was shot almost execution-style in the back of
- 7:54Speaker 8: the head, and Brenda was shot on the side of
- 7:58Speaker 8: her head, basically on the right temple. All of those
- 8:02Speaker 8: wounds were clearly from someone that intended to kill his victims.
- 8:11Speaker 4: Suspect's on. Yeah.
- 8:13Speaker 1: By the time first responders arrived, Damian had already fled
- 8:17Speaker 1: the scene.
- 8:20Speaker 2: The suspect had stolen a pickup truck from that property
- 8:23Speaker 2: as well as some other firearms. When we're dealing with
- 8:28Speaker 2: a person who just committed a mass shooting, we don't
- 8:31Speaker 2: know what the mentality of this person is. Are they
- 8:33Speaker 2: going out and are they going to continue a spree
- 8:35Speaker 2: of murders afterwards?
- 8:41Speaker 12: My husband... My husband is.
- 8:49Speaker 13: I don't know if he's dead or not.
- 8:51Speaker 7: I think he's dead.
- 8:55Speaker 2: While we were en route to La Madera, there was
- 8:57Speaker 2: another 911 call that came out advising that a woman,
- 9:01Speaker 2: she had just came home and found her husband laying
- 9:05Speaker 2: shot in their front yard.
- 9:08Speaker 1: This incident had taken place 35 miles away in the
- 9:12Speaker 1: equally small community of Tres Piedras.
- 9:16Speaker 4: When I arrived on.
- 9:17Speaker 2: Scene, I observed an elderly male laying down on the
- 9:20Speaker 2: ground with apparent gunshot wounds.
- 9:22Speaker 4: He was deceased. The individual who shot him had also
- 9:26Speaker 4: stolen his pickup truck.
- 9:30Speaker 1: The victim was Michael Kite, a retired archaeologist who had
- 9:34Speaker 1: only recently moved to New Mexico.
- 9:39Speaker 4: This is a very remote area.
- 9:41Speaker 8: It would be unusual, highly unusual, to have that number
- 9:45Speaker 8: of fatalities in that short of a time period that
- 9:48Speaker 8: close together. So I think that at that point they probably,
- 9:51Speaker 8: you know, had a good idea that they were all related.
- 9:56Speaker 1: Shortly after, those suspicions were confirmed when Herrera's trial... from
- 10:00Speaker 1: La Madera was found abandoned not far away. It had
- 10:04Speaker 1: run out of gas. I think it would be easy
- 10:09Speaker 1: to think, well, he's just a ruthless murderer at this
- 10:12Speaker 1: point on a spree. He's killing people. He's killed his
- 10:15Speaker 1: own family members. Now he's killing strangers on the road.
- 10:18Speaker 1: But probably what's going on in his mind is he
- 10:22Speaker 1: was desperate. He is still trying to escape. And he
- 10:25Speaker 1: needs to put distance between himself and the crime scene.
- 10:28Speaker 1: And the only way he's going to do that is
- 10:29Speaker 1: if he has another vehicle or gas. And I think
- 10:33Speaker 1: in that moment, you're not thinking about this individual as
- 10:36Speaker 1: a human being. So I think it's more of a
- 10:40Speaker 1: practical and instrumental, as we call it, murder. By now,
- 10:45Speaker 1: Carissa's mom, Brenda, had been airlifted to the hospital. She
- 10:49Speaker 1: was on life support.
- 10:52Speaker 6: I held her hand. I didn't want to leave her side.
- 10:56Speaker 6: They did inform us that she was brain dead. There
- 10:59Speaker 6: was no way of her coming out of it. Seeing
- 11:02Speaker 6: her in that bed was the hardest thing. She didn't
- 11:04Speaker 6: look like my mom anymore. I just knew that she
- 11:10Speaker 6: couldn't suffer. I just knew that we had to do
- 11:13Speaker 6: something about it. And I mean, she was just in pain.
- 11:18Speaker 6: And so it was about a day and we took
- 11:20Speaker 6: her off life support.
- 11:24Speaker 1: Just a few hours after they received the first call,
- 11:30Speaker 1: the Ria Ariba Sheriff's Office got.
- 11:32Speaker 4: Yet another 911 call.
- 11:43Speaker 12: It was reported to us that over in the community
- 11:45Speaker 12: of Abiquiu, an individual was shot at the Bodie's gas station.
- 11:49Speaker 12: The victim was identified as a local man. Manuel Serrano
- 11:53Speaker 12: was a family man who lived in that community.
- 12:13Speaker 2: He worked as a security guard at the local Georgia
- 12:16Speaker 2: O'Keeffe Museum. He was actually headed to work at the
- 12:19Speaker 2: time that he was shot and killed.
- 12:23Speaker 1: Investigators were able to access the store's CCTV.
- 12:34Speaker 2: Here we see a black Chevy pickup truck pulling up
- 12:37Speaker 2: to pump number six. This is the truck that was
- 12:41Speaker 2: identified as being stolen from Michael Kite. At this point,
- 12:49Speaker 2: there's an individual that walks outside with a straw cowboy
- 12:53Speaker 2: hat and appears that he is going to be getting
- 12:55Speaker 2: gas for his truck. So here you see a white
- 13:10Speaker 2: Jeep pulling up to pump number four, and we see
- 13:13Speaker 2: Manuel Serrano exiting his vehicle.
- 13:20Speaker 4: And the individual begins to take notice.
- 13:24Speaker 2: There doesn't appear to be any sort of communication between
- 13:27Speaker 2: the two of them, but he's watching him, he's observing
- 13:29Speaker 2: everything that he's doing. Manuel Serrano was still going about
- 13:39Speaker 2: his business. He's actually cleaning his windshield and you see
- 13:43Speaker 2: the black truck, the lights come on and the driver's
- 13:46Speaker 2: side window goes down.
- 13:49Speaker 4: An arm comes out.
- 13:50Speaker 2: And the individual in that truck discharges his firearm in
- 13:56Speaker 2: the direction of Manuel Serrano. From the ricochets off the pavement,
- 14:04Speaker 2: we know that the gunshots are coming from him. Manuel
- 14:10Speaker 2: Serrano is seen actually trying to escape the person who's
- 14:12Speaker 2: shooting at him. As he's running away, that black truck
- 14:16Speaker 2: is seen pulling out. This was a targeted attack. No
- 14:24Speaker 2: altercation happened.
- 14:29Speaker 1: Manuel Serrano died of his wounds shortly after. For investigators,
- 14:34Speaker 1: there could be no doubt what they had witnessed.
- 14:38Speaker 2: Manuel Serrano was an innocent victim who was shot in
- 14:41Speaker 2: the back as a cold-blooded murder by this individual in
- 14:45Speaker 2: the black truck. We were able to identify the individual
- 14:51Speaker 2: as Damian Herrera.
- 14:58Speaker 1: This doesn't feel like a situation where he's got nothing
- 14:59Speaker 1: else to lose because the bigger question is what does
- 15:01Speaker 1: he have to gain from shooting this guy? This is
- 15:04Speaker 1: so random. And so I think there must be something
- 15:08Speaker 1: going on in his own mind that we don't see
- 15:11Speaker 1: where this makes sense, that shooting this man is a
- 15:15Speaker 1: good outcome because it either protects his escape, it protects
- 15:19Speaker 1: his identity, or maybe he thinks, what if this is
- 15:22Speaker 1: a cop who's after me? Or what if this guy's
- 15:24Speaker 1: out to get me? So it points to paranoid delusions
- 15:27Speaker 1: for me or some sort of perception that we don't
- 15:30Speaker 1: have just watching this footage that's only in his own mind.
- 15:38Speaker 8: At this point, we've got multiple law enforcement agencies, you know,
- 15:41Speaker 8: Española Police Department, Río Arriba County Sheriff's Department, New Mexico
- 15:44Speaker 8: State Police, that are all involved in essentially this manhunt
- 15:47Speaker 8: to find Damian Herrera.
- 15:51Speaker 12: Units are heading north on 84. I have a unit
- 15:53Speaker 12: heading in the direction of a possible suspect, black, Silverado,
- 15:58Speaker 12: driving on the shoulder, almost hitting several vehicles.
- 16:01Speaker 8: Herrera is speeding down the highway pretty quickly after killing Mr.
- 16:06Speaker 4: Serrano.
- 16:08Speaker 12: He is now driving in the northbound lane, northbound lane
- 16:10Speaker 12: passing vehicle.
- 16:11Speaker 6: He might go head on.
- 16:12Speaker 3: Oh, my goodness.
- 16:14Speaker 8: You've got two law enforcement officers that are chasing him.
- 16:17Speaker 8: They're pretty close behind.
- 16:18Speaker 14: Oh, he's going to wreck it.
- 16:20Speaker 5: I think he's wrecked it.
- 16:20Speaker 3: I think he's flipped.
- 16:23Speaker 2: Damien Herrera ends up pulling too far off onto the shoulder.
- 16:26Speaker 2: He goes off the road, hits a rock, and it
- 16:28Speaker 2: causes his truck to flip, and it rolls over.
- 16:36Speaker 4: At that point, it's a very active situation. There's dust
- 16:39Speaker 4: all over the place. It's very hard to see.
- 16:41Speaker 5: Stop the ambulance!
- 16:43Speaker 4: Stop the ambulance!
- 16:43Speaker 6: Stop!
- 16:45Speaker 4: They're looking around, looking for the driver of the vehicle.
- 16:47Speaker 8: They're actually looking.
- 16:48Speaker 4: At the truck.
- 16:49Speaker 8: And it isn't until just a few seconds later that
- 16:52Speaker 8: they realize that the driver is actually already out of
- 16:55Speaker 8: the vehicle and begins to charge at them. Cut!
- 16:59Speaker 7: Stop it there!
- 17:00Speaker 4: Stop right there!
- 17:02Speaker 6: Cut!
- 17:03Speaker 15: Oh!
- 17:06Speaker 8: He is wild. He's trying to get guns. He is
- 17:09Speaker 8: just fighting with everything that he has.
- 17:16Speaker 10: Damian Herrera is not a large man, but it took
- 17:28Speaker 10: three large and very healthy, very strong police officers and
- 17:32Speaker 10: a taser a couple times to get him into.
- 17:35Speaker 8: Compliance and to get him into handcuffs. That's how wild
- 17:39Speaker 8: and crazy he was acting.
- 17:41Speaker 2: He's in this fight or flight mode and he is
- 17:45Speaker 2: full of adrenaline.
- 17:56Speaker 1: It seems like a situation that spiraled from that first shot,
- 17:59Speaker 1: and then he just kept shooting, and he kept running,
- 18:01Speaker 1: and he kept attacking, and he's still in that mode
- 18:03Speaker 1: when he encounters the police, and he doesn't know how
- 18:06Speaker 1: to shut it off. Herrera was put in the back
- 18:10Speaker 1: of the police car. Once he'd calmed down, he was
- 18:13Speaker 1: able to answer the officer's questions.
- 18:17Speaker 4: I was in the train house, man. So we ran
- 18:19Speaker 4: right into it over gasoline, okay? And I stuck out.
- 18:26Speaker 4: Tried to take some down, me, gun.
- 18:30Speaker 7: My brother got in the middle of it.
- 18:32Speaker 4: And around enough to hit my brother, and I wrestled
- 18:36Speaker 4: with my dad.
- 18:38Speaker 2: And as I was trying to get the gun away,
- 18:39Speaker 2: my mom went in the middle of it and started.
- 18:42Speaker 4: Trying to hit. I don't even know if she was
- 18:44Speaker 4: trying to hit me or him, but she ended up
- 18:46Speaker 4: getting in the middle of it. And it was just,
- 18:49Speaker 4: it was bad, dude.
- 18:50Speaker 3: I don't even really remember.
- 18:51Speaker 4: It was just so bad. The police officer then asked
- 18:56Speaker 4: him about what happened with Mr. Kite. I asked him
- 19:00Speaker 4: for gas. He took me to his house to go
- 19:03Speaker 4: get gasoline.
- 19:04Speaker 7: He was trying to push me out of his truck
- 19:06Speaker 7: as soon as we got to his house.
- 19:08Speaker 4: Okay. And I was just defending myself, dude.
- 19:12Speaker 8: And then the police officer very artfully asked, you know,
- 19:15Speaker 8: was there anything else that happened?
- 19:16Speaker 4: He said, no, no, no, that's it, that's it. And
- 19:18Speaker 4: then the police officer asked him about Manuel Serrano. I
- 19:23Speaker 4: was cleaning the windows and he.
- 19:25Speaker 15: I don't even know what he started telling me in Spanish, dude.
- 19:28Speaker 4: And I was just like, yo, calm down. And he
- 19:31Speaker 4: started arresting me.
- 19:32Speaker 16: And that's.
- 19:34Speaker 4: All that happened.
- 19:36Speaker 8: He had essentially blamed the killings on everyone else. And
- 19:40Speaker 8: it's a story that is absolutely wild and unbelievable and
- 19:43Speaker 8: just not supported by any evidence. He was actually even
- 19:46Speaker 8: telling the police officer, you know, I'm not i'm not
- 19:49Speaker 8: a violent person ask ask anybody it was just an
- 19:52Speaker 8: alarming statement to hear out of his mouth considering that
- 19:55Speaker 8: he had just killed five.
- 19:57Speaker 1: People damian herrera was charged with five counts of first
- 20:04Speaker 1: degree murder Further charges arose from his time in custody.
- 20:21Speaker 8: While he was incarcerated at the jail in Tierra Maria,
- 20:26Speaker 8: he attacked one of the guards.
- 20:35Speaker 1: This just feels like Someone who isn't of sound mind,
- 20:39Speaker 1: who's making incredibly bad decisions. Maybe he's just a violent person,
- 20:43Speaker 1: but there's nothing to suggest from his criminal record or
- 20:46Speaker 1: from his own past that he was violent really before
- 20:50Speaker 1: any of this happened. And so you've got that first
- 20:54Speaker 1: incredibly violent act of shooting his stepfather and then a
- 20:58Speaker 1: cascade of violence that follows from there. Damian Herrera had
- 21:05Speaker 1: in fact been struggling with his mental health for some time.
- 21:08Speaker 6: We all just kind of knew that something was wrong.
- 21:14Speaker 6: I mean, we could see the signs, but we never
- 21:17Speaker 6: thought it would get this far. Damian had told me
- 21:21Speaker 6: it would be cool to just see somebody hurt and
- 21:25Speaker 6: in pain and just to see them go through something.
- 21:30Speaker 12: And I.
- 21:32Speaker 6: Think at that time, I didn't really think of it
- 21:35Speaker 6: as a way of him hurting us, but at the
- 21:37Speaker 6: time I knew it was weird. It was scary. Where
- 21:40Speaker 6: is this coming from? And I remember my mom just
- 21:44Speaker 6: reaching out to my siblings, my older ones, to just
- 21:48Speaker 6: let them know we need to help him in a way.
- 21:51Speaker 6: We need to get him to talk.
- 21:55Speaker 1: This is a 21-year-old man, a young man, who is
- 21:57Speaker 1: in a pretty dark place. Fantasies of violence are not
- 22:03Speaker 1: totally uncommon, but it is uncommon to voice to somebody
- 22:08Speaker 1: else that you think this is acceptable behavior. And it
- 22:11Speaker 1: borders on something that's called criminal thinking. So criminal thinking
- 22:16Speaker 1: is a set of beliefs that predisposes people to engage
- 22:19Speaker 1: in crimes, including violent crimes. And they include things like
- 22:23Speaker 1: rationalizations that make it seem like it's okay to be
- 22:26Speaker 1: violent or aggressive. that say, if I do bad things
- 22:29Speaker 1: or break the law, it's because other people had it
- 22:31Speaker 1: coming or that other people are out to get me.
- 22:35Speaker 1: And so it's the set of beliefs that put you
- 22:38Speaker 1: as the victim often in these situations and that make
- 22:41Speaker 1: it easier for you to justify lashing out against others.
- 22:47Speaker 1: Herrera was found guilty of the four murders in Rio
- 22:50Speaker 1: Arriba County and sentenced to four consecutive life sentences, a
- 22:54Speaker 1: minimum of 120 years. The legal process in Taos County
- 23:01Speaker 1: for the killing of Michael Kite is ongoing because the
- 23:04Speaker 1: charge for the stolen truck is currently under appeal.
- 23:09Speaker 6: Why? Why would he do this? Why would anyone think
- 23:13Speaker 6: like this? To this day, I still ask why. It
- 23:17Speaker 6: was never really answered, never a question that he answered
- 23:21Speaker 6: on his own. It's gut-wrenching, is what it is. There's
- 23:26Speaker 6: Not a day that goes by I don't think of
- 23:30Speaker 6: my parents and Brendan. I mean, there's times where I'm
- 23:33Speaker 6: doing something and I'm thinking they would have enjoyed to
- 23:35Speaker 6: see this. It's the hardest thing to come back to
- 23:40Speaker 6: reality when I'm thinking and know that I can't pick
- 23:43Speaker 6: up that phone and I can't give them a call.
- 23:45Speaker 6: I can't give my mom a hug. There's never a
- 23:50Speaker 6: day that goes by. I mean, they were my everything, really.
- 24:10Speaker 1: Damian Herrera believed he could fight his way out of
- 24:12Speaker 1: the scenario he'd created in his own mind. Delusions can
- 24:20Speaker 1: take many forms. So they can be a very simple
- 24:24Speaker 1: delusion that you can fight and flee your way out
- 24:26Speaker 1: of a situation that is actually already impossible. Or it
- 24:30Speaker 1: can be a situation where you see reality through distorted eyes.
- 24:36Speaker 1: And so that borders more on what we consider psychosis,
- 24:41Speaker 1: where you have someone reacting to cues that aren't really there,
- 24:48Speaker 1: but they're perceiving as such. And so you can have
- 24:50Speaker 1: a delusion that ends up fueling a crime in itself.
- 24:54Speaker 1: which is when you think that it's me or the
- 24:56Speaker 1: other person, that if I don't kill them, they will
- 24:59Speaker 1: kill me, even if it is completely implausible. And it
- 25:06Speaker 1: was another delusion that led to a brutal murder in
- 25:09Speaker 1: the cold mountains of Colorado. In the west of Colorado
- 25:22Speaker 1: is Gunnison County.
- 25:27Speaker 3: Gunnison, a very rural community located in between two mountain ranges, 7,000
- 25:32Speaker 3: feet above sea level. So there is a lot of
- 25:35Speaker 3: areas that are inaccessible at certain times of the year
- 25:38Speaker 3: without special equipment and don't necessarily have cell phone or
- 25:42Speaker 3: even radio coverage.
- 25:44Speaker 4: And so the job can get quite difficult at times.
- 25:49Speaker 1: On March 7th, 2021, police received a report from a
- 25:54Speaker 1: remote corner of the county.
- 25:57Speaker 4: The sheriff's office.
- 25:58Speaker 3: Received a call about an abandoned vehicle on Alpine Plateau Road,
- 26:01Speaker 3: which is the road that would lead to the Arrowhead subdivision.
- 26:08Speaker 1: Deputies made their way up the snowy trail to locate
- 26:11Speaker 1: the vehicle.
- 26:16Speaker 3: It was a small Ford Orb sedan, and it appeared
- 26:20Speaker 3: it had just gotten stuck in the snow going up
- 26:22Speaker 3: the road.
- 26:24Speaker 4: Where was the driver of the vehicle? and why aren't
- 26:27Speaker 4: they the ones calling for help?
- 26:32Speaker 1: While the deputies were on the scene, the dispatch center
- 26:35Speaker 1: received another call from a nearby cabin.
- 26:38Speaker 12: 911, what is your emergency?
- 26:42Speaker 5: I haven't been here for a week, and I come
- 26:46Speaker 5: in and see the whole living room in a disarray,
- 26:49Speaker 5: really torn up.
- 26:51Speaker 3: And then I see this body.
- 26:52Speaker 5: Laying over there by the couch. They're face down.
- 26:55Speaker 3: The body is cold. It's not moving.
- 27:01Speaker 1: Officers were confronted with a distressing scene.
- 27:04Speaker 5: There's something inside the couch.
- 27:10Speaker 3: Looking at the body, it was really hard to tell
- 27:12Speaker 3: what the injuries were because there was.
- 27:14Speaker 4: A large amount of blood around it. But the body
- 27:16Speaker 4: had some severe injuries to the head.
- 27:20Speaker 3: The scene itself looked like some sort of altercation had
- 27:23Speaker 3: taken place that was quite violent. The whole living room was.
- 27:34Speaker 4: In disarray.
- 27:37Speaker 3: There was a bottle of lighter fluid on the counter
- 27:40Speaker 3: and the coffee table was smoldering. It appeared that Some
- 27:46Speaker 3: kind of a fire had either started or somebody intended
- 27:50Speaker 3: to start.
- 27:53Speaker 1: In all the chaos, investigators found a promising lead.
- 27:57Speaker 4: We were able to find a set of car keys.
- 28:03Speaker 3: On those keys was a tag that had linked it
- 28:06Speaker 3: to the abandoned vehicle that was called in earlier.
- 28:11Speaker 1: The car was registered to 22-year-old Anna Raskon.
- 28:20Speaker 17: Ana was the type of person that people tended to
- 28:24Speaker 17: gravitate towards. She had this smile on her. She had
- 28:31Speaker 17: like this light heart and she was so kind.
- 28:34Speaker 1: She did have a temper, not gonna lie.
- 28:36Speaker 17: She did have a temper and she was stubborn, but she,
- 28:42Speaker 17: she was an amazing person.
- 28:47Speaker 1: Ana was born in Grand Junction, Colorado, but she moved
- 28:50Speaker 1: back and forth between the city and her mother's home
- 28:53Speaker 1: of Agua Prieta in Sonora, Mexico.
- 28:59Speaker 13: When she first came from Mexico, I remember she hardly
- 29:02Speaker 13: knew any English, and she learned it, she picked it
- 29:06Speaker 13: up so quick.
- 29:08Speaker 6: So fast.
- 29:08Speaker 4: She was really smart.
- 29:10Speaker 1: Always posing, I told you she always looked cute in people.
- 29:14Speaker 16: And a lot of people found it easy to talk
- 29:17Speaker 16: to her. She for sure was the person that you
- 29:20Speaker 16: would feel comfortable going to.
- 29:23Speaker 18: She always had that mother instinct.
- 29:25Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 29:26Speaker 18: She was really nourishing.
- 29:31Speaker 1: Anna was a devoted mother who had her first child
- 29:34Speaker 1: at the age of 17.
- 29:35Speaker 17: I knew Anna was going to be a great mom.
- 29:41Speaker 17: One of her biggest ambitions was to have that white
- 29:43Speaker 17: picket fence life, having that normal life where she just
- 29:48Speaker 17: kind of took care of her kids.
- 29:50Speaker 18: Everything was good. Everything was stable.
- 29:53Speaker 17: That's what she dreamed of.
- 29:58Speaker 1: Anna later moved to Rifle, Colorado, to be with a
- 30:01Speaker 1: new boyfriend.
- 30:04Speaker 17: She originally had moved out there to be with her
- 30:07Speaker 17: daughter's father. She kind of stayed out there after they
- 30:11Speaker 17: split and ended up finding a job working at a
- 30:14Speaker 17: hotel doing housekeeping, but she was more focused on raising
- 30:18Speaker 17: her kids and being a mom.
- 30:19Speaker 13: For her kids.
- 30:22Speaker 1: But life grew increasingly hard.
- 30:26Speaker 17: Anna's really started struggling and feeling the pressure of being
- 30:29Speaker 17: a single mom and doing things on her own. She
- 30:33Speaker 17: had overdue bills. She was a negative, her bank accounts.
- 30:38Speaker 17: She did express like, my life's falling apart at this point.
- 30:41Speaker 17: I need some help.
- 30:46Speaker 1: Anna was prescribed antidepressants and other medication to help her
- 30:50Speaker 1: mental health. But by 2020, she also began to self-medicate.
- 30:57Speaker 17: There was signs that Ana was using, but I think
- 31:00Speaker 17: as a family, we all found it very hard to accept.
- 31:04Speaker 18: We didn't want to believe that.
- 31:08Speaker 17: Ana felt that she was putting herself in a dark
- 31:10Speaker 17: place and she wanted to find a way to get
- 31:13Speaker 17: out of it. She reached out to her mom and
- 31:17Speaker 17: she asked, hey, can you take the kids just so
- 31:20Speaker 17: I can get into a new apartment, find a job,
- 31:23Speaker 17: get back on my feet, and then I'll.
- 31:25Speaker 4: Go back for the kids.
- 31:27Speaker 14: Anna loved being a mother, and so to have to
- 31:31Speaker 14: send her children away very likely left her feeling depressed,
- 31:37Speaker 14: isolated from her loved ones, and also probably there was
- 31:41Speaker 14: an element of shame there. And so this cocktail of emotions,
- 31:45Speaker 14: these really difficult emotions to carry, they can really set
- 31:49Speaker 14: the stage for someone to start engaging in unhealthy and
- 31:52Speaker 14: unhelpful coping strategies. But then that means that we can
- 31:56Speaker 14: end up in kind of a cycle of suffering. So
- 31:59Speaker 14: we turn to the drug use, and then our emotional
- 32:01Speaker 14: and our financial pressures, they mount, they grow. And then
- 32:06Speaker 14: we then turn to the drugs again, and then we
- 32:09Speaker 14: fall into this loop that becomes really difficult to find
- 32:13Speaker 14: our way out of.
- 32:16Speaker 1: Eventually, on Friday, March 5th, Ana and her mother arranged
- 32:21Speaker 1: that Ana would drive down to Sonora, Mexico, to collect
- 32:25Speaker 1: her children that weekend.
- 32:29Speaker 17: Come Sunday, I get a call from my mom, and
- 32:32Speaker 17: she was like, hey, have you heard from Ana?
- 32:34Speaker 18: Nobody's heard from her.
- 32:37Speaker 4: Her phone's off.
- 32:38Speaker 17: Nobody can get in touch with her.
- 32:44Speaker 1: In Arrowhead, investigators were taken aback by the severity of
- 32:49Speaker 1: the victim's injuries. She'd been bludgeoned around her face and head.
- 32:55Speaker 1: Her arm was badly broken, and she had several large
- 32:59Speaker 1: puncture wounds in the back of her neck.
- 33:02Speaker 4: It was a very horrific thing that took place. It
- 33:09Speaker 4: might be blood.
- 33:11Speaker 3: We had found almost an antique pickaxe of some kind,
- 33:14Speaker 3: maybe an ice pickaxe, something like that.
- 33:19Speaker 4: It was pretty clear that that was the murder weapon.
- 33:24Speaker 4: And it absolutely came from the residence.
- 33:26Speaker 3: We were able to track down some photographs of the
- 33:29Speaker 3: residence from an earlier time, and it was actually hanging
- 33:33Speaker 3: on the wall above.
- 33:34Speaker 4: Kind of the door.
- 33:37Speaker 3: Through a law enforcement search database, we were able to
- 33:39Speaker 3: get a description and were able to confirm that the
- 33:43Speaker 3: female that was in the house was, in fact, Anna Roscoe.
- 33:51Speaker 11: I picked up the phone and said, okay, are you
- 33:55Speaker 11: sitting down? And I was like, don't scare me. Be
- 34:02Speaker 11: prepared because I'm gonna say something to you and it's
- 34:04Speaker 11: something bad.
- 34:07Speaker 7: She just told me that. My sister was gone. I
- 34:15Speaker 7: started going crazy. I didn't even listen to her anymore.
- 34:21Speaker 16: My first instinct was to go into denial because, no,
- 34:26Speaker 16: that wasn't possible. And I said, finally, I was like,
- 34:30Speaker 16: what happened? Like, what happened with her? And he's like,
- 34:35Speaker 16: at the moment, we're treating this as a homicide, so
- 34:38Speaker 16: it's under investigation.
- 34:41Speaker 13: When they called me, I started asking questions like, what
- 34:45Speaker 13: the hell?
- 34:46Speaker 18: Where did this happen? How did it all go down?
- 34:49Speaker 13: And they did tell me too, there's not a lot
- 34:52Speaker 13: we can tell you, but whoever did this to her
- 34:56Speaker 13: is a monster.
- 34:57Speaker 16: And I.
- 34:59Speaker 13: Can tell you that the way her, I can tell
- 35:04Speaker 13: you that the way her knuckles were, she defended herself
- 35:10Speaker 13: to the best of her abilities.
- 35:18Speaker 17: After the realization really set in of it was a
- 35:22Speaker 17: homicide investigation, it just made me think, like, who would
- 35:29Speaker 17: do that.
- 35:31Speaker 18: To a person?
- 35:31Speaker 5: Like, who?
- 35:33Speaker 17: Especially her.
- 35:36Speaker 1: Outside the cabin, the snow revealed further evidence. Footprints leading
- 35:43Speaker 1: to and from the property.
- 35:47Speaker 3: The initial kind of size up was two people had
- 35:49Speaker 3: broken into a house for an unknown reason and one
- 35:53Speaker 3: ended up dead.
- 35:55Speaker 4: We weren't sure how or why they were in the area.
- 36:01Speaker 1: Over in Rifle, investigators were given the names of people
- 36:04Speaker 1: Anna had been known to associate with. One of them
- 36:07Speaker 1: was known to the police.
- 36:10Speaker 3: Jorge Solis had a bit of a criminal record, mostly
- 36:14Speaker 3: kind of small petty crimes, a little bit of property crime,
- 36:17Speaker 3: but primarily he had drug crimes going on in his record.
- 36:22Speaker 1: Interviews with neighbors on the mountain revealed that a man
- 36:25Speaker 1: fitting Solis' description had been spotted with Anna by the
- 36:29Speaker 1: car early on Saturday morning.
- 36:33Speaker 4: I rolled the window down and said, you guys stuck,
- 36:34Speaker 4: need help. Do you remember what this female looked like
- 36:37Speaker 4: at all?
- 36:37Speaker 8: I remember very skinny.
- 36:40Speaker 5: Very skinny, straight black hair.
- 36:45Speaker 1: Later that day, the same neighbors spotted the same man
- 36:49Speaker 1: further down the mountain. But this time, he was alone.
- 36:53Speaker 3: 100% remember, without a shadow of a doubt, we picked
- 36:57Speaker 3: up that crazy kid in the back of the truck.
- 37:00Speaker 4: Do you remember what he was wearing?
- 37:03Speaker 5: I remember big, baggy blue pants.
- 37:06Speaker 4: And I remember a big jacket.
- 37:09Speaker 3: He had that, I don't know whether it was, you know,
- 37:11Speaker 3: mentally ill or drug-induced, but he was suffering some psychosis.
- 37:18Speaker 4: At that point, he became our number one suspect.
- 37:24Speaker 1: A search of Anna's vehicle revealed promising leads.
- 37:28Speaker 4: Anything here you guys see that you're gonna need for evidence?
- 37:34Speaker 3: In the midst of that search, we had located several
- 37:36Speaker 3: receipts from Walmart located in Rifle, Colorado. At that time,
- 37:43Speaker 3: CBI had sent agents to request surveillance around the approximate
- 37:47Speaker 3: times that we saw on the receipts.
- 37:52Speaker 1: CCTV showed Anna with an unknown male.
- 37:57Speaker 4: The surveillance footage around the store picks him up.
- 38:00Speaker 3: Getting out of her car, walking into the store, and
- 38:03Speaker 3: right as they walk in the store, there's a great
- 38:05Speaker 3: shot of the two of them, where you can see
- 38:07Speaker 3: most of their faces.
- 38:10Speaker 1: Anna's companion was wearing the same jacket and pants described
- 38:14Speaker 1: by the witnesses who saw them on the mountain. Other
- 38:18Speaker 1: evidence also linked him to the crime scene.
- 38:23Speaker 3: The male scene with Anna Rescoe has a very identifiable
- 38:28Speaker 3: baseball cap on it.
- 38:31Speaker 4: We then locate this ball cap inside the vehicle.
- 38:38Speaker 1: The man was now positively identified as Jorge Salas.
- 38:45Speaker 3: The Walmart surveillance became a crucial piece of evidence because
- 38:48Speaker 3: it linked the two of them together, which what we
- 38:51Speaker 3: knew was the last known person she was with, and
- 38:54Speaker 3: to the car.
- 38:55Speaker 4: We see him get in the car and drive away.
- 39:02Speaker 3: How do we go from a shopping trip to Walmart
- 39:05Speaker 3: to Anna Harsko's death?
- 39:08Speaker 1: Despite the breakthrough, the trail now went cold.
- 39:15Speaker 3: Ten days after the investigation had started, we had no sign,
- 39:21Speaker 3: no word of anybody seeing or hearing from Jorge Solis.
- 39:26Speaker 4: And then we kind of catch a break.
- 39:29Speaker 1: In Grand Junction... 95 miles away from the crime scene,
- 39:33Speaker 1: a member of the public called the police about a
- 39:36Speaker 1: man acting suspiciously.
- 39:43Speaker 3: Officers with the Grand Junction Police Department were dispatched to
- 39:46Speaker 3: the area.
- 39:46Speaker 4: Hey, what's going on? Can you come talk to me, sir?
- 39:53Speaker 4: What's your name? What's your last name? What's that? Well,
- 40:01Speaker 4: you do, actually. In this case, you do, because there's
- 40:04Speaker 4: suspicion of criminal activity, okay? So you got to identify yourself.
- 40:10Speaker 4: I can't hear you. He says his name is Jay Santos.
- 40:15Speaker 3: This officer is not convinced that this person is being
- 40:18Speaker 3: completely honest with him.
- 40:20Speaker 4: Is Jay your actual legal name, or is it.
- 40:25Speaker 4: What? Is Jay your legal name, or is it something else?
- 40:30Speaker 6: Okay, so what's your legal name?
- 40:35Speaker 3: George. One of the officers remembers reading the bulletin about
- 40:40Speaker 3: the warrant we had for a homicide suspect, and they're like, absolutely,
- 40:43Speaker 3: this is the guy we're looking for.
- 40:44Speaker 4: All right, man, so you're under arrest. You've got warrants.
- 40:47Speaker 4: I'm sure you knew that. That's my warrant on. Others,
- 40:50Speaker 4: a few of them, we'll explain. Can't take him out
- 40:53Speaker 4: of my car.
- 40:55Speaker 1: There's an unease in this interaction where he's obviously being
- 40:58Speaker 1: a bit cagey. Certainly psychologically, he's trying to evade the
- 41:04Speaker 1: answers to the questions. And he's probably trying to be
- 41:06Speaker 1: strategic about it, but in the end, he gets detained anyway.
- 41:13Speaker 3: When Jorge was picked up by Grand Junction Police, he
- 41:16Speaker 3: had a backpack with him. And we locate several items...
- 41:20Speaker 3: that were, without a doubt, inside the cabin. We had
- 41:25Speaker 3: contacted the cabin owner, and she had confirmed they were
- 41:29Speaker 3: in the basement of the house.
- 41:33Speaker 1: Salas' fingerprint was also found on a bottle in the cabin.
- 41:39Speaker 4: We're positive this is the man who killed Anna Resco.
- 41:44Speaker 1: Agents from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation now conducted an interrogation.
- 41:51Speaker 9: You're not the first person who, in a cold, snowy area,
- 41:54Speaker 9: borrowed somebody's house for a little bit to lay up
- 41:56Speaker 9: for a while and warm up and stuff. But something
- 41:58Speaker 9: in that house, man, something went crazy between you two.
- 42:03Speaker 9: So do you know what happened? And you just don't
- 42:05Speaker 9: want to tell me?
- 42:07Speaker 12: I mean, do you know what happened?
- 42:08Speaker 2: No.
- 42:08Speaker 12: Do you know, like, what happened?
- 42:10Speaker 8: No.
- 42:13Speaker 9: Talk me through that, man.
- 42:15Speaker 4: I think they got spun up on dope.
- 42:19Speaker 3: They're somewhat lost or not really sure where they're going,
- 42:22Speaker 3: he now starts getting paranoid that she is a narc.
- 42:26Speaker 9: But you picked the house that you were walking to.
- 42:28Speaker 7: What do you mean by that?
- 42:31Speaker 10: Okay, you're not saying.
- 42:37Speaker 9: Anna was sacrificed.
- 42:43Speaker 5: What could have been you?
- 42:45Speaker 9: Well, you think you could have been the one that
- 42:49Speaker 9: was That was killed?
- 42:51Speaker 3: Yeah.
- 42:54Speaker 1: He has this bizarre story that he was being set
- 42:57Speaker 1: up and that she had to be sacrificed. And that
- 43:01Speaker 1: sounds to me like a almost what's called dissociative fugue
- 43:07Speaker 1: when you're like not really there. And you're taking drugs,
- 43:11Speaker 1: and we know that they took drugs and that they
- 43:13Speaker 1: took them together. And you're just somewhere else. You're on
- 43:17Speaker 1: a different planet, and you have your own thoughts about
- 43:20Speaker 1: what's going on in the world. And it translates into
- 43:23Speaker 1: misperceiving reality in very weird ways.
- 43:27Speaker 9: I want to know what caused you to kill Anna.
- 43:32Speaker 9: We don't know why that happened. Well, we think you do,
- 43:37Speaker 9: and that's what you don't want to tell us. But
- 43:39Speaker 9: as of now, it's just gonna stay as, I don't
- 43:41Speaker 9: know why I killed her. I just killed her. That's
- 43:46Speaker 9: how you.
- 43:51Speaker 12: Want it to be?
- 43:54Speaker 4: Okay.
- 43:56Speaker 1: What's striking is that he seems to accept that he
- 43:59Speaker 1: killed her at this point, and he isn't really making
- 44:03Speaker 1: an effort to patch together a plausible story for the cops.
- 44:07Speaker 9: Did you tell her what you were going to do?
- 44:16Speaker 3: Jorge Solis made a conscious decision to end Ana Riscón' s life.
- 44:21Speaker 4: Based on the scene, we know she fought because the
- 44:24Speaker 4: house was torn apart.
- 44:26Speaker 3: But he went from such a violent act to, within hours,
- 44:31Speaker 3: talking to people on the street nonchalantly like nothing had happened.
- 44:36Speaker 4: That tells you the kind of man he was.
- 44:41Speaker 1: Investigators had enough evidence to charge Jorge Salas with Ana's murder.
- 44:48Speaker 1: On March 3rd, 2023, he was sentenced to 42 years
- 44:53Speaker 1: in prison following a plea deal.
- 44:58Speaker 18: The verdict is not really what we wanted.
- 45:01Speaker 13: He took that chance for her to live life, to
- 45:06Speaker 13: be a mother, you know, to her babies, and he
- 45:10Speaker 13: took that from them.
- 45:12Speaker 18: You know, they need her.
- 45:13Speaker 4: And she loved them so much.
- 45:19Speaker 14: Anna's story is a particularly tragic one. She tried to
- 45:23Speaker 14: build a life for herself and her kids and just struggled, really,
- 45:28Speaker 14: to navigate this world. She kept falling on hard times,
- 45:32Speaker 14: but I think that she would constantly show that she
- 45:36Speaker 14: had the passion, the devotion to be a good mother.
- 45:40Speaker 14: She fought right up until the very end, even in
- 45:43Speaker 14: the face of senseless violence. She tried to fight for
- 45:48Speaker 14: her life and the life of her children.
- 45:54Speaker 15: She was the best sister I had. And I still
- 46:00Speaker 15: remember her with her good things. Not bad things, trouble things.
- 46:04Speaker 15: I still remember the trouble things because now they're funny.
- 46:07Speaker 3: And I.
- 46:09Speaker 10: Love her.
- 46:24Speaker 6: Thank you.