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BONUS: Potomac River Rapist CAUGHT! · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

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Speaker 1: You know, I've prosecuted many, many rape cases, and yes,
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Speaker 1: the rape victim, if she's not martyr, goes on, but
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Speaker 1: you're never the same. Ten women brutally raped, one of
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Speaker 1: them murdered. And that's that we know of ten women
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Speaker 1: in all brutally raped, but for years no answers crime
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Speaker 1: stories with Nancy Grace. When he came in, he came
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Speaker 1: in with force at the front of me, and then
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Speaker 1: at some point from there picked me up and flung
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Speaker 1: me onto my stomach, pulled my shirt over my head,
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Speaker 1: and that's when he tied my hands to my ankles.
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Speaker 1: He said he was going to kill me. I just
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Speaker 1: had this feeling like if I don't get out of here,
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Speaker 1: he's going to come back and do something else to me.
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Speaker 1: You felt like Superwoman. I like ripped the chords hanging
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Speaker 1: screaming out of the window. Help me, help me. They
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Speaker 1: had footsteps that took him out through the wooded area
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Speaker 1: and that's the last that he was ever seen. The
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Speaker 1: so called Potomac River rapists who sex assaults at least
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Speaker 1: ten women then murders one of them. I mean, I see, Grace,
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Speaker 1: this is crime stories. Thank you for being with us.
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Speaker 1: It was Christine Merziyan, just twenty nine years old, raped
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Speaker 1: and murdered ten women in all brutally raped, but for
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Speaker 1: years no answers. Again, I mean, I see grace. This
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Speaker 1: is crime stories. Thank you for being with us. How
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Speaker 1: does someone escape for so long? You were just hearing
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Speaker 1: one of the victims of the Potomac River rape is
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Speaker 1: speaking to NBC four. Now take a listen to WUSA
2:02
Speaker 1: non reporter Mike Dunstan. Luisa Human is a walker. I
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Speaker 1: never worried before, but that'll change. Gully and Covelle is
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Speaker 1: a biker. You're on a biker going faster than anybody else.
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Speaker 1: And Karen Mitchell is a jogger. I try to stay
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Speaker 1: where there's a lot of people and cars and stuff.
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Speaker 1: You hear about what happened, Yeah, definitely I was. My
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Speaker 1: car was blocked in last night. Because of all the
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Speaker 1: police tape, I couldn't get it. It was a beautiful
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Speaker 1: Sunday afternoon. Some folks were out here taking a stroll,
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Speaker 1: but they walked into something ugly, a crime scene. About
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Speaker 1: ten feet from the sidewalk. They found a woman's lifeless
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Speaker 1: body right here in the woods. I think I'll wear
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Speaker 1: my pepper gas a little more visible, and I usually done.
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Speaker 1: That's about it. You gotta keep going on and things happen,
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Speaker 1: and there's really nothing you can do. You know, can't
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Speaker 1: be too careful, otherwise I wouldn't be able to dug
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Speaker 1: anywhere living. Indeed, see, I've lived here about five years.
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Speaker 1: It's terrible to say, but these random crimes happen in
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Speaker 1: every neighborhood, and you keep hearing you and I'll never
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Speaker 1: expect it here. What happens everywhere in the worst neighborhoods
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Speaker 1: and the best neighborhoods. You still have to have a
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Speaker 1: light with me. An all star panel. Ashley Willcott judge,
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Speaker 1: trial lawyer, court TV anchor at Ashley Wilcott dot com.
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Speaker 1: Cloyd Steiger thirty six years Seattle PD author Seattle's Forgotten
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Speaker 1: serial Killer, Gary Jane Grant at Cloyd Steiger dot com.
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Speaker 1: Renowned psychoanalyst out of Beverly Hills. Doctor Bethany Marshall at
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Speaker 1: doctor Bethany Marshall dot com, Noted South Carolina medical examiner,
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Speaker 1: author of homicide Investigation field Guide doctor at Michelle Dupree.
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Speaker 1: But right now to Crime Online dot com investigator reporter
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Speaker 1: Levi Page ten women brutally raped. One of them murdered.
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Speaker 1: And that's that we know of Levi. Where does it
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Speaker 1: all start, Nancy. This man has been described by the
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Speaker 1: FBI as the Potomac River rapist. Is modus operandi is
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Speaker 1: a blitz, a tech. He would sneak up on his victims.
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Speaker 1: He had a knife, sometimes a screwdriver. He would throw
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Speaker 1: blankets or towels over their heads, and then he would
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Speaker 1: rape them. In many instances, this happened in the nineties,
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Speaker 1: he would break into the victims home while they were
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Speaker 1: not there, and then he would wait hours for them
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Speaker 1: to return. He amassed ten victims. Some of the victims
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Speaker 1: were raped in their own home, Some were out walking
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Speaker 1: around or jogging. One woman had an infant in her
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Speaker 1: home Nancy, when he raped her. And most of the
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Speaker 1: attacks happened from eight pm to eleven pm at night.
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Speaker 1: To Judge Bethany Marshall's psychoanalyst out of la that tells
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Speaker 1: me a lot. Now I'm a little concerned about the
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Speaker 1: conflicting ms. Somewhile women are out walking or jogging, some
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Speaker 1: he goes into their home and waits for hours. You know,
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Speaker 1: I know, you think this is crazy. Doctor Bethany Marshall.
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Speaker 1: But it never failed. When someone was caught you skulking
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Speaker 1: around a woman's home or peeping tom's, they go on
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Speaker 1: to much worse crimes. I don't know the psychological reason
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Speaker 1: for that, but I know that it's true because I
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Speaker 1: saw that unfold over ten years prosecuting. You get a
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Speaker 1: peeping Tom, you can guarantee he's already done another felony
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Speaker 1: or he will, because I've just seen it unfold so
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Speaker 1: many times. Many people say it can't be the same
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Speaker 1: person because they've got different emos. That's not true, doctor
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Speaker 1: Bethany dive In. Well, you know, rapists have particular subtypes,
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Speaker 1: but serial rapists have a lot in common with other
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Speaker 1: types of criminals. So the motivation is primarily criminality. The
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Speaker 1: fact that he was sitting in these women's houses for
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Speaker 1: hours on end shows that he has a prolific fantasy
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Speaker 1: life that just the act of waiting it's very exciting
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Speaker 1: to him. I do believe, as you were saying, that
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Speaker 1: this is a serial killer in the making. As we know,
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Speaker 1: perpetrators often escalate in the nature of their crimes. You know,
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Speaker 1: they do one crime and they become emboldened to do another.
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Speaker 1: And another. And I think this type of the serial
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Speaker 1: rapist is actually somebody who uses sadism. I know you
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Speaker 1: always tease me about this, but the m O was
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Speaker 1: serial rapists and serial killers is inflicting harm upon the
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Speaker 1: victim in order to enhance their sexual pleasure. I think
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Speaker 1: the fact that he threw a towel over the victim's
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Speaker 1: heads is that he was savvy enough to know that
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Speaker 1: he did not want to be ided. He uses a screwdriver,
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Speaker 1: I think that that's the precursor to eventually wanting to
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Speaker 1: use a knife and to kill and name in order
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Speaker 1: to enhance his sexual pleasure. So the screwdriver or the
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Speaker 1: knife is to kill or name strictly to enhance his pleasure.
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Speaker 1: Is that what you're self absolutely correct, because I would
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Speaker 1: have thought it would be to subdue the person, but
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Speaker 1: you're saying it's for his own benefit. So with serial
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Speaker 1: killers and serial rapists, aggression and sex are processed through
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Speaker 1: the same parts of the brain. And for sociopaths it's
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Speaker 1: very They have very low levels of excitement and life
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Speaker 1: unless they're doing something cruel. So somehow, for the serial
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Speaker 1: rapists and murders, sex and cruelty have become fused in
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Speaker 1: their mind, and because sociopaths psychopaths have a lot of
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Speaker 1: inner emptiness, they have low levels of arousal. The only
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Speaker 1: way they can enhance their sexual arousal is to see
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Speaker 1: fear on the victim's face, to maim the middle the victim,
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Speaker 1: to hurt the victims. So this type of rapist is
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Speaker 1: not just trying to reassure himself through having power or
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Speaker 1: telling himself, oh, the woman really wants me. This offender
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Speaker 1: wants to see fear on the woman's face. He cannot
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Speaker 1: achieve arousal an ejaculation unless there is some kind of
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Speaker 1: a fierce situation or sadism. This is often why these
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Speaker 1: serial rapists will mutilate the woman's genitoles or name her
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Speaker 1: in other ways, it's because it's exciting to them. Take
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Speaker 1: a listen to this FBI public service announcement. It's important
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Speaker 1: that we find that individual who is still on the loose,
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Speaker 1: so he not only has to be accountable for the
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Speaker 1: crimes he committed, but also can't hurt anyone else. In
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Speaker 1: Christine's case, a witness driving along Canal Road saw a
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Speaker 1: man trailing her as she walked home. Another man walking
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Speaker 1: his dog on a cliff above heard Christine screams. Her
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Speaker 1: body was discovered the next day and her purse was
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Speaker 1: found months later in the Potomac River. Since then, the
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Speaker 1: FBI laboratory has used DNA technology to link Christine's murderer
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Speaker 1: to set than other rapes in Montgomery County, Maryland. We've
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Speaker 1: been working with Montgomery County in the fbm's cases and
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Speaker 1: not actual assault. Investigators say the rapes and one attempted
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Speaker 1: rape date back to May nineteen ninety one and happened
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Speaker 1: within an eight mile radius in Maryland. They say the
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Speaker 1: Potomac River rapist has strong ties to the area. They
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Speaker 1: also say the rapist turn murderer attacked each of his
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Speaker 1: victims in the same way inside their homes, often with
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Speaker 1: their children present. He covered their heads with like a
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Speaker 1: pillow case or another blanket and then would commit his crime.
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Speaker 1: That is horrifying the terror put in these women's minds,
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Speaker 1: often with their children there. To ask you, willcott, judge,
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Speaker 1: trial lawyer, court TV anchor, what leverage does it give
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Speaker 1: the perp to have the child in the home, Because
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Speaker 1: a person is going to protect that child, whether it's
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Speaker 1: a parent, a caretaker, or a babysitter. They're gonna do, frankly,
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Speaker 1: whatever the purp tells them to do. So if the
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Speaker 1: purp says be quiet and take all your clothes off,
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Speaker 1: you're going to do it. You're more likely you're not
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Speaker 1: going to fight back because you don't want the child hurt.
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Speaker 1: Bottom line. You know, we saw that, didn't we. Cloyd
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Speaker 1: Steiger with the Golden State Killer who was caught through
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Speaker 1: familial DNA, you know, twenty thirty years after the murders
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Speaker 1: and rapes. He would attack women with children in the
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Speaker 1: home and they use them is leverage to make the
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Speaker 1: woman do what he said. Yeah, that's exactly right. I mean,
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Speaker 1: that's the maternal instinct. You know, you'll die before you
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Speaker 1: let your child get hurt. And so he's counting on that.
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Speaker 1: And I don't know if he intentionally planned that in
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Speaker 1: these cases or just happened to be that way, but
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Speaker 1: that was a big benefit to him to have that
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Speaker 1: go the way he wanted and then a break in
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Speaker 1: the case. Listen to WUSA nine. I'm Newsham. I'm the
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Speaker 1: chief of police with a much Palm police department here
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Speaker 1: in DZ eight. Between nineteen ninety one and nineteen ninety eight,
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Speaker 1: a man terrorized our community as he brutally preyed upon
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Speaker 1: and attacked multiple women across this region. Today, joined by
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Speaker 1: law enforcement partners, we collectively are announcing that an arrest
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Speaker 1: has been made of a man who was known as
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Speaker 1: the Potomac River rapist. The suspect in this case attacked
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Speaker 1: at least ten of women in and around Washington, DC.
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Speaker 1: His last known victim in Washington, DC was a twenty
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Speaker 1: nine year old congressional fellow who was murdered. Forensic evidence
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Speaker 1: linked the man to these crimes and was instrumental in
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Speaker 1: leading detectives to his location in Conway, South Carolina, where
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Speaker 1: he was placed under arrest. Based on the investigation, sixty
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Speaker 1: year old Giles Daniel Warwick of Conway, South Carolina, was
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Speaker 1: identified as a possible suspect through forensic genealogy work was
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Speaker 1: arrested in Conway, South Carolina. He will be extradited to
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Speaker 1: the district and charged with first degree murder. You will
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Speaker 1: also face additional charges stemming from the multiple sexual assaults
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Speaker 1: if he committed to Doctor Michelle Dupre, South Carolina medical examiner,
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Speaker 1: author of homicide investigation Field Guy, Doctor Dupre. This guy
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Speaker 1: is now being linked to cases back in the nineties.
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Speaker 1: How can DNA be called extracted and then saved for
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Speaker 1: so many years? Nancy, Likely it's going to be mitochondrial DNAs,
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Speaker 1: which simply means that it's different from the normal DNA
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Speaker 1: that we usually talk about. Mitochondrial DNA last a lot longer.
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Speaker 1: But the caveat with that is it can only be
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Speaker 1: tracked back to a maternal relative. But I don't understand
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Speaker 1: how does it stay viable for so many years, doctor
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Speaker 1: g pre Because this doesn't require to issue. This is
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Speaker 1: not in the nucleus of cell. This can be in
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Speaker 1: our bumrilation, be in other places in that that would
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Speaker 1: still survive. Crime stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, we are
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Speaker 1: talking about the arrest of the Potomac River rapist and
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Speaker 1: we are learning so much. He's not just a rapist,
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Speaker 1: he is a murderer. What can you tell me, Leavi
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Speaker 1: Page about his last known victim, twenty nine year old
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Speaker 1: Christine Merseyon She was found bludge and dead in Georgetown. Question.
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Speaker 1: I don't think this is its only murder victim, but
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Speaker 1: what can you tell me about her? Nancy? She was
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Speaker 1: twenty nine years old. She was a biochemist. In nineteen
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Speaker 1: ninety eight, she went to a friend's cookout in the
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Speaker 1: Georgetown area of DC. She'd been sick, she had the flu,
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Speaker 1: and after the cook out, some of her friends were
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Speaker 1: going to go out around town go dancing, but she
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Speaker 1: decided not to. She was going to go back to
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Speaker 1: the student housing at Georgetown University. She had an internship,
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Speaker 1: very very intelligent young woman. Witnesses told police that they
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Speaker 1: saw a man following her and that was the last
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Speaker 1: time that anyone seen her alive before she was brutally murdered.
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Speaker 1: She was raped, and she was beat to death Nancy
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Speaker 1: with a seventy three pound rock. Her body was found
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Speaker 1: in a wooded area alongside the road, so she was blushing,
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Speaker 1: dim with dead with a seventy three pound rock. You
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Speaker 1: are correct. I'm taking a look at her photo, Christine
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Speaker 1: Mercillon right now, it's at crime online dot com, and
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Speaker 1: she's just gorgeous. She's got her whole life in front
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Speaker 1: of her. Now I'm looking at the rock and it's
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Speaker 1: covered in her blood. Ashley Willcott, It's such a brutal
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Speaker 1: and such an elementary murder to just pick up a
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Speaker 1: rock that happens to be there and bludgeon someone dead. Well,
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Speaker 1: it's it's such a brutal way to do it, and
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Speaker 1: there's no empathy, there's no compassion. It's a crime of
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Speaker 1: opportunity and they pick up and do whatever they can
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Speaker 1: with that rock. But it also to me indicates such
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Speaker 1: an extreme amount of rage, hatred, all of the emotions
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Speaker 1: that would allow someone to do that without any remorse.
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Speaker 1: And this girl with everything before her biochemist, a congressional fellow,
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Speaker 1: walking home from a friend's to cook out and murdered.
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Speaker 1: I mean leavi Page. Georgetown is one of the most
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Speaker 1: desirable areas in DC, and the local news there when
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Speaker 1: this happened in the late nineties were interviewing people and
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Speaker 1: they didn't expect this to happen there because it is
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Speaker 1: a very sought after place to live in the DC
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Speaker 1: metro area. In DC. You know, it took more recent
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Speaker 1: developments in technology and the advent of public genealogy services
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Speaker 1: to crack this case. Explain how it was crack, Cloyd Steiger. Well,
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Speaker 1: they recovered DNA. I imagine they had rape kids and
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Speaker 1: things back in the day, and those were frozen and maintained,
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Speaker 1: and then they developed they tried to they likely tried
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Speaker 1: to run it INCODAS, which is the National DNA Data Bank,
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Speaker 1: and didn't get a hit. So what they do then
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Speaker 1: is they have to take raw DNA and reprocess in
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Speaker 1: what's called SNP or snap DNA, which is a different
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Speaker 1: FDRs WITH'SINCODAS, so they're not compatible. And that's what all
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Speaker 1: these genealogy services use. And so they run it through.
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Speaker 1: They're looking for certain markers and they can go they
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Speaker 1: score each marker and they have to have like a
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Speaker 1: thirty score or whatever, and they look at those people
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Speaker 1: who are likely distant cousins and to get as close
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Speaker 1: as they can, and then they have a genealogist actually
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Speaker 1: start following the family tree until they get down to
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Speaker 1: three or four possibles, and then it's up to the
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Speaker 1: police to go either voluntary assets for people for a
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Speaker 1: voluntary sample, or surreptitiously get it and compare one to
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Speaker 1: one using the str technology of the DNA that's compatible
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Speaker 1: with konus. Doctor Bethany Marshall, do you believe that this
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Speaker 1: is his only murder victim? Why or why not? I
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Speaker 1: do not believe this is his only murder victim, because
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Speaker 1: he seems to have all the markings of a serial killer.
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Speaker 1: He puts an enormous amount of energy into his activities.
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Speaker 1: He spends hours looking for victims. He seems to have
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Speaker 1: a certain type young women who are out jogging, walking,
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Speaker 1: walking home from a cookout like this. And one of
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Speaker 1: the things we know about serial killers, Nancy, is that
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Speaker 1: they can pop up and then go underground for months
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Speaker 1: or years, and then pop up again randomly. And one
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Speaker 1: of the reasons this happens is that they have prolific
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Speaker 1: fantasy lives, so they can often satisfy themselves with their
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Speaker 1: fantasy lives for years at a time, and then all
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Speaker 1: of a sudden it breaks over into the urge to kill. Also, Nancy, briefly,
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Speaker 1: that rock, a seventy three pound rock covered with blood. Usually,
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Speaker 1: when you ask me about the emma of the perpetrator,
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Speaker 1: I have all kinds of thoughts. But all I could
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Speaker 1: think about was this poor woman, you know, lying on
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Speaker 1: the ground. Maybe he asked her to life based down
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Speaker 1: and put the towel over her head and then bludgeoned her.
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Speaker 1: And I cannot imagine what a brutal scene that was
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Speaker 1: LEVI Page. These rapes and martyr occurred over years of time,
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Speaker 1: how many years do we know he was at work
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Speaker 1: between the first and the last that we know of victim.
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Speaker 1: So first victim was in nineteen ninety one and the
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Speaker 1: last victim was in nineteen ninety nine, the young woman
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Speaker 1: that was found beat to death without seventy three pound rock,
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Speaker 1: So about ten years. I have a strong reason to
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Speaker 1: suspect DNA's going to link him to other rapes and murders.
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Speaker 1: Ashley Wilcot with a DNA evidence stacking up against him
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Speaker 1: was the worst that can happen to him for rapes
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Speaker 1: and murders in DC, it is going to be life
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Speaker 1: without paroles. So most states allow capital punishment. However, the
19:30
Speaker 1: District of Columbia is one state that specifically does not.
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Speaker 1: As of nineteen seventy two. We wait as justice unfolds.
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Speaker 1: Nancy Grace signing off goodbye friend,