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The Resolved: The Dallas/Fort Worth ‘80s Murders Part 8 · Gone Cold - Texas True Crime

0:01
Speaker 1: The Gone Cold podcasts may contain violent or graphics subject matter.
0:05
Speaker 1: Listener discretion is advised. On the very day, fort Worth
0:18
Speaker 1: police detectives and officials met to form a special homicide
0:22
Speaker 1: task Force to investigate the disappearances and murders of Catherine Davis,
0:27
Speaker 1: Cindy Heller, Angela Ewart, and Sarah Kashka. Another victim was
0:32
Speaker 1: added to the list. At about eleven pm on Wednesday,
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Speaker 1: January ninth, nineteen eighty five, the body of a young
0:40
Speaker 1: woman was found in an unincorporated part of Terrant County,
0:43
Speaker 1: not far from the Fort Worth and Benbrook city limits,
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Speaker 1: alongside railroad tracks in a brushy field, fully clothed in
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Speaker 1: a violet colored jogging suit. Police immediately theorized the apparent
0:57
Speaker 1: homicide victim had not been raped, and educated guests that
1:01
Speaker 1: would later be confirmed not to get ahead of themselves.
1:05
Speaker 1: Detectives were most interested in the identity of the woman.
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Speaker 1: The next day, twenty year old Lisa Lynn Griffin, who
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Speaker 1: lived with her mother Levaughn at the Indian Creek Apartments
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Speaker 1: in Fort Worth's Westover Hills neighborhood, was reported missing. She
1:22
Speaker 1: hadn't been heard from since Tuesday evening, more than twenty
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Speaker 1: four hours before, when she phoned work to see if
1:29
Speaker 1: they needed her to come in. They didn't need her
1:32
Speaker 1: that night as business was slow, and the next day
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Speaker 1: she didn't show up for her shift. Later that day,
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Speaker 1: Lisa's nineteen seventy seven blue and white Ford Pento was
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Speaker 1: found in the parking lot of a shopping strip about
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Speaker 1: a half mile east of her home. It didn't take
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Speaker 1: long for authorities to identify the body found by railroad
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Speaker 1: tracks outside the city as hers. Lisa, a waitress at
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Speaker 1: local nightclub Buy Loose and receptionist at a local insurance agency,
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Speaker 1: had been shot once in her head, the bullet later
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Speaker 1: determined to be twenty two caliber. Within a couple days,
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Speaker 1: a twenty five year old man named Timothy Paul Volkmar
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Speaker 1: was charged in the crime. Long story short, Volkmar was
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Speaker 1: not the guy the cops were looking for, but instead
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Speaker 1: was a convenient suspect with mental health issues who had
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Speaker 1: been taken into custody under what were likely false pretenses.
2:30
Speaker 1: An officer with the Arrant County Sheriff's Office supposedly matched
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Speaker 1: a fingerprint found on the trunk of Lisa's car to
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Speaker 1: his fingerprint. Experts exonerated Volkmar. Within a few days, and
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Speaker 1: without any further evidence against him, he was released. It
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Speaker 1: wasn't the last nor the worst embarrassment for the department
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Speaker 1: in this case. Meanwhile, the Fort Worth Police Special Homicide
2:57
Speaker 1: Task Force felt slighted by the share of office lack
3:01
Speaker 1: of transparency. They hadn't informed the unit of Volkmar's arrest.
3:06
Speaker 1: The task force had a special interest in the case
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Speaker 1: for a few different reasons. Lisa, like a couple of
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Speaker 1: the other victims they were investigating, was a member of
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Speaker 1: Broadway Baptist Church, and she'd worked at Mama's Pizza on
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Speaker 1: Camp Bouie Boulevard with twenty three year old Katherine Davis,
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Speaker 1: who at that time had been missing for three months.
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Speaker 1: Lisa had also looked into enrolling at a fashion merchandising
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Speaker 1: college inside the apparel mart in Dallas, where Dallas murder
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Speaker 1: victim Mary Till had once modeled as had missing person
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Speaker 1: Angela Ewart. There was one more connection, though they never
3:46
Speaker 1: came out and said so, it seemed obvious. Detective's next
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Speaker 1: suspect was a man connected to the body that had
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Speaker 1: just been found and identified on the campus of Texas
3:57
Speaker 1: Christian University. A man named Nathan Gaspard. Authorities certainly liked
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Speaker 1: him for the murder of twenty three year old Cindy Heller,
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Speaker 1: his fiancee, and since he also had a connection to
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Speaker 1: Lisa Griffin through his job. She was a receptionist at
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Speaker 1: an advertising company for which gas barred landscaped the grounds,
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Speaker 1: they were absolutely interested in finding out if that was
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Speaker 1: just a coincidence. He'd even introduced Cindy to Lisa. Two
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Speaker 1: recently slain women connected in such a way was just
4:31
Speaker 1: too much, it seemed, seemed, is the key word. Slowly,
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Speaker 1: both by chance and due to an unexpected investigator, evidence
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Speaker 1: in Lisa's case trickled in about two weeks after her murder,
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Speaker 1: Lisa's driver's license and a receipt for a money order
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Speaker 1: she'd made out to a Fort Worth photo album company
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Speaker 1: were found not far away from her home in a
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Speaker 1: rain gutter in the Bristol Court apartments in the Westover
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Speaker 1: Hills neighborhood, near where her car had been found. Oddly,
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Speaker 1: a grocery list Lisa had made was found at a
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Speaker 1: residence on the forty six hundred block of South Drive
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Speaker 1: West in Wedgewood, about seven miles from where the driver's
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Speaker 1: license and receipt were found. Just a few days after
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Speaker 1: her body was discovered. Another discovery had been made, though
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Speaker 1: the Terrant County Sheriff's Office managed to keep it quiet
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Speaker 1: till the end of January, almost three weeks, and it's
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Speaker 1: no mystery why they sought to suppress the information. When
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Speaker 1: Lisa's seventy seven Ford pento was discovered at a small
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Speaker 1: shopping strip off Burton Hill Road, deputies and investigators left
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Speaker 1: no stone unturned as they searched for evidence in the area,
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Speaker 1: or so they thought. On January sixteenth, a ten year
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Speaker 1: old Nancy drew Fan, whose father discribed as a murder
6:01
Speaker 1: mystery buff decided to look for clues on her own.
6:05
Speaker 1: At the back of the shopping center, hidden behind a
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Speaker 1: heat pump connected to Quicksack convenience store, the little girl
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Speaker 1: found an unspent twenty two caliber bullet and Lisa Griffin's
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Speaker 1: car keys. Using a piece of paper so she wouldn't
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Speaker 1: touch the evidence, the girl collected the keys. She used
6:24
Speaker 1: a leaf to move the twenty two cartridge. There's little
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Speaker 1: doubt that this ten year old was exceptional. Still, it
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Speaker 1: was another embarrassment for the sheriff's office when the girl's
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Speaker 1: father finally came to the press with the story, but
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Speaker 1: they certainly made up for it in the long run.
6:45
Speaker 1: Although Lisa's name would remain on the task force's roster
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Speaker 1: for some time, her case was solved much faster than
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Speaker 1: the few others that would eventually have resolution. On Friday,
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Speaker 1: June twenty first, nineteen eighty five, less than six months
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Speaker 1: after Lisa was killed, Terrant County Sheriff's Office investigators arrested
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Speaker 1: and charged nineteen year old Michael Wayne Gooden with her
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Speaker 1: murder after he led them to the scene of the crime.
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Speaker 1: Gooden claimed Lisa's death was nothing more than an assisted suicide,
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Speaker 1: a kind of mercy killing, as he described her as
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Speaker 1: inconsolably despondent about several recent turns her life had made,
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Speaker 1: including troubles with her boyfriend, a drug problem, an arrest
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Speaker 1: for passing a hot check, and an abortion she'd undergone.
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Speaker 1: The young man claimed, though he'd only met her a
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Speaker 1: week prior, Gooden said he felt compelled to help her
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Speaker 1: die since she couldn't bring herself to do it. Lisa
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Speaker 1: offered him a check for a couple hundred dollars and
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Speaker 1: her car as payment. Gooden maintained at trial. This defense
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Speaker 1: seemingly worked a little. Though Goodness was found guilty of
8:01
Speaker 1: Lisa Griffin's murder, a crime Texas juris liked to punish
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Speaker 1: to the fullest extent generally, he was sentenced to only
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Speaker 1: forty three years in prison. Terrant County medical examiner Nizam
8:14
Speaker 1: Pirwani testified at trial that before being shot to death,
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Speaker 1: Lisa had received a blunt force injury to her head
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Speaker 1: and significant self defense wounds elsewhere. By the time Lisa's
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Speaker 1: case was solved, the Fort Worth Police Special Homicide Task
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Speaker 1: Force had long maintained that they didn't believe all their
8:34
Speaker 1: cases were the work of the same killer. In fact,
8:38
Speaker 1: they'd been saying for some time that they believed a
8:41
Speaker 1: couple of the murders were at the hands of someone
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Speaker 1: close to or well acquainted with the victim. Though Lisa's
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Speaker 1: mother didn't believe that Gooden knew her daughter at all,
8:52
Speaker 1: law enforcement undoubtedly thought that her case fit in this
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Speaker 1: particular category, and there was another on their list in
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Speaker 1: which they believed the same the savage murder of ginger
9:04
Speaker 1: Lynn Hayden, US Postal Service employee Sharon Hayden arrived home
9:22
Speaker 1: early in the morning of Wednesday, September fifth, nineteen eighty four,
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Speaker 1: at about three forty five am, her unit at the
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Speaker 1: Village Apartments in West fort Worth's Arlington Heights neighborhood was
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Speaker 1: dark and quiet. Believing her eighteen year old daughter, Ginger,
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Speaker 1: was already asleep, Sharon started getting ready for bed herself.
9:44
Speaker 1: In the bathroom, she noticed a small, red tinged puddle
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Speaker 1: of water on the floor. Believing Ginger had dyed some
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Speaker 1: clothing in the bathtub and carelessly left the water on
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Speaker 1: the floor, Sharon grabbed a towel and laid it over
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Speaker 1: the puddle. Then she went to bed. Next thing Sharon knew,
10:04
Speaker 1: an alarm clock was incessantly buzzing in the other room.
10:08
Speaker 1: She looked over at her own clock. It was six
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Speaker 1: a m. She yelled at her daughter to turn off
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Speaker 1: the alarm, but there was no response and it continued
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Speaker 1: to buzz loudly. Sharon got up and headed to Ginger's room.
10:23
Speaker 1: She opened the door and flipped on the light switch. Ginger,
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Speaker 1: who worked as a cook, cashier and waitress at the
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Speaker 1: local restaurant, the Skinny Haven, and was to attend her
10:34
Speaker 1: second day of classes at the University of Texas Arlington
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Speaker 1: that morning, laid nude in a kneeling position, slumped over
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Speaker 1: next to her bed. The bedclothes were covered in blood
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Speaker 1: and a puddle had collected on the floor under Ginger.
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Speaker 1: Sharon's mind wouldn't accept what had happened, even though the
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Speaker 1: room was covered in it. She saw no blood. Ginger
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Speaker 1: was teasing her, Sharon's brain insisted to let her know
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Speaker 1: she'd figured out the joke. Sharon bent down and touched
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Speaker 1: Ginger's leg. It was cold, indescribable. Shock overwhelmed the mother
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Speaker 1: as she realized her daughter was gone. Struggling, she stumbled
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Speaker 1: down the hall to the phone, holding onto the walls
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Speaker 1: to make up for her weak knees and light head.
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Speaker 1: Sharon called the police. My baby's dead, she told them.
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Speaker 1: She hung up the phone and screamed. Fort Worth police
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Speaker 1: officers and detectives arrived at the scene shortly thereafter and
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Speaker 1: discovered no signs of forced entry, an unlocked sliding glass
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Speaker 1: patio door, and a teenager's bedroom that had every indication
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Speaker 1: of an intense struggle. Ginger had been repeatedly slashed and
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Speaker 1: stabbed fifty seven times. It was later determined the over
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Speaker 1: kill suggested a crime of passion. The murder weapon laid
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Speaker 1: at Ginger's feet a knife that belonged to a set
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Speaker 1: in the kitchen. The wood handle was broken and the
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Speaker 1: blade bloodied and bent. Inside the bathroom, police found bloodstained socks.
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Speaker 1: The killer had used the socks as makeshift gloves, which
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Speaker 1: were later found to have a splintered piece of the
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Speaker 1: wooden handled knife the murder weapon tangled within its fibers.
12:30
Speaker 1: A pubic hair was also found on the socks, though
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Speaker 1: there was no indication Ginger had been raped. The murder,
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Speaker 1: for all police knew at the time, was motiveless. Both
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Speaker 1: the pubic hair and the blood stains on the bath
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Speaker 1: towel were preserved for future testing, though the significance of
12:49
Speaker 1: this evidence would not be understood until much later. The
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Speaker 1: discovery of Ginger's body sparked a major criminal investigation in
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Speaker 1: the city. Police arrived at and secured the crime scene early,
13:05
Speaker 1: which was so gruesome it left even the most seasoned
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Speaker 1: officers visibly shaken. As detectives worked to piece together the
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Speaker 1: events surrounding the teenager's tragic death, the investigation intensified, leading
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Speaker 1: them to focus on those closest to the victim Ginger's
13:24
Speaker 1: last moments were scrutinized by police with help from her mother, Sharon,
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Speaker 1: who told police that her daughter had been romantically involved
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Speaker 1: with a local young man named Jeff. Detectives wasted no
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Speaker 1: time and tracked down Jeff at his nearby home that night,
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Speaker 1: waking him from sleep. They took him to the station
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Speaker 1: for questioning, though he was not charged with any crime.
13:49
Speaker 1: At the police station, Jeff expressed shock and sorrow upon
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Speaker 1: hearing of Ginger's death. He recounted their brief but intense relationship,
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Speaker 1: which had begun the previous summer. Jeff explained that he
14:03
Speaker 1: had met Ginger at a pool party at her apartment complex,
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Speaker 1: where he also befriended another young man, Ryland Shane Absalom. Shane,
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Speaker 1: a quiet and introverted individual, lived with his father above
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Speaker 1: Ginger's apartment. Jeoff recalled spending much of the summer together
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Speaker 1: with both he and Ginger, but on the day of
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Speaker 1: the murder, Labor Day, his time with Shane was more limited.
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Speaker 1: According to Jeff, he'd spent much of the afternoon with
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Speaker 1: Shane while Ginger was at work. After she got off,
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Speaker 1: the boys parted ways so Jeff could spend a romantic
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Speaker 1: evening with Ginger. They discussed their plans for the future,
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Speaker 1: something especially important to them after having recently learned that
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Speaker 1: she was pregnant. Ginger drove Jeff home and around eleven
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Speaker 1: thirty pm and returned to the apartment when jeff FFF's
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Speaker 1: story checked out. The investigation soon turned towards Shane Absalom.
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Speaker 1: His father, who was present during interviews, reported hearing screams
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Speaker 1: from the apartment the mourning Ginger's body was discovered. He
15:15
Speaker 1: also reported seeing his son wearing a reddish stained T shirt,
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Speaker 1: which Shane claimed had been caused by a strawberry soda mishap.
15:25
Speaker 1: Despite an extensive search of the home, the shirt was
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Speaker 1: never found. However, police did discover a pair of Shane's
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Speaker 1: shoes with a bloodstain on them. The teenager, anyway, denied
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Speaker 1: any involvement and refused to take a polygraph test when asked.
15:42
Speaker 1: It wasn't long before detectives exhausted their scrutiny of him.
15:47
Speaker 1: Dozens of other interviews were conducted, but no concrete leads emerged.
15:53
Speaker 1: The case became more complicated as Fort Worth residents already
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Speaker 1: on edge over a string of unsolved murders that occurred
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Speaker 1: after Gingers continued to speculate that a serial killer might
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Speaker 1: be operating in the area. The Fort Worth Star Telegram
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Speaker 1: even suggested a possible connection between Ginger's murder and other
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Speaker 1: recent deaths of young women. The cops kept surprisingly tight
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Speaker 1: lipped about Ginger's case in general, and a month after
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Speaker 1: announced they had a strong suspect, police were not talking
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Speaker 1: about forty four year old freelance photographer Remsen Newbold Wolf,
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Speaker 1: who was arrested for a series of rapes and suspicion
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Speaker 1: of involvement in Ginger's murder. A few months later. Wolf
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Speaker 1: lived in and was taken into custody at the same
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Speaker 1: complex as the murdered teenager, the Village Apartments. A survivor
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Speaker 1: had identified Wolf as the man who had raped her.
16:52
Speaker 1: In the attack against her and six other women, the
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Speaker 1: rapist had taken photos of the victims using a Polaroid
16:59
Speaker 1: or polaroids type camera. Though police sought the device as
17:03
Speaker 1: well as pictures of Ginger Hayden in Wolfe's apartment, they
17:07
Speaker 1: found neither. In fact, they found no evidence against the man,
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Speaker 1: only a secret media source whose information could not be
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Speaker 1: corroborated by other witnesses. Or evidence. Suspicion toward Wolf and
17:23
Speaker 1: the investigation of him for the murder of fifteen year
17:25
Speaker 1: old Sarah Kashka and the disappearance of twenty one year
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Speaker 1: old Angela Ewart were among the reasons Ginger Hayden's name
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Speaker 1: ended up on the Police Special Homicide Task Force's investigative roster,
17:38
Speaker 1: which by the end of January nineteen eighty five included
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Speaker 1: seven names. Hers wasn't the last to be added. News
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Speaker 1: about Ginger's case fizzled out as it went cold, and
17:51
Speaker 1: for decades her name could only be found listed among
17:54
Speaker 1: other eighties murder victims. In October of nineteen eighty five,
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Speaker 1: portions of a psychological profile of Ginger's killer created by
18:05
Speaker 1: the FBI were released. The suspect, the report said, was
18:10
Speaker 1: between the ages of seventeen and twenty five, knew Ginger
18:14
Speaker 1: Hayden and was familiar with her apartment, and had an
18:17
Speaker 1: explosive temper. If he had a criminal record, it was
18:23
Speaker 1: most likely for impulsive offenses such as the destruction of
18:27
Speaker 1: property or assault. The FBI profiles of other victims were
18:32
Speaker 1: kept quiet for the most part, but Fort Worth Police
18:35
Speaker 1: Lieutenant Tommy Swan said they suggested multiple killers instead of
18:39
Speaker 1: connections between the cases. More than two and a half
18:44
Speaker 1: decades later, police discovered that as far as Ginger's case went,
18:48
Speaker 1: the FBI profile was dead. On On August twenty ninth,
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Speaker 1: twenty ten, as it approached the twenty sixth anniversary of
18:58
Speaker 1: the savage and to rave murder of eighteen year old
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Speaker 1: Ginger Lynn Hayden, the police in Sierra Vista, Arizona arrested
19:06
Speaker 1: a suspect on a murder warrant out of Texas. Beginning
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Speaker 1: in two thousand and two, evidence from Ginger's case was
19:14
Speaker 1: continually sent out to the crime lab to try and
19:17
Speaker 1: isolate the DNA profile of her killer, but it wasn't
19:20
Speaker 1: until two thousand and nine that one was obtained, when
19:24
Speaker 1: it was some on the towel Sharon Hayden had used
19:27
Speaker 1: to soak up a puddle of water in her bathroom
19:30
Speaker 1: the night her daughter was slain. Fort Worth Police sergeant
19:33
Speaker 1: and cold case unit founder J. D. Thornton and detectives
19:37
Speaker 1: quickly traveled to Arizona took a DNA sample from a
19:41
Speaker 1: forty five year old man named Ryland Shane Absalon, who
19:46
Speaker 1: of course had been a primary suspect since the get go. Absalon,
19:51
Speaker 1: seventeen at the time of the murder, was a former
19:54
Speaker 1: classmate of Gingers at Arlington Heights High School and again
19:58
Speaker 1: resided in the same apartment complex. After his arrest, he
20:03
Speaker 1: was extradited back to Fort Worth, where he tearfully confessed
20:07
Speaker 1: and was charged, indicted, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison.
20:13
Speaker 1: Everything came out at trial, including confessions Absalom had made
20:18
Speaker 1: to others while in group therapy at a drug counseling program.
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Speaker 1: Ginger had said no to romantic advances made by Absalom.
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Speaker 1: A weak man who couldn't handle simply being friends. He
20:31
Speaker 1: snuck into her apartment while she was gone, entering through
20:34
Speaker 1: an unlocked patio door. While hiding in her closet, Absalom
20:40
Speaker 1: listened as Ginger returned home, took a shower, and crawled
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Speaker 1: into bed. Then he attacked. Absalom stabbed Ginger repeatedly in
20:50
Speaker 1: her chest, pelvis, and head. Got tired, stopped, heard her moan,
20:56
Speaker 1: and stabbed her again until she was gone. In her bathroom,
21:01
Speaker 1: he cleaned up before leaving the apartment, ditching his clothing
21:05
Speaker 1: in a nearby dumpster and returning to he and his
21:08
Speaker 1: father's apartment. Upstairs from Ginger and her mother, Sharon. Perhaps
21:14
Speaker 1: it isn't beyond the realm of possibility that Ryland Shane
21:17
Speaker 1: Absalom has more than one victim, but if he does,
21:21
Speaker 1: it's doubtful any of them are among the names on
21:24
Speaker 1: the fort Worth Police Special Homicide Task Forces list. One
21:28
Speaker 1: recently solved area crime, however, was perpetrated by a man
21:33
Speaker 1: more easily theorized to have other area victims. In the
21:50
Speaker 1: midst of the fort Worth Police Special Homicide Task Force's
21:53
Speaker 1: initial push to solve the murders of Mary Till, Ginger Hayden,
21:58
Speaker 1: Catherine Davis, Cindy Heller, Sarah Kashka, and Lisa Griffin, and
22:04
Speaker 1: the disappearance of Angela Ewart, a twenty two year old
22:07
Speaker 1: young woman named Terry Ann McAdams was brutally assaulted and
22:12
Speaker 1: killed in nearby Arlington. Originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, Terry
22:18
Speaker 1: had come to Arlington in nineteen eighty four to attend
22:21
Speaker 1: the University of Texas, where she was studying finance. Terry
22:26
Speaker 1: was no different than so many other young women in
22:28
Speaker 1: the Dallas Fort Worth metroplex at the time, justifiably obsessed
22:34
Speaker 1: over becoming the next victim in the series of senseless murders,
22:38
Speaker 1: and there were tragedies happening closer to home as well.
22:43
Speaker 1: Because of its proximity to DFW Airport, a lot of
22:47
Speaker 1: folks who worked for various airlines lived at walnut Ridge
22:50
Speaker 1: apartments where Terry lived. A rapist was targeting flight attendants
22:56
Speaker 1: and had struck at the complex several times. Terry had
23:01
Speaker 1: every reason to be scared, as madmen and monsters stripped
23:05
Speaker 1: local young women of their everyday rights and freedoms. Both
23:09
Speaker 1: physically and psychologically. Those fears gripped Terry tightly, and she
23:15
Speaker 1: was taking extraordinary precautions. She quit her job in Irving
23:20
Speaker 1: so she wouldn't have to drive or be out at night.
23:24
Speaker 1: In order to avoid being out past dark, Terry became
23:27
Speaker 1: a recluse, for the most part, a prisoner in her
23:30
Speaker 1: own home, especially when her fiance was away from the
23:34
Speaker 1: North Arlington apartment they were basically sharing at that point.
23:39
Speaker 1: On Friday, February fifteenth, nineteen eighty five, he was out
23:43
Speaker 1: of town on business. At two forty p m. An
23:47
Speaker 1: apartment maintenance worker and pest control professional entered Terry's unit
23:51
Speaker 1: to spray for bugs. Nothing appeared amiss, as the two
23:55
Speaker 1: men made their way through the home. The apartment was
23:58
Speaker 1: orderly and well cast. Because the television and oven were on,
24:04
Speaker 1: they figured the apartment's occupants had stepped out to run
24:07
Speaker 1: a quick errand when they entered the bedroom, however, they
24:11
Speaker 1: were shocked to find blood splattered everywhere and disarray as
24:15
Speaker 1: if there had been a violent and intense struggle. Also
24:20
Speaker 1: in the bedroom, Terry McAdams laid still and silent, beaten
24:25
Speaker 1: and bloodied. The men quickly called the Arlington Police department.
24:31
Speaker 1: When officers arrived at the scene, they made note that
24:34
Speaker 1: there were no signs of forced entry, but later metal
24:37
Speaker 1: shavings found outside the sliding glass patio door made it
24:41
Speaker 1: obvious the killer had indeed broken in Arlington. Detectives were
24:46
Speaker 1: well aware of the recent string of the murders of
24:49
Speaker 1: young women in neighboring fort Worth and the presumed Dallas
24:53
Speaker 1: murder of Mary Till, whose apartment was nearby just over
24:57
Speaker 1: a year before. As the initial investigation unfolded, detectives struggled
25:03
Speaker 1: to find anyone with a motive to harm Terry. That
25:07
Speaker 1: left them with only one theorized motive, as the young
25:10
Speaker 1: woman had been raped. Terry's cause of death was blunt
25:14
Speaker 1: force trauma. As it grew cold, lawman on Fort Worth's
25:20
Speaker 1: Special Homicide Task Force kept a keen eye on the case,
25:25
Speaker 1: whether officially or not. The Terry McAdams murder was considered
25:29
Speaker 1: an important case to keep in mind as they investigated
25:33
Speaker 1: the many others, and like most of the others, it
25:36
Speaker 1: would remain unsolved for decades. A local, later confirmed serial
25:41
Speaker 1: killer was speculated by some in the Dallas Fort Worth
25:44
Speaker 1: area to be responsible when it was solved in twenty
25:48
Speaker 1: twenty four. Like many long cold cases, Terry's killer wasn't
25:53
Speaker 1: someone those familiar with the case had on their radar.
25:58
Speaker 1: Her case had been revisited many times over the years,
26:01
Speaker 1: but it took more than thirty six for the ball
26:04
Speaker 1: to get rolling in the right direction. In twenty twenty one,
26:08
Speaker 1: the Arlington Police sent out physical evidence for DNA testing.
26:12
Speaker 1: A full str profile of an unknown male was discovered
26:17
Speaker 1: when entered into FBI's combined DNA indexing system. However, there
26:23
Speaker 1: were no hits. It was a similar dead end to
26:26
Speaker 1: those cold case detectives across the United States faced. The
26:32
Speaker 1: purp had either never been arrested for these specific crimes,
26:35
Speaker 1: for which the State of Texas requires a felon to
26:38
Speaker 1: give their DNA upon imprisonment or other sentencing, or if
26:43
Speaker 1: they had it was before the late nineteen nineties when
26:47
Speaker 1: that became state law. Some, even those convicted of the
26:51
Speaker 1: most heinous crimes, also sometimes slipped through the cracks, but
26:56
Speaker 1: investigators would soon learn none of those scenarios was the
27:00
Speaker 1: right one, and reality was just as complicated. In twenty
27:06
Speaker 1: twenty four, after contacting the FBI's Dallas Field office to
27:10
Speaker 1: see if the Terry McAdams case was a good candidate
27:13
Speaker 1: for investigative genetic genealogy, the previous August evidence, including a
27:18
Speaker 1: cigarette butt and Terry's fingernail clippings, was sent to labs
27:23
Speaker 1: for analysis. Specialized FBI agents painstakingly identified a man named
27:29
Speaker 1: Bernard Lassalle Sharp as Terry's likely killer, but there would
27:35
Speaker 1: be no arrest, no trial, or accountability. At about twelve
27:41
Speaker 1: twenty a m. On Sunday, November third, nineteen eighty five,
27:45
Speaker 1: almost ten months after Terry McAdams was killed, Sharp appeared
27:49
Speaker 1: at the house of his estranged wife uninvited. A small
27:54
Speaker 1: argument erupted between him and his wife's cousin. Sharp produced
27:59
Speaker 1: a pistol and shot her she slumped, barely clinging to consciousness.
28:05
Speaker 1: Sharp then argued with his wife briefly. Several more shots
28:10
Speaker 1: rang out. Both his wife and her friend, who'd been
28:14
Speaker 1: seated at the table, along with his cousin in law,
28:17
Speaker 1: were shot several times by Sharp before a brief silence,
28:22
Speaker 1: and then one more shot, Bernard Sharp taking his own life.
28:27
Speaker 1: His wife's cousin was the only one of the three
28:30
Speaker 1: women to live ten months earlier. Sharp was interviewed during
28:36
Speaker 1: the initial investigation because of his proximity to Terry and
28:40
Speaker 1: because of his criminal record. In nineteen seventy six, he
28:45
Speaker 1: was convicted of indecent exposure and fondling a child, for
28:49
Speaker 1: which he was incarcerated for four years. Interviewing areas sex
28:54
Speaker 1: offenders was standard procedure, and it appears there was no
28:57
Speaker 1: evidence to suggest Sharp's involvement, not until DNA technologies entered
29:03
Speaker 1: criminal investigations and advanced to include genetic genealogy. Detectives today,
29:10
Speaker 1: just like in nineteen eighty five, could not find a
29:13
Speaker 1: connection between Bernard Sharp and Terry McAdams. They presume the rape,
29:19
Speaker 1: beating and murder to have been at random. Sharp had
29:23
Speaker 1: connections to both Fort Worth and Arlington, and his potential
29:27
Speaker 1: involvement in other early and mid nineteen eighties assaults shouldn't
29:31
Speaker 1: be ignored. Next time on Gone Cold, Texas True Crime
29:38
Speaker 1: other predators who roamed or potentially roamed the streets of
29:43
Speaker 1: Fort Worth during the height of the eighties murders. We'd
29:49
Speaker 1: like to give a warm thanks to Joe S for
29:52
Speaker 1: supporting us at Patreon dot com Slash Gone Cold podcast.
29:57
Speaker 1: Erica and I appreciate you. If you'd like to join
30:02
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30:07
Speaker 1: missing persons cases, and other perplexing mysteries, you can support
30:11
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30:15
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30:20
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30:24
Speaker 1: Words cannot express how much we appreciate our patrons. Thank
30:28
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30:52
Speaker 1: Thanks for Listening y'all