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The Murder of Arlis Perry - Cold Case Solved · Wicked and Grim: A True Crime Podcast

0:07
Speaker 1: In October of nineteen seventy four, a nineteen year old
0:11
Speaker 1: young woman walked into Stanford Memorial Church to seek a
0:14
Speaker 1: quiet place for prayer after a minor argument with her
0:17
Speaker 1: newly wet husband. Hours later, she was found murdered inside
0:22
Speaker 1: of the university's most recognizable building, leaving investigators confronted with
0:27
Speaker 1: a bizarre crime scene, also a growing list of suspects,
0:31
Speaker 1: and a mystery that would haunt Stanford University for more
0:34
Speaker 1: than four decades. What followed was a sprawling investigation filled
0:40
Speaker 1: with dead ends, strange theories, and advances in forensic science
0:45
Speaker 1: that would ultimately transform one of California's most notorious cold
0:49
Speaker 1: cases into a solved crime. This is the story of
0:55
Speaker 1: Arles Perry.
0:57
Speaker 2: My name's Ben, I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked
1:01
Speaker 2: and Grim, a.
1:01
Speaker 1: True crime podcast. The following material more audience listener discretion.
1:34
Speaker 2: Boom boom, Happy Friday.
1:37
Speaker 1: That's that's your opening.
1:40
Speaker 2: Boom boom boom, Happy Friday, Happy Friday, Happy Friday. Is
1:45
Speaker 2: that is still a thing?
1:46
Speaker 1: Oh? I hope not. I really hope not. That's always
1:49
Speaker 1: been cringe to me.
1:50
Speaker 2: But you also don't like, oh what is it? Yolo?
1:55
Speaker 2: You don't love that either. No, I don't you only
1:59
Speaker 2: live one.
2:00
Speaker 1: I am too old now for all these youngins talking
2:03
Speaker 1: words and slang, and I don't.
2:05
Speaker 2: Think that's youngins, though I still think those are millennial terms.
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Speaker 1: Probably, well, maybe it is. I'm too old of a
2:12
Speaker 1: soul for it. How's that? It might be my generation,
2:15
Speaker 1: But I'm too old of a soul for that sort
2:17
Speaker 1: of stuff.
2:17
Speaker 3: What about fumough?
2:20
Speaker 1: Is this going to be our show today? You're just
2:22
Speaker 1: going to antagonize me?
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Speaker 2: Well, generally it's the worse, So touche you're not. I
2:26
Speaker 2: can't have this once a year.
2:29
Speaker 1: It's your day.
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Speaker 3: Hey, it's my day.
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Speaker 1: I'm not saying you're a dog when I say this,
2:33
Speaker 1: but every dog has its day, right, Oh, I needed
2:36
Speaker 1: to clarify. I wasn't calling you names, but there is
2:38
Speaker 1: that saying every dog has its day.
2:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, you get some hate. Treat me well?
2:43
Speaker 1: I do treat you well, though, you do?
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Speaker 3: I do, you do? I'm just bugging ye.
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Speaker 1: God to love the meritlews disputes of this true crime show.
2:51
Speaker 1: You do gotta love it, you do. But I do
2:54
Speaker 1: want to get onto the story a little bit here,
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Speaker 1: and I do want to tell you this is a
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Speaker 1: solved cold case? Are I think it was over forty
3:01
Speaker 1: years this case went on for before it was finally solved.
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Speaker 2: That's always like kind of a night Like it sucks
3:07
Speaker 2: that it's not solved initially obviously, but it kind of
3:10
Speaker 2: gives you, like some hope, you know, that's some of
3:12
Speaker 2: these cases that we have gone over will one day
3:14
Speaker 2: get solved when they like really eat at you.
3:17
Speaker 1: Oh for sure. The idea that you know what, there's
3:20
Speaker 1: evolution in technology that's going to you know, bring some
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Speaker 1: things to light or even people coming out of the
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Speaker 1: woodworks who can help things. That's always a good thing. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: So a cold case being solved is always one of
3:32
Speaker 1: my favorite things to see.
3:33
Speaker 2: Interrocret Okay, well, I am fricking ready.
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Speaker 1: Are you ready? Just like that? Yeah, just like boom boom,
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Speaker 1: let's go okay, well our list. Marlene Dykma was born
3:45
Speaker 1: on February twenty second, nineteen fifty five, in Bismarck, North Dakota.
3:50
Speaker 1: She was the youngest of three children born to Marvin
3:53
Speaker 1: and Jean Dykma, who grew up in a close knit
3:55
Speaker 1: family where their faith played a very important role in
3:58
Speaker 1: daily life. Friends and relatives described her as kind, trusting,
4:02
Speaker 1: and deeply committed to her beliefs. She was active in
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Speaker 1: church from a very young age and spent much of
4:07
Speaker 1: her teenage years involved in religious organizations, including Young Life
4:11
Speaker 1: and Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Now Bismarck during the nineteen
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Speaker 1: fifties and nineteen sixties was the sort of place where
4:18
Speaker 1: people tended to know their neighbors, and Arlas's life reflected
4:22
Speaker 1: that environment. She attended local schools, participated in cheerleading, and
4:26
Speaker 1: built strong friendships through both school and church activities. Those
4:31
Speaker 1: who knew her often remembered her as someone who genuinely
4:34
Speaker 1: enjoyed helping others and making people feel welcome. Now. During
4:37
Speaker 1: her teenage years, she met a young man named Bruce Perry.
4:42
Speaker 1: The two quickly connected through their shared interests and religious backgrounds,
4:46
Speaker 1: so what started as a high school relationship gradually developed
4:50
Speaker 1: into something more serious as they grew older. Friends who
4:53
Speaker 1: knew the couples said they were devoted to one another
4:56
Speaker 1: and largely inseparable whenever they had the opportunity to spend
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Speaker 1: time together. After high school, Bruce's academic ambitions took him
5:04
Speaker 1: far beyond North Dakota. He was accepted to Stanford University
5:08
Speaker 1: in California, one of the most prestigious schools in the country,
5:12
Speaker 1: and the move created a challenge for the young couple.
5:16
Speaker 1: Nearly fifteen hundred miles would separate them while Bruce pursued
5:19
Speaker 1: his education. Maintaining a long distance relationship like this in
5:23
Speaker 1: the early nineteen seventies, while it required a lot of
5:26
Speaker 1: patience and commitment. There were no text messages or social
5:29
Speaker 1: media accounts or video calls. Most communication, in fact, happened
5:33
Speaker 1: through handwritten letters in the occasional long distance telephone call. Still,
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Speaker 1: despite the distance, the relationship continued to grow, and on
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Speaker 1: August seventeenth, nineteen seventy four, Arlistaichma and Bruce Perry got married.
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Speaker 2: Okay, can I just say how cute and quaint getting
5:52
Speaker 2: a handwritten letter would be. I don't think you've ever
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Speaker 2: written me a handwritten letter. That's so special.
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Speaker 1: You haven't written me a handwritten letter? We've done no.
6:00
Speaker 1: In high school we used to pass notes.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, so we have technically.
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Speaker 2: Have that, but I don't know. It's just I feel
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Speaker 2: like that now, just in the day and age that
6:07
Speaker 2: we live in now, it just seems so special and
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Speaker 2: like romantic.
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Speaker 1: It's a lost art form.
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Speaker 3: I agree with you, yeah, oh man.
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Speaker 1: The wedding took place in North Dakota, surrounded by family
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Speaker 1: and friends, and like many newly weds, they were excited
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Speaker 1: to begin building their life together. Then shortly afterwards, Arlist
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Speaker 1: left the state where she had spent her entire life
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Speaker 1: and joined Bruce in California. The couple moved into student
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Speaker 1: housing in Stanford University. Their apartment was located in Quinnolan
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Speaker 1: Hall within Escandindo Village, a housing complex designed for marital
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Speaker 1: students and their families. It was not an extravagant lifestyle,
6:45
Speaker 1: but they worked. Bruce was focused on his studies, and
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Speaker 1: like many student couples, they were learning how to balance finances, responsibilities,
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Speaker 1: and the realities of adult life. Our Lists found work
6:57
Speaker 1: as a receptionist at Paulo Alto Law firm, helping contribute
7:01
Speaker 1: to the household while Bruce continued his education. Now the
7:05
Speaker 1: job provided a routine and an opportunity to meet people,
7:08
Speaker 1: but the transition to California was not always easy. See
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Speaker 1: Arlis had left behind her parents, siblings, friends, church, community,
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Speaker 1: and nearly everything familiar to her. Bruce had already made
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Speaker 1: connection through Stanford, but Arles was starting over in a
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Speaker 1: completely unfamiliar place. Letters soon became one of the primary
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Speaker 1: ways she stayed connected to home. She frequently wrote to
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Speaker 1: her family and friends in North Dakota, sharing updates about
7:34
Speaker 1: married life and experiences in California. Some of those letters
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Speaker 1: showed that she was struggling with some loneliness out there,
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Speaker 1: and in one she even joked that she considered knocking
7:43
Speaker 1: on doors and asking strangers if they just wanted a friend.
7:47
Speaker 1: The remark was made a little humorously, but it showed
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Speaker 1: the reality of trying to build a new social circle
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Speaker 1: in a place where she knew basically no one. One
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Speaker 1: location on campus became particularly important to her to those
8:00
Speaker 1: first few months Stanford Memorial Church. It stood at the
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Speaker 1: center of the university's main quad, and it had been
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Speaker 1: one of the school's most recognizable landmarks since its completion
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Speaker 1: in nineteen oh three. The church's towering architecture, stained glass windows,
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Speaker 1: and quiet atmosphere made it a very popular place for
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Speaker 1: students and of course, anyone else who was seeking reflection
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Speaker 1: in a moment of need. For Arles, whose faith has
8:26
Speaker 1: been such a significant part of her life, the church
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Speaker 1: offered a sense of familiarity. When she felt homesick or overwhelmed.
8:33
Speaker 1: It provided a place of peace, a place to sit,
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Speaker 1: think and pray, and over time it became one of
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Speaker 1: her favorite places on campus. On Saturday, October twelfth, nineteen
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Speaker 1: seventy four, the day began as an ordinary week day
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Speaker 1: for both Arles and Bruce. The couple had been married
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Speaker 1: for less than two months at this point, and they
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Speaker 1: were still adjusting to their life together in California. Bruce
8:55
Speaker 1: was balancing the demands of Stanford's rigorous academic schedule, while
9:00
Speaker 1: Arliss was settling into her new job and continued to
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Speaker 1: build a life away from North Dakota. As the evening approached,
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Speaker 1: Arles spent some time writing letters home, and by the
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Speaker 1: late evening the letters were finished and ready to be mailed. Now,
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Speaker 1: at some point during that night, Arles and Bruce left
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Speaker 1: their apartment together to go mail these letters. Now accounts
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Speaker 1: differ slightly on the exact timing, but investigators determined that
9:23
Speaker 1: the couple was walking across campus near the end of
9:26
Speaker 1: the evening, sometime between roughly ten forty five pm and
9:29
Speaker 1: eleven forty five PM, when they became involved in a
9:33
Speaker 1: bit of a minor disagreement, which happens in many cases
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Speaker 1: of you know, couples or whatever. According to Bruce, the
9:40
Speaker 1: argument centered on air pressure in one of the car's tires.
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Speaker 1: By all indications, it was not a major confrontation or anything.
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Speaker 1: The disagreement was the sort of everyday kind of squabble
9:53
Speaker 1: that many couples experience. Nevertheless, it was enough that Arles
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Speaker 1: decided she wasn't going to go home right away. She
10:01
Speaker 1: wanted to spend some time alone, and rather than heading
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Speaker 1: to the apartment, she told Bruce she was going to
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Speaker 1: the Stanford Memorial Church. It was quiet there, it was
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Speaker 1: opened late in the evening, and plus it offered a
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Speaker 1: place where she could pray and reflect before coming home.
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Speaker 1: So the couple separated. Bruce returned towards their apartment, while
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Speaker 1: Arles continued towards the church. Several witnesses would later place
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Speaker 1: her inside the church some time before midnight. She appeared
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Speaker 1: to be calm, and she was seen praying near the
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Speaker 1: front portion of the sanctuary. It seemed like everyone there
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Speaker 1: who saw her said she was doing exactly the same
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Speaker 1: thing that she said she came there to do. However,
10:40
Speaker 1: the church was preparing to close for the night soon. Now,
10:43
Speaker 1: they regularly welcomed visitors into the church throughout the day,
10:46
Speaker 1: but like most campus buildings, it operated on a schedule,
10:50
Speaker 1: and his closing time approached, the remaining visitors gradually began leaving.
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Speaker 1: Witnesses later reported hearing announcements that the church would soon
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Speaker 1: be shutting down for that night, and among those responsible
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Speaker 1: for securing the building was campus security guard Stephen Crawford.
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Speaker 1: He entered the church near closing time and advised visitors
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Speaker 1: that it was time to leave. Multiple witnesses remembered seeing
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Speaker 1: Arlis inside the church shortly before it closed. Meanwhile, Bruce
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Speaker 1: waited for his wife to return home. Memorial Church was
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Speaker 1: only a short distance away, and Arlis had every reason
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Speaker 1: to believe she could spend a little bit of time
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Speaker 1: there before heading back to the apartment. But as the
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Speaker 1: minutes passed, however, Bruce began to worry when she wasn't
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Speaker 1: showing up, and eventually he decided to go look for
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Speaker 1: her himself. He made his way to that church, expecting
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Speaker 1: to find her inside, but instead he found the building
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Speaker 1: closed and locked. Unable to enter, he began searching other
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Speaker 1: parts of the campus too. He checked locations where he
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Speaker 1: thought that she might have gone, or looked for any
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Speaker 1: sign that she had returned on a different route or something,
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Speaker 1: but he found nothing, and by the early hour hour
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Speaker 1: of October thirteenth, Bruce's concern had grown serious enough that
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Speaker 1: he contacted Stanford's security and reported our lists missing. Sometime
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Speaker 1: between three and three thirty am, security personnel began making
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Speaker 1: inquiries and checking locations around the campus. Memorial Church was
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Speaker 1: among the places considered because Bruce believed it was the
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Speaker 1: last location where she'd gone, But those early efforts produced
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Speaker 1: no answers, and as far as anyone knew, a nineteen
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Speaker 1: year old newlywed had entered this church some time before
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Speaker 1: midnight and then never returned home. The search continued through
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Speaker 1: the early morning hours while the campus remained largely quiet. Then,
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Speaker 1: at approximately five forty am on Sunday, October thirteenth, nineteen
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Speaker 1: seventy four, Stanford's security guard, Stephen Crawford, entered Memorial Church
12:52
Speaker 1: during his morning rounds, and what he found inside immediately
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Speaker 1: transformed a missing person scenario into a homicide investigation. There inside,
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Speaker 1: near the altar of the church, lay the body of
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Speaker 1: nineteen year old Arles Perry. Campus security quickly notified law
13:12
Speaker 1: enforcement and investigators soon began arriving at the scene. Arlis
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Speaker 1: was found near the altar in an area of the
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Speaker 1: church known as the East transept. She was partially undressed
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Speaker 1: from the waist down. Investigators could immediately see evidence suggesting
13:28
Speaker 1: that she had been raped. Two large church candles were
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Speaker 1: also found in direct association with her body. One had
13:35
Speaker 1: been positioned between her legs and another had been forced
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Speaker 1: upwards through her blouse with enough force to break the
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Speaker 1: straps on her braw Nearby, investigators located a kneeling pillow
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Speaker 1: that appeared to contain seemen evidence, so the pillow was
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Speaker 1: collected and preserved, along with numerous other items from the church.
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Speaker 1: The condition of Arlas's body immediately revealed that she had
13:59
Speaker 1: suffered multiple injuries, but the most significant was an ice
14:04
Speaker 1: pick wound to the back of her head, in which
14:07
Speaker 1: the ice pick was still embedded into her skull.
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Speaker 3: Oo.
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Speaker 2: Okay, that is brutal.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a scene and a half for a church.
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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, the fact that I feel someone would a
14:19
Speaker 2: do something like that to someone in a church and
14:23
Speaker 2: be like, someone would have that done to them in
14:25
Speaker 2: a place where they think that you know, they're quite safe,
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Speaker 2: I would imagine, yeah.
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Speaker 1: Now, during the autopsy, authorities also documented a broken neckbone.
14:35
Speaker 1: Although the neck injury was serious, the medical examiner concluded
14:39
Speaker 1: that the fatal injury was in fact the ice pick
14:42
Speaker 1: wound to the head. The murder weapon presented investigators with
14:46
Speaker 1: an immediate mystery of its own, because while the metal
14:49
Speaker 1: shaft of the ice pick was recovered, the handle of
14:52
Speaker 1: it was missing. Detectives searched for it extensively, but were
14:57
Speaker 1: unable to locate it, and it was never recovered. As
15:00
Speaker 1: crime scene technicians worked through the church, they collected every
15:04
Speaker 1: single piece of physical evidence that they could find, and
15:07
Speaker 1: one of the most significant discoveries was a palm print
15:11
Speaker 1: found on one of the candles. Investigators believe the print
15:14
Speaker 1: could belong to the killer, and they hoped it might
15:17
Speaker 1: eventually lead to identifying the person responsible.
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Speaker 2: Okay, because also the ice pick would have been brought
15:24
Speaker 2: to the scene, right, That wouldn't never really necessarily been
15:26
Speaker 2: something that they just picked up in the church.
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Speaker 1: I'm not certain. I mean, there's an array of unusual
15:34
Speaker 1: implements found in something like a church. The ice pick
15:36
Speaker 1: could be used for various things. Maybe it's used for
15:38
Speaker 1: scraping candlewax or something in the back room for cleaning.
15:42
Speaker 1: It's hard to say, okay, because like an ice pick,
15:46
Speaker 1: it's basically just a pointed metal like spike with a
15:50
Speaker 1: wooden handle sort of thing, right, So that can be
15:52
Speaker 1: used for a variety of different things, whether it's gardening, cleaning,
15:56
Speaker 1: or in the handyman closet. Who knows. Okay, Now, I'm
16:00
Speaker 1: not saying the person did or did not with Yeah,
16:03
Speaker 1: it's just the possibility of where it came from. I
16:06
Speaker 1: don't know.
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Speaker 2: It just an interesting weapon. I suppose of choice.
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Speaker 1: It very much so. Is now detectives also preserved biological
16:14
Speaker 1: evidence found near the body. Today, DNA would likely become
16:18
Speaker 1: the focal point of such an investigation, but in nineteen
16:21
Speaker 1: seventy four, however, forensic science had significant limitations. Investigators could
16:27
Speaker 1: determine blood types and compare certain biological characteristics, but they
16:31
Speaker 1: could not generate the type of individual DNA profile that
16:35
Speaker 1: would become standard in criminal investigations today. Now. Another detail
16:40
Speaker 1: that quickly drew attention was the absence of several personal items.
16:44
Speaker 1: Our lists normally wore glasses or contact lenses, yet investigators
16:48
Speaker 1: were unable to locate either of them during the examination
16:51
Speaker 1: of the church, and other searches of the immediate area
16:54
Speaker 1: failed to uncover them as well. Whether they had been
16:57
Speaker 1: removed during the assault or lost out swear in the church,
17:01
Speaker 1: or just taken from the scene, it remained completely unknown,
17:05
Speaker 1: and despite the violence of the attack, there was relatively
17:08
Speaker 1: little evidence of a prolonged struggle throughout the church. See,
17:12
Speaker 1: it wasn't like anything there was heavily damaged. The pews
17:15
Speaker 1: remained undisturbed. There was no obvious signs that a fight
17:19
Speaker 1: moved across large portions of the building, and this observation
17:22
Speaker 1: led detectives to consider several possibilities, including whether Arlis had
17:27
Speaker 1: been surprised by her attacker, whether she knew the person
17:30
Speaker 1: who approached her, or whether the assault had occurred very quickly,
17:35
Speaker 1: because if she was overpowered fast, that would explain, you know,
17:39
Speaker 1: because if she's approached by a stranger or something, she's
17:41
Speaker 1: going to put up a fight, then there should be
17:43
Speaker 1: evidence of it. But there's not.
17:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, so almost like she didn't even have a chance.
17:47
Speaker 1: Possibly, Yeah, it's like she could have potentially have known
17:49
Speaker 1: this person. They snuck up. Who knows. Now. As the
17:53
Speaker 1: morning progressed, Investigators began documenting every single aspect of the church,
17:58
Speaker 1: trying to establish a timeline of the previous night. Witnesses
18:03
Speaker 1: who had been inside the building before closing were identified
18:06
Speaker 1: and interviewed. Security personnel were questioned about access to the church.
18:11
Speaker 1: Detectives worked to determine exactly who had been inside the
18:14
Speaker 1: building during its final hours of operation and who may
18:17
Speaker 1: have had the opportunity to encounter Arles after other visitors
18:22
Speaker 1: had left. At the same time, another team of investigators
18:27
Speaker 1: was assigned the difficult task of locating and informing Bruce
18:32
Speaker 1: Perry of what had happened. Only hours earlier, Bruce had
18:36
Speaker 1: been searching for his missing wife, and he had contacted
18:39
Speaker 1: campus security in an effort to find her. Detectives informed
18:43
Speaker 1: Bruce that Arles had in fact been found, she was
18:46
Speaker 1: inside the Memorial Church, and then they began interviewing him
18:50
Speaker 1: about the events of the previous evening. Now Bruce provided
18:54
Speaker 1: investigators with a detailed account of his evening with Arles.
18:57
Speaker 1: He explained that the couple had gone out to mail
18:59
Speaker 1: some letters, that a small argument had happened about some
19:02
Speaker 1: air pressure in one of the car's tires, and then
19:04
Speaker 1: he described the disagreement as just being minor, and told
19:07
Speaker 1: him that Arlis went to spend time alone in the
19:10
Speaker 1: church before returning home. He walked the investigators through the
19:14
Speaker 1: hours that followed, including his efforts to locate her and
19:17
Speaker 1: his eventual call to the Stanford security when she failed
19:20
Speaker 1: to return home. By all accounts, he seemed to be
19:24
Speaker 1: a concerned man who just lost his partner. But during
19:27
Speaker 1: those early interviews, investigators noticed something. There was a bit
19:32
Speaker 1: of blood on Bruce's shirt, and given the circumstances, detectives
19:36
Speaker 1: could not ignore the possibility that that blood might be
19:39
Speaker 1: connected to this murder. Now the shirt was collected and
19:43
Speaker 1: examined as evidence. Bruce claimed that he had suffered a nosebleaede,
19:46
Speaker 1: which accounted for the stains.
19:48
Speaker 2: The amount of times people used Novs blade as an excuse, hey.
19:52
Speaker 1: For sure, However, in this case, subsequent testing supported his explanation.
19:57
Speaker 1: It seemed like it was in fact his blood.
19:59
Speaker 2: Okay, I mean, one time out of one hundred, it
20:02
Speaker 2: actually isn't a fight.
20:04
Speaker 1: I have a feeling the number is a lot higher
20:06
Speaker 1: than one hundred one time out of like one hundred thousand. Maybe,
20:11
Speaker 1: But Bruce was considered a possible suspect, though any partner
20:14
Speaker 1: in a situation like this would be, and he continued
20:17
Speaker 1: cooperating with authorities throughout the investigation. He provided his fingerprints,
20:21
Speaker 1: answered additional questions, and allowed detectives to scrutinize his timeline,
20:27
Speaker 1: and as investigators compared his statements with witness accounts and
20:30
Speaker 1: physical evidence, they gradually became confident that he had not
20:33
Speaker 1: been involved in his wife's murder. So, with Bruce largely
20:38
Speaker 1: eliminated as a suspect, detectives widened their focus. Investigators began
20:43
Speaker 1: interviewing everyone known to have been inside the church in
20:47
Speaker 1: those final hours. Witnesses were asked where they'd been sitting
20:52
Speaker 1: when they left, who they'd seen, and whether they had
20:54
Speaker 1: noticed anything unusual, and these interviews helped detectives establish a
20:59
Speaker 1: rough timeline. Several witnesses confirmed seeing Arles alive. She was
21:06
Speaker 1: observed praying near the front of the church, didn't appear
21:08
Speaker 1: in any sort of distress, and during the witness canvas,
21:12
Speaker 1: detectives also learned about an unidentified young man who had
21:16
Speaker 1: attracted attention in the day surrounding the murder, A coworker
21:19
Speaker 1: from the Palo Alto law firm where Arlis worked reported
21:23
Speaker 1: seeing her engage in a conversation with a young man
21:26
Speaker 1: on October eleventh, the day before she was killed. According
21:30
Speaker 1: to the coworker, the discussion appeared serious enough to stand out,
21:34
Speaker 1: and Arless seemed a bit bothered afterwards. The man was
21:38
Speaker 1: described as a young, white male with blonde or sandy
21:41
Speaker 1: colored hair. Investigators became even more interested in this lead
21:46
Speaker 1: when similar descriptions emerged from people who had been near
21:50
Speaker 1: the Memorial Church on the night of the murder. Several
21:54
Speaker 1: reports referenced a blonde or sandy haired young man in
21:58
Speaker 1: the area the same time that Arlist was in the church.
22:03
Speaker 1: Detectives took descriptions, they compared them, and leads were pursued.
22:08
Speaker 1: Potential matches were investigated, but still, despite these efforts, authorities
22:12
Speaker 1: were never able to conclusively determine who the man was
22:16
Speaker 1: or whether he even had any connection to the crime
22:18
Speaker 1: at all. Now, at some point during the investigation, detectives
22:22
Speaker 1: learned that another individual associated with Stanford appeared to share
22:27
Speaker 1: the same name of Bruce Perry. This was Bruce D. Perry,
22:32
Speaker 1: which I will say to try and keep a difference
22:34
Speaker 1: between them, but the similarity attracted attention because Arlis's husband
22:38
Speaker 1: was also named Bruce Perry, and so investigators explored whether
22:41
Speaker 1: the duplicate name held any significance, but again it failed
22:46
Speaker 1: to uncover any evidence, and it led to a dead end.
22:49
Speaker 1: While witness interviews continued, detectives were also examining the church's
22:54
Speaker 1: security procedures, and a significant portion of the investigation was
22:58
Speaker 1: focused on determining who had access to Memorial Church during
23:02
Speaker 1: those hours surrounding the murder. Investigators reviewed statements from security personnel,
23:07
Speaker 1: reconstructed building access, and attempted to establish precisely when the
23:12
Speaker 1: church had been secured for the night. And among those
23:15
Speaker 1: interviewed was security guard Stephen Crawford, the man who had
23:18
Speaker 1: actually discovered Arlas's body. Now, Stephen explained his activities during
23:23
Speaker 1: the evening and early morning hours and described his responsibilities
23:26
Speaker 1: on securing the church. Detectives compared his statements against witness
23:30
Speaker 1: accounts and the developing timeline, just as they did with
23:34
Speaker 1: other individuals. Now In the days following Arles Perry's murder,
23:38
Speaker 1: Arlas's family was beginning to prepare to bring her home
23:41
Speaker 1: to North Dakota on October fifteenth, nineteen seventy four, before
23:46
Speaker 1: she was brought home. A memorial service was held at
23:49
Speaker 1: Stanford Memorial Church. The setting was actually rather difficult for
23:53
Speaker 1: many to comprehend because just days earlier, the church had
23:57
Speaker 1: become the very scene of one of the most disturbing
24:00
Speaker 1: crimes in Stansford's history, and now students, faculty members, church officials,
24:05
Speaker 1: and members of the university they all gathered in the
24:08
Speaker 1: same building to remember the young woman whose life had
24:11
Speaker 1: just ended their days earlier as well.
24:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, I do not like that, my reacity. It was
24:18
Speaker 2: just like, what.
24:19
Speaker 1: Your face is a face of mortified.
24:21
Speaker 3: I don't know.
24:22
Speaker 2: That just does not seem quite right to me.
24:24
Speaker 1: Actually, Yeah, her memorial service was held on there. She
24:28
Speaker 1: got on the site of her murder.
24:30
Speaker 2: Which I mean, okay, sometimes people like you know, car
24:34
Speaker 2: accidents or whatever, they'll they'll put something there and memorial
24:38
Speaker 2: and stuff. But I guess, I don't know. I guess
24:41
Speaker 2: it's just the actual service itself kind of just kept.
24:44
Speaker 2: It just caught me really off guard.
24:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's different. But I do see the parallel
24:48
Speaker 1: you're drawing as well, like those like roadside crosses, yeah,
24:51
Speaker 1: stuff like that.
24:52
Speaker 2: So I don't know what. It did catch me off
24:54
Speaker 2: guard though, for some reason now.
24:56
Speaker 1: Following the memorial service, Arlas's body was returned to North
24:59
Speaker 1: Dakota and her funeral took place on October eighteenth in Bismarck,
25:03
Speaker 1: where her family, friends, and members of her church community
25:06
Speaker 1: gathered to pay their respects. Many of those attending had
25:09
Speaker 1: known Arliss for most of her life. She was a daughter,
25:13
Speaker 1: a sister, friend, and newly wet whose life had been
25:16
Speaker 1: cut so short only weeks after her marriage. Then, not
25:20
Speaker 1: long after Arlis was buried, her temporary grave marker was taken.
25:26
Speaker 1: It disappeared.
25:27
Speaker 2: Oohoo, that's not very freaking nice now.
25:31
Speaker 1: According to reports, the marker was removed from the cemetery
25:34
Speaker 1: while surrounding graves remained untouched.
25:37
Speaker 3: Wow.
25:38
Speaker 1: Investigators examined the incident and considered whether it could be
25:41
Speaker 1: connected to the murder because that theft appeared targeted. Still,
25:45
Speaker 1: despite those inquiries, no one was ever able to identify
25:48
Speaker 1: anyone as being the person responsible, and the missing grave
25:52
Speaker 1: marker became another unanswered question that was attached to such
25:56
Speaker 1: a strange case.
25:58
Speaker 2: It is very odd, though, because there's a distance between
26:01
Speaker 2: where she got murdered and where she was laid to rest. Definitely,
26:04
Speaker 2: so if it was the murderer. That seems kind of
26:06
Speaker 2: odd that they would travel that far.
26:08
Speaker 1: Too, that did. Yeah, that's a significant distance to just
26:12
Speaker 1: steal a grave marker like that. So meanwhile, the murder
26:17
Speaker 1: continued to weigh heavy on the Stanford community, and fear
26:20
Speaker 1: was amplified by the fact that the investigation had not
26:22
Speaker 1: made an arrest yet. Days became weeks, weeks became months,
26:28
Speaker 1: and as the investigation continued, detectives began looking beyond the
26:32
Speaker 1: immediate circumstances of Artless's murder and examining whether it might
26:36
Speaker 1: be connected to other violent crimes. Several unsolved killings in
26:41
Speaker 1: and around the Stanford area attracted their attention considering this.
26:45
Speaker 1: Among them was the murder of Leslie Perloff, a young
26:49
Speaker 1: woman who had been killed in nineteen seventy three. Detectives
26:53
Speaker 1: also examined the murder of Stanford's student Janet Taylor, and
26:57
Speaker 1: reviewed other violent crimes that shared certain similarities. They compared
27:01
Speaker 1: timelines and victim profiles, and went over locations and any
27:04
Speaker 1: available evidence that they had in an effort to determine
27:07
Speaker 1: whether a single offender could be responsible from multiple attacks.
27:12
Speaker 1: The reviews were thorough, but they failed to establish any
27:16
Speaker 1: definitive connection, and the case continued to grow larger, so
27:21
Speaker 1: federal authority soon became involved. An FBI behavioral profile was
27:27
Speaker 1: reportedly developed to help investigators better understand the person responsible
27:32
Speaker 1: for this murder. Behavioral profiling was still relatively new at
27:35
Speaker 1: the time, but detectives hope that it might prove some
27:39
Speaker 1: insight into the type of offender that they were looking for.
27:42
Speaker 1: According to later reports, the profile suggested a socially isolated
27:46
Speaker 1: individual who may have had military background or who might
27:51
Speaker 1: keep items connected with the crime. While the profile offered
27:54
Speaker 1: investigative guidance, you could say it still didn't identify ass
27:59
Speaker 1: us or produce an arrest. As the investigation moved into
28:03
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy five and even later, the lack of an
28:07
Speaker 1: arrest made room for open speculation. The crime scene inside
28:12
Speaker 1: the church had been unusual from the very beginning, and
28:16
Speaker 1: while investigators focused on evidence and facts, others began searching
28:21
Speaker 1: for different explanations. Shortly after the murder, memorial, church Dean
28:26
Speaker 1: Robert Hamerton Kelley publicly described aspects of the scene as
28:31
Speaker 1: appearing ritualistic and satanic, and these comments attracted significant media
28:37
Speaker 1: attention and would have a lasting impact on how the
28:40
Speaker 1: public actually viewed this case. Before long, newspapers and TV reports,
28:45
Speaker 1: as well as private investigators were all discussing the possibility
28:49
Speaker 1: of Arliss's murder being connected to occult activity, and those
28:53
Speaker 1: rumors spread fast, with some people actually becoming convinced in
28:58
Speaker 1: fact that the crime had been part of ritual sacrifice. Others, though,
29:02
Speaker 1: thought it was secret organizations that were operating in California
29:06
Speaker 1: and targeting victims as part of ceremonial practices. Various different
29:11
Speaker 1: claims emerged about symbols, hidden meanings, and occult groups supposedly
29:16
Speaker 1: connected to the crime, and so investigators were actually forced
29:20
Speaker 1: to evaluate many of these claims even when they appeared unlikely.
29:25
Speaker 1: Detectives followed leads involving alleged cults, satanic organizations, and individuals
29:30
Speaker 1: who claimed to possess inside knowledge of ritualistic activity, and
29:35
Speaker 1: the sheer volume of information became so large that considerable
29:40
Speaker 1: investigative resources had to be spent to examine many far
29:44
Speaker 1: fetched theories that ultimately failed to produce any evidence. One
29:49
Speaker 1: organization frequently mentioned was the Process Church of the Final
29:53
Speaker 1: Judgment see the group had actually attracted controversy during the
29:56
Speaker 1: late nineteen sixties and early nineteen seventies, all mostly because
30:01
Speaker 1: of its unusual beliefs, but also public image. Rumors surrounding
30:06
Speaker 1: this case expanded. Some writers and independent investigators began suggesting
30:10
Speaker 1: the organization might have been connected, but despite the attention
30:14
Speaker 1: these theories received, investigators were unable to establish any evidence
30:18
Speaker 1: linking the Process Church to Arles Perry. No physical evidence
30:22
Speaker 1: supported a theory, no witness has placed any members of
30:25
Speaker 1: the church anywhere near what had happened, and no credible
30:28
Speaker 1: connection could be established. Yet, because the case remained unsolved,
30:33
Speaker 1: these rumors just persisted, and the situation became even more
30:36
Speaker 1: complicated several years later, when another notorious criminal investigation entered
30:41
Speaker 1: the picture. In New York, David Berkowitz had become known
30:45
Speaker 1: across the country as the son of Sam Killer after
30:49
Speaker 1: a series of shootings that terrorized the city during nineteen
30:52
Speaker 1: seventy nineteen seventy seven. Following his arrest, Berkwitz became the
30:57
Speaker 1: subject of intense media attention, and over time he made
31:01
Speaker 1: a variety of statements about a cult influence and Satanic groups,
31:05
Speaker 1: and many crimes beyond just the ones that he had
31:08
Speaker 1: been convicted of, and eventually his name became connected to
31:12
Speaker 1: the Arless Perry case. One statement that was allegedly attributed
31:17
Speaker 1: directly to Berkwitz himself reportedly quoted him saying, quote Arliss
31:22
Speaker 1: Perry hunted, stalked, and slain end quote Now. That remark
31:29
Speaker 1: immediately attracted attention, and as a result, law enforcement officials
31:33
Speaker 1: traveled to interview Berkowitz directly and determined whether he possessed
31:37
Speaker 1: information that had never been made public, But the interviews
31:41
Speaker 1: ultimately proved disappointing. Although Berkowitz hinted that he knew details
31:45
Speaker 1: about the crime, investigators found that he consistently failed to
31:49
Speaker 1: provide any sort of verifiable information. When questioned about specifics,
31:54
Speaker 1: he offered vague statements rather than facts that could be
31:57
Speaker 1: independently confirmed. Detectives also looked for evidence placing Berkowitz in
32:02
Speaker 1: California at the time of the murder, but they found none.
32:05
Speaker 1: They searched for forensic evidence linking him to the crime scene,
32:07
Speaker 1: but they found none. They searched for witnesses who could
32:10
Speaker 1: connect him to Stanford University, but again they found none. Eventually,
32:16
Speaker 1: investigators concluded that Berkowitz, the son of Sam, had no
32:21
Speaker 1: demonstratable connection to the murder of Arles Perry. But by
32:25
Speaker 1: that point, however, the public fascination with the case had
32:28
Speaker 1: already evolved beyond the facts. Books were written, television programs
32:34
Speaker 1: revisited the murder. Independent researchers proposed increasingly elaborate theories involving
32:40
Speaker 1: secret groups called conspiracies and interconnected crime syndicates. In many cases,
32:46
Speaker 1: the theories attracted more attention than the actual evidence collected
32:49
Speaker 1: by investigators. In fact, while researching this case, I can't
32:53
Speaker 1: tell you how many articles I came across where they
32:56
Speaker 1: were attributing the possibility of the the son of Sam
33:00
Speaker 1: Killer being the one responsible for Artlas's death, even though
33:05
Speaker 1: he was not.
33:06
Speaker 2: That's interesting.
33:09
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, the homicide investigation remained exactly where it had been
33:12
Speaker 1: years earlier, with no answers in sight, and by the
33:16
Speaker 1: late nineteen seventies the investigation into Arles Perry's murder had
33:20
Speaker 1: reached a very difficult stage. The case remained open, but
33:24
Speaker 1: as the years continued to pass, progress was not getting
33:28
Speaker 1: anywhere at all. It was just a dead end, stale, stagnant.
33:33
Speaker 1: Responsibility for the investigation shifted from one detective to another
33:37
Speaker 1: as personnel retired or moved into different assignments. Each new
33:40
Speaker 1: investigator inherited thousands of pages of reports, and with witness
33:45
Speaker 1: interviews and forensic findings and photographs and evidence logs, it
33:49
Speaker 1: left a lot to go through. Periodically, detectives would review
33:53
Speaker 1: the case from the very beginning, hoping for a fresh perspective,
33:56
Speaker 1: maybe to reveal something that had been overlooked. Those views
34:00
Speaker 1: often generated new questions, but they didn't produce the breakthrough
34:03
Speaker 1: investigators hoped. For Arlas's family, the passage of time was
34:07
Speaker 1: measured differently. Marvin and Jean Deichma continued living with the
34:12
Speaker 1: uncertainty surrounding their daughter's death. Her sister, Karen Barnes, remained
34:17
Speaker 1: engaged with developments in the case and maintained contact with
34:20
Speaker 1: investigators whenever significant activity occurred. But decades passed without an arrest,
34:26
Speaker 1: and the family never stopped hoping that someone would eventually
34:30
Speaker 1: identify the person responsible. While the murder investigation remained unsolved,
34:35
Speaker 1: the lives of the people connected to the case continued
34:38
Speaker 1: to move forward. Bruce Perry eventually left Stanford and went
34:43
Speaker 1: on to build a distinguished career in psychiatry. Over time,
34:47
Speaker 1: he became widely known for his work in childhood trauma
34:50
Speaker 1: and mental health. Although he rarely spoke publicly about the
34:53
Speaker 1: details of Arlas's murder, the crime remained a defining event
34:56
Speaker 1: in his.
34:56
Speaker 2: Life, absolutely that would have changed his life forever. Hopefully
35:00
Speaker 2: he was able to deal with his trauma no kidding
35:04
Speaker 2: in order to be helping with other people, say yeah now.
35:07
Speaker 1: Investigators also continued encountering the name Stephen Crawford whenever the
35:12
Speaker 1: old case files were reviewed. See Stephen was a security
35:15
Speaker 1: guard who found her body and had never been charged
35:18
Speaker 1: in connection with the murder whatsoever, but his role in
35:20
Speaker 1: the timeline ensured that detectives periodically revisited his statements. Over
35:26
Speaker 1: the years, investigators conducted additional interviews and continued examining information
35:31
Speaker 1: connected directly with him, though they lacked the evidence necessary
35:35
Speaker 1: to move inside any sort of further investigation. Now, outside
35:39
Speaker 1: of the homicide investigation, Stephen experienced some legal trouble of
35:42
Speaker 1: his own. Authorities eventually discovered that he had stolen numerous
35:46
Speaker 1: items associated with Stanford University. Items that included rare books,
35:50
Speaker 1: historical artifacts, a ceremonial cane connected to the Stanford family,
35:55
Speaker 1: and a human skull taken from the university's anatomy Department.
35:59
Speaker 1: Investigators also discovered that Stephen had created a fraudulent Stanford
36:03
Speaker 1: diploma for himself. Now the case resulted in criminal convictions,
36:08
Speaker 1: but none of those crimes established a connection to the murder. Now.
36:12
Speaker 1: During that same period, forensic science was undergoing dramatic change.
36:17
Speaker 1: Techniques that had been unavailable in the seventies gradually became
36:21
Speaker 1: standard investigative tools. Throughout the nineteen eighties and nineteen nineties,
36:26
Speaker 1: DNA analysis transformed criminal investigations across the United States and
36:31
Speaker 1: the world Alike, cases that had once seemed impossible to
36:35
Speaker 1: solve were suddenly producing suspects decades after the crime had
36:39
Speaker 1: even occurred. Law enforcement agencies began reopening cold cases and
36:44
Speaker 1: re examining evidence that had spent years in storage, and
36:48
Speaker 1: the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office eventually did the same
36:52
Speaker 1: with the Artless Perry investigation. As advances and forensic technology continued,
36:58
Speaker 1: detectives repeatedly reveal the evidence preserved from the memorial church.
37:03
Speaker 1: Progress came slowly, and it took years, and by the
37:06
Speaker 1: time investigators entered the twenty tens, more than four decades
37:10
Speaker 1: had passed since Arles Perry walked into that Memorial Church.
37:14
Speaker 1: Many of the original investigators had retired, some witnesses had died,
37:18
Speaker 1: and memories had faded. Yet the physical evidence collected in
37:22
Speaker 1: October of nineteen seventy four it still existed. If the
37:26
Speaker 1: murder was ever going to be solved, it would clearly
37:28
Speaker 1: not come from a new witness suddenly stepping forward, or
37:32
Speaker 1: from a confession that was made decades later. It was
37:35
Speaker 1: clearly going to come from the items investigators had carefully
37:38
Speaker 1: preserved at the very beginning of this case, as well
37:42
Speaker 1: as the ability of modern forensic science to extract answers
37:46
Speaker 1: that had been impossible to obtain in the seventies. Detectives
37:51
Speaker 1: first had to locate, catalog in verify items that had
37:54
Speaker 1: been in storage for decades. Evidence logs were reviewed, chain
37:58
Speaker 1: of custody records were examined, and investigators worked to ensure
38:01
Speaker 1: that the material being tested was actually what they believed
38:05
Speaker 1: it to be.
38:06
Speaker 2: Now.
38:06
Speaker 1: During that review, detectives uncovered a problem that nobody had
38:09
Speaker 1: realized for years. A pair of pants long believed to
38:15
Speaker 1: belong to Arless did not belong to her at all. Instead,
38:19
Speaker 1: investigators discovered that the clothing had actually been incorrectly identified
38:23
Speaker 1: and was actually Bruce Perry's, her husband. Exactly how the
38:26
Speaker 1: mistake occurred remains rather unclear, but the discovery immediately raised
38:31
Speaker 1: concerns about whether other evidence had been misidentified you know,
38:34
Speaker 1: during the original investigation. So detectives began tracing the records
38:39
Speaker 1: associated with Arliss's clothing and eventually located the correct items,
38:45
Speaker 1: and for the first time, her actual genes were now
38:48
Speaker 1: being subject to modern DNA testing. Now testing identified biological
38:54
Speaker 1: evidence that had never been properly analyzed during the original investigation.
38:59
Speaker 1: Unlike to time detectives in nineteen seventy four, modern forensic scientists, though,
39:04
Speaker 1: could now develop detailed genetic profiles from extremely small samples.
39:09
Speaker 1: So as laboratory work continued, investigators developed a DNA profile
39:13
Speaker 1: believed to belong to the men responsible for the assault
39:16
Speaker 1: and the murder. The next stage of the investigation was
39:20
Speaker 1: comparing that profile against people who had appeared throughout the
39:24
Speaker 1: case over the years. Detectives revisited witness statements, old suspect lists,
39:29
Speaker 1: you know, going through the investigative file to compile their
39:32
Speaker 1: list of names. Any individual had drawn attention during the
39:35
Speaker 1: original investigation were now being reviewed again and tested against
39:39
Speaker 1: this DNA profile. Some were eliminated very quickly and others
39:45
Speaker 1: required a little bit more scrutiny. But one of the
39:47
Speaker 1: names that resurfaced again was Stephen Crawford. In twenty sixteen,
39:52
Speaker 1: detectives interviewed Stephen again. The conversation occurred more than forty
39:56
Speaker 1: years after Arlis's death. Stephen was now an older man
39:59
Speaker 1: living in Santa far removed from the Stanford campus where
40:02
Speaker 1: he had found her body and the murder had taken place.
40:06
Speaker 1: Investigators questioned him as part of their renewed reviewal of
40:09
Speaker 1: the case while continuing to pursue additional forensic evidence. At
40:13
Speaker 1: the same time, detectives began looking at a way to
40:16
Speaker 1: obtain a DNA sample from him that could be compared
40:19
Speaker 1: against the profile recovered from the evidence. Investigators eventually obtained
40:23
Speaker 1: a discarded item that Stephen had used, allowing forensic analysis
40:27
Speaker 1: to develop a DNA sample without requiring his cooperation, and
40:32
Speaker 1: once the sample was collected, it was submitted for comparison testing,
40:37
Speaker 1: and according to the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office, the
40:40
Speaker 1: DNA profile obtained from his discarded item matched the profile
40:46
Speaker 1: recovered from the evidence associated with the murder of Arles Perry.
40:52
Speaker 1: So now it seemed for the first time since October
40:54
Speaker 1: of nineteen seventy four, detectives had evidence that was capable
40:59
Speaker 1: of an identifying the killer. Well, I mean, they had
41:02
Speaker 1: evidence that did identify the killer.
41:05
Speaker 2: What a bastard. But honestly, right from the beginning, I
41:09
Speaker 2: just had this gut feeling that it was going to
41:11
Speaker 2: be security campus. Yeah, someone in that role.
41:14
Speaker 1: Well I kind of thought the same thing too, And
41:16
Speaker 1: don't get me wrong, I'm pretty sure authorities had a
41:19
Speaker 1: bit of a hunch on them too. It was just
41:20
Speaker 1: a matter of they didn't have any anything to prove
41:23
Speaker 1: it until they finally got the DNA.
41:25
Speaker 2: Well, because I mean, probably the reason why I thought
41:28
Speaker 2: this too was because they were the ones that locked
41:31
Speaker 2: up the church, right.
41:32
Speaker 1: And the ones that opened it, and the one that
41:34
Speaker 1: found it and the ones that reported it.
41:36
Speaker 2: So they're going to be able to lock like they can't.
41:39
Speaker 2: They're going to know if someone's in there still, or
41:42
Speaker 2: lock them in or do something terrible and then hide
41:45
Speaker 2: it for the night or whatever.
41:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, So that makes sense one hundred percent. That's exactly
41:50
Speaker 1: what I thought. So bang on now, detectives quickly began
41:54
Speaker 1: assembling search warrants. They were organizing evidence and planning the
41:58
Speaker 1: next steps necessary to confront Stephen, the man who they
42:01
Speaker 1: believed was responsible for California's most notorious cold case. Forty
42:07
Speaker 1: four years after Arlis entered that church, investigators were finally
42:11
Speaker 1: preparing to make their move, and by June of twenty eighteen,
42:15
Speaker 1: investigators believed they had enough evidence to move forward, and
42:18
Speaker 1: on the morning of June twenty eighth, twenty eighteen, members
42:22
Speaker 1: of the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office arrived at Stephen
42:25
Speaker 1: Crawford's apartment on Camden Avenue in San Jose. Detectives showed
42:31
Speaker 1: up to serve that search warrant, and when they arrived
42:33
Speaker 1: at the apartment, they knocked and made it clear who
42:35
Speaker 1: they were and made verbal contact with Stephen through the door.
42:38
Speaker 1: He responded and told investigators he just needed to get
42:40
Speaker 1: dressed before opening the door. The interaction lasted only a
42:44
Speaker 1: short period, but it quickly took an unexpected turn. As
42:48
Speaker 1: deputies prepared to enter the residence because he clearly wasn't
42:51
Speaker 1: opening the door, they observed Stephen Crawford inside holding a gun.
42:57
Speaker 1: Law enforcement officials immediately backed away from the doorway rather
43:02
Speaker 1: than you know, forcing a confrontation or anything. Then wanted
43:04
Speaker 1: to get control, and a short time after they did that,
43:08
Speaker 1: a single gunshot was heard ringing out from inside the apartment.
43:14
Speaker 1: When investigators eventually forced their way into the residence, they
43:17
Speaker 1: found Stephen Crawford dead from what authorities later determined was
43:21
Speaker 1: a self inflicted gunshot wound. No deputies fired weapons, and
43:26
Speaker 1: no one else was injured, but also no arrest was made,
43:31
Speaker 1: even though Stephen Crawford was now deceased, The investigation continued.
43:36
Speaker 2: That is freaking maddening.
43:38
Speaker 1: He's a coward.
43:40
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, like, fuck him. He got how many extra years?
43:43
Speaker 2: Forty four and then he can't even just like accept
43:47
Speaker 2: the consequences after having forty four free years. Yeah, after
43:51
Speaker 2: being a complete dick wad.
43:53
Speaker 1: That's a good way to describe him. Yeah, he's a
43:55
Speaker 1: complete dick wad.
43:56
Speaker 2: Wow, that makes me mad.
43:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm not a fan Steen. He was a coward,
44:01
Speaker 1: piece of shit in freakin' sucks. Detectives searched the apartment
44:05
Speaker 1: and collected items they believed could have relevance to the case.
44:09
Speaker 1: Among the materials reportedly recovered was the dusk jacket from
44:12
Speaker 1: a book titled The Ultimate Evil. It's a controversial work
44:17
Speaker 1: Sorry that had examined various different murder cases and prompted
44:22
Speaker 1: theories involving occult groups and Arles Perry's murder had been
44:26
Speaker 1: discussed extensively in that book Wow. Investigators also located what
44:32
Speaker 1: was described as a suicide note, believed to have been
44:35
Speaker 1: written approximately two years ago. According to later reports, authority
44:40
Speaker 1: believed that the note may have been connected to the
44:42
Speaker 1: renewal of the attention that detectives were giving the case.
44:47
Speaker 1: While the contents of the note did not provide a
44:49
Speaker 1: detailed confession to Arliss's murder, its existence suggested that Stephen
44:53
Speaker 1: had contemplated ending his life well before the investigators arrived
44:57
Speaker 1: at his apartment in twenty eighteen, and that he realized
45:01
Speaker 1: authorities were likely closing in on him. The events of
45:04
Speaker 1: that morning brought an abrupt end to one of the
45:07
Speaker 1: longest running homicide investigations in Santa Clara County's history. For detectives,
45:12
Speaker 1: the outcome was rather frustrating. The DNA evidence had finally
45:16
Speaker 1: identified a suspect after forty four years, but Stephen's death
45:19
Speaker 1: meant there be no interrogation, no courtroom testimony, no opportunity
45:24
Speaker 1: to ask him the questions that investigators had spent decades
45:27
Speaker 1: trying to answer. The evidence established who committed the crime,
45:31
Speaker 1: but it didn't explain his motive or thought process, or
45:35
Speaker 1: the precise sequence of events on what happened in that
45:38
Speaker 1: church that night. Now. Later that same day, Sheriff Laurie
45:41
Speaker 1: Smith publicly announced the results of that investigation. During a
45:46
Speaker 1: press conference, she revealed that the Sheriff's office had identified
45:49
Speaker 1: Stephen Crawford as the person responsible for the murder of
45:53
Speaker 1: Arles Perry, through the advances in DNA technology that had
45:56
Speaker 1: finally allowed detectives to solve a crime that had once
46:00
Speaker 1: appeared impossible to answer. For forty four years, investigators had
46:05
Speaker 1: worked on this case without being able to identify anyone.
46:09
Speaker 1: Advances made it possible, and for Arlas's family, the news
46:13
Speaker 1: was both significant and bitter sweet. After more than four decades,
46:18
Speaker 1: they finally knew who had killed her. Yet the answer
46:21
Speaker 1: arrived long after many of the people most affected by
46:24
Speaker 1: the crime had hoped to hear it. One of the
46:26
Speaker 1: most heartbreaking details involves Arlas's father, Marvin Deikma. According to
46:33
Speaker 1: family members, one of his final wishes had been to
46:36
Speaker 1: learn who had murdered his daughter. He died only a
46:40
Speaker 1: few months before the investigation announced the DNA breakthrough. Oh No,
46:45
Speaker 1: after waiting almost over four decades, he never lived to
46:48
Speaker 1: hear the conclusion of the investigation.
46:50
Speaker 2: That's terrible.
46:53
Speaker 1: Arlas's sister, Karen Barnes, later spoke publicly about the case
46:56
Speaker 1: and the impact that the announcement had on the family.
47:00
Speaker 1: Bruce Perry also learned the results of the investigation too,
47:03
Speaker 1: and although he rarely spoke publicly about the details of
47:06
Speaker 1: the case, reports indicated that he was relieved to finally
47:09
Speaker 1: know that investigators had solved it and they knew who
47:13
Speaker 1: killed his wife. But still there remained so many unanswered questions.
47:19
Speaker 1: For example, investigators never conclusively determined the significance of the
47:23
Speaker 1: unidentified blonde or sandy haired man reported by witnesses during
47:27
Speaker 1: the original investigation. Were they an accomplice or someone unrelated entirely.
47:33
Speaker 1: Arlis's missing glasses were also never recovered, The person responsible
47:37
Speaker 1: for sealing her grave marker was never identified, and those
47:40
Speaker 1: leftover questions have continued to generate discussion among researchers and
47:44
Speaker 1: true crime writers. However, unlikely the speculation that dominated much
47:48
Speaker 1: of the case for decades, the central mystery is no
47:51
Speaker 1: longer in doubt. The evidence points towards Stephen Crawford as
47:55
Speaker 1: being the one responsible, and that conclusion was reached through
48:00
Speaker 1: not through any sort of rumors or theories or other
48:02
Speaker 1: confessions that eventually came out, but through forensic testing performed
48:06
Speaker 1: on evidence collected from the crime scene that was preserved
48:09
Speaker 1: for more than forty years. Today, Arlis's story is often
48:14
Speaker 1: remembered because of the extraordinary length of the investigation and
48:18
Speaker 1: the remarkable DNA breakthrough that finally identified the killer. But
48:23
Speaker 1: before she became the subject of one of California's most
48:25
Speaker 1: famous cold cases, she was simply a nineteen year old
48:30
Speaker 1: newlywed who had recently moved across the country to begin
48:33
Speaker 1: a new life with her husband. She had been married
48:37
Speaker 1: for less than two months, She was settling into a
48:39
Speaker 1: new job, she was writing letters home to family and
48:42
Speaker 1: friends that she missed, and on the night of October twelfth,
48:46
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, she walked into Stanford Memorial Church seeking
48:50
Speaker 1: a quiet place to reflect and to pray. And forty
48:55
Speaker 1: four years later, investigators finally learned who was responsible for
48:58
Speaker 1: what happened that she was in a place of worship.
49:03
Speaker 1: The reason why remains one of the few parts of
49:05
Speaker 1: the story that died with the killer. But what we
49:08
Speaker 1: do know is that a monster named Stephen Crawford is responsible.
49:13
Speaker 1: And that's the story of the murder of Artless Perry.
49:17
Speaker 3: Hmm.
49:19
Speaker 1: Cold case solved after forty four years, and he just
49:23
Speaker 1: self deletes like a coward. Yeah, he couldn't take what
49:26
Speaker 1: he had done. Yeah, I couldn't take what he had done.
49:29
Speaker 1: He couldn't take the accountability of what he had done,
49:32
Speaker 1: He couldn't take the repercussions for his actions.
49:36
Speaker 2: Honestly, I hope that he had just a terrible life.
49:38
Speaker 1: I agree, fuck that man.
49:41
Speaker 2: And I also have to just I don't know mentioned
49:44
Speaker 2: too how awesome it was of those detectives at the
49:47
Speaker 2: time to keep the evidence that they did right right like,
49:51
Speaker 2: because they had no idea how it could be used
49:54
Speaker 2: potentially later on exactly. They're just like, they obviously did
49:57
Speaker 2: very good job of keeping you know, all the items
50:01
Speaker 2: and later helped solve this case good, which is frickin' awesome.
50:06
Speaker 1: Having that investigative foresight in many of these older cases
50:10
Speaker 1: is huge, and it's what essentially solves many of them
50:14
Speaker 1: because as you're saying, it's so easy to just not
50:16
Speaker 1: look to the future and think, well, what could technology be, Like,
50:19
Speaker 1: maybe we should keep this, you.
50:20
Speaker 2: Know, Oh yeah, we don't need this now, so why
50:22
Speaker 2: keep it? Like it's just it's like it's useless to us.
50:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's useless.
50:27
Speaker 2: But they're like, no, like, we're going to preserve all
50:29
Speaker 2: this stuff and hopefully one day it can catch the
50:32
Speaker 2: killer exactly.
50:33
Speaker 1: So I want to applaud all the investigators and detectives
50:37
Speaker 1: for doing that to this day and previous and then
50:41
Speaker 1: moving forward having that foresight, doing the the good due
50:44
Speaker 1: diligence on everything you can is incredible. Keep it up,
50:49
Speaker 1: you guys are doing good work.
50:51
Speaker 2: And it's also quite bizarre too, the grave marking being
50:54
Speaker 2: grave marker being taken.
50:56
Speaker 1: I have a feeling it wasn't necessarily taken, but maybe
51:01
Speaker 1: it was more so just vandalized and it was lost,
51:04
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Yeah, vandalization seems like the
51:07
Speaker 1: most reasonable explanation to me. Someone who's I don't know,
51:11
Speaker 1: wandering through a graveyard drunk or just an idiot and
51:14
Speaker 1: stupid and they grab it and they chuck it in
51:16
Speaker 1: the bush or something like that. That's kind of what
51:18
Speaker 1: I'm picturing.
51:20
Speaker 2: This is really out there too, But could it not
51:21
Speaker 2: have been like potentially a wild animal sorts.
51:24
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know what that grave marker was like, if.
51:27
Speaker 2: It was just a wooden cross or something, say, right,
51:30
Speaker 2: I feel like an animal could just be like yoink.
51:32
Speaker 1: I mean, theoretically speaking, if it is something like that, Yeah,
51:35
Speaker 1: I guess you.
51:36
Speaker 2: See some weird things on reels and stuff of animals,
51:40
Speaker 2: wild animals doing weird stuff, right, Yeah, you never know.
51:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, it could have been something that wasn't actually malicious whatsoever.
51:48
Speaker 1: You're right, it could have been an instant explanation.
51:50
Speaker 2: I kind of hope so, because that's terrible. So yeah,
51:54
Speaker 2: the fact that she lost her life so young, when
51:56
Speaker 2: her life was really just getting started, it was, it's
51:59
Speaker 2: pretty sad. Nineteen years old, just married two months like
52:03
Speaker 2: frig Yeah huh.
52:05
Speaker 1: Well, I'm glad it was solved though forty four years
52:08
Speaker 1: It's it's not too late. It's never too late for
52:12
Speaker 1: something to be solved. I love the fact that we
52:15
Speaker 1: can solve these cold cases, and I want more of
52:17
Speaker 1: them to get solved. But anyways, thank you guys for
52:20
Speaker 1: being here. You're amazing. We appreciate you. We're an independent
52:24
Speaker 1: show and without you, we couldn't keep doing this. And
52:26
Speaker 1: I usually do this little like wind down thing and
52:29
Speaker 1: talk about all this stuff at the end, but I'm
52:30
Speaker 1: just gonna, you know what, throwing a cole into the
52:33
Speaker 1: deep end of the pool and make her finish up
52:35
Speaker 1: from here. Go ahead. I told her nothing that I
52:38
Speaker 1: was going to do.
52:38
Speaker 2: That so funny because I had this feeling. I got feeling.
52:41
Speaker 2: But anyway, thank you guys for being here. We do
52:44
Speaker 2: appreciate you. All of our links are in the description
52:47
Speaker 2: if you want to know anything else.
52:48
Speaker 3: And until next time, stay wicked thing. Oh oh