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Amber Hagerman Part 5: Bad Men · Gone Cold - Texas True Crime

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Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Alice. I'm a Girl Scout and I have plans.
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0:54
Speaker 2: The Gone Cold podcasts may contain violent or graphics subject matter.
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Speaker 2: Listener discretion is advised. Friendswood, Texas, founded in eighteen ninety
1:05
Speaker 2: five by Quakers, is about twenty miles southeast of Houston. There,
1:12
Speaker 2: in the semi rural wooded community lived a family named
1:15
Speaker 2: the Smithers. Twelve year old Laura Kate smither was a
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Speaker 2: gifted student, a girl scout, and could even scuba dive.
1:25
Speaker 2: But most of all, she was passionate about ballet and
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Speaker 2: quite talented. In fact, Laura's parents had supported her unaccommodating
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Speaker 2: dance schedule by teaching her at home the past school year.
1:40
Speaker 2: For the most part, it was her stepmother who doled
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Speaker 2: out the academic lessons. Laura's mother died of breast cancer
1:47
Speaker 2: when she was only eighteen months old, and Gail, who'd
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Speaker 2: been her nanny, married Laura's father about a year later.
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Speaker 2: Upon doing so, Gail immediately adopted the little girl, who
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Speaker 2: she loved with all her heart. Just after nine o'clock
2:06
Speaker 2: on the morning of Thursday, April third, nineteen ninety seven,
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Speaker 2: and overcast and rainy morning, Laura woke up to find
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Speaker 2: her stepmother preparing to cook pancakes. She'd awakened happy and
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Speaker 2: finding out they were having flapjacks for breakfast only heightened
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Speaker 2: her good spirits. But Laura had priorities. She asked Gail
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Speaker 2: if she could go for a jog before eating. Jogging
2:35
Speaker 2: had become a regular routine for the aspiring ballerina, part
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Speaker 2: of her strength conditioning for dance. Gail, of course told
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Speaker 2: Laura she could go, but told her to be back
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Speaker 2: in twenty minutes. The twelve year old left for her
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Speaker 2: routinely fifteen minute run, but when a half an hour
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Speaker 2: had passed, Laura hadn't yet returned, and her parents set
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Speaker 2: out looking for After gathering a few neighbors to help,
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Speaker 2: after some time had passed with no sight of the girl,
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Speaker 2: they called nine one one and reported her missing. For
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Speaker 2: the next seventeen days, the Friendswood Police, Harris and Galveston
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Speaker 2: County Sheriff's offices, local firefighters, the FBI, the US Coast Guard,
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Speaker 2: the U S Marines, and several thousand volunteers relentlessly searched.
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Speaker 2: Searchers combed parks, creeks, overgrown fields, abandoned structures, and the
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Speaker 2: thick woods and canals that surrounded the country's suburb on foot, horseback, ATV, helicopter,
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Speaker 2: and boat. The Amber Hagerman Task Force two hundred and
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Speaker 2: seventy seven miles north in Arlington were keeping a close
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Speaker 2: eye on the case. They felt the frustration of their
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Speaker 2: Southern colleagues when every day in nas with the news
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Speaker 2: that not a trace of Laura Smither could be found.
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Speaker 2: The task Force knew the feeling all too well. Laura
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Speaker 2: they believed matched their victim's profile, but Task Force detectives
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Speaker 2: could have never fathomed the similarities that were to come.
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Speaker 2: Tracking dogs were about the only searchers successful in finding
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Speaker 2: a trace of Laura Smither. The canines tracked her scent
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Speaker 2: to a part of more road that she would have
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Speaker 2: passed on her job, and then lost it. After setting
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Speaker 2: up what they called informational roadblocks, where they gave fulks
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Speaker 2: a short questionnaire about the day Laura disappeared. The friends
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Speaker 2: would police were able to get something to go on.
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Speaker 2: Hundreds of tips poured in in the media. On April twelfth,
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Speaker 2: nineteen ninety seven, nine days since Laura was last a
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Speaker 2: public plea made an appearance alongside a composite sketch in
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Speaker 2: newspapers and on television. The cops were searching for a
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Speaker 2: white male in his thirties, tall, with a medium build
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Speaker 2: and dark complexion. This man was seen at a construction
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Speaker 2: site near where the tracking dogs lost Laura's scent. He
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Speaker 2: drove a nineteen ninety three to ninety five Ford extended
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Speaker 2: cab pickup truck, blue with no running boards. A photograph
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Speaker 2: of a similar vehicle was featured alongside the composite sketch.
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Speaker 2: Though the descriptions of their suspect differed some, the relatively
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Speaker 2: close match to the man and vehicle in Laura's case
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Speaker 2: wasn't lost on the Amber Hagerman Task Force. Seventeen days
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Speaker 2: after the twelve year old Friendswood girl disappeared, after more
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Speaker 2: than six thousand volunteers and law enforcement officials had searched
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Speaker 2: hundreds of acres in the area, a terrible discovery was made.
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Speaker 2: The outcome everyone was dreading. At about three forty five
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Speaker 2: pm on Sunday, April twentieth, nineteen ninety seven, a man
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Speaker 2: and his son were out training their Labrador Retriever for
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Speaker 2: hunting in a field in Pasadena, about twelve miles northeast
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Speaker 2: of the Friendswood home of Laura Kate Smither. At the
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Speaker 2: edge of a retention pond there near Preston Road and
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Speaker 2: Beltway eight, the dog led his owners to a small,
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Speaker 2: unclothed and badly decomposed body, partially submerged. Authorities swarmed the scene,
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Speaker 2: including Friendswood Police Chief Jared Stout, Though he commented that
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Speaker 2: he did not believe it was Laura, the body was
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Speaker 2: positively identified as belonging to the twelve year old the
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Speaker 2: following day at the Harris County Medical Examiner's office. Immediately
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Speaker 2: upon hearing details of the young girl's death, detectives with
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Speaker 2: the Amber Hackerman Task Force traveled to Friendswood to compare
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Speaker 2: notes with investigators there. Oddly, though certainly just a strange coincidence,
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Speaker 2: both girls were found by dogs. The suspect in each
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Speaker 2: case was described as white, either Hispanic or Caucasian, with
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Speaker 2: a tanned or dark complexion. The vehicles were similarly described,
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Speaker 2: but besides the descriptions of the truck and suspect, the
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Speaker 2: similarities were mind blowing. Both girls were abducted in broad daylight,
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Speaker 2: both had brown hair, and were close in age, among
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Speaker 2: other similar fishysical attributes, Both were found partially submerged in
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Speaker 2: water drainage structures. Laura Smithers's cause of death could not
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Speaker 2: be determined due to the state of decomposition. She was
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Speaker 2: found decapitated, but the pathologist could not find evidence that
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Speaker 2: pointed to whether it was at the hands of her
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Speaker 2: killer or the result of animal activity or decomposition and
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Speaker 2: water flow. Nevertheless, it peaked the task force's interest due
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Speaker 2: to Amber Hagerman's near decapitation. Both Amber and Laura wore
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Speaker 2: only a single sock when their bodies were found. The
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Speaker 2: cops couldn't help but wonder if this was some sort
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Speaker 2: of sick signature. Among the several suspects identified by the
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Speaker 2: Friendswood Police in Laura Smithers's case was two time convicted
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Speaker 2: rapist William Lewis Reese. However, detectives weren't able to gather
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Speaker 2: enough evidence to arrest the thirty seven year old man,
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Speaker 2: who had been paroled just six months before from Oklahoma
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Speaker 2: and was working construction in friends Wood, near the site
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Speaker 2: where witnesses identified the man whose composite sketch and a
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Speaker 2: similar blue, full sized truck were featured in television and
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Speaker 2: newspaper stories about Laura's disappearance even before her body was found.
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Speaker 2: The month following Laura's murder, William Lewis Reese slashed nineteen
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Speaker 2: year old Sandra Sapau's tire outside a convenience store in Webster, Texas.
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Speaker 2: Sandra briefly drove her car, but stopped when she realized
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Speaker 2: her tire was flat. Reese, posing as a good samaritan,
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Speaker 2: albeit briefly stopped behind her, and then he put a
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Speaker 2: knife to Sandra's neck when she got near his pickup,
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Speaker 2: restrained her wrists, forced her inside, and drove away. He
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Speaker 2: attempted to rape her in a nearby motel parking lot,
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Speaker 2: but she fought him off. Reyese became angry and began
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Speaker 2: driving again. On Interstate forty five, Sandra was able to
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Speaker 2: break free from her restraints after feigning compliance. Bravely, she
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Speaker 2: leaped from the moving vehicle. She was severely injured, but
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Speaker 2: escaped something far worse, something several other young women and
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Speaker 2: girls had not. Eventually, Reese was identified and arrested, and
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Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety eight tried, convicted, and sentenced to sixty
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Speaker 2: years in prison for Sandra's abduction. A few years later,
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Speaker 2: when it became law for certain types of offenders to
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Speaker 2: do so, Reese was forced to provide the state with
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Speaker 2: his DNA while incarcerated. More than a day. Decade later,
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Speaker 2: in twenty fifteen, a male DNA profile found on nineteen
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Speaker 2: year old Tiffany Johnston's body was entered into cotis or,
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Speaker 2: the FBI's combined DNA indexing system. Tiffany was raped, beaten,
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Speaker 2: and strangled to death in July nineteen ninety seven in Bethany, Oklahoma.
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Speaker 2: The DNA profile matched William Lewis Reese. To avoid the
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Speaker 2: death penalty, Reese confessed to the murders of twenty year
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Speaker 2: old Kelly Cox from Denton, Texas and seventeen year old
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Speaker 2: Jessica Kin from Clear Lake, Texas, both missing since late
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Speaker 2: summer nineteen ninety seven. He subsequently led police to the
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Speaker 2: locations of Kelly and Jessica's bodies, which were unearthed in
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Speaker 2: twenty sixteen. In twenty twenty two, then sixty two year
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Speaker 2: old William Lewis Reese pleaded guilty to Laura Smither's murder.
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Speaker 2: Reyese confessed this to police. I remember going to work
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Speaker 2: at a construction job site. It was a rainy morning.
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Speaker 2: I heard something slam against my mirror and it scared me,
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Speaker 2: so I stopped. I got out, and then that's when
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Speaker 2: I looked in the ditch and I seen Laura Smither
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Speaker 2: laying in the ditch and she wasn't breathing. He panicked.
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Speaker 2: Ryese led on and disposed of Laura's body. The depraved
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Speaker 2: predator was lying, of course, trying to lessen his role,
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Speaker 2: and later admitted strangling her to death. Perhaps it will
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Speaker 2: never be known if he really did hit her with
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Speaker 2: his truck, but if he did, it was almost certainly
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Speaker 2: no accident. None of this, of course, was known in
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Speaker 2: nineteen ninety seven.
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Speaker 1: Then.
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Speaker 2: The Amber Hagerman Task Force was keeping a close working
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Speaker 2: relationship with the Friends with Police during their investigation of
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Speaker 2: Laura's murder, but knowing they'd be disbanded at some point,
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Speaker 2: and fully aware that the Houston Suburbs prime suspect, William
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Speaker 2: Lewis Reese was in jail in January nineteen ninety six
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Speaker 2: when Amber was abducted and murdered. They had to move on.
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Speaker 2: Time was of the essence, and anyway, there were many
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Speaker 2: solid leads to follow all the way through. Trying to
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Speaker 2: explain to her five year old son what happened to
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Speaker 2: his sister was incredibly difficult. When little Ricky asked his mother,
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Speaker 2: Donna Whitson a question, which happened often, she'd begin her
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Speaker 2: answer with something along the lines of well, Ricky, the
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Speaker 2: bad man did this to Sissy, and would then can
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Speaker 2: continued to address the boy's inquiry as best she could.
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Speaker 2: Perhaps Donna had to explain to Ricky that the bad
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Speaker 2: man was still out there somewhere. A hard parental line
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Speaker 2: to maneuver when considering the possible paranoia the boy might
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Speaker 2: have undergone as the result. Most folks are decent folks,
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Speaker 2: Donna knew who would not do what was done to
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Speaker 2: her daughter, nine year old Amber Hagerman. Even still, there
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Speaker 2: were plenty of bad men prowling the streets. Howard stephen
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Speaker 2: Ault was twenty nine years old when Amber was kidnapped,
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Speaker 2: raped and slain. The man's record was peppered with charges
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Speaker 2: like criminal mischief, auto theft, and aggravated battery. Also, in
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Speaker 2: September of nineteen eighty six, at age twenty, he was
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Speaker 2: drunk and approached a couple walking on a Fort Lauderdale,
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Speaker 2: Florida beach. Alt pulled a knife and threatened them, but
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Speaker 2: because the man was an off duty police officer, he
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Speaker 2: didn't get very far. All of these crimes aside, it
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Speaker 2: was his nineteen eighty eight offence that had cops in Arlington,
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Speaker 2: Texas putting Alt under the microscope. On the fifteenth of
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Speaker 2: May that year, between the hours of four and five am,
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Speaker 2: Howard stephen Alt broke into a home in Lauderdale Lakes,
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Speaker 2: a city in South Floridas Miami metropolitan area, wearing a
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Speaker 2: pillowcase over his head. Inside was the twelve year old
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Speaker 2: daughter of a woman he had befriended, asleep in her room.
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Speaker 2: Alt approached the sleeping girl and straddled her. She woke
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Speaker 2: up and began to scream. He quickly covered her mouth
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Speaker 2: with his hand before picking up a trophy from the
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Speaker 2: bedside table and raising it in the air as if
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Speaker 2: he was prepared to bludgeon her. Scream or I'll kill
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Speaker 2: you all demanded The girl stopped. The madman then removed
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Speaker 2: her underwear, intending to rape her. Suddenly, a car door
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Speaker 2: slammed outside my mommy's home. The twelve year old girl shouted.
16:18
Speaker 2: Alt sprung to his feet and raced to look as
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Speaker 2: the girl began to crawl around looking for somewhere to
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Speaker 2: be safe. But her mother wasn't home, and the depraved
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Speaker 2: predator realized it quickly. He came back into the girl's
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Speaker 2: bedroom and she screamed. The would be rapist fled, but
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Speaker 2: not before taking the pillowcase off his head. For whatever reason,
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Speaker 2: Howard Stephen Alt was quickly apprehended and arrested after the
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Speaker 2: girl identified him to police. He was convicted of attempted
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Speaker 2: sexual assault in August of nineteen eighty eight and served
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Speaker 2: four years in a Florida prison. Worst was yet to come.
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Speaker 2: A former Arlington, Texas resident, Alt was living in Florida
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Speaker 2: when the Amber Hagerman Task Force got wind of him.
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Speaker 2: Throughout the nineteen eighties and nineteen nineties, the convicted child
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Speaker 2: molester moved back and forth between the two states, his
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Speaker 2: mother's house in Texas and fathers in Florida. A couple
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Speaker 2: years after his release from prison, in March of nineteen
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Speaker 2: ninety four, Alt drove a six year old neighbor to
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Speaker 2: an isolated park, removed her clothing, and molested her. In
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Speaker 2: May of nineteen ninety five, Alt assaulted his pregnant wife, and,
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Speaker 2: as a result, presumably violating parole conditions pertaining to his
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Speaker 2: nineteen eighty eight attempted sexual assault conviction, he was sentenced
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Speaker 2: to two years community control. Y'all will later see that
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Speaker 2: this program is pretty much unenforced to the point of
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Speaker 2: being utter bullshit. The accompanying and required psychologist and group
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Speaker 2: therapy sessions for what the State of Florida called sex
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Speaker 2: problems were also apparently ineffectual. The following December, an eleven
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Speaker 2: year old Lauderdale Lake's girl showed up for a babysitting
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Speaker 2: gig at Alt's home. The pedophile, undressed, grabbed and carried
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Speaker 2: the girl into his bedroom and began trying to rape her.
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Speaker 2: She struggled to get away. An Alt attempted to subdue
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Speaker 2: the eleven year old by slapping her in the face
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Speaker 2: and choking her, but in stark contrast to the weak
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Speaker 2: and cowardly child rapist, the girl was brave and strong.
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Speaker 2: She kicked Alt in the chest as hard as she could.
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Speaker 2: He stopped. He then proceeded to plead with her not
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Speaker 2: to keep it a secret, but instead tell someone of
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Speaker 2: the horrible thing he did. It was likely intended to
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Speaker 2: garner sympathy rather than Alt realizing the error of his ways,
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Speaker 2: because his ways would later get much more sickening. The girl, anyway,
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Speaker 2: told her father, and he filed a police report with
19:22
Speaker 2: the Broward County Sheriff's office. There were likely many factors
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Speaker 2: the Amber Hackerman task Force were considering when scrutinizing Alt.
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Speaker 2: First is the timing. This attack occurred on New Year's
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Speaker 2: Eve nineteen ninety five, exactly two weeks before Amber was
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Speaker 2: taken from the parking lot of the abandoned When Dixie
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Speaker 2: grocery store. If there is any doubt Alt was under
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Speaker 2: a significant amount of stress during this period, it's no
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Speaker 2: more than an inkling, considering the timing, the incredible stress
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Speaker 2: of a seemingly imminent arrest, and the FBI's Amber Hagerman's
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Speaker 2: suspect profile that theorized her killer was almost certainly under
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Speaker 2: intense pressure from a major, negative and recent life occurrence.
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Speaker 2: Arlington police detectives were likely chomping at the bit to
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Speaker 2: get any and every piece of information about Alt that
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Speaker 2: they possibly could. Even the nature of Amber's neck wound
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Speaker 2: could be theorized the work of Howard Stephen Alt, as
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Speaker 2: far as anyone knew, he would be inexperienced at inflicting
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Speaker 2: such an injury and likely again in theory, needing to
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Speaker 2: get back to Florida and the hell out of Texas
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Speaker 2: as fast as humanly possible. The assault against the eleven
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Speaker 2: year old girl was assigned to Broward County Sheriff's Office
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Speaker 2: Detective Deborah Cox. Cox should have never become a police officer,
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Speaker 2: and that's much more polite a statement than she deserves
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Speaker 2: in this story. For ten months, Howard Stephen Alt roamed free,
21:08
Speaker 2: even though there was more than enough evidence to make
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Speaker 2: an arrest, a fact later confirmed by her superiors. Superiors
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Speaker 2: Detective Cox didn't even run a criminal records check on
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Speaker 2: Alt during that period, and in that ten months, Alt
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Speaker 2: committed one of the most heinous crimes imaginable. In either
21:33
Speaker 2: late October or early November nineteen ninety six, Howard Stephen
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Speaker 2: Alt met Donna Jones and her children, eleven year old
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Speaker 2: Dianne and seven year old Alisha, at john Easterland Park
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Speaker 2: in Broward County. Jones, her two year old daughter, and
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Speaker 2: the girls had been living in a pop up trailer
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Speaker 2: they towed around when she could afford it. Jones paid
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Speaker 2: the camping fee to say stay at Easterland Park, something
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Speaker 2: they'd been doing off and on for months. Alt gave
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Speaker 2: Donna Jones a hand drawn map to his house and
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Speaker 2: told her she and the kids could come take showers
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Speaker 2: there if they wanted to. That same day, Jones had
22:17
Speaker 2: to scold Dianne and Alisha for accepting a ride an
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Speaker 2: Alt's truck. He'd taken them to a convenience store nearby
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Speaker 2: and bought them snacks and drinks. The mother would have
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Speaker 2: been horrified had Alt introduced himself as what he really
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Speaker 2: was a child rapist. Soon, Howard Stephen Alt would escalate
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Speaker 2: his criminal persona to child killer. On Monday, November fourth,
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Speaker 2: nineteen ninety six, Alt drove up just before the final
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Speaker 2: bell rang at Lloyda State Elementary at two thirty pm.
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Speaker 2: Little Alicia had told Alt days before that someone had
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Speaker 2: stolen her candy at their Halloween party. He'd come to
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Speaker 2: pick them up and take them to get some. He
23:08
Speaker 2: told the girl and her sister, Dianne, when they came
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Speaker 2: out of the school building it was at his apartment,
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Speaker 2: Alt said. When they entered his home, Alt immediately put
23:20
Speaker 2: Dianne to the ground and raped her. The eleven year
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Speaker 2: old began fighting back and screaming to make her stop.
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Speaker 2: The monster strangled her till she was no longer breathing.
23:34
Speaker 2: Dianne was dead. He then strangled seven year old Alicia
23:39
Speaker 2: to prevent her from telling anyone. Alt redressed Dianne and
23:44
Speaker 2: put both girls in the attic of his apartment. Alicia, however,
23:49
Speaker 2: wasn't dead. She lay comatose in the attic for twelve
23:54
Speaker 2: to eighteen hours before finally succumbing to the unforgivable work
23:59
Speaker 2: of this record griant killer. The following day, Alt was
24:04
Speaker 2: questioned at the Oakland Park Police Department. While he was there,
24:09
Speaker 2: Broward County Sheriff's Office, Detective Deborah Cox arrested Alt for
24:14
Speaker 2: the assault and attempted rape of his eleven year old
24:17
Speaker 2: babysitter ten months before. That at least kept him in
24:22
Speaker 2: jail while Oakland Park police could button up an investigation
24:26
Speaker 2: of the girl's disappearances. But the fact of the matter was,
24:30
Speaker 2: had Cox actually performed an investigation and arrested Alt in
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Speaker 2: the first place, Diane and Alicia would not have endured
24:39
Speaker 2: the hell they did, they'd still be alive. Detective Deborah
24:45
Speaker 2: Cox was later fired and her direct supervisor was demoted.
24:51
Speaker 2: But first, Howard Stephen Alt confessed to murdering the two
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Speaker 2: little girls and led the cops to their bodies. In
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Speaker 2: the Broward County jail as he awaited indictment and then
25:15
Speaker 2: a trial, Detectives from the Amber Hagerman Task Force traveled
25:20
Speaker 2: from Texas to Florida to interview Howard Stephen Alt. In
25:25
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety three, Arlington police learned Alt lived in an
25:30
Speaker 2: apartment within a mile of where Amber's body was found.
25:35
Speaker 2: Detectives collected hundreds of pages of information documents and interrogation
25:41
Speaker 2: transcripts on the Florida child rapist and murderer, much to
25:46
Speaker 2: the dismay of Alt's defense attorney. As soon as the
25:49
Speaker 2: media showed interest in his arrest and the fact that
25:53
Speaker 2: detectives from Texas had come to town to talk to him,
25:56
Speaker 2: he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Alt told reporters he
26:01
Speaker 2: knew Arlington well and had attended Workman Junior High in
26:05
Speaker 2: the city. It was possible, he went on, that he
26:10
Speaker 2: was there when nine year old Amber was kidnapped and killed.
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Speaker 2: I might have had something to do with some disappearances
26:17
Speaker 2: out in Texas. Howard Stephen Aught said, as annoying as
26:22
Speaker 2: it was, the task force was enjoying Alt's loose lipped
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Speaker 2: fifteen minutes of fame. He was giving them plenty to
26:30
Speaker 2: use against him should the case go before at Tarrant County,
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Speaker 2: Texas Grand Jury, and potential clues for the not so
26:38
Speaker 2: distant future as well. Alt also told reporters that in
26:43
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety two he'd met a woman at the Peach
26:46
Speaker 2: Tree Lounge, a strip joint off power Line Road in
26:50
Speaker 2: Fort Lauderdale, and subsequently killed her. After that, he dumped
26:56
Speaker 2: her body in the holy Land area of the Everglades.
27:00
Speaker 2: On August twenty eighth, nineteen ninety three, at about six pm,
27:05
Speaker 2: hunters did find the skeletal remains of a woman in
27:09
Speaker 2: the holy Land Wildlife Refuge Management Area just north of
27:15
Speaker 2: the Broward County line in Palm Beach County. The Fort
27:20
Speaker 2: Lauderdale Police, working with Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office deputies,
27:25
Speaker 2: attempted to confirm Alt's story, but when they visited the
27:29
Speaker 2: area of holy Land where he said he had left
27:32
Speaker 2: the body, there was really no way to find any clues.
27:37
Speaker 2: It had been years and the area was expansive. Alt anyway,
27:42
Speaker 2: doubted his recollections and told reporters it might have been
27:46
Speaker 2: the Rotenberger Wildlife Refuge Management Area where he disposed of
27:51
Speaker 2: the woman's body. It seems obvious Alt was both toying
27:56
Speaker 2: with police and basking in the glory he thought the
27:59
Speaker 2: media was giving him. The nineteen ninety three Palm Beach
28:04
Speaker 2: County Jane Doe was still unidentified as of twenty twenty.
28:09
Speaker 2: She is estimated to have been sixteen to twenty years
28:13
Speaker 2: old and was wearing men's shorts and one men's boot. Ultimately,
28:20
Speaker 2: the Amber Hagerman Task Force eliminated Howard stephen Ault as
28:24
Speaker 2: a suspect, more or less citing his court ordered community
28:28
Speaker 2: control as the reason. Alt's probation officer had contact with
28:33
Speaker 2: him three days before Amber's abduction the officer told them
28:38
Speaker 2: and the day following. But there is perhaps reason to
28:43
Speaker 2: question the validity of the community control program's management. Alt
28:49
Speaker 2: wore no electronic monitor. He was only required to keep
28:53
Speaker 2: a log of his whereabouts, which should have been work
28:56
Speaker 2: or home, only expect unannounced visit from his probation officer,
29:02
Speaker 2: and adhere to scheduled visits to the probation office. However,
29:07
Speaker 2: Alt was able to run around with two little girls
29:10
Speaker 2: he met while out at a park and ultimately rape
29:13
Speaker 2: one and murder both. That seems to be leaving out
29:18
Speaker 2: the control part of community control, arguably the most important
29:24
Speaker 2: aspect of keeping a convicted sexual predator of children in check.
29:29
Speaker 2: It was referred to verbatim by the task force as
29:33
Speaker 2: strict house arrest when they announced Alt's elimination from the
29:38
Speaker 2: suspect pool, and that's not simply a stretch of the truth. Rather,
29:43
Speaker 2: it's a complete tear. After the task force headed back
29:48
Speaker 2: to Texas. Alt did a back and forth in an
29:50
Speaker 2: attempt to make a deal and avoid the death penalty,
29:54
Speaker 2: pleading guilty, then not guilty, guilty again, and then not
29:58
Speaker 2: guilty again. The prosecutor declined to bite, and the case
30:03
Speaker 2: went to trial. The jury heard plenty of evidence, including
30:08
Speaker 2: his confession in which he told an Oakland Park detective
30:12
Speaker 2: that he had no intention of killing eleven year old
30:16
Speaker 2: Diane till she started screaming as he raped her, and
30:20
Speaker 2: only killed seven year old Alicia because if she told,
30:24
Speaker 2: his wife would undergo hardship with him going back to jail.
30:28
Speaker 2: The statements were in contradiction to what he'd told the
30:31
Speaker 2: eleven year old babysitter he attempted to rape when he
30:35
Speaker 2: pleaded with her to tell someone about the bad thing
30:38
Speaker 2: he'd done, his weasley and pathetic attempt to garner sympathy
30:43
Speaker 2: from the traumatized girl. In August of nineteen ninety nine,
30:48
Speaker 2: for the murders of eleven year old Diane and seven
30:51
Speaker 2: year old Alicia, Alt was found guilty and sentenced to death.
30:57
Speaker 2: He remains incarcerated on Florida's death Row at the time
31:00
Speaker 2: of this recording. In mid July of twenty twenty three.
31:06
Speaker 2: Another suspect that came on the radar of the Amber
31:09
Speaker 2: Hagerman Task Force was a thirty nine year old tipster,
31:14
Speaker 2: Matthew Wade. Howard was a graduate of Saint Mary's University
31:18
Speaker 2: Law School in San Antonio. In nineteen eighty five, he
31:23
Speaker 2: moved to Bedford, not far from Arlington, set up a
31:26
Speaker 2: law practice, and became a fairly well known and very
31:30
Speaker 2: respected criminal defense attorney. In nineteen ninety five, Howard ran
31:36
Speaker 2: for Bedford Municipal Court judge, campaigning on the basic principle
31:41
Speaker 2: that a magistrate should gain the respect of the people
31:44
Speaker 2: before expecting it in return, but he fell short of
31:49
Speaker 2: winning the run. Though he didn't quite fit the bad
31:53
Speaker 2: man profile the cops were looking for and definitely didn't
31:57
Speaker 2: fit the FBI's criminal profile well, his actions were nothing
32:02
Speaker 2: short of bizarre and perhaps even more worrisome obsessive. Midway
32:09
Speaker 2: through nineteen ninety six, the Arlington Police began receiving incessant
32:14
Speaker 2: phone calls and letters from Howard. The man claimed to
32:18
Speaker 2: know who killed Amber, and his constant accusations against the
32:23
Speaker 2: same person led to the task force's careful scrutinization. But
32:28
Speaker 2: when police investigated the tips, they quickly found out they
32:32
Speaker 2: had no merit. The letters Howard sent were long and
32:36
Speaker 2: rambling and contained what the cops called packets of information
32:41
Speaker 2: that went nowhere. In the writings and on the phone,
32:45
Speaker 2: the respected lawyer expressed great frustration and anger with detectives
32:50
Speaker 2: and officers over the fact that Amber's killer was still
32:54
Speaker 2: out there, But according to Arlington Police detectives Sergeant Mark Simpson,
33:00
Speaker 2: he would talk to him in person, he was always
33:02
Speaker 2: pretty reasonable. After his visits to the station, Howard would
33:07
Speaker 2: leave on good terms and seem to come to an
33:09
Speaker 2: understanding with investigators, and then would go home and send
33:13
Speaker 2: information he'd come up with to other police jurisdictions. All
33:18
Speaker 2: the tips and information, according to Sergeant Simpson, were absolutely
33:23
Speaker 2: irrelevant to anything. After finding an alibi for Howard early on,
33:30
Speaker 2: police refocused efforts on him later because of his continual correspondence,
33:37
Speaker 2: it was abundantly clear that he was obsessed with Amber's case,
33:41
Speaker 2: but it was not the only one. Thirty two year
33:46
Speaker 2: old Sharon McClain was last seen leaving her shift at
33:50
Speaker 2: Advantage or rent A Car on Wednesday, December eleventh, nineteen ninety six,
33:57
Speaker 2: after failing to show up for her shift. A few
33:59
Speaker 2: days later, on the fourteenth, Sharon's supervisor requested her friend
34:04
Speaker 2: go to her Bedford apartment to make sure everything was okay.
34:09
Speaker 2: Her friend arrived there that morning to find her door unlocked.
34:14
Speaker 2: When she entered, she found Sharon's body on the kitchen floor,
34:19
Speaker 2: lying face down in a pool of blood. The scene
34:23
Speaker 2: was horrific. A kitchen knife was at her feet, and
34:28
Speaker 2: later police discovered two more under her body. Sharon McLane
34:33
Speaker 2: had been repeatedly stabbed and slashed. It seemed likely the
34:38
Speaker 2: murder occurred on December twelfth, since her neighbors heard what
34:41
Speaker 2: they called blood curdling screams at a little after three
34:45
Speaker 2: pm that day. A neighbor and a maintenance worker both
34:49
Speaker 2: saw a tall, white man wearing a black cowboy hat
34:53
Speaker 2: walk from the breezeway adjacent to Sharon's apartment, not thirty
34:57
Speaker 2: minutes after the screams. The maintenance worker told Bedford police
35:02
Speaker 2: detectives that the man was acting nervous and trying to
35:06
Speaker 2: avoid contact with him. Even considering these witness accounts, a
35:11
Speaker 2: man named John Earl Noley was convicted of Sharon McLean's
35:16
Speaker 2: murder and sentenced to life in prison. In nineteen ninety eight.
35:20
Speaker 2: Noley is a black man. There is no justification for
35:25
Speaker 2: this guilty verdict. We don't have the time to get
35:29
Speaker 2: into it here, though we will in an upcoming episode.
35:34
Speaker 2: But the evidence against Knowley, a friend of Sharon's, was
35:38
Speaker 2: less than shaky. It was nonexistent. Still, he was in
35:44
Speaker 2: prison for almost twenty years before a terrant County judge
35:48
Speaker 2: released him on bond in twenty sixteen. Noley was fully
35:53
Speaker 2: exonerated in twenty eighteen. This was the other case Matthew
35:59
Speaker 2: Wade Howard was obsessed with, and both before and after
36:04
Speaker 2: Noley's conviction, he repeatedly sent information to detectives in charge
36:09
Speaker 2: of the case. He knew, Howard said, who killed Sharon Maclain,
36:15
Speaker 2: but his information apparently led nowhere, seemingly eliminated at least
36:22
Speaker 2: during the Amber Hagerman Task Force days. Howard's story ends tragically.
36:29
Speaker 2: Upon his divorce, he stopped sending Arlington Police detective's tips
36:34
Speaker 2: on Amber's case in early nineteen ninety eight. In August
36:39
Speaker 2: of nineteen ninety nine, he asked a relative to kill him.
36:44
Speaker 2: After calling the police and carefully coaxing Howard out of
36:47
Speaker 2: his apartment. He was treated at a Bedford mental health facility.
36:52
Speaker 2: When he was released, family raced to Howard's home to
36:56
Speaker 2: remove all his weapons, but in October nineteen ninety nine,
37:01
Speaker 2: he purchased a cult three fifty seven revolver. On February eleventh,
37:07
Speaker 2: two thousand neighbors of Matthew Wade Howard at the gated
37:12
Speaker 2: Shoal Creek apartments in Bedford witnessed him throwing clothing and
37:16
Speaker 2: furniture from his third story balcony. It was bizarre behavior,
37:22
Speaker 2: but nothing compared to the terror that followed. Howard began
37:26
Speaker 2: firing his three fifty seven at folks in the parking
37:29
Speaker 2: lot below. Probably more accurately, Howard wanted to appear to
37:35
Speaker 2: be firing at people. After shooting off approximately ten rounds,
37:41
Speaker 2: a Bedford police sharpshooter shot and killed Matthew Wade Howard.
37:48
Speaker 2: The officer had never been involved in a shooting before
37:51
Speaker 2: that day. Howard was forty two years old. Everyone who
37:57
Speaker 2: remembered him as an upbeat and extremely kind man was shocked.
38:05
Speaker 2: The Amber Hagerman Task Force looked into several more particularly
38:09
Speaker 2: good suspects during their run. We'll discuss those and more
38:14
Speaker 2: on the next episode of Gone Cold. If you have
38:20
Speaker 2: any information about the abduction and murder of Amber Renee Hackerman,
38:25
Speaker 2: please call the Arlington Police at eight one seven four
38:28
Speaker 2: five nine five seven seven to two. To remain anonymous
38:33
Speaker 2: and to be eligible for a reward, you can provide
38:37
Speaker 2: a tip at Terrant County Crime Stoppers at eight one
38:40
Speaker 2: seven four six' nine eight four seven. Seven if you
38:47
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