00:00:12
sometime during a neighborhood christmas
00:00:14
party in 1989
00:00:16
five-year-old melissa brannon
00:00:18
disappeared
00:00:19
she really did we had a great time but
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it's late
00:00:23
melissa will you go get the coats
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none of the adults or other children at
00:00:27
the party saw where she went or noticed
00:00:29
anything unusual
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it took science to see what witnesses
00:00:35
did not
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[Music]
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tammy brannan and her five-year-old
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daughter melissa had moved from texas
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into this suburban apartment complex in
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lorton virginia
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tammy was a single mother recently
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divorced working as an accountant and
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beginning a new phase in her life
00:01:20
tammy is
00:01:21
a very good mother she's a very sweet
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very caring person kept to herself more
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or less you know she wasn't
00:01:29
what i would call extremely outgoing
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although she did participate in just
00:01:33
about everything
00:01:34
one of the attractive features of the
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apartment complex was the active social
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program for the residents every friday
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night was some sort of social gathering
00:01:44
in the clubhouse and during the holidays
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there were special events
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the night of december 3rd at the
00:01:51
christmas party
00:01:52
that's something that they they
00:01:53
basically did uh for almost every
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holiday people looked forward to it uh
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they always had a nice layout within the
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clubhouse and people
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spent time getting to know their
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neighbors
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tammy brannan and her daughter melissa
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both attended that christmas party in
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1989.
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altogether about 200 residents of the
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complex were there
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everybody was very upbeat
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having a very good time the children
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played with each other all through the
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night going around and snatching all the
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food and having a good time
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[Music]
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when it was time to leave tammy asked
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melissa to get their coats
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[Music]
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shortly after handing the coat to her
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mother
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melissa
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disappeared merry christmas
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where's melissa she was just here
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tammy looked for her daughter throughout
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the clubhouse
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[Music]
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in a utility room off the lobby marked
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private a full length window leading to
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the outside was wide open
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the window faced a wooded area behind
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the apartment complex
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it's possibility that somebody could
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have went out that window and not been
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seen by anybody outside
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and it's in an area where it's secluded
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to the inside partygoers wouldn't have
00:03:39
seen anybody exiting to that window also
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fairfax county police searched the
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entire area and questioned everyone who
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attended the party
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it was very cold out that night it was
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pretty imperative that we try to locate
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as quickly as possible
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it's hard to imagine a young child
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with a dress on and a small coat
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surviving temperature that night
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although no one at the party noticed
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anything unusual
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police feared that melissa had been
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abducted
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tammy brennan pleaded for her daughter's
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safe return during a televised news
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conference
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the person who took melissa
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i beg you to please call somebody
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anybody
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and tell us where she is
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no matter what happened she saw that i
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have please bring it back to me
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[Music]
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if you can hear mommy
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and get to a telephone
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call our number like i talked to you
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or call me
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we love you we miss you very much
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please come back to us mommy's waiting
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all the way down to
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davis
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police could find no trace of
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five-year-old melissa brannan despite
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the help of hundreds of volunteers
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hundreds of police officers down there
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we had hundreds of people from the
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military bases
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we had people volunteering their
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airplanes their helicopters
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the search was phenomenal
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it just showed how this case touched so
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many people
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yellow ribbons were placed throughout
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the neighborhood a symbol of concern and
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hope for melissa's safe return
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police questioned melissa's father who
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was in texas on the night of melissa's
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disappearance
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he was immediately ruled out as a
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suspect i also asked
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that if the person who took my daughter
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can hear me
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please let her go
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we love her very much
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if anyone has any information that may
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help please contact someone
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who will pass the information on to us
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thank you
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[Music]
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police questioned everyone who lived at
00:05:59
the apartment complex as well as all of
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the employees
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[Music]
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caleb hughes worked at the apartment as
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a maintenance man and attended the
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christmas party
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police interviewed hughes at his home a
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few hours after the party around 2 a.m
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i'm sergeant garcia from the fairfax
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police department
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i'd like to ask you a couple questions
00:06:28
about the party at the apartment complex
00:06:30
that you worked at
00:06:32
they asked him where he had been since
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leaving the apartment complex what did
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you do after you left the party
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i drove straight home i stopped off for
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a six-pack and i got home about 12 30
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quarter of wine he said he stopped just
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before he got home near his house well
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if he got home at 12 30 quarter of the
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one they stopped selling beer in
00:06:50
virginia at 12 o'clock so he didn't stop
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for beer he couldn't
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what'd you do after you got home
00:06:58
i did chores laundry stu you know stuff
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like that
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do you mind if we look around
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now go ahead
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during the search police noticed
00:07:15
something unusual
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hughes told police he had been doing his
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laundry but the clothes he was washing
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were the ones he wore to the party did
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you always wash your sneakers with your
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clothes mr hughes
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he was also washing his belt and the
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knife holder
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said why would you wash all your clothes
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you don't have another pair of blue
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jeans and why would you wash your
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sneakers
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caleb had no response
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the side a few sneakers had been shaved
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away
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although the sneakers had been washed
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tests showed traces of human protein
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possibly blood deep in the fibers
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caleb hughes wasn't cooperating either
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hughes told police he did not speak to
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melissa brennan at the christmas party
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but several witnesses contradicted him
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[Music]
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did you have something to eat said caleb
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i think you know more i think you took
00:08:10
melissa out of that party and all caleb
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would do is just sit there and finally
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caleb said prove it
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look me straight in the face and no
00:08:17
emotion at all
00:08:18
and that's what investigators set out to
00:08:20
do
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weeks passed and still there were no
00:08:27
signs of five-year-old melissa brannan
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the community of lorton virginia held a
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candlelight vigil at the brannan's
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apartment complex
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just a few feet from the clubhouse where
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melissa was abducted
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bumper stickers yellow ribbons and
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flyers with melissa's picture were
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everywhere
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it was all anybody talked about
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because this wasn't one girl in one
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family this was
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any child all of our families
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if this could happen
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to tammy brannon's daughter this could
00:09:02
happen to anyone's daughter and there
00:09:04
was a desperate outcry to find who would
00:09:07
have taken this child
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the remaining suspect was caleb hughes
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hughes attended the christmas party but
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he denied having anything to do with
00:09:17
melissa's disappearance
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forensic scientists began their
00:09:21
investigation with a look inside hugh's
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car
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the interior of the car was cluttered
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with a lot of of debris dirt bags of
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books
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dog hair i just looked at it and thought
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holy mackerel how am i going to be able
00:09:35
to find any type of evidence that would
00:09:37
link melissa to this car
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the car was sprayed with the chemical
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luminol which fluoresces when it comes
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into contact with the hemoglobin
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component of blood
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luminol revealed blood on the steering
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wheel foot pedals and floor mat
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the blood was collected for dna analysis
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but the results were inconclusive
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the car was also searched for trace
00:10:01
evidence specifically hair and fibers
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and was sent to special agent doug
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dietrich of the fbi for analysis
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first thing that i do is look at the
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tapings that came from the front seat of
00:10:15
the car
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trying to identify what types of
00:10:18
materials are there and if possible
00:10:20
anything that may have come from the
00:10:22
victim if she had been in that car
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dietrich discovered quite a bit of
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animal hair in the car most of it dog
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hair
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but three of the hairs from hugh's front
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seat were different
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they were rabbit hairs
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that had been dyed black
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the rabbit hairs were microscopically
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similar to a german rabbit hair coat
00:10:44
tammy brannon wore to that christmas
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party
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when tammy brown was leaving the
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apartment
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she told melissa to get her fur coat
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melissa got the fur coat and as a child
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will do
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she draped that coat across her
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shoulders
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and of course
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those
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hairs from that coat certain them
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transfer to her
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dietrich also discovered blue and red
00:11:12
fibers on hugh's front passenger seat
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the red fibers were cotton and extremely
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common fiber but the blue fibers were
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extremely rare
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the 50 blue fibers were man-made and
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acrylic they were all the same shape
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length and diameter an indication they
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were from the same manufacturer
00:11:33
gas chromatography revealed that the
00:11:36
blue fibers were dyed with the same blue
00:11:38
dye
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but the chemical composition of the blue
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dye was unusual
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melissa brannon was wearing a blue
00:11:46
sweater and red plaid skirt on the night
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she disappeared the outfit had been a
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gift from melissa's grandmother who
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could not recall where she bought it all
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she could remember was that the sweater
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had a picture of big bird on it a
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character from the sesame street
00:12:02
television series
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prosecutors needed more evidence than
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the three rabbit hairs from mrs
00:12:09
brannon's coat found in caleb hughes car
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they knew that any good defense attorney
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would argue that caleb hughes could have
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brushed up against tammy brannon's coat
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at the party and transferred those
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rabbit hairs onto the seat of his car
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doug dietrich was convinced that the
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blue fibers held the key to melissa
00:12:29
brannon's disappearance but there was no
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way to tell if the fibers were from
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melissa's clothing
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after work one night doug dietrich
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shared his frustration with his wife he
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told her he needed to find the
00:12:43
manufacturer of the outfit melissa was
00:12:45
wearing at the christmas party some sort
00:12:47
of blue winnie the pooh thing or a
00:12:50
sesame street uh outfit with a red plaid
00:12:53
skirt
00:12:54
i don't know anything about winnie the
00:12:55
pooh but if it's sesame street that's
00:12:57
sold by j.c penney hold on a second
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[Music]
00:13:03
mrs dietrich had kept a number of store
00:13:06
catalogs some going back a few years
00:13:09
[Music]
00:13:11
red plaid skirt i see that she proceeded
00:13:13
to bring a catalog down from the year
00:13:15
before christmas
00:13:17
and sure enough on page 11 of that
00:13:19
catalog there was an outfit that
00:13:22
looked darn close to what they were
00:13:24
describing to me as the one melissa
00:13:26
brandon wore the night of her
00:13:27
disappearance
00:13:29
when tammy brannon was shown the picture
00:13:31
from the catalog
00:13:33
she identified it as the one melissa was
00:13:36
wearing at the party
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the fbi asked jc penny for one of the
00:13:41
outfits in order to analyze the fibers
00:13:44
but they were sold out
00:13:46
the item was a catalog only item
00:13:49
jcpenney sold all seven thousand
00:13:51
garments in a matter of months
00:13:53
but jcpenney located a customer in
00:13:56
kentucky who had purchased one of these
00:13:58
outfits a year earlier the customer
00:14:01
bought the outfit as a present for his
00:14:03
granddaughter but it was the wrong size
00:14:06
so it had never been worn
00:14:08
the customer sent the outfit to the fbi
00:14:11
for analysis the idea of just being able
00:14:13
to find an outfit
00:14:15
that that's exactly the same outfit that
00:14:18
a victim wore in a case that's an
00:14:20
extremely good
00:14:21
stroke of luck
00:14:24
when doug dietrich examined the garment
00:14:27
he made a startling discovery
00:14:30
when jc penney had this outfit
00:14:31
manufactured they wanted to make it
00:14:34
unique instead of using a standard die
00:14:37
and there are 10 000 of them pennies
00:14:40
decided to create a brand new color
00:14:44
jcpenney specifies a particular color
00:14:46
then they'll work with the dye
00:14:48
manufacturer to find some combination of
00:14:51
chemicals that will produce exactly that
00:14:53
tone in this particular case they went
00:14:56
an additional step and made sure that it
00:14:58
was a die that nobody else had access to
00:15:00
so that they could trademark this
00:15:01
sweater from the color point of view
00:15:04
they called their new color plum navy
00:15:06
number 887
00:15:08
jc penney patented that signature die
00:15:12
and used it only once when they produced
00:15:15
the 7 000 big bird sweaters
00:15:18
when diedrick compared the fibers from
00:15:20
the duplicate sweater to those found in
00:15:22
hughes automobile
00:15:24
they were the same
00:15:26
with several hundred million people in
00:15:28
the country and only seven thousand
00:15:29
sweaters the probability of
00:15:32
that particular sweater being located in
00:15:34
individual cars very small
00:15:37
you can just work out the ratios of the
00:15:39
two there's no question in my mind that
00:15:41
that melissa brandon had been in the
00:15:43
front seat of cal hughes car and where
00:15:45
she went from there well i guess that's
00:15:47
a mystery right now
00:15:50
a mystery
00:15:52
police were desperately trying to solve
00:15:58
the search for melissa brannan's body
00:16:00
continued for almost a year
00:16:03
statistics show that children abducted
00:16:05
by strangers are usually murdered within
00:16:08
three hours of the abduction
00:16:10
the prime suspect caleb hughes was asked
00:16:13
to take a polygraph test
00:16:16
are you the one who abducted melissa
00:16:18
no
00:16:20
right now can you take me to melissa's
00:16:22
body
00:16:23
no
00:16:24
the results of his polygraph examination
00:16:26
indicated deception
00:16:28
as soon as he realized that i knew
00:16:32
that he had failed that test
00:16:35
he didn't want anything to do with that
00:16:37
that room didn't want anything to do
00:16:38
with me
00:16:39
and pretty much bolted out of there but
00:16:42
there was a problem in the state of
00:16:44
virginia prosecutors must be able to
00:16:47
prove where a homicide occurred
00:16:50
since the blood in caleb hughes
00:16:52
automobile could not be identified as
00:16:55
melissa's
00:16:56
prosecutors could not reach the
00:16:58
threshold of homicide
00:17:00
they could only prove kidnapping which
00:17:02
carried a maximum sentence of only 10
00:17:05
years
00:17:06
but prosecutors were convinced that the
00:17:09
blue and red fibers in caleb hughes car
00:17:12
indicated more than kidnapping
00:17:15
the last tammy brennan saw her daughter
00:17:18
she was wearing the pink nylon coat
00:17:22
winter coat
00:17:23
over top of this big bird outfit
00:17:26
if the child remained in that winter
00:17:28
coat in the automobile
00:17:31
you wouldn't have the collection and the
00:17:33
population of blue acrylic fibers that
00:17:35
are found on the scene
00:17:37
because they'd be inside the nylon coat
00:17:40
they weren't
00:17:42
prosecutors believe that hughes removed
00:17:45
melissa's ski jacket in the car an
00:17:48
indication that hughes committed a sex
00:17:50
act
00:17:52
hughes had the child's coat off in the
00:17:55
automobile
00:17:56
and it seems to me the inference that
00:17:59
flow from that all legitimate inferences
00:18:02
of an intent to the file
00:18:09
while melissa was waiting for her mother
00:18:11
to say her goodbyes at the christmas
00:18:13
party prosecutors believe that she left
00:18:16
for a moment to get a drink from the
00:18:18
water fountain in the hallway near the
00:18:20
utility room
00:18:23
this is where hughes abducted her
00:18:32
[Music]
00:18:36
hughes took melissa through the window
00:18:38
in the utility room and fled in his car
00:18:43
hughes removed melissa's ski jacket in
00:18:45
the car causing the transfer of the blue
00:18:47
and red fibers onto the front seat
00:18:51
also in the car there were three rabbit
00:18:52
hairs from tammy brannon's coat the one
00:18:55
melissa handed her mother seconds before
00:18:57
she was abducted
00:18:59
where hughes took melissa brennan and
00:19:02
left her body
00:19:04
remains a mystery
00:19:07
hughes tracked blood onto his foot
00:19:09
pedals and floor mat from his sneakers
00:19:12
luminol revealed blood on the car's
00:19:14
steering wheel as well
00:19:24
when hughes arrived home
00:19:26
he immediately washed his clothes in
00:19:28
order to remove trace evidence
00:19:34
he also scraped away the blood stain
00:19:36
from the sides of his sneakers before
00:19:39
washing them along with his clothes
00:19:41
but he didn't remove evidence that he
00:19:44
couldn't see
00:19:45
the tiny fibers from melissa's clothing
00:19:48
left on the passenger seat of his car
00:19:53
caleb hughes was arrested and charged
00:19:56
not with kidnapping but with the
00:19:58
abduction of melissa brennan with intent
00:20:01
to defile her
00:20:03
he was found guilty and sentenced to 50
00:20:06
years in prison
00:20:07
without parole
00:20:09
the maximum sentence
00:20:11
caleb hughes has never confessed to the
00:20:14
crime
00:20:15
and the search for melissa's body
00:20:18
continues to this day
00:20:20
each piece of evidence no matter how
00:20:22
small whether it's a car
00:20:24
or whether it's a strand of dna all have
00:20:27
a story to tell
00:20:28
where they've been who they've been with
00:20:30
how long they've been around
00:20:32
and this is the type of information that
00:20:34
that i look at and that i decipher and
00:20:38
try to determine what value it has so
00:20:40
one piece of evidence is can be
00:20:43
significant when you add multiple pieces
00:20:46
of this puzzle and you never get the
00:20:47
whole puzzle you only get pieces but you
00:20:50
don't need the whole puzzle to see what
00:20:52
that picture is going to say and in this
00:20:54
case
00:20:55
50 fibers blue acrylic 10 cotton
00:20:58
black rabbit hairs to me it's
00:21:00
overwhelming evidence
00:21:03
[Music]
00:21:18
[Music]
00:21:24
so
00:21:26
[Applause]
00:21:30
[Music]
00:21:41
you
