00:00:05
two women from the same town killed in
00:00:07
the same way suggested a serial killer
00:00:10
was on the loose
00:00:12
there were unusual metal fragments on
00:00:14
both victims and investigators needed to
00:00:17
find out what they were
00:00:19
in order to stop a killer
00:00:23
[Music]
00:00:42
uh
00:00:49
the spirit of washington was traveling
00:00:51
from seattle along the shores of lake
00:00:54
washington when it stopped unexpectedly
00:00:56
because of some work being done on the
00:00:59
tracks ahead
00:01:01
ladies and gentlemen we are slowing down
00:01:04
when the passengers looked outside
00:01:07
they saw more than just pretty scenery
00:01:10
witnesses who were on the dinner train
00:01:12
saw what appeared to them to be
00:01:14
a human body laying in the bottom of
00:01:16
this creek
00:01:18
local authorities secured the site and
00:01:21
found the remains of a middle-aged woman
00:01:23
wearing a nightgown and slippers a blue
00:01:26
jacket was thrown nearby along with an
00:01:29
empty pack of cigarettes
00:01:32
unfortunately there were no fingerprints
00:01:34
dna or any other forensic evidence on
00:01:37
the cigarette pack
00:01:39
the medical pathologist who performed
00:01:40
this autopsy was not able to determine a
00:01:43
cause of death the
00:01:45
medical examiner's
00:01:47
ultimate autopsy didn't show any obvious
00:01:50
signs of homicidal violence yet it was
00:01:52
clear from the circumstances that she
00:01:53
was the victim of a homicide
00:01:55
after a review of missing persons
00:01:58
reports police identified the victim
00:02:00
as 53-year-old arlene jensen who lived
00:02:04
alone and worked as a seamstress
00:02:08
her son reported her missing five weeks
00:02:10
earlier when she failed to show up for
00:02:12
work
00:02:13
he found the door a jar
00:02:16
her purse and her keys were on the end
00:02:19
table and her car was in its stall
00:02:23
there was no sign of forced entry or any
00:02:26
disturbance
00:02:27
but there were signs that someone other
00:02:30
than arlene had been there
00:02:32
she was a very neat housekeeper and
00:02:35
there were ashes spilled all around the
00:02:38
ash tray on the coffee table that's
00:02:40
something she just never did
00:02:42
there was various blankets comforters on
00:02:44
top of the bed i looked at those and
00:02:46
then i pulled them back and i noticed
00:02:48
that in the area of the upper left hand
00:02:51
side of it on the pillow and on the
00:02:53
sheet underneath that there was some
00:02:55
blood stains which i tested and they
00:02:56
were indeed positive for blood
00:02:58
the comforter didn't have any blood
00:03:01
but the sheets underneath dead
00:03:05
this meant someone pulled the comforter
00:03:07
over the sheet after the blood was dry
00:03:10
which would have been about 30 minutes
00:03:12
later
00:03:14
on the bathroom floor were some used
00:03:17
towels and two cigarette butts were in
00:03:19
the toilet with the seat and lid left up
00:03:23
all these clues
00:03:25
told a story
00:03:27
some man had been in her home some man
00:03:29
had used the toilet and flipped his
00:03:31
cigarette butts into the toilet and
00:03:34
failed to flush before he left someone
00:03:36
has been there for a while long enough
00:03:38
to smoke at least one cigarette possibly
00:03:40
even two they've had time to have blood
00:03:43
dry they've been there for at least 30
00:03:45
minutes and then they've washed their
00:03:47
hands or attempted to wash their hands
00:03:48
and clean something up and the cigarette
00:03:51
butts were the same brand
00:03:53
as the empty package found near the
00:03:55
victim's body
00:03:57
if arlene had been abducted from her
00:03:59
apartment
00:04:00
the motive certainly wasn't robbery
00:04:04
her purse which she always kept on a
00:04:06
chair where she sat and watched
00:04:08
television
00:04:09
was there her wallet was there the keys
00:04:11
to her car were there forensic
00:04:14
scientists found another important clue
00:04:17
in arlene's bed
00:04:19
tiny bits of metal most no bigger than a
00:04:22
fraction of an inch
00:04:24
these are metal fragments which weren't
00:04:25
just one type even visually some were
00:04:28
silver colors some were brass colored
00:04:30
some were copper colored so it's quite a
00:04:31
large
00:04:33
mixture of materials something you
00:04:34
normally don't see
00:04:36
investigators found those same metal
00:04:39
shavings
00:04:40
on arlene's body it gives you a
00:04:42
significant tie between the body
00:04:45
recovery scene and what you would
00:04:47
believe to be the actual location of
00:04:50
occurrence
00:04:51
on arlene's jacket
00:04:53
were several beige nylon fibers
00:04:57
they were triangular in shape the kind
00:04:59
used in cars
00:05:01
[Music]
00:05:03
this suggested that arlene's body had
00:05:05
been inside a car with beige upholstery
00:05:11
apparently
00:05:12
the killer had left
00:05:14
plenty of clues
00:05:19
the metal fragments found on arlene
00:05:21
jensen's body and in her apartment were
00:05:23
sent to the forensics lab for testing
00:05:27
under a microscope
00:05:29
scientists could see that the fragments
00:05:31
were different shapes and sizes
00:05:34
the surfaces were corrugated
00:05:36
and the composition of the metal varied
00:05:39
from piece to piece they were made of
00:05:41
various types of steel for his grades of
00:05:43
steel with his crates of brass
00:05:45
the unique shapes and the fact some were
00:05:48
hollow
00:05:49
were a clear indication of their origin
00:05:52
what that means to me is that's a piece
00:05:53
of metal which is projected through the
00:05:55
air and when it's projected through the
00:05:57
air metal molten metal projected through
00:05:59
is cooling very very rapidly and with
00:06:02
the air currents as it goes through the
00:06:03
air it dries to a
00:06:06
soccer ball round shape
00:06:09
so investigators knew the killer was
00:06:12
probably a machinist
00:06:14
someone who worked with metal at high
00:06:16
heat
00:06:17
on a lathe
00:06:19
arlene jensen was a seamstress and there
00:06:21
were no metal fragments like these in
00:06:23
her workplace
00:06:28
the next clue came from an unlikely
00:06:30
source almost
00:06:31
40 miles away
00:06:34
campers in a national park outside of
00:06:36
seattle found
00:06:37
a decomposed body of a young woman
00:06:40
partially buried in a shallow grave
00:06:43
a leopard-skinned jacket was on the
00:06:46
ground nearby
00:06:48
through dental records the victim was
00:06:50
identified as 29 year old stephanie
00:06:53
dietrich
00:06:54
an administrative assistant who was
00:06:56
reported missing several weeks earlier
00:07:01
she was last seen
00:07:02
at a fourth of july party stephanie was
00:07:05
at her residence on july 4th and there
00:07:09
were people firing fireworks around the
00:07:11
area it sounds like she was having a
00:07:12
good time with the neighbors
00:07:14
stephanie told friend she planned to go
00:07:16
camping
00:07:17
but no one knew if she went alone
00:07:20
or with others
00:07:21
we were still thinking she was going to
00:07:23
come back i even when i was printing the
00:07:25
flyers i remember still thinking she was
00:07:27
going to come back from
00:07:29
some camping trip that she was having so
00:07:31
much fun that she just didn't want to
00:07:32
come home for
00:07:35
investigators were stunned to discover
00:07:38
tiny metal fragments on stephanie's body
00:07:41
like the ones found
00:07:43
in the arlene jensen case
00:07:45
well the first
00:07:46
natural thing you know come up in your
00:07:48
brain is oh these two people are
00:07:49
connected
00:07:51
at 100 times magnification the fragments
00:07:54
looked identical
00:07:56
but were they
00:07:59
to find out analysts turned to a process
00:08:02
known as energy dispersive x-ray
00:08:05
spectrometry
00:08:07
the samples were bombarded with
00:08:09
electrons this created x-ray frequencies
00:08:12
which were then
00:08:14
charted and compared
00:08:16
each element has a set of characteristic
00:08:19
x-rays iron is different from chromium
00:08:21
and chromium is different from aluminum
00:08:23
the fragment samples contained steel and
00:08:26
brass
00:08:28
the steel had the exact same
00:08:30
combinations of iron manganese and
00:08:33
chromium
00:08:34
in the brass
00:08:36
copper and zinc were found in identical
00:08:38
amounts and all the samples had equal
00:08:41
amounts of cerium
00:08:43
part of a compound used to ignite an
00:08:45
oxyacetylene torch a common item in
00:08:48
machine shops
00:08:50
we examined all of them and could can
00:08:52
see the pattern that regardless of where
00:08:55
they came from they were basically the
00:08:57
same kind of metal fragments machining
00:08:59
fragments
00:09:01
this proved that both arlene jensen and
00:09:04
stephanie dietrich were killed
00:09:07
by the same man
00:09:09
the science is starting to really catch
00:09:11
up to the bad guys now
00:09:14
a serial killer was on the loose in the
00:09:16
seattle area
00:09:18
he had to be stopped
00:09:20
before he could kill again
00:09:26
while investigating stephanie dietrich's
00:09:28
murder
00:09:29
police interviewed the guests at her
00:09:31
fourth of july party the last time she
00:09:34
was seen alive they said stephanie spent
00:09:37
most of her time talking to a man
00:09:40
they did not know
00:09:42
while they didn't know his last name
00:09:44
they knew his name was gary they knew
00:09:46
that he bragged about being a drummer in
00:09:48
a rock band
00:09:50
stephanie's family identified the man as
00:09:53
her oldest and dearest friend
00:09:56
gary ackley
00:09:58
when interviewed by police actly
00:10:00
recalled he was at the party but wasn't
00:10:02
there specifically to be with stephanie
00:10:06
one of the things he told us was he had
00:10:07
gone there to locate somebody else had
00:10:09
seen stephanie so stop to talk
00:10:11
the witnesses said that it seemed a
00:10:13
little bit more than that
00:10:16
then police did a background check on 29
00:10:19
year old gary ackley and discovered
00:10:22
some alarming information
00:10:26
gary ackley was related to the first
00:10:29
murder victim arlene jensen
00:10:32
actly lived with arlene's daughter and
00:10:34
they had two children together
00:10:37
when questioned by police
00:10:40
ackley said he loved his common-law
00:10:41
mother-in-law and was devastated by her
00:10:44
murder
00:10:45
but family members said
00:10:47
that was a lie
00:10:49
well he didn't like her and it was no
00:10:52
secret she didn't like him
00:10:55
but no one in the family did like him
00:10:58
their relationship can best be described
00:11:00
as being acrimonious arlene jensen was
00:11:03
concerned about the welfare of her
00:11:04
daughter whom she believed was at least
00:11:07
verbally and psychologically being
00:11:09
abused by gary ackley
00:11:11
arlene also didn't like the way actley
00:11:14
treated her grandchildren
00:11:16
when she would express those concerns
00:11:17
particularly in the presence of of gary
00:11:20
ackley
00:11:21
it became quite apparent that he didn't
00:11:23
want her anywhere around
00:11:25
and ackley's fights with arlene were
00:11:28
well known to neighbors and family
00:11:30
members
00:11:32
they got into a a disagreement during
00:11:34
which gary ackley called her at a
00:11:36
minimum of [ __ ] and depending on whose
00:11:38
version you believe
00:11:40
if she interfered any longer he would
00:11:42
kill her
00:11:43
she left the house that they rented
00:11:46
making statements something like i'm not
00:11:47
going to put up with this and i don't
00:11:49
know why you're putting up this either
00:11:50
to her daughter
00:11:52
ackley's brand of cigarettes was another
00:11:54
interesting coincidence
00:11:57
when he bought cigarettes he bought the
00:11:59
cheapest cigarettes he could get his
00:12:00
hands on those were basic basic brand
00:12:04
cigarettes
00:12:05
that was the kind of cigarette butts
00:12:06
that were located in the toilet in
00:12:08
arlington's house there was also a box
00:12:10
from basic brand cigarettes located near
00:12:13
the dump site where arlene jensen's body
00:12:15
was ultimately recovered some six weeks
00:12:16
later
00:12:18
but what was most telling to
00:12:20
investigators
00:12:22
was gary ackley's profession
00:12:25
gary ackley worked as a fabricator he
00:12:28
worked in a metal shop
00:12:29
and much of his time he spent on a lathe
00:12:33
this was suspicious since metal
00:12:35
fragments were found on both stephanie
00:12:37
dietrich's body as well as arlene
00:12:40
jensen's
00:12:42
with a search warrant
00:12:44
investigators found
00:12:46
metal shavings on ackley's jeans in his
00:12:49
car and in his workplace
00:12:53
when tested with energy dispersive x-ray
00:12:56
spectronomy
00:12:57
scientists discovered that the shavings
00:13:00
from gary actley were the same as those
00:13:03
found
00:13:04
on both murder victims
00:13:07
these metal shavings that came from the
00:13:08
body of arlene jensen the body of
00:13:09
stephanie dietrich gary ackley's car and
00:13:11
the jeans he was wearing all came from
00:13:13
the same place
00:13:15
but ackley's lawyer said this proved
00:13:17
nothing
00:13:19
they claimed it shouldn't be surprising
00:13:21
the metal shavings were the same because
00:13:23
ackley knew both victims and could have
00:13:26
transferred those particles weeks
00:13:27
earlier
00:13:29
so investigators turned to the beige
00:13:32
fibers found on the jacket near his
00:13:34
mother-in-law's body
00:13:36
there's an infrared spectrophotometer
00:13:38
which identifies this this polymer fiber
00:13:41
as a nylon fiber then we also use a
00:13:44
micro spectrophotometer which is an
00:13:46
instrument for basically identifying and
00:13:48
comparing color of a specific fiber
00:13:51
and what he found
00:13:52
was that those beige fibers on arlene's
00:13:55
jacket came
00:13:57
from the back seat of ackley's car
00:14:01
interestingly there were several blue
00:14:03
nylon fibers found inside acne's car
00:14:06
that were microscopically similar to the
00:14:09
fibers from arlene's jacket
00:14:12
this is called a cross transfer
00:14:17
that jacket had been in contact with
00:14:20
some area of a car that had carpet
00:14:23
fibers that were shedding onto her
00:14:24
jacket so her jacket was in some
00:14:26
location with a brown carpet and his car
00:14:28
was in some contact with a blue jacket
00:14:32
in fact
00:14:33
the blue jacket fibers were found on
00:14:36
only one area of the car's back seat
00:14:41
this was a clear indication that arlene
00:14:44
was either unconscious or immobile while
00:14:47
she was in her son-in-law's car
00:14:50
she didn't move a lot yeah there wasn't
00:14:52
a whole lot of movement with the jacket
00:14:54
so if you're sitting in the rear seat of
00:14:56
a car and you never move then that's
00:14:58
where the transfer would be
00:15:00
finally
00:15:02
in the national park near where
00:15:04
stephanie dietrich's body was found
00:15:07
investigators discovered remnants of a
00:15:09
campfire
00:15:11
some of stephanie's personal items were
00:15:13
strewn in the grass
00:15:16
along with a plastic shopping bag
00:15:19
there was a shopping bag from a local
00:15:22
grocery store and once it was submitted
00:15:24
to the washington state patrol crime
00:15:25
laboratory
00:15:26
what we found was a very clear latent
00:15:29
fingerprint left by
00:15:31
none other than gary ackley
00:15:35
the fingerprint along with the metal
00:15:37
fragments and fibers clearly tied gary
00:15:40
ackley to both crime scenes
00:15:43
prosecutors knew why ackley killed his
00:15:46
mother-in-law arlene
00:15:48
what they couldn't figure out
00:15:50
is why he killed his childhood friend
00:15:54
stephanie
00:15:57
he knows he killed arlene jensen
00:16:00
prosecutors believe that gary actley
00:16:03
killed arlene jensen out of anger
00:16:06
he wanted revenge
00:16:08
for what he believed was her meddling in
00:16:10
the way he raised her grandchildren
00:16:13
and the way he treated her daughter
00:16:16
the offensive thing about stereotypes i
00:16:18
think most people would agree is that
00:16:20
they're oftentimes true but i will say
00:16:22
that one
00:16:23
stereotype that i think gary ackley is a
00:16:26
perfect example of is a domestically
00:16:28
violent woman abusing killer
00:16:33
prosecutors believe
00:16:34
ackley had access to arlene's apartment
00:16:37
key
00:16:38
and used it to enter her home
00:16:41
late one night after she was in bed
00:16:49
the autopsy results aren't clear about
00:16:52
how he killed arlene but the evidence
00:16:55
suggests she was killed while in bed
00:16:59
metal fragments dropped from actley's
00:17:02
clothes onto the sheets fragments
00:17:04
he couldn't see
00:17:07
[Music]
00:17:11
he stayed in arlene's apartment long
00:17:13
enough to smoke two cigarettes and wash
00:17:16
his hands
00:17:19
then he hid the bloodstained sheets with
00:17:22
the comforter
00:17:24
the trace evidence shows he put arlene's
00:17:27
body into the back seat of his car
00:17:29
creating the fiber cross transfer
00:17:33
her jacket fibers were left on the seat
00:17:36
and the upholstery fibers clung to her
00:17:39
jacket
00:17:42
ackley dumped her body a mile away in a
00:17:45
field near the railroad tracks
00:17:48
unaware
00:17:49
he left more metal shavings there
00:17:54
he also left
00:17:55
another calling card
00:17:58
an empty pack of his favorite brand of
00:18:00
cigarettes
00:18:02
the same brand he left in his
00:18:04
mother-in-law's bathroom
00:18:08
but what was the motive
00:18:10
for stephanie dietrich's murder
00:18:13
by all accounts gary ackley had a big
00:18:15
mouth
00:18:18
prosecutors think in a moment of
00:18:20
weakness
00:18:21
actly told stephanie that he killed
00:18:24
arlene
00:18:28
prosecutors found a witness who saw
00:18:30
actley and stephanie camping together on
00:18:33
the fourth of july weekend
00:18:40
prosecutors believe
00:18:42
ackley killed his childhood friend in
00:18:45
order to silence her
00:18:47
burying her body in a shallow grave
00:18:49
again
00:18:51
leaving the tell-tale metal fragments
00:18:53
behind
00:18:56
when he disposed of stephanie's personal
00:18:59
items
00:19:00
he left his fingerprint on the shopping
00:19:02
bag
00:19:05
i don't think there's anything i could
00:19:07
say that would bother him because
00:19:09
someone that can kill their girlfriend's
00:19:11
mom and their kid's grandma
00:19:14
is untouchable emotionally so i wouldn't
00:19:17
even try
00:19:19
a year after the crimes
00:19:21
gary ackley was convicted of two counts
00:19:24
of first-degree murder and sentenced
00:19:27
to life in prison without parole
00:19:30
despite the mountains of forensic
00:19:32
evidence against him
00:19:34
arlene jensen's daughter julie refused
00:19:37
to believe that ackley killed her mother
00:19:40
so after his conviction she cemented
00:19:43
their common-law relationship by
00:19:45
formally marrying him
00:19:48
in a prison ceremony
00:19:50
i don't know why julie jensen would
00:19:52
marry the man who was convicted of
00:19:53
killing her mother and you'd have to ask
00:19:55
her
00:19:56
first of all it's nauseating and i i
00:19:59
can't understand her train of thought at
00:20:01
all
00:20:02
and
00:20:04
i don't know i've tried to understand
00:20:06
that before and all i can make of it is
00:20:09
domestic violence in its severest form
00:20:12
like the brainwashing the abuse
00:20:15
that just makes that person just not
00:20:18
even think for themselves because
00:20:20
it's so plain to see you know
00:20:23
two murders
00:20:25
seemingly unrelated
00:20:28
but unmistakably connected by a series
00:20:31
of microscopic clues detectives all over
00:20:34
this country are solving murder cases
00:20:36
that are 20 or 30 or 40 years old based
00:20:39
on science that didn't exist seven or
00:20:40
eight years ago
00:20:42
so my expectation is that gary ackley
00:20:45
one was not a very intelligent fellow
00:20:47
and two there was just not this blitz of
00:20:50
information from the media about murder
00:20:52
investigations that would have ever
00:20:54
given him any pause to consider the fact
00:20:56
that he was bringing to each of these
00:20:58
two crime scenes the most compelling
00:21:01
evidence that would be used to convict
00:21:02
him
00:21:04
[Music]
00:21:13
[Music]
00:21:24
so
00:21:32
[Music]
00:21:41
you
