00:00:06
it was a christmas gift delivered to a
00:00:08
jacksonville florida home there was no
00:00:11
card or label identifying the center but
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inside were some clues
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a thin piece of wire and some cryptic
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numbers on a sales receipt held the key
00:00:24
to a brutal and senseless murder
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[Music]
00:00:36
[Music]
00:00:40
[Applause]
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[Music]
00:00:55
january 6 2001
00:00:58
was packing day for lillian jarvis and
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her two children
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she was moving her family to a new
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apartment in the same town just a few
00:01:07
miles away
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son lillian was a very wonderful girl we
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didn't have any secrets we talked about
00:01:12
everything and i don't even want to tell
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you what everything means either
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lillian spent most of her professional
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life working with special needs children
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she was very sweet girl she would do
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anything for anyone
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on moving day
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it was lillian's mother who first saw
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the gift on the front porch
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there was no card just a note saying
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sorry it's late
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she carried the package inside the house
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lillian was actually inside the bathroom
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packing some toiletries and things
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marjorie came back into the house with
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the package kind of excited you know oh
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look look there's a christmas package
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here
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and everybody gathered around to see
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what it was
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inside
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was a green fisherman's tackle box
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[Music]
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the explosion was immense
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it blew a hole straight through the roof
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shards of galvanized steel proved it was
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a pipe bomb
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the fire component was extremely
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uncommon
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the impact of the bomb
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threw my daughter across the room i knew
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my daughter was dead i knew she was dead
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when she landed
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there's no way she could have got out of
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there
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forty-four-year-old lillian jarvis was
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killed
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lillian's mother suffered burns on her
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face and torso but fortunately she
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survived
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lillian's boyfriend dan show walter also
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had burns on his face and upper body
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he lost the sight in one eye and
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sustained permanent hearing loss
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lillian's daughter was unharmed
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it was very difficult to tell who the
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package was intended for the package did
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not have a label on it that we were
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aware of uh denoting who this present or
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package was intended for
00:03:25
a little child could have come by and
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picked it up and opened it thinking it
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was a christmas gift and not even
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thinking that it wasn't on their house
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or anything i mean children will do
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those things
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firefighters could smell the remnants of
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gasoline making this an extremely
00:03:41
unusual bomb
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i think most bomb builders
00:03:46
are revenge motivated to get even with
00:03:49
the victim or or to kill the victim for
00:03:52
some reason some motive other than just
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a random
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killing most of the individuals that do
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bombings or criminals
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basically think they're smarter than
00:04:02
everybody else but there's always one
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mistake they make
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that's gonna
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get them caught
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since the package didn't have a shipping
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label
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it was most likely delivered by hand
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but
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was lillian the intended target
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bomb experts conducted a grid search
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inside and outside the home in which
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lillian jarvis was killed
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and little by little
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searchers found quite a few pieces of
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the bomb
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bomb builders think that the bombs are
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destructive and that they destroy
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evidence but in fact
00:04:47
bombs don't destroy evidence they create
00:04:49
evidence and they create very unique
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imprints of evidence there were i
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believe over 160 items and all of that
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had to be sifted and separated and
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looked at under the microscope or or
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magnifying ring
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i spent upwards of
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several months to a year looking through
00:05:09
and going through all of that evidence
00:05:12
by testing the debris with gas
00:05:14
chromatography
00:05:16
scientists confirmed that gasoline was
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used in the bomb
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so not only was she blown up then she
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was also burned up
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and
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this again shows that there was a
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personal hatred
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of this target
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experts believe that the gasoline was in
00:05:35
a balloon inside the tackle box
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the bomb was identified as a type of
00:05:41
pipe bomb
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wrapped with ball bearings to make it
00:05:45
more deadly
00:05:48
investigators also found bits and pieces
00:05:51
of the tackle box enough to identify the
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macon model
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fortunately there were stickers and
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labels on some of the pieces that i was
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able to reconstruct and able to identify
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this tackle box as a plano tackle box
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thousands of these tackle boxes had been
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sold in the area making it virtually
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impossible to trace
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they're sold in jacksonville as well as
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other parts of the country so we we have
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ran into a problem in trying to identify
00:06:19
who may have bought that taco box as
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well it's a pretty generic item
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but investigators did find an extremely
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important piece of evidence in the
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rubble
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a tiny piece of metal wire
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no wider than a thread
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a single wire
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that it was a little heavier gauge than
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some of the other wires the house wires
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that i had been seeing in the evidence i
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recognized it as a model rocket igniter
00:06:44
just from my past experience and seeing
00:06:46
these in other devices
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the first suspect in the bombing was
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lillian's ex-husband william jarvis
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because he had been clearly unhappy
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about the divorce
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he was a 39 year old air traffic
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controller with no criminal record
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he would be calling her hours of the day
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and night harassing her to come home and
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i love you i'm sorry and yada yada
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and it just kept getting worse and worse
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but his daughter katie was in the home
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at the time of the blast no one believed
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william jarvis would ever put her in
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harm's way
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there was some real confusion as to
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whether or not a father would actually
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send a device to where his daughter was
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staying therefore we kind of ruled him
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out
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then investigators learned that
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lillian's mother marjorie worked for an
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organization that had received a bomb
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threat just 24 hours earlier
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the night before there was a bomb threat
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called to where i work which is
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community hospice
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and they were thinking that someone
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didn't like me or they didn't like the
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company when we were investigating to
00:07:56
see if marjorie was a target through
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hospice and the bomb threat they
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received
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we looked very hard at the fact that the
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caller was a female and had a very
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strong southern accent
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this was a tantalizing clue
00:08:10
lillian's new boyfriend dan showalter
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almost died in the blast
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his ex-wife connie
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had a southern accent
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dan had a protection order against
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county
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he received because connie had attempted
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to take their daughter
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take custody and flee the state with the
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daughter
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when questioned connie showalter said
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she was out of state when the bombing
00:08:33
occurred and her alibi checked out
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plus if you just look at the nature of
00:08:38
this particular killing which is highly
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personal
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with a very very vicious device it's
00:08:43
just not
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women don't do that to women
00:08:48
one piece of evidence found in the
00:08:50
rubble suggested that lillian jarvis may
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have been the intended target after all
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it was wrapped in some angel christmas
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wrapping paper and lillian was known to
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have a fondness for angels
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a background check revealed lillian had
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developed extensive and sometimes
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intimate relationships over the internet
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[Music]
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we were concerned that perhaps this bomb
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had been left by somebody that she had
00:09:19
met online that had developed a
00:09:21
relationship with and that that
00:09:23
relationship maybe have gone bad
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and we conducted almost 100 interviews
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on various people that knew lille
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through the internet
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five days after the bombing
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friends and relatives held a candlelight
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vigil for lillian jarvis in a park
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nearby
00:09:42
detectives posed as tv news crews to
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conduct surveillance
00:09:47
and they actually filmed the vigil
00:09:49
interviewed some of the people there and
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we used that footage to see who showed
00:09:53
up and maybe who didn't show up that
00:09:54
might help in the investigation
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[Music]
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you'd be surprised how often killers
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show up at these things
00:10:04
[Music]
00:10:10
bombing victim lillian jarvis developed
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many friendships online following her
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divorce
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investigators spoke to everyone on
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lillian's buddy list and email address
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book but all were virtual dead ends
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then
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they learned something suspicious
00:10:30
just two days after the bombing
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lillian's ex-husband william jarvis was
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due in court
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he owed lillian a considerable sum of
00:10:40
money as part of their divorce
00:10:42
settlement and he had been refusing to
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pay
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he was to be in court with a check for
00:10:50
close to forty four thousand dollars
00:10:52
cashier's check to present to the judge
00:10:55
for this money that he owed her that was
00:10:58
the date
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the judge had told him he said he was
00:11:01
not letting him go one more day
00:11:03
the money was for back child support and
00:11:06
lillian's 50 share of the house they
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owned together
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was the timing of the
00:11:12
explosion just a coincidence
00:11:16
investigators didn't think so
00:11:19
so they asked the judge for a search
00:11:21
warrant to look inside william jarvis's
00:11:23
home
00:11:25
at his desk
00:11:26
was a hint that some items from the
00:11:29
house had recently been removed
00:11:32
the tower computer was gone in fact
00:11:34
there was still an input and there was
00:11:36
carpet of a tower computer yet there was
00:11:38
none
00:11:39
and where did it go
00:11:41
investigators then searched the home of
00:11:43
jarvis's new girlfriend
00:11:45
we found two cd roms which are in her
00:11:48
underwear drawer in her bedroom we were
00:11:50
positive these were the cds belonging to
00:11:53
william jarvis because there were
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various emails
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personal pictures
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documents relating to his divorce and
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his children
00:12:03
and some of those documents
00:12:05
were incriminating
00:12:08
some documents and brochures on how to
00:12:10
build a bomb he had demonstrated that he
00:12:12
had an interest in the oklahoma city
00:12:14
bombing he had approximately 50 pages of
00:12:17
that one of the interesting items that
00:12:19
we found in that bomb was a sound bite
00:12:21
and the sound bite stated i'll blow this
00:12:23
place up and be home in time for
00:12:25
cornflakes which actually came out of
00:12:27
the movie total recall
00:12:29
in william jarvis's home
00:12:31
investigators found two walmart sales
00:12:34
receipts for items purchased just three
00:12:37
weeks before the bombing
00:12:39
the receipts had fallen by a nightstand
00:12:41
next to a bed
00:12:44
and evidently been missed
00:12:46
on the receipts were what's known as sku
00:12:50
or sku numbers it stands for stock
00:12:54
keeping unit a way for stores to keep
00:12:56
track of inventory
00:12:59
we went to walmart with that sku number
00:13:01
walmart was able to tell us that that
00:13:03
sku number is unique to a certain item
00:13:06
that no other item they sell would have
00:13:08
that same skew number
00:13:10
the sku numbers revealed jarvis bought a
00:13:13
package of sd's brand model rocket
00:13:15
igniters
00:13:16
[Music]
00:13:18
atf forensic chemist rob reed used x-ray
00:13:22
fluorescent spectroscopy to compare the
00:13:25
sd's wires from their rocket igniter to
00:13:28
the wire recovered from the bomb site
00:13:32
x-ray beams identified the chemical
00:13:35
elements of the wires
00:13:37
the estes model rocket igniters have a
00:13:40
particular alloy that's used for the
00:13:42
bridge wire and the leg wires it's also
00:13:45
very unique this is proprietary
00:13:47
information that estes doesn't share
00:13:49
with anyone they shared it with us for
00:13:50
our own reasons and trying to help solve
00:13:52
crimes
00:13:53
the wire in the bomb debris
00:13:56
had the same metal alloys as the estes
00:13:59
brand igniters
00:14:01
the companies that make these products
00:14:03
have no control over how we use them as
00:14:05
consumers they have an intended purpose
00:14:07
but sometimes
00:14:09
people in their sick minds will twist
00:14:11
them and use them for something that's
00:14:12
going to hurt someone
00:14:14
we had been working long and hard on
00:14:16
this and
00:14:17
you almost start to take a personal
00:14:19
interest in in the case
00:14:21
and
00:14:22
to get the first we had other suspects
00:14:24
but to get the first piece of evidence
00:14:26
that directly linked
00:14:28
our best suspect to the device
00:14:32
it's like winning the lottery
00:14:34
investigators swept william jarvis's
00:14:36
kitchen floor for any microscopic
00:14:38
particles that might be present
00:14:41
under the microscope
00:14:43
scientists found irregularly shaped
00:14:46
spheres of nitrocellulose
00:14:49
an ingredient of smokeless gunpowder
00:14:52
the same type used in the bond
00:14:56
also on the sales receipt was proof
00:14:58
the jarvis purchased christmas wrapping
00:15:01
paper
00:15:02
the sku number proved it was the same
00:15:04
wrapping paper used with the bond
00:15:07
[Music]
00:15:09
it was a very rare form of wrapping
00:15:11
paper which had been distributed through
00:15:14
some stores in the southeast of which
00:15:17
one of these stores was this walmart
00:15:19
store
00:15:20
where these particular items were
00:15:21
purchased
00:15:23
the receipt also showed jarvis bought
00:15:26
condoms investigators suspected jarvis
00:15:29
used the condoms to hold the gasoline in
00:15:31
the bomb
00:15:33
we did some tests
00:15:34
to see how long a condom could contain
00:15:37
gasoline and we found that
00:15:40
the couple of hours it would have taken
00:15:42
for him to transport the device
00:15:44
from his home
00:15:45
to
00:15:46
the victim's house
00:15:48
was more than enough time that there was
00:15:51
no leakage or seepage of the gasoline
00:15:54
from the condoms we were sure at that
00:15:56
point that we had our man and that we
00:15:58
were going to be able to prove it in
00:16:00
card as well
00:16:02
but jarvis denied any involvement in the
00:16:04
bombing and said he had an alibi
00:16:08
he claimed he was at home on his
00:16:11
computer at the time of the bombing
00:16:13
which was an hour's drive away
00:16:16
his online computer service confirmed
00:16:19
he was on his computer so
00:16:23
how
00:16:24
did he do it
00:16:25
[Music]
00:16:30
prosecutors believe william jarvis had
00:16:32
two motives for killing his ex-wife
00:16:34
lillian the first was money
00:16:38
bill jarvis ended up owing lillian
00:16:40
alimony and child support payments in
00:16:43
the neighborhood of around 1800 a month
00:16:45
he was also as part of the settlement
00:16:47
property settlement had a balloon
00:16:49
payment due to her of almost thirty
00:16:52
thousand dollars that was due to be paid
00:16:55
to her in october
00:16:57
and he did not pay it the other thing
00:16:59
was william jarvis viewed his wife as
00:17:01
less of a person than him and he was
00:17:04
quite upset that she would run around
00:17:06
and do things that he did not approve of
00:17:08
and therefore she had to be punished
00:17:11
in other words
00:17:12
jarvis didn't approve of lillian dating
00:17:15
other men after they were divorced
00:17:20
three months before the murder
00:17:22
store receipts show that william jarvis
00:17:25
purchased the same brand of rocket
00:17:26
igniter and wrapping paper used in the
00:17:29
bombing
00:17:29
[Music]
00:17:31
he also bought condoms which
00:17:34
investigators believe held the gasoline
00:17:37
in the bond
00:17:42
the evidence shows that jarvis made the
00:17:46
bomb on his kitchen table
00:17:49
microscopic particles of smokeless
00:17:51
gunpowder fell onto his floor
00:17:56
on the morning of the bombing
00:17:58
prosecutors believe jarvis woke around 5
00:18:01
a.m and logged onto his aol account
00:18:04
possibly to establish his alibi
00:18:08
then he drove to lillian's house 40
00:18:11
miles away
00:18:12
to deliver the bond
00:18:15
prosecutors don't believe jarvis was
00:18:17
home when his computer logged off aol
00:18:20
they believe aol ended his online
00:18:22
session at 5 15 due to inactivity
00:18:28
[Music]
00:18:30
jarvis left the package on lillian's
00:18:32
doorstep around 6 a.m
00:18:35
he knew lillian liked this kind of
00:18:38
wrapping paper so the children would
00:18:40
know
00:18:41
it was for her
00:18:48
lillian's mother first saw the package
00:18:50
around 6 30.
00:18:52
she didn't think it was for her because
00:18:54
she didn't celebrate christmas
00:18:57
when she handed lillian the package
00:19:00
no one except william jarvis
00:19:03
could have anticipated
00:19:05
what would happen next
00:19:13
i believe william jarvis waited around
00:19:15
in the neighborhood until he heard the
00:19:16
explosion
00:19:18
then
00:19:19
instead of going home
00:19:21
he went to work 45 minutes before his
00:19:24
shift started
00:19:26
we don't think he wanted to go back to
00:19:27
his house fearing that people might be
00:19:29
there
00:19:30
waiting for him therefore he had to be
00:19:32
at work and he just went to his normal
00:19:34
routine of going to work except he was
00:19:36
early that day which is unusual
00:19:39
william jarvis's hatred for lillian
00:19:42
could easily have resulted in the death
00:19:44
of his daughter katie
00:19:46
had she been the one who opened the
00:19:48
package
00:19:51
the last image of my daughter is seeing
00:19:53
her standing by the sink
00:19:55
opening the gift that was wrapped for
00:19:57
christmas
00:19:58
and it exploded and she was thrown in
00:20:01
mid-air across the room
00:20:03
and
00:20:04
everything went up in flames
00:20:06
including her
00:20:08
william jarvis was tried and convicted
00:20:11
of first degree murder and arson
00:20:14
he was sentenced to three consecutive
00:20:17
life terms in prison with no possibility
00:20:20
of parole
00:20:23
the forensic evidence proves that jarvis
00:20:26
planned the bombing for months
00:20:29
but was convinced
00:20:31
the explosion would destroy all the
00:20:34
evidence
00:20:36
i'd say the most critical piece of
00:20:38
evidence in this entire case was one
00:20:41
tiny piece of wire that our lab
00:20:43
technician found
00:20:45
and this tied him to the bomb without
00:20:48
one piece of wire this case probably
00:20:50
wouldn't have been solved that was the
00:20:51
smoking gun
00:20:53
in this entire case that one piece of
00:20:55
wire
00:20:56
and that just goes to show that
00:20:58
you may think you're smarter than the
00:21:00
police but you're not eventually we'll
00:21:02
get you
00:21:04
[Music]
00:21:16
[Music]
00:21:33
[Music]
00:21:45
you
