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madeline murray o'hare was america's best-known atheist principally responsible for abolishing prayer in
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public schools madeline you either liked her you hated her in 1995 madeline murray o'hare mysteriously
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disappeared from her texas home along with her son john murray and granddaughter robin
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over 600 000 of their organization's money disappeared along with them what is it not to love about this story
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it involves greed it involves gold it involves the most hated woman in america this is a sexy story and we should tell
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it it was a local newspaper reporter playing forensic detective who helped solve the case
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[Music] [Music] the most hated woman in america mr withers is this a form of harassment
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because i will leave i am creating the record now no you're not creating this
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and you are wasting my time these are when you're done reading that call me i'll be in the ladies room is it your
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understanding that you have brought no doctors in the ladies room when you are done
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she was an avowed atheist who achieved fame in 1963 by opposing prayer in public schools
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she took her case all the way to the united states supreme court and won she founded the non-profit group the
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american atheists as well as a magazine preaching the gospel of strict separation of church and state
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she also wrote articles for larry flint's hustler magazine and was the subject of a playboy magazine interview
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madeleine o'hare was a difficult woman to work with and was notorious for speaking her mind
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all right then don't [ __ ] with me i have never encountered a more bitter more distasteful person than madeleine
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murray o'hare don't touch him she was extremely foul-mouthed to the point
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that even though we were doing an interview about something that she wanted us to do a story on
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we had to stop the interview in the middle because she was cursing so much you have a limited opportunity this
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morning to ask me questions why don't you get to the question in august of 1995 77 year
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seventy-seven-year-old madeline her forty-year-old son john and thirty-year-old granddaughter robin left
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austin texas without saying a word to anyone the staff of the american atheist organization found a note on their
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office door saying the o'hares had been called away for an emergency and didn't
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know when they would return john's mercedes-benz and robin's porsche were gone too
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but they left their passports behind as well as madeleine's diabetes medicine
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and her three dogs madeline may not have cared very much for people but she sure loved those dogs
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we were told couldn't get in touch with them and i got concerned so i started
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making phone calls and then i called john's cell phone and that's when madeline answered
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but madeline wouldn't tell board member ellen johnson where she was johnson said the calls were short and
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strained and she worried that madeleine and her son were under some sort of duress
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i questioned him about what was going on and and you know he tried to reassure me that
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everything was okay and i believed it just one month later madeleine and john stopped answering
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their cell phone calls when ellen johnson took over the american atheist group in madeleine's
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absence she discovered that since the o'hares disappeared more than 600 000 was missing from the organization's bank
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account suddenly you have three people and a very large amount of money all disappearing at the same time and
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this makes it far more interesting john mccormick covered the disappearance for the express news in san antonio
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texas among the atheists there was a very peculiar silence but beneath it was a very
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profound concern they were very concerned they didn't know what to do they hadn't really attempted to get any
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help from law enforcement no one associated with the american atheist reported the three missing and
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it wasn't until a year later that bill murray madeleine's estranged son filed a
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missing person's report with austin police madeleine and bill had a rocky relationship
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in 1980 on mother's day bill told maglin that he had embraced christianity and was no longer an
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atheist he then went public writing a book and making a film attacking his mother's
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beliefs my mother loved confrontations and she never hesitated to use me as an accomplice in her schemes
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she wanted to push the school prayer issue as far as she could so she instructed me to keep a record of prayer
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and bible reading at school it was here in my home my mother made me a spy for the cause of atheism
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madeleine immediately disowned him and bill never again spoke with his mother his brother john or his daughter robin
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bill didn't know if his family's disappearance was foul play or if they had stolen the atheists
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money and fled [Music] a year after madeleine murray o'hair disappeared with her son john murray and
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granddaughter robin journalist john mccormick learned what the american atheist group already knew
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that john murray had withdrawn over six hundred thousand dollars from the atheist bank account just weeks after
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the three disappeared mccormick also examined john's cell phone records which indicated he had
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been living in san antonio texas after his disappearance many of the 200 calls were suspicious
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they've been calling financial institutions they've been calling airlines they've been calling
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uh drug stores to get madeline's uh prescriptions uh there were more than 150 calls they called jewelry stores
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one of those jewelry stores was on frederickson road in san antonio the owner said that john murray
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purchased six hundred thousand dollars worth of gold coins using cash even after madeleine's son bill murray
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reported the three missing the austin police showed little interest there was no investigation by the austin
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police department it was a total joke the police reaction may have been based on their belief that madeleine and her
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family absconded with the atheist money and that it was an internal matter how can somebody that's that famous turn
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up missing with all that money and still no one wants to look for so i decided i'd be part of the team
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that went looking television news reporter valerie williams discovered that john murray
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sold his mercedes-benz for 15 thousand dollars well below the car's value to
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this man mark sparrow john the seller identified himself as john murray [Music] low miles yeah it's 20 000 is that about
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right but when shown a picture of john murray sparrow said it wasn't the man who sold
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him the car he said his name was john murray and that's not the guy that's on
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my car would you mind taking a look at these mug shots for me after reviewing mug shot pictures mr
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sparrow identified the impersonator as another missing person an ex-convict named danny fry
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this was an interesting coincidence danny fry's family told police that danny had been working with another
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ex-convict david waters who had once worked for madeleine o'hare and had a falling out
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in 1993 madeleine hired david waters as her office manager within a few months she fired him
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maintaining he had stolen fifty thousand dollars from the atheists organization waters was charged with theft
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he accepted a plea agreement and paid the money back and in so doing avoided jail time
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but madeline was furious that authorities allowed waters to go free using the power of the pen madeleine
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wrote an article in her magazine exposing waters as a thief and implied waters had homosexual relationships
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while serving an earlier prison sentence for assault when water saw the article friends say he vowed revenge
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journalist john mccormick called waters and asked him if he had anything to do with madeleine's disappearance
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i didn't believe a word he said but uh he spoke as though uh you know it was
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the truth mccormick discovered that david waters danny frye and another ex-convict gary
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carr were all working together in austin texas around the time the o'hares disappeared in august of 1995.
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and not long afterwards a headless handless male torso was discovered in a dallas river
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they'd spent three years trying to figure out who it was but they had no fingerprints no dental and they had no
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missing persons records that match this disappearance so they were totally stumped
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mccormick had a hunch that this body was somehow connected to the o'hare's disappearance
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[Music] not long after the o'hares disappeared a male torso was found in a dallas river
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without a head or hands fingerprints and dental records couldn't be used for
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identification forensic anthropologists estimated the man to be between the ages of 35 and 45
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he had a stocky build and a lot of chest hair the description didn't fit madeleine's
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son john but journalist john mccormick had a hunch he told police that it might be
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danny fry the man who had impersonated john murray when selling his car scientists took dna from danny fry's
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brother and compared it to the blood dna of the torso it was a match just as mccormick suspected
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the dead man in the river was danny fry the blockbuster was when we could write a story that said that the headless
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corpse in dallas was danny fry and by the way he was last seen with david waters in austin and by the way he spent
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his last month in san antonio at the same time the oh harrison so that really kicked in the door
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suddenly local state and federal law enforcement officials took notice and joined the
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investigation david water's ex-girlfriend patty steffen read about danny fry's murder in
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the newspaper she immediately called the fbi at first she wanted to tell us small
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bits and pieces you have to understand this was a woman who was terrified she gave investigators an important lead
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three years earlier she said that david waters had rented a storage unit around the time the o'hares disappeared and
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that waters had once gone there with this spray canister laboratory tests on the canister
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revealed it had once contained bleach which is sometimes used to remove blood evidence
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[Music] armed with a search warrant police found a tiny red stain beneath a piece of aluminum under the wall
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it was so small it was almost invisible with blood from madeleine's son bill for
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comparison a mitochondrial dna test revealed the stain was a mixture of two people
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madeleine murray o'hare and her son john murray next the fbi searched water's apartment
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we found documents that belonged to the o'hares that were dated after david waters had been fired
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from their organization mr waters himself a prior convicted felon who was not allowed to have guns
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or ammunition was found to be an illegal possession of about 118 rounds of handgun ammunition
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of three different calibers they even found books from the o'hare library and a bow saw
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the fbi confronted david waters with the forensic and physical evidence against him
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it took quite a while but eventually five and a half years after the o'hares disappeared waters led
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investigators to a remote burial site at camp wood texas forensic anthropologist dr david
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glassman was there when we hit the first bone it was kind of interesting in this
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case because the bone was very large and it was the upper leg bone the upper leg bone is the largest bone
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in our skeleton but this one was particularly large after 21 hours of excavation
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three adult bodies were uncovered in each case the legs had been cut off possibly to make it easier to transport
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the bodies on one of the bodies the hair was very well intact a female skull and the hair
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was braided down the back of the of the neck of the individual there were some remnants of clothes that
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were found but no clothes that were intact there had been some effort to burn the
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remains not to the point of cremation but in order to destroy maybe the clothing or
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any other you know dna evidence that might be there as the remains were unearthed
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shining in the afternoon sun was the metal plate of an artificial medical records revealed that madeleine
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o'hare had undergone hip replacement surgery several years before her disappearance
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the serial number of the hip in madeleine's medical file matched the number on the hip and the grave
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forensic odontologist compared the o'hare's dental records to the skulls in
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the grave and confirmed that these were the remains of madeleine her son john and granddaughter robin
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for john murray when he was in the grave and uncovered he did have a plastic bag
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over his skull and when the plastic bag was removed there were small fractures that occurred
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to the skull itself indicating some blunt trauma had been done to him during the time of
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his death the cause of death for madeline and robin couldn't be determined by looking
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at the bones but since their heads were covered in plastic it was assumed they were asphyxiated
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but investigators found something else an extra head and two extra hands the head showed a single gunshot wound
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at the base of the skull forensic scientist used a photo superimposition technique for
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identification they suspected the skull was that of danny fry the man whose torso was found in the
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dallas river scientists took a photograph of danny fry then photographed the skull at the same
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angle and size the two photographs were superimposed to see if the facial features matched the
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skull for example the distance between the eyes and the shape of the nose and the distance between the nose to the
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teeth the distance across the cheeks and every area that i examined in the video superimposition
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matched up the motive for the o'hare's murder had been revenge but why had danny fry been murdered
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[Music] the forensic evidence found years after the o'hare's disappearance tied david
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waters and his two associates danny fry and gary carr to their murders david water's girlfriend patty stephens
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told police that waters kidnapped the o'hares because of the unflattering and
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inflammatory article madeline had written about him his girlfriend said he fantasized about
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torturing her cutting off her toes and so basically i think this whole thing came down to
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not just money but really ugly uh personal chemistry between two uh dysfunctional personalities
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for david waters it was about revenge he wanted the ultimate revenge on madeleine
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o'hare and the money was just a byproduct after kidnapping the o'hares waters
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forced john murray to withdraw six hundred thousand dollars from the atheist bank account and then took him
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to the jewelry store to exchange the six hundred thousand dollars for gold coins
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the o'hares were most likely dead by the time danny frye impersonated john murray
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to sell his car but why was danny fry killed too the answer was his drinking we knew that danny fry
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drank and uh loose lips sink ships and by what david had told bob fry about his brother
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and that was you know your brother has a big mouth could be the thing that caused his death
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but david waters made several crucial mistakes [Music] although waters cleaned the room with
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water and bleach scientists still found a tiny speck of blood three years later identified by
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mitochondrial dna as that of john murray and madeleine o'hare but removing danny fry's head and hands
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still didn't prevent identification dna and skull photo superimposition were
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all scientists needed ironically after stealing the six hundred thousand dollars from the o'hares waters never
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got the opportunity to enjoy the money it was stolen from him well his first mistake was putting his
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money in a storage locker up in austin and having three bozos from san antonio who were looking for used tvs
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open up the locker with a master key and find a suitcase with a half blade in gold
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[Music] for his role in this case david waters was sentenced to 80 years in prison
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his accomplice gary carr was sentenced to life in prison mr carr fully admitted his role in
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involvement with david waters in the abduction robbery and murder of the o'hares
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and uh he indicated that he had assisted in dismembering the bodies and putting the body parts and 55-gallon drums in a
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storage unit here in austin it was a nice neat ending they found the bodies the bad guy goes to prison
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and you know the heroes right off into the sunset for his persistence john mccormick is one of the heroes of
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this case and forensic science played an important role too well i mean this was definitely one that
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if it wasn't for dna we'd probably still be scratching our heads as to who this person was
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a lot of times i kind of forget about the case when the next case comes in and so i really don't have one that
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always jumps to mine but i'll remember this one for a long time [Music] [Music]
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[Music] you