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[Music] up next the secret life of a call girl often a very dangerous profession they
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found a female face down didn't appear to have any signs of life she would be a
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natural target because she would usually have significant amounts of cash on her
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person the evidence points to one man looks like rambo acts like rambo and dresses like rambo it may be rambo until
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one tiny clue turns the case around [Music] it was after midnight on a chilly march
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evening when virginia russell was driving home from a party with her boyfriend rodney hartman
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the couple had been dating for three years and were talking about getting married
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but on this night tragedy struck she was thrown from the car the car flipped like eight times and
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they were both ejected from the car when an ambulance arrived they pronounced rodney hartman dead at the
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scene virginia was rushed to the hospital for 48 hours virginia hovered between life and death
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but she survived toxicology tests showed virginia had a blood alcohol level of 0.16 almost twice
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the legal limit i had charged her with the felony dui i mean it struck home pretty hard and
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like i said it wasn't like it was a stranger that she had hit or anything it was
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somebody that she had been dating that the family had known for years virginia was convicted and sentenced to
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six years in prison for vehicular homicide it was hard enough that she had lost somebody in her life
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and then to be doing time for it and be taken away from her family again i mean it was very difficult time for
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virginia when virginia was released from prison she told her family she found work
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cleaning houses one evening while spending time with her family virginia got a message on her pager at 8
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54 p.m yeah i can do that we asked her where she was going and she tells us that she has to go
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clean a house for an individual we said our goodbyes and hugged her and told her we loved her
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and she told us as well and that was the last time early the next morning a man walking his dog
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found a woman's body near an athletic field in rosewood south carolina the victim had been shot three times
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execution style in the head two shell casings were found nearby fingerprints identified the victim
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as virginia russell pretty shocking absolutely she hadn't been out two months
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when this incident happened she was missing her right shoe there was no dirt or debris on her foot
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but her stockings were ripped and she had scrapes on her knees the missing shell casing indicated
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virginia may have been shot once in another location and then dragged to where she was shot two more
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times [Music] there's obviously more to this homicide than just this one particular location
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where the body was found police found two empty beer bottles 20 feet from virginia's body
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no one was sure if they were connected to the murder they also found a single hair on virginia's body
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as we do at all crime scenes we've collected everything that we could possibly collect
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there was no sign of sexual assault but two purses were found near the body they weren't but two dollars in change
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in the purses so investigators believe that part of the motive may have been robert
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a background check stunned virginia's family her real profession wasn't cleaning houses
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she was a call girl it was a total shock but then again i guess virginia had to do
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what she needed to do because it was very difficult for her to find work because of her background
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as the family coped with the tragedy investigators were forced to deal with a problem of their own
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virginia's profession meant a large list of potential suspects [Music] investigators found virginia russell's
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car in an abandoned parking lot two miles from the location of her body there was a single shell casing inside
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obviously she was initially shot in the vehicle you could see the blood spatter that went throughout the
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car consistent with her having been shot in the head on the passenger floorboard spattered
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with blood was a potential clue we found a six-pack of michelob beer that the carton was still there but it had one
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bottle full bottle still left in the carton this was the same brand of beer as the
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two beer bottles found near virginia's body blood inside the door confirmed virginia
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had been dragged from the car her missing shoe was on the driver's side floorboard
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[Music] in a search for virginia's killer investigators wanted to know who had
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paged her on the night of her death the call was traced to this apartment rented by 27 year old justin bullard who
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owned an aquarium cleaning business justin bullard denied any involvement in the murder and said he never met
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virginia he had no criminal history mr bullet's alibi was his at home alone and the problem with that was
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him being home alone and no one else to cooperate him being there at the time with a search warrant
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investigators found a wealth of evidence inside his apartment we find in his apartment a
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380 caliber pistol the pistol registered to justin billard was apparently the same caliber as the
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gun used in virginia's murder and investigators found something else there are several pages uh ripped out of
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the phone book and each of those pages relate to escort services and phone numbers for escort services
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on a pair of bullard's boots analysts noticed some slight discoloration the boots were examined
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under a microscope they were stained with what appeared to be high impact blood spatter
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high impact spatter might be invisible if the surface that it's deposited on
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is absorbent or dark in color it's very likely that it would be very difficult to simply visualize it
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dna tests on the bloody boots tied them to virginia's murder the swabs were subjected to pcr testing
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and the results came back consistent with the victim whoever was wearing those boots
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was probably in contact with the victim at the time she was murdered next investigators tested bullard's
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handgun the firearm that was submitted to me was a russian manufacturer makarov semi-automatic pistol chambered to fire
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380 auto caliber ammunition shell casings from the crime scene and casings from a test firing of the gun
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were examined with a comparison microscope viewed side by side the shell casings left no doubt
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the murder weapon was justin bullard's gun i was able to determine that those
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cartridge cases those 380 autos that were from the scene were fired by this particular firearm the boots were mr
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bullard's the gun was mr bullard's the last phone call from the victim was to
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mr bullo's apartment but despite the overwhelming evidence bullard not only denied he was the
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killer he came up with the incredible tale that someone must have stolen all his things
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committed the crime then returned them [Music] the prime suspect in virginia russell's
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murder was justin bullard inside bullard's apartment investigators found all the evidence they needed for a
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conviction virginia's blood was found on bullard's boots his handgun was the murder weapon
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names and phone numbers of escort services were near his telephone and virginia russell was paged from
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bullard's phone just hours before her murder looks like rambo acts like rambo and
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dresses like rambo it may be rambo bullard claimed a roommate might have committed this crime with items taken
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from his apartment bullard said he had allowed a friend to live with him temporarily because the electricity in
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his friend's apartment had been turned off due to lack of payment as preposterous as this seemed
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it took on more significance when prosecutor knox mcmahon learned of a similar crime that happened three days
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before virginia's death [Music] a call girl went to an apartment to meet her client
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she said there were no lights on in the apartment only candles the client wouldn't identify himself
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but asked her to undress [Music] then without warning he pulled a knife and demanded money
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he then tells her to run and don't look back she's only partially clothed
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the apartment was leased to a known drug addict roy beck but was he the perpetrator
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the victim was shown a photo lineup she positively identified roy back the physical description she gave fit roy
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back it's not fit mr bullard coincidentally roy beck was the friend justin bullard
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said was living with him at the time of virginia russell's murder that meant
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two suspects were staying in the apartment that was the source of all the evidence in virginia russell's murder
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you definitely have two people bullard owns the gun owns the boots it's his apartment and
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roy beck is staying there and has access to these items also there was no root on the hair found on
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virginia's body so scientists couldn't perform genetic dna testing all analysts could say was
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that visually it looked more similar to beck's hair than bullets but inside roybeck's apartment the one
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with no electricity that the call girl visited police found a potential clue we found three
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bottles of michelob beer so now you have uh two michelob light beer at the body scene
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one unopened and a carton in virginia russell's car and three it beck's unpowered apartment
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scientists swabbed the beer bottles from the murder scene looking for a possible
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connection unfortunately they didn't find enough saliva or skin cells to generate a dna
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profile testing for saliva at that time on the mouth of a beer bottle wasn't as
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commonly done as it is today the bottles were then subjected to super glue fuming
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these fumes will adhere to finger oils and often produce quality prints glass is a very smooth surface
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and the residue that builds up on the ridges and the fingers and in the palms of the hands easily will transfer from
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the surface of the hand onto a glass surface and that glass surface will hold it after 15 minutes in the fuming
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chamber one partial palm print emerged on one of the bottles found near virginia's body
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this partial print didn't match virginia russell justin bullard or roy beck the forensic evidence from virginia
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russell's murder pointed to justin bullard the gun the bloody shoes the telephone calls to
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the escort service from his apartment but bullard had no criminal record and no apparent motive
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some of the circumstantial evidence pointed to his friend roy beck the beer bottles in his apartment were
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the same brand as those found next to virginia russell's body and the background check revealed beck
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was addicted to crack cocaine he was a drug addict and obviously to feed that dragon you got to have a lot
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of cash prosecutor knox mcmahon thought the beer bottles at beck's apartment and those found at the crime
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scene were too much of a coincidence so he decided to take a second look if you look at those beer bottles there
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is a born on date and there is a code under the born on date the date was october 22nd
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1996 followed by the letters wf w is the geographic location in this case williamsburg virginia within
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williamsburg virginia there are multiple lines within the plant and f designates
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which line the bottling took place on but the key piece of information was the final part of the label
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the number 58. at the time the williamsburg brewery produced 600 cases of beer every 15
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minutes and each of these 15-minute periods was given a number 58 met the 58th 15-minute period of a 24-hour day which
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was 2 15 to 2 30. but how many bottles were filled in one 15-minute period with over a million beers bottled at
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that brewery every day only one percent were bottled in any 15-minute period so only 14 000 bottles would have the
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same code so what would be the chances that roy beck would have three bottles of beer in
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his apartment with the same code as the bottle found inside virginia russell's
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car and the two next to virginia's body the probability of that happening is
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incredibly small you would have to have all the people involved at the same location at the same time buying the
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same beer the odds of the beer bottles coming from different six packs were more than one
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in 32 million these six beers came from the same six pack roy beck was arrested and charged with
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virginia russell's murder prosecutors say beck desperate for money called the escort service to arrange for
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an out call which means the girl would go to the customer's home [Music] the first time he called the escort
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service he asked that the girl meet him in his own apartment [Music] when she arrived
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beck robbed her of a couple of hundred dollars at knife point then let her go without power
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beck moved in temporarily with justin bullard and when he needed more money for drugs
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called the escort service again this time from bullard's phone and set up the meeting with virginia
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russell sure he took bullard's boots and gun and the beer from his own apartment
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when virginia arrived beck got into her [Music] car and they went to a deserted location
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each drank a beer and threw the empty bottles out the window [Music] prosecutors think beck was acquainted
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with virginia from a previous meeting and decided to kill her so she wouldn't
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identify him blood spattered on the remaining beer bottle and on the boots beck had stolen
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from bullard beck dragged virginia's body onto the road then shot her two more times
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[Music] he stole all the money from her purses then drove virginia's car two miles away
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where he abandoned it beck later returned bullard's blood-spattered boots and gun to
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bullard's apartment without him knowing it setting him up for the crime but beck didn't know that the three
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bottles of beer left in his apartment would tie him to the bottles at the murder site and
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to one in virginia's car it was very significant in this investigation it um
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it was the one thing that could really put back at every cri at all three crime scenes
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at his trial roy beck insisted justin bullard was the killer but the science showed otherwise
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i myself did not feel it was bullard uh when he was on the stand and all i mean just the look in his eyes
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i felt like it was back the whole time roy beck was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison
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investigators described this as one of their most unusual cases two suspects each connected to the crime
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by the same evidence until something as seemingly insignificant as the label on a beer bottle showed who
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was lying and who was telling the truth that's what sanctum just those those bottles of beer um
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i guess he didn't have that in his plan the beer bottles themselves ended up
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being one of the more telling aspects of the case and it's very unusual to be able to
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help solve a crime by the use of beer bottles and the date they were made it's
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very unusual that's just the type of circumstantial evidence that that you just don't get every day that
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you just don't see every day that people can look at it and see it touch it and
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relate to it [Music]