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[music playing] NARRATOR: Early Monday
morning on October 19, 1992, 23-year-old Laura Houghteling
was seen leaving her Bethesda,
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Maryland home, walking
to the train station on her way to work. She never arrived.
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A clue to her disappearance
was a peculiar strand of hair found in her hair brush.
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[music playing] Laura Houghteling was
an ambitious young woman with a bright future.
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She had recently graduated
from Harvard University and had moved back home
with her mother, Penny.
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Laura worked for a public
relations firm in Washington DC and was contemplating
law school.
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[trumpet playing] ANNOUNCER: Flag is
up, and away they go. NARRATOR: On the Saturday
before she disappeared,
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Laura attended the
Gold Cup Steeplechase Horse Races in Virginia. When Laura didn't
show up for work,
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a co-worker called the house,
but there was no answer. Laura's mother was out of
town on a business trip.
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Next, Laura's brother
Warren was called. He lived nearby. When he arrived at
the house, he found
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that the back door was
unlocked, but there was nothing missing inside. As time went on, nobody
had heard from Lauren.
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And this was just
totally, totally out of character for her. There was-- we checked
her bank account,
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credit cards, checking account. There was nothing there where
she had withdrawn money where--
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that she would have needed
to survive somewhere else. NARRATOR: Fliers with
Laura's photograph
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were distributed at the
train station in the hope that someone might
have seen her.
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Police also searched the walk
in between the drain station and Laura's home looking
for possible clues,
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but found nothing. When detectives searched
Laura's bedroom, they noticed that a
fitted sheet and mattress
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pad were missing from her bed. Laura's mother said that
Laura always made her bed
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before leaving for work. Four days after Laura
Houghteling disappeared, investigators made
a grim discovery
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in the woods near Laura's
home at the base of a tree. They found a bloody
pillow and pillowcase.
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Immediately, I-- I recognized
the pattern on the pillowcase was identical to
what I had remembered
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had been on Laura Houghteling
bed a few days earlier. NARRATOR: The blood
on the pillow case
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was type A, Laura's blood type. A police bloodhound,
named Sherlock, was given some of
Laura's clothing
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to establish her scent. When Sherlock was
released from his cage, he went directly to the
tree where police had
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found the bloody pillowcase. The bloodhound followed the
scent through a church parking
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lot, through a residential area,
and straight to the back door of Laura Houghteling's home.
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The dog had a
very strong track and actually ran the distance,
which indicated to us
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that he was very, very
definitely on the scent of Laura Houghteling. NARRATOR: Police suspected foul
play, but they had no suspects.
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We spoke to everyone that
we could that had seen Laura or knew Laura within
the last year or two,
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and no one could give
us any reason for anyone to want to do any harm to her,
have any harm to come to her.
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NARRATOR: But police wondered
why the bloodhound tracked Laura's scent to her back
door when she was seen
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leaving the front
door of her home on the morning she disappeared. Police suspected foul
play in the disappearance
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of 23-year-old Laura
Houghteling when a bloody pillow
from Laura's bedroom was found in the
woods near her home.
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To find out whether the blood
on the pillow belonged to Laura, blood samples were taken
from Laura's mother,
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Penny, and her brother, Warren. Using a DNA test called
Restriction Fragment Length
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Polymorphism, or
RFLP, scientists concluded that the blood came
from a biological offspring
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of Laura's mother,
Penny, and was that of a biological sibling
of Laura's brother, Warren.
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The blood on the pillow was
that of Laura Houghteling. Next, scientists used
another illuminating test
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on the mattress
to look for blood that may have been cleaned
up with water or detergents.
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Luminol is a chemical
compound that reacts with the hemoglobin
component in blood,
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causing it to glow in the dark. And it works with
fairly minute traces. And once this
begins to glow, you
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can get a pretty
good idea of what the-- the pattern of the blood
flow was on a particular area.
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NARRATOR: This
demonstration shows a carpet with a visible blood
stain, and next to it,
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an invisible blood stain
that has been cleaned with the water and detergent. The tiles with X's are
targets used as reference
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points in the dark. When the luminol is
sprayed, within seconds, the invisible blood stains glow.
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After luminol was sprayed
on Laura's mattress, an invisible blood
pattern emerged.
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The left side of
the mattress was giving us no response at all. But when we started spraying
the right side of the mattress,
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we were seeing areas of
very intense luminescence. And this proceeded
from the headboard
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all the way down to the
foot of the mattress. NARRATOR: Next, forensic
scientists examined the hair
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brush found on Laura's dresser. They examined over 30 hairs,
presumably, Laura's hairs.
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They were all microscopically
similar, except one. So I was scanning through
several of the hairs
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that I recovered from the
brush, and all of a sudden, one that I looked at I realized
was not a human hair,
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in fact, was a synthetic fiber. NARRATOR: The fiber was
identified as a strand of artificial hair from a wig.
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Penny Houghteling told police
that her daughter never wore a wig, and had never owned one.
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So now that put greater
value on this particular piece of evidence. Why was a wig fiber
in that hairbrush
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sitting on the dresser
from her bedroom? NARRATOR: Forensic
examiner Susan Ballou also examined the bloody
pillowcase found in the woods.
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She noticed blood stains that
looked like the impression of a knife, which had been
wiped on the pillowcase,
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and another bloodstain
on the pillowcase was different than the rest. The ridges that
I was seeing was
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different from the weave of
the fabric of the pillow case. There were enough that
was consistent with what
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I was familiar with with
leaving an impression behind. NARRATOR: It appeared to
be some sort of print,
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but lifting a print from
a fabric is difficult. For a closer look,
scientists used a protein
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stain called amido black. Next, a wash
solution was applied, followed by distilled water.
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When the print on the
pillowcase was enhanced by the amido black
stain, it was identified
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as a partial thumb print. We then sat down
with the family, would have been
Laura's brother and--
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and her mother, and
explained to her that we felt that Laura
possibly may have been murdered
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in the bedroom based
on the amount of blood and based on the circumstances. 10 days after 24-year-old
Laura Houghteling disappeared
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from her Bethesda
home, her family tells reporters they believe
they know what happened to her.
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She was first considered to
be a missing person, but now, the high-tech equipment that
is now available to the police
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have shown that she died here. NARRATOR: Police now had
solid evidence that might
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lead them to the murderer. Although police suspected that
Laura Houghteling had been
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murdered in her bedroom, they
were unable to find her body, and had no solid leads.
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Laura's brother, Warren,
told police of an incident he had with a part-time gardener
who worked at his mother's
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home, Hadden Clark. The night after
Laura disappeared, Warren was outside
his mother's home
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and saw Hadden Clark driving
through the neighborhood. Hadden. NARRATOR: When he
attempted to speak
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with Clark to ask him if he had
seen Laura, Clark sped away. 40-year-old Hadden Clark
was known to police because
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of a past arrest for burglary. A few years earlier,
Clark had also been a suspect in
the investigation
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of a missing young girl, a case
that has never been solved. Clark was born with
brain damage and had
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difficulty throughout his life. He trained as a chef, but
had difficulty keeping jobs.
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He was currently working as a
gardener and other odd jobs. He was, at one time, in
the United States Navy,
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and he was discharged
and diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. NARRATOR: Clark was
basically homeless, often
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sleeping in the back of
his truck, which he parked in a church parking lot
not far from the woods
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where the bloody
pillow had been found. Clark got into an argument
with Penny Houghteling just
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one week before
Laura disappeared over some tools Penny said
were missing from her toolshed.
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The Houghtelings also kept a
spare house key in the shed. When police researched
Clark's financial records,
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they learned that he
had purchased duct tape, braided rope, and
nylon cord several days
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before Laura's disappearance,
and paid for the items with a personal check. Investigators were
alarmed with what they saw
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written in the memo section. One word. Laura. On the day Laura
disappeared, Clark
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purchased a queen-sized sheet
from a department store, a size that was too large
for the mattress
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in the back of his truck,
but was the same size as Laura's mattress. From Clark's financial
records, police also
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learned that he rented a
storage locker in Warwick, Rhode Island, 450 miles away.
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An employee of the
storage unit told police that Clark visited
his storage locker two
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days after Laura disappeared. Armed with a warrant, police
searched Clark's storage unit
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and discovered a secret
side of Hadden Clark's life. He had falsies that
he would place in bras.
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Apparently, he had bras, he had
dresses, he had female shoes, he had female coats, he had
wigs, everything that he could
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wear and look like a female. NARRATOR: Was it possible that
the individual seen leaving
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the Houghteling's home
on the morning of Laura's disappearance wasn't Laura
at all, but was, in fact,
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Hadden Clark dressed as Laura? Penny Houghteling told police
something about Laura's attire
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that they hadn't heard before. RICHARD FALLIN: Laura
never, ever wore slacks.
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Laura was a tall girl and she
would wear skirts or dress. She didn't want to accentuate
her height by wearing slacks.
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So she never wore slacks. Didn't own a pair of slacks. NARRATOR: Fibers from all of the
wigs in Clark's storage locker
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were compared to the wig fiber
found on Laura's hairbrush. It's very easy to
remove some of these wigs
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as being the contributor
just from color. Very blonde or other colors
were not a possibility
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since we were dealing
with a brown tone as far as the dye goes
for this wig fiber.
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Then, doing microscopic
exam narrowed it down to one particular wig that
was identical in all respects
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to this particular fiber. NARRATOR: Hadden Clark's
wig and the fiber from Laura's hairbrush
from her bedroom
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were sent to the
Trace Evidence Unit at the FBI laboratory
in Washington DC. In their analysis,
they used what
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is called a
microspectrophotometer, an instrument that can
discern between the 7,000
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commercial dyes used
in the United States. MAX HOUCK: It takes
a beam of light and runs it through an
object, such as a fiber,
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and it measures the amount
of light that's lost as it passes through that fiber.
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Light is lost at different
wavelengths, wavelengths relating to color,
so a dark brown fiber
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will absorb more light
than a light brown fiber and would absorb
different colors of light
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than, say, a light blue fiber. So we simply measure
those differences and then plot that on a chart.
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NARRATOR: Dyes are
proprietary and are trademarked by the manufacturer
to protect against duplication.
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The dye from the wig fiber
found in Laura's hairbrush. Was identical to the fibers
from Hadden Clark's wig.
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MAX HOUCK: It indicated
to us that they exhibited the exact same color optically.
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Therefore, the questioned
fiber is consistent with coming from that wig that were
dyed to the same color,
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the same industry
standard, and probably, from the same dye lot. NARRATOR: Finally, police
turned their attention
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to the bloody thumbprint found
on the pillowcase in the woods. When they compared it to
Hadden Clark's thumbprint,
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it was a match. Police now knew how Hadden
Clark fooled the neighbor and left the crime scene
without creating suspicion.
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But where had he
taken Laura's body? Hadden Clark was
arrested and charged with first degree murder in
the death of Laura Houghteling.
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Although her body
had never been found, prosecutors hoped that
they had enough evidence
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to convince a jury that Laura
Houghteling was, in fact, dead, and that Hadden Clark
was the murderer.
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The first degree
murder trial was set to begin on June 14, 1993,
but the trial never took place.
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The defendant
in the Houghteling case just pled guilty. The plea was accepted. The-- the plea was to
second degree murder.
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NARRATOR: As part
of the plea bargain, Clark revealed to prosecutors
where he had buried the body.
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He led them to a shallow
grave less than half a mile from Laura's home. It had been eight
months since Laura
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Houghteling's disappearance. RICHARD FALLIN: There was a
skeletal part of the body that
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was sticking out of the ground. The rest of the body was
still intact under the ground.
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NARRATOR: The autopsy report
also listed suffocation as a possible cause of death,
since Clark told prosecutors
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that he suffocated her. Clark also admitted using
a knife from the kitchen and a pair of scissors
consistent with the blood
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imprints found on the
discarded pillowcase. SUSAN BALLOU: When you
hold a pair of scissors
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to these marks, they, in
fact, fall right in line with the outline impression
of the marks on the pillow.
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NARRATOR: Clark did not reveal
his motive for killing Laura. Police theorize that Clark was
angry over the disagreement
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he had with Laura's mother
over the missing tools from the shed. Looking into
Hadden's background,
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we found that any time,
especially, a female, would cross him in any
way, he would retaliate.
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It's hard to say exactly why. And I don't know if
we'll ever know why.
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NARRATOR: Clark's
confession and evidence gathered by the police told
prosecutors all they needed
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to know about what happened
to Laura Houghteling in the early hours
of October 19, 1992.
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Hadden Clark knew Penny
Houghteling was away when he entered the home
through the back door
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sometime after midnight. He picked up a knife
from the kitchen and went to Laura's bedroom.
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He suffocated her with a pillow,
and then, he stabbed her. Clark used the scissors to
remove her earrings, which left
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the blood impression on the
pillowcase, and in that blood, the partial thumbprint uncovered
by the amido black stain.
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There was no blood
trail in the house since Clark wrapped the body
in bed linens and plastic.
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[music playing] While transporting
the body to the woods, he accidentally dropped
the bloody pillowcase
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with his thumbprint
later found by police. Before dawn, he
returned to clean up as much blood from the
mattress as he could,
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found with the luminol. At daybreak, Clark
needed to exit the house without being seen,
so he dressed up as Laura.
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Before leaving, Clark
made a second mistake. He used Laura's hairbrush
to comb his wig,
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leaving behind the
single fiber, linking him and his wig to the murder scene. Later that day, he purchased
a replacement bed sheet
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for Laura's bed. He may have been on
his way to replace it when he encountered Laura's
brother outside the home
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the next night. A partial thumb print
and a single wig fiber all marked a grisly
tale of murder,
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madness, and mistaken identity. He planned it, he knew
exactly when he was gonna do it,
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exactly how he was gonna do it,
and he almost got away with it. Of course, the
bloody fingerprint
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on the pillowcase, the
hair, the wig fiber, but I was impressed with the dog. This was the only wig
fiber that was recovered.
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If this had been missed
or not even examined, it's very doubtful that we would
have put together everything
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that we knew after the fact
as to what actually happened on that Monday morning.
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Now, with the new
technologies that are-- that are helping us out, it
allows an investigator to have
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new tools to help him find that
little tiny bit of evidence that sometimes is there.
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Sometimes, it's not,
but when it is there, and you have those
tools, and you're
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able to find that
little bit of evidence, makes all the
difference in the world and allows you to get
people like Hadden Clark
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off the street. [music playing]