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Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode

January 20, 2022 / 21:42

This episode covers the disappearance of Sherry Durell, her double life, and the investigation into her husband Bob Durell's involvement in her murder.

Sherry Durell, a 36-year-old mother of three, vanished from her home, prompting concern from her friends and family. Initial investigations revealed that she had been leading a double life, engaging in an affair with a man named Kevin Johnson. Despite her seemingly perfect life, Sherry had been planning to leave her controlling husband, Bob Durell.

As the investigation progressed, police discovered Sherry's van abandoned near a hotel and found evidence of her troubled marriage, including a letter she had written to Bob expressing her unhappiness. Bob's behavior raised suspicions, especially after it was revealed he was also dating online.

Forensic evidence from the Durell home indicated a violent crime had occurred, with blood found throughout the bedroom. Despite Bob's claims of innocence, investigators pieced together a timeline and evidence that led them to believe he was responsible for Sherry's murder.

Ultimately, Bob Durell was convicted of first-degree murder after leading police to Sherry's body in the Cascade Mountains. The episode highlights the forensic evidence that played a crucial role in the case against him.

TLDR

Sherry Durell's disappearance leads to her husband's conviction for murder after forensic evidence reveals his guilt.

Episode

21:42
00:00:05
an employee from a large brokerage firm disappeared her computer revealed she was leading a
00:00:12
double life and among the bits and bytes were the clues to her final destination
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[Music] [Music] to friends and family 36 year old sherry durrell had an enviable life
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married with three young children sherry had a high job with the stock brokerage
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firm and the respect and admiration of her colleagues she was selfless she was warm she always did
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things for other people she cared about others a lot sherry was also a punctual employee
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so when she didn't come to work one day and didn't call her co-workers were concerned
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they called her husband bob who said sherry left for work at the usual time that morning and he didn't know where
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she was so sherry's friends called police a couple of officers look around knock
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on the door nobody answers but they find an unlocked door so they go into the house and they walk
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through the house everything looks orderly everything looks tidy cherries clothes jewelry and toiletries
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were still in the house it seemed very unusual that a woman with three children would just suddenly
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disappear for the next two days there were no signs of her [Music] then police got a call about a red van
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driving erratically the license plate number identified the van as sherry durell's
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the witness said it was weaving in and out of traffic slowing down speeding up to a point where he wouldn't let the
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witness pass him unfortunately the witness didn't get a good look at who was driving the van
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friends distributed missing person flyers throughout the community and a convenience store clerk
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responded saying sherry was in his store the day after she disappeared the clerk there was sure that she'd seen
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her on saturday evening came in purchased gas with cash and then left there was an initial thought that yeah
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she's in the area and the van's been seen traveling along the freeway sherry's husband looked around their
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home for clues and found some information on sherry's computer that he turned over to the police
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we investigated that and discovered that mrs darrell had in fact pursued a relationship outside her
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marriage there were emails and internet chat room conversations with a man named
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kevin johnson and it was clear the relationship was serious i have tried to be indifferent to you
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and keep my feelings in check i have been thinking about this a lot and feeling bad about my self-respect sort
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of feeling like a call girl more than a friend the correspondence included talk of the
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two running away together they talked about oh wouldn't it be great to go to costa rica the cost of
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living there is so much cheaper when police interviewed kevin johnson he admitted the two had a brief affair
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but insisted he hadn't seen her for the last six months police weren't so sure
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[Music] one week had passed since sherry durrell's disappearance she hadn't contacted her children her
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husband or kevin johnson the man with whom she had the affair i knew that she wouldn't leave without
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telling her mom or calling me we were the two closest people to her she was too responsible of a mother
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and a person to do that then investigators got their first solid lead they found sherry's van in a hotel
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parking lot near the seattle airport that could have been a thought that she parked there
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or she met somebody who came into town or she hopped on a plane and took off but there was no record she stayed in
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the hotel or took a flight out of town it was very emotional finding that van and not her she wasn't anywhere near the
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vehicle and so we found a van but we didn't find our our friend and that was that was really difficult a
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forensic examination of the van revealed no evidence of foul play and there were no foreign fingerprints
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even more troubling sherry's personal bank account hadn't been touched since her disappearance
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she just got a bonus at work and she had just put that into the bank i think that
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week so the theory from all the co-workers was well why would she be putting all this
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money away and then not leave with it and not touch it police conducted extensive interviews
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with sherry's friend kevin johnson he insisted he had nothing to do with her
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disappearance and he was later able to provide some information what he was doing on the day that she was reported
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missing sherry's co-workers told police about a comment she made the day before she disappeared
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she said if anything happens to me my life is in my desk and in her desk among other things was a
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long letter a draft of a letter that she'd written to her husband in an effort to try to explain
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why she felt it necessary to leave it my spirit is crushed i feel that you are too controlling and obsessive and
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jealous and i just can't live with those personality traits anymore i can't go on
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pretending that there is nothing wrong i am unbearably unhappy the bottom line is
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i don't love you enough to stay married also in her desk were books about divorce
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she was planning the separation and she'd saved up some money and she had spoke to a couple of lawyers to get some
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advice and she was making her plans to move on to her new life with her children
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and sherry told friends that bob had been abusive and no sign of physical violence at all
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it was more that she wasn't comfortable around him he was obsessive controlling he emotionally
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controlled her and she just did not feel good around him he would apparently be sort of
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monitoring her whereabouts occasionally she would go out to lunch with some of her friends mr doral would show up so he
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in effect uh she describes a situation where you almost have a husband stalking his own
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wife during police questioning bob dorell admitted there were problems in his marriage
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as for him being involved in sherry's disappearance he said that was ridiculous
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police asked bob what happened on the night before she disappeared bob said they went to dinner at a local
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restaurant when they got home sherry spoke with her sister-in-law mrs durrall appeared perhaps slightly tipsy
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and told her that she was going to bed and that her husband robert durrall had made her a drink
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sherry's sister-in-law told police that she was very suspicious because bob seldom served his wife usually
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it was the other way around they said that it was extraordinarily atypical for mr drawl to ever make his
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wife a drink of any kind or to serve her any kind of food or drink and cherie's best friend had one final
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insight it was a dream she had about sherry the night before she disappeared i woke my husband up
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like at 12 30 1 o'clock in the morning and i said oh i had the worst dream about blood
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everywhere and couldn't get back to sleep and and i feel like that was a message being passed to me like do
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something with this you know the information found in sherry doral's desk at work
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painted a revealing picture of her marriage at the time of her disappearance [Music]
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so investigators decided to search bob dorell's work computer too bob was in charge of the computer system
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at the king county housing authority as a government agency bob's computer was government property so investigators
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seized it and turned it over to gordon mitchell an expert in the growing field of computer forensics
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mitchell copied bob doral's hard drive to examine the information on it without
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altering the original data this is an important process where they can actually discover is there something
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going on here or is bob just a nice guy mitchell found evidence that bob deleted
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certain files but they were still on the hard drive that's because computers don't erase
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files they just mark the space occupied by those files for reuse that's part of why computers take so
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long to start up and shut down files are being created and files are being deleted
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a lot of the deleted files are simply information left in place the deleted information revealed
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that bob was dating women he met on the online dating service match.com and was doing so at the same time his
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wife sherry was dating kevin johnson bob's profile on the dating website was also revealing
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mr drawl portrayed himself as a man who was living separately from his wife and who was completely unburdened by any
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other romantic or personal attachments and was open to a relationship with the appropriate
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woman in emails to prospective dates bob explained why a divorce was impossible to one young woman mr durall said that
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he really did not want to pursue a divorce with his wife because it would be expensive and messy he actually went
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so far as to say that he would be better off if his wife were dead in another email bob said he had a plan
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to resolve his unsatisfactory marriage and what was that plan bob's internet search engine revealed he
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looked for information on all sorts of diabolical schemes we were shocked to see
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these searches on things like poison herbs death something about sedation of people
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also about smothering but the most graphic one was actually a search that drawl did on the words kill
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spouse i was stunned i was stunned the contrast between the the sort of apparently very high
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level functioning man and the sort of almost jaw-dropping stupidity of the evidence they left behind was
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really staggering investigators now had probable cause to search the doral's home
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and they went straight to the master bedroom they found a spot on the carpet that looked like it had been cleaned
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they swabbed it with phenolphthalein and it turned purple an indication it was blood
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under the bed were two squares of carpet that had been cut out and replaced underneath
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were large pools of blood that had been cleaned with water and detergents if a cleaning solvent was used
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it didn't work very effectively around the bed almost invisible to the naked eye
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investigators found the most incriminating evidence it was just hundreds and hundreds of very very small
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red dots on the headboard on the wall above the headboard in the corners and on the bureau and on
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the door jamb to the bathroom the blood near the floor didn't happen during the beating
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that's blood was just coughing out of the lungs through the mouth and that was down very low to the ground
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so someone was coughing up blood very close to the ground in the area of where this
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large pool of blood underneath the bed had been investigators concluded the blood on the
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walls and ceiling was medium velocity blood spatter [Music] consistent with someone
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swinging a bloody object scientists compared the dna from the blood in the bedroom to the dna profiles
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of sherry's parents and discovered that this was sherry's blood investigators also found
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a blood stain on the doorway leading to the garage and in bob's car was a receipt for a specialty cleaning
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product and police also solved another mystery where were the doral's children
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on the night of the murder perfect opportunity for him his youngest child was going to be
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gone that evening his other two were at camp and they were going to be alone in the house that night
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giving bob all night to carry out his plan but where was her body 41 year old bob dorell sat in prison
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awaiting trial for his wife's murder to police he denied it but to his god he said something else in a jail cell he
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was observed and overheard apparently asking god to forgive him for what he had done
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prosecutors didn't need to find sherry's body in order to go to trial no one could have survived the amount of
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blood loss found in sherry's bedroom but for the sake of her family prosecutors approached bob dorell's
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attorneys with an offer we said we would encourage mr drawl to lead us to the location of the body
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of his wife and that we would not use evidence that he had revealed the whereabouts in trial
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surprisingly bob agreed and led investigators to the cascade mountains about an hour's drive away
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there at the base of a steep ravine they found cherry's body in a plastic bag
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under a pile of rocks the autopsy revealed sherry died of blunt force trauma just as the forensic evidence suggested
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prosecutors believe bob was as unhappy in the marriage as sherry was but concluded a divorce would be too
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expensive he did not want to incur the costs of child support or of a divorce a division
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of the property mrs gerald's parents were fairly wealthy mr drawl didn't want to lose his
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inheritance on the night of the crime prosecutors think bob drugged sherry to make her drowsy
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although toxicology tests that the autopsy were inconclusive [Music] the evidence proves bob hit sherry on
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the head repeatedly with a blunt object creating the blood spatter on the floor walls and ceiling
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bob wrapped her body in plastic then carried her body to the garage leaving the blood smear on the door
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he dumped her body in the ravine near the cascade mountains and returned home to clean up the crime scene
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the evidence shows that bob tried to clean up the blood in the bedroom but couldn't come close to removing it
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all so you've got a guy who fancies himself an extraordinarily clever and crafty fellow who's done all months of
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research on how to commit a murder and then he commits a mistake that a sixth grader would laugh at so he's a very a
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very peculiar man a very dangerous man in some ways was his own worst enemy police think it was bob driving sherry's
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van to the hotel parking lot when the witness reported seeing it and they think the store clerk was simply
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mistaken when he claimed sherry was in his store the day after her disappearance we pulled the videotape
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from the store that from that evening and sherry was nowhere on the table at bob dorell's trial
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despite leading police to sherry's body he pled not guilty and took the stand in
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his own defense he told an incredible tale of two men who killed sherry and forced him to
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dispose of her body they said they'd kill him and the children if he went to the police
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actually i was having a hard time trying not to laugh because i thought it was so ridiculous of a story that
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after two years in jail you think he would come up with a better a better story but in reality i think
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that he was putting half the story together during the trial in the end there was simply too much forensic
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evidence the computer forensics and blood spatter told the story after only two hours of
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deliberation bob dorell was found guilty of first degree murder and sentenced to
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46 years in prison i will impose a total of 560 months despite spending months researching and
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planning his wife's murder he still wasn't able to get away with it i think the forensic evidence was
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everything the direction of the blood the patterns how they went out around the room
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like in many cases the evidence was really overwhelming not just a single thing but many many
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items that helped us feel confident about what we were doing mr doral who was professionally involved
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in the use of computers the extent to which he left evidence of premeditated murder
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on his work computer in such a sort of blatant way really continues to boggle my mind
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[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 90
    Most shocking
  • 90
    Most intense
  • 90
    Biggest twist
  • 85
    Most heartbreaking

Episode Highlights

  • Sherry's Double Life
    Sherry Durrell led a secret life that shocked her family and friends.
    “She was leading a double life.”
    @ 00m 09s
    January 20, 2022
  • The Disappearance
    Sherry Durrell vanished without a trace, leaving her family and colleagues worried.
    “When she didn’t come to work one day, her co-workers were concerned.”
    @ 01m 16s
    January 20, 2022
  • The Affair
    Evidence revealed Sherry was having an affair, complicating the investigation.
    “Mrs. Durrell had pursued a relationship outside her marriage.”
    @ 03m 14s
    January 20, 2022
  • Bob's Dark Secrets
    Bob Dorell's online searches revealed disturbing intentions regarding his wife.
    “He looked for information on all sorts of diabolical schemes.”
    @ 12m 01s
    January 20, 2022
  • The Murder Trial
    Bob Dorell was found guilty of first-degree murder after a swift trial.
    “After only two hours of deliberation, Bob Dorell was found guilty.”
    @ 20m 04s
    January 20, 2022

Episode Quotes

  • I have tried to be indifferent to you.
    Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode
  • I don’t love you enough to stay married.
    Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode
  • I woke my husband up... I had the worst dream about blood everywhere.
    Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode
  • He would be better off if his wife were dead.
    Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode
  • I was stunned the contrast between the high level functioning man...
    Forensic Files Season 11, Episode 17 - Internal Affair - Full Episode

Key Moments

  • Disappearance00:08
  • Double Life Revealed00:12
  • Concern Grows01:16
  • First Lead04:40
  • Blood Evidence14:17
  • Trial Verdict20:04

Tension Over Time

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown