00:00:00
[DRAMATIC MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Greeley,
Colorado, 2001, a seven-year-old little girl
is kidnapped in broad daylight
00:00:18
while walking to school
with her brother. I just thought somebody
grabbed me from behind,
00:00:25
and they put me in their car. NANCY GRACE:
Investigators learned the little girl has been raped.
00:00:35
It was hard to believe that
someone would target someone as innocent as this little girl.
00:00:43
NANCY GRACE: Greeley
police worked feverishly to find her attacker,
but, sadly, the case goes cold.
00:00:51
ROBERT CASH: No more
leads or fewer suspects, and then it becomes cold. I think it probably went
cold within the first year.
00:01:00
NANCY GRACE: Police
have one hope, that a revolutionary new DNA
technique might just help find
00:01:07
this violent child predator. I'm Nancy Grace. This is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC]
00:01:36
[SOFT DRAMATIC MUSIC] 2001, Greeley, Colorado,
a rural farming community one hour north of Denver.
00:01:46
NOVAR GARCIA: Today,
the community is about-- I believe we're
about 110,000 people.
00:01:51
Income levels go
from very poor to-- we have very wealthy
people in this community.
00:01:59
The area this occurred
was a lower-income area, and there were a lot
of Spanish-speaking
00:02:04
folks that lived in-- in that area of town. NANCY GRACE: September 18,
2001, Greeley PD gets a 911
00:02:13
call that shocks even them. DUFF KNOT: Well,
the call came in that a-- a young child had told
some workers that his sister
00:02:23
had been kidnapped. They were walking to
school to Jefferson Elementary, which was
very close to where
00:02:30
this kidnapping happened. The brother said they were
walking down the street, and a car pulled up behind them.
00:02:35
Someone got out,
grabbed his sister, and took her in the car. It was only me and
my older brother,
00:02:44
and we were walking together. My mom had walked
us a few blocks, but then she walked back home.
00:02:53
And me and my brother
walked the rest of the way. I just remember that my
brother and I were walking,
00:03:00
and we came to an alley
where I saw a vehicle parked with the driver door open. There was nobody there.
00:03:10
We walked. When we were, like,
halfway through the alley, I just felt somebody
grab me from behind,
00:03:17
and they put me in their car. DUFF KNOT: The brother was smart
enough to shout and scream,
00:03:24
and some workers, some
construction workers, in the area helped him
out, got him to a phone,
00:03:29
got a hold of the
police department, and that's kind of where
the investigation started.
00:03:34
The first officer was on
scene inside of two minutes, and I was there with another
detective shortly after that.
00:03:45
NOVAR GARCIA: I was called to
assist with the investigation, because I believe he didn't
speak English well enough
00:03:55
to communicate
much to the officer that originally picked him up. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT:
We got a description
00:04:02
of what she was wearing-- she had on, I believe, a dress
and a jacket over the dress--
00:04:07
and the direction of the
vehicle and a vague description of the vehicle that was
used by the suspect.
00:04:15
And that-- that all came
from-- from the little brother. It was a tan-colored
car that left
00:04:20
eastbound through the alley. I absolutely thought, if we
don't find her really quick,
00:04:28
when we do find her, she
won't be alive anymore. That's the biggest
fear for sure.
00:04:35
CLAY BUCKINGHAM: She
was scared to death, and he pushed her down on the
floorboard, drove off with her.
00:04:41
She's all by herself now. Her brothers left on the street,
and he takes her to a location
00:04:47
that I think that he
probably knew about already. And then he committed
a horrible act.
00:04:52
He sexually assaulted her. Put duct tape around her,
wrapped her up in duct tape,
00:04:58
and-- and then he threw her out
of the car, and he left. So a horrible thing
happened that day
00:05:04
to just a great little girl,
and it changed her life forever. NANCY GRACE: Police in
Greeley are scrambling
00:05:13
to find a kidnapped
little girl and chase down a child predator when
they get another phone call--
00:05:19
this time from the National
Guard post in Greeley. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: The
suspect took her to an area
00:05:27
nearby the Air
National Guard station. And it had to be
a place he knew, because if you don't
know where you're going,
00:05:35
you would never even
have found this place. ROBERT CASH: For him to
simply let her go was--
00:05:41
was a bit baffling to us. Many other cases don't end as
well as this, regarding that.
00:05:47
NAYLEY TORRES: The
first thing that I did, I tried to go the
opposite direction from the way my
attacker had gone,
00:05:56
and I tried to look
for another adult. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: She walked
back to 8th Street, which
00:06:03
was about 100 to 150 yards from
where the assault occurred, and the guardsman said that
he saw this little girl
00:06:11
walking on 8th Street,
which immediately drew his attention to her. And she was walking very
fast, looked very afraid,
00:06:17
and kept looking
over her shoulder. NAYLEY TORRES: There was
actually a soldier who saw me
00:06:21
from across the street, and he
was the one that directed me to their gate doors.
00:06:27
And they were the
ones who helped me. NOVAR GARCIA: I was with the
victim's brother and her mother
00:06:34
at the time we received a call
from the National Guard outfit that they had been contacted by
a seven-year-old girl who was
00:06:41
determined to be the victim. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: I just really
thought that I'm glad to see
00:06:49
this little girl alive. When I first saw her, another
officer had arrived right before me, and when
I got out of the car,
00:06:56
he was holding her and
trying to comfort her. She was crying, wanting to
see your mom and brother.
00:07:03
And I was just happy to--
that she's still alive. The first thing that the victim
asked was, how's my brother?
00:07:12
And when she was
kidnapped off the street, she yelled at her brother,
run away, because she
00:07:18
didn't want him taken, too. So I mean, this little girl
is just really amazing. I saw some minor
injuries on her.
00:07:26
She had some scrapes
on her knees, on her arms, some
mud on her face. But because she wasn't
seriously injured,
00:07:34
I told the officer
who got there first to just drive her right to the
hospital, and I'd have our--
00:07:42
our female detective
meet them there, and they can start
the process of-- of, ultimately, what would be
a sex-assault investigation.
00:07:52
ROBERT CASH: She did
have a piece of duct tape that was still around her neck. We believe that that
was one of the pieces
00:08:01
that was over her mouth. She was able to give a fairly
decent initial statement as far as what had happened.
00:08:09
Was then, soon thereafter,
taken to the hospital for examination. She was interviewed by a
doctor through an interpreter,
00:08:19
and my interview with her came
later with another detective. NANCY GRACE: The terrified
seven-year-old little girl
00:08:28
rushed to the hospital. She's reunited with
her family, and before police tried
to speak with, her
00:08:34
she's examined by
a medical team. Meanwhile, word of the
abduction is spreading fast
00:08:41
through the town of Greeley,
and police want to calm down a scared community. NOVAR GARCIA: At
the time, I believe
00:08:51
this was prior to the internet,
everybody read the newspaper. Lots of people were aware
that this had happened
00:08:57
and where it happened,
and they knew the victim was a seven-year-old female. So I'm sure many parents were
extra careful about allowing
00:09:06
their kids to walk to
school or where they were when they weren't home. DUFF KNOT: We'd never
had a stranger abduction
00:09:12
on a child like this, at
least in my time here, and it hit home to everybody
at the police department.
00:09:18
It became a passionate
issue for everybody to-- to catch the suspect. NANCY GRACE: A little
girl traumatized
00:09:27
by a brutal sex attack. The community in
a state of panic. It's up to law enforcement
to apprehend a violent child
00:09:37
rapist before he strikes again. That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [DRAMATIC MUSIC]
00:09:52
NANCY GRACE: Greeley,
Colorado, 2001, a seven-year-old little
girl kidnapped and raped,
00:09:58
but she's still alive. Her attacker let her go. Now it's up to police
to try and interview
00:10:07
a precious little girl. NOVAR GARCIA: She
was very open with us and telling us the story,
and for seven years old,
00:10:17
she was incredible
in how well she-- she shared the entire incident. NAYLEY TORRES: The police--
was they were really--
00:10:50
they were really kind. It was-- it was a little bit
hard because, at the time, there was a language
barrier, but they made--
00:10:58
they made it as
easy as they could. NOVAR GARCIA: She told
us that she was walking
00:11:05
to school with her brother. When they approached the
alley, the suspect jumped out
00:11:10
of a car, grabbed her around-- around her arms, and he put
one hand over her mouth.
00:11:17
He ran back to the car. And she told me
that he fell down as they were getting
back to the car,
00:11:24
and she hit her
mouth on the ground. And it was a dirt alley. So she said she got
some dirt in her mouth,
00:11:30
and she said that her-- her mouth bled a little bit. And she said the suspect
put her in the car,
00:11:38
later on the passenger
seat that was already in the reclined position,
and put a jacket
00:11:44
or something over her head. So she couldn't see
where they were going. She gave me a description
of the car, even
00:11:51
though she couldn't see it. She told me that she could
hear the gears shifting. She saw gear shift.
00:11:57
It was hard to believe that
someone would target someone as innocent as this little girl.
00:12:07
NANCY GRACE: The
seven-year-old girl tells police, during the attack,
she does an incredible thing.
00:12:13
She gives her
attacker a fake name. NOVAR GARCIA: She told
me that she thought the suspect was
Hispanic, but she said he
00:12:24
didn't speak Spanish very well. He tried to talk to her in
Spanish once he realized
00:12:28
that she didn't speak
English, and the only thing she really understood was that
he was asking her for her name.
00:12:38
And she told me
that she knew she didn't want to give him her real
name, so she made up a name.
00:12:46
NAYLEY TORRES: I remember
thinking, what's happening? It's not-- it's not
good what's happening.
00:12:51
And obviously it was a
stranger, so I didn't want him to have any of my information.
00:13:00
NANCY GRACE: This is one
courageous little girl. She fights through the trauma
of a horrible sex attack
00:13:07
and still gives police
the kind of detail many adults would never
be able to remember,
00:13:15
including a description
of her attacker. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT:
Later that day, I arranged for a sketch artist to
come to the police department
00:13:26
so that we could try
to get a sketch of what the suspect looked like. And it was in that
interview that she
00:13:32
described him in great detail,
drew a pretty good description. In that interview, she
mentioned the suspect
00:13:38
had a snake tattoo on his right
forearm, and she drew a very-- a very descriptive drawing
of it with the tattoo artist.
00:13:48
So I was convinced that
whoever this person was had a snake tattoo
on his arm based
00:13:53
upon what she had told us. NOVAR GARCIA: She
said he had long-- long hair like a woman.
00:14:01
He had ugly teeth. He smelled of cigarettes. He was wearing a-- a big jacket that was
zipped all the way up.
00:14:11
And this made me
think a little bit, because she also told me she saw
a tattoo on his right forearm.
00:14:18
And when I asked her how
she was able to see that, she told me that his
right sleeve was actually
00:14:25
pulled up a little bit. I couldn't understand
why a suspect would allow that
to be seen if he's
00:14:32
trying to conceal his identity. DUFF KNOT: There was
some confusion on that whether it was a
snake or a dragon,
00:14:38
but it wrapped around his arm. So we were able to
focus on that long hair, and the suspect did
speak some Spanish.
00:14:45
It gave us a lot of
information really quickly to try to-- to
try to identify a suspect.
00:14:51
Anything she told me, I knew
she was telling the truth. NANCY GRACE: Imagine
you're a parent,
00:14:58
and your little girl has
been viciously assaulted. So many times, in
cases like these,
00:15:05
a parent suffers not only for
the welfare of their child, but because they blame
themselves for what happened.
00:15:15
NOVAR GARCIA: She was
a concerned mother, and she felt like
she was responsible.
00:15:20
And this wouldn't have
happened if she would have been walking the children's school.
00:15:25
But it wasn't more than a
three- or four-block walk. It wasn't anything unheard of
for second- and third-graders
00:15:32
to walk that distance. I felt very strongly
for the brother, because I thought in his mind,
for the rest of his life, as--
00:15:41
as the older brother,
you know, your job is to protect your little sister. And even though there was
nothing he could have done,
00:15:50
I thought that he might have
been psychologically damaged because something horrific
happened to his sister,
00:15:57
and he didn't stop it. NAYLEY TORRES: After
the fact, it was-- it was hard. I was angry.
00:16:07
I was really angry. I was really hurt, but
I knew that my family was there to support me.
00:16:15
It was a relief to be
home, but it was scary. It was really hard
going back outside.
00:16:25
NANCY GRACE: A child rapist
still on the loose, a brave child victim showing
incredible courage,
00:16:32
and a community
looking to police for answers before a child
predator can strike again.
00:16:38
That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [DRAMATIC MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Greeley, Colorado,
2001, police investigating
00:16:54
the abduction and
brutal sex assault of a seven-year-old little girl. Incredibly, this child
fights through the trauma,
00:17:05
giving important details
to police about her rapist. Police begin to build a case.
00:17:15
BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: When I got to
the air National Guard station, she still has some duct
tape around her neck.
00:17:19
So, you know, I knew
she'd been duct-taped and tied up in some fashion. So the duct tape, of
course, was collected
00:17:26
in case there are some--
any type of trace evidence or fingerprints on it. And everything she had on
was collected as evidence.
00:17:34
All of her clothing. And then, because it was-- I believe they saw
blood in her underwear,
00:17:41
they did a sex-assault
examination on her. At the scene, in
searching around the area,
00:17:51
we came across an
area with duct tape and assumed that was
where it occurred. The victim later verified that's
where the assault took place.
00:18:00
CLAY BUCKINGHAM: Tire tracks are
always important because a tire track is an impression
in a substrate
00:18:06
such as dirt, which
leaves a pattern design of a potential tire. And there's the possibility,
if you can get a tire,
00:18:14
you can make
exemplars of that tire and then compare those to the
tire tracks from the scene.
00:18:21
I spent quite a bit of time at
the first scene in the alley doing photography,
and then we did
00:18:25
what we call plaster
casting or dental stone casting of those tire tracks. It's a casting
material like plaster.
00:18:32
And you mix it up, and you
pour it into the tire track, and it dries. And then you lift it out.
00:18:37
It gives you a good
impression of that tire track. So I did that at that
scene, and then I
00:18:42
did the same thing down on--
off of the Fern Avenue scene. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT:
There wasn't a cop
00:18:49
in Greeley that
did not want to see an arrest made in this case. [TENSE MUSIC] NOVAR GARCIA: We had
one-- one call that led us
00:18:58
to a suspect that we
focused some attention on, and there were lots of-- lots of odd things about
this suspect that made
00:19:07
me think he was our guy. DUFF KNOT: My role was
chasing suspects at the time. We had a couple-- a
couple pretty good
00:19:16
suspects that we
focused on right away. During our neighborhood canvas,
we had developed information
00:19:24
from the neighborhood
that there was a guy there that was inappropriate with
kids and had all of a sudden cut
00:19:31
all his hair off. He had drawn a tattoo
on his arm and that he switched cars out daily.
00:19:37
So we kind of-- we
focused on him right away, trying to either
eliminate him as a suspect
00:19:42
right away so we could move on
or focus on him at that time. So we spent a lot--
00:19:47
probably two or three
days looking at him. We ended up interviewing him. We ended up pulling DNA from
him, and he was not a match.
00:19:57
It was not him. We probably had 40 to
50 different leads of different suspects at the time.
00:20:04
[TENSE MUSIC] CLAY BUCKINGHAM: It was probably
months later, the photographs and the dental stone
castings I did from the alley
00:20:12
and the ones I did from
the Fern Avenue scene were compared to
each other by a--
00:20:17
an expert that does that type
of comparisons from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, and the
results of those comparisons,
00:20:25
the best they could tell
was that both patterns from both scenes
were-- were similar.
00:20:31
So they couldn't say they
were exactly the same, but they could say
that they were similar.
00:20:35
It didn't take us anywhere. We-- we took the
impressions to different tire shops to try
to see if they could
00:20:41
determine what to make and-- of the tire. But, as I recall, it
didn't amount to anything.
00:20:49
NANCY GRACE: Police
consider a possibility. Most sex assaults on children
are committed by someone
00:20:57
they know-- a friend of the
family, a relative. Even though this brave
little seven-year-old girl
00:21:04
says she did not
recognize her attacker, investigators must
chase down those leads.
00:21:12
DUFF KNOT: Probably
about 95% of the sex assaults we have on children
are usually family involved.
00:21:20
Either family
involved or a friend-- friend of the families,
a neighbor, a boyfriend,
00:21:27
something like that. It's very rare that
it's a stranger. ROBERT CASH: The
initial feeling was
00:21:34
that it needed to be somebody
who was close to the family. Just given the time
frame, just given
00:21:39
the spontaneous nature of this,
it seemed to be planned to me. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: We
thought it's possible.
00:21:48
So we certainly
looked at the family and eventually eliminated
them all as suspects.
00:21:55
NANCY GRACE:
Greeley police leave no stone unturned to apprehend
a violent sex predator.
00:22:01
They throw more resources
at the investigations, but still, their leads dry up. We put a lot of
resources into it.
00:22:12
We spent a lot of time
and effort on the case. Certainly did we-- we knew
that it was a small child
00:22:18
that was involved as a victim. Does that give us a little more
strength or effort in the case?
00:22:23
Maybe so. We want work a little
bit harder on it, maybe. We did take all
of our resources,
00:22:29
all of our detectives and
a lot of other people, and they worked on this
case for a long time.
00:22:35
ROBERT CASH: So there's a--
a national database that is run by the FBI
which is called ViCAP,
00:22:42
and it's a database
of cases that include suspect
descriptions, MOs or motives by suspects in different cases.
00:22:54
This case was memorialized
and brought to ViCAP early on by detectives. NANCY GRACE: Police submit
the DNA evidence gathered
00:23:04
from the victim's clothes
into the national police DNA database. It's called CODIS.
00:23:11
At the same time, they apply
for a John Doe warrant. We were able to get what
we call a single-source DNA
00:23:21
profile of our suspect from
the evidence collected during the sex assault, and that gave
us a single-source profile
00:23:28
of an individual person. And so when I wrote
the John Doe warrant, I wrote the warrant
for that DNA profile.
00:23:36
A profile-- it's a set
of numbers and letters, and that gives us what that
specific DNA profile is.
00:23:43
So the actual description of the
person for the John Doe person on the warrant is
the profile itself,
00:23:50
and so the arrest warrant
was for the person that has that profile. BRAD GOLDSCHMIDT: It's just
important to have something
00:23:57
in the system so that if
this suspect got contacted for anything, and
his DNA was run,
00:24:04
there would be an
arrest warrant. We would be immediately-- be able to go out and
arrest whoever it was
00:24:10
who matched that DNA profile. So if he was ever
contacted anywhere, and a DNA profile was
submitted to CODIS,
00:24:17
we would have had
a match there, too. So-- but it was important
to have an arrest warrant
00:24:21
for who this person was. Even though we didn't know his
name, we knew what his DNA was.
00:24:27
It is so frustrating
for investigators. They believe a DNA match
is within their grasp,
00:24:33
but they come up empty. And the case goes cold. Oh, boy, we worked
it hard for months.
00:24:42
And we-- you know, whenever
a tip came in, we would-- followed it up immediately.
00:24:47
We worked it really
hard for months. Several months. ROBERT CASH: No more
leads or fewer suspects,
00:24:55
and then it becomes cold. I think it probably went
cold within the first year. Officers and detectives
would stay in touch with--
00:25:03
with the victim and her family. NAYLEY TORRES: The
police kept in touch for quite a few years after.
00:25:09
Yeah. I was-- I was hopeful that
they would find my attacker. DUFF KNOT: We had a
really good DNA profile,
00:25:20
and in 2001, DNA wasn't
as good as it is now. So a lot of the felons
that went to prison
00:25:27
didn't have to automatically
give DNA at the time, so you didn't have
a huge DNA registry.
00:25:33
What you had to do at the time
was, basically, anyone you talk to, any witnesses, you'd had
to get consent to get their DNA
00:25:41
and then compare it
to the victim's DNA. Now there's such a big
DNA database that it
00:25:48
cross-references everything. So if the DNA is
in that database, it'll show a match right away.
00:25:55
Back when I started, you had to
have a confession or, you know, the murder weapon or a witness.
00:26:02
Now DNA-- DNA tells
a big story, and it's really hard to prove otherwise. NANCY GRACE: Greeley detectives
are running out of options.
00:26:12
A DNA sample is the
one piece of evidence keeping this case alive, but
cops are unsure how to use it.
00:26:21
But then investigators
learn about a revolutionary new
technique solving cold cases all over the world.
00:26:30
Can that same forensic
science work here? We find out next on
"Bloodline Detectives."
00:26:44
[DRAMATIC MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Greeley,
Colorado, 2018, police reopened
their investigation
00:26:52
into the kidnap and sex assault
of a seven-year-old little girl back in 2001. Investigators have a DNA
sample from the victim,
00:27:02
but so far, it has
provided no solid clues. Now, bloodline detectives
take one last shot
00:27:12
at applying their
DNA evidence to an exciting new forensic weapon-- genetic genealogy.
00:27:20
There had been a
serial killer in the '70s into the '80s, and through-- genealogy and phenotyping
had been done in the case,
00:27:30
and a suspect was found. Given that case really
kind of gave me, I guess, the motivation
to try to utilize
00:27:39
that in this case knowing that
we had a strong DNA sample. I believe that it would
actually solve the case.
00:27:49
NAYLEY TORRES: Detective
Cash was always in contact. I feel like whenever
there was going
00:27:54
to be a new step, a new
movement in the case, he would always let me know. ROBERT CASH: She
was very surprised
00:28:01
that it was still a case. Her words was-- you know, she
thought that this kind of just
00:28:06
had gone by the wayside, that
nobody was found or caught, so it was over. NOVAR GARCIA: Robert Cash
stayed in contact with me
00:28:17
when he first was
assigned this cold case. And he told me he was
working that case,
00:28:23
and I said, please solve it. Please solve it. This is the one case that-- that still bothers me almost
20 years after the fact.
00:28:31
After almost 20 years,
investigators in Greeley, Colorado, are
clinging to the hope
00:28:38
that the same science of genetic
genealogy in the Golden State Killer case could help them.
00:28:45
Detective Robert Cash
contacts Parabon NanoLabs in Reston, Virginia, the leader
in genetic genealogy research.
00:28:57
CAROL ROLNICK: There are
certain cases that some of us take because we have
expertise in different areas
00:29:03
of genetic genealogy,
and I end up doing all of the
Hispanic-related cases because I have a background
in speaking and reading
00:29:14
and understanding Spanish. So it's a little
bit easier for me to handle these cases
because I can read some
00:29:21
of these genealogical
records that I need to to be able to piece
together these families.
00:29:28
We use the DNA to create a
composite of this individual, and we can tell the eye
color and the hair color
00:29:37
and the skin color
and the face shape and lots of different
things about this individual
00:29:43
just from their DNA. NANCY GRACE: Police release the
composite sketch of the suspect
00:29:48
to local media, but,
unfortunately, no one comes forward with
even a possible ID.
00:29:57
ROBERT CASH: Typically,
the first phase, which is the phenotyping
with the composite,
00:30:02
if that generates
enough interest, if that generates the
leads that you need to--
00:30:07
to resolve the case,
it doesn't need to go to the second phase, which
is the genealogical aspects.
00:30:13
Thankfully, we decided to
take that leap of faith, take it to the second stage,
and Carol and her team
00:30:22
were miracle workers as
far as what they found. CAROL ROLNICK: So we end up
using a different DNA profile
00:30:33
than what is used
by law enforcement when they are doing
comparisons in CODIS. We are using a SNP profile.
00:30:43
So it's a different way
of looking at the DNA, and it's using
hundreds of thousands
00:30:48
of markers on the genome. That SNP profile is uploaded
into the public DNA databases
00:30:56
that law enforcement
is allowed to use and what we get as a
result are matches. Actually, it's
thousands of matches.
00:31:05
It's not a single match like
you would get in the law enforcement CODIS database.
00:31:11
So these are all people who are
relatives of our perpetrator and what we're trying to do
is put together the pieces
00:31:20
of this puzzle to figure out
what individual on this earth could potentially be related
to all of these people
00:31:29
at the right genetic distance. And that's really what genetic
genealogy is in a nutshell.
00:31:34
[SOFT DRAMATIC MUSIC] Let me walk you through
this in a diagram, because I think it's
a little easier when
00:31:41
you can see it written out. It starts with the matches,
and we had two pretty good matches in this case.
00:31:50
We'll call this guy
match number one. And then match number
two happened to be a full generation younger.
00:31:57
And as I built out their family
trees, I'm looking for an area where their trees converge.
00:32:04
I know that they share
some DNA with each other, so in theory, they should have
a set of common ancestors.
00:32:10
And I built this up-- his father, his grandfather-- and it turned out that these
two individuals were siblings.
00:32:20
They shared a set
of parents here. NANCY GRACE: Carol
Rolnick and her team make a remarkable breakthrough.
00:32:29
They trace the DNA back
to a couple who lived in Mexico in the 19th century. Now they start working
forward in time,
00:32:39
hoping it will lead them to a
suspect in Greeley, Colorado, in 2001. CAROL ROLNICK: So
this was a couple
00:32:50
that was based in Coahuila,
in the town of Allende in Coahuila, Mexico,
by the name of Maltos,
00:32:58
and both of these
top matches descended from this same ancestral couple. So we can theorize then
that our perpetrator also
00:33:10
descends from this
same ancestral couple. We begin to build their trees,
and we see where those matches'
00:33:17
trees are going to lead us. As I built this
tree forward in time and enumerated all of
the many grandchildren,
00:33:28
great-grandchildren, and
great-great-grandchildren, I was actually only able to
identify two individuals who
00:33:35
were male, who were of the right
age at the time of the crime, and who lived in
Greeley, Colorado.
00:33:44
ROBERT CASH: It was
astounding, to say the least. They gave us their breakdown
from their research.
00:33:50
They did find, after
literally reaching into, handwritten at
times, databases and lists
00:33:58
and census results in Mexico-- found relatives which would
be grandparents to a male
00:34:06
identified as Jaime Zamora. NANCY GRACE: After almost
20 years, police finally have a name--
00:34:14
Jaime Zamora. But will that name finally
identify a child rapist? The answer next on
"Bloodline Detectives."
00:34:32
[TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: 2019,
police in Greeley, Colorado, finally have the
name of a possible suspect
00:34:41
in the 2001 kidnap and rape of
a seven-year-old little girl. NAYLEY TORRES:
When he first told
00:34:49
us that they had a
name to the suspect, I was in complete shock. I-- I felt like I couldn't--
00:34:57
I just-- I was shocked. I didn't know what to say. So many years had passed
by that, at a certain time,
00:35:04
I had lost a little bit of hope. Like, I had hoped,
but, I mean, it still crossed my mind that
maybe this person
00:35:12
was never going to be found. CAROL ROLNICK: Whenever
I find someone that fits in the right
part of the tree that
00:35:19
is the right possible age
that was living nearby, yes, I always want to
do a lot more research
00:35:26
on that particular individual. And when I did so, I found
that he had died of suicide.
00:35:36
NANCY GRACE: The
bloodline detectives are this close to
finding Jaime Zamora, the prime suspect in a
savage sex attack occurring
00:35:46
almost 20 years before. Suddenly, they are
rocked by the news the suspect committed
suicide in 2014.
00:35:59
We learned how he
died, where he died. We would find the-- the police reports surrounding
his death that ultimately
00:36:10
led to his autopsy report, which
also provided us a DNA sample. We had a great briefing with
the Greeley Police Department,
00:36:21
and the detective was
wonderful to talk to. It was up to him to then make
that direct comparison using
00:36:30
some DNA from Jaime Zamora
directly to the crime-scene DNA to see whether they
had that direct match.
00:36:39
We got a phone call from the
Greeley Police Department, from the detective,
and he let us
00:36:45
know that it was a direct
match and that Jaime Zamora was indeed our perpetrator.
00:36:51
NANCY GRACE: Jaime Zamora may
be dead, but his DNA lives on. It's a positive match to
the DNA from the 2001 rape
00:37:01
and kidnapping of a
seven-year-old girl. Finally, police can
provide some resolution
00:37:08
for the victim and her family. NAYLEY TORRES: It's been--
it's been quite a journey.
00:37:16
Sometimes I feel like
I've overcame it. I'm going to be OK. But then there's times
that it just-- it's hard.
00:37:26
It's really hard. I'm just glad that
I don't have to-- that I could just put
it on the back burner,
00:37:35
that I don't have
to continuously have that doubt of-- if it's ever going
to come to an end
00:37:43
or if they're ever
going to find anybody. I just am glad that-- I'm glad it's over.
00:37:50
NOVAR GARCIA: I think back to
the statement that she gave me and how-- how thorough she was in giving
me descriptions of everything.
00:37:59
Her courage, you
know, ranks up there with any combat vet
that charged a machine
00:38:04
gun or anything like that. She-- she was an
incredible young lady. NANCY GRACE: The
bloodline detectives
00:38:12
reflect that
determination, combined with incredible
forensic science, could still prove a
long-dead suspect was
00:38:21
in fact a brutal child rapist. We did all of the
work we could do. The doctors did the correct
work in the hospital
00:38:31
with the sex-assault
kit to collect the evidence from the victim,
and that gave us a DNA profile.
00:38:37
And years later,
through genealogy, we were able to solve this case. And so, yeah, that
was everything.
00:38:43
Without that, we would
never have solved this case. CAROL ROLNICK: We
often get asked
00:38:48
that question, how can I help? You know, what can I do? Well, if you've tested your
DNA at a commercial DNA testing
00:38:55
company, download your
raw DNA and then upload to either GEDmatch
or Family Tree DNA
00:39:02
and opt in to law
enforcement matching. You just never know when
you might be a third cousin
00:39:08
or a second cousin once
removed to a perpetrator of a violent crime or
to a Jane or John Doe
00:39:13
that was found that's
trying to be identified. And the more people that
can upload and be compared
00:39:20
to this crime-scene
DNA, the more likely we are to solve these cases. NOVAR GARCIA: This is something
that does affect victims
00:39:29
for the rest of their life. I was pleased to see that
this victim had gone on with her life, and she seemed
to have a healthy home life
00:39:38
with a husband and children. And that made me feel good. It's nice-- it's
nice being married.
00:39:46
My husband is very supportive. He's very understanding. And, I mean, having
kids, it's hard.
00:39:55
I think because of what
I went through, now I'm really overprotective
of my kids, but I enjoy it.
00:40:03
I enjoy being a mom. I feel like if speaking out
is going to help in any way, shape, or form in future cases,
in current cases, to get solved
00:40:15
or to come to a
conclusion, I think that's why I want to do it. NANCY GRACE: This
case is solved, thanks
00:40:24
to the amazing science
of genetic genealogy, and the more people whose
DNA become available,
00:40:32
the more crimes can be solved. This case is also about courage. That's really what
defines this story--
00:40:40
the courage of a very brave
seven-year-old little girl, of her family, and of
the bloodline detectives,
00:40:48
who never gave up, and
the resolution they bring may help a young wife
who was once a child
00:40:58
victim, giving her
the comfort she needs to achieve her dreams. We can only hope that she will.
00:41:08
I'm Nancy Grace. Thank you for joining us here
on "Bloodline Detectives." [EMOTIONAL MUSIC]
00:41:34
[THEME MUSIC]