00:00:00
[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: May 2003, Mammoth
Lakes in California's Sierra Nevada mountains, a hiker's
dog strays off the path
00:00:20
and digs up a human skull. It wasn't until the next
day that they were really able to identify the
scattered remains of a human,
00:00:29
and also along with
that, clothing, jewelry, and other
things that indicated it probably was a woman.
00:00:36
NANCY GRACE: Detectives
try everything. But they cannot identify
the female victim.
00:00:42
This is the beginning of a near
20-year investigation, where cutting-edge science
may blow open
00:00:51
a seemingly impossible case. Throughout the
years, there had been a number of possible
leads that were presented.
00:01:00
They were all looked into,
and, one way or another, they were eliminated
as likely candidates
00:01:07
as far as being a suspect. NANCY GRACE: When cold case
detectives have exhausted
00:01:12
all leads, they turn
to new groundbreaking technology, investigative
genetic genealogy.
00:01:19
There's always some
kind of trace left behind. And we, as law
enforcement officers,
00:01:24
need to find those traces. Sometimes it's really
hard to find them. But if we look hard
enough, they're there.
00:01:31
This is the incredible story
of the Mammoth Lakes Jane Doe, a case where
Bloodline Detectives.
00:01:39
use groundbreaking
science to try and solve the mystery of her
life and her violent death.
00:01:48
I'm Nancy Grace. This is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: 2003,
Mammoth Lakes,
00:02:18
California in the
Sierra Nevada mountains, a local hiker is
walking in an area known as the Shady Rest Park.
00:02:28
It was just about three
weeks after the Shady Rest Park had reopened
after being closed
00:02:33
for five months for the winter. A man was walking his dog
along one of the hiking trails,
00:02:38
and he came across
something very disturbing. It looked like human
remains, a skull.
00:02:43
And so he called
police, and they came out and started looking around. The evening turned to nighttime.
00:02:52
It wasn't until the
next day that they were really able to identify the
scattered remains of a human.
00:02:58
They essentially set up a
perimeter, or a crime scene, and started canvassing--
you know, just
00:03:03
kind of checking the area-- and ultimately
came upon what they believed to be a shallow grave.
00:03:09
Within that shallow
grave, they found a black jacket, a pair of
shoes, bra, and a pair of jeans.
00:03:17
[CHILLING MUSIC] ALAN DUKE: There
are very specific items that could help tell the
story of who this person was.
00:03:24
There was a winter
coat you couldn't buy just anywhere
unless you found it maybe in a thrift store.
00:03:31
There was a watch, which
is probably the most intriguing thing to me-- a Jaclyn Smith watch.
00:03:38
And these are really
not expensive watches, but apparently they're
very durable because it
00:03:45
was still ticking. It had been there for
months and months, through a very cold winter
and was still ticking.
00:03:53
The watch was set to daylight
standard time, which, in 2002, began on October 27.
00:04:01
So whoever was wearing
that watch obviously set it to that time for the winter. And that meant that
this occurred sometime
00:04:13
in that five-month period. NANCY GRACE: A week
after the discovery, the skeletal remains are
examined by a coroner.
00:04:21
This preliminary
autopsy confirms the victim is a young woman. So the pathologist
determined that she
00:04:30
most likely died from blunt
force trauma to the head. She had significant trauma
to the front of her face,
00:04:35
and she had significant
trauma to the back of her head causing her to fall backwards,
and then secondary blow
00:04:40
to the back of her head. They determined an
approximate time of death and then that coincided with
the time frame of the watch,
00:04:47
so they had an approximate. And they ultimately determined
that she was an Asian female,
00:04:53
and they died approximately
six to eight months prior to discovery. Through further examination,
they had her approximate height
00:04:59
and that she had very likely
carried a child to full term. NANCY GRACE: Forensic
anthropologists initially
00:05:06
theorized the victim's
Asian but cannot come to a definitive conclusion. It's a start, but
investigators need to learn
00:05:15
a lot more about this victim. Police sent part
of the remains to the University of
California at Santa Barbara,
00:05:24
and their science
department said, we think we see a knife wound. But even then, they
couldn't be sure.
00:05:35
Was that the product
of a violent encounter? Or was that the product
of the animals scavenging?
00:05:44
The police started to
believe that they could get a good feeling as to the
appearance of a skull,
00:05:53
that they would use
literally pencil erasers, and they would glue them to
the various points on the skull
00:06:01
and have skin then
implanted above those pencil erasers to the depths that
they thought that the skin was.
00:06:11
And then with the
use of clay as skin, they could get a clay model
of the victim using the skull.
00:06:23
Investigators firmly
believe the answer to Jane Doe's identity lies
right there in Mammoth Lakes.
00:06:31
They appeal to people in the
community for any information. BRIAN MADERA: A tip came
in from the Visitor Center.
00:06:38
They stated that
they had seen a man with a female, which
then led the officers to go down that investigation.
00:06:46
During those interactions,
the Forest Service employee believed that the male
person was being very
00:06:54
inappropriate with the female. CHRIS CALLINAN: They
separated at one point, and the Forest Service
employee kind of
00:07:00
engaged them in conversation. And the female
conveyed that they were otherwise afraid of the
person who they were with.
00:07:09
They'd been violent
with them in the past. And so that incident
itself, and then coupled
00:07:15
with the recent
discovery of the remains, caused that Forest Service
employee to come forward
00:07:20
and give that
description, saying, hey, I don't know if
this is associated, but this had occurred
in approximately around
00:07:25
that same time period. Some of the posters that were
put out by the Mammoth Lakes
00:07:29
police department
at the time, there was a thought that
there was a connection. And so at the time, that was
the best lead the town had.
00:07:38
Can an argument hold the
key to unlocking this case? Can forensic science
crack it wide open?
00:07:47
We find out next on
"Bloodline Detectives." NANCY GRACE: 2003,
Mammoth Lakes, California.
00:08:03
On May 25, the skeletal remains
of an unidentified woman are discovered. Investigators create an
image based on the skull,
00:08:14
but they cannot identify her. Detectives turn to isotope
testing, a relatively new
00:08:21
technique that could
shed more light on the victim's background. This was a slow
cold case, whether it
00:08:30
was because the
police department and, you know, the
California Department of Justice investigators had
a lot of other things to do,
00:08:37
but occasionally,
apparently some detective would pick up the file and say,
why don't we try this new test?
00:08:43
You know, new levels
of DNA testing that have solved so many cold
cases just in recent years.
00:08:50
So they did more DNA testing. When it comes to human
beings, we can tell the diet of that human being.
00:09:01
People who have a
high corn diet will have a lot of carbon-13 and
carbon-12 in their bodies
00:09:12
because the corn absorbs
those kinds of elements, particularly from the Mexico,
Mesoamerica, Middle America.
00:09:22
Here the body that
was being examined had a lot of carbon-12 in it. And, therefore, it
was an indication
00:09:31
that this was a Mexican
woman not an Asian woman. NANCY GRACE: The fact
that the lady victim is
00:09:39
of Mexican descent
is significant, but her identity
is still unknown. Parabon NanoLabs
becomes involved
00:09:48
in conducting
phenotyping, a test that aims to predict physical
appearance and ancestry.
00:09:56
CHRIS CALLINAN:
One thing that we felt could be a
benefit to the case was the Parabon
phenotyping generating
00:10:03
what would likely be a
potential image of what the decedent had looked like. They'd done it in 2003 via a
pinning method, using clay.
00:10:12
At the time, it was kind of
cutting edge, so to speak. Obviously technology
had advanced,
00:10:17
and so that clay model
was kind of rudimentary. So we wanted to kind of see
if we could generate more
00:10:24
of like a real life-like
image that we could utilize, and then coupled with the
isotope testing to a region,
00:10:31
whether they had
originated from or where they had spent
the last remaining portions of their life.
00:10:37
So based upon the DNA sample
that was provided to Parabon, they were able to ascertain
her hair color, eye color, skin
00:10:45
complexion, again, the region
where she most likely had originated from,
ultimately generating what
00:10:51
appeared to be a
25-year-old Hispanic female or Native American female. It appeared to be a very--
00:10:57
very real image. I mean, it was, you know,
you could look at that, and you could--
00:11:02
you could definitely-- you
know, it was a person as opposed to, like,
the clay which was
00:11:07
just a face, very rudimentary. For years, detectives
firmly believed the remains of the
skeletal victim
00:11:16
are that of an Asian woman. The phenotyping
test says otherwise, and it is a definitive test.
00:11:26
It allows detectives to
narrow down their search for potential leads. Investigators in
November 2020, then
00:11:34
reach out to the Hispanic
community in Mammoth Lakes, asking those members
to think back
00:11:41
to people they knew in 2003. When we finally did
have our big town meeting, it was very, very well attended.
00:11:51
And there was a lot
of concern voices within the community
about their perceptions.
00:11:58
NANCY GRACE: Two
witnesses come forward, telling detectives they
believe the mammoth lakes
00:12:04
Jane Doe is actually
their missing cousin, Isabel Sanchez Bernal. They agree to appear on camera
as long as their identities
00:12:16
are protected. (INTERPRETED) My cousin
is Isabel Sanchez Bernal, who's been missing since 2002.
00:12:23
My partner introduced
me to the detectives. I told him about
my cousin, and I asked him how I could
find out if the missing
00:12:30
woman was indeed her. Sergeant Madera showed me
the evidence and everything-- how it happened,
when it happened,
00:12:37
and where the body was found. And because Isabel went
missing around the same time,
00:12:42
I just thought it had to be her. (INTERPRETED) Before
she went missing, Isabel came with us
to the United States
00:12:50
to look for better
opportunities. She hoped to help her
parents and provide a better
00:12:56
life for her young son. Isabel was so happy. Whenever you spoke
to Isabel, she'd
00:13:04
always talked about her son
and how much she loved them. Her family was
everything to her.
00:13:11
NANCY GRACE: The
new witnesses say they had concerns about
Isabel's boyfriend at the time.
00:13:16
VICTIM'S COUSIN 1
(INTERPRETED): We didn't have much contact with
Isabel whenever her boyfriend,
00:13:20
Diego, was around. We sometimes had a bit
of friction between us because we could see that he
didn't treat Isabel very well,
00:13:28
and he kept his distance
from us and our family. Getting to know Diego
was a bit difficult
00:13:33
because he was very reserved,
a very mysterious man. It's like he didn't
like to spend
00:13:38
time socializing with people. Isabel didn't have many friends. The only one she went
out with was him,
00:13:44
and they went
everywhere together. And I mean everywhere. It was alleged that they were
involved in several arguments
00:13:52
almost on a daily basis. There was even some
rumors that she was trying to break up with him.
00:13:58
VICTIM'S COUSIN 1 (INTERPRETED):
She made a mistake when she got involved with Diego.
00:14:01
But otherwise, Isabel really
seemed happy with her life in Mammoth Lakes. But then suddenly,
the day came when
00:14:08
Isabel was never seen again. Isabel told another
cousin that she was going out on a walk with
Diego and to get his hair cut.
00:14:14
But then later that night,
Diego came back to our house without Isabel, and
he said he hadn't
00:14:19
heard from her all that day. VICTIM'S COUSIN 2 (INTERPRETED):
I was in the living room,
00:14:23
and Diego was asking
me if I'd seen Isabel. I found it strange because he
was the last person to see her,
00:14:30
but he didn't seem to
know where she was. Diego supposedly went
to look for Isabel
00:14:36
and then said that
Isabel had moved away and gone to a friend's house. But I knew Isabel didn't
have many friends.
00:14:43
So the next day, I
just went to work. When I got home from work,
I found a note on the stairs
00:14:48
from Isabel. The note states,
"This is Isabel. I just want to let you know
that I left with someone else.
00:14:54
Please do not come
looking for me. I'll be OK." They were really surprised
and didn't really believe
00:15:01
the letter was actually
from her or that she had gone somewhere
rather than something
00:15:05
had just happened to her. VICTIM'S COUSIN 2 (INTERPRETED):
A short time later, me and my family were
visiting my uncle's house.
00:15:12
We saw on the television
that the remains of a woman had been found in the Shady
campsite in Mammoth Lake.
00:15:19
We talked about
it with my uncle, and he even told us he thought
that maybe it was Isabel.
00:15:24
But because of what
was said in the note and that the
woman's remains were said to be of an Asian woman,
we really weren't sure.
00:15:33
I talked about it
with my friends who told me to go to the police. But because in Mexico some
of the police are corrupt,
00:15:40
and also Diego lived
in our neighborhood, how could we report this? When she went over the entire
story with us, at the end,
00:15:48
we looked at each other,
and we knew we had it. We knew this was it. And so because of
that, we moved forward
00:15:55
in collecting DNA from our
informant to be sent off to the Department of Justice.
00:16:02
NANCY GRACE: The
DNA result is not what detectives are expecting. This woman, as it turned
out, was not a DNA match.
00:16:10
She wasn't biologically related. She called herself a
cousin of this woman, but it wasn't a
biological relationship.
00:16:17
It was more a closeness,
a community closeness. Is the Mammoth Lakes
Jane Doe the missing woman
00:16:24
named Isabel Sanchez Bernal? That answer on
"Bloodline Detectives." [SOMBER MUSIC]
00:16:39
NANCY GRACE: Almost
20 years pass since a hiker discovers
skeletal remains of a woman
00:16:45
near Mammoth Lakes, California. It's now 2020. Police finally get a tip. The body may be that
of Isabel Sanchez
00:16:56
Bernal, a woman
originally from Mexico who's been missing since 2003. Now investigators need a family
member to make a DNA match.
00:17:08
CHRIS CALLINAN: So once
we got the statement, or she gave us the circumstances
surrounding her disappearance,
00:17:14
we then tried to figure
out the familial match and learned that her mother,
father, all of her blood
00:17:22
relatives had since passed,
and the only remaining person that anybody was
aware of was a brother
00:17:26
who resided down in Mexico. NANCY GRACE: In early
2021, detectives began tracing the whereabouts
of the brother in Mexico
00:17:35
to obtain his DNA sample. And I told them that we
needed to positively identify the victim as his sister.
00:17:43
My request that I
told him, I advised them that FBI would probably be
contacting him for a DNA test.
00:17:49
NANCY GRACE: That brother in
Mexico cooperates with the FBI. He gives a DNA sample.
00:17:55
Detectives then contact
Othram Labs in Texas to prepare for testing
between the victim's remains
00:18:04
and DNA from the brother. But to do so, Othram
must obtain a brand new sample for analysis.
00:18:14
We were called from the
detectives at Mammoth Lake PD, and they asked if we
would work this case.
00:18:20
They said that they
had heard that we could work with bones that were
difficult to extract DNA from.
00:18:26
They were just
fragments of bones left, so not much DNA left. It's really sad. I mean, clearly this woman was
buried in that shallow grave.
00:18:36
But initially, when
fragments of skull and other skeletal
remains were found, no one knew what had happened.
00:18:43
And Forensic-Grade
Genome Sequencing is absolutely necessary
to start to bring answers.
00:18:53
As word began to spread of
Othram's ability to take even the most challenging bones
and produce profiles,
00:18:59
some of these skeletal
fragments were sent to us. And as we received
them, they went
00:19:05
through our typical
process, chain of custody, specialized skeletal
remains room.
00:19:09
And we were able to, from
these little fragments, pull together enough DNA
to do something with it.
00:19:16
And so we called back the
investigator and said, in fact, I do think we have enough DNA
to make a difference here.
00:19:22
To be successful,
forensic science is often the sum of many parts,
and that is the case here.
00:19:29
The team at Othram Labs
successfully creates a good quality DNA sample. It builds on the
successful phenotype
00:19:39
test produced by Parabon
NanoLabs back in 2020. Before Othram continues
with kinship testing,
00:19:47
they subjected to
biogeographical testing to reconfirm
Parabon's prediction. DAVID MITTELMAN: Some folks
use anthropological techniques.
00:19:57
Anthropological techniques
can give you some insight, but they're based
on very few markers.
00:20:03
It may be tens of markers
that you're looking at. And they're generally
trained on complete skeletons
00:20:08
or complete skulls. And so in a lot of
these forensic cases, you just don't
have the precision
00:20:14
with that amount of information
to really know who someone is. And you'll either end up
sometimes misassigning,
00:20:20
if you overinterpret the
results, the ancestry. And so the solution
to that problem
00:20:26
is to use more information. And in doing that, we
came to the conclusion that this person
likely was from Mexico.
00:20:35
And so this cleared
up some ambiguity in the initial analysis
of who she might have been
00:20:40
or where she was from. KRISTEN MITTELMAN: Based on
the detailed biogeographical analysis that we were able
to do using these hundreds
00:20:48
and hundreds of thousands
of markers on this profile, they were able to
find a possible match
00:20:57
as to who this victim
might be in the area. And when they did
that, they asked if we would be willing
to do the kinship
00:21:04
analysis between this possible
family member and the DNA that was found at
the crime scene.
00:21:13
And this kinship
technique allows us to very quickly,
and very securely, measure the relatedness
between two people.
00:21:19
And this becomes
another data point. That one thing on its own--
that one test on its own--
00:21:23
doesn't guarantee an identity. But that plus the genealogical
work, plus the STR work, all
00:21:28
of this together tells us
that this is a person that is a contributor of that DNA.
00:21:33
The analysis showed that
this, indeed, was her brother. And we were able to
conclusively say that this
00:21:40
was Isabel Bernal Sanchez. NANCY GRACE: The match confirms
the remains are, in fact,
00:21:46
those of Isabel Sanchez Bernal. Detectives now must break
the news to Isabel's family.
00:21:56
I called him a day before
just to let him know, hey, we have some
information that we want
00:22:00
to share with you, the family. You guys are more than
welcome to come in. And we invited the family.
00:22:06
The next day they showed up. Once they arrived, we
told him, you know, we had positively identified
the Jane Doe as Isabel Bernal.
00:22:18
And that's when-- that's
when we started looking into more into
Diego, now that we
00:22:22
had a positive identification. (INTERPRETED) When I
found out what happened, I had a lot of mixed
feelings because I
00:22:29
wanted to keep in mind that
my cousin was still alive. And when I found out
that she was dead,
00:22:36
everything came crashing down. It was like time
had gone backwards. We'll never understand why.
00:22:42
NANCY GRACE: Attention now
focuses on the last person to see Isabel Sanchez
Bernal alive--
00:22:49
her then boyfriend,
Diego Hernandez Antonio. CHRIS CALLINAN: So as
the years had gone by--
00:22:56
nobody had still
heard from Isabel-- there was these rumors
or conversations amongst the community members.
00:23:02
There had been several
incidents where friends of Diego's had
said, you know, hey, I think
00:23:07
I saw Isabel at a local store. Diego laughed and said,
that's not possible. The friend said,
I don't-- what do
00:23:14
you mean that's not possible? I think I saw her. And he just responded
that's-- no, you didn't.
00:23:19
You couldn't have seen her. That's impossible. And that friend
said that he found
00:23:23
that statement strange, as
though why are you telling me that's impossible? I think I did see her.
00:23:28
He was part of a band. And so after various
different band events, they would be drinking,
and they would--
00:23:34
the Isabel thing would come up. You know, hey, whatever
happened to Isabel? You know, that's just so
strange that she left.
00:23:40
At that point, it was
reported that there were several incidents where
he would become emotional.
00:23:45
He would make statements to
the effect that, you know, what's done is done. And, again, they
reported that as strange
00:23:51
because they found that that
was a weird statement to make. If she ran off
with a guy, why are
00:23:56
you sounding as though it's a-- it's a foregone
conclusion, and you know, she's otherwise never
to be seen again?
00:24:04
Once we get this
information, we then start to understand
that Diego possibly does have something to do
with Isabel's disappearance.
00:24:14
At that point, we start
investigating Diego. His last girlfriend that he
had, who reported a few months--
00:24:22
even a few months later,
before this whole investigation started unraveling, that she had
been involved in a very abusive
00:24:28
relationship with Diego. So that's what we started
finding out about Diego. We started to kind of follow him
around, kind of set boundaries
00:24:36
and where he was
living, where he was going, what
time he was working, who he was working with.
00:24:40
We started formulating a plan
that we were-- the only way to be able to talk to him
without him either running away
00:24:47
from town, either to a different
state or back to Mexico, is would be by placing
him under arrest.
00:24:52
They followed him. He worked at Vons as
a stocking employee. And they decided
that they were going
00:25:01
to try and find a
good cause to arrest him and start questioning him. So they got what's known
as a Ramey warrant.
00:25:12
Before any charges are
brought, they had a warrant to detain him and question him.
00:25:19
When it came
time to arrest him, I was asked to assist because
I speak Spanish fluently,
00:25:26
and there being so many
individuals who only speak Spanish involved in this case.
00:25:31
I was asked to
assist in the case. And to my surprise, when
it came time to arrest him,
00:25:36
I was asked to put
the handcuffs on. He asked what this
was all about. And I recalled replying
something to the effect of,
00:25:45
you know what this is about. And he kind of stopped talking. So maybe he thought he got
away, but I think it was
00:25:55
still in the back of his mind. I think it was going to
be in the back of his mind
00:25:58
for the rest of his life. Mammoth Lakes
detectives prepare to question Diego Hernandez
Antonio two decades
00:26:07
after Isabel's disappearance. We find out what happens next
on "Bloodline Detectives."
00:26:22
NANCY GRACE: Mammoth
Lakes, California, 2021. 18 long years have passed since
the discovery of a woman's
00:26:30
remains in a shallow grave. Thanks to investigative
genetic genealogy, she's finally identified.
00:26:38
Her name? Isabel Sanchez Bernal. She came to America from Mexico
in search of a better life.
00:26:48
Now police prepare to
question the last person to see Isabel alive-- her boyfriend, Diego
Hernandez Antonio.
00:26:58
Once he was arrested,
he was transported to the Mono County Jail,
where I was waiting,
00:27:04
along with investigator-- DEA investigators
and also homicide investigators from the Riverside
County Sheriff's Office.
00:27:11
We had planted a few
confidential informants inside the jail. Once inside the jail we
placed Diego inside the jail
00:27:20
with these confidential
informants. These confidential informants
then began speaking to him,
00:27:23
kind of asking him questions,
see what kind of information he would be willing to give up.
00:27:27
He played like he didn't know
anything why he was there. He played like he
was very confused
00:27:32
of the whole situation. He was very disconnected. He was-- at first,
he was, I don't know.
00:27:37
I don't know who that is. I showed him pictures of Isabel
and pictures of the gravesite,
00:27:43
and immediately he disconnected. I don't know who that is. I've never seen that
person in my life.
00:27:48
[SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH] No. [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:28:36
[SPEAKING SPANISH] Initially he
acted like, Isabel? Isabel? Doesn't ring a
bell, essentially.
00:28:56
Like, he didn't know her. He wanted to distance himself. After more questioning,
he acknowledged
00:29:03
that he knew who she was. And he started telling
a series of changing, evolving scenarios
of what happened.
00:29:11
[SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:32:15
I knew that his
story was false. It wasn't-- it wasn't true. There was more to the story
that he was telling us.
00:32:21
I thought it was ridiculous
because this hike is not an easy hike. It's a very strenuous hike and.
00:32:27
Just to go build a
rope swing, especially in the mountains, where you
know, I'm sure back in the day,
00:32:31
in 2002, 2003, his
apartment was filled with trees where they could
have built this rope swing.
00:32:38
So the fact that they actually
travel all the way up, built this rope swing on
the top of the hill,
00:32:43
and then him pushing her so
hard to the point where she fell backwards and hit
her head, I just--
00:32:48
I just thought the whole
story was ridiculous. [SPEAKING SPANISH] You know what-- do you know
what is going to save you?
00:32:59
[SPEAKING SPANISH] The truth, being
remorseful-- do you know you haven't cried once?
00:33:09
[SPEAKING SPANISH] You haven't cried once. [SPEAKING SPANISH] Not once. [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:33:20
We just showed you the skull. [SPEAKING SPANISH] No. No, no, no. [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:33:29
We just showed you
where your girlfriend is for the first time in 18 years. [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:33:35
And you haven't even
so much as even once-- [SPEAKING SPANISH] [SPEAKING SPANISH]
00:33:45
[SPEAKING SPANISH] He's a sociopath. He's narcissistic. He's very manipulative. He likes to control people.
00:33:57
He likes to control the mind. He was able to live with
it for almost 20 years. I'm sure he has that type of
personality, where he could--
00:34:06
he probably could have
killed other people, and we wouldn't know about it. NANCY GRACE: Could the
couple at the visitor center
00:34:12
be Diego Hernandez Antonio
and Isabel Sanchez Bernal? If it is them, what is
Diego's motive for murder?
00:34:23
I don't think there was a
specific motive to kill her. I think there was a
specific motive to control
00:34:31
her, to dominate her. And he did that through-- through violence. We saw it years
after the killing,
00:34:40
that he was doing
that to other women. And he hadn't changed. So I don't know that he woke
up in the morning and said,
00:34:49
I need to kill her. A man and a woman can get
very heated if one of them has a particularly violent
temper and strength.
00:34:59
But it's not that hard to
cause really fatal injuries to somebody if you are enraged.
00:35:06
The thing that I would like
to know about that, though, is were those
really knife wounds?
00:35:12
Was there a blow to the
head and knife wounds? We don't know that and
probably never will know that.
00:35:19
I don't think Diego will ever
tell us what really happened. While Diego Hernandez
Antonio sits in jail,
00:35:27
investigators watch and listen. That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." NANCY GRACE: Mammoth
Lakes, California, 2021.
00:35:43
Investigators have
arrested a suspect in the 18-year-old murder
of Isabel Sanchez Bernal.
00:35:51
It's her ex-boyfriend,
Diego Hernandez Antonio. The evidence is strong. While Diego sits in jail,
detectives hope he'll break.
00:36:03
Listening to those jail
calls, we found out that he-- he was accepting whatever
the jail or whatever
00:36:09
the court system was offering. He pleads to murder,
and then he's sentenced to I
believe is 11 years
00:36:16
in prison with an actual
deportation after that. NANCY GRACE: The case is
finally closed April 2022,
00:36:23
when Diego Hernandez Antonio
is convicted, not of murder, but of a lesser charge--
00:36:30
voluntary manslaughter. He's sentenced to just
11 years behind bars. Some family members and
people close to the case
00:36:40
think this sentence
is much too lenient. 11 years? It's like, if you kill
somebody, take their life,
00:36:51
and then hide their
body, and lie about it-- if it were my sister,
daughter, cousin,
00:37:00
it would be a punch
in my stomach. 11 years? Is that what her
life was, you know?
00:37:06
It just doesn't seem that
that's justice for Isabel. VICTIM'S COUSIN 1 (INTERPRETED):
It didn't seem fair to me
00:37:11
that he got 11
years because he'd gone on with his normal
life all this time. He took the life
of a person who had
00:37:18
dreams, who came to this
country for a better life. I don't know why he did it. And the truth is that it
doesn't seem fair to me.
00:37:25
He was given that sentence,
but after 11 years, he'll be free and
go on with his life.
00:37:30
But my cousin won't
get that chance. She's going to rest
in peace, and we know what happened
to her, which was
00:37:36
the only thing we ever wanted to
know, that it was actually her. VICTIM'S COUSIN 2
(INTERPRETED): Isabel's son
00:37:41
was cut off from having a
better life and a better future. But as I say, nothing
is going to change it.
00:37:49
They did give him
that short sentence. Well, if they feel that's what
he deserved, well that's fine.
00:37:57
We don't want to have that
feeling of resentment, of anger, of hatred because
it's not healthy for us.
00:38:05
So we leave it to God. And the only thing we
know is that God forgives. We have to get through
this and survive.
00:38:13
[BITTERSWEET MUSIC] I think for some family
members more than others, they'll never
forget about Isabel,
00:38:19
especially she still has a
brother who's alive in Mexico. He'll never forget about
her, I don't think.
00:38:25
Isabel's son, who
remains in Mexico, will never forget about what
exactly happened to his mom.
00:38:32
It's just difficult, I
think, something like this. How can you forget
something of this magnitude
00:38:38
as a family member? And this was one of those
cases where I started with the Mammoth Lakes
police department,
00:38:44
and this was a big
case at the time. And I feel so grateful
to just be sought out
00:38:51
and be a part of this
because I know that it means a lot to this community. NANCY GRACE: The
Mammoth Lakes community
00:38:59
is also indebted to scientists
who gave the victim her name-- Isabel Sanchez Bernal.
00:39:09
We develop a very
close relationship with the investigators
we work with, and they're very
passionate about the case.
00:39:14
We're very passionate
about our role, and so we do develop kind
of a close relationship.
00:39:20
It's exciting to do that. We enjoy working the cases. But it's even more enjoyable
to work a case when there's
00:39:25
a team of other folks that are
equally passionate and fired up about following up
on leads and getting
00:39:30
to that eventual answer. You know, making sure that
everyone has access to the best
00:39:35
technology for their case,
and it's important to us that the folks at the most
remote parts of the US
00:39:41
that may not have
their own laboratory or access to a laboratory
get the same service
00:39:46
that you would get at a state
lab or at a federal agency. And so we work really
hard to make sure
00:39:52
that we can evenly distribute
this technology to everyone for everyone's benefit.
00:39:57
Is there such a
thing as justice? Yes and no. It's not perfect. It's hard to really achieve.
00:40:04
It's subjective to
how you measure it. There's no justice for Isabel's
son, who grew up without a mom.
00:40:11
There is no justice for
Isabel, in that she suffered, and she lost her life. Was justice done in this case?
00:40:22
Not completely. It's imperfect. NANCY GRACE: For 18 years,
Isabel Sanchez Bernal
00:40:30
remained a Jane Doe without
a name, without an identity, without a family to
love and to be loved by.
00:40:40
The amazing teamwork
between two countries, two incredible forensic
laboratories, and two
00:40:48
investigative
agencies finally made her someone who was recognized
with a place in her community.
00:40:57
I'm Nancy Grace. Thanks for joining us here
on "Bloodline Detectives." [DRAMATIC NOTES]
00:41:11
[THEME MUSIC]