00:00:01
[INTENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE
(VOICEOVER): Huntington Beach, California, 1968-- schoolboys stumble across what
they believe is a scarecrow.
00:00:20
The reality is far worse. JOAN RENNER: When the
boys came on this, it was a horrific scene.
00:00:28
She had died an awful death. EARL ROBITAILLE: It was violent. She had bruises
all about her face.
00:00:33
Her clothing was
in total disarray. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
It's a double mystery
00:00:38
about an unidentified murder
victim and her unknown killer, a mystery that takes
52 long years to solve.
00:00:49
DIANE BAUGHMAN: We knew
that this was probably going to be solved using DNA. NANCY GRACE
(VOICEOVER): Finally,
00:00:55
a remarkable
breakthrough-- a new tool that's unlocking seemingly
impossible cases,
00:01:02
investigative genetic genealogy. DAVID DIERKING: I felt that
this is really, really special.
00:01:10
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
This is the story of how one brutal criminal hid
in the shadows for years
00:01:18
and ultimately discovers there
is no escaping the science of his own family's DNA.
00:01:25
I'm Nancy Grace, and this
is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC] Huntington Beach on California's
beautiful Pacific Coast
00:01:59
has long been a hangout for
surfers and celebrities alike. Huntington beach in the
late '60s was a typical
00:02:07
Southern California beach town. There wasn't much crime there. It was mostly oil derricks.
00:02:12
A lot of oil was
there, and it was just a scruffy little beach town. But it had character,
and it had soul.
00:02:24
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
March 14, 1968-- this beach town is
shaken by a discovery
00:02:30
at one of those oil fields. EARL ROBITAILLE:
There's a couple young guys, were on their way to
school, and they saw the body--
00:02:39
went and notified somebody who
called the fire department. Fire department responded,
thinking it was somebody
00:02:46
that was sick or injured. And once they discovered what
they had, they notified the PD.
00:02:53
DAVID DIERKING:
The first officer that responded for
the police department was officer Tom Quick.
00:03:00
He arrived at the
scene at about 4:10 PM. He saw the deceased face down
in this drainage ditch that
00:03:10
was about 450 feet south
of Yorktown, in the area of Yorktown and Newland. She had this jacket which was
an imitation leather jacket.
00:03:24
She was wearing a
flowered blouse that had two ripped off buttons. She had a ripped open bra.
00:03:33
She had purple
capri pants, and she had black loafered shoes on. And on her left ring finger,
she had a birth stone.
00:03:44
It was a square stone,
and it was aquamarine or light blue in color. She was described as
a female Caucasian
00:03:54
or Hispanic, 20 to 30 years old. EARL ROBITAILLE:
At the time, I was a detective bureau commander.
00:04:02
The detectives called in and
let me know what was going on. And that's when I made
the pass out there.
00:04:09
Her throat slashed open. She had bruises
all about her face. Her clothing was
in total disarray.
00:04:18
DAVID DIERKING:
There were tire marks that were clearly visible. And they went onto the
field from Yorktown,
00:04:27
and they made a complete circle. And it was apparent
that the car stopped near the location of where
the Jane Doe was found.
00:04:38
And it was apparent
by the drag marks that she was pulled or
dragged from that passenger
00:04:44
side of that car down to the
location where she was at. She had been the victim
of a violent assault.
00:04:52
ANTHONY PHAM: There were
quite a few items of evidence. One that actually jumps out
is a cigarette butt that
00:04:58
was right next to the body. At that time, DNA wasn't
even on the radar. So the fact that
officers at that time
00:05:06
decided to collect that
evidence, that was huge. And it would
obviously play a role
00:05:10
later in the investigation. JOAN RENNER: At the
time in '68, they were looking for blood
evidence because you
00:05:17
could prove blood type. But they were very careful
about collecting evidence. They collected
anything that looked
00:05:26
like it could have been
dropped by the killer, it could belong to the victim. They tagged and
bagged everything
00:05:33
because they were very thorough
in their investigation. DAVID DIERKING: They located
one of the torn blouse buttons.
00:05:40
They took soil and dirt samples. They made plaster castings
of the tire tread marks
00:05:51
and what they
believed to be knee impressions near the Jane Doe. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Investigators
00:06:00
have no witnesses and very, very
little crime scene evidence. They hope an autopsy can
advance their investigation.
00:06:10
ANTHONY PHAM: After the
coroner conducted the autopsy, the manner of death was,
she basically bled to death
00:06:18
and bled out. There was seminal fluid in the
pubic region of the victim. EARL ROBITAILLE: One
of our sketch artists
00:06:30
had made a sketch from the body
itself at the coroner's office. And that was circulated.
00:06:37
And many people called in
saying they thought they had seen her with somebody else that
they knew, and they had a name.
00:06:43
And that happened a number
of times, a number of times. And a lot of people are
just trying to be helpful.
00:06:48
DAVID DIERKING: She
was kept at the morgue because she was not identified. She was considered a Jane
Doe for over 10 months.
00:06:56
And it was estimated that nearly
3,000 people viewed her body. And no identification was made.
00:07:04
JOAN RENNER: They buried
Jane Doe in an unmarked grave in Newport Beach. And the reason for that
is because they wanted
00:07:11
to be able to dig her up if
they had to at some point, if there was some
evidence that they
00:07:17
could match to her, anything. So they're always thinking
to the future a little bit.
00:07:23
One thing about detectives,
they always sort of have one eye toward the future. What will that future
hold for investigators?
00:07:32
We find out next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE MUSIC]
00:07:46
Huntington Beach,
California, 1968-- the scene of a brutal
murder, the body of a mutilated,
unknown female victim,
00:07:56
discovered by children near
one of the town's oil wells. EARL ROBITAILLE:
They went out almost
00:08:04
two or three miles in every
direction, went door to door. We put 20 to 30 guys on
the street immediately,
00:08:11
canvassing all the houses,
stopping all the passing cars to see at what time of day
they passed through that area.
00:08:18
If it was a regular
thing, that they might have been in the area at
the time and seen something.
00:08:24
They did a tremendous,
intense investigation. Over 1,100 residences
were contacted.
00:08:32
In addition, every beer
bar, cocktail lounge, business establishment in
the city of Huntington Beach
00:08:39
was contacted. An excess of 225
personal contacts were made with individuals who
were either suspects or persons
00:08:48
who possibly had information. All efforts to
identify the victim, either through
fingerprints, dental charts,
00:08:56
or the one piece of available
jewelry that is identifiable, have all been met
with negative results,
00:09:03
indicating the possibility
that the victim is completely unknown in this area and may
have been brought to this area
00:09:09
from some distant point. And that is reflective
of the efforts that continued throughout the years.
00:09:16
So they worked every
single lead in an effort to identify her in the suspect. JOAN RENNER: So that leaves
them with a limited avenue
00:09:26
for their investigation. They have to do
the best they can. They can bring in people.
00:09:31
Because it was a
sexual assault, they can bring in people,
known sex offenders, and question them, find out
where they were, if they could
00:09:38
have committed this
homicide, that kind of thing, but with very little evidence,
and no identification of her.
00:09:47
They've got a huge problem
with their investigation. EARL ROBITAILLE: A cold
case is a case that's
00:09:54
reached a dead end,
where you have no more information to work
on, no more suspects
00:09:59
to find and interrogate. There is a point in time
when you say you've got to go to the cold case guys.
00:10:06
And you have specialty
investigators that work nothing but cold cases. And they're usually the
bulldog investigative type,
00:10:15
the guys that never give up. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Brand-new scientific advances
00:10:21
are helping transform
investigators into cold case detectives. EARL ROBITAILLE: The
scientific community
00:10:29
was stepping in and helping. As time goes by, the
technology improves. And that's exactly
what happened here.
00:10:39
ANTHONY PHAM: Back in
2001, Detective Mack submitted evidence
from the investigation
00:10:46
to the Orange County Crime Lab. They were able to come
up with a DNA profile. And at that time, they plugged
it into the numerous databases
00:10:55
that we have. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Of
these, the single largest emerging DNA database is CODIS.
00:11:03
CODIS is the Combined
DNA Index System. It is operated by the FBI, and
it's a network of local state
00:11:09
and national DNA databases. It consists of DNA profiles from
convicted offenders, arrestees,
00:11:15
crime scene evidence
samples, which are known as forensic unknowns. JOAN RENNER: The limitation
is that not everyone
00:11:23
enters the information. The database is only as
good as the information entered into it.
00:11:29
So it's not like when you
watch crime shows on TV, and they bring up this
wonderful color screen
00:11:35
and they do a few keystrokes and
they've suddenly got the face of a killer in front of them.
00:11:39
It doesn't work like that. NANCY GRACE
(VOICEOVER): By 2001, DNA is becoming an increasingly
powerful investigative tool.
00:11:50
The suspect whose DNA
profile is found on CODIS matches the partial
single source
00:11:57
male DNA profile
from the cigarette butt, found at the crime scene. In 2001, there was a single
source DNA suspect profile
00:12:09
located from seminal
fluid from the swab that was taken from
her body, and also from the cigarette butt.
00:12:17
That profile was uploaded
into CODIS in 2001, and there's never been a hit. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Then the cold case team
00:12:26
tries a new approach,
a familial DNA test of the killer's bodily fluids. The California Department
of Justice Laboratory
00:12:36
conducts familial searching
against the state DNA index. And it's a step that's taken
after all investigative leads
00:12:44
have been exhausted, and
there are no hits in CODIS. So what you ideally want
to do is find a relative
00:12:52
on your paternal side. So you have your unknown. You want to find a paternal
and a maternal relative--
00:13:00
ideally, hopefully,
close, because it's much easier to solve. When you get to third,
fourth, fifth cousins,
00:13:06
it's really hard. But once you've found those
matches that are related to your unknown, then you need
to build back to what's called
00:13:17
a most recent common ancestor. The descendants of that
most recent common ancestor
00:13:22
then is where your
suspect pool is. ANNA DADHANIA:
Familial searching was conducted in this case
on the suspect profile
00:13:27
at least four times against
the Cal DOJ database. However we had no good leads
with familial searching.
00:13:34
NANCY GRACE
(VOICEOVER): Years pass. And cold case detectives see the
remarkable story of the Golden
00:13:41
State Killer, who's
finally caught by investigative
genetic genealogy. Could this technique be applied
to the Huntington Beach Killer?
00:13:53
DAVID DIERKING: As they watched
and participated in this trial, they saw the value in that he
would have never been caught
00:14:03
had not IGG or
FGG been involved. They realized the value of
having a tool like that.
00:14:11
And the Orange
County DA's office has always been on the forefront
of using whatever new DNA
00:14:18
tool that might be out there
to solve violent crimes and to identify people that
have not been identified.
00:14:27
DIANE BAUGHMAN: Forensic
investigative genetic genealogy is an amazing thing
that has done so much
00:14:33
for the world of crime solving. And it's basically-- what we're
doing is looking at that DNA.
00:14:40
And instead of putting it
into the system where we have the criminals, we're putting
it into public systems where
00:14:49
people agree to put their DNA. And that opens up a whole new
world of amount of connects
00:14:55
that we can have to that DNA. And in this case, we did it
with both our suspect's DNA
00:15:02
and our Jane Doe. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Investigators call in a specialist,
Dr. Colleen Fitzpatrick,
00:15:10
a world-renowned
forensic genealogist with an incredible track
record in cracking cold cases.
00:15:19
ANTHONY PHAM: She was able
to work with CAP Sergeant Dierking, and they were able
to spend a significant amount
00:15:26
of time building a family tree. There wasn't enough
material to send out for SNP
00:15:35
testing regarding the Jane Doe. DIANE BAUGHMAN: Once
investigative genetic genealogy
00:15:42
came around, we had a
list of different cases. Most of them were ones that we
had done the familial searching
00:15:49
on that didn't have matches. And now it was an opportunity
to open it with IGG. And as long as
there was DNA still
00:15:57
that we could achieve and get
the right DNA that we needed, we were able to do that.
00:16:03
And luckily we could
exhume her body and get even better
DNA than they had with the other samples.
00:16:11
DAVID DIERKING:
In April of 2019, Jane Doe's body was exhumed. After they exhumed
the body, they still
00:16:19
couldn't get a full
profile from her remains. So they actually sent a
bone of hers, a femur,
00:16:25
to the International
Commission on Missing Persons Lab in the Netherlands. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
While investigators
00:16:33
wait for results
to come back, they focus on the suspect's DNA. DAVID DIERKING: Once the profile
is obtained, it's uploaded.
00:16:44
The DA's office only uses law
enforcement forensic databases that allow us to enter it
into their public database
00:16:59
as a law enforcement sample. And it is only compared
against those people that have opted in to law
enforcement comparisons.
00:17:08
Once that comparison is made,
a match list is provided. And then the family
trees are then worked.
00:17:18
ANNA DADHANIA: She went
to the IGG war room and wrote down the surnames
of all the great-grandparents
00:17:23
from the family trees
that we had built. There were two sides
that we had focused on,
00:17:28
so all the surnames from
the great-grandparents and any of their descendants
were written down.
00:17:33
At that point, when we were
analyzing those two lists, we noticed that
there was a marriage
00:17:38
between the last
name on one list and the last name
of another list. And that last name was also in
our Y chromosome surname list.
00:17:48
And that last name was Chrisco. After over half a
century, investigators have a crucial lead and
a potential family name--
00:17:58
Chrisco. Can they finally identify
the Huntington Beach Killer? That's next on
Bloodline Detectives.
00:18:08
[INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE MUSIC] Huntington Beach,
California, 2020--
00:18:20
52 years since the discovery of
a mutilated lady murder victim. Both the victim and her
killer remain unidentified.
00:18:30
But now investigative
genetic genealogists can name four brothers,
one of which they believe
00:18:38
is the killer. ANNA DADHANIA: I
remember when we first suspected the brothers. We immediately
went down the hall
00:18:45
and looked for
investigator Dierking, but he was nowhere to be found. He just happened to
be in court that day.
00:18:50
So I immediately texted him,
hot lead, exclamation point. And we told him the
four brothers that we
00:18:57
suspected for this case. This was the first
time he was seeing investigative genetic genealogy
playing out, so he wasn't sure.
00:19:06
I was not a believer
at this time in IGG, to be very honest with you. In looking at the
four sons, they
00:19:14
were all in their 20s in 1968. Three of the four were deceased. Not only were they deceased,
they had been cremated.
00:19:24
There was one living son, and he
very well could be the suspect. ANNA DADHANIA: When we first
were able to connect the family
00:19:33
trees that led to
these four brothers, it was our first time
doing IGG on a case.
00:19:39
So we weren't even sure,
were we on the right track? Everything looked
like it connected.
00:19:46
DAVID DIERKING: We
called Huntington Beach, and we briefed them on
what the tree showed
00:19:51
and the belief that one of
these four boys was the killer. And they only had
one living son.
00:19:57
And Huntington Beach
Police Department elected to immediately
seek out evidence that
00:20:02
would either prove
him, the living son, to be the suspect or not. They drove hundreds of miles,
collected discarded trash
00:20:12
items, which were then
immediately provided to our office, which
has a rapid instrument,
00:20:19
and profiles were obtained. And I was called at 3:00 in
the morning from my supervisor
00:20:27
who said, we got good DNA
profiles from the items. He's not the suspect. Then my heart went down.
00:20:36
And he goes, but
he is the brother. It was at that moment that I go,
wow, this is pretty incredible.
00:20:45
To think, after all these years,
that this actually works-- that was the first real
time that I felt that this
00:20:57
is really, really special. It is a heart-stopping moment
for "Bloodline Detectives."
00:21:03
Their surviving Chrisco
brother is innocent. But investigators are positive
one of his three dead brothers
00:21:12
is a killer and a rapist. ANNA DADHANIA: We knew that
we were in the right family.
00:21:17
And the genetic genealogy
led us to the right family, and we just have to figure
out which of the other three
00:21:23
brothers could be our suspect. We were able to obtain
an autopsy sample. It was not a match.
00:21:29
And the other brother was
in the military at the time, so he was not in the area.
00:21:37
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Which leaves just one brother, Johnny Chrisco. DIANE BAUGHMAN: Johnny Chrisco
had a lot of things that
00:21:45
pointed in his direction-- his
history being somewhat violent, things like that that
led us in his direction.
00:21:52
Unfortunately he had
no living children. When he died, he was cremated,
and there was no autopsy done.
00:22:01
So in order to identify him, one
of the thoughts that I had is, as a cancer survivor
myself, I saw
00:22:10
that he had died, in part at
least, to having lung cancer. And if someone is
diagnosed with cancer,
00:22:18
they have to have had a biopsy. So in that, I thought,
well, there's got to be biopsy tissue somewhere.
00:22:25
And I ran into a
lot of brick walls. I left a lot of messages. I got transferred a lot.
00:22:31
And there wasn't much
that was coming out of it. I sent an official
letter, and I received
00:22:36
back a notice of,
sorry, you can't have what you're asking for. And I thought I might be dead
in the water at that point.
00:22:44
However, a few days later, some
records showed up in the mail. So one of my phone calls
must have helped in some way.
00:22:53
And with those records,
I was able to see that he did at least have a biopsy. I located the fact that the
hospital has a contract lab.
00:23:03
So I called again
a number of places and found a way into that lab,
where I was actually talking
00:23:10
to a person who
was inside the lab, and was actually very
surprised that I got to her.
00:23:16
How did you even get here? I said, I don't know. I just made this call
and I got hold of you.
00:23:20
Here's what I need. She did tell me that if
they had any records, they couldn't look
them up by name
00:23:26
or anything about the patient. All they had were
numbers, and I'd have to provide her a number.
00:23:32
She also told me that if
it was a biopsy tissue, it was only kept for 10 years. When I saw that he had
the biopsy in 2007,
00:23:41
again I thought we
might be out of luck because we were
past that 10 years. Luckily, once we found a
number to provide to her
00:23:50
and had her look it up, she was
able to tell us that they were a little behind on
destroying their tissues,
00:23:56
and they still had that one. And just in two days we
had it in our office. And I think it was about
10 days for our lab
00:24:05
to get through the processing
and actually tell us for sure that the DNA from that biopsy
matched our killer, Johnny
00:24:14
Monroe Chrisco. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
So, what more do we know about Johnny Chrisco?
00:24:20
Johnny Chrisco was-- I think he was just bad pretty
much right from the beginning.
00:24:25
I'm not sure why. Sometimes you just don't know. He was involved in a
statutory rape case at 17.
00:24:31
He seems not to have gotten
much better after that. He went into the army. And I suspect that he went
into the army-- especially
00:24:39
in those days, in the '60s-- a judge probably said,
you know what, Johnny? You're going to be in a
whole world of trouble.
00:24:47
I suggest maybe you go into
the service, make a man of you kind of thing. Because that happened a lot.
00:24:53
You were given that
choice if you were a guy-- army, jail. He moved around. He married three times.
00:25:00
He had two children, both
of whom predeceased him. DAVID DIERKING: His first
son was born in 1961.
00:25:07
His second son was born
in 1962 in North Carolina and died just 20 days later-- very suspicious circumstances,
as we look back.
00:25:17
It was due to a gastric
infection and rupture. The military, rather than
deal with the mother's claim
00:25:27
that he had killed the baby-- and their own psychological
evaluation turned up all kinds of negative stuff.
00:25:39
JOAN RENNER: He
failed miserably. He was determined to be somebody
who was very aggressive,
00:25:47
someone who felt the
world was against him. He had all these issues. And curiously or not,
the same mental state,
00:25:57
the same characteristics,
are similar to a rapist. They share a lot of those
same characteristics.
00:26:05
So they just gave him a
discharge and got him out. Which is a shame
because, you know,
00:26:10
later on, had that
conviction taken place, had we been able to put a
few of those pieces together
00:26:18
and identified him as
that kind of individual, there might have been a
speedier conclusion to the case.
00:26:25
He died of throat
cancer, which I thought was kind of appropriate. Almost as good as a
regular death sentence.
00:26:31
But you know, if there
is justice in this world, maybe that was his. It sounds like a
terrible way to go.
00:26:38
I think it was fitting because
he slit Jane Doe's throat, and his own throat
failed him with cancer.
00:26:47
I don't know if people
believe in karma or what, but I think sometimes
you commit a bad act,
00:26:54
and it comes back at
you a thousand-fold. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
The identification
00:27:01
of Johnny Chrisco is a
remarkable breakthrough. But a central piece of the
case is still missing--
00:27:08
who's the victim? We find out next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE STINGER]
00:27:21
[INTENSE MUSIC] Huntington Beach,
California, 2020-- detectives now have the
name of a killer, a man who
00:27:32
they believe killed a
still unidentified lady murder victim, 1968. She was mutilated
and sex-assaulted
00:27:44
near an oil field. 52 years later, investigative
genetic genealogists finally name her
killer, Johnny Chrisco.
00:27:55
But Chrisco died of
cancer five years before. Now, bloodline
detectives try their best
00:28:03
to identify the
unidentified female victim they call Jane Doe. DAVID DIERKING: We had
identified Johnny Chrisco.
00:28:15
But obviously the focus now
was to put a name to Jane Doe. And through the
investigation, we
00:28:21
were not able to identify her
through anything that we had learned about Johnny Chrisco.
00:28:29
So there was a request for
the Orange County Crime Lab to do DNA testing again on
the victim's bloody clothing.
00:28:37
And fortunately this
resulted in a DNA profile that we could say was
hers because it was
00:28:44
consistent with the
partial profile that had been obtained from DOJ. So with that, we
had enough material
00:28:53
to send out to do SNP testing. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
S-N-P, or "snip" testing,
00:28:58
is a recent forensic technique
that allows investigators to identify people
with common ancestors,
00:29:06
using biological markers
found in their DNA. We put her DNA
into those systems that we used and found
connections and worked trees.
00:29:20
So we're just pulling all sorts
of relatives with all sorts of connections and
trying to find a place
00:29:27
where this person might fit. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The
hunt for Jane Doe's identity
00:29:33
is led by Dr.
Colleen Fitzpatrick, with the help of
Orange County District attorney's investigators.
00:29:40
Fitzpatrick is a forensic
genealogist who specializes in cracking cold cases. DAVID DIERKING: I
received a call from her.
00:29:50
She suggested-- she said,
we've reached the point in our investigation
that we need to reach out
00:29:58
to an extended family member. At that time, Colleen
also predicted that Jane Doe was
from the East Coast,
00:30:06
and specifically
mentioned Maine. She had identified a gentleman
by the name of Steve Sabo
00:30:13
that she could tell based
on the public databases that he was quite interested
in building family trees,
00:30:20
and he was loosely connected. So we called Steve Sabo. I introduced her, and
for the next two hours
00:30:27
talked about family. The very next day I received
a call from Colleen, and she had received a 2016
obituary for a distant family
00:30:40
member from Steve Sabo
for a Constance Saucier, who passed away in Maine. JOAN RENNER: There
was an obituary that
00:30:49
talked about the passing
of a whole group of them, and a final little mention about
Jane Doe, who had disappeared.
00:31:01
DAVID DIERKING: And
in the obituary, it made a reference
to a missing sister since 1970 named Anita Piteau.
00:31:12
And I have to admit, I
was rather skeptical, even though it
sounded promising-- 1970 was not the date that
we were really looking for.
00:31:21
It was 1968. And so late at night,
we called several what we believe to be family
members of Anita and Constance.
00:31:32
And after making the
second round of calls, I believe it was
after 10 o'clock their time, we spoke to Ann
Lavoie Piteau, and explained--
00:31:45
you know, asked about
her missing sister. And she said, oh,
it wasn't 1970. It was 1968.
00:31:51
And we've been looking
for her ever since. And she said the last contact
we actually had from her
00:31:57
was in February of 1968
when she sent a letter. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
While investigators believe
00:32:07
Jane Doe may be Anita Piteau,
missing from Maine since 1968, they still need DNA
samples from her relatives
00:32:17
for definitive proof. That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [INTENSE STINGER] [INTENSE STINGER]
00:32:29
[INTENSE MUSIC] It's been 52 years since
an unidentified young woman found raped, mutilated,
and murdered in Huntington
00:32:40
Beach, California. Bloodline detectives
finally identify her killer. Now they believe they
have a name for her--
00:32:49
Anita Piteau. ANNA DADHANIA:
Investigator Dierking was able to obtain
buccal swab samples
00:32:55
from her siblings, who were
Raymond Piteau and Ann Lavoie. Both those samples were shipped
to our Orange County Crime
00:33:02
Lab, who did the DNA testing. Once we obtained
the DNA profiles, I did a kinship
calculation to see
00:33:09
if the Jane Doe could
be a potential sibling of both of these individuals. Doing this kinship calculation,
I could say with confidence
00:33:18
that Jane Doe could
not be excluded as the full sibling of
Raymond Piteau and Ann Lavoie.
00:33:25
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
After over 50-plus years, the woman's body in an oil field
is no longer just a Jane Doe.
00:33:34
Her name is Anita Piteau,
and now investigators can learn more about Anita. DIANE BAUGHMAN: She
came from Maine.
00:33:45
And she wanted to
see Hollywood, so she went with two friends
who were traveling
00:33:50
also to the West Coast. She was not going
to stay permanently. JOAN RENNER: She was really
interested in Hollywood.
00:34:00
I don't know that she wanted
to be an actress or anything, but she wanted to see,
how does this work?
00:34:05
How do things work? And she wrote to her
family frequently. She was a good correspondent.
00:34:10
She would write,
and she told them that she'd gone on one of those
tours of the movie stars homes.
00:34:16
And she was very
excited about it. It was the kind of thing
that she really enjoyed.
00:34:23
But she did
mention that she was going to be returning to Maine. So it was very out
of character for her
00:34:30
when the letters stopped,
and the family could not get in contact with her. And in the research, we did find
that the family had actually
00:34:38
contacted the last place
they knew she lived, which was Whittier,
and contacted the Whittier Police Department
to do a check on her.
00:34:46
And unfortunately they
did a check and said, there's no one here. And that kind of just
ended at that point,
00:34:53
even though the family did
continue to think about her and try to locate her
every way they could.
00:35:01
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Still, the details of Anita Piteau's horrible
death remain a mystery.
00:35:09
JOAN RENNER: Now,
with him deceased, that's the part of the story
that we don't get to find out.
00:35:16
We don't know. We don't know what
he said to her, how she got in that car, why
she got in that car, where
00:35:22
she was going-- none of that. We don't get to find that
out because he's gone. Not that he necessarily would
have told people anyway,
00:35:29
but there was at least that
opportunity now, lost forever. In 1968, young people
hitchhiked quite
00:35:37
a bit, even women on their own. She could have been
trying to get somewhere. He saw her on the road
and offered her a ride.
00:35:46
And if he didn't seem
suspicious or creepy, she would have taken it. That's just how things
work in the late '60s.
00:35:56
According to her letter,
she did reference that she was working in a restaurant nearby.
00:36:04
Johnny, based on the
information we had, was working in La
Habra at the time. La Habra is very
close to Whittier.
00:36:13
And it appeared to
me, based on the way she was dressed, that it very
well could have been a date.
00:36:20
And he drove her down and,
you know, attacked her. And obviously she didn't want
to do what he wanted to do,
00:36:30
and ultimately killed her to
eliminate any accountability. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
After waiting 52 years,
00:36:40
Anita Piteau's family can
finally bring Anita home. Her niece, Laurie Quirion,
just eight years old
00:36:48
when her aunt goes missing. She still keeps her
letters and has never given up hope of finding her.
00:36:56
DIANE BAUGHMAN: I would say
that almost everyone who worked on this case would
probably tell you
00:37:00
the same thing, that
the most fulfilling part of this whole case
was bringing Anita
00:37:06
Piteau back to her family. She was reburied
in Maine, finally. I understand about
20 family members
00:37:15
and our detectives, the
guys from the DA's office, showed up. JOAN RENNER: I think that there
is a way through these rituals,
00:37:22
the ritual of
grieving, the ritual of having someplace to visit
the person that you love--
00:37:27
and I think that goes
a long way to help the survivors put
that person back in their lives in some way.
00:37:36
Because she's never
going to be back. She's always missing. The children that came
after her are never
00:37:43
going to know her as an aunt. They're never going to know-- she never got to
have kids of her own.
00:37:48
All those things
were denied to her. So I always think of it-- just
you look at the family picture.
00:37:54
And there's always
a missing place. There's a missing
place at the table. There's a missing place
at the holidays always.
00:38:03
But at least when you
have the remains returned, there's something you can do to
soothe your heart a little bit.
00:38:15
NANCY GRACE
(VOICEOVER): 52 years after the murder
case was opened, the file is finally closed.
00:38:21
Why? Because of the
determination of three generations of investigators. DAVID DIERKING: I really was
just a small part of this.
00:38:31
The foundation and the
work and keeping this going was done by all
the lineage of all
00:38:39
these hard-working detectives. EARL ROBITAILLE: I think
when you see the tenacity,
00:38:45
the bulldog pushing of
the case, never giving up, that's the key right there. That's it.
00:38:50
That's what you have to have. You have to have--
and the cold case guys come, work, may not
make it, the next guy
00:38:58
comes in and takes over. But each one of them adds a
bit and a piece here and there.
00:39:03
And in the end, you get
a solution to your case. Never give up-- never. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
Anita Piteau's murder
00:39:13
is solved, thanks to a
new tool that's cracking the coldest of the cold cases. In this case, investigative
genetic genealogy
00:39:23
not only reveals a
killer's identity but also allows a
victim to finally come home to her family.
00:39:32
ANNA DADHANIA: DNA
was used in this case throughout the years
many, many times in an effort to solve the
case for both the suspect
00:39:40
and to identify Jane Doe. And it was just-- you know, every time that there
was new technology was tested,
00:39:47
however no new
leads were obtained. But it wasn't until
investigative genetic genealogy
00:39:53
came around that we were
actually able to solve it. So it's exciting to see, given
that in 1968 DNA was not even
00:40:00
a thought, to all the
way in 2019 and 2020, when this newest DNA technology
exists, that we're actually
00:40:07
able to solve a
case that is so old, and that the DNA
sample still remained that we were able to do this.
00:40:16
BRETT WILLIAMS:
That's the beauty of investigative
genetic genealogy. It cannot make a false positive.
00:40:22
And what I mean by that
is, a false positive mean falsely accusing someone. Because if those
profiles don't match,
00:40:28
you've got the wrong person. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER):
It takes three generations
00:40:33
of detectives, and
the remarkable science of investigative
genetic genealogy to crack the case
of Anita Piteau.
00:40:42
In so doing, the
bloodline detectives do more than solve a cold case. A family is finally given the
answers they have desperately
00:40:53
waited 52 years to hear. I'm Nancy Grace. Thanks for joining us here
on "Bloodline Detectives."
00:41:03
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