00:00:05
[dramatic music] [gun fires] - When a murder's committed, it's always a race against time
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to find the truth, to
separate fact from fiction, to catch the killer and to make sure that
justice is served.
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[suspenseful music] But what happens when the
truth vanishes with the victim? I'm Dr. Richard Shepherd and
I've spent my entire career
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as a forensic pathologist performing nearly
23,000 autopsies. [suspenseful music]
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I've learned that the
dead don't hide the truth and they never lie. Through me, you'll
be hearing directly
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from the victim. With the aid of a state-of-the-art
laboratory, using groundbreaking technology.
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I'll be investigating a
series of intriguing crimes. Where from the victim's bodies
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are revealed to you the truth behind these murders. [camera flashes] On the 10th of June, 1994,
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Linda Curry was
found dead at a home in San Clemente, California, but doctors didn't
know why she died.
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It would be 20 years
before the truth was finally discovered. [suspenseful music]
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[phone rings] - [Dr. Richard] Emergency
services received an urgent call from a home in
the Californian beach resort
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of San Clemente. [suspenseful music] [upbeat music] - They got 911 call
that a person was down.
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- [Dr. Richard] 50-year-old
Linda Curry was struggling to breathe. Paramedics raced to the scene.
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[ambulance sirening] - They arrived at the house and they found Linda in the
master bedroom on the bed
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with vomit on the bed with her. She had no heartbeat,
no breathing. [dramatic upbeat music]
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- [Dr. Richard] Linda was
rushed to a nearby hospital. [clock ticking] - At about one in the
morning, Linda passed away.
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[suspenseful music] - [Dr. Richard] Mysteriously
just months before her death, Linda reported to police
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that someone could be
trying to kill her. [upbeat dramatic music] - [Linda] The only motive
I can think of is money
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and I don't want really even
believe that or think that. I think that's so hard for
me to think things like that.
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[upbeat music] - [Dr. Richard] Linda
Curry's troubles began in the summer of 1993.
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She was struck down by
an unexplained illness. - For a year prior to her death, she was sick or had symptomology
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of diarrhea, vomiting,
nauseousness. - [Dr. Richard] Linda's
friend, Merry Seabold,
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was often at her side. - She was in and out
of a couple hospitals, her stomach was bothering her.
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I saw her in between
two hospital visits and she was noticeably shaky. Just her hands would just shake
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like she had Parkinson's
disease or something. - Linda would had
gone to every doctor,
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she was going to a
gastrointestinal. She had tests done,
she had scopes done, she had blood tests done.
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The doctors didn't know
the root cause of it, they could never determine it. - [Dr. Richard] For
those who knew Linda,
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her sickness seemed
out of place. - Linda was a relatively
healthy person, ate a lot of food and
never gained any weight.
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She was active, she was
peppy, always doing something and seemed to
always have energy.
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- She was impeccably
dressed at all times, she was like a fashion model. She had a perfect house
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and the perfect person
to have as a friend. Merry said that they were
like long lost sisters
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from the very beginning
when they first met. - Linda and I were both Southern
California Edison employees.
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She was in the
bookkeeping department and I was in the customer
service telephone center.
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And we met in the break room because we both ate like crazy
people when we were young.
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And we would always cook
big pizzas in the oven and have them for break, and make all the
other girls jealous.
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And that was really our first
connection was over food and pizzas in the
microwave oven.
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Anyone that knew Linda would say that she was the nicest,
most fun person in the world.
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She always had a
smile on her face, she would do
anything for anybody. She would give you the
shirt off her back.
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She just didn't talk
badly about people and just was an all
around good person. Just a good person.
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- Everyone loved,
"I've loved Linda." [playful music] - [Dr. Richard] In
1989, Linda was working
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at the nearby San Onofre
Nuclear Power Station. - Linda met Paul
Curry at San Onofre
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where she had transferred to. I think it was kind
of attraction right from the very beginning
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because Paul is very
charming young man and he was a nuclear
physicist there at San Onofre,
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and that was impressive alone. Their friendship started and then ultimately
they started dating.
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- People that he worked
for, described him as extremely intelligent. Linda herself that was one thing
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that she said she was
attracted to Paul for, that he was very smart. - Paul won about $64,000
on the program "Jeopardy",
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which is a TV program
that obviously talks about a lot of things,
history and movies,
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and everything. And you have to be very smart
to win that kind of money, and she was impressed that way.
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She liked smart people because really all of her
boyfriends prior to that were very intelligent.
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[upbeat lively music] - [Dr. Richard] Soon the couple
got married in Las Vegas. Linda was 48 and Paul was 35.
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- My husband and I met
him a a couple times, actually went to their
house and when we walked in,
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he was actually
seated at the piano. [piano music] And he just went right for it
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and he played like
he just was Liberace. [piano music] It was, again, impressive.
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He had these things he could
do that just blew you away, and that was one of his gifts.
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He had, you know, maybe not
the best looks in my book, but he could be charming,
and funny, and bright,
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and all those things were
things that attracted Linda. [upbeat music] - Not long after Linda
married Paul Curry,
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she started having very
serious abdominal problems that often landed
her in hospital.
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Now the causes of
diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal pain are
very difficult to diagnose.
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And in Linda's case, the
doctors couldn't work out what was wrong with her. Linda worked at a
nuclear power plant
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where she could have been
exposed to radiation. So one possibility
they considered
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was that she might be suffering
from radiation sickness, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea
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are all symptoms of
radiation sickness. And that's because
the radiation damages
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the delicate lining
of the intestines. But all the tests
came back negative, leaving doctors still baffled
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as to what was
making Linda so sick. There was something
troubling her friends too.
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- It was about three or four
months into their marriage and Linda called me one day
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and she says, "You
know, Paul wants me to have a million dollar life
insurance policy taken out."
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Lynn, I said, "You're going to have a million dollar life
insurance policy taken out
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on him as well?" And she said, "Well,
you know what Paul says is since I'm several
years older than him,
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it really isn't necessary
since he's a younger person, so we're just going to
take the policy out on me."
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I said, words I can't even
say, "Are you kidding me? That's crazy, Linda,
that's crazy."
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[suspenseful music] - He felt that because
her house in San Clemente was so expensive that
he needed a safety net
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in case something
were to happen. Why did she have such a
large life insurance policy
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when she didn't really
have any debt except for her mortgage? - It was always Paul
says, Paul says.
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That was the first time a
red flag went up for me. - [Dr. Richard] But there
were yet more to come.
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- Linda called me
one day and said, "Hey Merr, I got something
to talk to you about.
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I got a call from Paul's ex-wife and she wanted to know
where the check was." And when Linda inquired
what check, she said,
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"Well, the the child
support check." He had adopted her two children and was paying child
support on an ongoing basis
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of which Linda
knew nothing about. [suspenseful music] - [Dr. Richard] To add to that,
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questions still surrounded
Linda's unexplained illness. - I just knew something
was going on in that house.
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[dramatic music] [upbeat music] - 50-year-old Linda
Curry had been very ill with vomiting,
nausea, and diarrhea.
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Linda's friends suspected
her husband, Paul, was somehow behind it. His high living had put
the couple in serious debt
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and he'd tried to take out a million
dollar life insurance policy in her name. Linda had also discovered
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that Paul had hidden
payments to stepchildren. She didn't know he had. To make amends, Paul took
his wife on a cruise.
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[suspenseful music] While they were on the cruise, there was an
outbreak of antivirus
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and many people, including
Paul and Linda, were ill. The symptoms were nausea,
vomiting and diarrhea,
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just what Linda had had before. Now most people got
over it in a day or two, and indeed Paul
recovered quickly.
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But Linda ended up in
hospital for several weeks, gravely ill, and then her
symptoms simply disappeared,
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leaving doctors once
again, none the wiser. [upbeat music] But months later, Linda's
sickness returned.
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- I went to see her at
her home in San Clemente, and I remember her hands shook
like a 90-year-old woman.
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I said, Linda, "What's
wrong with your hands?" And she goes, "I don't know, I just kind of I
am shaky lately."
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- [Dr. Richard] Linda
revealed more to her friend. - She said, "I just
want you to know
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that if anything happens to me, I'm not going to be committing
suicide, just know that
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and you may wanna look into it if anything happens to me." And, again, another red flag.
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[dramatic music] [ambulance sirening] - [Dr. Richard] But Linda's
symptoms took a turn
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for the worse, she was rushed into the
Good Samaritan Hospital in San Clemente. - I had talked to Linda on
the telephone when she was
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in, admitted to the
San Clemente hospital, and she sounded not like Linda. So I told my husband, he says,
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"Honey, we have to go see her." And we went into the hospital and it would kind
of take him back
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because as we went in, we saw
Paul right there in the lobby, and of course said, "Hi,
Paul, how you doing?"
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"Oh, I'm okay, I wish
Linda was feeling better." And I said, "Are we
able to see her?"
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And he goes, "Ah,
I think you can." When I walked in and I
saw Linda in that bed,
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she was laying back,
her eyes were closed. She had no color in her face and it looked like
death warmed over,
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and it was just hard to even
get her to speak or whatever. I think she knew we were
there, I'm not sure.
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Hardly said anything. And as we left, it was
such a emotional thing. I said, "Paul, do you mind if
we just crash at your house?"
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[suspenseful music] And so we ended up
spending the night, I went into their spare bedroom
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and as I walk in on the
dresser, bunch of papers, all laying out
folders and stuff,
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and that they looked official. And so as I looked at them and I saw a couple other
various life insurance policies
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and I thought everything here is related to death and money. And I thought, what's he
doing with all this stuff out?
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She's in the hospital, she
didn't pull it out of her file. You know, I just
had this feeling.
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I just feel like Linda
Curry's gonna die because I feel like her
husband's trying to kill her.
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[inspiring music] - The nurse at
Samaritan Hospital, heard an IV alarm go off
and went to Linda's room
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and found that the IV
bag, that liquid appeared to be cloudy and the
bag appeared to be
puffy or expanded.
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- An IV bag or
intravenous sac like this is essential for giving
a sick patient the salts
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and fluids they need
whilst in hospital, they can also be used
to supply medication.
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The question was, had Linda been given something
potentially life-threatening? - The nurse immediately
stopped that IV
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and took that IV bag off, put
a different or new IV bag on, and she called her
superiors and made a report.
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After she removed the
bag, Linda became septic. - [Dr. Richard] Linda's
heart rate soared
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and her blood
pressure plummeted. The nurses phoned
Paul advising him to come to the
hospital immediately,
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[phone rings] but there was no response. - She went into septic shock and went to the
intensive care unit,
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nearly died of septic
shock at that time. [ambulance sirening] - Paul didn't visit his wife
until the following morning,
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Linda pulled through, but there were questions about the intravenous
sac giving her fluids.
00:16:08
- Ivy tampering at Samaritan
Hospital in San Clemente was reported to the police.
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The investigator interviewed
the nurse who did, found the IV bag tampered
with and interviewed Linda.
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- [Dr. Richard] Detectives
were taken aback at what they heard next. - [Dr. Richard] Tests
revealed the bag contained
00:17:39
a drug Linda hadn't
even been prescribed. In large doses this
anesthetic lidocaine
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could cause seizures
and prove fatal, but nobody knew who
had administered it. The police
investigation continued.
00:17:59
Linda was eventually discharged, but months later, her sickness
and vomiting returned.
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[dramatic music] - After the IV bag incident
at Samaritan Hospital, Linda and Paul both
decided that she would go
00:18:20
to a different hospital be, so that there would
be no problems. So anytime she went
to the hospital,
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she went to Mission
Hospital Mission Viejo. In New Years Eve,
she was sick again.
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The nurse was walking
down the hallway, Paul passed her and told
the nurse she's okay,
00:18:40
and he left the hospital. The nurse then went
into Linda's room and she thought the
IV looked suspicious.
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The port on the IV bag
at Mission Hospital was actually broken. She found an injection
market in one of the ports
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and she knew that there was
no, nothing ordered for her, so there shouldn't be an
injection mark in there.
00:19:05
So she felt it was
suspicious, stopped the IV, put a new IV bag up
and made a report.
00:19:15
- After the second time that
Linda was in the hospital and the IV bags
were tampered with,
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I truly felt that
something was happening to her in her own home
that she was unaware of.
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[suspenseful music] - At Samaritan Hospital, Paul's
the only person in the room.
00:19:36
Mission Hospital, 15
miles up the road. No similar staff, no similar
visitors, Paul's the only one.
00:19:45
So we have two different
hospitals, two different nurses and the only common
denominator is Paul.
00:19:53
- [Dr. Richard] Paul was
interviewed by detectives about both incidents. Although they had
their suspicions,
00:20:00
there was not enough
evidence to charge him. - After Linda was
out of the hospital,
00:20:08
I actually had a conversation
with her that was honest and truthful and I said that
I really thought, Linda,
00:20:16
that Paul was
trying to kill her. There were just too many
red flags that I saw and that she saw that
I couldn't account for.
00:20:25
And, you know, she's
still kind of just wanting to think the best,
but probably knowing
00:20:31
there's something going
on and he's the person that's making it go on. - [Dr. Richard] Linda's
friends hatched a plan.
00:20:40
- I said, "Linda, we'd like
to put our money together for you even though we
know she's got money,
00:20:44
but we'll make it even better and we will rent a place
for you in Orange County near Sanofi so
that you can go in
00:20:51
and out to work and not
worry about anything and get out of the house." She said, "Okay,
Merr, I'll do it."
00:21:02
[upbeat music] And I was so happy
she's gonna do it. And the next day,
the very next day,
00:21:13
she called me and said,
"Paul's too good of a husband, I can't do it." [upbeat music]
00:21:31
- Linda Curry had
been struck down by a mystery illness. After two separate
attempts to tamper
00:21:38
with Linda's intravenous line
in two different hospitals, police opened an investigation.
00:21:45
Linda's friends suspected
her husband Paul was trying to poison her. - I did pretty much
caught off communications
00:21:52
with Linda after the second
experience in the hospital. I, it was just too
painful to deal
00:21:57
and talk to her all the time because I knew it was happening and I couldn't do
anything about it.
00:22:02
[suspenseful music] I got an email from Paul at work and it just said, "Merry, I'm
really worried about Linda.
00:22:19
She's working overtime,
12-hour days, she's wobbly. She doesn't look fit for duty,
00:22:25
I'm really worried about her." And I was in my office and two of my office
mates were there.
00:22:31
And I said, "You know, ladies,
I have to tell something, somebody this, I just feel
like Linda Curry's gonna die
00:22:39
because I feel like her
husband's trying to kill her. I just feel like something's
gonna happen to her."
00:22:47
- [Dr. Richard] That same
night, it was Paul Curry who called paramedics saying
his wife was unconscious.
00:22:53
[phone rings] - [Responder] 911,
what is your emergency? [ambulance sirening] - [Dr. Richard] Once again,
Linda was rushed to hospital.
00:23:07
- My husband and I are at a
conference the very next day and he, and I'm in
the room waiting
00:23:12
to go to the next session, and he comes in and says,
"Merry, Linda Curry died." And that's when I found out.
00:23:23
- Linda passed away at the
hospital of undetermined causes. So she had an autopsy at the
Orange County Coroner's Office,
00:23:30
and the autopsy was inconclusive because they couldn't
find a cause of death and it became pending.
00:23:38
[dramatic music] - But Linda's autopsy did reveal something intriguing. Hidden from view behind the
right ear was a small mark.
00:23:54
There was a suspicion that
this was the puncture wound from a needle. Could it be that Linda
had been injected
00:24:01
with a substance that
induced a fatal reaction? To add to this, Paul had started receiving
initial life insurance payouts
00:24:11
of more than $300,000. Detectives went to Paul's home to interview him about
his wife's death.
00:25:00
- [Dr. Richard] But
Paul seemed more evasive when asked how much he'd
benefited from Linda's death.
00:25:21
- [Dr. Richard] As the police
investigation continued, Paul hastily prepared
Linda's funeral.
00:25:30
- I really will
remember that funeral, it was really something. There was a lot of people there
00:25:36
and I can remember standing
outside in kind of a open area and Paul was inside
in the funeral home,
00:25:42
and he was just standing
there all by himself. Nobody around him. And it was so strange
00:25:51
because I think by now there
was enough rumor out there because people had
heard about the IV bags
00:25:57
and the word spreads. And then Paul sat
in the front row and I remember he used to
say, "Linda is his angel."
00:26:07
And I gave the eulogy and I
had an angel that I bought and I wanted to continue
to be friends with him
00:26:13
because I wanted to make sure
he got caught for what he did, because I knew he killed her.
00:26:19
And I gave the angel
to him in this eulogy, and so that he would think that I still didn't have
any suspicions for him,
00:26:27
which I totally did. [suspenseful music] Paul's acting like the
remorseful husband,
00:26:33
it was just a drama. It was an unbelievable
drama in the worst sense, nobody consoling him
00:26:40
because I think
everybody thought he
probably murdered her, even though there was no proof.
00:26:46
[suspenseful music] [dramatic music] - But soon Linda's body revealed the truth behind the rumor.
00:27:01
Test results on her blood
uncovered something untoward. Toxicology showed that
Linda had in fact died
00:27:10
from nicotine poisoning. Nicotine is a powerful
stimulant of many of the nerves of the body.
00:27:16
High doses, it's very toxic. It affects the heart,
it affects the muscles of respiration
leading to paralysis
00:27:25
and cardiovascular collapse. The toxicology tests showed that Linda had an extra
ordinary high concentration
00:27:34
of nicotine in her bloodstream,
1,120 nanograms per mil. That's far, far more
than you'd ever find,
00:27:43
even in the very
heaviest of smokers, and here's an interesting fact. Linda didn't smoke,
00:27:50
so how did all that
nicotine get into her body? Faced with the realization
that she'd been poisoned,
00:27:57
police launched a
murder investigation. Leading nicotine expert, Professor Neal Benowitz
was enlisted on the case.
00:28:12
- I was contacted
in the early 1990s by district attorney by time, who said we have a murder case
00:28:23
where there is a question
about nicotine poisoning. He contacted me because I had
published a lot of research
00:28:30
on the human
pharmacology of nicotine, and my laboratory did
assays of nicotine and its breakdown products.
00:28:37
So he first contacted me saying, "Can your laboratory
confirm tests that other
laboratories have done,
00:28:45
showing there was high
levels of nicotine?" So in 1994, we got
10 blood samples and urine samples from him,
00:28:57
and they wanted us to confirm
the levels of nicotine. And then we also measure its
breakdown product cotinine,
00:29:06
which turned out to
be an important aspect of the analysis of the case. - [Dr. Richard] After
weeks of testing,
00:29:13
Professor Benowitz
his lab confirmed the investigator's suspicions. - So we found important
information in Linda Curry,
00:29:24
both in her blood and her urine. So the first thing we
found, in the blood, there was a
phenomenally high level
00:29:32
of nicotine in the blood, 50 times to a 100 times higher
than no seen in a smoker.
00:29:39
She was not a smoker. The second observation,
which was critical, is that the level of cotinine,
which is a breakdown product,
00:29:47
was similar to that of a smoker. Normally, cotinine levels
are 10 times higher than nicotine in a smoker,
00:29:55
but it takes time to convert
nicotine to cotinine. So the fact that our nicotine
level was phenomenally high
00:30:01
and our cotinine
level was not meant, that was not much time
to metabolize nicotine.
00:30:06
So she must have
got the nicotine and then died shortly
after getting the nicotine.
00:30:10
[suspenseful music] - [Dr. Richard] And
there was more evidence from Linda's body that
she'd been poisoned.
00:30:17
Fluid was found in her lungs, that's usual when people
die but Linda had vomited
00:30:23
and aspirated, which
is a common effect of nicotine poisoning and
very uncommon in non-smokers.
00:30:30
This suggested foul play. And the autopsy also
revealed a cocktail of other drugs to explain
Linda's mystery illnesses
00:30:39
in the lead up to her death. - And, again, her autopsy
levels of cadmium, which is a metal, was
found 10 times higher
00:30:51
than what you expect
with industrial exposure. She was in the hospital,
she had a metallic taste
00:30:56
and then suddenly
lost consciousness, and she had no known
exposure to cadmium. So right there,
there were questions
00:31:03
about something
bad was going on. [dramatic music] - [Dr. Richard] In the meantime,
00:31:11
Paul had received
the first payouts from Linda's life insurance and bought himself a
brand new Cadillac.
00:31:20
But the authorities still
didn't have enough evidence to file charges. They needed hard
proof that it was Paul
00:31:27
who was behind the poisoning. - You know, it was strange
when Linda passed away that nobody really
had an answer why?
00:31:35
I know that people
were looking into it, but there was just the un, it
was just an unresolved reason.
00:31:44
- The initial investigator
had this case, felt that it was a
very suspicious death,
00:31:48
but he kind of got stuck on
some red herrings in the case, like the cadmium,
like other stuff.
00:31:56
And because he got stuck
with the red herrings, he never made any
progress in the case.
00:32:02
- [Dr. Richard] Paul
Curry slipped off to start a new life in Nevada, and Linda's murder
investigation was put on hold.
00:32:09
[dramatic music] Sergeant Yvonne Shull of the Orange County
Sheriff's Department
00:32:24
would reopen the case. - I was a detective at the time. I was working in
the cold case unit,
00:32:33
and my sergeant at the time brought the case to me and
asked me to look at it. He told me that a detective
00:32:41
who had retired had
the case in his garage for several years,
and he brought it back
00:32:46
to the sheriff's
department as an unsolved. So I went upstairs
with the case number
00:32:55
and pulled every forensic
report that was done. So I pulled all of those and took them
downstairs to read them.
00:33:04
- [Dr. Richard] Yvonne had the
toxicology results reviewed to see what more Linda's
corpse could reveal
00:33:09
about her killing. In the meantime,
something else drew the investigator's attention.
00:33:18
- My decision was to
listen to all of the tapes and try and make a decision on, could we work the
case, yes or no?
00:33:24
[upbeat music] While I was listening
to the interview, the investigator asked Linda,
00:33:33
"If somebody was trying to
kill you, who would it be?" - And at that time I thought,
00:33:49
wow, she's talking
to us from the grave. She's telling us Paul did
this and it was for money,
00:33:55
so let's look further
into the case. [upbeat music] - Eight years after Linda
Curry'S 1994 murder,
00:34:12
the Orange County Sheriff's
Department reopened their investigation. Linda's autopsy revealed
she'd been poisoned
00:34:20
by a fatal dose of nicotine. The prime suspect
was her husband Paul, but the cold case
unit had to prove,
00:34:28
he was behind Linda's demise. - We had no scene but
because it's a homicide, because of the
unsolved homicide,
00:34:38
all of the toxicology
samples are kept. And so I could request
further toxicology be done
00:34:44
on samples from the autopsy. - There was another
twist in this tail. Further tests showed a toxic
level of Ambien in her system,
00:34:58
a drug used to treat insomnia. [suspenseful music] - I was concerned at the time
00:35:05
that she was maybe
overdosed on Ambien, which I could never
find a prescription for Linda for Ambien.
00:35:13
- [Dr. Richard] So was
Ambien the true cause of Linda's death? - So I was kind
of concerned about
00:35:19
that when I was first
started working the case. What I found out is
later when I talked
00:35:25
with the toxicologist is her
level was high for Ambien, but it, the Ambien
did not kill her.
00:35:33
- [Dr. Richard] With
Ambien ruled out, investigators turned
back to nicotine as the agent of
Linda's poisoning.
00:35:41
- I had never heard of
nicotine poisoning before, I never knew so many
types of nicotine existed.
00:35:48
When I met the expert on
nicotine, Dr. Neal Benowitz in San Francisco, he
educated me on nicotine.
00:35:58
- You could purchase it
from a commercial source because nicotine is used
as a chemical research,
00:36:04
it's used in different
smoking cessation products. So it's conceivable
someone could buy in.
00:36:11
The easiest way actually,
is just to make a tea with tobacco leaves. - [Dr. Richard] To pinpoint
the method of Linda's murder,
00:36:20
Professor Benowitz reanalyzed
the samples from her body. - One of the things
that he did for me
00:36:29
is he ran a test
on the blood serum to find out was it
tobacco nicotine, was it pharmaceutical nicotine,
00:36:39
or was it pesticide nicotine? Because I felt I needed to
determine that in order to say,
00:36:45
where'd he get it
from to kill her? Well, what we found
out is the nicotine was accrued extraction
from tobacco.
00:36:53
- So you boiled tobacco leaves,
nicotine is water soluble, goes into the tea, you then
concentrate it, boil it down,
00:37:01
and you can get a very
concentrated nicotine liquid. And her husband, Paul
Curry, was nuclear physicist
00:37:08
and he was thought
to be a genius. And I think this is
thought to be a genius idea
00:37:14
of how to get nicotine
and kill someone without being detected. [water boiling] - A coworker of Paul's told
me that Paul used to brag
00:37:23
that he knew how to kill someone without the police ever knowing. He could grow flowers
of different colors
00:37:30
by adding different
things into the soil. So I think that
Paul was very smart. He's smart enough to do it.
00:37:40
[suspenseful music] - If Paul Curry concocted a crude form of liquid nicotine, how did he poison
his wife with it?
00:37:50
Perhaps the answer could light in the strange puncture
mark, found behind her ear
00:37:55
at the autopsy. In this area of the skull, there are only
small blood vessels and the solid bone of
the base of the skull.
00:38:05
But even entering these small
blood vessels behind the air, a drug could be administered
00:38:11
that would make its way quickly
into Linda's bloodstream. So could it be that Linda had
been injected with nicotine?
00:38:20
- Nicotine is a
very potent poison. So if you smoke a cigarette, you take in about one milligram.
00:38:29
If you have a milliliter,
which is a pretty small volume, that's a 1000 milligrams.
00:38:35
So you can easily just
take portion of a teaspoon and inject it and give them a
massive overdose to kill them.
00:38:43
So it's very easy to kill
someone with liquid nicotine. - [Dr. Richard] Now, police
could explain the presence
00:38:50
of Ambien in Linda's body. - Paul Curry had given his
wife this drug to sedate her
00:38:56
so that he could administer
the fatal dose of nicotine. But detectives
needed more evidence
00:39:03
to prove Linda's husband
was a potential killer. So Yvonne tracked down women from Curry's previous
relationships.
00:39:12
His ex-wife, Leslie,
whom he met working as a pianist on a cruise ship, revealed something sinister.
00:39:22
- Leslie told me that
prior to Paul leaving for about a year
that she was sick, and that she felt that
she had Lyme's disease.
00:39:31
However, when she described
her symptoms to me, it was not as symptoms
of Lyme disease.
00:39:37
She had described her symptoms as nauseousness,
diarrhea, vomiting. Well, those are symptoms
consistent with poisoning.
00:39:48
- She was getting ill and
somehow they separated and after separating, all
of a sudden she was fine.
00:39:56
So I think he was trying
with her originally, it didn't work, with
Linda, he got a bingo.
00:40:05
[upbeat music] - Paul wanted Leslie
to get life insurance and she applied
for life insurance,
00:40:15
but she was denied
the life insurance. But I spoke with a underwriter, what he told me was that
the most common reason
00:40:25
for people to be
denied life insurance is because they test
positive for nicotine
00:40:31
in their blood test
and have written that they are a non-smoker. Well, Leslie told me
that she's a non-smoker
00:40:40
and that she answered "no"
to the nicotine question. - [Dr. Richard] Now, police
suspected Curry's previous wife
00:40:49
was a victim of
nicotine poisoning. Detectives delved
deeper into his past. - When I started looking
into Paul's background,
00:40:59
I found that his
background was all fake. He said he had college degree
from Columbia University,
00:41:06
but that was incorrect. It was a mail order degree from Columbia
University of Louisiana.
00:41:15
- [Dr. Richard] Curry's claim of being a qualified
nuclear physicist was a complete fraud.
00:41:21
[ambulance sirening] And his account of
the night Linda died didn't stack up either.
00:41:27
[upbeat music] - I interviewed the paramedic who responded to the scene
on the night that she died.
00:41:41
When I spoke with the paramedic, he told me that he felt
that Paul was aloof. - [Paul] She wouldn't wake up,
00:41:51
I didn't know
exactly what to do, but I grabbed her cordless phone and I called 911
and I started CPR.
00:41:58
- He says that he started CPR
according to the paramedic, CPR was not being
done when he arrived.
00:42:09
- [Dr. Richard] After building
her case against Curry over seven years,
Yvonne tracked him down
00:42:14
to his new home
in Salina, Kansas. She brought him into the
local sheriff's office
00:42:20
for questioning. [suspenseful music] - When I interviewed Paul, he's very cocky and
very condescending
00:42:32
when he first comes in, he's sitting straight
up in his chair as the interview goes on
00:42:37
and as I confront him
about Linda's death, you can see his body
language change.
00:42:43
Do you have a physics degree? - No. - No? Did you ever tell anybody
you had a physics degree?
00:42:49
- I've told people
that in my past. - Yes, how come? - Self inflation, bragging.
00:42:58
- [Dr. Richard]
Now, Curry himself had admitted he was a fraud. - I know that you got
a substantial amount
00:43:04
of money from life insurance. It just seems to me that
your financial benefit on Linda's death...
00:43:15
- [Dr. Richard] Yvonne
questioned him about the evening Linda died. - And what I found out from Paul
00:43:21
is that she came home from work, they were the only
people in the house. Nobody broke into the house,
00:43:28
there was nobody living
in the house except them. - In the end, Paul Curry
sealed his own fate.
00:43:36
When interviewed by the police, he was adamant he had
been alone with Linda in the six hours
before her death.
00:43:43
The dose of nicotine
she had received would've killed her
within half an hour. And so by his own admission,
00:43:51
he was the only person who could
possibly have poisoned her. [suspenseful music]
00:43:58
- Then I pull out my
badge and tell him, you're under arrest for
the murder of Linda Curry.
00:44:04
Stand up and turn around. And I put handcuffs on him. - When I found out that Paul
Curry had been arrested,
00:44:15
best day of my life, and it
made me think I wasn't crazy. All my feelings and all the
red flags, they were right.
00:44:22
They were right and
he was the murder. - [Dr. Richard] Paul
Curry was charged with the murder of
his wife, Linda.
00:44:30
[dramatic music] He finally faced justice
in a three week trial at Orange County Superior Court.
00:44:46
- He was found guilty of murder, murder for financial
gain and insurance fraud, and sentenced to life without
the possibility of parole
00:44:57
in California State Prison. - When I heard what
the jury came back with and they were all like
smiling at me, almost,
00:45:05
I was elated. He's an evil person. He doesn't deserve to
see life out of prison because he would do it again
00:45:14
and he'll find some victim
like, Linda, that's easy prey. - This is one of those cases
00:45:19
that could very easily have
been a cold case forever. The guy was a pianist
on a cruise ship,
00:45:29
he was a nuclear physicist,
he was a chameleon. You don't know what
he gonna do next,
00:45:34
but he's smart enough
to carry it off. - He's gotta stay in prison the
rest of his life, he has to.
00:45:41
- For almost 20 years, Linda Curry laid dead while
her husband spent her money and carried on
with his own life.
00:45:49
The evidence in Linda's body would eventually catch him out. There was the toxicology report,
00:45:55
showing how he sedated
her with one drug, the injection mark behind
her ear, where a fatal dose
00:46:01
of another drug 'nicotine'
was administered. And the only person
who could have done
00:46:06
that was Paul Curry for money. But when the truth hidden
in her body was revealed,
00:46:13
he could no longer
escape justice and the jury had no doubt
that he had killed her.
00:46:19
[dramatic upbeat music]