00:00:00
[THEME MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Colorado
Springs, Colorado, 1987. 20-year-old Army
specialist Darlene
00:00:18
Krashoc is on a night out
with friends in the military. JESSICA VELTRI: Towards
the end of that night,
00:00:24
she told her friends
that she wanted to stay. When they were saying,
hey, we want to go.
00:00:29
It's time to leave now. And she said, hey,
don't worry about me. I'll get a ride.
00:00:33
And unfortunately, that was the
last time they saw her alive. NANCY GRACE: Early the next
morning, police discover
00:00:40
a gruesome crime scene. I've experienced,
despite thousands of death investigations.
00:00:46
I've seen very few that compare
to the brutality of this one. For more than 30
years, police cannot
00:00:55
find Darlene Krashoc's killer. Now, the power of
forensic genetic genealogy might just crack this case.
00:01:04
I'm Nancy Grace. This is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC] Colorado Springs, 1987.
00:01:35
A sprawling community
one hour south of Denver. 20-year-old Darlene
Krashoc, a young soldier
00:01:43
stationed at Fort
Carson, a US Army post located just south of the city. BEN HOSTETTER: Krash
was her nickname
00:01:53
there at the Army base. Speaking with anybody
that knew Darlene, you could tell that she
was definitely full of life
00:02:00
and just a wonderful person. NANCY GRACE: It's March 16, the
day before St. Patrick's Day.
00:02:08
A huge storm hits
Colorado Springs. Darlene Krashoc
gets off work early. She and her fellow soldiers
decide to go out and celebrate.
00:02:19
Ended up at a bar
called Shuffles. The Shuffles nightclub
that's on Academy Boulevard here in
Colorado Springs.
00:02:26
JESSICA VELTRI: That night
she was drinking and dancing with some friends and
with some other folks that
00:02:31
were at the bar. Towards the end of that
night, she told her friends that she wanted to stay
when they were saying, hey,
00:02:37
we want to go. It's time to leave now. And she said, hey,
don't worry about me. I'll get a ride.
00:02:43
I'll walk home. And they were reluctant,
but ultimately, they agreed to leave her there.
00:02:49
And unfortunately, that was the
last time they saw her alive. NANCY GRACE: Friends leave
Darlene Krashoc there
00:02:56
at the bar. But just a few hours
later, two Colorado Springs police officers
on routine patrol
00:03:03
make a horrible discovery. JOSEPH EDEN: They were
patrolling an area that was a high crime
area for other types
00:03:11
of crimes, robberies,
burglaries, and things like that. They just happened to be going
down an alleyway at about 5:00
00:03:18
in the morning on that
very cold next morning. And when they were
driving down that alley,
00:03:23
they looked up
next to a dumpster and they saw what they believed
to be a mannequin laying
00:03:28
out next to the dumpster. So they parked their
police cruiser, they got out and walked over.
00:03:32
And when they walked over,
they realized immediately that it was not a mannequin.
00:03:36
That it was the
body of the victim, of Darlene, there on
the ground before them.
00:03:42
And they found her body and
immediately secured the scene. They checked to see if
Darlene had vital signs,
00:03:47
and she did not. Once they determined
that she was deceased, they made the notifications.
00:03:51
And the homicide unit
was activated to respond and continue the investigation. LEON KELLY: One of the
more kind of violent scenes
00:04:01
that I've ever been involved in. She is found partially nude. She has multiple patterned
abrasions on her body
00:04:10
that are consistent with
the bite marks, scratches, as well as blunt force trauma.
00:04:17
After Darlene's
body was discovered, they cordoned off the area. Officers were able to determine
pretty early on that they
00:04:23
suspected that she was not
killed behind that Korean club restaurant, they
believe that she was
00:04:29
thrown from a moving vehicle. They were able to determine
that because of the snowstorm
00:04:33
that had happened in the area. There were tire marks that led
up to it, the body was there,
00:04:38
and tire marks that had led
away from the crime scene along with three
cigarette butts that they
00:04:42
had found there as well. They don't believe
the attack actually happened there because
there was no other signs
00:04:49
of a struggle or sexual assault,
or blood actually in the snow itself. We're not sure if she was
actually killed somewhere else
00:04:58
and it was just
that her body was taken there because it
was a secluded area, and then dumped out.
00:05:03
We don't know if maybe the
killer drove to that location, sexually assaulted her in his
vehicle, and then strangled her
00:05:10
or killed her, and
dumped her right away. The homicide detectives
that show up on that scene,
00:05:15
they want to make
sure that scene is preserved as well as possible. NANCY GRACE: News
of the brutal crime
00:05:23
quickly spreads through
Colorado Springs. Investigators focus on
Darlene Krashoc's movements
00:05:30
the night she's murdered. JOE SOMOSKY: There
are a lot of elements of the crime from
Darlene Krashoc's murder
00:05:37
that created unease
in the community just because of the unknown
nature of the perpetrator.
00:05:41
If that person was
still in the community, had they committed
crimes in the past, will
00:05:45
they commit more crimes of
similar nature in the future. BEN HOSTETTER: The
other thing that
00:05:49
stood out to me was how
many members of the public just came forward. I mean, this was a heavy impact
on the community as a whole.
00:05:56
And many of the individuals
that had contact with Darlene contacted the authorities
themselves, and said,
00:06:02
hey, I remember her, I
saw her at this club. Or, you know, I danced with her. There was one individual that
came forward and was like, hey,
00:06:08
I even got her phone number. I mean, a lot of
people came forward. All of those people participated
with the investigation.
00:06:16
Particularly, that
was most helpful is that they
collected DNA samples from all of those
individuals, which is pretty
00:06:23
impressive given this was 1987. And DNA, at that point,
wasn't terribly prevalent.
00:06:29
But all of those individuals
volunteered that. The detectives that
handled it back in 1987
00:06:35
laid the framework for this case
in a very, very good manner. Can Colorado
Springs detectives
00:06:43
use the few clues they have
to bring them one step closer to Darlene Krashoc's killer?
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That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [AUDIO LOGO] Colorado Springs, Colorado. March 16, 1987.
00:07:07
The night before St. Patrick's
Day, 20-year-old Darlene Krashoc out having drinks
and fun with fellow soldiers
00:07:15
from nearby Fort Carson. Her friends go home, but
Darlene stays, having fun. Just a few hours later,
police, out on routine patrol,
00:07:27
find Darlene Krashoc
brutally murdered. They immediately
examine the scene for any clues left behind.
00:07:37
JOSEPH EDEN: They'll
put up crime scene tape, they'll make sure that nobody
can come into the scene
00:07:41
or leave the scene. The body actually isn't
touched by any of the homicide detectives until after the
coroner comes and clears
00:07:49
that piece of evidence. And even then,
typically, the body won't be touched by the
detectives until the autopsy,
00:07:55
if it's touched at all. The reason for that is that
the body is actually considered
00:07:59
legally the property
of the coroner, really at that point in time. And so the detectives
can't go and manipulate
00:08:04
the body in any way
without permission of the coroner first. JIM ISHAM: The crime scene
investigators after arriving
00:08:11
on scene, their first priority
is collecting that evidence, preserving it, keeping the
integrity of the evidence
00:08:16
so it doesn't get destroyed. So you can imagine that crime
scene just the size of it
00:08:20
being on the back
side of a strip mall. They basically searched
back and front. They're going to note anything
as far as cars that might have
00:08:28
been parked when they arrived. They're going to
photograph everything. They're going to collect
all the evidence.
00:08:32
They're going to start
knocking on the business doors saying, hey, this
is what we discovered.
00:08:37
When were you here last? When did you shut
your business down? Conducting all those
necessary interviews to try
00:08:43
to narrow a timeline down. Being in the winter,
the wind was blowing, there were snow on the ground.
00:08:49
So some of those
items of evidence needed to be collected
in a timely fashion so they weren't blown
off into the snow,
00:08:55
or snow didn't melt and
contaminate the evidence, and the crime scene
was well protected.
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Those initial detectives and
the crime scene investigators did a phenomenal job collecting
and preserving the evidence.
00:09:07
JOE SOMOSKY: Other than
the physical evidence that would support the theory of a
sexually motivated homicide,
00:09:11
an identification card was found
that identified the deceased as Darlene Krashoc.
00:09:16
We're looking for
things that would allow us to tie who came to
that scene and dropped the body.
00:09:21
But also the body itself, can
we use it than to find evidence that not only tie her
to the perpetrator,
00:09:28
but maybe to the
perpetrator's vehicle, or the scene or the location
which she was originally
00:09:33
killed. And so that's part
of the responsibility at the scene in this case. It's for the coroner to
come, identify the body,
00:09:39
look at what kind of weapons,
what kind of issues, what kind of trace evidence we may be
looking for on the body that
00:09:46
could help link
the perpetrator, as well as maybe the location
where she was actually murdered.
00:09:51
LAURI MARTIN: One of
the pieces of evidence that they had found
at the crime scene
00:09:54
was three cigarette butts. And detectives were able to
determine that whoever dumped
00:10:00
her body there decided
to smoke a few cigarettes before dumping her off. Like, who would do that?
00:10:07
Just so blatantly not care
about what actually happened. Investigators know Darlene
Krashoc suffered an extremely
00:10:15
violent death at the hands
of a sadistic killer, but very few solid
clues left behind.
00:10:24
As it happens so often
in cases much like this, homicide detectives pinned their
hopes on the medical examiner's
00:10:33
autopsy. LEON KELLY: The
autopsy indicates that Darlene was strangled. The ligatures are still
present around her neck.
00:10:40
She's got multiple ligature
marks across her neck telling us that that's how she
was held and restrained,
00:10:47
and then ultimately strangled. She also has multiple
blunt force injuries. Blows to her face, her head,
her body, her extremities.
00:10:55
An incredibly violent and
protracted or prolonged assault that resulted
in numerous injuries.
00:11:04
Careful examination of
the body in this case reveals circular
pattern, abrasions,
00:11:10
or scrapes that are
consistent with what we know as to be bite marks. Now historically, in
this period of time,
00:11:17
bite marks would have been
used to try to identify the perpetrator themselves,
to try to match their teeth
00:11:23
to the body to the injuries. NANCY GRACE: The
autopsy does provide insight into the terrible
trauma of Darlene's
00:11:32
fight for her life. The autopsy reveals
multiple defensive injuries, which are injuries
that are sustained
00:11:40
when someone's fighting back
against the perpetrator. Darlene has multiple
bruises, scrapes,
00:11:45
and scratches of her forearm. She has injuries consistent
with those bite marks on her extremities
as she's trying
00:11:52
to force the person off of her. She also has what appear to be
injuries consistent with bite
00:11:56
marks of her nipple. So an incredibly violent attack. But this is an
individual that fought
00:12:02
back to her greatest ability. Colorado Springs Police
asked military investigators
00:12:09
from Fort Carson for their help. After all, Darlene Krashoc spent
her last night alive partying
00:12:17
out with fellow soldiers. So the US Army Criminal
Investigation Division, CID, searches within the military
for a possible suspect.
00:12:29
JOE SOMOSKY: The Army's
Criminal Investigation Division worked hand in
hand with us from beginning.
00:12:33
CID agents from the army worked
with our homicide detectives. They paired up, they
split resources.
00:12:38
And the Army Nexus
helped because the army was able to make soldiers be
present for these interviews.
00:12:45
Whereas in the civilian
side, a lot of times, people will avoid us. They won't answer calls,
they won't answer their door,
00:12:50
they won't speak to us at
work, things like that. Where in the army, I know
you have to follow orders.
00:12:55
And a lot of times, this was
such a big deal in active duty soldier being murdered
in the community,
00:12:58
especially in this fashion. NANCY GRACE:
Statistics show most murder victims actually
know their killer
00:13:05
in one way or another. So Colorado Springs detectives
and military investigators
00:13:11
focus on Darlene's
close circle of friends. There was no evidence
that the victim in this case
00:13:18
was in any kind of a
dispute with anybody, or that she had been
fighting with anybody,
00:13:24
or was enemies with
anybody like that. She was engaged at the
time, but her fiance
00:13:29
was down in military training. And so they knew that
he had a solid alibi. There was no way
that he could have
00:13:34
possibly even been in the area. And on top of that, he
would have had no motive for the murder either.
00:13:40
She did have an ex-husband. She had been recently divorced. But by all accounts,
that divorce
00:13:45
was relatively amicable. They didn't have any issues. I know that he had another
solid alibi as well.
00:13:51
And so those two first obvious
leads went away very quickly. NANCY GRACE: Investigators use
standard operating procedure.
00:13:59
They retrace Darlene
Krashoc last movements just before the night she
was out with her friends.
00:14:08
JOSEPH EDEN: One of the
things that detectives did was essentially tracked
down almost every person
00:14:14
that was in the bar that night. It was really impressive to
read through their reports
00:14:18
from 1987 and all the
people that they talk to. They must have done so much
work to find this many people.
00:14:25
Even if it was right
around that time, they were going off of
very limited information.
00:14:32
It was all word of mouth. That didn't really generate
a whole lot of leads. NANCY GRACE: Police focus
on two young men who were
00:14:39
also in the bar that night. One of them quickly becomes
a person of interest. JOSEPH EDEN: The male friends
that she was with, those were
00:14:48
kind of early unpegged
as potential suspects because they were the last
people who had ever seen her
00:14:52
alive and the last
people who could confirm that they had seen her alive. And then they left
together that night
00:14:58
and they just went
to another bar. Now one of them turned
out to have a really solid
00:15:03
alibi because he went and met up
with his girlfriend that night. But whenever they
found him, there's
00:15:08
kind of an
interesting side story there because he had
scratch marks on his back.
00:15:13
And so they went
and talked to him and asked him about how he
got those scratch marks.
00:15:17
And it turns out that
was from consensual sex with his girlfriend
later that night,
00:15:20
but they had to confirm that,
of course, with his girlfriend. They were able to,
once again, rule
00:15:24
out suspects very early on. But as far as identifying
anybody right away that they
00:15:30
really thought could have been
responsible for this crime, they weren't able to do that.
00:15:33
And so that's where
the DNA became so important so many years later. All of them
cooperated, all of them
00:15:40
provided samples or took
a polygraph as requested. And ultimately, they were
all cleared as suspects
00:15:47
after the initial investigation. And after that, there
was no real front runner as far as suspects goes.
00:15:55
NANCY GRACE: Multiple leads
fail to deliver a suspect. Weeks turn into months. The investigation into
Darlene's murder goes cold.
00:16:06
JOE SOMOSKY: Everyone
that we talked to, to include
Darlene's husband, were cooperative and compliant.
00:16:11
Soldiers from all different
units, Darlene's and outside of Fort Carson, civilians
that we talked to,
00:16:17
possible suspects who were
at the bar identified. A composite sketch was
made of someone that
00:16:21
was seen to be dancing with
Darlene before her friends left, which was, I mean,
it looked like a white guy
00:16:26
with a flattop. Which at this time, I
mean, that was probably 99% of everyone at
Fort Carson at the time
00:16:32
and then some people in
the community as well. So every lead ultimately
became exhausted,
00:16:36
and this leads would
come in through the years that would be followed up on. But no information
was ever presented
00:16:41
that led us to a strong
suspect, a viable suspect, or got us any closer to
identifying where Darlene
00:16:47
Krashoc was actually
murdered before she was found behind the business. The murder of Darlene
Krashoc remains unsolved
00:16:56
for more than 30 long years. That is until detectives turn to
ground breaking science to try
00:17:04
and catch Darlene's killer. That's next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [AUDIO LOGO] Colorado Springs, 2016.
00:17:22
Nearly 30 long years
since the savage sex attack and murder of a
young 20-year-old Army
00:17:32
Specialist Darlene Krashoc. Darlene's badly
mutilated body found trashed next to a dumpster
after she leaves a bar alone.
00:17:44
Now, Colorado Springs
detectives hope and pray new
investigative science can finally crack this case.
00:17:53
Detectives were
always involved. They always have
somebody who is assigned to these types of cases.
00:17:58
And they have an entire cold
case homicide unit over there that really just looks
at these types of cases,
00:18:03
investigations that have gone
cold from these types of time periods. Now, rather any
leads were really
00:18:09
generated in the meantime,
it was pretty scarce there for a little while. And certainly through the
90s, soon after this happened,
00:18:16
there wasn't a
whole lot that was able to happen with
the case because there just wasn't any new information
that they were really getting.
00:18:24
Me as an investigator looking
at the amount of evidence that we had collected, you
kind of sit back in your chair
00:18:29
and go, why haven't we
had a match to this? We have good male DNA
as being our suspect.
00:18:35
Why haven't we caught this guy? Reading that initial case,
I knew the old investigators
00:18:40
that had originally worked
on that were in contact with Darlene's parents. After reading the case,
I learned early on
00:18:49
that her parents were involved. They would frequently reach
out to the police department
00:18:54
to see if there was
any new updates. So I picked up the
phone and called. Introduced myself, saying
I was assigned the case.
00:19:01
My first phone contact
with them initially, I basically explained I was
in charge of the case now.
00:19:06
I didn't really
have anything new to tell them, but definitely
provided my information
00:19:10
and told them to
call me any time. NANCY GRACE: Investigators
bring Darlene Krashoc's parents
00:19:17
back into the investigation. Detectives review the evidence
they've gathered so far
00:19:22
and they zero in on DNA
samples, which, thank heaven, have been preserved. LEON KELLY: This case has
multiple potential transfers
00:19:34
of DNA from the
perpetrator to the victim. DNA was collected from the
ligatures, the objects that
00:19:39
were found on her, as well
as from the various injuries areas that were
suggestive of bite marks.
00:19:45
As well as the fact that it
was clear that a sexual assault occurred in this case
based on the injuries
00:19:50
so vaginal swabs were collected. All of those with the
hopes that they would provide critical
information tying
00:19:55
the victim to our perpetrator. This is an especially
vicious sex attack. Darlene was tortured.
00:20:08
Investigators firmly believe
her killer most likely had struck again. So they are hoping for a
match within the National
00:20:20
DNA database, CODIS. LEON KELLY: What's important
to keep in mind in DNA is that there is
no central database
00:20:28
of every human being on earth. You don't put the DNA and it
spits out who this person is,
00:20:32
where they live, and
what's their phone number. You can only search
databases that already exist,
00:20:37
people who've already
had their DNA submitted. And through, certainly the
80s, 90s, and early 2000s,
00:20:43
that was limited essentially
to violent perpetrators. If you hadn't committed a
violent crime in the past,
00:20:49
there was no database
that your DNA was going to be present there. That's still, despite
the advent of DNA
00:20:55
and then searching that
CODIS database of those violent offenders,
unfortunately,
00:21:00
it didn't lead to the answer. So this was not someone
who was in the system. They were out there,
but we just didn't
00:21:06
have their DNA at that point. NANCY GRACE: Another dead end. The CODIS database
does not find a match.
00:21:13
Colorado Springs Police and
the US military crime unit search for a new
scientific strategy.
00:21:21
I came into the
picture around 2015. I was assigned the
case to review and try to identify if there were
any new leads or new angles
00:21:32
we could work with. Everything was really
thoroughly documented, and it was really easy to
identify what evidence existed
00:21:40
and where it was. That's half the battle
sometimes in these cold cases. Once I had an understanding
of what was done,
00:21:46
I reached out to the army crime
lab and the Colorado Springs police department cold
case team so that we could
00:21:52
have a collaborative
conversation and see what we could do
to move things forward.
00:21:58
JOE SOMOSKY: So Detective Isham
and I worked with CID Agent Jessica Veltri and we determined
that Darlene Krashoc's case had
00:22:04
a high probability
of being solved but only if we moved from
the conventional methods
00:22:08
of investigation. All these years have
passed, no suspect DNA had been entered into CODIS
to match what we had gotten
00:22:14
from the crime scene and from
the physical evidence collected so we had to do
something different.
00:22:18
At that time, we had determined
that at Parabon NanoLabs, which we had used for
genetic phenotype snapshots,
00:22:24
could also be used
for a new technology or a new process called
genetic genealogy.
00:22:31
JIM ISHAM: Agent
Veltri, I could tell she was very invested in the case. Came to me and said
the military would like
00:22:37
to pay to put this DNA
sample through the testing, do some genetic genealogy,
would I be willing to do that.
00:22:44
Of course, I said,
yeah, I was thrilled. JESSICA VELTRI:
Genetic genealogy is the practice of using genetic
data from DNA in combination
00:22:54
with genealogical
records to identify relationships among people. And so we can use it
in law enforcement
00:23:01
by trying to identify
how a match in a database might be related to our suspect
by building family trees,
00:23:08
and ultimately
identifying that person. NANCY GRACE: Military
CID and Colorado Police
00:23:15
agree to proceed with
genetic genealogy. Parabon NanoLabs
takes the sample and they launch a search
for a very unique DNA match.
00:23:28
JESSICA VELTRI: They
take the suspect DNA once they have the
profile developed and they enter it into
these public databases.
00:23:35
And when they enter it,
they can run a search. And the search will produce
cousin, possible third cousin.
00:23:41
They share this amount
of DNA in common. And they do that with several
matches for our suspect DNA
00:23:48
and they find common ancestors. And then they can work
those common ancestors down
00:23:53
through their descendants to
see who of those descendants might have been in
Colorado at that time,
00:23:58
might fit the age
of our suspect. And that's kind of how they
developed this suspect profile.
00:24:06
NANCY GRACE: 32 painful years
after Darlene Krashoc's murder, Parabon NanoLabs contacts
Colorado Springs detectives
00:24:16
with a possible breakthrough. Jim and I we're
familiar with the process. We got an email saying
that the results were in,
00:24:22
and the next step was
to have a briefing. Jim and I were present
while the investigators
00:24:26
and scientists from Parabon
shared with us their findings. And we followed it along
on a written report
00:24:30
that they had prepared. JIM ISHAM: When the
analyst from Parabon said we have a match to
the person in your case
00:24:36
report identified as unknown
individual number one, you know, you felt like
jumping up for joy and run
00:24:42
around the office. You just don't get
better news than that. JOSEPH EDEN: When they
built those family trees
00:24:49
on either side of unknown
individual number one, they found that intersection,
that intersection bore one son,
00:24:56
and that one son
was a soldier who was stationed in Fort Carson
at the time of the murder.
00:25:02
And so they knew right away it
wasn't just coincidence, right. It wasn't just that
they had their lead
00:25:10
and this is just
like some random guy living out on the East
Coast or something.
00:25:15
This was somebody who
was actually stationed in Fort Carson at the same
time as our victim was
00:25:20
during the time of the murder. JESSICA VELTRI: The suspect
name that was produced to us
00:25:25
by Parabon was Michael Whyte. He was a soldier in the
army at that time stationed
00:25:31
at Fort Carson, Colorado. He had no history that was
known as far as violence, just
00:25:37
some routine traffic citations. And ultimately, his name was
nowhere in the case file.
00:25:44
NANCY GRACE:
Detectives have a name and they began to take a
closer look at Michael Whyte.
00:25:51
JESSICA VELTRI: We did
some digging on the name to try to see, one, was he
interviewed as a suspect.
00:25:56
In the initial stages
of the investigation, was he identified as a
person that was at the club
00:26:00
that night. Was he a soldier? Where did he live? We did all that
background research.
00:26:05
We didn't find his name
anywhere in the file so there was no indication
that he was ever
00:26:09
identified or interviewed
as part of Darlene's initial investigation. JOE SOMOSKY: Based on the very
specific and extremely violent
00:26:16
nature of Darlene Krashoc's
murder and sexual assault, not just myself, but
investigators before me
00:26:22
who had worked on Darlene's
case ever at the onset or in between when it
was a brand new case
00:26:27
and when it was a cold case. I always thought that this
was someone who had committed
00:26:31
a similar offense in the past. We looked at unsolved
cases, not just here, but we asked Interpol
to see if they
00:26:36
had anything that
matched that method used in Darlene's murder. And while we found some that
were kind of matches, not
00:26:42
really full matches. And then once Mr.
Whyte was identified as being the possible
suspect in that case,
00:26:48
we looked at where
he was stationed during his military
career to see if there was anything matching.
00:26:53
And while we did
find cases that had some similar
characteristics, not exact, we couldn't draw a link to them.
00:26:59
So it was hard to believe that
something so violent and so specific was a one-off crime.
00:27:05
JIM ISHAM: And I went
back and forth on this. I have my own
theory of what might
00:27:09
have taken place that night. But if you look at
the overall picture and the severe brutality of
the way this killing happened,
00:27:17
can people just snap
out of the blue? Sure, we've all seen it. But the brutality of this,
the injuries she sustained, we
00:27:26
were all thinking this is
either not his first time or it wasn't his last. So that's always in
the back of your mind.
00:27:34
NANCY GRACE: In light of the
brutality of Darlene's murder, police know the perpetrator
is capable of horrible acts.
00:27:43
They close in on Michael Whyte. Their next step
is to obtain a DNA sample from Whyte without
alerting a possible killer.
00:27:54
[AUDIO LOGO] Colorado Springs, 2019. Detectives closing
in on a suspect they believe murder Darlene
Krashoc 32 years before.
00:28:12
The young army
specialist horribly sex attacked, tortured,
and thrown away like trash next to a dumpster.
00:28:21
Thanks to forensic
genetic genealogy, police finally have at least
a suspect and a name
00:28:27
to go with it, Michael Whyte. Michael Whyte was a US Army
soldier stationed at Fort
00:28:34
Carson at the exact same time. So he would have been
co-located at the base, even though they weren't
in the same unit,
00:28:40
and lived in the community
in Colorado Springs. His military career spanned
over 20 years and he retired.
00:28:46
CID Agent Jessica Veltri helped
us get his military background. And we saw that he had been
posted all across the United
00:28:52
States, in Europe, in Hawaii. And after retirement,
had moved back to Denver where he worked for
a telecommunications company.
00:29:00
Police then launched
a background check. They're trying to establish
Michael Whyte was in Colorado
00:29:06
Springs at the time
Darlene Krashoc was sex attacked and murdered. The next step is
to secure his DNA
00:29:15
sample without alerting Whyte. JOSEPH EDEN: They knew that
they needed to collect a sample
00:29:20
directly from Michael Whyte
to compare against the samples that have been taken from
the items of evidence that
00:29:25
were found at the crime scene. And so what they did was
they looked more into where
00:29:30
Michael Whyte was at the time. In 2019, they found that
he was living in Thornton.
00:29:35
They actually followed
him from his home one day, watched him go to work. They kind of waited for
lunch time, waited for him
00:29:43
to leave his place of work. And he went to a
burger restaurant and sat down and had a burger.
00:29:49
And while he was sitting
there, he was sitting there with a friend and
he was drinking
00:29:52
from like a red
hard plastic cup. JIM ISHAM: Basically,
what the court says is if I put something
in the trash,
00:29:59
I have no expectation
of that being mine or no expectation of privacy. So as far as law enforcement,
I can reach in the trash,
00:30:06
grab it, and we can submit it. Those detectives grabbed that
cup, placed it into evidence.
00:30:13
They swabbed the door
handles of the vehicle he was seen in that day. Those samples were
also sent into the lab.
00:30:19
Now it's a waiting game. JESSICA VELTRI: So the idea was
to send that trash to the army
00:30:25
crime lab to test
his DNA against our known forensic
sample from the evidence at the crime scene.
00:30:32
Because the genetic genealogy
identification wasn't enough alone to make an arrest.
00:30:37
NANCY GRACE: Darlene
Krashoc's cold case team finally gets the news
they've been waiting for.
00:30:44
JOSEPH EDEN: They found
for the first time that it was a conclusive match. That the person that was
sitting at that table,
00:30:49
drinking from that
cup, was the person who had also left their DNA
at the crime scene in 1987.
00:30:54
And when that came back to
be a match, that was enough probable cause
for the detectives
00:31:00
to then get an arrest
warrant for Michael Whyte. JOE SOMOSKY: We
took steps to ensure
00:31:04
we could make notifications
to Darlene's family if and when Michael Whyte was
identified as the suspect,
00:31:08
and if and when we
made the arrest. We figured out
where he was living and what his schedule was,
and let Jessica Veltri
00:31:15
and her team at CID know. And they flew overnight from
Hawaii to Colorado Springs
00:31:19
so they could be
present for the arrest. Our undercover officers from
the Metro Fugitive Unit,
00:31:25
again, assisted
with surveillance. And we determined
that they were going to be the arrest team for this.
00:31:29
We set up surveillance and a
perimeter around his house, and waited and waited. And his wife came out of
the house several times
00:31:35
to work in the yard. And the determination
was made that we were going to make contact and
make an arrest at that point.
00:31:42
Now, police have only
one thing left to d. arrest Michael Whyte for the sex
attack and murder of young army
00:31:51
specialist Darlene Krashoc. Their takedown is next on
"Bloodline Detectives." [AUDIO LOGO]
00:32:07
2019, Colorado
Springs detectives move in to arrest
the main suspect in the 1987 murder of army
specialist Darlene Krashoc.
00:32:19
His name, Michael Whyte. He had been a soldier at
the same base as Darlene when one night, she is
sex attacked, tortured,
00:32:30
and murdered. Then, the beautiful 20-year-old
girl thrown beside a dumpster. I remember being on the
back side of his residence.
00:32:42
The offender units detectives
knocked, they went inside. And within two or
three minutes, I
00:32:48
heard radio communications
that they had taken him into custody without incident.
00:32:52
I came around the back
side of Mr. Whyte's house about the time they
were placing him
00:32:57
into the back of a police car. BEN HOSTETTER: And
law enforcement went and arrested him.
00:33:05
The detective's remark was
that the look on his face was like he'd been expecting
this day for a long time.
00:33:11
Michael Whyte was arrested. I was brought back,
I was interviewed. The primary statement that
he gave to law enforcement
00:33:18
when they showed him
Darlene Krashoc's photograph was, that looks like my ex-wife.
00:33:23
Otherwise denied knowing
Darlene Krashoc or recalling her, other than she looked
familiar to him as his ex-wife.
00:33:32
JOSEPH EDEN: He voluntarily
submitted to an interview. He certainly acted like he had
no idea what they were talking
00:33:37
about, or what they
were there for, or anything that
had been going on. But they kind of dug into
his past a little bit,
00:33:44
got some answers about
what he was doing in 1987 and where he was. And at that point
in time, they had
00:33:49
the warrant to take the sample
from his person directly. And so they did take that
sample directly from his person.
00:33:55
And they tested that sample
that was taken directly from him against
all that evidence
00:34:01
that was collected in 1987. And that's where we got our
match that was the most solid
00:34:06
for us as a prosecution team. NANCY GRACE:
"Bloodline Detectives" have two complete
DNA matches linking
00:34:14
Whyte with semen found
on the body of Darlene Krashoc back in 1987. And they feel confident
they've got the evidence
00:34:24
to secure a conviction. But of course, there's a hitch. The Colorado statute
of limitation states
00:34:31
too much time has passed to
formally accuse Whyte of rape. While we had to dismiss
the sexual assault count,
00:34:41
it was still the basis for
our felony murder count. Because what we were
saying to the jury
00:34:46
was that the victim in
this case was killed during the commission
of a felony, that felony
00:34:51
being sexual assault.
So even though it was a felony at the time,
we couldn't charge it now,
00:34:57
but it was still the basis
for the felony murder charge that we did have. BEN HOSTETTER: Michael Whyte
decided to take the stand
00:35:03
and testified in his trial. His statement then was that
he didn't remember or recall
00:35:08
Darlene Krashoc, which I
just found inconceivable given the amount of
media coverage that this
00:35:14
happened at that time. The fact that he was stationed
at the same base with her.
00:35:18
I mean, it was plastered
all over the news. For him to just
say that he didn't know or remember Darlene,
I found almost offensive.
00:35:25
Because he did know. He remembered Darlene Krashoc. NANCY GRACE: Two more years
pass until a jury in 2021
00:35:34
listens to all the evidence. Michael Whyte takes the
stand in his own defense. And he stupidly brags
about his womanizing,
00:35:46
and then goes on to vigorously
deny murdering Darlene Krashoc. But the jury doesn't buy it.
00:35:55
They convict Michael Whyte
on all counts guilty. The judge then passed his
sentence, life in prison
00:36:04
with no parole. I don't think that you can
commit this type of a crime and be capable of remorse,
especially when you consider
00:36:14
those three cigarette butts. I mean, they were smoked
down to the filter. And there wasn't one,
there were three.
00:36:20
And if that was
the body dumpsite, that means that he had
to have stood there and stared at that
body, dragging all three
00:36:27
of those cigarettes. There's no remorse
in this killing. And there was no remorse
shown by Michael Whyte.
00:36:35
JESSICA VELTRI: It was strange
to be in the same room with him right there, and then
also in the same room
00:36:40
with Darlene's parents. But I was very grateful
that her parents were alive and well to witness
the trial of Michael Whyte.
00:36:50
I don't know if it
brought them closure, but I'm hopeful that it brought
them some sense of peace
00:36:57
knowing that both
Colorado Springs Police Department
and Army CID never gave up on their daughter.
00:37:04
That ultimately, justice
was served for her. NANCY GRACE: Later, the team
reflects on how they solved
00:37:11
a seemingly impossible case. JOSEPH EDEN: Jessica
Veltri worked incredibly hard, possibly harder
than anybody else on this case.
00:37:19
It was a very good
coordinated effort between CSPD and the army
investigations lab as well.
00:37:29
They worked very close, hand
in hand with one another. I've had the honor and
privilege of working high level
00:37:36
complex investigations
like homicides for a good part of my career. And it's a big part
of my livelihood.
00:37:41
Just knowing that,
one, it brings closure not just to Darlene
Krashoc, but to her family.
00:37:46
Two, it let other perpetrators,
who have been undetected at this time, know that as long
as an agency does their work
00:37:53
and never gives up, that there's
a very good chance that they'll be brought to justice.
00:37:59
NANCY GRACE: This case and so
many others like it would still be unresolved had it not been
for remarkable developments
00:38:07
in forensic genetic genealogy. LEON KELLY: The advances
in genealogy and DNA submitted essentially
by the public
00:38:16
has really launched
a Renaissance of cold case examination. Without this new database,
without this new material
00:38:27
to compare it to, none of
this justice would be served. It really is, at this point,
the greatest tool we have.
00:38:34
In searching cold
cases and revisiting some of these old mysteries
are the willingness
00:38:40
of the citizens, of individuals,
who are obviously curious about their own background, their own
history, their own genealogy
00:38:46
to submit that material. It undoubtedly will
continue to provide law enforcement and folks such
as myself critical information.
00:38:55
Allows us to bring closure
and justice to cases and tragedies of long ago. I would anticipate,
there are going to be many
00:39:05
more cases like this coming
down the line in the future. I think that genetic
genealogy is single-handedly
00:39:12
what solved this case for us. LAURI MARTIN: Michael
Whyte would never have been caught
without DNA technology
00:39:19
and genetic genealogy. Had those distant relatives
not submitted their DNA into those databases,
who knows if he
00:39:27
ever would have been caught. He was living this normal life. He was married, he
lived an hour and a half
00:39:32
away from the crime scene,
he had no criminal past. He never thought he
was going to be found.
00:39:41
JIM ISHAM: The advancements
in forensic technologies and advancements in DNA, I think
you have a lot of detectives
00:39:47
out there now just
smiling, going, you know what, it's
a matter of time. You know, so the
criminals out there
00:39:53
that think they've got away
with things for years and years may not have room to
hide for very long.
00:39:59
NANCY GRACE: As an
army specialist, this beautiful girl,
20-year-old Darlene Krashoc,
00:40:05
truly represented what
teamwork really means. Darlene's brutal death at
the hands of another soldier
00:40:15
demanded teamwork on
the part of others. The Colorado Springs Police,
the Army Criminal Investigation
00:40:23
Division, and of course, the
scientist at Parabon NanoLabs. Their efforts, along with ground
breaking forensic science,
00:40:33
finally brings a killer
to justice after 32 years. I'm Nancy Grace. Thank you for joining us here
at "Bloodline Detectives."
00:40:45
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