In 1989, the entire town of Miramichi is held hostage by a monster. This troubled man with a heinous past embarks on a 7-month crime spree, including brutal beatings, rape, arson and serial murder. His victims are women, both young and old. The rampage culminates in the killing of a local priest. Finally, Canada's most intensive manhunt frees the people from Allan Legere, the Monster of Miramichi.
In 1995, terror descends upon the Bible belt community of Abbotsford, BC. An attack on two teenage girls leaves one dead and starts a 7-month siege of torment. The killer hides, phoning and taunting both police and community with details of his horrific crimes. Behind the voice is Terry Driver, a devote husband and father with a terrifying double life. His crimes change the community forever.
A young Vancouver woman is tied to a tree and sexually assaulted for 9 straight days just yards away from the busiest highway in Canada. A wealthy Ontario realtor and his wife are found murdered in the trunk of their car. Behind it all, a reclusive loner named David Snow. Snow's passion for antiques is so intense that it sends him down a violent path from which there is no turning back.
This episode details information about John Wayne Gacy (March 17, 1942 – May 10, 1994) who was an American serial killer and sex offender known as the Killer Clown. He assaulted and murdered at least 33 young men and boys.
A man who was once accepted into a small Quebec community and commonly referred to as Bill l'Anglais turns out to be a murderer, whose crimes cover nearly twenty years. When he makes four trips from Barrie, ON to Montreal, QC in the fall of 1999 in an accelerating frenzy of rape and murder, he leaves behind a single fingerprint. Through skillful police work and intense surveillance, the police are able to catch their killer in the process of disposing incriminating evidence.
On December 11, 1987 a hard luck child living in a group home in Ontario was reported missing when she failed to return home from school. Trina Campbell had been known to run away on occasion but, this time she had been abducted by a convicted rapist. With the help of the suspect's sister and brother-in-law, authorities begin a surveillance mission that would take them across three provinces and lead them directly to where Trina's remains were hidden.
Known as the Vampire Rapist for his distinctive modus operandi, Wayne Boden would rape, strangle and bite the breasts of his victims. It was a bite mark that he left on his Calgary victim that proved he was the person responsible for these crimes. Superior evidence gathering and the help of a local orthodontist would work to ensure his conviction for his Calgary crime, and force him to plead guilty to three similar cases in Montreal.
In August of 1982, six members of the Bentley/Johnson family disappear in the Wells Grey National Park without a trace. Over a month later, the burned out Johnson vehicle is found with the remains of all six family members burnt beyond recognition inside. A massive manhunt for the killer begins, finally ending with a local man, David Shearing confessing to the crimes.
In 1983 the ex-wife of Cabinet Minister Colin Thatcher is found brutally murdered in her garage. Police have their suspect, but pointing the finger at powerful politician Colin Thatcher is dangerous business. Through intense interrogations and a brilliant sting operation, police gather the evidence they need to shake the halls of power and bring the killer to justice.
Spring 1998. In the city of Moncton, New Brunswick police discover the bodies of Joan Hicks and her 11-year-old daughter, Nina - both brutally murdered late in the night. That same day, an eyewitness account prompts police to arrest Michael Wayne McGray for the heinous crime. However the real investigation soon uncovers the depths of Michael McGray's twisted mind, revealing a nation-wide killing spree that spanned more than a decade.
An international student is found raped and murdered in the bathroom of her high-rise apartment. Police on the scene have few concrete leads, but painstaking fingerprint analysis finally connects a Malaysian bodybuilder named Tien Poh Su to the crime scene. To bolster the circumstantial evidence, police pursue an elaborate undercover operation to get the blood sample they need to convict a rapist who practices crime 'by the book'.
On a single rain-soaked night during the Victoria Day weekend, police are called to the scene of three very similar crimes. Three sex-workers found dead only blocks away from each other, and each of them shot in the head execution style. Fear of a serial killer shake the community. Police have few clues to go on, and rely on hypnosis to bring about an image from the only eyewitness. The image produced points police in the direction of the most unlikely of suspects, Marcello Palma.
Women are being attacked in their beds at night. At each crime scene police find no trace of forced entry and are baffled as to how this intruder is gaining access to apartments sometimes more than 15 stories up. Unraveling the killer's modus operandi and eyewitness accounts lead detectives to Russell Johnson - a handsome and well-built man who actually scales apartment balconies to find his victims. Pressured into a hasty and premature arrest, detectives must gain the evidence they need from the killers unstable mind, otherwise this balcony climber could walk free to hunt again.
A hunter on the outskirts of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan stumbles across human remains. Police are called to the scene and over the next two months, two more full sets of remains are uncovered in the same vicinity. At the same time, forensic anthropology determines that the remains are less than two years old and all three were female and Aboriginal. The threat of a serial killer is soon on everyone's mind and threatening the Saskatoon Aboriginal community. An unprecedented tip from an unreliable source soon has the RCMP working in conjunction with the local media. Together they will attempt to pull-off an elaborate sting operation designed to record the incriminating truth straight from the mouth of John Martin Crawford
In the winter of 1968, the prairie city of Saskatoon is ravaged by a string of savage rapes. A few months later, fears are bolstered when a young nurse is found raped and murdered in an alley near her home. Police attention is brought to a young man named David Milgaard - the evidence on him is thin, but the court finds him guilty. After spending nearly 20 years in prison, David continues to plead his innocence. Through the undying faith of his mother, the real killer is slowly discovered to be a man named Larry Fisher. Approaching the turn of the century new DNA technologies finally exonerate David and plant the real killer, Larry Fisher, behind bars for life.
Near Montreal, a husband comes home from work and finds his wife bound, gagged and shot in the head. There is no evidence of sexual assault or theft and police are left without a lead to go on. Some years later, police are called out to a crime scene very similar to the scene four years earlier, but this time they find that the killer has stolen the victim's bankcard. They trace the card to a convenience store and by ingeniously matching the security camera to the bank records detectives acquire an image of their prime suspect. Police quickly locate and arrest the man who promptly admits to both murders as well as the murder of a woman gone missing 7 years earlier.
On a rainy night in Edmonton, Alberta police are called to a trucking yard where the body of a 6-year-old girl laying face down in the mud rattles the most seasoned homicide detectives. Few clues are left at the crime scene, and a mysterious marking left in the soft ground is the only lead that police have to follow. The city residents are overcome with fear for their children, which prompts an immense response of tips from across the province. However, despite the thousands of tips and leads that are processed, the investigation enters its 10th year, and the police are no closer to finding the killer. Finally, an officer unexpectedly finds the one clue that ties a man by the name of Clifford Sleigh to the crime committed almost a decade earlier. Revolutionary DNA analysis conclusively determines that he is the Boogeyman that police have been searching for.
In downtown Edmonton, a prominent business owner is found shot to death in his business. Police on the scene discover several suspicious clues, leading them to suspect a hired assassin from somewhere in Europe. However, revolutionary finger printing technology links Keith Latta, the victim's business partner to the crime. The discovery of a $75000 insurance policy bolsters it further. When questioned about his involvement Keith creates an elaborate story to explain his innocence. At the same time, new evidence is discovered which ties Keith even closer to the crime. Once again Keith changes his story, but by now the evidence is too hard and damning.
For three weeks in May of 1994, a brutal killer had a nation on edge. A bloody spree of rapes, kidnappings, and murders resulted in the deaths of six Oklahoma residents, including a local radio personality and an elderly widower. Gary Alan Walker, an emotionally disturbed ex-convict, was eventually captured and executed for these crimes.
Multiple murders in rural communities are always a shocking occurrence, but never more so than in Livingston County, Missouri in the late 1980's. Ray and Faye Copeland, an elderly farmer and his wife, would become America's oldest couple on death row when a simple livestock scam escalated into murder.
The trail of crimes committed by Sacramento handyman Morris Solomon, who entered the homes of his victims to commit murder
Dorothea Puente spent much of the 1980's providing shelter for the elderly and infirm in her Sacramento boardinghouse. It wasn't until the first body was found in her backyard that authorities realized Dorothea was not the sweet old woman she first appeared to be.
Like many Alaskans, bakery owner Robert C. Hansen was known for his hunting abilities. In the early 1980's, however, his taste for hunting took a sinister turn. A growing list of missing persons and the discovery of two dead bodies led the police to begin the search for a killer who raped his victims before turning them loose and hunting them down like animals
One of the most intensive manhunts in the history of Texas took place over the summer of 1999 when brutal serial killer Angel Resendez Ramirez was on the loose. Riding the rails eastward and driving the vehicles of his victims back west, Resendez terrorized railroad communities all across America before finally surrendering to police.
In the early 1990s, the tourist hotspot of New South Wales, Australia became a place of fear when backpackers started going missing. Over the course of a year, the bodies of seven missing backpackers were found in Belanglo State Forest, 150 km from Sydney. After an intense police investigation, local construction worker Ivan Milat was found guilty of these crimes.
During a time when immigration to Sweden was growing, feelings of racism were also on the rise. On August 2, 1991, one man began to act by shooting young immigrants on the streets of Stockholm. His weapon of choice, a laser guided rifle, would earn him the nickname "The Laser Man".
In 1985, a brutal killer had Southern Californians fearing for their lives. Richard Ramirez, known as "The Night Stalker", entered homes in the dead of night to terrorize the people inside. After six months and 14 murders, Ramirez was chased and beaten by a gang of citizens and finally arrested for his horrendous crimes.
On July 26, 1983, police in Vero Beach, Florida received a report of a nude man firing shots at a naked girl on a residential street. When they arrived on the scene, officers found the body of a 17-year-old girl hidden in the trunk of a car. David Allen Gore surrendered to police and confessed to five other murders, also implicating his cousin Fred Waterfield in the crimes.
On August 8, 1973, police in Pasadena, Houston received a phone call from a young man who had just committed murder. He claims that his victim, Dean Corll, was going to kill him just like he had done to so many others. Over the next 3 days, police will uncover the bodies of 27 boys who had all mysteriously disappeared. The most shocking part of the story, Corll's killer was also his accomplice.
In the late 1990s, a string of disappearances in Rockhampton, Queensland leave police searching for a killer they can't identify. The murder of a 9-year-old girl on her way home from school blows the case wide open when ex-con Leonard Fraser is arrested and convicted for her murder. Without the evidence to connect Fraser to the other disappearances, however, police must rely on one of his fellow inmates to get the truth from Fraser.
When the body of a local beauty queen is found in a farmer's field near Sydney, Australia, the entire country is riveted. Eyewitness accounts lead to John Travers, an out of control kid leading a notorious gang that terrorized the area. Police work tirelessly on the case, wrapping up their investigation with multiple raids to bring in the loathsome crew.
Gerald Gallego, son of a convicted killer, and Charlene Gallego, honour student and musical prodigy, were a match made in hell. Preying mostly on young women, they raped and murdered ten people in counties across the western States between 1978 and 1980. The Gallegos earned the odious title of the first husband and wife serial murderers.
In 1974, a man identifying himself as the BTK (Bind, Torture, Kill) Strangler started a killing spree in Kansas spanning the next two decades. He managed to kill ten people while eluding an intense manhunt by police. After a 13-year lull, he reemerged in 2004 through a disturbing letter to the media that ultimately lead to his capture a year later.
A dead body is identified as a local DJ and security guard, giving police a lead to three teens.
A week-long search for a missing 10-yr-old Indiana girl ends sadly with her body being discovered in a nearby stream. The ensuing investigation puts police through the wringer as they are misled by false confessions and stories of secret meth labs. DNA evidence eventually pins the crime on Anthony Stockelman and the community is finally able to achieve justice.
In November 1986, a snowstorm rips through Connecticut, leaving wife and mother Helle Crafts missing. Her husband, airline pilot Richard Crafts, evades suspicion for weeks by claiming that Helle had run off with another man. Groundbreaking forensic work and an eyewitness to a gruesome scene involving an industrial-sized woodchipper, result in a conviction that shocks a community.
US Coastguardsman Ricky Dale Hemphill and companion Charla Toma set out for a picnic along a river near Brookings, Oregon in the fall of 1979. A day later Ricky is found murdered and Charla is missing. A tip from a local hunter leads police to Edward Delen Warren, a former convict in the area trying to set up a religious retreat. What police uncover is a bizarre plot that will soon spiral out of control.
Three separate women, unrelated to one another, went missing from the Kansas City area in the 1980s and 90s. They all disappeared shortly after meeting a man online and coming to Missouri to meet him. Police suspected one man was behind the disappearances, and their surveillance of conman John Edward Robinson led them to gruesome evidence of the women's fate.
A common-law couple were found guilty of the 1990 rape and murder near Portland of Taunja Bennett. But a letter signed with a happy face sent to a Portland newspaper claimed responsibility for Taunja's murder, and others. The Happy Face Letter remains a mystery until Keith Jesperson is arrested on an unrelated murder. Investigators unravel the truth, convict Jesperson of Taunja's murder and free the wrongly convicted couple.
Stephen Grant reported his wife, Tara Lynn Grant, missing five days after he said she left their house in an unidentified black car. Macomb County Sheriff in Michigan focused on the mystery sedan, but attention soon turned to Stephen Grant. A search of the family home revealed Tara Lynn's dismembered body parts. Police tracked Grant to a state park in Northern Michigan and arrested him before he froze himself to death.
American Atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair and her family vanished in August 1995, leaving behind an ominous note claiming a family emergency. When the IRS started looking for some of the organization's missing money, they found a former employee with the motive to commit murder instead. Fellow Atheist David Waters was convicted and the complex case was finally put to rest.
Handyman Cary Stayner is accused of murdering three Yosemite National Park tourists.
In rural Ohio, Jamie Paxton was found dead. Investigators found no evidence at the crime scene, but Paxton's murder mirrored multiple deaths in the area. A psychological profile pointed to Thomas Lee Dillon as a suspect. Police arrested Dillon on firearms charges, giving authorities enough time to gather enough evidence to charge him with the murders that had plagued the community
When neurologist Richard Boggs called 911 early in the morning to report a patient's death, paramedics immediately had their doubts. However, it took a clever insurance agent and a private investigator to get to the bottom of this twisted case. In the end, three men, including the "dead" patient, were found guilty of murdering an innocent man for insurance money.
On a wintry morning in Sweden, Alexandra Fossmo, wife of pastor Helge Fossmo, was found shot to death in her bed. Soon after, their former nanny Sara Svensson confessed. However, investigators wisely suspected there was more to the story. Text messages revealed the pastor and his nanny had a relationship and proved that he incited her to murder his wife.
In November 1996, Raymond Collin went missing in his home town of Timmins, Ontario. The discovery days later of his body in a snow-covered truck in the downtown led Timmins police to uncover an assortment of possible suspects. However, police picked up the trail of the killers following another murder, this time in southern Ontario. The co-operation of the two Ontario police departments lead to the arrest and conviction of Robin Graves and Wayne Jones.
Having told neighbors and police that her house had been broken into and her mother and brother murdered by Albanian thugs, Erika De Nardo's story began to crumble upon a closer police investigation. Finding physical evidence that contradicted her story, police took her into custody, and discovered a disheartening plan that ended with Erika and her boyfriend murdering her family.
1986. Cindy Zarzycki is 13 years old when she goes missing on her way to a Detroit ice cream store. Considered a runaway, Cindy remains just another missing child on a milk carton until Detective Derek "Mac" McLaughlin receives her file nine years later. Teaming up with Jen Liebow, a fresh-faced intern, Mac revisits every single clue to identify Arthur Ream, father of Cindy's boyfriend Scott, as his prime suspect. With dogged determination and superb investigative skills, Mac and Jen discover new and conclusive evidence - enough to convict the killer. Arthur Ream is sentenced to life in prison twenty-two years after Cindy's disappearance.
1987. Just hours before her divorce hearing, Atlanta socialite Lita McClinton opens her front door for a flower delivery. The deliveryman, a small time hood named Tony Harwood, hands her a box of roses and then shoots her dead. Detective Welcome Harris - and most of Atlanta's elite - suspect Lita's estranged husband, millionaire Jim Sullivan, of orchestrating the murder. After a 19 year investigation, one guilty hit-man's confession and an international manhunt, Sullivan is finally found guilty of her contract killing.
It's just another meeting for Los Angeles real estate developer Meyer Muscatel. Unfortunately Muscatel meets with Iouri Mikhel, a Russian immigrant with murderous intent. A week later, Muscatel's body is found floating in a northern California lake. Mikhel masterminds a kidnap-for-ransom scheme, and he and his crew kill and dump four more victims. With a storyline that includes a bank account in Abu Dhabi and a mysterious Moscow middleman, the case is solved by FBI agents Louis Perez and Jim Davidson and prosecuted by Assistant US Attorney Robert Dugdale. Mikhel and his co-conspirator Jurijus Kadamovas are convicted of five cold-blooded, ruthless murders and, in 2007, are sentenced to death.
1978. Nancy, David and Susan Spangler are found shot to death in their home - the brutal slaughter is deemed a murder suicide. Over the next fifteen years, two more Spangler spouses, Sharon and Donna die in similarly suspicious circumstances. After an exhaustive investigation by numerous agencies, authorities finally get a confession from psychopath Robert Spangler as he reveals his role as a serial spousal killer.
1995. The brutally beaten body of First Nations sex trade worker Pamela George is discovered on a cold spring morning just outside Regina, Saskatchewan. Initial investigators focus on men known as 'bad tricks', but three weeks later, new information changes the direction of the investigation. Popular university students Steven Kummerfield and Alexander Ternowetsky, white boys from successful families, are charged with first-degree murder in the death of Ms. George. They are ultimately convicted of manslaughter in a sensational case that divides the public along racial lines.
1951. After confessing to the brutal murder of Clarence Pellet in Shelby, Montana, Frank Dryman, a mysterious hitchhiker, is sentenced to hang. Dryman's verdict attracts considerable attention and the public outcry results in Dryman's penalty being reduced to life behind bars. After serving 18 years Dryman is paroled but disappears in 1971. In 2009, discovering that Dryman is alive and still at large, victim Clarence Pellett's grandson Clem finally sees justice done.
In 1996, nurses and patients at the Veteran's Affairs Medical Center in Northampton grow concerned. It seems that wherever nurse Kristen Gilbert goes, death follows
On November 14, 1997, 14-year-old Reena Virk goes to a party at the Craigflower Bridge, near Victoria, Canada. It is there where her 'friends' swarm, burn and beat her down. When she walks away, Kelly Ellard and Warren Glowatski follow her, beat her again and drown her. They are arrested a week later by Saanich Police. The unfolding coverage shocks the country due to the senseless violence of the young crowd. Almost ten years later, Kelly Ellard was convicted of second-degree murder, ending one of the most tragic chapters in Canadian history.
Anthony Hopkins is a traveling preacher in Mobile, Alabama. Left with eight children to raise after his wife purportedly leaves him, he tells his congregation that she died giving birth. But it's not as it seems - Hopkins was forcing his stepdaughter to engage in sexual acts. When his wife finds out, he kills her and forces his stepdaughter to help him conceal the body. No one finds out until years later, when the girl becomes pregnant with his child and the harrowing story spills out.
Gary Evans makes his living robbing antique stores throughout New York State and is well known by police in the area. After two years of having no contact with him, police are thrust back onto his path in late 1997 - a path that is littered with bodies of his former associates and a few store owners who didn't get out of the way fast enough. Evans is eventually captured and confesses to the murders before killing himself, having never been prosecuted.
Over a two year period, eight women disappear from Poughkeepsie, NY. All of the women are prostitutes who work in the area. Several suspects come to light, but no evidence can ever be connected to them. Then in September 1998, a prostitute tells police that Kendall Francois tried to kill her. He had been questioned previously but said nothing incriminating and even passed a lie-detector test. When he finally confesses, a search of his home reveals eight bodies
Bruce Firman is found dead in his garage by soon to be ex-wife, Margaret Benesch, and her daughter, Elizabeth Gatenby. Suspicion immediately falls on Benesch - as the sole heir in Firman's will, she is entitled to receive everything, but produces a rock-solid alibi. When investigators dust Gatenby's rental car for fingerprints, one match those of a 17-year-old teenager. He said he'd been hired to kill Firman by Gatenby's son, Byron, who confesses that his mother planned it all.
18 year old Erin Chorney goes missing. Investigators immediately suspect her abusive boyfriend, Michael Bridges, but do not have enough evidence to arrest him. Over a year later, they turn to police for help. Officers go undercover as figures in charge of a powerful criminal organization. They tell Bridges that if he comes clean about his past, they will be able to trust him to join their association. When Bridges confesses to murdering Chorney, police move in and finally get their man.
The body of Katherine Foster is discovered at the University of Alabama. A student reports hearing gunshots the night before she was found, leading police to conclude that Foster was shot and left in the woods. Suspicion falls on a campus security guard, an apparent suicide who was obsessed with Foster's murder. The guard is cleared and the case goes cold for two decades before a whispered confession to an AA sponsor leads police to arrest and convict Jamie Letson, a friend of Katherine's.
Investigators find David Castor dead with a glass of bright green liquid nearby. His wife Stacey's fingerprints are on the glass and police locate a turkey baster in the garbage with David's DNA on the tip. They suspect Castor poisoned her husband. As evidence against her mounts, her daughter Ashley is found unconscious with a note proclaiming she killed David. Upon Ashley's recovery, Stacey is found to have poisoned both of them - and her first husband too.
Nikia Shanell Kilpatrick, 19, is found bound and strangled with a cord in her Jacksonville, Florida apartment. Within a month, three more bodies are discovered and attributed to the same killer, each found strangled with a cord fashioned into a peculiar slipknot. Police begin to find links - including DNA samples, fiber analysis, and cab and cell phone records - connecting taxi driver Paul Durousseau to the murders. He is eventually convicted of five counts of first-degree murder.
In 1987, Kathy Odom is found stabbed to death in her home. There are several signs suggesting that she knew her attacker, but detectives cannot make an arrest. Years later, a new technique is developed that allows DNA to be collected from items used in a murder. The lamp cord that was tied to Odom's wrist is subsequently tested for DNA. Her brother-in-law, Greg Markwardt, turns out to be a match for the profile and after fifteen years, is arrested for the murder of Kathy Odom.
In 2002, San Antonio police find Susan McFarland's abandoned vehicle. Soon after, her husband, Richard, files a missing persons report. Police find a stolen SUV across from the McFarland home with blood on the back bumper. The SUV leads police to Rick Clemmer, who has a shady past and a link to Susan. But evidence is found that also links Richard to the SUV - did Clemmer frame Richard? After 53 days of searching, police find Susan's body and tie it to Richard based on circumstantial evidence.
Exploring the police hunt for Louisiana serial killer Derrick Todd Lee, using first-hand accounts, dramatic re-enactments and exclusive footage to tell the story of his capture.
Virginia man Earl Bramblett, who was convicted of the murder of four people, all of the same family, and eventually went to the electric chair in 2003.
The story of a Nashville detective's relentless hunt for a potential serial killer, using first-hand accounts, dramatic re-enactments and exclusive footage.
The story behind the rampage of convicted Israeli murderer Elias Abuelazam.
The murder for hire company masterminded by Richard Savage, who recruited Sean Doutre to carry out two brutal hits.
First-hand accounts, dramatic re-enactments and exclusive footage help tell the story of how the FBI convicted Thomas Capano, a wealthy attorney in a position of power, of the murder of his mistress Anne Marie Fahey.
The undercover sting operation set up to extract a confession from notorious gang leader Daniel Wolfe.
First hand accounts, dramatic re-enactments and exclusive footage are combined to examine the hunt for Ohio serial killers Anthony and Nathaniel Cook.
The hunt for copycat killers Sebastian Burns and Atif Rafay, whose technique was inspired by 1924 murderers Leopold and Loeb.
Exploring the crimes of school dropout Dominick McCullock, who killed one woman is Saskatchewan and assaulted several more.
The case of serial killer Dennis Rader, the BTK (Bind, Torture, Kill) Strangler, who was convicted of murdering 10 people in the Wichita area.
