Tales of True Crime

A murder in Portland, Oregon goes unsolved for decades until a forensic genealogy investigation reveals a Texas killer, executed in 1999 for a triple murder, was responsible for more evil than anyone knew.

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In a new record for forensic investigators, they're able to determine the killer of Peggy Beck with genealogy, 56 years after the crime. A victory for sure, but even though they found their suspect, they had a surprise waiting just around the corner...

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The murders of Leslie Perlov and Janet Taylor in Northern California would vex investigators for decades and lead some to question whether they might have been victims of Ted Bundy or the Zodiac (or whether their murders were linked to another killing in Salt Lake City) but it would take a genetic genealogy investigation to finally identify the killer, 45 years later.

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In January of 2020, Suffolk County authorities held a press conference to announce a new website about the Long Island Serial Killer case, to share a previously unknown piece of evidence with the public, and to ask for the public's help. In this episode, a few pieces of that press conference, and Troy's thoughts on what it means.

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The behavior of one person can affect the behavior of another person. And sometimes when a group of people behave in a certain way, it becomes a snowball, rolling downhill.

In 1944, in Mattoon, Illinois, it started with a report of a crime.

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Even in the suburbs, our neighbors are sometimes strangers, and the horror we dread is often just beneath the surface, waiting to be exposed, like a cemetery where they moved the headstones, but not the bodies.

On more than one occasion, Westfield, New Jersey has been just such a place.

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Two murders in San Diego, six years apart, lead to three suicides and a lawsuit against the city of San Diego. DNA evidence can be a dangerous tool in the wrong hands.

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A woman reports she's been raped, but nobody believes her. The perpetrator, who rooms with a police officer, attacks another woman, but she disappears before he can be brought to trial and charges are dropped. By the time her body is found, he has accidentally killed himself. 44 years later, the authorities discover through a forensic genealogy investigation that he was an evildoer beyond expectation.

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A missing woman turns up murdered, a professional clown is the primary suspect, and it takes half a century to solve the crime.

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He got away with murder on an insanity defense... shot to death in 1978 attempting to abduct a woman, and decades after his death, he claimed another victim.

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