[Music]
up next
a predator terrorizes a texas town
i said i have family i have a son just
please don't r*pe me he started to choke
me
i couldn't breathe i was just gasping
for air until he finally stopped
no one knew what he'd do next we had a
huge problem
that this guy wasn't going to stop when
police find him
the dna evidence exonerates him he was
smart enough to outwit
the investigators i knew he he was just
evil
and i never knew that there was evil
people on this earth like that
[Music]
it was 9 p.m in texas city texas
and 19 year old stevie green was waiting
for a friend to drive her home from work
but the friend never showed up i'm in
a ticked off mood because he left me
hanging christmas was coming around the
corner
i've thought about taking a taxi but
then i was like no i want to save the
money so
we can have a better christmas so stevie
decided to walk home
which was about a mile away
suddenly she heard someone running up
behind her
the footsteps just stopped the Kn*fe was
in my back
i didn't want to die i was willing to do
anything
that this man was gonna ask me to do he
said he'd s*ab her if she didn't
take off her clothes as he r*ped me i
just kept thinking in my head
saying the lord's prayer the more i said
it the more angry
he got afterwards still holding the
Kn*fe
he told her to get up they told me to
turn around
and have my back to him and when i stood
up
something in me just told me to run and
i grabbed my shoe and i
booked into the middle of the street
screaming at the top of my lungs
stevie was traumatized in shock but
lucky to be alive
it was very difficult for stevie to look
at him and get a good description other
than some general
build general height and things of that
nature
the whole time he kept telling me don't
look at my face don't look at my face
stevie described her assailant as an
african-american wearing a hooded
sweatshirt
that concealed his face but nothing more
it was somewhat shocking that it did
happen at 9 15
at night walking home on a street that
i've walked my kids have walked
and i would trust them to this day to
walk down that street
no clues to the r*pist identity were
left at the scene
however a r*pe test kit produced his dna
profile
unfortunately that dna profile did not
match any of the dna profiles in the
statewide database of known criminal
offenders
police checked files for known sexual
offenders
living near the crime scene one stood
out
kenneth ray johnson had just moved to
texas city after serving
25 years for r*pe he was really a good
suspect because he was new to the area
he didn't want to cooperate at first but
then he did he had
several alibis if i'm not mistaken
johnson denied any involvement
since he was on parole he was wearing an
ankle bracelet that tracked his movement
using gps technology
it showed johnson was at home at the
time of the r*pe
and his dna did not match the dna of the
r*pist
he was not in the location on the date
where stevie green was sexually
assaulted
i never questioned that he would be
found i knew that he was going to pay
for what he did one way or another
but would he be caught before he could
strike again
with no one in custody for stevie
green's r*pe
investigators feared he would strike
again
as the investigation went into the fifth
week and we heard nothing more about
any suspects being arrested or charged
or identified
it became an idea that maybe this was
going to be an unsolved crime
then five weeks later fifteen-year-old
vanessa rocha
and her sixteen-year-old boyfriend were
in a secluded area
of goddard park in downtown texas city
we went out there on many occasions and
never had anything to worry about
a man walked rapidly toward the young
couple we looked up and we saw a man
standing there with a devil mask on with
a g*n
he told my boyfriend to turn not to look
at him
the man held a g*n to vanessa's
boyfriend and ordered her
to undress
he was calling me every name in the book
cussing me out
calling me a [ __ ] you know a [ __ ] just
whatever i was making him mad because i
kept opening my eyes
at one point he started to choke me i
couldn't breathe i was just gasping for
air until he finally stopped
after the sexual as*ault he told
vanessa's boyfriend
to remove all of his clothes i was
terrified
i really thought he was going to k*ll us
i don't even know how to explain it you
can't explain something like that
he demanded the keys to the couple's car
then
made his getaway and he told us not to
get up
until we heard him start the car
unfortunately because of the mask
neither of the teenagers was able to
provide a detailed description
he was covered up from head to toe what
caught my attention was his mask that he
was wearing
it was the devil when we're teenagers we
don't think anything's gonna happen to
us until it happens
the as*ault was similar to the stevie
green case except
vanessa roach's case was more brazen
i have never read about or talked to
anyone that had worked a case
where two people were abducted and
totally controlled stripped down
in front of each other with a girl being
sexually assaulted
it very seldom do you have an att*ck
take place with a witness present
attackers in most sexual assaults don't
want any other witnesses
a r*pe test kit collected biological
evidence
and the result showed it was the same
perpetrator in both cases
the next morning investigators found the
teenager's car
just a few blocks from where vanessa was
assaulted
we realized he didn't keep the car long
and at that point we really started
focusing in that
he did live in that area and
that was his area of comfort where he
was acting from
just to give him an easy route to get
home wherever that was
unfortunately police found no foreign
fingerprints or other trace evidence
inside the car
the very next night two women were
walking home from a nightclub around 2
a.m
when they were approached by a masked
man brandishing a p*stol
they were both abducted at gunpoint he
took them to a secluded area behind the
school in like a little cul-de-sac one
suspect taking
two into control and totally humiliating
one in front of the other
he sexually assaulted one of the women
but not the other
again a brutal sexual as*ault took place
very brazen very cocky in the presence
of the
witness who was there again a very angry
very demeaning a very control freak
type of activity that took place both
women described a young black male
all they could see was his eyes and
mouth
but they noticed something distinctive
the assailant
had a gold front tooth police
finally had something besides his dna
profile
that might identify him
in the oil refinery town of texas city
texas
three r*pes within five weeks of each
other
had some striking similarities
the r*pist used masks or clothing
to cover his face it appeared he didn't
know
any of his victims before he att*cked
them
his r*pes all happened within a radius
of
two miles and most alarming
the crime showed an unmistakable
arrogance it indicates a very
strong-willed
angry cocky arrogant individual who
wants to play games with the police
thinks he's better than the system and
can b*at the system
and it's a it's a game for him
a dna test was conducted on r*pe kits
from
every similar crime i was able to look
at these three cases and say yes
this was the same person that was in the
sperm fraction of all these extractions
police had a serial r*pist on their
hands
and worried about what he would do next
we were all concerned about the
escalation of these offenses
oftentimes a serial r*pist will turn
into a serial k*ller
or injure their victims much more
severely than he was injuring his
victims so we were very concerned about
it
the only clue to the r*pist identity
was a description by a witness that he
had
a gold front tooth
investigators scoured files for people
in the area who fit
this description and one did
chad price a 29 year old construction
worker
chad price was a father married seemed
to be actively participating with his
wife and children in different things in
the community
he had developed a reputation in the
community of being just that bold
taunting in your face catch me if you
can type a guy
price had never been arrested but had
been a suspect in a series of robberies
a year
earlier the robberies were unique
because
the perpetrator would call reporters to
brag about his crimes
sometimes he would call and say he was
going to rob a building
and sometimes he would call and thr*aten
the lives of the reporters
during one particular att*ck actually
called the police department
and started telling them that he was
watching them
actually investigate the crime the
audacity of the robberies
mirrored the audacity of the r*pes
police brought chad in for questioning
we didn't felt we had enough to get a
search warrant for his dna
for his blood and that he understood
that name there was nothing concrete
to connect him to any of the sexual
assaults and he basically denied
everything
price also refused to provide his dna
detective getchas wanted to get price's
dna legally
without him knowing it i have learned
from tv shows like forensic files that
you can't obtain a dna sample from a
coke can
or cigarette butt and it's lawfully
obtained
during chad price's interrogation
detective getchas offered him a can
of soda
we got through with the interview chad
he had not finished the
mountain dew i had an empty trash liner
in the trash can new and he was going to
throw it out
i said no don't spill it don't get it
all over there leak out
investigators knew they had to drain the
soda by making a hole
in the bottom of the can that's probably
the best thing to do is to go ahead and
drain the can so that there's no chance
that
anything that spills out of that can
could possibly
affect that dna that's on the mouth of
the can
then dna testing could begin
the very next day before the dna results
were in
there was another r*pe 10 miles away
a 17 year old girl and her 22 year old
boyfriend were parked
at the dickinson bio boat ramp when they
encountered trouble
two people were present girlfriend and a
boyfriend
and out of nowhere came the assailant
opened the door
produced a g*n had him removed from the
pickup truck and then the terror began
the man sexually assaulted the girl at
gunpoint
while her boyfriend stood by helplessly
he picked the perfect people
just a couple young kids out there uh
making out in a desolate area
investigators were convinced this was
the work of chad price
at the dna lab christie wimsat swabbed
the opening of the mountain dew can
with a sterile swab
i'm looking for a transfer of saliva or
skin cells from the mouth
onto the opening of the can a dna
profile was produced
and it matched the dna from all
of the r*pe cases i called texas city
police department to let them know that
this was the guy the guy that drank out
of this can was the guy that
was committing these r*pes in that area
on september 12
2000 chad price was arrested and
charged with the crimes they cut a
search warrant
for a storage shed where price had items
they found a duffel bag and in the
duffel bag they found some tremendous
evidence that supported
all the other evidence in the case
including the dna
everything from ski masks to the
halloween mask of a devil
to a g*n when i learned that the dna
test came back that it was him
i was excited i was just i was happy
i i couldn't wait to come to court to
testify
despite the evidence price continued to
deny
any involvement and he insisted that the
dna test on the soda can
was falsified he told me that he was not
the r*pist
that the mountain dew can never touched
his lips so therefore they
the police did not have his dna and that
he was going to be required to take
another blood sample
and that when the results of that blood
sample were made available it would show
that it was his dna was not at any of
the crime scenes
in a shocking development chad price
turned out to be right when price was
arrested
a sample of his blood was collected and
sent to an independent lab for dna
testing
this time his dna did not match
the biological evidence from the victims
i was in disbelief
i couldn't believe that we had the wrong
person
and that all the testing we had done had
been wrong
and i wanted to if it wasn't him let's
get him out of jail
no matter what i thought of him but what
went wrong investigators were determined
to find out
a dna test conducted by texas law
enforcement indicated
chad price was the serial r*pist
terrorizing
texas city texas but his defense
attorney insisted
on an independent dna test
and when a private lab performed their
test
it showed chad price wasn't
the r*pist i was mortified i was
immediately short of breath just trying
to remember what i had done in the case
trying to figure out
you know what did i do what was switch
what was different
prosecutors couldn't believe they had
the wrong man
the blood sample for the independent lab
had been drawn from price while he was
in custody
at the galveston county jail a
technician went into the prison
checked his identification took his
blood
then wrote the inmate's name on the vial
containing his blood when samples are
taken
there is a fingerprint that goes with
the vial of the sample of
blood the individual who gave this blood
obviously put their fingerprint on this
file so prison officials compared the
print
on chad price's blood vial to chad
price's fingerprint
the expert said that's not chad price's
fingerprint on the vial
great the next step
whose fingerprint is it the unknown
print
was run through aphis or the automated
fingerprint identification system
and there was a hit
the print belonged to 36 year old
derrick perry derek perry was
another inmate being detained or held in
the galveston county jail on unrelated
charges
he was also a not a cell mate
but he was in the same pod as chad price
and in each pod there must be 50 or 60
inmates
two jailhouse informants told prison
officials
how chad price switched the dna sandals
they admitted to me that they witnessed
and have personal knowledge of the
conspiracy between
chad price and derek perry to switch
armbands
for the blood sample chad price
had a mindset of someone who really
believed he was smarter than everyone
else
he had a real sense of power he had a
sense that he could control situations
i don't know where that comes from the
medical staff
does not look at faces they don't know
chad price from derrick perry
they call the name chad price instead of
chad price standing up and walking
forward to get blood
it was derek perry who came forward
another dna
test confirmed what investigators had
long suspected
the dna from their r*pe cases
was from chad price he was
just as brazen in the r*pes as he was in
his attempt to get away with them
i think chad price believes he can b*at
anything the system will give him
and that that he is smarter than we are
and
and just anything is the limit for him
you actually had a criminal who thought
he was smart enough to outwit
the investigators and play this game
with his own dna
on may 24 2001 a jury
took just two hours to find chad price
guilty of aggravated r*pe
kidnapping and robbery for the att*ck on
stevie green
he was indicted on the other r*pes and
the jury was informed of his involvement
during
the penalty phase they sentenced price
to life in prison plus 60 years
he got a life sentence and i found that
to be surprising
because i really i really thought he
would he
might get the death penalty i was just
ecstatic
uh knowing that he was going to be there
just
for life i mean there's no that i can't
even explain the way i felt you know
just
i don't have to see this man i have to
worry about this man ever coming for me
i'd love for him to admit it that was
the only thing out of the whole trial
that i think that's why i felt so robbed
was because i wanted him to admit it i
wanted him to say yes
i did this derek perry
who was due to be released from prison
the day after he switched wristbands
with price
was charged with fabricating evidence
and got
an additional five years in prison
the galveston county jail has since
changed its procedures
for drawing blood but the lesson for
investigators
and for chad price was that criminals
may lie
but forensic technology doesn't
without that mountain dew can to link
him to these sexual as*ault cases
they might not have ever been able to
get a warrant to get the actual known
sample
to compare to the sexual as*ault case so
i would say the dna
was was key in this case we take a lot
of pride in putting a person like chad
price
behind bars it's nice to get someone who
is that arrogant
and that cocky and that brazen behind
bars as quickly as possible
chad price thinks he can b*at whatever
the system has to present
technology is foolproof given the best
circumstances we had those best
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circumstances
13x16 - Unmasked
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Documentary that reveals how forensic science is used to solve violent crimes, mysterious accidents, and outbreaks of illness.
Documentary that reveals how forensic science is used to solve violent crimes, mysterious accidents, and outbreaks of illness.