13x48 - Lights Out

[bunniefuu]

Up next, a young
girl sees her mother's k*ller,

but can't identify him.

There was nothing
she was a complete blank.

With no other
evidence, the case turns cold.

After Kathy was laid to rest,

I was always struggling,
trying to find

out who could have done this.

Until forensic scientists

decided to play-act the crime.

Basically what we

were doing was we were
strangling each other.

And when they did, found

evidence hidden for 15 years.

It takes science
and luck to solve cases.

In this case, it
took a lot of luck.

Mike Odom met
Kathy Martin in high school.

They dated and soon decided
to make a life together.

But, before they
could get married,

Mike was arrested for selling
heroin, a mistake that

put him behind
bars for two years.

- I
- remember while he

was in the penitentiary,
and Kathy was dead set

on waiting on him to get out, to
date him again, which she did.

Shortly after his release,

Mike and Kathy did get married
and had two children, Tasha

and Shawn Kathy's
father even gave Mike

a job, working in
his sign business.

Kathy was set
on making the marriage work.

Did everything she could.

Things were going
well, until one night, when

Mike couldn't get in
touch with Kathy, who

said she'd be home
with the two children.

Kathy didn't answer the phone
so Mike called his next door

neighbor and asked him to
see if anything was wrong.

The neighbor

went over, b*at on the door.

Nobody answered.

He looked in, and I
think the TV was going.

There was just
something suspicious.

But instead of calling police,

the neighbor drove a
quarter-mile into town, found

a policeman, and they both
went back to the Odom's house

together.

The officer entered
the unlocked house.

Inside, on the living room
sofa was four-year-old Tasha,

beaten and unconscious,
but still alive.

He found two-month-old Shawn
unharmed in the back room.

In the next room, he found
Kathy Odom on the floor,

naked and covered in blood.

She'd been stabbed to death.

An ambulance rushed
four-year-old Tasha

to the hospital.

When Kathy's father
arrived at the scene,

police told him little
about what had happened.

I said, where's the children?

He said, well, the children
have been taken to the hospital,

and he said, that would
be a good place for you

to go and check on the children.

Frank described to me

what it was like to be
sitting in the hospital,

and he looked up at
a TV set, and that's

when he learned that his
daughter had been k*lled.

I didn't know that at the time

and I seen that.

Well, I went
outside the hospital

and sat down, cried a
long time, and until I

got myself back
together a little

bit to... I never did go back
to the house that night,

which was strange.

When Mike Odom got there,

police paid special
attention to his appearance.

Mike
Odom, the husband, drives up,

and he's wearing blue
jeans and a blue shirt,

and one of the
investigators notices

that he's got
stains on his shirt.

Is that blood?

Is it not blood?

A search of the Odom's home

revealed blood in the bathroom,
which meant the k*ller had

cleaned up before
leaving, but police

found no evidence of a break-in.

All the doors were locked,
except the front door.

This indicated Kathy
probably knew her k*ller.

Kathy Odom's autopsy showed
she had been stabbed 19 times

and sexually assaulted.

This is a crime of passion.

It's not a stranger
k*lling because, why would

a stranger feel the need
to s*ab her 16 times

plus slash her throat
three more times.

Kathy Odom's clothes told

police something
about what happened.

She took them off.

She folded them up deliberately,
and her clothes haven't been

ripped off of her,
so she voluntarily

took her clothes off.

Police believe
that the k*ller att*cked

Kathy Odom's daughter,
Tasha, in order

to make Kathy do
whatever he wanted.

Number one, it
would make Tasha stop crying

and, more importantly,
it would convince Kathy

that he's serious,
and she better go

along with what
he's going to do.

Apparently, the k*ller
used a cord from a nearby lamp

and bound Kathy's wrists
before sexually assaulting her.

Then, stabbing her to death.

In the end, she ended up

losing her life while
she was protecting

herself and her children.

As family members tried

to cope with
Kathy's m*rder, they

prayed for four-year-old
Tasha's recovery.

They had Tasha on IVs.

She was in a coma state.

She had been beaten bad.

As doctors
worked on the little girl,

police talked to
her father, Mike.

His
emotions... he was emotional.

He was distraught, but there
were some people at the scene

that thought, we need to look at
this person a little bit more.

Also suspicious, Mike
Odom didn't come straight home

after work on the night
Kathy was m*rder*d.

Instead, he went
out with friends.

That's why he was calling
his wife that night,

to let her know he'd be late.

We've seen it before,

where an individual
has arranged a m*rder.

He's at another location.

He calls the person.

Go check on my wife.

So, we're always
suspicious of the husband

until we can get
them cleared out.

When police
interviewed Mike Odom,

they saw stains on
his shirt, which

was taken to the
forensic lab for testing.

Police also found
suspicious stains

on the floor mats of
Tim Robinson's car,

the neighbor who first
contacted police.

We had to get the floor mat.

We had to send it to the
lab and have it tested.

The medical examiner
estimated that Kathy Odom was

m*rder*d about six hours
before her body was found,

which would have been about


Mike Odom and his
neighbor, Tim Robinson,

both claimed to be
at work at the time.

While investigators
check their alibis,

they got a potential witness.

Tasha Odom emerged from her
coma and told investigators

she remembered a man entering
the house and coming up to her.

What Tasha could remember

was that the person put
their hands up over her face

and so that tells you right
there they knew Tasha.

She said he had yellow
hair, like you, Nanny.

Your hair yellow.

Mike Odom didn't have blond hair

and neither did Tim Robinson,
but the k*ller's hair

color was all Tasha
could remember.

There was nothing.

She was a complete blank.

She remembered nothing.

When the
forensic tests came back,

the stains in Tim Robinson's
car turned out to be motor oil.

The stains on Mike
Odom's shirt were paint.

In addition, coworkers provided
solid alibis for both of them,

and they each passed polygraphs.

They don't have anything

to do with it, then we want to
get them cleared out as quickly

as possible, so we can
move on to the next person.

And that next person was

mentioned by everyone
who knew Kathy.

It was her brother-in-law,
Greg Markwardt.

Everyone
knew their relationship,

and that it wasn't good... that
he had this weird obsession

for her... that she
didn't like him...

That she was afraid of him
and that he had tried to make

advances toward her before...
To put a move on her before,

and she didn't like it.

And there was ample evidence

Greg had been in the house.

They found his fingerprints,

his hair throughout the scene.

There was only one problem.

As a family member, who had been
in the house numerous times,

this didn't prove a thing.

The only witness to
Kathy Odom's m*rder,

her four-year-old
daughter, Tasha,

had sustained a massive
blow to her head.

She had injuries to her face

with swelling and
everything, and it

would appear that she
was hit with a fist.

But after two days
in a coma, Tasha rallied.

Before her release
from the hospital,

her uncle, Greg
Markwardt, came to visit.

It was an encounter Tasha's
grandmother would never forget.

Hi, Tasha.

How are you feeling?

Hi, Greg.

How's she doing?

Better.

- I
- brought you this.

Tasha, when
she saw Greg, she looked over

at me, like scared
to death look.

When they ask little
Tasha whether it was her Uncle

Greg who entered the house
on the day of the att*ck,

she said she couldn't remember.

They tried different things

to try to bring
out those memories.

At one point they
even hypnotized

her, hoping they could
find some grain of memory.

She was so traumatized,

she never recalled it.


Greg Markwardt

had been married to Kathy
Odom's sister, Shelley,

for four years.

Shelley and Greg had
served time in prison

for possession of cocaine.

It's the drug scene

of the '80s they
were caught up in.

In fact, one of the reasons

Kathy wanted to
move to a new house,

was to get away from
Greg, who had made

many sexual advances toward her.

She was scared of Greg.

She said, I would not want to
be alone with him by myself.

Oddly, despite these rebuffs,

Greg Markwardt was surprisingly
open about his attraction

to Kathy, particularly
to one part of her body.

He had a thing for Kathy's

tummy, which is sort of odd.

I mean, why would he pay
attention to her tummy

and be obsessed by that?

This fixation was so obvious,

Kathy talked about
it with friends.

Kathy even would say,

and I don't know what it is, but
he's just... there's something

about my stomach, and he
wants to have sex with me.

I've heard
of people having fetishes

with feet or hands, but that's
the first one having a fetish

with a stomach
that I've heard of.

Coincidentally, Kathy Odom

had been stabbed
repeatedly in the stomach.

WEDGEWORTH: And these

are deep, penetrating wounds.

When questioned by police,

Markwardt denied
any involvement,

but said little else.

At some point
in that detective's interview,

Greg said, excuse me.

I need to go out and put
money into the parking meter.

He got up.
He left.

He never came back.

Greg's wife,
Shelley, the victim's sister,

said Greg drove her to school at


and picked her up again at 2:30.

This four-hour window was
more than enough time for Greg

to commit the
m*rder and clean up

before picking up
his wife from school.

The way
I would describe Shelley is,

she's extremely
codependent and absolutely

was under the control
of Greg Markwardt.

This much I know, that he
got her hooked on heroin,

which, to me, is the worst
thing that a human being

could do to another one.

An analysis of the crime scene

provided little help.

Greg's fingerprints and hairs
were found in Kathy's house,

but other family members'
prints were found there as well.

He was
her brother-in-law, law

and he had been to
the house before.

So it was natural
that you would find

his fingerprints and his hairs.

Although Kathy
had been sexually assaulted,

this crime occurred years
before DNA was widely

used in m*rder investigations.

At the time, in the 1980s,

they were using serology.

Basically, they were
doing blood group typing,

and it was very difficult.

You need a very large
sample, and, plus,

you would only get a blood type.

The blood type from the r*pe kit

was consistent with Greg
Markwardt's blood type.

He was a type
O. About 50% of the population

is a type O, so that's not
giving you much information.

So without more
evidence, the case went cold.

After Kathy was
laid to rest and time went on,

I found myself at the
cemetery most all the time,

but I was always
struggling, trying

to find out who
could have done this.

They say
if you don't solve the crime

within a month with
all the fresh leads,

there's not a possibility
there that you would.

Greg and
Shelley Markwardt went on

with their lives, but
for Kathy's father

it was especially difficult.

The idea that he had

to go through his
daughter's m*rder

and then live, believing
for all those years,

with all his heart,
that the man who did it

was married to his
other daughter.

Can you imagine what
that would be like?

It took 11 years
before DNA testing became

dependable enough
to generate a DNA

profile from the
biological evidence

in Kathy Odom's r*pe kit.

When that profile was compared
to Greg Markwardt's DNA,

it wasn't 100% conclusive,
but it did show

that Greg was among the 2% of
the general population, who

could have been the perpetrator.

Well, when this came forward,

I thought, sure, we had him.

But Greg had an explanation.

He claimed he and Kathy were
having a consensual affair

and was with her on the
morning of her m*rder,

but he insisted she
was alive when he left.

Greg Markwardt was not

arrested at that time, because
the district attorney we were

talking to did not
feel like we could get

a conviction on this case
with him saying, at that time

I was having an
affair with her...

That we were having
consensual sex.

They would have
to prove that Greg was there

that day, and that Greg
was there to m*rder Kathy.

But how would they do it?

It had been four years since
DNA testing showed that Greg

Markwardt was among the 2% of
the general population, who

could have sexually assaulted
and presumably m*rder*d Kathy

Odom, but investigators
weren't sure

how to counter Greg's
claim that he was involved

in a consensual
affair with Kathy

around the time of her m*rder.

While this was taking
place, investigators

were working with Katherine
Long at Orchid Cellmark,

a private forensic
lab in Dallas.

Katherine Long...

Her dad was the chief of
police in El Paso, Texas,

so she thinks a
little differently

than your normal scientist.

And Cellmark was
doing some unusual experiments

at the time.

Basically,
what we were doing was,

we were strangling each other.

Not for fun.

It was business to determine
whether a k*ller would deposit

skin cells in the act
of choking a victim.

We would swab their neck.

We would also swab the
hands of the person

who performed the choking.

That's when they realized

there was a significant
transfer of skin cells.

And it was actually very high.

Investigators needed
to find something in Kathy's

evidence file that
would have contained

the perpetrator's skin cells.

The answer was the
electrical cord

used to bind Kathy's hands.

Any time you go anywhere,

you leave a piece of yourself
behind, be it skin cells,

be it a hair follicle,
be it a fingerprint.

In an incredible piece of luck,

the cord had been stored, not in
a plastic bag, but a paper bag.

That paper
bag provides breathability,

so if there is any moisture on
that item, it's going to dry,

and that will, therefore,
prolong the DNA life.

It will actually
preserve the DNA

longer than it would
in a plastic bag.

The cord was covered in blood,

so scientists swabbed the cord
for the blood and any skin

cells that existed
with the blood.

Testing revealed two
genetic profiles.

One was Kathy Odom's DNA.

The other was Greg Markwardt's.

The only way Markwardt's
DNA would have been

on the bloody electrical cord
found wrapped around Kathy's

hands, was if he
were the k*ller.

Greg Markwardt was
arrested and charged

with Kathy Odom's m*rder.

In prison, Markwardt told
the whole chilling story

to a fellow inmate.

Markwardt said he
was high on heroin

when he drove to
Kathy's house that day.

Once inside, he made a sexual
advance, which she rejected.

- I
- thought maybe that...

Just stop.

You tell me that...

Just stop.

You say we don't...

Just get out of here, Greg.

To force her to comply,

he struck his four-year-old
niece, Tasha, repeatedly

in the head, leaving
her for dead.

The baby, Shawn, was
in the next room,

and Greg threatened
to k*ll him too.

In order to save the baby's
life, Kathy complied.

Using a Kn*fe from the kitchen,
Greg cut the electrical cord

from a lamp and
bound Kathy's wrists,

leaving his DNA on the cord.

After he sexually assaulted
Kathy, he stabbed her to death.

He washed up in the bathroom and
changed into Kathy's husband's

clothing to keep
blood out of his car.

Little did Markwardt
know, advances in science

would be able to identify him as
the perpetrator 15 years later.

Sweet.

Thank you, God.

Justice.

God knows what we're going to
have in 10 years or 20 years.

It's even better and more
advanced than what we have now.

It's amazing.

When faced with this evidence,

Greg Markwardt pled
guilty to Kathy's m*rder

and was sentenced to


He d*ed of liver
disease after serving

four years of his sentence.

He was 56 years old.

It
Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

That's the way I feel about it.

It doesn't bring back Kathy.

I'll always remember
her, the house

she put together,
the things we did.

It's tough to lose
a child, but I

thank the good Lord
for everything he did.

It's just one of those cases

that... I guess it makes you
proud to be a part of... that we

were able to have
a good ending to,

and that's just filing on him...
That Greg was not able to get

away with m*rder in
this case, but there's

a lot more out there
that are still unsolved.