01x02 - Culture of Suspicion

[bunniefuu]

[eerie guitar music playing]

[Kathryn] In 1991

there was this couple out on horseback

going through the k*lling Field.

And they can smell something.

- The police are called.

- [police sirens wail distantly]

And another decomposing body's found

underneath a tree in the k*lling Field.

[reporter 1] A fourth body found

in the same location.

She is unidentified at this time.

We know she is a white female,

approximately five foot two inches tall.

Police believe this latest victim,

they're calling her Janet Doe,

was somewhere between 30 and 50 years old.

[Kathryn] You'd already had

these three girls

who'd been found in the k*lling Field,

and you had this questionable death

with Ellen Beason.

And it's like déjà vu.

It's happened again.

It was shocking another body was found.

[reporter 2] The body is one of four

that turned up in this League City field

between 1983 and 1991.

[Skip] Some k*ller was creating a kind

of tour of his own personal graveyard.

What was going on?

[Richard] Had a serious impact

on the community.

Especially young women.

[Marla] It did make you scared.

I can remember watching the news

crying one night

because I didn't want to grow up.

I didn't want to get any bigger,

because I was scared.

Bodies keep showing up.

The girls keep disappearing.

And we got to do something.

[Nina] This person's still walking around,

still snatching ladies up.

Why?

The fear was actually palpable.

It looked like a work of a brilliant

but depraved serial k*ller.

[ominous music playing]

[birds tweeting]

[somber music playing]

The k*lling Field cases on Calder Road

were kind of a black eye for League City,

having these unsolved homicides.

But Tim Miller had a few ideas

about who he thought may be responsible

for the death of his daughter

and the other three victims.

[Tim] Clyde Hedrick worked

for a contractor on Calder.

I mean, Clyde hung out

in League City a lot,

at the Texas Moon

and all the different bars.

[director] Was Clyde

ever looked at as a suspect

in the Calder Road killings at the time?

I couldn't answer that because

of the nature of the open investigation.

There's really not much that I can say.

I can tell you generally that

the police are not quick

to eliminate suspects.

[Richard] As an investigator,

we can't just take

the word of somebody and

run full speed at that person.

We have to do methodical investigation

and continue to follow the evidence.

[ominous music playing]

[Skip] The first three bodies were

discovered within a period of two years,

all within 50 yards of each other.

About five years later,

a fourth body was found

on that same patch of land,

but it was a hundred yards away.

Is she connected to the other three,

or is she some other k*ller's victim?

Somebody who read

about the Texas k*lling Fields

and decided to add his victim to the pile.

Girls' bodies were found

in an advanced stage of decomposition.

They used dental records

to identify Laura Miller

and Heide Fye.

But Jane and Janet Doe didn't match

with any missing person cases in the area.

[Lise] League City had very few resources,

small police department.

They couldn't seem to identify her.

And despite the fact that in 1991,

there is DNA evidence

that could be tested,

the evidence is not kept very well

by League City Police.

They don't have anything to test.

[reporter 1] For now, the key to solving

the k*lling Field murders

may lie with these

two reconstructed heads.

[Richard] The League City

Police Department

tried a number of different techniques

to identify Jane and Janet Doe.

One was rebuilding the skull,

try to put clay on the skull to see

what they might've looked like in life,

hoping that would be

something to generate leads.

[reporter 2] If you have any information,

if Jane or Janet Doe look familiar,

call the League City Police Department.

[Lise] A lot of people are really outraged

that these women aren't even identified.

And how can it be that no one

can figure out who k*lled them?

The attention did have the effect

of putting more pressure

on the League City Police

to do something about those cases.

[newscaster] Tonight, investigators take

a closer look at the similarities

in the cases,

and they take their case to the FBI.

The fact that it was a serial k*lling case

gave the FBI the authority to investigate.

I went and interviewed the head

of the FBI's task force in Houston.

Now, if you're a reporter,

you never get into the FBI offices.

Why was I being invited

to go talk to the FBI director?

Because these guys didn't know what to do.

They were stuck.

The basic hope

was to get out some publicity

that someone would come forward and say,

"I know who's doing all this."

[reporter] Profiling is a technique where

special agents dissect a crime scene.

They use the information

to identify the k*ller's characteristics.

The FBI pulled together a profile

of the k*lling Fields k*ller.

It, in many ways, fit this guy

who lived on Calder Road.

[Skip] The profile that the FBI made

suggested that the k*ller

probably lived close to the k*lling Field,

that he kept clippings

from newspapers of the case,

that he had a superior attitude,

and that he had troubled relationships

with women.

The League City Police said,

"We've got a man that owns these two

properties adjoining the k*lling Field."

"Who's bright, who's had

bad relationships, who's hit animals."

And the FBI agent said,

"He could be your guy."

League City Police Department called me.

And they said, "Hey, we've been looking

towards this one guy Clyde Hedrick."

"But we've got another guy

on the radar now, Robert Abel."

Robert Abel was this brilliant

former scientist for NASA.

He had helped create

the modern Saturn rocket

that got astronauts to the moon.

[Lise] By the time Janet Doe's body

was found in 1991,

Robert Abel owned the land

where the k*lling Fields was.

He turned part of it into riding stables.

Robert drew suspicion

because he was really cooperative.

He offered to help police,

provide equipment, clear brush,

do whatever he could.

[Kathryn] He kept insinuating himself

into the investigation,

which is something

that sometimes K*llers do.

[Lise] And there were some things

about Robert Abel's history

that made him suspicious.

[Skip] He had three ex-wives.

One ex-wife said

that he said he would k*ll her

if she did not provide him sex

like he wanted.

[Kathryn] His ex-wives had said

that he used to beat the horses,

and that when one of the horses would die,

he would leave it out in the field to rot

the way the girls' bodies

had been left out in the k*lling Field.

[ominous music playing]

Come on.

Come on.

[Kathryn] Tim had really been looking

at Clyde Hedrick

because of the Ellen Beason case.

And he had talked to the police about him.

[Lise] Now, Clyde has always denied

that he committed

any of the Calder Road murders.

The momentum to try to investigate him

for the other crimes wasn't there.

[Kathryn] Because of the FBI profile,

when Janet Doe was found,

Clyde Hedrick was kind of put

on the back burner.

Everybody thought at that point that

Abel was the better suspect in the case.

[Tim] All of a sudden,

a person I had really suspected,

it's like, "Oh my God.

I wonder if I was wrong."

[reporter] Supported by an FBI profile

and testimony from two former wives,

police said the k*ller

was Robert William Abel.

[Skip] The League City Police Department

writes an affidavit that goes public,

that Robert Abel, the NASA scientist,

could actually be a sexual serial k*ller,

who had done these killings

to these four young women

in the k*lling Fields

next to his trail ride business.

And what happened,

because there'd been so much publicity

at this point about these killings,

in police departments

up and down the I-45 corridor,

detectives were wondering

if Abel was the guy

who had done

one of their unsolved killings.

Are you responsible for the four bodies

that were found on this property?

Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

[Skip] A team of officers

go over his property,

trying to find trophies, locks of hair,

something that would no doubt

connect Abel to the crimes.

[Kathryn] And they found odd things.

Old newspaper articles

about the Calder Road killings.

They found human teeth

with gold crowns.

And there was a g*n found,

a .22 caliber g*n.

And Jane Doe had been shot

by a .22 caliber g*n.

But when the autopsy was done,

the Galveston County medical examiner,

Dr. Korndofer, had boiled the b*llet

when he boiled the bones.

And it had stripped it

of any evidentiary evidence,

so they couldn't match it up with the g*n.

I don't think there was a smoking g*n

that said Robert Abel didn't do this.

I think it was just that they didn't find

any evidence that he actually had.

The police couldn't do anything.

I wanted to meet this NASA scientist

who'd been accused in a court document

of being a serial k*ller.

So, I called him,

and I assumed he would hang up on me.

And he says, "Come on down."

[Robert] Back in this area here

is the site of the Laura Miller discovery.

[Skip] We went out to the k*lling Fields

and went from one grave to another.

That girl, Heide Fye,

was allegedly discovered right here.

[Skip] He had a notebook full of clippings

and four photos he had taken

of where the bodies were found.

And I said, "A lot of people would suggest

you're showing me your trophies."

And he said, "No, I'm showing you

the research I've done

to try to help out."

[Robert] All of a sudden, these people

come along and say I fit some profile

of a criminal, a specific criminal.

The serial k*ller on these four girls.

[Skip] And he just seemed

haunted as I was.

And I thought,

"Is he putting on a show for me?"

Or is he just being a scientist,

looking for evidence

to try to prove what happened?

What was going on on his property?

At the end of the day,

the police had no evidence

that Abel had done any of this.

[man] He's a suspect.

He may not be responsible

for k*lling these women,

and he may be responsible

for k*lling these women.

So he's still in the pool.

He's still swimming

in the pool of suspects.

[Skip] In League City,

he continued to be a suspect.

But what happened? Nothing.

The nightmare, in many ways,

is that the parents still grieve.

I can't tell you how many times

I searched this property

just hoping I could find Laura's clothes

or Laura's little necklace.

I would go out there during lunchtime.

I'd go out at night.

I was out there the middle of the night

screaming at the top of my lungs.

I said, "I am out here.

Come and get me, you coward."

I shot six times in the ground.

[g*nshots]

Hopefully somebody would call the police.

Nobody came. Nobody came.

[dramatic music playing]

I remember going out there

many, many times,

and walking up to that cross and saying,

"Laura, please don't hate your daddy."

"I can't come out here anymore."

"I have to say goodbye.

I have to put my life back together."

Literally, I'd be walking away and

I'd just hear a little voice say,

"Dad, don't quit. Please don't quit."

That was kind of like the beginning of,

"Maybe I can do something

to help these families

when they have a missing loved one."

[Kathryn] Once I got out

to the EquuSearch office,

he spent the whole day with me,

talking about Laura's death

and what it'd done to him and his family.

And also, you know,

why he had founded EquuSearch.

He was doing what he was doing

to try to save others.

Why don't you just walk away from it, man?

Just walk away from it.

Everybody knows me as Tim, Mr. EquuSearch.

And I've lost my identity.

I don't know who Tim Miller is.

But I haven't quit.

It's taken its toll, but I haven't quit.

I tried to say goodbye.

Can't do it.

I made that promise to God and Laura

I'd never leave a family alone.

I just didn't know

it was going to be this many.

[crickets chirping]

[ticking]

[Bob Smither] My daughter went, uh,

on a run this morning.

And she's been gone

a lot longer than I expected.

[911 dispatch] She left at 9:00,

and it's 10:04?

[Bob] Right. And she can't run this long.

[Skip] In April of '97, Laura Smither,

a 12-year-old ballerina,

went jogging from her Friendswood home

and completely disappeared.

She was supposed to be back in 20 minutes

because we were making pancakes.

She was gonna be home for breakfast.

She wanted exercise before breakfast.

[g*y] We were so naive back then.

I immediately started making

some phone calls to call people to say,

"Laura's missing. We can't find her.

Please come help us search for her."

Everything was upside down.

Nothing made sense.

We had no idea where she was.

Couldn't find her. Couldn't find her.

[reporter] The day began with

this heartbreaking sight, g*y Smither,

drenched by rain,

passing out flyers and hoping

someone would stop and listen and help.

[g*y] The days

after Laura first went missing,

they're kind of a blur

of real terror in my mind.

It's not something

that anybody wants to admit has happened.

I was just hysterical.

Walking, searching,

and just screaming Laura's name.

Laura!

Laura!

Laura!

We didn't find her.

She was almost 13.

[reporter] Residents say things like this

don't happen in their small community.

This was a town called

one of the ten safest places to live.

People did not lock their doors.

[Lise] Friendswood is

one of these little towns

along the I-45 corridor.

It's a particularly safe town

by reputation.

It was founded by Quakers,

by people who believe

peace is the way, right?

So when this 12-year-old

disappears while jogging,

there is a huge outcry.

[Jared] If you are responsible,

I speak for this team when I say

there is a maximum commitment

to find you and do everything

the law permits.

[dramatic music playing]

Usually, in these cases, it's the,

"Well, your daughter's a runaway."

This was the unusual case

where the police jumped on it right away.

[Tim] Friendswood Police Department,

Harris County Sheriff's Department.

And now the FBI was involved.

When she went missing,

our task force stopped our narcotics work

and began searching for her.

It was a major,

major event in our community.

[officer] Try to form a line.

[reporter] Friendswood community

has banded together to help in the search.

Volunteers are combing

through the thick brush, the mud.

[barking]

[g*y] Whoever has her

could take another child.

We don't want your families

to go through this.

[Skip] The town came together,

and 6,000 people went on a search for her.

Within days, 6,000 people,

including a contingent of Marines.

[woman] I guess it's the fear

of the unknown, what you'll come across.

This poor family,

they need an answer.

[dramatic music playing]

Well, we brought our dogs out

and was gonna run them right around,

you know, for exercise around this pond.

We picked up a, you know, foul odor.

And we thought it was a dead animal

in the water or something like that.

And my son, Jason, he says,

"Animals don't have socks."

[Jared] The evidence at the scene includes

a silver ring bearing her initials,

and it is apparent

that the young woman wore braces.

It is the opinion of my department

the young woman found

is Laura Kate Smither.

[g*y] She went missing

on April the 3rd, 1997.

And it was on April the 20th.

So, 17 days

of hell.

[clocks ticking]

[mournful music playing]

Been a while since we looked at this one.

- Look at that little face.

- Oh yeah.

[g*y] So sweet.

I love that picture.

[laughs]

I do see God's hand in my life,

that I was meant to be Laura's mom.

That was the very first little recital.

And she had four costume changes

that production.

Yeah, I remember.

[g*y] Laura was a year old.

And her mom had died with breast cancer.

Her dad, Bob,

he was an emotional wreck, obviously.

It was just a very,

very hard time in his life.

So, one of the grandmothers said,

"We need to help him find a nanny."

That's how we met.

Laura captivated me immediately,

and we bonded.

I remember sitting on the floor

with her that day that I met her.

It was just a connection.

I just loved her right away.

Little Red Riding Hood, probably.

[g*y laughs]

[ticking]

Four months later, we were married.

Whirlwind.

[laughs]

And I look back on that

and think I was crazy.

I was crazy.

I adopted her the following year.

She was touched by light.

I feel honored to this day

to have been Laura's mom.

I just wish it

had not been cut short the way it was.

When this happened to us,

we were given a life sentence.

Laura's m*rder is our life sentence too.

[reporter] Laura's m*rder is only one

of at least 35 still unsolved cases

in a three-county area involving

missing or dead young women.

[g*y] The search for Laura

had shone a spotlight

on our area for the missing.

[camera shutter rapidly clicking]

It awakened so many questions

about what was happening

and how things were being done.

[Lise] A reporter at the Houston Chronicle

writes about those unsolved murders.

She ends up publishing a map,

and she includes

unsolved cases all along the corridor,

really to draw attention

to a larger issue,

which is women being treated as prey,

and that their murders too often

don't get enough attention.

We had learned by then

that there were other cases

that didn't get any help at all.

[busy signal beeping]

[Nina] It really made us feel bad

that my aunt Heide was being portrayed

the way that she was.

Hitchhiker, runaway, c*ck waitress.

Those all tend to have, like,

a negative spin on it.

They really reacted as though

she was not important enough

to use the resources to find her.

[dial tone humming]

[Tim] I never forget some things

that League City Police Department

said about the girls.

Heide was a drug addict,

Laura was a known runaway,

and Jane and Janet were just drifters.

Guess that's given somebody

a license to k*ll them?

They're throwaway children?

I said, "No, Laura wasn't throwaway."

[Lise] Teenagers who are engaged

in some sort

of criminal behavior or just using drugs,

their disappearances will not

be taken as seriously

as someone who is younger,

who is believed to not be doing

that kind of risky behavior.

That's still true today.

It's implied that that person

did something that caused their m*rder.

They were a person who,

for one reason or another,

who is less important to our society.

[Skip] Laura Smither

just seemed so vulnerable.

She was a good girl from a good family

and a good neighborhood.

The reaction was so much stronger.

There was this sense of despair,

that if you couldn't save Laura Smither,

who could you save?

These men that come to get our children,

these men who come to get our daughters

cannot be stopped.

[reporter] Flags fly at half-staff

as nearly the entire town of Friendswood

is in mourning over the loss

of the 12-year-old.

This is now a homicide investigation.

[Kathryn] When the news breaks

about Laura Smither

everybody's talking

about the k*lling Field again.

And then everybody's talking about I-45.

And everybody's talking

about why these girls keep dying

and why they can never figure out

who's k*lling them.

There is somebody that's taking children,

that is murdering little girls,

and and it's gotta stop.

It's affected my daughter very much.

It's affected our entire town.

Um, how can it not?

[Richard] It had been six years

since any of the bodies

had been found on Calder Road.

And so there was a fear that,

"Oh my goodness, the person's back."

Women are being abducted again.

No one's being held accountable for it.

So there was a lot of fear

and a lot of anxiety.

If your child ever disappeared,

do you have a sample

of their DNA and fingerprints?

Friendswood was so panicked

that the school district

passed out this kit

where parents could fingerprint

their own children and put a lock of hair,

so that if the child went missing,

they would at least have fingerprints

and hair evidence to use

to help identify the body.

[reporter 1] Who k*lled 12-year-old

Laura Smither and why?

It's a question that haunts

police chief Jared Stout.

The community needs to get

their level of awareness up.

[reporter 2] Police and firefighters

work on the task of draining the pond.

They're looking for anything that will

place them closer to the elusive suspect.

[Kathryn] The police ran a list

of all of the sex offenders

in Galveston and Harris County

and the adjacent areas,

and they ended up

with a couple thousand or more.

[g*y] I didn't even have that term

in my vocabulary, "sex offender."

It just wasn't part of my reality.

Well, it became my reality.

The volume of sex offenders

that were in our area was huge.

[Marla] Especially being a female

your parents talk to you

about safety, being careful,

going out with your friends,

being on the road

when you did come of age to drive.

[inhales and sighs sharply]

I can remember when

my mother got married to Clyde,

my dad asked me

if Clyde had ever hurt me or my brother.

And at the time,

I really didn't understand.

[gasps] This is them.

When my mother lived

at the apartments in Dickinson,

we would go there to visit.

[gasps]

And there's the pool.

Clyde had taken me

and my brother swimming.

My brother was on one end

of the pool, and I was near Clyde.

And he's like, "Hey, go underwater.

I gotta show you something."

And, "Okay."

[thunder rumbling]

So, I went underwater.

And that's when he pulled

his pants down and exposed himself

underwater.

And I ran back to the apartment.

My brother ran right after me.

I ran into the apartment.

[door opens]

I told my mother.

They got into a fight.

Clyde denied it.

My mother believed

whatever he said to her.

And it hurt because it didn't matter.

I'm done

with this place.

[Lise] If we look at the characteristics

of the people who are the suspects

in the cases along the I-45 corridor,

we do see some themes.

We see men who were dominant,

violent people who were transient.

People like Clyde Hedrick.

Hedrick fits the profile of some

of the people we've been talking about

who were attracted to Houston

in the '70s and '80s

by the construction boom.

He had already done time

in prison in Florida.

He was accused

by various ex-wives and ex-girlfriends

of being very a*usive and violent.

[Marla] There it is.

That was it.

This place has changed a lot.

That was never there.

The trailer was there.

I just hate saying his name.

You have no idea what it does.

I moved out after I graduated high school.

And my mother told me

that she had left him.

My mother came to where I was living,

and she said

she wanted to show me what he had done.

So, my uncle and my mother

asked me to go back to the trailer

down in Galveston.

It was absolutely destroyed.

But that's not what they really

wanted to show me.

My mother pointed out

a certain spot on the wall.

She explained that

there was a hole in the wall.

And Clyde would look through the hole,

looking in on me.

All those times that I felt like

somebody was watching,

I wasn't actually crazy.

My uncle took me and my mother

to the police down in Galveston

with the photos that he developed.

One man in his office

took my statement

and then sent me on my way.

I did my part.

They could have arrested him.

I could have testified

about all the things that he was doing.

And nobody did anything.

[ominous music playing]

To me, when a man

has seriously harmed a child,

they should never have

the opportunity to harm another child.

And yet, the man who had taken

and k*lled Laura was still out there.

[Kathryn] It was

the beginning of a really bad year.

[dramatic music playing]

[Jan] It was just like any other day.

My daughter Kelli,

she did drop Alexis off.

I remember saying,

"I love you, honey. Have a good day.

I'll talk to you this afternoon."

And those were the last words

that I spoke to her.

[reporter] Kelli Cox

is a mother, a daughter,

and she has mysteriously disappeared.

[Kathryn] In July of 1997,

unbeknownst to everybody in Houston,

a woman named Kelli Ann Cox

disappeared up in Denton, Texas.

[Jan] She was going on this tour

of the city jail

with her criminal justice class.

When she got out to her car,

she couldn't get the key to work.

She couldn't get into the car.

[reporter] Kelli used

this phone to call her boyfriend

to bring an extra set of keys.

This is the last place

anyone heard from or saw Kelli.

I mean, it's like she was there

one minute, and then she was gone.

[dramatic music playing]

[reporter 1] Detectives searched her car,

but leads in this mystery

seem very limited.

[reporter 2] Police say while she still

hasn't made contact with her family,

they can't say for sure

if a crime happened.

I think it's really premature to speculate

on whether or not there are any suspects.

What are you doing? What are you doing?

[Jan] And then it was like almost a month

to the day after Kelli's disappearance,

Jessica Cain disappeared.

[dramatic music playing]

[reporter 3] The Tiki Island teenager was

last seen leaving a Webster restaurant.

Her truck later found abandoned

on the Gulf Freeway,

her purse still inside.

[woman] She would not go somewhere

without calling.

She'd call one of us at least.

And that's why we know something's wrong,

and we gotta find her.

[Jan] Jessica Cain was

with her theater group.

After she left,

it was like, poof, vanished.

[Tim] We just started out on horses.

They asked me to run down there

where Jessica Cain's vehicle was found

and see if we can find a spot

for a command center.

Another huge search.

[reporter] Grieving parents,

Bob and g*y Smither, joined the search.

[g*y] I'll never forget

seeing Jessica's dad.

I knew exactly what he was going through.

Of course, at that point,

I was just hoping for a different outcome.

[Marla] In '97,

when Jessica Cain disappeared,

my dad lived on Tiki Island.

She was my brother's

ex-wife's good friend.

She was her good friend.

I joined in the search party.

We'd wear vests,

and we had walking sticks.

Lost a lot of sleep

when Laura Smither disappeared.

Lost a lot of sleep

when Jessica Cain disappeared.

Lost a lot of sleep in the last 38 years.

[dramatic music playing]

[Skip] No matter what they tried to do

and no matter how much

of a police presence there was

My heart is breaking today.

[Skip] someone was able

to get through the lines.

[officer] The search

for Jessica will continue.

How do you explain it?

[newscaster] There's somebody amongst us,

or something, some monster there.

How do we stop him?

Of course I was feeling,

"My God, it's the same person

that got our girls out there on Calder."

You know, how could there be

this many serial K*llers in one area?

You know, all kind of crazy stuff's

going through your head.

[reporter] The Tiki Island teenager

has been missing since early August 17th.

[Kathryn] When you have a suspicion

growing in a community,

when you have people

looking over their shoulder all the time

and wondering who really is the k*ller,

it kind of eats away at you.

[Marla] I was in the area of searching

in Jack Brooks Park for Jessica Cain.

She was a young female,

going home from being out.

She was clearly alone.

It made me think of

what happened to my mother.

All the things that he did to her.

I know partly she was scared,

but when he left,

he would take off,

and she would always let him back.

One time, he came back,

and he was covered in blood

and had a bloody knife.

And he

He told my mother, "I did it again."

[ominous music playing]

After what happened to Ellen Beason,

and with his criminal history,

and what he did with me,

I don't know.

[crickets chirping]

[Richard] We didn't know if Laura Smither,

Jessica Cain, and Kelli Cox

connected with the Calder Road killings.

But of course, we had to consider

the possibility that they were.

If it was the same person,

why would there be

such a lapse of time from '91,

when Janet Doe was found, until '97?

He's now utilizing a different M.O.,

not putting the bodies in a field.

We had a lot more questions

than we had answers.

[g*y] After Laura went missing,

thousands of leads were called in

to the Friendswood Police Department.

They had a lot of serious suspects

that they were looking at.

But they had nothing to link them

or eliminate them.

[reporter] With the recent k*lling

of Laura Smither

and the ongoing search for Jessica Cain,

Robert Abel has been worried police

will try to connect him to the crimes.

Police claimed that he remains a suspect

in the four League City killings.

[Lise] There was still a lot of talk

in the community about Robert Abel.

So, it's understandable that Tim Miller

thought Robert Abel had to be the k*ller.

We had every reason to think that,

"My God, it could be connected."

[Skip] No one worked harder at trying

to prove Abel was a k*ller than Tim.

[Tim] That was

that metal building back there.

[Skip] He wanted there

to be lots of excavations

and digs throughout Abel's property.

He wanted the police

to interrogate him harder.

[Kathryn] That 17 months

when he didn't know where Laura was

absolutely tore his heart out.

And the idea that other families

are going through that

and the knowledge that the police

often don't do what they need to do

in order to find people

and find those bodies is so

hard for him to accept.

So he goes out, and he does it himself.

[Skip] A lot of his frustration and grief

got channeled into

this kind of vengeance toward Abel.

And he decided he was gonna torment Abel.

And he'd call him, leave voicemails.

I have a person that was

gonna come out there and take you

to Las Vegas and beat your a*s

all the way up there,

and k*ll you.

And then put you in a sand dune.

Tim was convinced

he was on the righteous path.

[Tim] All right, put a mark

Put a mark right

at the fence line right there.

I searched that property so many times,

thinking now maybe there's some

more bodies that are buried out here.

He got out this sort of ragtag army

of volunteers to do a dig.

We are sifting

through every grain of dirt.

[Skip] He had borrowed someone's backhoe.

Somebody brought a group of cadaver dogs

that could smell dead bodies.

The dogs were let loose,

and they all converged on one spot.

[dogs barking]

They'd found something.

And so, everyone began digging

right around the area.

And they uncover a woman's purse

and women's clothes.

Tim thought that they were items

belonging to another victim.

But he couldn't prove it.

No one could prove it.

Finally, Abel was so horrified and scared

that he filed for an order of protection

to keep Tim away from him.

Abel spent years living this tragic life.

He was the pariah of League City.

Abel finally said enough is enough.

He shut down his Stardust Trail Rides.

Moved back to his family ranch

in another county in Texas

to get out of League City altogether.

[ominous music playing]

[Richard] In the summer of '97,

there was still no arrest made

in the Calder Road cases.

And now we've got

two other young women abducted,

Kelli Cox and Jessica Cain.

I know someone knows something.

Anyone who knows about Jessica,

please take this pain from our heart.

[Richard] And the m*rder of Laura Smither.

We're coping as best as you can.

Every agency in the area was helping.

It wasn't from a lack of effort.

Houston Police Department

came down to help.

There was Everybody was pitching in,

and just couldn't catch a break at first.

[911 dispatcher] Webster 9-1-1.

[woman] Yes, ma'am.

Y'all need to come to Waffle House.

Somebody just came in and said

that someone was abducted.

[Kathryn] It was all over the news.

A woman had been

at a convenience store that night.

A man was standing there,

kind of watching her.

She got back in her van to leave.

And her car started to act up on the road.

She pulled over.

And the guy from the convenience store

walks up with a smile

on his face and says,

"You've got a flat tire. Can I help you?"

And the next thing she knew

was that he was behind her

and that he had a knife at her throat.

He forced her into his truck

and gunned the engine,

and he started down I-45.

[911 dispatcher]

They're at the Waffle House?

[woman] They're outside

in the parking lot.

She needs an ambulance. She can't walk.

[police sirens wailing distantly]

They got her out of the middle

of the freeway, they said.

The woman's name is Sandra.

What Sandra did was the turning point

of the investigation.

[911 dispatcher] Need units

to route to 959 West Nasa Road.

Female jumped out of a white dually.

Unknown LP,

last seen headed 45 northbound.

[ominous music playing]