01x03 - Cape Fear k*ller

[bunniefuu]

[water rippling]

[Det. Odham] Cape Fear...

sounds ominous just
in the name.

It was named Cape Fear
based off of pirate stories

back in the 1600s.

Sailors were scared of it,
the water,

because it was so -- so rough.

It's been said that it sucks
in storms,

hurricanes.

There's a history of this area
being cursed, or bad luck,

or something along those lines.

I've seen many crimes
committed in this area.

I've seen full moons
where people do act out.

I've seen Friday the 13th
where bad things do happen.

[woman screaming]

[theme music plays]

[sighs]

♪♪

[siren wailing]

[woman screaming]

[music increases]

[Det. Odham]
It was the summer of 1977.

[girls laughing]

[Det. Odham]
There was a group of kids
leaving a school dance.

[girls laughing]

Approximately 10:30,

Barbara Lewis
was a 17-year-old girl.

Her and her friends,
at one point,

they said their goodbyes.

[ominous music plays]

[Det. Odham] And Barbara was
left walking alone.

[Rev. Jamison]
There was no place in Wilmington

that was so dangerous,
but a block from home,

safest place in town.

[ominous music increases]

[suspenseful vocalizations]

[woman screams]

[Det. Odham]
The next morning,

the Wilmington Police
Department got a call...

[sirens wailing]

[Det. Odham] ...that there was
a young black girl who was,

what appeared to be,
deceased in the alley

behind a house.

Police at the time responded
and found Barbara Ann Lewis.

Her clothes were cut
from her body,

wearing her shoes only,

and was left laying on her back
in that field

where she was strangled
to death.

We found heel prints
where the k*ller dragged her.

They had a shoe print
impression

that they photographed
by the crime scene.

[Cathryn]
Police did find two people

that saw Barbara get pulled
across the street.

They were able to describe
the assailant

as a tall black man.

[Det. Odham]
Pretty vague description
as far as that goes,

but nonetheless,
it gave us a starting point.

Unfortunately, at that time,
we were unable to locate

anyone in particular.

The Cape Fear area is located
in southeastern North Carolina.

Wilmington is what I would
consider to be a small,

quaint town, you know,
surrounded by beach communities.

[Brian] I think Wilmington
is sort of a place

where people are
more superstitious

than in other places.

I think that's something to do
with the history here,

all of the ghost stories,
the pirate stories

that you hear.

And there were serial K*llers
that would come through here.

The growth of Wilmington
and all the new people moving in

and all the tour
that come here, too,

kinda created a --
a hunting ground.

I think people believe
that there is

some other force
out there that's...

causing these things.

So just a couple weeks later,
two hours away up in New Bern,

police get a call
from a hysterical woman.

She's found the body
of a young woman

who's been severely beaten
outside of an elementary school.

New Bern is only about 100
miles north from Wilmington.

[Det. Dombrowsky] The victim was
partially clothed on her back

and had been beaten severely
about her head and body.

[indistinct
police radio chatter]

[Det. Dombrowsky] We collected
biological evidence

such as blood and semen.

There was nothing else
to go on.

I remember it was quite
bizarre because of the nature

of the beating that she took.

He had struck her so hard,
he had embedded her head

into the ground.

[flies buzzing]

[Cathryn] Her head is beaten
so severely that...

they don't know
who even the victim is,

until her mother identifies
her as Gwendolyn Nelson.

[ominous music plays]

[Det. Dombrowsky] Gwen was
an 18-year-old young mother

to her daughter and lived
with her mother.

Gwen liked to hang out
in the neighborhood.

[Cathryn]
Gwen always kind of struck me

as someone that was very
vibrant and full of life.

She just has an aura about her,
someone that she looked

like she'd be fun to be around.

She was also known as a person
who did not put up with much,

was a fighter, was a scrapper,
and stuck up for herself.

[funky music plays]

[man]
What's the problem?

When a woman's k*lled,
a lot of people ask,

"Who do you first look at?"

Normally, a boyfriend,
a husband, a domestic partner

are always included
in a suspect pool.

[indistinct arguing
in the background]

Police contacted her boyfriend.

He lived several doors down
from the crime scene.

He stated she had actually
been to his house that night.

[indistinct arguing]

He told the officers
Gwen had left his house.

She was walking up the street.

And at the intersection there
of Elm Street,

a black male individual came out
and engaged her in conversation.

[man speaks indistinctly]

[ominous music increases]

[panting]

-[woman screams]
-And then grabbed her

by the upper body,

and drug her across the street
towards the schoolyard.

The boyfriend thought
there was nothing to it.

He thought maybe
they were joking around

and they knew each other.

[door creaking]

[Cathryn]
He went inside, shut the door,

and he was the last person
to see her alive.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
Her boyfriend described
the suspect as a black male,

taller, and provided a clothing
description with sneakers,

nothing out of the ordinary.

But the officers at the time
had suspicions of the story.

"Why did you not intervene?"

Why did you not call somebody
to help if you see somebody get

grabbed about the upper body
and dragged off the street?

Why would you not do anything?

[Cathryn] He seemed
like the strong suspect.

They couldn't say he did it,

but they couldn't rule
him out either.

But if Gwen this boyfriend
was telling the truth,

that means
there's still a k*ller

out on the streets of New Bern.

♪♪

[Brian] There is a guy out
there just randomly

snatching people off the street.

You never know
who's gonna be next.

♪♪

And that's when,
Friday the 13th,

marks the Cape Fear k*ller's
deadliest chapter.

[woman screams]

[Brian]
Back in the '70s,

I can't imagine
the terror that these women

must have been feeling
to have someone stalking

and preying on people
around here in this area.

[sirens wailing]

You start to understand
that we have a problem here,

and this may not be just
an isolated incident.

You know, as a woman,
you wanna be able to walk home

at night by yourself
and be safe.

But cases like this,
people just being attacked,

it makes you feel
like it's not safe

to be alone as a woman.

It's the summer of 1977,
and here in Wilmington,

Barbara Lewis's body

was discovered.

And then just two hours away
in New Bern,

the body of Gwen Nelson
shows up.

[Det. Odham]
Two totally separate cities.

During that time,
there was no correlation

between those two
m*rder investigations.

This is a photo of me as
a reporter

for the New Bern
Sun Journal.

For years, both the murders
of Barbara Lewis

and of Gwen Nelson
became unsolved cold cases.

When I was writing the story
for the Sun Journal,

I had the opportunity to speak
to Gwen's daughter,

who was only two at the time.

She never felt safe
leaving home.

She never felt safe
going to school.

Her grandmother kind of kept
her really close to her

just to make sure
that she was safe.

[Det. Tully]
Over 30 years later, in 2012,

I was on evening shift.

As I was leaving, I was
approached by a patrol officer

in the alleyway.

He told me that he had
a missing person --

Latricia Scott.

Latricia was 24-year-old

that lived in the downtown area
of Wilmington,

and she was a student
at Cape Fear Community College.

She had two young children
that lived in the house.

[Cathryn]
In January 2012,

Latricia Ann Scott's mom
called police.

She was frantically
looking for her daughter.

She hadn't been
returning calls.

Latricia's mom said she hadn't
come home from school that day.

[Det. Tully]
In 2012,

I was a detective assigned
to the violent crime section.

I was working the night
Latricia Scott

was reported missing.

[sirens wailing]

[Det. Odham]
I was assigned

to the Wilmington
Police Department,

the Homicide Unit,
as an investigator,

but also
as a cold case investigator.

We started looking
for attacks in the area

and found a cluster of --
a high number of r*pes

for a particular small area
during that time frame.

The last year or two
in that particular area,

women walking alone
were grabbed from behind

and dragged and assaulted.

It just kept happening over
the course of years.


We have definitely
had a serial r*pist

operating in that area.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
In 2007,

I took over
the investigative unit

at New Bern
Police Department.

We had a number of cold cases
that had not been worked.

The oldest of the cases
was Gwendolyn Nelson's homicide

dating back to 1977.

The attacks,
they were in a close time frame,

and then July of 1979,
Friday the 13th, they stopped.

In some cases, there was
a description of the suspect --

a black male,

with a pretty large,
imposing figure.

Late 2008,

I reached out to Wilmington
Police Department detectives,

Detective Odham,
and Detective Tully.

We started comparing notes.

[Det. Odham]
When Detective Dombrowsky
and I were comparing cases,

I looked
at his crime scene photos,

something that resonated
in my mind.

This is a picture of a partial
shoe print impression taken

from the New Bern PD m*rder
scene of Gwen Nelson in 77.

And this is
a shoe print impression

taken from the crime scene

of the Barbara Lewis
m*rder in 1977.

It appeared to be the same
shoe print

in both cases.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
Then we noticed something else.

Between the two crimes
of Gwen Nelson

and Barbara Lewis,

we reviewed some
of the crime scene photographs

and it was pretty stark to me.

They almost looked identical,
the way they were laid out

on the ground.

[Det. Odham]
That was the initial correlation

that we really needed
to solidify

that those cases
were involved with each other.

[Cathryn]
Could this be the same guy?

If it is, there is one man
that police were looking at.

[Det. Dombrowsky] In July 1979,
he was convicted of three counts

of as*ault in Wilmington.

And also confessed to a couple
of the r*pes and assaults

that occurred in New Bern.

He'd spent about 30 years
incarcerated

for those offenses

that he committed
in the late '70s.

We know now
why the as*ault stopped,

because he was locked up
on Friday the 13th

in July 1979.

[Brian] He went to prison
for three decades.

And the second he gets out,

these r*pes
start happening again.

[Rev. Jamison]
You know, in the community,

people were fearful.

They said, "Who the heck would
do something like that?"

This guy was a vicious criminal
walking the street

that was capable of just
indiscriminately taking women

and brutally assaulting them.

All over the city,

everybody knew
that he wasn't done yet.

We knew he intended
to look for other prey.

[ominous music plays]

[crows cawing]

[Det. Odham]
Around the Cape Fear area.

We had the 1977 m*rder
of Barbara Lewis,

the 1977 m*rder
of Gwendolyn Nelson,

and then we come up to 2012.

Latricia Scott went missing

from Cape Fear
Community College.

We started looking back
to the early '70s,

and we found up to a dozen
unsolved r*pes

around Cape Fear
between 1977 and 1978.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
And then July 1979,

on that Friday the 13th,
they stopped,

and it didn't
occur any longer after that.

[Rev. Jamison] I can understand
the sense of calm

would have come across
the city now that they know

that this individual
is incarcerated.

[Det. Dombrowsky] That was
the light bulb going off

that Friday the 13th --

that's exactly when
the one individual was convicted

of three counts of as*ault
in Wilmington.

Andrew Bernard Adams.

He was very imposing.

He made a lot of people
just feel uncomfortable.

People described him
as Frankenstein.

[Cathryn]
Once they realized
that Andrew Adams

could be connected
to Barbara and Gwen's m*rder,

they started to peel back
his history,

and they found
a very dark history.

[Det. Odham] Mr. Adams
went into prison at 17 years old

for r*pe and was released
in May of 1977.

In 77 and 78, his mother lived
in downtown Wilmington

and his father lived
in New Bern.

[Brian] Because of the lack
of technology and information

sharing in the 70s,
Andrew Adams was able to go

back and forth between
Wilmington and New Bern

and commit these attacks
without police ever being able

to piece them together.

Andrew Bernard Adams was
locked up in July of 1979,

arrested for a number of r*pes
that occurred down here.

[Det. Odham] This time,
his sentence, it was 20 years.

They kept him in prison
as long as they possibly could.

[cell door buzzes]

[Det. Odham]
But they could not hold him

in prison any longer.

Statutorily, could not do it.

[Det. Tully] The mug shot
of how Bernard looked

when he was released
from prison in 2007.

[Det. Odham]
July 2008,

we had a young woman
walking alone

in a very busy area downtown.

She was walking home
from the bars.

[woman screams]

[Det. Odham] Out of the blue,
she was grabbed from behind

and dragged
into a concealed area

in a church courtyard.

He asked me if she had
ever been r*ped before.

[Brian] The rumor
is that she was stabbed

with a wooden stick
with nails in it.

[Det. Odham]
Somehow, by the grace of God,

she crawled out onto the street.

[panting]

And someone saw her,
a bloody mess.

[continues panting]

[Det. Odham] They miraculously
saved her life.

We were able to get
a description from her.

It was a black male
in his late 30s, early 40s,

around six-foot-two,

over 200 pounds,
with a muscular build

and short hair.

[Det. Tully]
There was no doubt in our minds

that Andrew Bernard Adams
was responsible,

but we didn't have forensic
evidence to show

that he was an attacker.

But the fact
that he's out there

and has the ability
to attack again,

there is a sense of creepiness.

Women around the community,
they knew Adam's history.

They're locking their doors.
There's a fear going around.

You didn't know when he was
going to strike again.

[Det. Odham]
Is it gonna be tonight?

Is it gonna be tomorrow night?

Uh, where is it gonna be?

[Cathryn] So 2010,

another year has gone by,

and things have seemed
a quiet town,

another quiet year
until Friday the 13th.

[Det. Odham]
A lone black female was walking

through a wooded area,
uh, taking a shortcut

to her residence, at night.

[ominous music plays]

[woman screams]

[screams terrorized]

[Det. Odham] And she was
attacked from behind.

He said,
"Have you ever been r*ped?"

And after that, he stole
some personal property from her,

including her earrings.

We wrote a search warrant
for Mr. Adams' house

to look for any evidence
related to the r*pe

of that particular female.

Property that had been stolen
from her,

as well as his DNA.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
It was obvious that...

he was very institutionalized
from being in prison.

Very sparse furnishings,
not much in the room.

[Det. Tully]
He had a calendar

with every day x-ed out
with big black magic marker.

[Det. Dombrowsky] Then we
noticed something strange

we found a package
that was underneath his bed

that contained multiple pairs
of ladies' panties.

[ominous music increases]

[Det. Dombrowsky] Adam said
that he just had a fetish,

and he was stealing
the panties off of clotheslines

when he was walking
near his house.

I then asked him,
"Well, how many people

hang dirty panties
on a clothesline?

And he became evasive
at that time.

[Brian] Detective Odham
took Andrew Adams' DNA

and they sent him off
to the crime lab.

The waiting game is
excruciating,

especially
when you think or note

that every day
he had that urge.

[phone rings]

And then all of a sudden,

I get a call telling me the DNA

that we had collected
from Mr. Adams

matched the DNA

at the Gwen Nelson
crime scene in 1977.

[Brian] It eliminated
the initial suspect,

which was
Gwen Nelson's boyfriend.

[phone rings]

[Det. Tully]
But the sample
was degraded to the point

where it wasn't of the standard
that's usually used in a court

or for the purposes
of DNA evidence.

[Det. Odham]
But it was a match nonetheless.

And Dombrowsky was gonna
be pushing the VA's office

to charge Mr. Adams
with the first-degree m*rder

and r*pe of Gwen Nelson
in 1977.

So months go by,
no decision had been made.

[Det. Tully] We pretty much
were just always waiting for it

to happen again.

And, you know, trying to get
that one extra puzzle piece

to maybe give us the reason
to charge him,

it wasn't uncommon for me
or Odham or both of us

to drive past his house
and wave.

I wanted him to know
that we didn't go away.

I guess it's a little bit
of pompous thing to do,

but, oh, well...

I just knew something terrible
was gonna happen.

[ominous music plays]

And then we come up
to January 2012,

when Miss Scott went missing.

[Det. Tully] There was two names
that were listed as people

that she sometimes
associated with.

When I saw the name
for the first time

on paper that she was with,
my heart dropped.

So I picked up my desk phone
and I called my partner,

Detective Odham, and I said,

"You're not gonna
believe this."

But this missing persons report
that I have on my desk,

Latricia Scott, she was last
seen with Andrew Bernard Adams.

And he said, "You're kidding."

[Det. Odham]
It became apparent

that we were gonna have to jump
in this case immediately.

-Number one, to find her...
-[siren wailing]

...if she is still alive.

But number two,
to prevent something

from happening to her.

We knew what Mr. Adams was
and what he was capable of.

[tense music builds]

[Det. Tully] I remember it being
Friday the 13th, 2012.

People think
of Friday the 13th,

they think of bad luck,
superstition.

It's not uncommon
for the police that I work with

to have heightened awareness,
especially on night shift that,

"Oh, it's Friday the 13th."

You don't know what to expect.

[sirens wailing]

[people yelling]

The night before, I was passing
the corner where Adams lived.

[people yelling]

[Det. Tully]
I had noticed there was a group
of people in the street.

[people yelling]

[Det. Tully] There was some type
of altercation going on.

[Det. Odham] Miss Scott's
family, they went directly

to the person that Miss Scott
was last seen with,

which was
Mr. Andrew Bernard Adams.

[Det. Tully]
The family members were heated,

and I can tell that Adams
was getting nervous.

Now that the police are there,

I had asked him to...

go into a more private area.

While doing that, I put
my digital recorder in my pocket

to record our conversation.

When we got to the backyard,
I had noticed that the ground

had been freshly dug.

And I...

brought that
to Adam's attention.

[tense music plays]

[Det. Tully]
He knelt down on the ground

and physically dug
a three-foot hole

just with his hand to show
me that there was nothing

in this hole.

I was taken back,
at the ease he had

to use his hands to do it.

[Det. Tully] Other officers were
walking around and they said,

"Well, there's another area
that was also disturbed."

I could see he was in fear,

because he was nervous,
you know.

[indistinct
police radio chatter]

[Det. Tully] Adam asked
if he could go inside.

And I allowed that,
because he was not in custody.

He was free to leave.

[policemen talking indistinctly]

[Det. Tully]
At the same time,

other officers
were walking around

near the end of the street.

There was a large fence

that separated the railroad
tracks and bushes.

You can see that there was
a Styrofoam cooler that had

looked like it had been
thrown over the fence.

The detectives
found that there was sheets,

pillowcases, some clothing items

that were tucked away inside.

But they had markings
consistent with blood,

somebody
that had a serious injury.

[tense music increases]

[Det. Odham] We ex*cuted
the search warrant on Friday,

January 13th of 2012.

[sirens wailing]

When the sun came up
on Friday the 13th,

the police began digging.

[indistinct
police radio chatter]

[Det. Tully]
And it was a painstaking
process,

it took a long time,

but they uncovered
the back part of a foot,

the heel specifically
sticking out of the ground.

This is the hole where Latricia
Scott's body was found,

buried in the yard.

[Brian] I believe I was maybe
on my way to work,

when we got word
there had been a body found.

I remember people being

worried and very upset.

I believe there were
some people crying.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
When Latricia's body had
been found buried,

it was disheartening

because here's an individual

that you had been closing in on
and then there's a new victim

to his senseless,

violent mind.

Anytime we have what
we feel is an opportunity

to save someone's life,

and we can't,

it's heartbreaking.

Um,

you know, um,

you -- you can't call yourself
a human if you don't feel that.

So after Latricia's body
was found,

there was a high importance
to get Adams in custody

as soon as possible.

[Det. Tully]
But he had taken off.

He had left the area,
and he was nowhere to be found.

He was in the wind.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
Now you've got an individual
committing assaults,

is committing homicides,
and has no regard

for human life,
for human safety,

and he's out there
on the street,

and he's stressed,

he's...being chased,

and...highly dangerous.

[tense music plays]

In early January of 2020,
Wilmington Police makes

a grisly discovery,
the bludgeoned body

of a 24-year-old
Latricia Ann Scott

buried in a shallow grave.

When Latricia's body was found

buried in Andrew Adams,

I was on edge
and was of high importance

to bring him in and to get him
off the street

for everybody's safety.

[Det. Tully] When he left
the scene that night,

we didn't know
where he went.

We know he doesn't
have a vehicle.

He doesn't have a lot of money.

We knew he was probably
in the area.

[sirens wailing]

[Det. Tully]
While we were at the police
station, we had a gentleman

walk in the front door,
and told us that Andrew Adams

was in his boarding house,
which was only two blocks away.

[sirens wailing]

[Det. Tully] That night,
we evacuated the house,

and he was more
or less barricaded inside,

not coming out.

[canister clatters]

[indistinct
police radio chatter]

[Det. Tully] So we deployed
gas munitions into that house.

[canister clattering]

[Det. Tully]
He didn't come out,

and that's
a very tough individual,

if you can withstand
the fumes of pepper gas.

We go inside the house.

We were on the second floor
looking for him.

And he wasn't up there.

Then we find this hole
that he dug.

Adam's head tunneled
through the floor and the wall,

through the plaster,
through the wood,

and he was high
on the first floor

in a completely different
section of the house.

We ultimately found him,
but he just tunneled

through the floor.
I mean, he was a strong man.

[panting]

[Brian]
I was standing about a block,

maybe a half-block away,

downwind, and all of a sudden
my eyes started watering

and hurting from the tear gas.
It was very surreal.

I think that the whole city

could then breathe
a sigh of relief.

When he was arrested

and brought
into the police station

and interviewed
by me and Lee Odham.

[Det. Dombrowsky]
Adams was emotionless, calm.

Initially,
he was a little hesitant.

[Det. Tully] Unfortunately,
this buildup of trust

that she had led to her demise,

because she was with somebody
who was extremely violent,

who had an extremely
checkered past.

And sooner or later, that side
of them showed its face,

and she paid with her life.

[Det. Tully] At his house,
we took a hammer.

It had a small hair

that was caught in between
the hammerhead and the handle.

Unfortunately, we learned
that that was the weapon used

against Latricia.

It didn't matter at that point
because he confessed.

[Det. Odham]
Then Mr. Adams was interviewed

about the Gwendolyn Nelson
m*rder in 77

and confronted
with the DNA match.

[Det. Dombrowsky] We walked
him through all the facts

and he was able to relay
particularly

detailed information

about her clothes,
a light-colored tube top,

a dark-colored pair of shorts.

He confirmed that she did
indeed try to fight him off,

which is why he struck her
in her head to disable her.

He was then interviewed about
the m*rder of Barbara Lewis.

He vividly described
grabbing the girl,

which he didn't know
was Barbara Lewis,

and dragging her
across the street behind a bush.

[Det. Odham] He says
he was hiding from the guys

who were on the porch
at the end of the street,

and he was pulling Barbara
out of sight.

He didn't realize
that he had choked her too hard

and for too long.

When we got to the why,

his answer was -- opportunity.

[Brian]
After that, they were able

to get enough evidence
to charge him

with m*rder
in the Latricia Scott case

and m*rder
in the Gwen Nelson case.

The DA's wanted to go
for the death penalty,

but it came back that
Andrew Adams' IQ was too low,

and so legally
they were not able to.

Adams pleaded guilty
to second degree m*rder

and second degree r*pe.

He got two life sentences

without the possibility
of parole.

[melancholic music plays]

[Cathryn]
With Barbara's case,

there wasn't enough physical
evidence to charge him,

but he had already been given

two large sentences with Gwen
and Latricia's m*rder,

so that case is closed,
without prosecution.

[Det. Dombrowsky] It was
a tremendous sense of relief.

On the ride home that night,
the totality of --

five years of working
that case, um...

hit me.

And I knew from interviews
with the family that Gwen's mom

cried almost every day

since she was k*lled, and --

I was...

upset...

because...

her mother had passed
away and had never had

the opportunity to see
this justice brought.

♪♪

[Det. Tully]
Throughout this case,

there was a connection
to Friday the 13th.

[Cathryn] It was the date that
Adams was locked up that got

the investigators' attention.
July the 13th, 1979.

Friday the 13th.

[Brian] And then three decades
later, on Friday the 13th, 2012,

the police find
Latricia's remains.

The same day,
Andrew Adams was arrested again,

but now he's in prison
for the rest of his life.

[Det. Odham] With cold cases,
it's such a great moment

when you're solving the puzzle

that someone else
couldn't solve.

We put it all together.

♪♪

The last time
Virginia Rodriguez

talked to her son, Pepe,

was on Friday the 13th.

I saw the volume of blood
that was on the floor.

You think it can't get any
worse, and then it does.

They had his head
in a bucket.

He's a psychopath.