Original subtitles

[somber music]

♪ ♪

PASTOR: We do pray for Missy's safety.

We pray for her safe return.

That's what we're asking God to give us

and hoping that he does.

We're asking that wherever she is right now,

that somehow she senses a peace and a strength

that comes from those who are here.

♪ ♪

CHARLENE: People are just, you know,

they're in their thoughts and prayers.

This family, how are they holding up?

Are they hopeful still, or...

PASTOR: Yeah, they are hopeful.

And I don't blame them.

I--I would be hopeful too.

In fact, I am hopeful.

It's hard not to think sometimes,

in other realms, but they're maintaining hope.

FRIEND: I know prayer is the one thing

that is gonna change this whole situation,

and it's the one thing

that's keeping me sane, that's keeping me from--

keeping my mind straight, really, the one thing.

And, you know, just-- just knowing that

God is in control of the situation is--

is what's keeping us optimistic.

♪ ♪

[ominous music]

♪ ♪

[clicking, whirring]

[pensive music]

♪ ♪

[clicking]

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

FRAN: It is a heart-wrenching day today for the family

of 19-year-old Melissa Witt.

ANCHOR: Family members are hoping against hope

that the body found in Franklin County

this morning is not Melissa's.

A local trapper apparently found the body

of a young white female early this morning

in the Ozark National Forest.

Fort Smith Police drove to a wooded area

near the Mulberry River around 9:30,

but they could not positively identify the body.

However, the dental work appears to match

that of the popular Westark college student

who has been missing since December 1st.

A police chaplain broke the news to Melissa's mother

and drove her home from work.

No positive identification has been made.

The state medical examiner arrived on the scene

just moments ago to take the body back to Little Rock

to determine if it's Melissa's

or some other young white female.

Standing by outside of Melissa's home in Fort Smith

is Charlene Shirk, who has talked with

Melissa's mother throughout this long ordeal.

Is there anything new that you can add to this, Charlene?

- Wilbur, we're outside of the home,

just in case Mrs. Witt does receive

any additional information.

But at this time, there is no positive identification.

Now, as you can see behind me, family and friends

have already begun to gather at the home

to show their support as the community

and as they have done throughout this entire,

as I said, heart-wrenching ordeal.

And we've all been wearing the ribbons

and hoping against hope.

And there is still a glimmer,

but it does seem to be dimming at this hour.

♪ ♪

- You know, and we got that call that--

that they found a body and it was a female.

You know, my photographer and I drove up there.

♪ ♪

We kind of figured, you know--

you know, Fort Smith and this area,

it's so heavily wooded, it's so mountainous.

You know, there was a good chance

that if--if--if her body had been hidden,

it was going to be by either people hunting

or people camping.

ANTHONY: So on January 13, 1995,

we ended up receiving a call

from the Franklin County Sheriff's Office.

The sheriff had reported that a trapper was out

in the woods in the national forest

and found a deceased female that was not clothed.

The sheriff knew that there was no other

missing persons in the area at the time

and could only think of Melissa Witt.

So the sheriff calls over down to the PD,

and now everyone's gearing up to head out

to the--where the body was located.

[tense music]

♪ ♪

[clicking]

[static droning]

♪ ♪

LEVI: So it's a--what I would call

a logging road or a forestry road

north of Ozark.

♪ ♪

Get out. Uh, wooded area.

what I would call scrub brush.

And they pointed out where the--the body was laying.

- So you have this U.S. Forestry Service road.

So not many people are really going up and down there.

You have to be somewhat familiar with the area.

- I mean, I've lived in this area my whole life

and, you know, I knew of Ozark, Arkansas,

but I'd never driven out in that area

close to Franklin County up there, which is quite remote.

So you kind of have to know where you're going

or have to know that spot, I guess--

at least be somewhat familiar with the area.

I remember seeing that

the top part of her torso was--

had decomposed, and it had probably

been eaten by small animals, a lot of it.

Naked, no jewelry, no watches, no clothing on her,

and so just laying out there by a big rock and trees around.

♪ ♪

- Part of processing the crime scene is,

you're taking fingernail clippings, swabs,

and all that type of stuff from the body.

The state crime lab actually sent one of their

investigators out there to the scene

to assist with the collection of evidence.

They're gonna take soil samples.

They're gonna take the leaves and pine needles

that were over the body or underneath the body.

Anywhere the body might have been,

they're gonna be taking samples from.

Cigarette butts were found out there, several of 'em.

♪ ♪

There was a Mountain Dew can, napkins,

all kinds of little things that were collected.

And it's not to say that those items were associated

with the person who did this.

You're--you're taking anything,

whether it might be related or not, because you don't know.

And it's better to take everything

than leave something behind,

because it might be the thing that breaks the case.

- Really, there's nothing unusual,

except the way that she was kind of--

not displayed, I guess.

Like I say, there's animal activity

with that big rock there.

Somebody--I think somebody knew where that rock was

or something and something had gone on.

But there was kind of a rock there,

kind of jutting out of the ground.

- It looks like the body may have been in another spot,

positioned on a rock.

There were several large boulders,

rocks that were sticking up out of the ground.

And it looks like the body was moved from the rock

over to the final resting place.

- It seemed like it would have been more logical,

if you can apply logic to a murderer's mind,

to put her behind the rock, or at least try to cover her up

with brush or something like that,

and they didn't try to do that.

So that was kind of the unusual part of it.

[ominous music]

♪ ♪

- Over by the rock in question, there was--

the ground was disturbed and you could see

where there was tissue.

And at some point, body fluid,

you know, from the decomposition,

was over by this rock,

and that included hair from the scalp.

So at some point, we know she was over by that rock

and then ended up being moved over a little bit

away from the rock, closer to the road.

Animals may have moved her.

You know, depending on snowfall, rain,

all that kind of stuff,

the body could have slid off over time

with the decomposition

and ended up in the position that we found it in.

So that's something that just--we can't confirm.

We don't know what happened or why her body was--

appeared to be in one place

and then moved slightly over to another.

It wasn't very far from the rock,

but far enough where something or someone had to move her.

DALE: The body has been picked up

by the Medical Examiner's Office,

and it's in their vehicle now,

and they're picking up some other items

of evidence at the scene.

REPORTER: When is it gonna be removed from this area?

- They should be coming out in the next few minutes.

REPORTER: Where is the body gonna go from here?

- It'll go directly to the state crime lab

in Little Rock.

There's not been any family members called to any scene.

The only personnel that are on the scene here

are law enforcement personnel, other than the witness

that actually found the body this morning.

He has been to the scene.

- I have no knowledge of that.

- We had to wait till the body was positively identified.

They had her dental records,

and that part of her body was intact.

So they were able to make an ID fairly quickly.

- The cause of death was ruled

strangulation, asphyxia.

And then the manner of death was ruled a homicide.

And part of that is, they're gonna test

and see if Melissa was

sexually assaulted at some point.

There was no evidence to support

that she was or wasn't.

Samples that were taken, swabs that were taken

were tested, and it may be negative on semen

that would lead you to believe that a sexual assault occurred,

but it doesn't rule it out.

Due to the comp--decomposition and being out in the elements,

you have the potential of losing evidence.

- I don't remember if I talked to Mary Ann

on the phone...

that day or that night.

I just remember having that conversation with her.

Why didn't somebody find her sooner?

Like, how long had the body been there?

Or how long had she been alive or kept

somewhere before her body was taken there?

Why did it take 45 days later,

around that time period, for her to be found?

And when she was found, I mean,

it wasn't that she was buried, right?

It wasn't that she was und--

I mean, she was right there.

So eith--somebody did a real sloppy job of--of--of--

I hate to say "disposing of the body."

I hate to think of her in those terms,

but there wasn't a big grave dug.

She was just left there,

which bothers me again to think that--

that this young girl was so disposable,

so dismissed in the beginning and so disposable in the end.

And it just makes me angry.

PASTOR: It's been tough on everybody.

It's been very, very difficult.

It's kind of shattered the, uh--

maybe the security thing

that we felt we had in Fort Smith,

and it's been a very tragic thing all around.

- When they positively identified her,

the first phase of that story is

having to tell that community,

a community that had been holding its breath,

a community that had been scared,

a community that had come together and bonded over this.

And we had to tell them how this had ended.

I felt a compassion, not just for Mary Ann,

but for our entire community in Fort Smith.

COWORKER: It's been very, very hard for us.

And she's just a very sweet, loving person.

And I--I just knew that--

that she wouldn't just run off or anything.

CHARLENE: You know, the first 24, 48 hours

were kind of letting them down,

letting them know.

And then we had to shift to, OK, what do we have?

You know, who could have done this?

Again, now we've got all these kinds of leads

and we've seen this person or we think we saw this person.

And, you know,

what's the description of this person?

So then--then it kind of started that

all over again, right?

It was almost like the parking lot all over again.

The leads end up getting cold and drying up.

And it's something that's never left me.

It's just absolutely never left me.

Because as I've aged and grown, I think about her,

and I think about what her life would have been like,

who--who she would have become, you know.

Mary Ann not being able to see her graduate college

and seeing her daughter accomplish great things

and, you know, being at her wedding

and Mary Ann becoming a grandmother.

Like, both women were so robbed of that.

And as I progressed in my life and I reached milestones,

I really did-- I've--I've thought about her.

I've--I've held on to her file all my--my--

my file with her missing posters and her--

and, you know, I think it was about--just about

five years ago or so I said,

"Well, I've got to let some of this go, you know.

"Why am I holding on to this?

I've got to let some of this go."

PASTOR: And we don't know how to deal with it.

I mean, you take it one step at a time

and learn as you go, so to speak.

CHARLENE: Why do you think people

have responded so much to Melissa?

I'm assuming it's because of the kind

of daughter that you raised.

MARY ANN: Well, I think that so many people

relate to this because they have children themselves

and they know how it feels.

I mean, even though they may not have gone through it,

they can imagine, and they understand that.

And the thing I tell everyone,

the only thing I want is--is the prayers.

I think that's the only thing that is helping or will help.

CHARLENE: OK. Anything else?

- I believe that's all.

I don't--I can't think of anything.

♪ ♪

[soft music]

CHARLENE: Even though Mary Ann is gone,

her mother is gone, and her mother will never

have justice in this case,

it is important to still find out who did this.

Young girls should be able to walk out of their car

and go across a parking lot

and meet their mother in a bowling alley.

This cannot be dismissed.

She cannot be dismissed again.

We have to be able to say, this person did this,

and that has to be a mark on them.

This has to--they have to have this as part of their history.

And it has to send a message that cases like this

are not going to be forgotten.

The police will be relentless in finding out what happened.

This case may then lead them to other unsolved cases,

and that's important, because you know what?

Their mothers and parents may still be alive,

and their friends may still be searching for them.

And if this person is still alive,

well, we need to stop this person from doing this again,

from doing this to other women

to doing this to other families.

It is never OK just to let something go and say,

"You know what? We'll never figure this out.

We'll never get the answer to this."

I don't think that's ever OK.

[tense music]

♪ ♪

PERSON ON TV: The principle that land

must not be obtained by force.

Such a policy is fodder for the president's critics.

[person on TV speaking indistinctly]

♪ ♪

PERSON ON TV: But the president's problem

is not just with the Europeans.

The Pentagon and the majority of the American people

strongly oppose U.S. military involvement in Bosnia.

In the end, only the Bosnians

have been willing to die for it.

Barrie Dunsmore--

[screen ripping]

[ominous music]

[glass shattering]

♪ ♪

[fanfare playing on TV]

World News Sunday.

[person on TV speaking indistinctly]

[suspenseful music]

♪ ♪

[engine rumbling]

FRAN: I think it started '93

and it went through '95.

We had back to back serious, serious crimes.

[ominous music]

♪ ♪

- It seemed like it was a Sunday afternoon, maybe,

or something like that, kind of--when we got a call.

Patrol had responded to a missing persons call.

♪ ♪

FRAN: Her name was Juanita Wofford,

an elderly woman that I personally knew.

I lived down the street from her, in fact.

She was much--very much of a loner, you know.

And she lived in a house that you really couldn't tell

if it was a house or not because it was

so overgrown around the house.

LEVI: Two church members, I think, reported her

not showing up for church, which was unusual.

And they went to her house--

the patrol officers went to her house,

noticed there had been forced entry.

They contacted the detectives,

and the detectives contacted us.

♪ ♪

Going to the house,

you noticed that the screen door

had been ripped open.

The front door had been obviously

forced open, shattered.

The door frame was shattered open

to a lot of different pieces.

As you open the door...

♪ ♪

Lots of blood on the floor, readily identifiable.

You could tell there had been a struggle

in the living room area.

There was even damage in the ceiling, blood spatters.

♪ ♪

There's so much blood that it was difficult

to get from the living room

back to the kitchen bedroom area

where the victim was found, where Mrs. Wofford was found.

♪ ♪

Once you stepped through the small living room,

there's a bedroom kitchen area.

She's on the right-hand side of the doorway as you walk in.

She's had her shoes and socks on

and a--like a T-shirt or something

that was pushed up around her neck and head.

She was laying on her face and--

face down on the bed and appeared

to have been sexually assaulted and obviously deceased.

FRAN: Right inside the door of the living room

was a pool of blood-- thick pool of blood.

And in it were drag marks.

And, I mean, you could tell they were drag marks,

which I thought, you know, she had been drug through it

and taken back to the bedroom.

There were no footprints other than a little dog.

She had a dog, and its footprints was in the blood.

At first we thought maybe she was stabbed

with the door jamb,

you know, 'cause it was splintered pretty bad.

She was stabbed in the neck, the head, I think the torso.

But it was the--the neck wound, I think,

that was the worst.

And, like I said,

she bled out right there.

There was a rag next to the bed

that had semen on it.

But there was also urine around the bed,

on the--the bed posts,

on the headboard, and all around the walls.

The pieces of wall where the urine was,

it was collected.

You know, all the bedclothing-- everything,

all that was collected

and all went to state crime lab.

♪ ♪

I had received a call from a woman

who had reported being raped at one time.

She called me and she said,

"I know it's my brother that did this,

"and I'm--we're scared.

My sister and I are scared of him."

Contact was made.

I--you know, I gave the information

to the group of investigating officers

that were working Juanita Wofford's murder.

They went and talked to the two sisters

about Danny Bennett, their brother,

who lived two houses down from 'em,

which was also very close to Juanita Wofford's house.

- Several suspects had been developed,

and Danny Bennett was developed

kind of as a primary suspect in the case.

There had been some circumstantial evidence

pointing to him.

FRAN: He would walk at night.

♪ ♪

During the day, he'd stay home,

but at night, he'd be out prowling all night.

He would walk up and down those railroad tracks

that were right behind Juanita Wofford's house.

So behind the house, it was all searched,

the ground and everything.

And behind the house was the railroad tracks.

And a ball cap was found, a blue ball cap.

♪ ♪

It did not appear to have been out there a long time.

It wasn't, you know, filled with dirt

and just, you know, nasty from having laid out.

So, you know, we felt like it was maybe with,

you know, evidence in the case.

So it was collected.

I made contact with

Danny Ray Bennett's sisters.

They were shown a picture of the cap.

They said that was Danny's cap.

So, you know, bingo.

You know, we've got us a suspect.

In talking to the sisters, they talked about

how cruel he was to animals

and how he had three dogs that he let starve to death.

And he would beat 'em and just terrible things, you know.

And--and then they went on to tell me about his childhood,

how their mother would make him sit on the corner of the bed

for hours and hours and hours.

He would have to use the bathroom,

and he would use the bathroom in a cup

or whatever was close

because he wasn't allowed to get up,

and that he and his mother had an incestual situation,

you know, and--and she would bring men in and--

and have sex in front of him.

And she was just really mean and cruel to him.

And they were scared of him because he had said

that he had killed people, had killed his ex-wife.

And, you know, we checked all that out.

He hadn't.

But he also, you know,

carried a knife with him.

Well, Juanita Wofford was stabbed.

We interviewed, you know, some ex-wives

and people that knew him,

and--and he had a thing about urine.

He would urinate on women

as part of his sexual thing.

You know, we felt like he was very,

very strong suspect in the case.

We wanted to talk to Danny Bennett again,

so we picked him up again.

And he was always very cooperative, you know.

He--we'd advise him of his rights,

and he said he understood 'em.

And he started talking to us.

He gave us the boot knife.

He said that the tip was broken on it,

and he didn't really remember how the tip got broken.

In his apartment, he had bottles of urine

all over the place.

♪ ♪

There was a door that, in his apartment,

that looked like just a closet door.

And I opened it up and it was--

went to a basement, a dirt floor basement.

And there was all these animal bones.

♪ ♪

He had a real thing for urine.

And, of course, we collected that

and sent that to the crime lab as well.

We were waiting on the DNA,

and we decided to pull him back in again.

[ominous music]

I interviewed him.

He admitted he needed money.

He had used all the money he got.

He got a disability check, and he used all the money

and he was out looking for something to get some money.

And that's why he decided to--to break into her house.

And he said that he kicked the door.

♪ ♪

She was right there, and she was on him,

and he took his knife out, and he stabbed her.

Then he drug her to the bedroom.

And I said, "Well, when you turned around

and looked back toward the door, what'd you see?"

He said, "I saw the big pool of blood."

And I said, "What else did you see?"

And he went like this, and made two marks.

♪ ♪

After he gave a statement, he was placed under arrest

and put in jail.

♪ ♪

DNA takes a while.

You know, it's a wonderful tool,

and it's even better now

'cause it doesn't take quite as long.

But back then, 30 years ago, it--it takes a while.

And so we were waiting on it, and he was in jail.

You know, the prosecutor was talking about,

you know, filing the charges and--and doing, you know,

getting ready for court and all that.

And then we get the report back on the DNA that it wasn't his.

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

And so, you know, we just-- we had to regroup.

To this day, I just really feel like he was there.

He was not the one that had sex with her,

but he--he was there.

♪ ♪

LEVI: The body was found.

[ominous music]

Small metal pins covering up blood drops.

♪ ♪

- You immediately notice forced entry to the door,

elderly victim that had been sexually assaulted

and raped and murdered.

That's why they called us there

is 'cause it looked like one of our crime scenes.

♪ ♪

When Mrs. Henderson-- the incident occurred,

the Crawford County Sheriff's Office

and maybe the state police had been involved.

And they'd contacted us, knew that we had

the Juanita Wofford investigation ongoing

and it was unsolved and that--

that was an elderly sexual assault victim

that had been murdered, forced entry.

Basically the same crime scene,

just in a different location, different county.

And they called us over there to assist them

with the crime scene investigation.

♪ ♪

PERSON: Several visual inspections of the house

reveals blood only in the entrance

to the bedroom off of the living room

and in the middle bedroom.

♪ ♪

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

FRAN: We later developed a suspect,

Charles Ray Vines.

♪ ♪

His name came to light when he tried to kill a 16--

I think it was 16-year-old girl in Crawford County.

- The sister to the juvenile that was attacked

worked for me in Central Records

there at the police department, so.

- He broke in on her, tried to rape her,

and he tried to kill her.

And her father came in and took care of the problem,

and he was arrested.

- He lived near--

or knew or was aware of the family that was there.

The father of the victim and the mother of the victim

had left, were gonna go eat dinner

or something or another.

Vines had went there.

The victim was a--knew him.

I don't know how well, but was aware of him,

opened the door,

had some sort of conversation with him,

and then was attacked.

The parents had forgotten something

and had returned home and of c--

found Vines attacking their daughter.

- Him breaking in, kicking in the door,

going in, it's similar to Juanita Wofford.

So, you know, we really take a look at stuff like that.

- Somebody at the crime scene there said, you know,

that Mrs. Henderson lived just right--you could--

I think you could see Mrs. Henderson's place

from theirs or lived right down the road from there,

and that he'd been living in the location,

and they started putting two to two together.

And that's when all of the--the crime scenes

started adding up.

- Once Charles Ray Vines was arrested

for that incident in Crawford County,

blood was taken.

You know, we were involved somewhat

in that investigation because of the similarities.

The semen that was found on a rag

by Juanita Wofford's bed

was sent to the state crime lab,

and it was compared to Charles Ray Vines.

His DNA was sent down there, and it did--

it was positive that it was his DNA.

REPORTER: The case of Juanita Wofford is now over.

Charles Vines admitted before a judge

he is guilty of beating and stabbing

the woman to death in 1993.

The agreement was this:

police would ask Vines questions

about unsolved cases,

including Melissa Witt,

Morgan Nick, Lori Murchison,

Dora Doe, and Juanita Wofford.

Vines tells the truth, he gets to live.

♪ ♪

[birds chirping]

[soft music]

♪ ♪

ROB: Well, this is a more important rock pile

than that one over there.

PERSON: Yeah, I agree.

ROB: So we'll at least--

we'll at least do this before that one.

Let's mark it, put it in the priority

where you think it's most important.

But let's clear it--

With Charlie Vines you have a--a--

you know, at present,

looking back, we now know he's a serial killer.

During his interviews, he--he did say

during his interviews that he liked to have sex with them

after they were dead.

♪ ♪

His words were, you know,

"Having sex with a dead body was the ultimate high."

- Charlie Ray Vines worked at a--like, a funeral home.

There were allegations that he was

sleeping with the deceased persons.

There were even allegations that he was

messing with the bodies, whether that was

actually sleeping with them or cutting up the bodies

and putting different people's organs

in other people's body parts.

- He's one of those outliers where generally

a person's taken for sexual reasons--

you know, some serial killers will kill a person

for that reason, whatever it is about the murder

that they get gratification for.

Vines was like the blending of the two.

He--he enjoyed the sex and the murder at the same time

and had a real weird fetish in that regard.

- After the fact, it was determined

that he was a "serial killer."

Typically, investigators start to go back

and start to look at, OK,

who all went missing around the same time?

[ominous music]

And then they start to think, OK,

does this fit this person's MO on how they do things?

And ultimately, that's how we got back

to Charlie Ray Vines and Melissa Witt.

- In the grand scheme of things,

to have a known serial killer in your area

and then have an abduction, you know,

or missing persons of any type,

you have to consider that person.

When you look at a 19-year-old missing,

right in the middle of his period of victimization

and right in the middle of--

of where he was preying,

then you have to consider him as a highly viable suspect.

- We initially were looking at Charlie Vines for Morgan Nick

and potentially Melissa Witt at the same time.

But with that correction being made

through their communications, now we understand

that the--the potential crime

that Charlie Vines was talking about while in prison

was that of Melissa Witt.

So then we look at Charlie Vines' background,

his proximity to the area, the crime itself.

You know, we see--we know that he's predisposed to murder.

We know that he targets opportunities.

We also found that a coworker of Charlie Vines

that worked for Ocker

helped Charlie dig cemetery plots and set headstones,

had reported that Charlie Vines liked to play pool

and even kept one of those collapsible

pool cues, the nicer--

you know, the guys who were serious about pool

would have those in a collapsible box.

He reported to that interviewer that he knew Charlie Vines

to have a pool cue, and that any time they would

stop and went somewhere for lunch or a break,

if there was a pool table in that restaurant or whatever,

that Charlie liked to play pool.

At that time, Bowling World had several pool tables.

So that would at least give us a reason

to believe Charlie to have known about Bowling Would,

frequented Bowling World.

We also--going through the old files of Fort Smith PD,

there was a, uh, uh--a lady had emailed a detective.

She worked with Charlie Vines' mother.

And Charlie Vines sometimes would show up

to his mother's work.

And this witness reported that she saw him wearing

a bowling league shirt of some sort.

She could not recall what bowling league it was

or any of the name on it.

But she associated that shirt with a bowling league,

which is, you know, two separate pieces of information

that at least puts Charlie Vines knowledgeable

of the bowling alleys and the pool halls

of Fort Smith, Arkansas.

JAY: So what do we assign significance--

let's just say greater or lesser,

greater to where they were taken from

or where they were dumped?

- Dumped. JASON: Yeah.

In this case I think dumped,

because it was such a secluded area and almost--

BRAD: And there's plenty of woods.

There's no reason to drive that far out there to dump.

I mean, there's-- ROB: Yeah.

I mean, this is-- that's two counties over

from Sebastian County, from Crawford County,

to Franklin County. PERSON: Yeah.

♪ ♪

ROB: There was a work order that assigned

Charlie Vines to dig a grave--

grave spot out here this way.

And when he was interviewed,

the interviewers brought to his attention

or asked him about it, and he denied it.

Interesting. It just--

it seemed more--more of he was distancing himself

from this cemetery in the denial,

and this cemetery being just a seven-minute drive

to where Melissa's body was found...

JAY: Yeah.

ROB: Makes it relevant.

The work order was to set a headstone

at Campbell Cemetery,

and Campbell Cemetery is just under 3 miles from where

Melissa's body was found, just a eight-minute drive

of regular dirt road driving.

He--he just doesn't recall any of the work order.

He doesn't--he pretends not to be familiar with

Campbell Cemetery,

although, looking through his history,

he either worked full-time or part-time

for Ocker Monument for a long period of time.

It's believed he would be very familiar

with most of the cemeteries in this four- or five-county area.

But, regardless, they-- the PD had a work order

putting him at Campbell Cemetery

just months prior to her disappearance,

and he denies that.

♪ ♪

REUBEN: Make sure nothing's behind ya.

ROB: Yeah. Yeah.

When you're on your way out, you stop.

You don't hear a vehicle. - Mm-hmm.

♪ ♪

- To put a body up behind that rock would take

less than a minute. - Right.

- You know.

So you wouldn't need any time at all to place the body.

But I would think you would be familiar with the area

to know that that's a good road.

- Right. - A good spot.

- If he's distancing himself from Campbell Cemetery

and we know Melissa Witt was found in Franklin County

just up the hill from there,

could he be involved

in Melissa Witt's disappearance or murder?

ROB: I think you'd have to hustle to get out there.

JAY: It's a good 45-minute drive to Ozark from Fort--

from--I lived not far from here,

and I think it was like 40, 45-minutes

to an exit in Ozark that my dad always had to meet his dad at.

ROB: We need to map out an average drive

from here to that dump location to where we could say, OK,

at least they're-- the suspect and her timelines

intersect for that period of time,

at least for that drive.

If you have familiarity with these roads,

and particularly the road where she was dumped at,

that little road, it goes up, and it just turns around.

It dead ends, basically.

So if you're looking to dispose of a body

and you drive up the road to the turnaround,

then as you come out, you know nobody's behind you.

Your back is safe because you know

no one can pull up behind you.

And so you have--

and it being remote and desolate.

And back then, it hadn't been logged yet,

so it was really, really thick woods.

You have what you need to--to dispose of a body.

I'm gonna get a better angle on this sign.

But when a child is taken,

there's--there are different categories.

There's like an infant that's taken because

a person wants a child.

They're not gonna harm it. They want the child.

They generally murder the parents

'cause they want the baby.

And then the next range is for--

usually for sexual gratification.

And that range is what we would put her in.

And that range, it's--

I think the stat is within the first eight minutes,

they're sexually assaulted at a most convenient location.

The stat is also that once the sex act is done,

they're usually murdered and disposed of.

And then there's your outlier of someone

who wants to keep 'em for a period.

And there's the other extreme outlier

that wants to keep 'em indefinitely.

And that extreme outlier is very rare,

and they have all kinds of mechanisms in place

to cage 'em and keep 'em and all of that stuff.

I agree with you guys.

I think there's way more significance

to where she was put, because we know

she's taken from the bowling alley.

Then where does she go between then

and a month later or however long later

where she's found in the woods?

You know, is she immediately taken out there

and dumped within 12, 24, 48 hours?

Is she kept somewhere for a week?

Additionally, when we were looking into him,

we ended up trying

to interview all of his neighbors,

and we found a neighbor who had started

building a cabin up in that area around '93 or '94.

Charlie showed up one day, was just introducing himself

as the new neighbor, talking to him.

And according to this witness, Charlie talked a lot

about liking to hike up in the Ozark Mountains,

being very familiar with the Ozark Mountains.

And that witness said that he even later brought in

some maps that he had put together

of trail maps of the Ozark Mountains,

and then at another point came back to get those maps.

And when he did that,

he freaked out this witness's wife.

So we have, he's familiar with the Ozark Mountains.

He's hiked it.

He's even drawn maps of the Ozark Mountain area.

And he did a work order, you know,

within an 8-minute drive of where her body was found.

That's very significant when you're trying

to piece together who did it

and whether he had something to do with it.

And when we initially looked at all this

for the Morgan Nick case,

we wanted to just interview him.

And so we looked at setting up a time to interview him.

He was in Central Arkansas at a prison.

When we reached out to that prison,

he had been moved to one of their medical prisons,

and we were told that he was terminally ill

and only had a few weeks left.

We still wanted to interview him.

And their response was, yeah, he's not even conscious.

He's--they're just waiting for him to pass.

Just a couple weeks of trying to get to him

to interview him, and he passed away.

And so, you know, we'll never know on that.

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

ROB: The flower bed just really sticks out.

It's really odd.

And the flowers in it were fake.

They were just plastic flowers. OFFICER: Yep.

ROB: So we're trying to relocate that,

'cause we want to get that.

And then inside--there's a depression inside this shed.

So those are the two places we are gonna do tomorrow.

If you guys want to kind of start looking

in the general direction of that rock pile?

OK. That's--

that's one of the places we want to identify.

- I immediately thought it was a pretty secluded area.

I mean, even now it's secluded.

So I can only imagine 20 years ago

what it would be like, you know, out there

in the middle of nowhere.

- The flower bed would have started right about here,

and it would have been somewhere in here.

So we've gone several feet that way, several feet that way.

There was pictures taken of the property,

taken when they did a search of the house.

They had the overall property.

And this was just a yard.

And there was a really odd flower bed here.

The flower bed was kind of an odd shaped circle,

and it was those core sample stones

that are over by the porch.

And it just didn't match any other landscaping.

You know, he had gardens, landscaping timbers.

But then to do something here with the different material.

And then it was plastic flowers in the mulch, not real flowers.

It just did not match any of the other stuff.

And knowing that a lot of serial killers

like to keep mementos of their victims

or something to remember--

something they use to-- use to trigger

the memory of their victims,

you--you would want to dig under something that stood out

as odd, as maybe he used the flower bed as a memory

or maybe there's something under it.

The typical behavior of serial killers

is to, you know, relive their victimization in--you know,

whether it's revisit a site or a grave site

or to keep a memento.

We've considered this checked off as well.

We've gone as far, wide, and deep as we need to.

REUBEN: We had ERT out there.

We had everybody kind of just overlooking the property,

seeing if there was any evidence of anything.

And we ended up going past the pond.

ROB: We were wrapping the day up,

and one of our ERT personnel calls me over

to near the pond, says, "You're gonna want to see this,"

and then points out some headstones just piled,

you know, grown over and kind of in the bank of the pond.

- You know, it's kind of strange.

And then we're kind of looking around.

And then there's another one.

♪ ♪

And then there's another one.

ROB: There's stones right here.

Can you take that thicket and either push one side

or the other with the thicket?

And then we'll start pulling the stones over.

PERSON: That the only one down there?

REUBEN: With all the rumors going on,

we started thinking, well,

what is--like, is he digging up bodies

and sleeping with them or taking things from 'em?

Because he had the access to all these deceased persons.

♪ ♪

- There you go.

- Are these people that he's killed?

♪ ♪

- What we had to do was go,

what could be underneath these headstones?

I mean, could he have marked other victims?

You don't want to just go, "Wow, that's bizarre,"

and then walk away.

Well, I'm thinking of is, from there to here,

maybe just--just-- just dig, like, a trench

and see what we see in it.

And then we move this way and dig a trench along here,

just to see what's under the ground,

if there's anything that indicates

disturbed earth or anything.

OK.

Just because the fact that he was a serial killer,

maybe these stones meant something to him,

or maybe he used it to mark victims that he'd buried.

- I mean, we really didn't know.

I mean, your mind starts to wonder.

ROB: And run a trench a couple feet deep, 2 feet--

2 feet all the way down to just past Carol here.

We'll see what that-- what it looks like,

see if there's anything under the ground.

And then we'll run another trench right here

just to see if there's anything underground.

Then we'll decide after that.

[machinery rumbling]

[dramatic music]

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[match ignites]

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