Original subtitles

[soft tense music]

♪ ♪

- Crouch could very easily be suspect in other cases.

This looks like he slipped through the cracks.

- And on a side note, I got a phone call yesterday that

Travis Crouch is getting paroled.

- His hearing is today.

- We had our next cold case meeting scheduled already.

We find out, going into that meeting,

that Travis is actually set for his parole hearing

the Thursday of that week, his first time eligible for parole.

So, of course, we're following that closely

because he's a strong person of interest

at minimum at this point.

Ideally, we'd like to interview him in custody

where he's not a risk to the public.

And if he's getting out in October,

then that really puts us at a pace we don't want to be at.

We'd like to slow roll and have all the resources in place.

And if I read his documents right,

his parole release date would be in October.

So if he did get granted, we're on a two-month clock.

If he didn't, he did tell me he could reapply in a year.

So we're on a one-year clock if he got denied.

♪ ♪

Detective Marion comes in and says

he knows that I've been tasked with

the Travis Crouch side of things.

And he says, received a phone call that Travis's victim

would like to talk to us.

- I didn't know--

I mean, I saw Marion tell you about that call.

And so...

I did--I mean, when did she call him?

- Yesterday.

ALLEN: And do we know what prompted that?

- My assumption would be the parole hearing.

But no, I don't know. ALLEN: OK.

- He hadn't spoken to her.

ALLEN: And so, for sure, it's the victim of Travis Crouch,

who he's convicted on in Colorado.

- That's what I've been led to believe.

Special Agent Allen and I did make a phone call to her.

It's been 26 years.

And she is--she's struggled to talk about it,

and we didn't force it.

We're not going to--we have records we can go back to.

So we don't need to make her relive all that.

She had testified in the parole hearing one way or another,

but that wound had been opened for the first time in--

since that trial was over.

So she had been through a rough couple of days,

to say the least.

But we did speak to her.

Fortunately, she was strong.

His victim fought this parole, and it was denied.

♪ ♪

He'll be in Colorado prison for at least another year.

He'll be eligible for another parole hearing in a year,

and we'll see what happens.

But the timing was wild that the day of that meeting,

we found out, he's going to have a parole hearing

two days later.

But we were on a pretty tight clock

if his parole had been released, and worse than that,

he would be back on the streets.

You know, maybe he was reformed in prison,

but we don't know that.

And the data that we do have on him

+is that he was very violent.

And I'm not sitting here saying,

for sure, that he did it.

He's a really good suspect, though.

And our job is to either rule him out

or prove that it was him.

[projector whirring]

[click]

♪ ♪

[click]

♪ ♪

[soft tense music]

♪ ♪

[projector whirrs, clicks]

BRAD: So we know Melissa was hit in the head.

The medical examiner said it was something that was--

could render her unconscious,

but it was not enough of a blow

that could be the cause of death.

So that tells me, about the crime scene,

that she was struck and then, I believe,

carried through the parking lot.

And that's why the blood spots are so spread out.

But the longer she was carried to the parking lot,

you get the larger blood spots towards the, uh--

towards the back of the parking lot.

The way the attack happened-- this could have been

a random person sitting in the parking lot

that saw her and, you know, acted immediately.

This could have been someone that she knew

and had an argument with.

We know that there was a man and a woman in the parking lot

and a verbal disagreement that caused alarm

to the 11-year-old that went outside.

So if I was to speculate,

I would say that Melissa got into an argument with someone

that she knew.

And she turned to go towards the bowling alley,

and she was hit in the head.

PARKINSON: So during the investigation,

detectives go to Missy's home.

And when they're at their home,

they're going to collect items that may help with the case.

One item that detectives did take was a diary.

BRAD: The last entry was a week or two before

she had actually went missing.

Inside the diary, you know, she laid out just about everything

she--her friends, every activity she had done.

And Melissa seemed like she was a very outgoing person.

There was nothing to indicate any kind of

drug activity or alcohol activity, anything like that.

She just seemed like she was a--

just a very young--

I'd say love-stricken teenager.

- Looking at some of the people in the investigation,

such as Charles Ray Vines, Travis Crouch,

their MOs were outliers.

They were different.

You start looking at, who knew Missy?

Statistics show that something like this

is going to be most likely someone

that she was associated with.

♪ ♪

- Any type of case you work, the victim's statement is

the best thing that you have.

I mean, what they experienced, how they experienced it.

And that was exactly what finding the diary was like.

You have her day-to-day life in her own words.

She references boyfriends, friends, going to parties,

people that have said ill things about her,

people she doesn't like.

Melissa was very meticulous in the way

that she wrote things and described things.

I mean, you could almost feel her excitement in her words.

- As we're searching all the documents, what was done,

what do we want to do, what do we still need to do.

♪ ♪

We know Missy was bleeding

in the parking lot of Bowling World.

We found blood.

So we assume that the bleeding will

continue on into the vehicle she was placed in.

As the investigation is ongoing,

you know, multiple vehicles are being searched.

Trying to rule people out.

If you do find blood, then we're going

to want to have it analyzed.

So that's something that we are, you know, hoping to find,

rule out, look at.

As part of the investigation, we look at phone records.

So we pull up the phone records for her house.

We look at the phone number and the date and time,

and then we go and look at the diary.

And surely, you know, right there is a document

in Missy's own words

about what was discussed on the phone call,

how she felt about the phone call, who she spoke with.

So it's basically Missy talking to us.

And, you know, we got the date and time of the phone call,

and then we have how Missy felt about that phone call

and what she wanted to tell us.

So it's real nice to have that,

where we can make that connection.

This is who she spoke to,

and this is how the conversation went.

BRAD: My goal at that point is to find out as much as I can,

try to interview friends, family, just to build a profile

and see what other people's interactions,

other relationships, what those were like.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

DETECTIVE: Baker, you got some updates on Crouch on CODIS?

JAY: Yeah. Yeah.

We'd noticed in his IIIs that there was an entry that said,

no CODIS entry made.

Collect DNA.

So that was a little alarming.

Contacted the Colorado Bureau of Investigation,

and they said, on their end, yes, there is one,

and it's constantly being searched.

I still wasn't real comfortable with that, given the IIIs.

So Arkansas State crime lab--

Miranda Crawford's also checking that.

She said in her findings, the same thing.

She's going to go a little more in depth

into the cigarette butt and the evidence that they're aware of

and the partial off the cigarette butt up there,

and see if--she said there's been no hit on it.

But she's going to make sure it's

being processed in such a way that if it's there,

they'll find it, so--

The family--his family said

he--he was not in the area in this time.

There's a lady named Glenda who lives in that area.

And she came forward and said he absolutely

was in this area at that time.

She remembered, for sure, that it was Travis.

She remembered for sure that Travis was in his mama's car.

And it would have been six to eight weeks after Labor Day,

putting us somewhere in November that Travis

was absolutely in this area.

Miss Glenda is still locked in on that.

She is in a difficult position because she is still very good

friends with Travis's parents.

She said maybe they just misremember the dates.

She doesn't think they're doing it intentionally.

She made an interesting comment to us.

Because as soon as we walked in, she said,

you're here about Melissa and Travis, aren't you?

And we said, yeah. We want to visit with you.

She said, well, I can tell you this.

Travis didn't kill her.

Travis wasn't a killer.

He was only a rapist.

So we just kind of filed that back,

knowing the behavioral patterns of serial rapist

and the affinity for violence.

So we didn't dig into that with Ms. Glenda.

I wasn't trying to run his name into the dirt with her.

I just wanted to corroborate with her

that he was in this area in that general timeframe.

And we were able to.

His ex-wife stated that every time he got out of jail,

he always went back to his dad's.

We know, for sure, New Orleans PD ran him in NCIC

on January 3 of '95.

So we've got a firmly established line.

We've got a north-to-south travel line

from Minneapolis to New Orleans that logically

would include our area.

If Travis Crouch is the suspect,

whatever vehicle he used to transport

Melissa will have blood in it because

we know it was a bloody scene.

We know that when she got in that car,

she didn't suddenly stop bleeding.

So if we can ever find a vehicle

that has her blood, especially if it's connected to him--

but even if it's one of these other gentlemen--

these other men that we're looking at--

then that's rock-solid evidence

that she was in that car.

But I think it's worth our while

to look into the other cars, see if we can find

some other vehicles, belong to the family,

see if we can track them down and perhaps run those as well.

And maybe he was driving something different that day.

PARKINSON: You know, you have this

beautiful young woman that

was abducted and murdered, and then her body dumped

out here in the National Forest,

and, you know, stripped nude.

I mean, just-- it's not right

not to be able to figure out who did this to her

and bring them to justice.

Even though, like you said, her parents are gone,

I think the community demands that,

and that's what they expect from, you know,

the police department.

It's not about pointing fingers or, you know,

did you do a good job, did you not do a good job.

Trying to find something-- something to grasp

and identify who did this.

And even if that person is no longer here,

at least we could wrap it up and, you know,

say, without a doubt, this is the person that did it.

I mean, just--to me, you abduct her,

knock her over the head, fight with her, whatever,

in the parking lot, and then drive all the way up--

I mean, we're not even on the logging road yet.

- We're not even there. Yeah.

- And it happens at night.

It's pitch black out here.

- Yeah.

I mean, there's 1,000 places he could have dumped her.

It's just hard to fathom he randomly

ended up on a logging road.

- Yeah, because the store and the campground

was on the aerial maps.

We're still here, so...

- But then you got the campground,

which puts Travis Crouch in the area,

and then you got the cemetery.

- And the lady that puts him in the area worked at that store

right there.

That's where she said she saw him.

And she still holds that to this day,

even though she doesn't think he did it.

She's friends with his parents.

She absolutely holds that he was right there,

picking up those puppies--

picking up a puppy in his mama's car

in the time he says he wasn't here.

- And then you got Charles Ray Vines

that had a work order for digging the cemetery

even closer to the logging road.

So--

- Well, we'll get on up there.

We got a lot to do.

When I think about it,

I mean, we are already quite a distance away from 40.

And the windy roads, coming up here

in the middle of the night, how dark it would be--

like you said, he definitely have to be familiar.

And this is just on the highway.

You know, we're not even on the logging road yet.

So that adds another whole layer of someone

has to be familiar with the area

to get all the way up there.

I don't know.

I keep going back to Crouch or--

I don't know.

I just--it's so fucking far out here.

I mean, look at this, going...

♪ ♪

- Kind of spooky how that big rock

almost looks like a headstone.

♪ ♪

- So when you're examining a cold case,

and you want to look at the evidence,

you're going to pull all this evidence out

so you can determine what evidence

is best and will give you the best luck of getting

a return on DNA, say.

DNA has made leaps and bounds, advances,

and they can do a lot more now than they could

back in 1995, 2000.

When we're looking at new procedures and the advancement

in technology, we really want to look at possibly submitting

almost everything again, and private labs

as well, who may have a better technology

than your state crime lab.

[soft tense music]

♪ ♪

DANNY: One of the first questions I had is,

um, the nail clippings.

I know the ME took those,

like, when you did the autopsy.

But I haven't found--

I know you sent me something on the nail clippings,

but it said it was, like, being retained,

that it hasn't been tested.

BRAD: I got you on speaker.

But no, I was just calling earlier.

We were fixing to go into a meeting with the crime lab.

And we had a list of questions and stuff,

and we wanted to make sure we didn't miss anything.

It's pretty exciting. So--

JAY: Yeah.

- The--they said, from their end, what they can tell--

the fingernail clippings have never been tested.

JAY: Ooh, that is exciting.

- So that's pretty awesome.

So--

JAY: Yeah.

- They've got them there,

so they're fixing to start testing them.

They said it could be anywhere from three to six months,

but just depending on if they can get people

moved to the cold case stuff.

And then, like, the blood droplets--

you know, we talked about, like, did they test each one,

or did it--

you know, they just test one or two spots?

And they said most likely it was the one or two spots,

but they were going to go back,

and they would retest all of them.

JAY: OK.

- Pretty exciting. So--

JAY: Dude, that fingernail thing--that is exciting.

Oh, my gosh.

- Hopefully--

JAY: You know, that could be--

I mean, that has the potential to be a huge breakthrough.

We'll see.

It seems like that's our best potential right now.

- Right. Yeah, I agree.

The whole purpose of the Cold Case group

is to overlook and see what could have been missed

and what can be re-approached.

And now we're doing that, and we're actually

getting solutions and finding key pieces that could have

slipped through the cracks.

I want to push to get this done because, I mean, this is,

like I said, it's one of those things

that you never thought you'd be part of,

and you're doing it.

And to feel like you're making headway and getting close

to something, it's pretty--

I mean, I can't even describe it.

- You know, they see, OK, we've got 10 blood spots.

Let's test four of them.

Four of them show to be the victim.

OK, we believe that all to be the victim.

I mean, that's a very good educated guess.

You know, and in that time, in that moment,

maybe that's sufficient enough at the time.

But when you get down to a case such as this,

where it's nitty gritty, like, every blood spot matters.

Every piece of DNA matters because you're

looking for that game-changing piece that could put everything

that we have together.

You know, that's why you have to have these follow up

meetings and explain to the crime lab, hey,

we need to revisit this.

We need to resubmit everything.

We need to figure out what's been tested,

what's not been tested so we can make sure it's all tested.

That way, nothing's missed.

BRAD: Now, Melissa was found in January.

And five to six months later,

you had the Morgan Nick case come up.

So you've got the insane amount of evidence

being sent from our case.

Then you turn around, and you know,

they're still sending stuff, I'm sure,

on that case and constantly following up with me and check.

There's no telling how many pieces of evidence

they had sent in that case.

- I think that's what makes this

a crucial time now is that we are finding out

that some didn't get tested.

Let's test it now and see what it does to open--

open up this case.

- Have I told you the story, when Morgan was actually taken,

that I was playing the Little League game the night

that she had gotten taken?

♪ ♪

I'll never forget.

My mom just like, stand right here.

Do not move.

And I was not to leave her side.

And I remember everybody kind of--

it's hazy.

But I remember, like, people in a panic.

You could just tell that something was wrong.

There wasn't any celebrating after the game.

There was--everybody was getting in their cars

and leaving.

And I remember a lot of police officers being there,

but you didn't really--

it wasn't until probably the next day

that it started hitting home and you

started hearing everything that actually had taken place.

Back then, nobody really had cameras,

and it was just a rare thing.

But my mom had gotten a video camera and had taken it to film

our last game.

And so the tape was turned over to the police and--

♪ ♪

That's the last time that Morgan was seen,

in the background of that video.

- I guess I didn't realize that your mom's was--

it actually had her in the background.

- But it also makes you think--

look at the Witt case--

you know, I said earlier, that can't happen to me.

And that happened.

And now here we are working it.

And I mean, you just got to--

it's wild how everything falls in line.

♪ ♪

[soft tense music]

♪ ♪

ALLEN: So Fort Smith PD has worked with--

is working with the state crime lab

to get the fingernail clippings sent to a private lab.

And that's that lab in Florida.

And so the goal is, uh,

to fully test the fingernails for the touch DNA.

So they're going to use that private lab.

And that private lab's-- you know, it's got the--

the reputation of handling touch DNA as their forte.

And then the other thing was the culmination

of everyone's work is that three of the blood spots

were confirmed tested, but not all of them.

- Gotcha.

- And so the state crime lab is going to--

they have the blood samples.

They're going to retest all of them,

the three that have been tested

and the seven or eight that have not been.

Any one of those blood spots--

if she had struggled enough to cause him to bleed any--

that if any of those spots could be our suspect,

then we would--

the only way to know is to have them all tested.

- Right. - So that should be

in the works now, to get all the blood spots tested.

♪ ♪

Admittedly, in the back of our minds,

we're going to be waiting for that answer,

waiting for that lab result, and guardedly hopeful

that it gives us something that we can act on.

- It's often not like what it appears in TV shows and movies

and things of that nature.

A negative answer is still an answer.

So if, for some reason, we get results back

that say it's not this, well, that just gives me motivation

to keep pushing forward to get some answers

for something to get a positive result.

So I'm hopeful, but at the same time,

I'm realistic and understanding that not every result

is going to be positive.

But that gives me the motivation to keep trying

to look for the right answer.

ALLEN: The hope would be that there's some form

of suspect DNA that can be found

with her fingernail clippings.

♪ ♪

[keyboard clacking]

[line ringing]

CHRISTINE: DNA Labs International.

This is Christine.

- This is Detective Marion with the Fort Smith

Police Department.

CHRISTINE: OK. Let me see if she's in her office.

Hold on one second.

BRAD: Thank you.

[classical music playing]

♪ ♪

It almost hurts to have to sit and wait

because it's something that, you know, has never been done.

And you just can't-- you want the results now.

But once we get it all sent off, 10 to 12 weeks,

I mean, that kind of crushes the excitement

as far as the timeline.

But it's still-- it's just because,

you know, you want it now.

In a case like this, I would think

that the fingernail clippings, in a strangulation case,

are going to be crucial evidence because, you know,

we know that Melissa fought at the bowling alley,

and most likely, she fought when she was being strangled.

And, you know, her fingernails could hold potential evidence

of the--of her killer.

I mean, it's--to me, I think that is a vital,

vital piece of evidence that has never been tested.

And, you know, with all the technology today,

hopefully we can find--

find some good answers with it.

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

- Well, there's a lot of weight that

goes into a call like this.

You know, there's hopes, especially with

the community and family members

and the department in general.

We just don't know whether that's

going to be a good phone call or a bad phone call

or inconclusive.

So either way, regardless of the information,

there's still going to be a lot of work to do.

So we're just hoping that we get a good phone call.

[phone ringing]

- Hello. This is Deputy Chief Thompson.

RACHEL: Hi, Deputy Chief Thompson.

This is Rachel from DNA Labs International.

- How are you? - I'm great.

How are you doing this morning?

RACHEL: Good.

I was just calling with some preliminary results

from your case.

So as you know, we had extracts

from the nail clippings,

and then we also tested the nail clippings

using our sponge shell method.

So looking at the extracts, we re-quantified them.

And although there is plenty of DNA

present to move forward with DNA profiling,

there was no male DNA detected.

- OK.

RACHEL: So we also retest them, as I said,

using our sponge shell method.

And again, although there's plenty

of DNA to move forward for DNA profiling,

no male DNA was detected.

I have a question for you guys.

So we do have two options.

We could stop testing at this point,

or we could still move forward with DNA profiling.

We don't necessarily know what happened to Melissa.

So it is possible we could still yield a DNA profile that

could have information, or we could also just

pause at this point and move forward

with some of the other items that we talked about.

- Do we think that the DNA profile could be hers,

or do we think that it's-- is there a way to test that?

RACHEL: It could be just hers.

It could also be her and another female,

or it's also possible that there could be a really

low-level male that's not being picked up

with quantification.

But the only way to be able to detect that

would probably be doing next-generation sequencing,

which is much more sensitive.

- OK.

RACHEL: Do you want us to issue a report

at this time on what we've done so far,

or do you want us to hold off?

- Yeah, if you could issue a report

and send it to us, that way we can look at that.

And then we can discuss it and go from there.

RACHEL: OK, sounds good. Thank you, gentlemen.

Have a good day.

- All right. Thank you.

PARKINSON: Yeah, that's definitely disappointing.

Disappointing news.

But I think bring that report and--

you know, to the team and discuss

what we want to do from there.

- But we'll just have to look and see how much further

we want to try to go with it.

- Yeah.

I don't think he's going to answer, so...

VOICEMAIL: Your call has been forwarded to voicemail.

- Yeah, no luck.

Brad's on vacation now.

I have to get in touch with him some other time, it looks like.

[somber music]

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

REPORTER: I remember interviewing people and people

saying this was such a safe and quiet and friendly community.

This is shocking that something like this

has happened in our town.

And I think that's why the town mobilized like it did.

But as far as violent crime or abductions or anything

like that, I mean, that was not going on

when I was there, you know, in the mid '90s.

It wasn't until this abduction occurred with Melissa Witt

that it just, it shook that community to its core.

INVESTIGATOR: Because when we walked up here, I saw--

REPORTER: I don't even think there was a,

we've got to find who did this, in the beginning.

It was more like, well, she's got to be somewhere,

and we've got to find her.

♪ ♪

PARKINSON: I think Melissa's case

is important to the community.

Someone committed this horrible crime.

Someone needs to be brought to justice.

And even if this person who did this to Missy--

if they're deceased, we still want

to be able to identify and make sure that nothing like this

could ever happen again.

So I think that's kind of what drives me

and the fellow detectives is you have this cold case

that hasn't been solved, we have plenty of evidence,

And just going back through all that evidence

and statements that were made--

see if we could find a link or something that wasn't followed

through with all the way and maybe rule out

some of the people that were already investigated,

but kind of left in limbo so we could definitely

cross them off the list.

REPORTER: It's 29 years later, almost 30 years later.

And if there's anything, anything that

covering her story today can do to help bring closure--

um, you know, unfortunately, Mary Ann has left us.

She's passed away.

And that breaks my heart to think that she passed

never knowing what happened to her daughter,

and that she lived all those years without knowing.

Even the day that they found Melissa's body

and we went to her home and--

she invited us in.

You know, her friends and family were showing up.

Melissa's friends were there.

She invited us into her home.

And I just said, Mary Ann, take this time for privacy.

We'll report from outside.

You need your--I had so much respect for her

and admiration for her on how she handled

herself through all of this.

And in her memory and honor and Missy's,

if there's anything that we could do to put out there

that could bring either justice or closure to this--

I guess it would make us feel better.

I know she's with Missy now.

You know, I know they're together.

I know she knows what happened now.

And that's the only thing that honestly brings me

consolation is that--

is that I know they're together.

♪ ♪

ALLEN: There's so much to be--to review,

so much information to go over,

boxes of materials to go through.

One person is easily overwhelmed by that.

But if you get a group of investigators that

are interested and will spend a little bit of time

individually and take a piece of the investigation,

then it's a force multiplier to enhance the ability

of the group to further the investigation,

to maybe get some clarity, eliminate suspects,

hopefully, theoretically, conclude what happened

and, you know, potentially convict someone

or at least close the case.

DETECTIVE: I don't know how guys and gals do this job

without faith as a central element to it because you

could quickly lose your hope, faith in all things.

But you just--

I've got on the back of my work phone

that from the Gospel of John

just to be a light in the darkness.

Coping with it, it's just a matter of getting in there

and realizing that you've been--

it's truly an honor to get to do what we do,

to shine light on these situations and to help--

maybe help deliver people from them and help them

find their way out.

BRAD: From the night that she was taken

and seeing how everything played out in the community,

how it affected the family, how it affected

law enforcement, just--

and watching that the entire time you're growing up

and then being part of this cold case group

that is on the other end of it working the case,

and seeing all the work that's gone into it--

I mean, it's very surreal.

DANNY: But then also too, we got to be mindful of,

you know, however many years left

we have in law enforcement, what we do today is extremely

important because if we're not doing it right now,

the right way--

and say we don't solve the case and it gets passed on

to the next detective,

you know, he's going to look at what we did

and then have to go off of our notes, what we've discovered,

you know, and some day, find a piece that we're missing,

add it to the rest of the case, and solve it.

I mean, everybody plays a part.

So we're hopeful we solve the case

or get a closure on that end.

But if we don't, we're still laying the foundation

or climbing the ladder to whoever

is able to solve that case.

ALLEN: You know, Melissa Witt's case, where,

you know, her family's deceased,

and a person would say, well,

what closure are you giving to anyone?

Well, it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things,

because, you know, it's important

to get justice for people.

It's important for--

it gets to me in a way because I think of--

and maybe it's wrong, but I think of, like,

Melissa Witt as a--

she was a 19-year-old girl who did nothing wrong.

And her last hours on this Earth

were probably the most horrific a person can experience.

And that 19-year-old Melissa Witt

deserves justice and deserves our best effort of justice.

Even if we fail, at least we give it our best effort

and do the best we can to get her justice

because that's what she deserved then.

She deserves it now.

You know, any victim of that kind of crime deserves it.

And if you don't have a heart towards that,

then you have no conscience.

[sniffles]

♪ ♪

[sirens wailing]

BRAD: It was December, so you never know.

I mean, she could have fought back,

and the killer could have had a long-sleeve jacket on or shirt

or, you know, something like that where

she just was not able to collect that DNA

under her fingernails.

Melissa was unfortunately out in the elements

for several days and exposed to,

you know, the sun, the snow, the cold weather,

things like that, wildlife.

When you put all that into account,

you know, DNA starts to deteriorate rather quickly.

You know, when we get assigned these cases, even new cases,

we become involved in them.

I mean, you meet with these people, you speak with them.

And just like in this case, you know,

we've talked about Melissa's diary

and how personal it was and how involved

and how real it makes it.

It's almost like you're entering into her world.

We had numerous blood spots located in the bowling alley

that we know all haven't been tested.

So we got to just kind of

move forward and hope for the best

with the evidence that we have and

start looking at the next suspect.

REPORTER: She was walking from her job at Hardee's on Waldron

in Fort Smith when she was approached by a man

who tried to abduct her.

That man was allegedly Dustin Markel.

- Within a minute or two, he had grabbed me by my right arm,

and I jerked away.

BRAD: He had very lengthy criminal history,

including sexual assaults, attempted rapes, rapes.

You know, he had attempted a kidnapping

at Central Mall from a lady that

was luckily able to escape.

And, you know, the day after Melissa was abducted,

this individual left the area and left the state.

You know, there's, like I said, several people

in this case file, and we've just kind of scratched

the surface of it.

So we'll keep pushing until we get the results that we want.

♪ ♪

[somber music]

♪ ♪