The series examines each piece of forensic evidence, each witness, each possible lead, and each turn in the road that ultimately leads detectives to their killer. Cold Case Files is a pioneer in the nonfiction forensics genre.
Police in Albany, N.Y., get a surprise when a killer they think targets only older women is suspected in the murder of an elderly man. And the contents of a secret storage shed holds the grisly clues to a murder that has gone cold for more than 14 years.
A 14-year-old boy is charged with the murder of his sister, but his public defender believes the police coerced the boy's confession and that the real killer is still on the loose. And two deteriorated medical examiner's slides.
A district attorney uses a clever technique--a "John Doe indictment"--to give law enforcement officials the time they need to track down the Schoolgirl Rapist from Rochester, N. Y.
A serial rapist seals his own fate when he sends a taunting letter to police, who use the DNA extracted from the saliva in the envelope's seal to track him down.
Our cameras follow Detective Manny Reyes as he investigates the 1990 murder of a Fort Worth, Texas woman. Reyes talks to the woman's two sons, who believe that her husband, Bobby, was the murderer.
In Rhode Island, policewomen go undercover in as street walkers to nab the man suspected of murdering three sex workers. And a dagger-shaped letter opener is the key piece of evidence that links a priest to the grisly 1980 murder of a nun in Toledo, Ohio.
After U.S. Navy sailor Andrew Muns disappears in 1968, the Navy claims that Muns went AWOL from his ship. But his sister works tirelessly for over 30 years to prove that Muns was really killed.
DNA found on a marijuana joint in Florida in 2005 helps to solve the 1988 rape and murder of a California woman. And a cold case of murder in Illinois heats up when a jailhouse lawyer turns jailhouse snitch.
