FilmRise True Crime

A skull on a laboratory table. A forensic artist's steady hands. A face emerging from clay and data. And a killer who thought his victim would never be identified. Facial reconstruction has solved some of the most challenging cold cases in criminal history. Pioneers like Betty Pat Gatliff developed the Gatliff/Snow American tissue depth method, gluing plastic pieces corresponding to tissue depth o...

A killer who dumped bodies along highways. A predator who crossed state lines knowing that jurisdictions would not communicate. And a forensic team that linked murders across Illinois and Indiana by following a trail of fibers and a single boot print. Larry Eyler was a truck driver and part-time college instructor who murdered at least 21 young men between 1982 and 1984. He targeted hitchhikers, r...

A badge. A handcuff. A promise of authority. For four months, two cousins posing as police officers terrorized Los Angeles, abducting women from busy streets while witnesses watched. No one suspected the killers were hiding in an upholstery shop. Between October 1977 and February 1978, Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono murdered ten young women ranging in age from 12 to 28 [citation:6]. Their victim...

A predator who chose victims based on hair color. Another who hunted near college campuses. A third who strangled women and kept their driver's licenses as souvenirs. Each one believed they were too smart to be caught. Each one was wrong. In this episode of The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, fore...

A killer who strangled women and kept their driver's licenses as trophies. Another who posed his victims in department store windows. A third who stalked college campuses, hunting for prey who reminded him of his mother. In this episode of The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, forensic investigators...

A boating accident on a remote lake. A husband who survived. A wife who drowned. The widow collected the insurance and moved on with her secret boyfriend. But the lake would not keep its secret forever. In 1987, Janice Gault drowned on Lake Wylie in North Carolina. Her husband David Gault told police they were boating when she fell overboard. He tried to save her, he claimed, but the current was t...

A shallow grave. A leather jacket soaked in blood. And twenty-nine white cat hairs that would make forensic history. In 1994, Shirley Duguay of Prince Edward Island, Canada, disappeared. Her estranged husband Douglas Beamish claimed he had no idea what happened to her [citation:1]. But when investigators searched Beamish's home, they found a leather jacket covered in Duguay's blood and over two do...

A pre-dawn raid. Ninety-nine bullets fired by police. Only one shot fired from inside the apartment. And a Black Panther leader drugged and murdered in his bed. Was Fred Hampton's death an assassination? On December 4, 1969, fourteen Chicago police officers raided the apartment of Fred Hampton, the 21-year-old chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party [citation:1]. The police claimed the Panthe...

An innocent man behind bars. A real killer still walking free. And a team of forensic scientists determined to prove that the system got it wrong. In this episode, I uncover the most shocking cases of wrongful conviction featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:2]....

He was the reassuring face of the Glendale Fire Department, a nationally recognized arson investigator who appeared on television and taught hundreds of firefighters how to catch serial arsonists. But John Orr had a secret darker than any case he ever solved: he was the Pillow Pyro, the most prolific serial arsonist in American history, responsible for nearly 2,000 fires and four murders. In this...

A torso floating in the river. No head. No limbs. And a team of forensic scientists who had to determine gender, identity, and cause of death from almost nothing. In this episode, I uncover one of the most macabre cases featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:1]. S...

A life insurance policy worth millions. A fall from 600 feet that was no accident. And a team of forensic investigators who proved that greed was the real killer. In this episode, I uncover a shocking case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:1]. The series revo...

A police officer looked a victim in the eyes and said: "I believe you." He didn't. He was the rapist. And he had been hunting her all along. In this episode, I uncover one of the most shocking cases featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:2]. The series revolutioni...

A couple reported their adopted son missing. Officers arrived at the house and noticed something wrong immediately. Then they opened the garage and found him inside the washing machine. In this episode, I uncover one of the most disturbing cases featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Inv...

A trash barrel on a remote embankment. A military parachute cord tied in a knot only a paratrooper would know. A body hidden for nearly three years, just 75 feet from the road. In this episode, I uncover the most insane ways killers have tried to hide their victims — cases featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the crea...

No corpse. No crime scene. No witness. Just a missing person, a suspicious spouse, and a team of forensic scientists determined to prove murder without the victim. In this episode, I uncover a groundbreaking case featured on The New Detectives, the iconic Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation . The series revolutionized fo...

A crime scene so chaotic that investigators couldn't tell how many killers were involved. Blood everywhere. Bodies positioned in ways that made no sense. And a level of brutality that suggested rage — but the evidence pointed to something far more calculated. In this episode, I uncover a case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 a...

A wedding. A marriage. A murder. And a trail of evidence that led investigators from the altar to the killer. In this episode, I uncover a chilling case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation . The series revolutionized forensic science television, showing viewers how inves...

A couple renovating their new home. A trapdoor in the ceiling. A skeleton wrapped in sheets. And a mystery that would take forensic science fourteen years to unravel. In this episode, I uncover a shocking case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation . The case begins when ne...

A car plunges into a river. A body trapped inside. And evidence sitting 150 metres underwater, where no investigator was meant to go. In this episode, I uncover a remarkable case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:1]. The series revolutionized forensic science...

A woman abducted from a highway. A mother vanished without a trace. Two kidnappings that defied all logic — and the forensic science that finally brought the predators to justice. In this episode, I uncover two shocking kidnapping cases featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigatio...

Cleaners noticed a wall that sounded hollow. Behind it, a barrel. Inside the barrel, a black rubbish bag tied with rope. And inside the bag, skeletal remains of a woman missing for nearly three decades. In this episode, I uncover one of the most macabre discoveries ever made in a New York home — a case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996...

A skull on a riverbank. A body scattered for hundreds of feet. And a team of forensic anthropologists who spent years trying to give a Jane Doe her name back. In this episode, I uncover a haunting case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. On March 25, 2003, surveyors wor...

A house fire kills a wife. A restaurant blaze claims two firefighters. A family tragedy leaves children trapped inside. Each fire was ruled accidental. Each fire was murder. In this episode, I uncover three heinous crimes featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:2]....

A phone call to police. A confession to murder. And a signature so distinctive that forensic scientists could identify the killer by the wounds left behind. In this episode, I uncover a disturbing case featured on The New Detectives, the groundbreaking Discovery Channel series that aired from 1996 to 2004 and inspired the creation of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation [citation:1]. This case follows a...