I don't know if you ever looked at a law enforcement officer after a car wreck, but they stand back and they observe everything that's going on to let emergency medics or whatever do their things, but they're assessing.

And that's what I felt like I was doing that night.

I stood back and was just watching, and life changed forever and always at that point.

There's something that happens when a tragedy occurs.

Everything slows down, time freezes, and that's exactly what happened for Jim Walker on a February night in nineteen seventy four.

I was just watching everybody, you know, sitting back, watching everybody and knock on the door.

And it was the evening of the high school Valentine's dance, and Jim was watching as his older sister Carla got ready and her date, Rodney, finally arrived to pick her up.

Rodney was here, and my sister Carla gave him that shot, you know that looked like like, dude, why why are you running late?

You know how important of a night this is.

When Rodney smiled at Carla, I'll never forget it, and this beautiful smile kind of came across her face all was good, and he came over and you know they hugged and put carsaoge on it and poised for pictures.

The last time I saw Carla was in front of that fireplace for pictures.

Carlo Walker's picture is on a wall in Texas, one of hundreds of photos in a collage.

Some look like high school yearbook photos.

Other were taken on a vacation or at a wedding.

Every face is framed in a hexagon, and every face on the wall represents a mystery, a crime that for years was never solved.

We have like the Happy Face killer, we have multiple victims of serial killers that we were able to identify.

Kristin Middeleman knows these faces by heart, and she knows the stories behind each frame.

This little boy, his mom murdered him and got away with it, and then we were able to identify the body and now she's serving life in prison.

Young women, old men, babies.

Kristin taps her fingers on photo after photo, sharing their personal stories.

Her name was Mary Catherine Edwards.

She was a thirty two year old teacher.

Everyone said she was the nicest person.

She was raped and murdered, handcuffed, and found in her bathtub by her family.

Kristen knows these faces because every one of them represents a cold case, one that's been solved by the cutting edge DNA technology she and her husband, David Middleman developed here in their lab.

Some of the cases are front page news, like the Idaho student murders or the Gilgo Beach serial killer, but most of these faces belong to someone's mother or son, an uncle who disappeared, or a sister who was kidnapped and murdered.

Their cases were never solved until now.

If you look at the screen, you can see that it doesn't really matter age, it doesn't matter background, it doesn't matter type of crime.

You're able to help resolve all these crimes using DANA technology.

The Wall of Faces is in the offices of Authrum, Kristen and David's forensics lab.

The lab is tucked away in a nondescript office park in the Woodlands, Texas, about thirty miles outside of Houston, and it's where a small team of scientists and investigators are solving the coldest of cases.

They work with the most challenging evidence, bodies that have been burned or thrown into the ocean, blood stained clothing that's been left in the desert heat or covered in chemicals.

Human remains stuffed into walls and sewage tanks.

This team has seen it all, and they figured out how to do the impossible.

Analyze tiny specks of DNA evidence considered too old or damaged to find new clues that lead police to a killer.

Most of the people that we identify have gotten away with murder in plain sight, and they are normal people.

They are serving your coffee.

They're an IT specialist at your office, right like you have no idea.

On this season of America's Crime Lab, we'll meet families who've lost loved ones, detectives who've chased every lead, and we'll discover how science is unlocking the truth that our DNA holds.

Let's start with a cold case that shook a community for forty six years.

Producer Catherine Fenlosa is here to bring us up to speed.

I'm going to take you back to nineteen seventy four in Fort Worth, Texas, and it's winter February.

There's a seventeen year old girl named Carla Walker.

She's a junior in high school.

She has long blonde hair.

Everyone describes her as having flashing blue eyes, and she's very petite, not even five feet tall, ninety five pounds.

Her friends describe her as silly, feisty.

She loves animals.

She has a white poodle and she loves to paint his nails.

She wants to be a veterinarian.

She's just sort of full of love and energy.

She's a cheerleader, which seemed to fit her really well because she's like a little firecracker of a personality.

I have a picture of her in my mind.

So this is February.

Carla was going to the high school dance with her boyfriend, Rodney, and Rodney is the quarterback of the football team.

Sandy, blonde, super gentle guy, and everyone describes them as the all American couple.

So the night of the dance, Carla's getting ready at her house and her parents are there.

She comes from a big family.

There's seven siblings.

A couple of her siblings are at home.

Her aunt and uncle have come in from West Texas for the occasion.

There's music on the parents have laid out plates of Southern food.

Carla is getting ready.

She's picked out a powder blue dress and she's waiting for Rodney to arrive, and he's running a little late.

He got home from work late.

He gets halfway to Carla's house realizes that he's left her corsage at home, so he turns around, grabs the corsage, pulls back up in his mom's car to the walker house and when he arrives at the door, Carla's a little annoyed because he's running late and she is very punctual, but he presents the corsage and a huge smile breaks out across her face.

He pins the corsage on her dress.

Everybody gathers around.

They take photos in front of the fireplace.

Mom says, you know, we'll be waiting up for you.

We can't wait to hear about the dance.

Go have a great time, and off they go.

I feel like that is out of a cute little rom com movie or something completely This is embarrassing to admit, but like as a little girl, I'd always dream of my little prom moment when a guy picks me up and has the corsage, and that's just really cute.

This is so it and everyone, you know, they're all there.

The dance is at the high school, so the parents and staff have decorated the whole, you know hall, there's a DJ.

Everyone is really really excited and they have a great time.

They leave the dance with another couple and they do what teens do.

They drive around Fort Worth.

They go to Taco Bell, they get something to eat.

One of the friends needs to use a bathroom, and the bathroom for some reason at Taco Bell isn't working.

So they go to a bowling alley which is nearby, and they go in.

They get back in the car.

They cruise around town for a little while.

The other couple has a curfew, so Rodney swings them back home, drops them off.

And on this night, Carla, her parents are you know, giving her a little leeway.

She doesn't really have a curfew tonight.

They absolutely love Rodney.

They're like kids, have a good time.

So Rodney and Carla, you know, they stay out a little bit later, they drive around a little bit longer.

Yeah, and she's seventeen.

This is their big night out.

So Carla needs to use the bathroom again, and they know that the bathroom at the bowling Alley is working, so they head back over there and when they come back to their car, you know, they're teenagers.

It's the Valentine's Day dance.

They're parked, it's dark, there aren't many lights, and the parking lot is pretty much emptied out by now because most of the bowlers have left.

So Rodney and Carla are in the front seat of his mom's car, and it's a bench seat, and so they basically start kissing.

Carla is reclined and her head is sort of like prepped up on the passenger door, and Rodney's leaning on her, and all of a sudden, the passenger door flies open and Carla's head drops back out of the door, and Rodney leans forward to cradle her head and pull her back in the car.

And the next thing Rodney knows is he's being beaten on the back side of his head and blood is pouring down through his eyes.

He's disoriented, he doesn't really understand what's happening.

Carla is screaming.

She's yelling, you know, stop hitting him, stop hitting him.

Rodney looks up and he can see a man and the guy has Carla by the arm and he's yanked her out of the car.

And this man says to Carla, you're gonna come with me, aren't you?

Sweetie and Carla screaming.

Rodney's sort of blacking in and out, and she says, Rodney, go get my dad, Go get my dad.

This man takes a gun and points it within inches of Rodney's head and he says, I'm going to kill you, and he pulls the trigger.

So did Rodney die.

Rodney passes out in the front seat of the car, and he wakes up some time later and his head is absolutely throbbing.

He's covered in blood, and Carla is gone.

He drives to the Walker's house, to Carla's house, and now all of the adults at Carla's house are still up there expecting Carla and Rodney to walk in the door at any moment.

So they're, you know, they're playing dominoes, they're eating, they've got music on.

Jim, Carla's brother, who's twelve at the time.

He has stayed up late because he is also super excited to be one of the first people just to get the lowdown on how the dance went.

Oh totally.

I mean, I have a daughter, and I can imagine when she gets the age where she's going out to a dance.

I'll be so excited.

I want, you know, all the details.

Yeah, the four one one on everything that happened that night, So I can imagine it's kind of festive in there.

But they don't know what just happened.

No, they have no idea.

So we had to porch light on waiting for Rodney and Carlin.

When he came to the house, I answered the door.

That's probably the first time I ever saw fear death.

You could see the blood and a big slip across his cheek, and eyes were very wide open, bulging.

His lips were almost puckered.

He was totally petrified, and I heard Rodney yelling, mister Walker.

Mister Walker helped me.

They have got her.

They're going to hurt her bad.

I know they are.

Everyone is trying to understand, Oh my god, what has happened?

What is going on here?

And they bring Rodney into the house and they sit him down, and Rodney starts saying, these men they took her.

I don't know where they went.

I think I've been shot.

And so they're trying to assess exactly what his wounds are, and you, thank god hadn't been shot, but he's been severely beaten.

Police were being called.

They started removing his shirt to see where else because he said he was shot and started compressed and trying to stop the bleeding.

But Jim notices that Rodney isn't really bleeding anymore.

It turns out that he wasn't shot.

The blood on his head and his face is dry.

It wasn't like it was running down like he just happened.

And that's one thing I noticed had bothered me for a long time.

He had a probably two to and a half inch cut on his right cheek, and I noticed it had started to coagulate.

So that tells you there's been some time from incident to current time.

Right.

What were Carla's parents feeling at this point?

I can't even imagine to have your daughter's date show up covered in blood saying they took her.

Carla's father, who's retired military, he yells to Jim, Carla's brother, and he says, come with me, and the father goes and gets his gun.

Whow Dad was out the door, and you know he knew where Carla was last seeing he's out the door with his weapon, and he would have absolutely absolutely killed this guy.

He was going to get his little girl.

He yelled at me, said Jimmy come on, and I just I froze.

I had never seen anything like this, so he took off.

You know, that's something I've lived with for decades as well, and I regret that.

I regret that, but he never said anything to me about it, and I don't think I've ever told anybody that before, but I wish I had gone.

Can you imagine being twelve years old and all this is happening.

Your sister's gone, Your dad is heading out the door with a gun, maybe to kill whoever took her.

It's like your whole world is bursting.

It's absolutely heartbreaking.

Carla's mom and aunt are taking care of Rodney, and they've called the police.

All hell was unleashed.

We had law enforcement coming in.

They're trying to get details.

Mom was very stoic.

I don't recall any yelling or screaming, cursing.

I stood back and was just watching.

And life changed forever and always at that point, New Walker's changed.

My sister, Cindy slept on the couch hoping to hear.

You know, we were just hoping somebody come by and push Carl out of the car, just get her back.

Sunday morning, everybody woke up to the abduction in the newspaper.

The high school the west side of Fort Orth shocked.

You know, they just saw Carl before and Ridney and these other kids and now kidnapped.

You know all that comes along with that, A big, ugly dude in a pretty young girl one thirty ish in the morning.

So the next morning people were already out, you know, high schoolers were out searching motor bikes, horses, right.

Law enforcement next morning was was crazy.

And then you know, no word, you know, one person said to my dad late and Carl is probably gonna be had been raped.

My dad was angry, So I don't care.

We just want her back.

We want her back.

We will take care of everything.

We want her back.

So the night Carlo was abducted, her father gets his gun and goes looking for her.

Yeah, so he drives to the bowling alley where Rodney says that Carla was pulled out of the car by one or maybe two men.

And it's pretty close, it's only a mile away from Carla's house.

The police arrived quickly and they find Carla's yellow purse and a magazine to a gun lying in the parking lot, and that's it.

There's no sign of where Carla was taken.

Did anyone see anything?

No, So the parking lot had emptied out by the time all of this had happened.

And remember this is nineteen seventy four, so there's no surveillance cameras at the bowling alley, no cell phones, and the parking lot wasn't well late.

It was pretty dark.

So the only things we have to go on are rodney story of what happened, and a magazine from a gun.

But we don't even know if that magazine is related to Carla's disappearance exactly.

And remember this is Texas in the seventies, so it wasn't super prising to find this magazine in the parking lot, and there's so little evidence for police to work with.

Now, Rodney's treated at the hospital and he actually heads back to Carla's house and he ends up sleeping in Carla's bed while hundreds of people are out looking for her.

Carlo's brother, Jim says, this goes on for three days.

I'm looking at the front door, and the front door was opened, the screen door was closed because people were coming and going, and homicide detectives, detectives from Fort Worth and Sheriff's department and a couple other men, and they were talking.

My parents were listening when a news reporter showed up at the front screen door and said, Hi, you know, it's missus Walker.

I'm so and so with Fort Star Telegram.

How are you feeling that that found your daughter.

I was in the middle of the living room.

My back was facing the fireplace, and I remember my looking toward the fireplace, and that's the first time in my life I ever saw his bomber pilot blue eyes intents right water up.

I didn't see tears, but I clearly saw water in his eyes, and my mom was leaning against him and her head went down.

So that's how they found out.

With a shock.

Yeah, Jim says.

They all fully expected Carla to be found alive.

They hadn't even thought that this could become a murder, you know, a homicide case, that she wouldn't be coming home, and that moment just completely changed everything.

The police get on the phone and then they're able to confirm that Carla's body had been found in a culvert the side of the road about five miles away.

Her blue Valentine's Day dress is ripped and bloody.

Her underwear and pantyhose are found a little bit away from her body near the entrance of this culvert.

And she's been beaten, raped and strangled.

There's nothing else there.

They don't find any fingerprints.

They do find some bodily fluid on Carla's bra, but you know, this is nineteen seventy four, there's no DNA testing.

The one piece of evidence that they do have is the magazine club that they found in the parking lot.

Can they identify the type of gun.

It belonged to, what's called a twenty two ruger handgun?

And so the police do.

They go when they get a list of everyone in the area who's bought this type of gun, and they go when they interview all of those people, they give them polygraphs, they check alibis, and everybody passes.

No one raises suspicion.

There weren't any other indications that any of those people were involved.

Correct.

Some of the people who had owned this type of gun were able to show that, you know, produce the gun, show the police, here's my gun, fully intact.

There was one person on the list.

He was a thirty one year old truck driver who passed the polygraph and he said that his gun had been stolen a while before, but there was no reason to suspect him, so the police were really left with nothing and the case goes cold.

And this case really, from every single person that I've talked to, it changed fort Worth.

It was just such a shock because it was a safe place to grow up.

There wasn't a lot of crime.

I wouldn't go outside, I wouldn't go anywhere by myself after dark, and then still I would be like locking my doors if I did go by myself.

And sometimes you'd meet somebody and it's like is he the one?

Or you'd see somebody that acted weird and you know, maybe he's the one.

It just shattered our innocence.

Typically a crime like this is committed by somebody who knows the victim, so people do start to kind of look at one another and wonder because everyone thinks someone knows.

Somebody knows.

Yeah, somebody's got to know something, yeah, and.

It's somebody in our community.

Cloud of sadness came over, hopefulness was gone.

I think my mom suffered in silence.

She and dad had a lot of intense conversations.

Only kid living in the house at the time.

I mean, jim he's only twelve at the time, and he's thrust into this horrible tragedy.

I just wonder, how's he feeling?

How do you even begin to process what's happening.

Yeah, I had the same question.

Nobody ever talked to me.

I was a watcher.

I set aside and I watch.

I watched these huge, bigger than life homicide detectives come in.

They would pull me in, let me listen to stuff.

Nobody ever sat down said, Jimmy, you know, how are you feeling?

So I watched and no, no, no exaggeration.

In the first ten minute conversation you and I had, that would have been more than any conversation I had with either one of my parents about what happened to Carla.

I was probably out of school for you know, the entire week after Carla's abduction, and when the Sheriff's department came by and said, you know, we're positive it's her, but we we need you to go down and identify the biding.

That was a tough night.

And for some unknown reason, I went with them and we drove down to the corner's office and it was dark So there's two big glass pedestrian doors like we see in businesses or hospitals today.

One with door was opened out there's a hallway, and I was just lined up perfectly with the door, looking down the hallway, watching mom and dad go.

And as mom and dad entered this hallway on the right hand side, a door opened.

Then it was left open, and my mom and dad went into that room within fifteen seconds.

And this is something that used to I just couldn't hardly talk about because I'd cried.

I hope you never hear or have to be around when a mama sees her beloved seventeen year old daughter dead and bruised and beaten and bloody on a table that kind of pulled back a blanket to see the face and neck.

I don't know if you ever heard a mom's scream of pain when they see their baby.

It's worse than any sound, almost any sound I think I could possibly imagine, other than a child hurting, but even that's different.

It was a gictorial from the deepest part of her core, painful scream within fifteen seconds of them entering that room.

That's what I heard, And that was really probably the beginning of me becoming angry.

Before Carlo's murder, Jim says, he played sports, he hung out with friends.

You know, he's really happy.

But now he becomes absolutely consumed with finding out who did this to his sister, and he wants revenge.

Jim starts working out every day so he can physically confront Carla's attacker, and he canvases the neighborhood.

He is looking for any signs or anyone who looks suspicious.

He actually becomes convinced that whoever did this is driving by his house every day.

He becomes distrustful.

He's short tempered, and he's getting into fights like daily.

I didn't again, didn't have the life experiences to realize what I was looking at.

So you know, as a teenager, I was spitting bullets, ready to I was ready to just kill some you know, some guy who did this in my family.

It changed, It went to season of mourning and grieving, but with that was mixed intense intense determination to find out what happened to Carla and who did.

It and where's the investigation at this point, So this is also part of the tragedy.

Police chase down every single lead.

They get and they still only have Rodney's story to go on and that clip from the gun in the Bowling Alley parking lot.

By the end of nineteen seventy four, Carla's case goes cold and it stays that way for forty six years.

Next time on America's Crime Lab, it.

Became very apparent that everybody had an opinion of what happened to Carla right, And what was really unusual was very few people felt like it was a stranger.

Most everyone felt like it was somebody who knew.

Carl Rodney's story had you know, it actually had some question marks on it.

I started remembering that cut on his right cheek, and it wasn't freshly blaeding, it was coagulating.

Remember me saying.

That Rodney doesn't show up to Carlo's house after she was abducted for an hour and a half, and it was like, well, where do you go?

Why did it take him so long?

America's Crime Lab is produced by Rococo Punch for Kaleidoscope.

Erica Lance is our story editor, and sound design is by David Woji.

Our producing team is Catherine Fedalosa and Jessica Albert, our executive producers.

Are Kate Osborne, Mangesh Jadigadour, and David and Kristin Middleman, And from iHeart Katrina Norville and Ali Perry.

Special thanks to Connell Byrne, Will Pearson, Carrie Lieberman, Nikki Eto, Nathan Etowski, John Burbank, and the entire team at AUTHRM.

I'm Alan lance Lessor, thanks for listening.