Cold Case Files Classic

Looks at how law enforcers stick with cases for many years, using fresh evidence to win convictions or to free prisoners who were wrongfully jailed. We examine the unsolved murder of Hogan’s Heroes star Bob Crane, meet a Dallas criminalist who uses state-of-the-art fingerprint matching to catch a rapist and murderer, see how Phoenix police solve the murder of a missing Navajo girl 20 years later, and talk to O.J. Simpson defense attorney Barry Scheck about DNA and an Illinois rape case.

In Portland, Maine a housewife disappears. One year later her body is unearthed in the cellar. I.R. unravels this cold case investigation from the inside out. With the help of science, police are able to uncover a blueprint of the crime.

From England to Texas to Georgia, I.R. will go inside cold case units and watch as police use ballistics testing, old fashioned fingerprints and a new DNA data bank for criminals, to crack open the mysteries of unsolved crimes.

Police solve the killing of an 11-year-old track star 10 years later when they obtain the DNA evidence they need in a cigarette butt dropped by the suspect. Also, a mother is convicted of killing her 5-year-old daughter 13 years after the crime.

DNA tests identify a skull of a 14-year-old boy who went missing 6 years earlier. When a second skull is found, investigators fear they have a serial killer in the area. In Florida, detectives trace a gun used in a 4-year-old murder.

In Missouri, a part-time missionary is convicted, 38 years later, of killing her 5-year-old stepdaughter, and the skeleton of a Michigan boy, dead for 10 years, leads police to a serial killer.