48 Hours - 48 Hours: NCIS: Ruthless

Episode Date: May 23, 2018

When a serial rapist targets military spouses, agents race against time before he strikes again. Rocky Carroll of CBS' "NCIS" narrates. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to this podcast ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app today. Even if you love the thrill of true crime stories as much as I do, there are times when you want to mix it up. And that's where Audible comes in, with all the genres you love and new ones to discover. Explore thousands of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals, with more added all the time. thousands of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals, with more added all the time. Listening to Audible can lead to positive change in your mood, your habits,

and even your overall well-being. And you can enjoy Audible anytime, while doing household chores, exercising, commuting, you name it. There's more to imagine when you listen. Sign up for a free 30-day Audible trial and your first audiobook is free. Visit audible.ca. In 2014, Laura Heavlin was in her home in Tennessee when she received a call from California. Her daughter, Erin Corwin, was missing. The young wife of a Marine had moved to the California desert

to a remote base near Joshua Tree National Park. They have to alert the military. And when they do, the NCIS gets involved. From CBS Studios and CBS News, this is 48 Hours NCIS. Listen to 48 Hours NCIS ad- multifaceted agency. So if there's a crime involving a spouse or a dependent of a Navy or Marine Corps member, our job is to vigorously pursue the perpetrator. That is a big piece of what we do,

so that the military member who is overseas fighting for our country doesn't have to worry about their spouse at home. fighting for our country, doesn't have to worry about their spouse at home. My husband's Marine. He's my best friend. He was in Afghanistan. I was at home with just my son. At the time that I was stationed at Camp Lejeune, we had an abundance of sexual assault cases.

I'm walking around the corner. I look up, and he's right there, and he's charging at me. He was covered in black from head to toe. He was wearing black gloves, black boots, black ski mask. The subject in the attacks was looking for the perfect victim. Turn! My husband worked on Camp Lejeune. He was a welder for 2nd Tank Battalion. He got picked up for work and I kind of just drifted back to sleep.

It happened like instantaneously. I saw a man in the entryway to my bedroom. He was just standing there with a gun pointed at me. This is everyone's nightmare. You sit there in the comfort of your home with your children. You look up and there's someone you don't know wearing a ski mask, holding a gun and threatening you and your children. I could hear footsteps. And then someone shook me.

And then I just felt like a big smack across my face and it made my head turn because it was so sharp. And I just immediately rolled over and I ran like as fast as I could. I was running, I was bleeding everywhere. There was a huge concern by the Marine Corps. There was a pervasive fear, really. He took good measures to make sure that he didn't leave any physical evidence behind. It was hard to say anything was directly connected until a point where we were able to investigate Breonna Murphy's case. We knew we had a connection at that point.

All of the sexual assaults did occur off-base and the Jacksonville Police Department has primary jurisdiction off-base. When you have a case like this that occurs, you have no greater case to work and solve. So NCIS and Jacksonville Police Department decided to create a task force to look at all the other cases. It is believed that the perpetrator was responsible for 12 sexual assaults. Five of those were dependent wives of Marines, four of which were deployed at the time. When he put the gun up to my head and he said he was going to shoot me,

I took a chance that I was either going to get shot or I could try and really defend myself. I wanted to do everything that I could to be part of him being caught. The NCIS mission is global. We're on aircraft carriers, we're in foreign ports, we watch after each other, we take care of each other. NCIS deal with every type of crime. Cyber, fraud, murder. General crimes, counterintelligence, counterterrorism. Every crime is a tragedy. Involves sisters, brothers, husbands. That's the only way to find the truth.

We live in dangerous times. And we're never going to give up. NCIS. The cases they can't forget. Have you ever wondered who created that bottle of sriracha that's living in your fridge? Or why nearly every house in America has at least one game of Monopoly? Introducing The Best Idea Yet, a brand new podcast from Wondery and T-Boy about the surprising origin stories of the products you're obsessed with and the bold risk-takers who brought them to life. Like did you know that Super Mario, the best-selling video game character of all time, only exists because Nintendo couldn't get the

rights to Popeye? Or Jack, that the idea for the McDonald's Happy Meal first came from a mom in Guatemala? From Pez dispensers to Levi's 501s to Air Jordans, discover the surprising stories of the most viral products. Plus, we guarantee that after listening, you're going to dominate your next dinner party. So follow The Best Idea Yet on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to The Best Idea Yet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. It's just the best idea yet. It's just the best idea yet.

In the Pacific Ocean, halfway between Peru and New Zealand, lies a tiny volcanic island. It's a little-known British territory called Pitcairn, and it harboured a deep, dark scandal. There wouldn't be a girl on Pitcairn once they reach the age of 10 that would still a virgin. It just happens to all of us. I'm journalist Luke Jones, and for almost two years, I've been investigating a shocking story that has left deep scars on generations of women and girls from Pitcairn.

When there's nobody watching, nobody going to report it, people will get away with what they can get away with. In the Pitcairn Trials, I'll be uncovering a story of abuse and the fight for justice that has brought a unique, lonely Pacific island to the brink of extinction. Listen to the Pitcairn Trials exclusively on Wondery+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

Camp Lejeune is a big part of the Jacksonville, North Carolina community. It's home to approximately 170,000 people. So that includes active duty, Department of Navy civilian personnel, and the dependents. The mission of Camp Lejeune is to prepare the Marines for warfighting capability so that they can then forward deploy an expeditionary environment such as Afghanistan, Iraq. Good things about being a Marine wife are the friends, the stability. He's deployed about every year and a half. He deploys for seven months at a time. In July of 2011, Mary Ann and her two-year-old son were counting down the days to her husband's homecoming. He had been in Afghanistan for six months. He was due to come home in a couple weeks. I was at home with just my son, and it was like 3 a.m. I always have a hard time sleeping when my husband's gone.

So I was gonna go out back and smoke a cigarette but the porch light wouldn't come on. I just figured it had blown. So I went to go out front and the front porch light wouldn't turn on either. go out front and the front porch light wouldn't turn on either. The light bulb was gone. Like somebody had unscrewed it and took it away. I was dialing my friend, going to get my baseball bat, and then when I was walking around the corner to my bedroom, he was right there. It was scary. It was just like something out of a movie.

I tried to scream, but nothing really came out. And I was trying to hit him with my phone. Blocked that, and it threw the phone out of my hand. He asked me my name, my husband's name, where my husband worked, what he did. My son's in the other room. That was all I could think about was my son. He told me that he had seen me building

a table in my backyard, just things that I had been doing in the backyard. After he said that he would hurt my son building a table in my backyard, just things that I had been doing in the backyard. After he said that he would hurt my son if I fought back or if I screamed or if I made too much noise or if I ran, then I just, I shut down, and I went into survival mode. He got a hoodie from my bedroom and he put it over top of me backwards so the hood was

over my face. And he put me on my bed and he took my clothes off and then he assaulted me. After he was done, he made me take a shower in the dark with the curtain open. Because he made me face the wall in the shower, I kept waiting for something to strike my back. He told me to use soap and wash myself good and to stay right there or he was going to go into the next room and snap my son's neck. I just kept my head down, and I just did what he told me to do. Right after the shower,

he made me cuddle with him in the bed. I thought that the room smelled like gasoline, and I thought that he was going to set me on fire. I thought he was going to stab me. I thought he was going to shoot me. He kept asking me if I had a gun in the house, and I'm like, no, there's no gun. He goes, I know you have a gun. Where's the gun? I'm like, there's no gun. We don't have a gun in the house. Mary Ann's attacker had now been in the house for more than two hours, but her ordeal was far from over. He asked me how much money I had, and I said, we don't have much money.

He said, well, it's payday. He said, well, you can get it from an ATM. And I said, but my son's in the other room. And he said, well, you can leave him. Fearing for her son's life, Mary Ann did exactly what she was told. He made me walk in front of him to the car. He turned my mirror so I couldn't see behind me. And he sat right behind me in the car while I drove to the ATM. I really, really wanted to crash the car, but my son's at home, and nobody was going to be coming to check on me or anything.

When we got to the ATM, the bank would only allow me to pull out $600. And so he got the $600. On the way back home, he was trying to act like a friend. So he was like, what's your favorite color? What's your favorite sports team? What's your favorite car? It was very weird. When they got back to the house, the intruder followed Mary Ann inside. He told me to go into my son's room

and hug him for dear life. I picked up my son's room and hug him for dear life. I picked up my son. I'm holding him in my lap on the floor. I keep hearing a bunch of noises outside of the door, so I know I can't do anything yet. I wait and I wait and I wait. I try to look underneath the bedroom door, and then I finally get the courage to open up the door. He was gone. Besides the cash, the masked intruder fled with Mary Ann's cell phone. That would later prove to be a crucial clue in bringing her attacker to justice. It wasn't until later on when we determined that we had potentially a serial rapist on the street. Hotshot Australian attorney Nicola Gaba was born into legal royalty.

Her specialty? Representing some of the city's most infamous gangland criminals. However, while Nicola held the underworld's darkest secrets, the most dangerous secret was her own. She's going to all the major groups within Melbourne's underworld, and she's informing on them all. I'm Marsha Clark, host of the new podcast, Informants Lawyer X. In my long career in criminal justice as a prosecutor and defense attorney, I've seen some crazy cases, and this one belongs right at the top of the list. She was addicted to the game she had created. She just didn't know how to stop. Now, through dramatic interviews and access, I'll reveal the truth behind one of the world's

most shocking legal scandals. Listen to Informant's Lawyer X exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify, and listen to more Exhibit C true crime shows early and ad-free right now. As a kid growing up in Chicago, there was one horror movie I was too scared to watch. It was called Candyman. The scary cult classic was set in a Chicago housing project.

It was about this supernatural killer who would attack his victims if they said his name five times into a bathroom mirror. Candyman. Candyman? Now, we all know chanting a name won't make a killer magically appear, but did you know that the movie Candyman was partly inspired by an actual murder? I was struck by both how spooky it was, but also how outrageous it was. We're going to talk to the people who were there, and we're also going to uncover the larger story. My architect was shocked when he saw how this was

created. Literally shocked. And we'll look at what the story tells us about injustice in America. If you really believed in tough on crime, then you wouldn't make it easy to crawl into medicine cabinets and kill our women. Listen to Candyman, the true story behind the bathroom mirror murder, early and ad-free, with a 48-hour plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. Once Mary Ann thought she was out of danger, she grabbed her son, drove to a friend's house, and reported the assault to JPD, the Jacksonville Police Department. When I went there, they just made me fill out a report.

The first detective kept trying to tell me that I could change my story whenever I wanted. He thought that I was making it up. We live in a military town where lots of wives cheat on their husbands. He thought that I wanted a way out of saying that I cheated on their husbands. He thought that I wanted a way out of saying that I had cheated on my husband.

When the first rape occurred, it was off base. And the Jacksonville Police Department has primary jurisdiction off base. They followed me out to the house. They took pictures. They had nothing to say. I had no faith in the system at that point. JPD says in no way did a detective

set out to re-victimize the victim or to discount their recollection. The department aggressively pursued the information Mary Ann provided. Hours after her assault and steel reeling from it, Mary Ann had to break the news to her husband in Afghanistan. And I had to tell him everything on the phone. He was crying. He was just so upset.

He was on a plane the next morning. He was just hurt that he couldn't be there to protect me. He blamed himself. It was hard. I couldn't be alone in the house for a while. I had a panic button with the security system. My husband could only leave the house during the daytime. And then when we found out he was deploying again,

I was just like, we're moving on base. I'm not staying in this house. Over the next 14 months, there were a series of unsolved and seemingly unrelated assaults. There was no evidence that was left behind. He made sure that he had the victim's shower. There wasn't any DNA, fingerprints. Unfortunately, every lead that we seemed to follow up seems to come to a dead end.

On September 11, 2012, it would all change. We had been alerted that there had been two assaults off base. When he hit me, I could have very easily been knocked out. The link that connected the cases together came when Breonna Murphy was shaken awake by an intruder shortly after 1 a.m. The house was completely different. We had carpet back then and we had different couches. Breonna still lives in the house she was attacked in.

That specific night, for some reason, my neck was hurting and to get the strain off of my neck, I laid like this. I remember being tired and you know you're about to fall asleep but you can still hear and I heard like footsteps the door opened and then someone shook me and then I just felt like a big like smack across my face and it made my head turn because it was so sharp. Sorry.

I knew it wasn't right. And my instinct was when my face went like this, I could see the door was open. So I just rolled over as fast as I could and I ran. And I remember it was pretty embarrassing because I used to sleep naked. So I was naked, I was running, I was bleeding everywhere. And when I came downstairs, it was like the twilight zone. The house was empty. Incredibly, just minutes earlier,

Brianna's roommate and four buddies had left the house for a beer run. I was like, where is everybody? I was hurt more than I thought because I dripped blood from here all the way through the living room. I immediately opened the door. I skipped this house and came straight to this house and I immediately started banging on the door screaming for help. I mean there were bloody handprints everywhere. Nobody came. I ran across the street to 105 and I banged on the door as well. Nobody answered. I went to 103, banged on the door and nobody answered. The neighbors

actually across the street at 310 came out and they said that they heard me screaming. As soon as I saw them I got down like this and I was screaming for help and I was like, help, help, someone's in my house. A few minutes later, the cops came, the ambulance came. The attacker had vanished, taking Brianna's wallet with all her credit cards. I ended up getting a telephone call that day for a break-in and assault that had taken place. She was panicked. She had taken a good hit to the face. She said that she wasn't able to

recall a whole lot of details about the actual attacker because it was dark in her room. He asked, do you think it was your roommate? And I'm like, no, I don't know who did this. There's no one who would have wanted to do that. Moments later, Brianna's roommate and his friends returned. And when they came back, everyone was confused because he's like, why are there cops in my house? Why is Brianna bleeding? The craziest part is that the fact that the whole incident happened within like 10 minutes, literally. At the hospital, Brianna learned the extent of her injury. She had been pistol-whipped.

It took 18 stitches right here, and it was about a half an inch deep. I just don't get how, especially in a small neighborhood, in a military neighborhood, like, nobody saw anything. Like, there was no witnesses. I mean, he had to be watching to know that I lived there and that someone had left. Police and NCIS say Brianna's instinct to flee most likely saved her from being raped.

I think she was very strong. The suspect was obviously very aggressive. What happened next would change everything about this investigation. As I go back to the police department, I received a telephone call about another assault that had taken place. We had gotten word that there was another female that had just been admitted for also being attacked and was actually raped. And I just started crying. I knew that it was connected to me. Just hours after taking Brianna's statement, Detective Ramirez got a call about another assault.

It's probably ten minutes away from Brianna's house. Quite honestly, I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know if this was going to be connected or not. I went out there to find out exactly what had transpired as well. This here, 215, is the former address of Sarah. Sarah, eight months pregnant, and her husband Andrew were expecting their first child. Andrew worked as a welder for 2nd Tank Battalion.

I was only 18 when I got pregnant. We knew it was a girl. I was excited. That morning, her husband left for work sometime after 5 a.m. My husband got picked up for work, and I kind of just drifted back to sleep. The light turned on, and I thought it was my husband, and it ended up not being my husband.

I saw a man in, like, the entryway to my bedroom. He was just standing there with a gun pointed at me. I remember him having a bandana over his face, like covering his nose so I could only see his eyes. And he had like black motorcycle gloves on. He came in about two minutes after my husband left. He was around that morning. He knew that I was in the house alone. He's looking at these homes. He's watching these victims and those who's living there,

when they leave, when they're gone. When he first came into the house, he asked questions like where our money was, where the weapons were, and I actually told him my credit card was in my car. We didn't have weapons in the house. Sarah had one chance to get help. I had my phone under my pillow in my bed,

and I tried to just dial 911, but he just grabbed my phone away from me. He forced me on the bed and he had me get down on my hands and knees. And he raped me the first time. I think I was more scared for my baby's life. I kept telling him, you know, I'm eight months pregnant. When he was done with that, he put the gun, like, to my head. And he said he was going to shoot me in the head. I thought that I was going to die, so I actually did grab the gun out of his hand.

But then he knocked me out into the closet and started beating me like really, really bad. Sarah was repeatedly pistol whipped. I was in a lot of pain. My face was throbbing. I could feel all the pain from him just punching me all over the face. He smashed me in the head a couple of times with a gun. I mean, that's why I had the black eye. He got my dog's retractable leash that was on the porch, and he actually, like, bound my legs and my wrists and stuff with it so I couldn't move, and he raped me a second time while I was bound. And then he went outside again,

and then once I realized that he might not be coming back, I was able to just kind of scissor the rope off from my hands. I just grabbed my keys and ran out the door. I just found the first gas station and pulled in there and jumped out of my car and ran in all bloody and bruised up and said I need to call 9-1-1. I just said that my house got broken into and I was raped. At the hospital, Sarah learned the fate of her unborn baby. We had to do a sexual assault kit,

and I had to go in to get my baby checked out. Everything was fine with my baby. I think that if I wasn't pregnant, I probably would have fought a lot harder, and I might have gotten really hurt. I think because I was pregnant, I went into survival mode more for my baby. Sarah's husband, Andrew, rushed to the hospital.

Once I told him in the hospital bed that my house was broken into and I was raped, he just lost it. My mom came down that night with my husband's mom. He didn't only do this to my daughter, but he did this to my grandbaby too. How could somebody do that to anybody? I wanted to take her and just wrap her in my arms and just say, Sarah, you know, it's gonna be okay. But I knew deep inside,

she was going through so many emotions. I was just really sad inside. I really hated to see everybody like that because, I mean, we had a baby on the way. A little over a month after the assault, Sarah welcomed a healthy daughter, Emma. After the assault, Sarah welcomed a healthy daughter, Emma. What helped me get better to this day is that I had a daughter, and I didn't want to be a mom, you know, that was depressive. He's choosing the vulnerable. He's also compiling a list.

If one of them didn't pan out on the night that he wanted to do something, he went to the next person on a list. If one of them didn't pan out on the night that he wanted to do something, he went to the next person on the list. NCIS and Jacksonville PD were determined there would be no other victims. That's when they decided to pool all their resources and form a task force. The senior Marine Corps leaders were extremely worried that we had potentially a serial rapist on the street. They had five of their dependent spouses

that had already been sexually assaulted. We hadn't gotten anyone in custody. And I received a phone call from my supervisor saying that there was some incident that occurred in Jacksonville. He's like, we're going to divert you over there to assist them. It was a race against the clock. In terms of looking at this from a serial perspective, we were worried that there would be increased violence to a point where it could possibly result in a homicide.

to a point where it could possibly result in a homicide. That day when it first happened, I remembered everything about him. The task force began working the leads on Brianna and Sarah's cases. The description that she provided us for the suspect would play a significant role later on in our investigation. He was wearing a red hooded sweatshirt, a bandana over his face and his nose, and he had like black motorcycle gloves on. He had these big, big eyes that were just really recognizable. I watched a lot of crime shows, like how they caught people. So I knew you should always repeat to yourself the clothing they're wearing.

I paid very close attention. Still recovering in the hospital, Brianna discovered fraudulent charges on her credit cards. Bank of America helped us print out a sheet of exactly where he went, exactly what time, exactly what he bought with my credit cards. And we took that evidence to Detective Ramirez. That was our real first investigative lead. One of our first goals is go out and see if there's any kind of video surveillance footage

that may capture the suspect using this card. Things were moving high speed so that's one of the things that I was tasked to do going to looking for the surveillance cameras. The investigators were about to hit pay dirt. A kangaroo gas station had really good surveillance. We had actually an excellent visual because that video surveillance footage showed the suspect wearing a red hooded sweater using Brianna Murphy's credit card. From the point where the transaction was made until Sarah's sexual assault, it was pretty close in proximity as far as the time, within maybe 20 minutes or so.

We were starting to make the assumption that these cases were probably connected. At the police department, and I think amongst NCIS, we still weren't able to identify them. The task force sent photos of the suspect from the gas station to a detective at the local sheriff's office. And he came back and said, yeah, I know who that is. In fact, I've dealt with him before. The person that we were looking for was Mr. Willie Abner Brown. NCIS and JPD learned Willie Brown was a 33-year-old career criminal who lived in town with his mother and occasionally spent time at his girlfriend's house.

Just three days after the attacks on Brianna and Sarah, the investigators were anxious to apprehend him. We checked our databases. We found out that he was actually working on Kent Lejeune. Brown had managed to get the job through an outside contractor. He was a janitor on base, and he would work in different buildings.

Let's go get him. Investigators picked Brown up for a traffic violation as he was leaving the base. Ultimately, he was brought back to the station based off the warrant that we had obtained for the use of Breonna Murphy's credit card. At first, he was somewhat cooperative. But ultimately, once we started discussing the assault on Sarah, his demeanor changed very,

very rapidly. He was denying everything, denying everything. That's when you can kind of see his tension kind of came out. He wouldn't allow us into the interview room to take him into custody. He tried to shut the door on Agent Lawson. We caught him by surprise. He had gotten to a point where he didn't worry about law enforcement.

When Willie Brown was initially arrested, he was charged with the crimes he committed against Brianna. We waited on the sexual assault charges until we had further proof. Jacksonville Police Department enlisted prosecutor Mike Maltzby early on in the investigation. I knew his name right away.

He had three prior felony convictions and several misdemeanor convictions. Once Lou Brown was identified as a suspect, NCIS and JPD really started to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. That's when Josh and I went back and we started pulling up other cases that were of similar nature. They were working about 12 alleged sexual assaults. We went back a two-year time span to see if there was any connection as far as it goes with any kind of physical evidence. Just general circumstances that were similar. They were looking to see if Willie Brown was in fact a suspect.

We spent again six months in a private room where we were able to set up shop. It was actually named the war room. For the first month it was just information gathering stage. The map that we had for locations of evidence, locations of the attacks, it was around areas where he had frequented. We actually discovered two other cases for a fact that we knew Mr. Brown had been connected in. We had actually executed a search warrant at Mr. Brown's mother's residence. We were searching his bedroom and found a coffee can that had things that he had taken from different

victims. Among the items recovered, several cell phones. I found photographs of Mary Ann's son on the cell phone. I got a phone call saying that they've caught him. They told me that they had found my cell phone and I had to verify if those pictures were mine. I was like, yeah, that's mine. Like, those are mine. You guys got them. The investigators moved into overdrive. We attempted to interview almost every victim that we were able to say that we thought

may have had a connection. Among the people they spoke with was a woman we will call Carla. Carla had been raped at her home on May 17, 2012. The perpetrator had a similar MO to Brown. Carla was married to a Marine. We know that her husband was deployed. She was attacked in the middle of the night

when she thought she was alone in the house. And just like in the other attacks, the intruder wanted weapons. Carla turned over an airsoft pistol. It was a replica of a Desert Eagle, which is a.50 caliber type pistol. We were looking to see if we could find a gun. On October 9th, Agent Lawson went to search Willie Brown's girlfriend's house. We looked into the closet, which on top of the shelf,

there was a shoebox and there was a gun on top of the shoebox. It matches as far as being the Desert Eagle that Carla described to us. We suspected that this is the gun that was used, obviously, in the following two assaults. What investigators learned next was jaw-dropping. I had pieces of the gun that had actually broken off from when he hit me in the face,

so they took that for evidence. The gun itself, it was also missing a portion of the trigger guard. We brought out the pistol, and then we brought out Sarah's sexual assault kit and basically compared the plastic broken piece to that of the trigger guard and it fit perfectly. This is the smoking gun. And we knew at that point, we got you.

NCIS and JPD came to my house, this big black Escalade, and told me that they had made an arrest. And I just remember like pretty much like dropping, crying and hugging everybody. To hear that they had caught the guy for my case was just a huge relief to know he was off the streets and he wouldn't do this to anybody else. But even with all this evidence, could NCIS and Jacksonville PD get a conviction? Going into this trial, I was concerned. I've been a prosecutor for 25 years. I can tell you, there aren't any slam-dunk cases. On March 3rd, 2014, Willie Brown went on trial for the crimes against Mary Ann, Brianna,

Sarah and the victim known as Carla. He was facing a total of 33 charges, including first degree rape, kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon. I had no problems at all testifying. including first-degree rape, kidnapping, and assault with a deadly weapon. I had no problems at all testifying. I wanted to look him in the face. I needed to know that it was done. He couldn't hurt anybody else.

I wanted to testify so that I could tell my story and get him put away. I have a hunch that he's connected to Moore. Ultimately, it comes down to what we're able to prove. We were able to say through physical evidence that there was a total of four that we knew that he was connected with. There were several pieces of evidence that were important to this case. This sweatshirt was found from the residence of the defendant's girlfriend.

Sarah's DNA was found on this as well of the defendant's girlfriend. Sarah's DNA was found on this, as well as the defendant's. This airsoft pistol was found along with a red hooded sweatshirt. This also tied into an assault that had happened to Harla. During that attack, we know that the attacker stole an airsoft pistol from her property. It belonged to her husband. That gun was literally the smoking gun at the trial.

The defendant's DNA, Brianna's DNA, and Sarah's DNA were all found on this item. Sarah's DNA was found along this broken trigger guard, as well as inside the barrel. Brianna's DNA was found in the slide mechanism. The jury had a lot to work with. Furthermore, you'll notice that it has a broken trigger guard. Sarah also reported that part of a trigger mechanism broke off and was lodged in her clothing. The North Carolina Crime Lab's trace section took this broken piece and the remaining piece and looked at them

under a comparison microscope and found that they were a match. Brianna and Sarah share a unique bond. Remember, Brianna was able to escape from Brown just a few hours before he assaulted Sarah. It put us really close together to know that it was all pieced together for what happened to us. They met each other for the first time during trial. I have a special bond with Sarah because of our attack happening the same night and then me having the guilt about what happened to her.

He didn't get what he wanted from me. He went in and found Sarah. wanted from me, he went and found Sarah. In an unexpected move, Willie Brown took the stand to defend himself. It surprised me, quite frankly. He didn't offer any answers as to some of the DNA questions. He maintained his innocence. He was like, I'm sorry for these victims, but I had nothing to do with this. He was on film using Breanna's credit card, so he would admit to that, but he denied everything else. Brown presented an unusual defense. He said that he was sexually, I believe sexually assaulted or molested as a child,

and that that's why he couldn't carry out these acts. Breanna, speaking for all of Brown's victims, addressed him directly. I wanted to let him know that he was not going to bring us down, and it was a poem by Maya Angelou, and it was called Still I Rise. And this part was directed towards him

when I looked at him. Did you want to see me broken, bowed head and lowered eyes, shoulders failing down like teardrops weakened by my soulful cries? You may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness, but still, like arrow, I'll rise. The jury began its deliberations at 3.30 on March the 13th of 2014. I recognized him. I didn't have any doubts. The jury returned a swift verdict in one day.

It was one of the few times I felt like, Judge, I need to leave the courtroom because if this isn't a good verdict, I don't know how I'm going to react. The jury found Willie Brown guilty of multiple felony charges, including four counts of first-degree rape against Mary Ann, Sarah, and the victim known as Carla. He was also convicted of assaulting Brianna with a deadly weapon.

When they said guilty, I remember everyone was just crying. There's so much against him. There was no way that they couldn't find him guilty. It's a huge relief coming out from me to feel safe. Willie Brown was sentenced to prison for a very long time, over 400 years. These women that came forward, they're directly responsible for us being able to arrest Willie Brown. They recently reunited, for the first time since the trial ended.

Hi! But the memory of Brown's reign of terror is never far away. I think about it all the time, like, why didn't I just run out the door? Why didn't I do this? Why didn't I do that? I don't sleep because it still comes to me a lot at night. I have a lot of nightmares. But each day gets better for these brave women. I have two daughters now.

I wanted to enjoy my life as a mom with my family. I'm in a much better place now than I ever was before. I'm married to a great guy, I have two amazing kids, and like I had to go through the rain to get to the rainbow. That's the way I see it. And you have to fight for your story. You have to fight to be heard, because even if they don't believe you, it could happen to somebody else, and they'll report it.

And then a link is made, and that's how they get caught. We ended the cycle. Yeah, we ended the cycle. So that's one less person down in this world that could hurt a woman. The sheer bravery that it took on each of their parts is nothing short of amazing. People think NCIS, we're just there for the Marine Corps and the Navy.

We're there for the war fighters and their families and their dependents. That's what we're there for. Therefore. If you like this podcast, you can listen ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a quick survey at wondery.com slash survey.