48 Hours - Post Mortem | Tracking the Killer of Mary Catherine Edwards

Episode Date: November 12, 2024

Correspondent Natalie Morales and Producers Jenna Jackson and Mary Murphy examine the DNA technology that cracked the cold case of Mary Catherine Edwards’ murder. They discuss a detective and genetic genealogist who sifted through nearly 7,500 names on a family tree to identify a single killer, Clayton Foreman, and how police and a Texas Ranger arrested him. They also discuss how the Smith & Wesson handcuffs used to bind Mary Catherine came full circle and the revelation that she had been a bridesmaid at the Foremans’ wedding.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Go to ConstantContact.ca for your free trial. ConstantContact.ca Music Welcome back to a new episode of Postmortem. I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales. I'm filling in for Anne-Marie Green. She is on assignment right now for 48 hours, but I am here with the fabulous producers of this hour, Jenna Jackson and Mary Murphy, to talk about our most recent report on the case of Mary Katherine Edwards, who was murdered in the mid-1990s in Beaumont, Texas, and her case went cold for decades. Mary and Jenna, thanks so much for joining me today to break down the case and all the work that went into putting this together.

Thanks for having us. Yeah. Now, remember, for you who are listening, if you haven't listened to this 48 Hours episode yet, you can find the full audio just below this episode in your podcast feed. Just go take a listen, then come right back here for our conversation. Mary and Jenna, we can all agree that this is probably one of the most remarkable cold cases I think that we have worked on, right? Oh, yeah. I mean, and the components between the familial testing and the family tree just growing and

growing and growing and what everybody had to do to whittle it down. And then there's just this kind of astonishing twist that no one could have predicted. And you have a husband wife detective team, which is always fun. And then you throw a Texas Ranger in the mix, which what could we love more than that? I'll tell you, I loved interviewing a Texas Ranger. I mean, he walked in with his faux croc embossed cowboy boots with the Texas Ranger seal on it.

He had the ring, he had the hat. I mean, it was the full effect and the great storytelling. I mean, Ranger Bess is incredible. Ranger Bess could have his own show. Yeah, he really could. I mean, he's the real deal. And he's so committed. I mean, he realized when there was a major breakthrough with the Golden State Killer case, that there was a possibility of using genetic genealogy perhaps to solve some of these cases and this one immediately came to mind.

Now just to remind those who are listening, it all started back in 1995 in Beaumont, Texas. 31-year-old school teacher Mary Catherine Edwards was found murdered, sexually assaulted, and handcuffed in her own bathroom. Notably though, the handcuffs that were used on her were police grade, which Detective Llewellyn said it was sort of like a whispered ghost story in the hallways at police headquarters. He described it to us like people were trying to figure out

who could it have been? Did this person have a connection to the police? But, you know, police were never really able to identify the perpetrator at the time, although they did have DNA samples from the crime scene and those samples were so carefully preserved, which was so key. However, the forensic science was not advanced enough yet. So let's talk about genetic genealogy and how it's become a game changer in cases like this and specifically how it factored into this

investigation. I mean I think it's pretty incredible that back in 95, first of all, they preserved the evidence so well and that they still had enough DNA, you know, years later to do all of this testing, not to mention the fact that they had tested multiple people over the years. The detectives wouldn't give up. They kept going back to this case. So the fact that this genetic genealogy technology has come so far that they were able to put this DNA in the system

and come up with almost 7,500 names. I love when Detective Aaron Llewellyn says, you know, by the time it got bigger than my computer screen, my wife had to jump in because he was like, my mind was blown, basically. And what they did was a very multi-layered, complicated process where they were doing the family tree, but they were also researching the birth and death records, Googling with certain things in mind like who's in education, who's near Beaumont, Texas, all things that they thought could lead them to the person who had the DNA at the crime scene. But to build it up and down and sideways and then have it be almost 7,500 people to get to one,

to get to the person they became sure was the killer. That was really pretty amazing. And an unbelievable husband and wife, Tina. Yeah, I was going to say. Tina wasn't even assigned to the case. She's an auto crimes detective. He's the homicide guy. And suddenly she sees him floundering in front

of the family tree and she already knows a little bit about it. And so she just jumps in and the obsession level just goes off the charts and she's up all night, you know, and not sleeping. She knows there's a killer out there and she will not stop. She goes into Mary Katherine's diaries. There's nothing that Tina didn't do to try to get to the bottom of this. Yeah, because they knew timing was of the essence because this is now more than two decades later. So they don't know, you know, at the time,

like how old is this killer? Is he still alive? So it's sort of a race against time, right? And so it really came down to the detective work, the incredible two dynamic duos that we saw in this hour, which I love. As you mentioned, there's the men work in the case, and then there's the women as part of sort of the sleuthing team. So Tina's building out the tree and she keeps running into this family name, LaPointe, and then she runs into Shira, keeps coming up, Shira LaPointe, and she's saying, who is this person? Why is she everywhere? And could

she be related to her suspect? So she gets Erin to do the calling. Erin calls her up, and not only is Shira uploading her family tree, and it turns out there may be some distant connection, she's also a professional genetic genealogist. So suddenly they have this new person who knows how to work these cases has done at least one with the Texas killing fields where she identified a woman in that case who had been buried along the highway with all those other victims. And they just, Tina and Shira to this day are really great friends. It was a huge connection and they even described Shira was driving almost through Beaumont. So they met and Tina said, we met in a coffee shop and we were both wearing like the same cat eye glasses. I mean, this

sort of mind meld was just, it was just incredible. These two had to meet and it's a bond forever that they'll have. And as you said, Mary, they're trying to sort of put the pieces together, who's still alive, but also who lived in Beaumont around that time, who went to possibly that high school even. And then they passed off their info to Detective Aaron Llewellyn and Texas Ranger Brandon Best to then try to track down any potential leads in person. What I loved is, you know, as we talked to Ranger Best, how he told me he and Aaron,

they would then have to knock on people's doors and say, you know, will you give us a sample of your DNA? Which is, I mean, that's not an easy thing to do in this day and age. People are, you know, very skeptical and probably not going to want to do that. But they had a charming way of going about it. I want to play for you a clip from that hour. Take a listen. When we would sense anxiety in someone, Aaron would immediately tell them, Hey, who do you want to play you in the movie?

They would look at Aaron like he was crazy and say, what are you talking about? Well, this guy's a Texas Ranger. Everything they do turns into a movie. Who do you want to play your role in this movie? That calmed them down every time. And I of course do out there, hey, I've already got Brad Pitt. So, you know, you can't be Brad because Brad's playing me.

You know, I do think there's a movie script in this. Although I told Ranger Bess, I think he's more of a Matt Damon type. He was fine with that too. He was fine. It really worked though, how they were able to get people to give their DNA up. And also the relay and the teamwork among the four of them

was really very extraordinary to watch and the teamwork among the four of them was really very extraordinary to watch and the way they work together. I mean, at one point, Brandon, Beth says to you, Natalie, and it doesn't make the show, but he talks about what it's like to be a cold case investigator, how they're just a different breed, you know, and that many great policemen have already looked at a crime, but the cold case people come in and they look at it sideways. And he called it like looking at it from the 10 mile mark. You just get above it, look at everything.

And that's what they all did together. Yeah. And it was really cool too how far technology has advanced, but you still can't do it without good old fashioned detective work. Yeah. What is so incredible, I mean, this was a cold case for more than two decades. And when it came to they were able to solve the crime and crack the case in a little less than three months, right? They were working at a fast and furious pace, though. Yeah, Tina actually said

in testimony that had she billed for overtime, it would have amounted to something like $50,000. she billed for overtime, it would have amounted to something like $50,000. So that's a lot of hours. And then it turns out that Shara hits pay dirt with the DNA and she is able to build out that family tree and get it to a point where she pared it down to two brothers, Michael and Clayton Foreman. And it turns out they went to the same high school as Katherine Edwards. So what did they find when they looked into Clayton and how did that eliminate Michael? Well that's a very dramatic moment. Erin Llewellyn describes just running a check on both of them to see if they have a criminal

record and Michael is completely clean as a whistle. But Clayton Foreman has a conviction for aggravated assault. There are some similarities to what happened to Mary Katherine and suddenly they are off to the races. This is our guy. We are on the right track. At that point, they felt like, okay, this has to be our guy. You know, the MO is the same. This is too close. And so they find Clayton Foreman. He's living in Ohio at the time. And they contact the police in Ohio and say, will you do us a favor, basically,

and go grab his trash from the curb in front of his house? So they did. They brought back the trash to Beaumont, Texas, had it tested in the DPS lab, and it was a match. So then those guys are like, okay, let's go get him. Yeah. We saw the remarkable police interrogation. I mean, that was sort of a masterpiece in police work and so fascinating to see how they sort of wove through the interrogation and then kind of cornered Clayton Foreman.

So, Ranger Bess and Detective Llewellyn, they essentially tag-teamed the whole thing. But then comes the real clincher of the moment there, right, Mary? Yeah, I mean, these guys, so much heart went into what they were doing. So they finally, after all their hard work and all these years, they've got an arrest warrant for them and they have one thing, just one more thing they really need to do.

And they worked it out with the prosecutors. They brought the very handcuffs that had bound Mary Catherine the night she died and they slapped them on Clayton Foreman. And that was such a moment when when Ranger Best talks to you about it. He just says it felt so good and that we had done something for Catherine. It's a moment he said he was doing that for her as if he was able to physically take the handcuffs off of her when she was murdered and to put them back on the guy who was responsible for killing her.

I mean, it was a huge deal. And definitely for them, a moment where I think they felt, you know, finally job done. And so symbolic. It was just this sort of parting thing they had to do. Did you know that after World War II, the U.S. government quietly brought former Nazi scientists to America in a covert operation to advance military technology? Or that in the 1950s, the U.S. Army conducted a secret experiment by releasing bacteria over San Francisco to test how a biological attack might spread

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Listen to the Pitcairn Trials exclusively on Wondery+. Join Wondery+, in the Wondery app, Apple podcasts or Spotify. Welcome back and now to the big twist in this case. We interviewed Catherine's childhood friend, Diana Coe, who had once been married to Clayton Foreman. Clayton Foreman was Catherine's killer. Jen, I think listeners would be really surprised to know, I mean, you were the booking producer, you helped get us all these great people and characters, but Diana, it took a long time.

She only agreed to do this interview with us just days before the broadcast aired. How difficult was it to convince her to do it? It took a while, it was difficult. Her brother, Scooter, who was wonderful, and her sister were really trying to convince her that she had nothing to be embarrassed about, that she was a victim in this as well, and that people needed to hear that this guy was hiding in plain sight and that none of them knew it.

I mean, they described him being at Christmases and Easter's. Diana and Clayton Foreman had a child together. She had no idea. I mean, there were some signs of that maybe he wasn't the best truthful person, that he wasn't the greatest husband, but no signs of violence ever. I just have to say my hat is completely off to Jenna, what she did and the delicacy that you must have when you're dealing with victims.

Jenna just did a remarkable job with just respect and gained their trust. They were a very nice family. I mean, Natalie, your interview with Diana and the siblings was just incredible. It was great that she finally felt comfortable talking. And she told me after, it was very cathartic for her.

Well, and I think she recognizes and she realizes that if there are other victims of his out there, she was doing this for them as well. She wants them to be able to have a voice and to be able to come forward. And she feels by telling her story, perhaps they will come forward too. Yeah, I think that was very important to her

and one of the deciding factors. But she did say, she did feel some guilt for being the connection between Clayton and her friends, Catherine and Allison, because they were the bridesmaids at their wedding. She felt like perhaps she, Catherine and Allison, because they were the bridesmaids at their wedding, she felt like perhaps she introduced Catherine and Allison into his orbit. So there's that heartbreaking moment when Diana said,

I think if he wouldn't have married me, she'd still be alive. I mean, that just gutted me when she said that. Yeah. That was so, it was wrenching, just wrenching. And then she had to testify at the trial. She was incredibly brave. So were all the women who came in and testified.

You have to get up on the stand and look at him while you're up there testifying. And I think it was very emotional for Diana because she hadn't had to face him since she found this out. It was still very surreal to her, but she also found out so many other things that he had done and he had had so many other victims who had lived to tell what he had done to them. Before she married Clayton Foreman, she knew there had been something in his past, but she didn't know really what had happened, right, Jenna?

It was a chilling moment for Diana later at trial when she realized before she married Clayton, this woman who was a fellow classmate of hers at the same high school had been raped by him. And this woman came forward and testified, you know, she hadn't spoken about this in almost 30 years as well. It was incredibly hard and painful for her to come forward. But for Diana realizing that this had actually happened and that her future husband explained it away,

it's just he said she said misunderstanding and she believed him because she had no reason not to. And just hearing that woman's testimony was very hard for Diana. I think the hardest part of watching some of the testimony I think was seeing Katherine's identical twin sister, Allison up there on the stand and decades later, how much she still misses and loves and feels that connection to her sister.

And we should say Allison declined an interview with us, but we did hear her on the stand. I want to play a clip from that. I didn't know what happened to her. It was just that she was gone was all I knew. The pain and the loss is still so palpable. Four years later, I had a daughter and her name is Catherine.

Catherine, after my sister and she never got to know her. That's the hardest part. When I saw the first time that testimony, I mean, I cried. You can't watch this and not get emotional. Heartbreaking. I think that the identical twin bond is so sort of deeply ingrained. It's just got to be awful. It was awful to listen to her and see her. And we point out as you're watching her testimony that it's not just you know

hearing but also you see the possibility of what Catherine would have looked like. You know, there she is, Allison at 60, and she is the spitting image of what could have been. I mean, they looked exactly alike to the point where they would play pranks and do a little parent trap switch, and they would switch places with each other and no one would know. I mean, we discovered there was a yearbook photo

that was mislabeled as Catherine and Alison and it in fact was the reverse. The story went that Catherine would tell her young school children, if you see me on the street and say hello and I don't answer, it's because it's my sister, Alison. She didn't want them thinking they were ignored. Well, Clayton's defense attorney said in his closing arguments

that while he may have done terrible things to all of these women, it didn't make him a murderer. Are authorities, though, looking now into other possible cold cases to see if he may be connected to them? I mean, I think all of them said they believe there's the possibility, right? Yeah, they all suspect that there are more victims

that either have not come forward or that they haven't found. And so there is an ongoing look at all the places he lived to see if they can connect any dots to any unsolved cases. Yeah, and I think these detectives, as we saw, once they sink their teeth into something, they don't give up. So they're all pretty committed to making sure his DNA is loaded into all the systems. Well, on the case of Mary

Catherine Edwards, it only took the jury less than an hour and they found Clayton Foreman guilty for capital murder. He was sentenced to life in prison. But for Tina, Shara, Brandon and Erin, who played such a pivotal role in this investigation, take us back to when they heard the verdict and how they reacted. Erin said, we did it. And it was just very emotional because everything about the case was emotional. And they all said a version of, yes, it's the ending we wanted and yes, it's what we worked for. But to call it justice for Mary Katherine is just too difficult for them because this guy got to roam the earth and have a family

and get married twice and live a life. And Katherine got none of those things. So, and everybody, I think, had to go back and dwell on the fact that he was just, as Jenna said, hiding in plain sight. He was just there and nobody thought twice about him. And I think, you know, this is one of those cases that everyone said, if not for technology advancements and this incredible genetic genealogy, this would never have been solved. And these guys are continuing to solve cases. Authram Labs, who we spoke to,

who is very instrumental in this case, they're continuing to solve cold cases daily, which is incredible. Well, I love how we end the hour and really it's reflecting on how Catherine lived her life and the impact she had as a school teacher. And we have one of her students who sat during the trial and was there when the verdict came in,

and she really wanted to be there to see justice. Helen I Adams, tell us about her connection to her teacher and what it meant for her to finally see the story come to at least a conclusion that she can live with and now move on. I think Helenia, I mean, she lost her favorite teacher who had been such an impactful part of her life when she was seven years old. And when we were talking to her, it was like it was yesterday. She was so moved by Miss Edwards, as she called her, and to the point where, like you said,

Natalie, she attended trial every day except for one. She's getting her master's in criminal justice right now and plans to go to law school. She wants to be a part of the justice system that finally brought this to a close. She was very inspired by that. So it was incredible to talk to her. And I love that Katherine leaves a legacy of, you know, young children who she touched who have now grown into incredible and productive human beings who perhaps could make a difference in the future. Exactly.

Yeah. Well, Jenna and Mary, thank you once again. It was so great working with both of you on this and thanks for taking the time to talk about the case. It was great to work with you, Natalie. Thank you so much. Thank you, Natalie. Anne-Marie is going to be back with you next week with a new postmortem. I hope you enjoyed our conversation and remember to rate and review 48 hours on Apple Podcasts

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