48 Hours - The Torrey Pines State Beach Cases

Episode Date: July 9, 2024

Two teens killed on the same California beach six years apart. DNA on one of the victims leads to two suspects -- one of them worked for the police. Richard Schlesinger reports.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. I'm Erin Moriarty of 48 Hours and of all the cases I've covered, this is the one that troubles me most. Listen to Murder in the Orange Grove, The Trouble Case Against Crosley Green,

wherever you get your podcasts. Torrey Pines is a beautiful piece of nature in Southern California. What's beautiful about a beach is also what's dangerous about it. There's a very different vibe of what it feels like to be there in the middle of the day versus 10 at night. There is a little feeling of you don't know exactly what's out there. 1978, Barbara Nante and Jim Malt decided to go

on a camping trip to the beach at Torrey Pines. Stole my heart the minute I saw her. You know, it's that feeling everyone gets, you know, when you find that person that fits. They were really good together. They loved each other. They had so much fun together, and you could see it. Barbara, she was outspoken, very popular, funny. Jim, great personality. He was the life of the party. And my sister, very popular, funny. Jim, great personality. He was the life of the party.

My sister was like that too. Barbara and Jim set up their sleeping bags on the beach itself, and it was sometime in the night after they had fallen asleep that they were attacked. Jim Alt had been beaten and was very severely injured. I was knocked unconscious. I couldn't protect her. I couldn't defend myself.

My dad looked at me and said, your sister has been murdered. I didn't find out until years later how bad it really was. I'm going to say the body was around this position here somewhere. They found her lying here nude. And she also had some cut marks on one of her breasts. Who would want to kill her, and why? Six years later, in 1984, another young woman, Claire Hough, who was 14,

was found murdered on Torrey Pines at nearly the identical location. I just said, don't go down there alone. I think about her just about every day. She was my best friend. You get to this crime scene, look at the body, and see what? Again, there was mutilation of the breast. My first thought was, hey, this is very similar to the one that happened six years ago.

How much evidence was there? How many leads? Not any at all, really. My first thought was, hey, this is very similar to the one that happened six years ago. How much evidence was there? How many leads? Not any at all, really. I just remember going crazy in my mind. Is there something I'm not remembering? Is there something I saw? I want to put a face to this crime because it's been faceless for almost 37 years.

There really was no big break until 2012 when police finally got hits on the DNA evidence that they had from the crime scene. San Diego police have identified a former San Diego police criminalist as one of two suspects in the 1984 murder of 14-year-old Claire Hough. It was a big surprise that of all people in the world you could find as a suspect,

that it would be somebody who had actually worked for the police department. He had a nickname in the crime lab, right? You know what that was? His nickname was Kinky. He liked strip clubs. He liked taking pictures of women. My husband didn't do it. He didn't go after teenagers.

I knew they were wrong. This has multiple suspects. There are a variety of motives. As a murder mystery, this has everything you would want. Richard Schlesinger reports, Blood in the Sand. Every morning for the last 37 years, Jim Ault wakes up terrified, thinking that it's 1978, that he's just been brutally attacked on Torrey Pines Beach. When I become aware that I'm awake, I do not open my eyes. I put my hands on the bed and I feel for that sheet or I feel for sand of a beach.

You still do that? Yes, sir. Before my eyes are open, I want to know where I'm at. It wasn't always this way. The beach used to be Jim's second home, a safe place, a fun place. And you were a big surfer. Absolutely. There's not a feeling on earth like surfing. It's just there's a big rush inside your body. Rick Selga has felt that rush. He was one of Jim's good friends back then.

Who was the better surfer between the two of you? Probably he was. Do you remember what he was friends back then. Who was the better surfer between the two of you? Probably he was. Do you remember what he was like back then? He was a big, strong, funny, happy guy. He was probably the guy that everybody looked up to. And this is probably one reason why. Jim was featured in a wetsuit ad in Surfer magazine. We were rock stars, all of us in there.

When that magazine, that issue came out, we autographed quite a few. And he had a lot of girls that liked him, but he didn't see anybody else but her. Jim Ault only had eyes for 15-year-old Barbara Nantes. They were the all-American couple. Jim, the surfer, had been dating Barbara, the cheerleader, for nine months. Man, just a beautiful girl.

Brown hair, brown eyes. I was in love with her the minute I saw her. They were introduced by Barbara's sister, Sue. She was outspoken, really stubborn, and set in her ways. We had lots of arguments and fights and disagreements, as sisters do. Barbara's parents, Ralph and Judy Nantes, knew they had their work cut out for them pretty early on.

So she wasn't just another pretty face. No, she wasn't. She was tough as nails. She was a popular, defiant, beautiful, pain in the ass, wonderful daughter. God gave her to me to keep me humble, and it worked. On the weekend of August 12, 1978, Ralph and Judy Nantes left town to visit some friends. A family friend was looking after Barbara and her three siblings. Before leaving, Ralph Nantes took Jim Ault aside. What did you tell him?

Take care of my girl, okay, and make sure that she's safe. I told her father and mother, you know, that we would stay put. And again, that, you know, I've said it before, it's the biggest mistake or the biggest lie I've ever told in my life. Almost as soon as Barbara's parents left, she and Jim hopped into a station wagon with Rick Selga and his girlfriend. And they all drove off to the beach. I remember as they pulled off

though just saying you guys better be careful you know and they're kind of like yeah haha my sister's like see ya. The four friends eventually ended up at Torrey Pines Beach. Parking lot was filled with people it was like a big party. Around 9 30 p.m., the friends called it a night. Rick and his girlfriend decided to sleep in the station wagon, and Jim and Barbara went down to the beach for some privacy. I zipped the sleeping bags together, and we crawled in them, and went to sleep. She was in my arms.

That's the last thing I remember. That's the last thing I remember. The next morning, Jim woke up cold and alone and wet. He was covered in blood. I'm freezing. I'm feeling for Barbara. Don't know where she is. I don't know anything. I can't see anything. Don't hear anything. He was blinded and disoriented so jim had to feel his way along a fence up the sandy hill to the parking lot where his friends were sleeping in the car jim came up here and he he was down low like this and he rapped on the window and what did he look like then? His face was swollen, blood all over his blonde hair, you know,

and his head was probably about that big. Jim had been savagely beaten with a rock and a log from a fire pit on the beach. Did he say anything to you? He goes, go find Barb. So I ran down to the beach looking for her, and she was there. Barbara's nude, lifeless body lay on the beach. I was thinking, what do I do? I think that I just yelled at some people to call the police.

Homicide officers say what started out as an evening with friends turned out to be a night of death. Paul Ibarondo was a sergeant for the San Diego Police Department. He was one of the first investigators on the scene. When we uncovered the body, it was covered with sand. She had some very severe looking wounds on her head. It looked like she'd probably been struck with something, perhaps the rocks that we found nearby. Barbara's murder had been vicious. There was sand in her mouth and the killer left a gruesome mark. It appeared that somebody had taken a sharp instrument and cut around the areola of her breast and also around the nipple of the breast. So she'd been sort of mutilated. Later on, it was determined that she had been raped and sodomized. Soon after,

Barbara's parents were notified. And I just started screaming, no, no, no, I must have said it 50 times. It was like somebody took a sledgehammer and hit me in the head because we didn't even know that the kids were down there. We had no idea. Jim Ault had been rushed to the hospital. He had suffered a traumatic brain injury and was in a coma for days.

When he awoke, he had no memory of the attack. I've got titanium in the cranium, stainless steel. I've got that plate that runs right about there. This was a serious, life-threatening attack. Yes, sir. I almost did not make it. Jim was briefly investigated but ruled out as a suspect. His injuries were too severe. Paul Ibarando and other investigators tracked down other leads. But police could not find the killer. The bloody attack and murder haunted everyone for years.

They were just kids, you know. That stuff didn't happen. But a few years later, Claire Huff's body was found on Torrey Pines Beach. She was murdered identically to Barbara. Judy and Sue Nantes share their memories of Barbara

on Facebook at 48 Hours. 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-free starting October 29th on Amazon Music. 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 have heard it. 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 Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. In the years after Barbara Nantes' murder, her family struggled with the overwhelming loss and pain. There was situations where I'd wake up in a cold sweat, crying. Just the sadness at losing this child that you loved. When you're the mom, you just carry that. I felt like I was a complete failure as a mother.

Barbara's parents were both sad and angry at their daughter for lying to them. But Ralph Nantes was especially furious at Jim Ault. I didn't want to see him and I didn't want to talk to him. That's exactly what I felt. You didn't keep my little girl safe. And I was very, very upset. It hurts. I didn't bring their daughter home.

Six years later, Claire Huff's loved ones faced the same pain that originated in the same place. She was like Barbanantes, a year younger, just 14, smart and spirited. And she loved the beach. She just had an inner light, a joy about her. It's hard to explain unless you've met her. Kim Jamer was Claire Hough's best friend.

Very gentle, funny, kind. Claire's parents, Sam and Penny Hough, were and are immensely proud of her. She was the class mediator. Kids who got into arguments would ask Claire to adjudicate. Couple of times she got in trouble in school because the teacher had accused someone wrongly and Claire wouldn't put up with it. She fought back.

Claire learned to love the ocean early on. She grew up on the coast of Rhode Island and spent as much time as she could walking along the shore with Kim. We grew up looking for treasures and bringing her mom pretty things home from the ocean, sea glass and pretty shells. Claire had also spent a lot of time on San Diego's beaches. Her grandparents lived just a few blocks away from Torrey Pines Beach.

One of the first pictures of Claire was taken there. She was still small enough to be carried. This may be her first introduction to real ocean surf. The Huffs had always considered it a safe place. And in the summer of 1984, they sent Claire and her brother out to California for a visit with their grandparents. Kim Jamer went along, too. We could just be silly, and nobody knew us, and it didn't matter how goofy we got. It was just really fun. The night before Kim was supposed to head home,

Claire convinced her to sneak out of her grandparents' house and go to the beach after dark. But once they got there and settled near their favorite spot by the bridge, Kim, almost immediately, had a panic attack. It was just an awful feeling. I knew how freaked out I was, how somebody could just walk right up and by you without you even knowing they were there.

You asked Claire to make you a promise when you were back at the house. What was the promise? I just didn't want her sneaking out by herself again. Two days later, after Kim went back to Rhode Island, Claire broke that promise. And on August 24, 1984, Claire Huff's body was found by a beachcomber near the bridge. Retired Detective Paul Ibarando also worked on this case and was interviewed by our CBS local station back then. We are evaluating all the evidence we recovered at the scene.

Claire had been found just a few hundred yards from where Barbara Nantes had been killed. To me, it was a lot of similarities there. Like Barbara Nantes, Claire Huff also had been beaten, strangled, and sexually assaulted. It was determined at the autopsy that this girl had a lot of sand packed in her mouth and larynx area. Our other victim had sand in her mouth. But perhaps most chilling, like Barbara's, Claire's breast had also been mutilated.

We either have a serial killer or a repeat performance by the person that probably did the first case. It didn't take long to find a promising suspect. As soon as they heard about their daughter's death, Sam and Penny Huff went to Torrey Pine State Beach. Before long, they were approached by a man named Wallace Wheeler. He was the beachcomber who had found Claire's body. He said, I'm Wally Wheeler, I'm a psychic. With his hand outstretched. So what did you make of Wally Wheeler the psychic? He was strange. So then we called the police to tell him, tell them that. The police encouraged Claire's parents to keep communicating with Wheeler, thinking he might confess or at least give them some useful information.

Wheeler wrote long and rambling letters to the Huffs, one of them saying Claire was coming to him in visions. That was why she let me see her smiling face and her eyes were radiant. This is a guy who found a bloody mutilated body and he's talking about smiling face and radiant eyes. The letters were odd, very odd. The police questioned Wheeler, but he never confessed to anything and the letters eventually stopped. What was the last thing you heard about Wallace Wheeler? That he had killed himself.

Threw himself off the top of a building, 13-story building, and died. Investigators would later tell the Huffs that they had ruled Wheeler out as a suspect, but the Huffs were convinced for years that Wheeler was their daughter's killer. You thought he was involved somehow? Oh, yeah.

Yeah. We assumed that Wheeler... That he had done it. That he had done it. For all the intrigue surrounding Wallace Wheeler, the loved ones of the first victim, Barbara Nantes, had never even heard of him at the time. In fact, the families did not even know about each other.

But around 2008, the San Diego Police Department posted the cases on its website and for the first time said publicly that the police believed Claire Huff and Barbara Nantes had likely been murdered by the same killer. I was mad that that had happened to Claire and that we weren't informed. But who may have been responsible would remain a mystery for four more years until advanced DNA testing revealed two suspects and one of them was one of their own. For decades after the murders of Barbara Nantes and Claire Hough, the San Diego Police Department kept investigating sporadically. But nothing had ever materialized.

Claire's friend, Kim Jamer, kept waiting for some news. Did you think about this case a lot? All the time. I mean, you know nothing's gonna bring your friend back, and you just hope that no one is out there hurting other people. In 2012, there was finally a promising development.

The cases were reopened, investigators hoping advanced DNA technology would change the course of things. It was encouraging for Barbara's parents, Judy and Ralph Nantes. I was cautiously optimistic. They would be disappointed. The new DNA tests would find nothing useful on their daughter, but Claire Huff's friend Kim would soon get a visit from a detective. He brought several pictures. Did you see any of these people during your trip? I didn't recognize anything.

Kim was given few details, but she had a feeling that investigators were finally on to something. I was like, finally, somebody's really looking into this. 48 Hours obtained the San Diego Police Department's case affidavits and search warrants. And here's what Kim Jamer didn't know. Police had found two DNA hits on Claire Huff. Blood on her jeans was linked to a convicted rapist named Ronald Tetreault. The other DNA, a tiny microscopic amount reportedly found inside Claire, was linked to a man named Kevin Brown. Police

knew Kevin Brown. He was a former criminalist in their lab. I was getting ready for work and there was the knock and two detectives were there. Rebecca Brown, a Catholic school teacher, had been married to 61-year-old Kevin Brown for more than 20 years. Kevin retired from the San Diego Police Department in 2002. So I thought, okay, they're talking about some case that he worked on. The Browns had led a quiet life for revolving around church, travel, and their pets before that visit by investigators in January of 2014.

The detectives showed Brown a picture of Ronald Tetreault and asked if he knew him. What did he say? He said, I've never seen this man. I don't know him. Journalist James Vlahos wrote about the case in October 2015 for The Atlantic magazine. He is a CBS News consultant. Did the police go and talk to Ronald Tetreault when they found his DNA in Klerhoff's body? They would have liked to have done that,

but Ronald Tatro was already dead. Tatro had drowned in what was ruled a boating accident in Tennessee in 2011. But to this day, there is suspicion it was a suicide. His wallet had been placed on the seat. His glasses had been placed on the seat. His glasses had been placed on the seat. And they said it looked as if he intended to go into the water. Another thing that certainly raises eyebrows is that his death took place on the anniversary

of Claire Hough's murder. Kevin Brown, the retired criminalist, was now the only living suspect. Police showed him a picture of Claire Hough. What did he say? Oh, sure, I remember her. The detectives told Brown that his DNA had been found in the evidence. They didn't tell him where or how they found it. The police maintained that it was Kevin who first mentioned the possibility

of it being found on a vaginal swab. The investigation ramped up quickly. That same afternoon, investigators served a search warrant on his property looking for any evidence related to the murders of both Claire Huff and Barbara Nantes because they were so similar. I said, you've got to clear this up. This is crazy. And he said, I tried telling them. I don't know what they're talking about. I said, you've got to clear this up. This is crazy. And he said, I tried telling them. I don't know what they're talking about. I never killed anybody in my life. You know that, and I do know that. In my deep core,

I know he never killed anybody. But investigators believed Kevin Brown had a dark side. At the time of Claire Huff's murder, Kevin was a bachelor in his 30s and had a randy reputation at the crime lab. He had a nickname Kinky Kevin Brown and that was because we knew that he frequented strip clubs. They called

him Kinky Kevin? Yeah, we called his nickname was Kinky. Retired criminalist Jim Stamm and John Durina worked with Kevin in the lab for years. Did he brag about going to the strip clubs? Did he make any secret of it? Early on, I don't think he kept it a secret, but he did have friends that would go with him to either a movie or a strip club, I believe. He would go to, what, dirty movies? I believe it was a porn movie, yes. Durina and Stamm never saw any inappropriate behavior by Brown in the lab,

but he made some female colleagues uncomfortable. There was a criminalist who worked with Kevin Brown, and she describes how Kevin took a report of a violent rape, and when she was alone in the lab with him, read it aloud to her and made a remark along the lines of, isn't that funny? After that, she never felt comfortable being alone with him in the lab again. As they dug into Brown's background, investigators learned more about his hobbies. He enjoyed photography and in the 80s, he went to lingerie and boudoir shoots advertised in a local magazine.

Photographer Rocky Ferguson took photos of aspiring models with Kevin. So they pose for the photographer and in return they get a free picture? Yes. But Rocky says that sometimes certain photographers would make arrangements for private sessions that were more racy. And Kevin did that? Kevin did his own thing. If he likes somebody, he'll hire his own models. In these private sessions, what would happen?

Adult type stuff. Adult stuff. Naughty stuff. Yes. Explicit photos. Kevin Brown's pastimes as a bachelor may have raised detectives' eyebrows, but his statements during the investigation made them even more suspicious. Although he initially denied having actually met Claire Hough, Brown later seemed to make a startling admission. He had done some thinking and that he now did recall having met someone named Claire

in the 1980s and possibly having sex with her. And then he got himself into even deeper trouble. According to the affidavit, Kevin Brown volunteered to take a lie detector test. He failed. And after the polygraph, an investigator talked to him about Claire Hough, saying, I don't believe for a second that you thought she was 14. Brown reportedly responded, I had no idea.

Then police learned Kevin Brown had called a friend. And told him, allegedly, the police are looking at me as a suspect. This girl I photographed on the beach ended up dead. Hot shot 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 Informants 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. Did you know that the movie Candyman was partly inspired by an actual murder?

Listen to Candyman, the true story behind the bathroom mirror murder, early and ad-free on Wondery Plus and the Wondery app. Ever since investigators got that DNA hit on Claire Huff in 2012, they had been quietly trying to build a case against Kevin Brown. But his wife, Rebecca Brown, stood by him. I never thought he was a killer. Never, never. This is a man who didn't have a mean bone in his body. Well, you know all those things that people are saying about he was going to strip clubs and taking photographs of naked women? He'd shown me some, and the majority were just, like,

just cutesy poses, glamour shots. And that was back when he was single, and he would have thought, wow, this is great. If everybody, whoever looked at a photo of a scantily clad woman, or if everybody who ever went to a strip club is likely to be a serial killer, I'm afraid we're going to have to build quite a few more prisons. We do not convict people on their character.

...hired on the police proceedings... Attorneys Jean Iredale and Gretchen von Helms represent the Browns. This was a violent, sadistic, choking, killing. The scope of what happened to these poor young women who were brutally, sexually assaulted and murdered is quite different from going to a strip club or going into a porn shop or reading an off-color story. The lawyers argue that there is almost no case against Kevin Brown. For starters, they say, investigators could never say if or when or how Kevin Brown, the mild-mannered criminalist, met Ronald Tetreault, the violent convicted rapist. Zero evidence that they had ever seen each other or met at any time. Zero.

They say there are perfectly innocent explanations for Kevin Brown's actions and statements, like the one he made when detectives showed him a picture of Claire Hough. He said at one point, oh, I remember her. Why did he say that? It was a well-known case, and that photograph that they showed him had been one that had been in the newspaper. But Brown also said he may have met someone named Claire in the 80s and that he might have had sex with her. Iredale says Brown was just being honest. I think that he said he had met a Claire, but the Claire that he was talking about was a woman who was 30 years old. Even the investigators seem to acknowledge in the affidavit that this woman did not sound like

Claire Hough. But remember, Brown had allegedly also told a friend that he photographed a girl who was found dead on the beach. The man to whom this statement is attributed says he never said such a thing. Gretchen Von Helms argues investigators had tunnel vision and interpreted everything Kevin Brown said as evidence of his guilt. She says that's what happened when Brown told a detective he had no idea Claire was 14. They immediately think the suspicious, guilty version of that versus, oh my God, you're telling me this awful crime. A normal citizen, when they're told about this awful crime, would say, oh my gosh, this

poor child was 14, how awful this is. The attorneys admit Kevin Brown's personality did little to help him during the investigation. He was one of the worst public speakers, let's say, in the history of the San Diego Police Department lab. He was kind of like a nervous Nelly. Retired criminalists John Dorina and Jim Stamm say Kevin Brown was, at best, a shaky witness for the police in court cases. Whenever he got confronted, he got very nervous

and very upset. He wanted to agree. He wanted to please them. But Kevin Brown's shyness or awkwardness cannot explain his DNA on that swab. Several swabs were taken from inside Claire during the autopsy. The medical examiner tested one of them in 1984 and found nothing. Another swab was sent to the San Diego Police Department lab, and that's where the lawyers say the trouble began. It was not kept in a way that would ensure the integrity of the evidence. It was the early 80s before much was known about DNA, and the procedures now used to prevent contamination

did not exist. How different were the procedures back then? A lot. I mean, we didn't wear masks, for sure. Kevin Brown did not work on the Claire Hough case, but he worked near the criminalist who processed the evidence, including that swab where a minute amount of Brown's DNA was later found.

The swab itself was put to dry in the open air. Without a cap? On a table near where Mr. Brown worked. Everything that was able to be airborne could have gone and touched that swab. able to be airborne, could have gone and touched that swab. The problem, though, with this case is, seems to me, that the allegation is that this isn't sweat or spit. It's his semen. How would his semen get on a swab?

You can still have cross-contamination of semen because they had to have fresh samples of semen in the San Diego lab. At the time of Claire Huff's murder, criminalists would often bring their own seminal fluid to the lab and use it to ensure the chemicals used to detect semen were working correctly. Dorena and Stan believed that all the criminalists in the lab did it. I think Kevin was doing that same thing. The San Diego Police Department, however, insists that contamination was not possible. But the retired criminalists know what they saw.

Most likely, Kevin's semen standard was in that lab and several analysts may have even had it. It may have been even used on that particular, on Ms. Hoff's case. We didn't switch gloves back then either. So let's say the analyst took Kevin's semen sample, wearing the same gloves, and then handled the deep vaginal swab. There's a logical explanation for the contamination. Cross-contamination does happen. There have been cases of lab technicians' DNA ending up on evidence documented in several states and at least four other countries. So, given the lab procedures in effect at the time and the lack of other solid evidence, Kevin Brown was assured the case against him was weak. And I believe that they lacked the evidence necessary to charge Mr. Kevin Brown with these murders. But by mid-2014, the stress of the

investigation, which was dragging on, was making Kevin Brown very anxious. I said, call him and get it straightened out. And he said, they just said, you know you killed her and you may as well confess. And he hung up the phone and he said, I didn't even say anything back to him, because I didn't know what else to say at this point. He said, I didn't do it and they're not going to ever believe me. Rebecca hoped their nightmare would soon end, but it would not end in a way that anyone expected. 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 bolder 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. On the morning of October 20th, 2014, Rebecca Brown came home from work and found her husband's Bible sitting on the table. In it, he had underlined a psalm about being wrongfully accused. His watch was there and his cell phone was there. And so I asked my mother, where is Kevin? And she had just said he went somewhere. He went out, he was cleaned up, he'd shaved, he'd show. Looked nice and said, I have things to do. Kevin didn't come home that night, and the following day, Rebecca got the news she feared most. I was just sitting there waiting, and then there was

the door knock, and it was the detective, and he said, we've found your husband. And he's gone. A ranger at a state park near where the Browns had a vacation cabin had found Kevin hanging from a tree. Were you surprised? Even after everything that he'd been through? We tried to... I tried to keep his spirits up. You thought you had kept him safe.

Oh, my. Yeah. Rebecca Brown is adamant that her husband's suicide was not an admission of guilt. I totally understand why he did it. He knew there would be people who would think, even if he went to court and was found not guilty, that would believe it. And this was going to tarnish his reputation that he prided himself in.

He didn't escape that, of course. After he died, the police held a news conference. Yeah. Three days after his death, the San Diego Police Department publicly named Kevin Brown as one of two suspects in Claire Huff's murder. We were able to establish a very strong case that Ronald Tatro and Kevin Brown were the suspects in the murder of Claire Huff. And also an arrest for Brown would be forthcoming. You never had enough to arrest him in his lifetime.

And now that he's gone, you're going to just say, he did it, case solved, it's done. Rebecca has answered the police charges with charges of her own. She's filed suit against two police detectives for misconduct and wrongful death. He was not a rapist and a killer. He was a quiet, good man. And I'm hoping the legal system will help set things right. The San Diego Police Department refused our request for an interview, but Penny and Sam Huff, Claire's parents,

have the answers they need. We're confident in the San Diego Police Department and their discoveries. The Huff family says after 30 years, the details surrounding their daughter's death are not as important to them as remembering her life. We've learned to live with her death. We've learned to live with her death. We've learned to live without her physical presence in our family.

To us, what's important is what Claire was and what Claire meant to us and to the people around her. And this is sort of a still life. That's a ninth grade one. Claire left her mother and father with a lot of memories. Well it looks like all her favorite rock groups. And at 14 she had the foresight to leave a will telling her family and friends that she loved them and not to be sad. You made me realize how precious and beautiful life is. Thank you. I wish I could list all the wonderful things you've done,

but everyone would fall asleep. I love you both. What did it mean to you that she had done this and she had written this? It's always a puzzle why she did it, but it is also a treasure. But the family of Barbara Nantes, the first victim in this case,

still has as many questions about her murder as they did in 1978. Reality, what happened to her, it's just so hard to think. I want to know her. I want her to have a life. Police now say Barbara and Claire's cases are not connected. I would like a viable suspect, but we don't have one.

Ronald Tetra was in prison for rape at the time of Barbara's murder, and Kevin Brown was attending college in Sacramento 500 miles away. Barbara's boyfriend, Jim Ault. What has it done to you over the years, especially with the developments in Claire's case, to see this case still remain open? It's devastating. We want answers. We want to know what they're doing to solve this. Even today, Jim Ault says he's suffering from survivor's guilt. It has stayed with him, even though Barbara's father, Ralph, sent him a letter long ago apologizing for having blamed him for her death.

I want you to know that I don't hold you responsible for Barbara's death. When I was grieving over her death, I needed to blame someone. And since she was with you, I lashed out at you. Jim, you were trying to be alone with Barbara is probably what every red-blooded American boy dreams of. Unfortunately, the time you spent together turned out to be a disaster. But the chance of that happening was probably one in a million. Yours truly, Ralph Nantes. It still is hard for you to read that without choking up.

Yes, sir. He's absolving you in a way. Does that help you? When I first read it, it did. But you can't hide what happened. Because of a decision Barbara and I made, she never came home. So I own part of that decision and I'll take that to the grave with me.

In 2020, a federal jury awarded Rebecca Brown more than $6 million in her wrongful death lawsuit.