Anatomy of Murder - The Promise - Part 1 (Robin Cornell & Lisa Story)

Episode Date: January 9, 2024

A predator entered a condo, assaulting and murdering an 11-year-old and a young woman. A mother's promise was made the day they died. She would not give up, ever, until she knew who took her child, and her friend. It was a quest by that mom, and law enforcement, that would go on for decades. For episode information and photos, please visit https://anatomyofmurder.com/Can’t get enough AoM? Find us on social media!Instagram: @aom_podcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @AOM_podcast | @audiochuckFacebook: /listenAOMpod | /audiochuckllc

I promise you I will never ever stop for as long as I'm alive. And I will find out who hurt you. And I promise you they will pay. They will pay for what they did to you. And I will never break that promise. Never. Unless God takes me. I'm Scott Weinberger, investigative journalist and former deputy sheriff.

I'm Anasiga Nicolazzi, former New York City homicide prosecutor and host of Investigation Discovery's True Conviction. And this is Anatomy of Murph. Before we begin, we do want to warn you that this episode includes some graphic content and the crime involves brutality and sexual assault. This episode is about a mother whose young daughter and friend both endured horrific violence. It's also about a promise that guided that mother and the law enforcement community in the many years that followed. The promise was this.

She wouldn't rest until the person who killed her child and her friend was found. When we first learned about today's case, we knew it was going to stick with us and likely with all of you for a very long time. It's about a devastating crime. It's also incredibly moving because of the heart and resilience of the victims' families and of law enforcement that would not give up. We're heading to Cape Coral, Florida, a small city next to Fort Myers, about 100 miles south of Tampa. In 1990, Cape Coral was quiet and it had a really small town feel to it. That's Amira Fox speaking, state attorney for the 20th Judicial Circuit of Florida.

She plays an important part in this story and in this case, but we'll explain more about that later. The residents of Cape Coral span the economic spectrum. It has multiple series of canals running through the city where you could get a reasonably priced house, but sit on a canal that took you right out to the river and then out to the Gulf of Mexico. You could also have a waterfront home that cost, even back then, over a million dollars. So it attracted a economically diverse group of people.

And then you also had many, many duplexes in Cape Coral where lower-income folks tended to live. In 1990, 37-year-old single mom Jan Cornell lived in a duplex with her two daughters, 11-year-old Robin and 18-year-old Jeannie. When we spoke to Jan, she had fond memories of their Cape Coral home. It was a very large complex called the Courtyard. It was beautiful. The grounds were beautiful. They had a beautiful pool. But not a lot of kids. It was a lot of older people, which was fine. It actually suited Jan's younger daughter, Robin, more than fine. She loved talking to older people.

And they all thought she was adorable and how polite she was. You couldn't go to the pool without an adult. And they would come to the door, these 80-year-old women, and they'd say, if Robin is allowed to, we'd be happy to take her to the pool. It was not hard to love Robin. She was lively and kind, both a natural-born leader and extremely empathetic. You know how they always say, every child you have is different. Robin was the different child.

She was very easygoing from birth. She had such a sense of humor. I can't recall one instance where she said, I don't like that person or I hate that person. She always tried to find the good in everyone. And that was what made her so special. Robin also seemed very independent. She fostered her own love of church and Bible study and always wanted to be outside in nature.

She loved anything to do with the outdoors. She loved camping, climbing trees, swimming, looking for wildlife. She would have lived outdoors. And I said, I'm glad you like the outdoors and camping because we may do that at some point in our lives. Jan's reference was only a half a joke. The family's finances were a real concern. And being a single mom providing for her kids fell squarely on Jan's shoulders. You worry about their housing, their clothing, their schools, their mindset.

You just worry about everything because you're doing this by yourself. But it just all seemed to work. I never thought about it as a burden. I just thought about it as a way of life. Money was tight, but the love in the home was abundant. Jan tried to make sure that her kids didn't realize that finances were a struggle. She didn't want them to grow up feeling like they were somehow missing out. We were poor, but I did not put that on them. There was a lot of things they didn't get to do,

but there was a lot of things they did get to do. So Robin never even realized the finances part. Jan split her time between caring for her two daughters and working at Cape Coral Hospital. This job had a positive impact on the Cornell family. I finally was at a part financially where I was able to keep up. My job had increased, you know, my money and my position, and we were actually having a very good life. But then she got thrown a curveball, the good kind. She met someone.

You know, I was younger, and I wasn't really looking for a relationship. I had my two daughters. So Donnie and I started out as friends, and then one thing led to another, and then we became more personally involved. There was a canal in between our properties where we live here in Coral. It was literally a three-minute ride to his house. So it was easy to see each other every day. It wasn't a relationship she'd been expecting.

But Donnie Batista fit into her life like a glove. Robin especially was thrilled. She actually fell in love with him. He had two children from a previous marriage. So we would do the pool, we would do camping, we would go out to eat. We would do things together. You know, Scott, I had to smile as I was thinking about this because I almost feel like her life was on autopilot a bit.

You know, here she is being that hardworking mother who also has a lot on her shoulders, the finances, but now how nice it must have been to finally feel that lightness of a new romance. Exactly. Now here's someone she could share her life with and somebody that she could grow with. Unfortunately, the Cornell home was about to get a shakeup. Jan and her older daughter had a falling out. Ginny had turned 19 and she had a boyfriend that I did not like. And ultimately ended up having a fight about him. And she said, well, I'm not going to live here. I said, go. You think it's going to be better somewhere else?

Go. So sometime in April of 1990, Jan's older daughter moved out. It was likely a huge stressor on Jan, but she focused her energy on all the everyday things that she had to do, like Robin and her job at the hospital. And there she was able to find distraction through work and her colleagues, like 32-year-old Lisa Story. Lisa was an administrative secretary at the KidCore Hospital. And we actually met each other because we were both smokers. We would meet on our breaks. And I mean, I had worked with her and known her for five years and we'd meet at the same place and catch up on the mutual friends we knew. Lisa was a lover of photography and motorcycles and had a reputation for being an incredibly hard worker.

She was also engaged and planned on tying the knot with her fiancé later that same year. She seemed to be one of those people who no one had a bad word to say about. We had quite a few mutual friends and they'd say, oh, Lisa's a great gal. She's all about ecology. She's all about saving the earth. And I thought that was a great thing. A friendship formed between two women. And shortly after Jan's daughter,

Jeannie, moved out, Jan found herself telling Lisa about the drama at home during one of their smoke breaks. I said, well, I have a vacancy. And kiddingly, I said, you know anybody that needs a room to rent? And we actually joked about it for a couple days. And then she said, I'm seriously asking, do you want to rent out that room? And I said, do you want to move somewhere where I have an 11-year-old and I do have some rules? Because she didn't have any children. I said, you know, come on over to the condo. I want you to meet Robin.

And she did this prior to moving in. I told Robin she was moving in, and Robin would move in my room and share my room with me, and that Lisa would have the other bedroom. The move was planned for the evening of May 9th, and as we all know, the logistics of movie day can be a complete headache, but both Lisa and Jan had some helpful reinforcements. That night, Donnie, my then-boyfriend, was going to help Lisa move the rest of her things that required a truck, and she had invited a friend to help. We got her stuff all loaded in the house, and we all had a few beers. It was just like a normal night. As the evening winded down and everyone got settled, Jan toyed

with the idea of going over to Donnie's place. The basketball playoffs were on that evening, and I was actually a Piston fan, and they went into overtime. That is what prompted later in the evening me leaving my house, which I did not normally do because I went to work at 4.30 in the morning. And I didn't usually go out, but made the decision to go to Donnie's and finish watching the game. Sports aside, it was also a welcome chance for Jan and Donnie to spend some time on their own. Donnie and I really hadn't spent any time without kids because Jeannie had moved out three weeks before and I had Robin. It all seemed so fine.

Donnie lived close. Lisa was someone Jan trusted. Even Robin insisted that her mom should go. But despite all of that, Jan still felt reluctant. Something was telling her to stay i said to lisa i don't want you to think you're here to be a babysitter so lisa goes we're going to be fine robin tell your mom to go because i came back up the stairs and said i'm going to call him and tell him i'll finish watching the game here and And they both said, don't call him. Just go. We're going to be fine.

That's one of those instances where you regret not dealing with whatever was saying you shouldn't go. That's one thing I'll never be able to forgive myself for. Because I went back up the stairs and I wasn't going to go. But at her daughter and friends urging, Jan did go. There could have been no way to predict the nightmare she'd find when she returned. Jan Cornell had gone to her boyfriend Donnie's to watch a basketball game while her 11-year-old daughter Robin stayed home with Jan's friend and now new roommate, 32-year-old Lisa Story. Lisa and Robin were going to sleep as Jan left.

Jan planned to be gone for just a couple of hours, but that night while watching the game, she accidentally fell asleep. Which is something I never did. I never actually spent a night at Donnie's house. If I did go over there and we spent some time together and either one of us dozed off, I got up and I went home. And that night I fell asleep and did not wake up till four o'clock in the morning and was in a panic because I had to be to work at 4.30. Jan rushed back to her condo so she could quickly change and head to work. But once there, she encountered another problem. Both locks on the front door were bolted closed. The bottom lock actually quit working. You could only use one key to get in the door, and if you locked the bottom lock, you couldn't get in.

I could not get in my front door. The bottom lock was locked. Jan couldn't wait around for Lisa or Robin to wake up. She was in a huge hurry, so she knocked on the door. I didn't beat the door down because I didn't want to freak Lace out thinking, she's a lunatic. By beating the door like I did if it was for Jeannie and Robin, who locked me out, I knocked on the door a couple times and said, come on guys, you need to let me in. That's when Jan heard something inside that immediately put her on high alert.

I heard footsteps. When I heard the footsteps, I am not exactly sure, but this is what my memory says. The footsteps were not them. Meaning that whoever she was hearing walking inside did not sound like Lisa, and it was definitely not Robin. Someone else was in the home. Her first thought... Oh my God, my house is being robbed.

So I ran around to the back entrance, which was a little closed-in patio. You could never ever open the gate to this patio. It was wood, and it would swell up and half the time you couldn't get in it. But the gate was open and when I entered that patio, my sliding glass door was open and my verticals were blowing through it. Even in her growing panic, Jan was trying to tell herself that there must be some kind of reasonable explanation. Lisa had a cat. This is such a safe neighborhood. She's seen all the older people around here. Maybe she thought it was okay to leave the door open for her cat to go in and out.

And then when I got in there, it all changed. The first things that Jan saw when she got into her home made it very clear that this was no robbery. I saw the kitchen light on, and I had set the ironing board up because I ironed my clothes for work every day. And there was pictures on the ironing board that were taken off my wall unit. The pictures were of her children, and they seemed to be placed there deliberately. There was a picture of Robin by herself, a picture of Robin with her brother and sister from her dad's second marriage. There was a picture of my daughter Jeannie, and then another picture of Robin. When I saw those pictures, I think I went into full panic mode and ran up the stairs. As Jan sprinted to Robin's room, she passed by Lisa's.

I kind of saw her out the corner of my eye. There was a small landing. And she actually kind of looked like where she was when I left her. Because when I left, she was tucked under her sheets in her bed and said she's going to sleep. So Jan assumed Lisa was sleeping. But she also wasn't really thinking much about anything except Robin. Her instincts were telling her that she needed to get to her daughter. And when Jan stepped into the bedroom, she knew immediately that her fears were founded.

I was looking around my room and clothes were hanging out of the drawer. Doors were emptied out. Everything I was looking at was ransacked. Then she saw her daughter, partially under the bed, and in a way that no parent, no person should ever have to see. And Robin was on the floor at the foot of my bed. And that's when I realized something horrible. Her arms were up next to her head, stretched out. Her head was on its side, and she had a pillow rolled up underneath her abdomen. We are not going to discuss the rest of what Jan saw.

Suffice it to say it was obvious that Robin was dead, that she had been sexually assaulted, and that it was brutal. Out of respect for Robin, Jan, and the rest of their family, we'll leave it at that. And my immediate reaction was to pull her out from there and get help. Jan dialed 911 and performed CPR. She did this knowing it was no use. I said a million times, my intelligent part of my brain knew she was dead. She was cold to the touch.

But I still called 911, got them on the phone, threw the phone on the floor, begging, screaming in between breaths that I was trying to breathe life back into her. I'm still screaming vulgar things to Asa because I thought, who could have done this? She was the only one here, and she wasn't answering me. Jan stayed with her daughter until the police arrived. They took me downstairs, and I'm screaming, I don't want to leave her, don't make me leave her. And she was naked. I remember begging them to cover her up, that I know she's so embarrassed.

Because she was 11, you know? In between calling for her daughter, Jan was begging the police to wake Lisa and interrogate her. She wanted answers about what had happened. But Jan was told by investigators that talking to Lisa wouldn't be possible. And then when they came down and I said, what did she say? Did you wake her up? And they said she's deceased. Both Robin and Lisa had been murdered. Even in the wake of this horror, police knew it ask me a question and I'd calm down and I was trying to answer but then this hysteria would take over everything I saw was there I could see the blood coming out of Robin's nose I could see the fear and terror in her eyes, and I just started saying the Lord's Prayer over and over and over again. And I don't, to this day, don't know why I did that.

Jan was eventually taken to Donnie's house, while about 30 investigators combed the crime scene for clues. The condo appeared ransacked, drawers were emptied, and some key personal items were taken, like Lisa's credit cards, checkbook, and license. There was also a watch missing. And Lisa had bought her boyfriend a Seiko watch for his birthday, which was May 11th. I gave her the tape and scissors to wrap it for him that night because she was seeing him the next day.

Those little gold tags and a new watch box. They were on the floor downstairs. And when we got up to Lisa's bedroom, the wrapping paper and the open box with no watch in it was on the floor. The monster took the watch. It was a puzzling crime scene. A pair of white socks, unrelated to the family, was also found on a dining room chair. But oddly, most valuable items had been left behind. Here again is State Attorney Amira Fox. There was no TVs ripped out of the walls or things like that, where if someone's committing a robbery, they're going to take everything that's worth some money. And that was not the case.

There was still some jewelry left in the home and other things that were of value. Amira wasn't involved in this case in 1990, but her knowledge of it came at a very formative time in her career. I graduated from law school in May of 1990, which is when this crime occurred, and immediately moved to Florida the day after I graduated. So as I arrived and started in this office on June 1st of 1990, the office was still abuzz with the talk of this horrendous crime. I actually remember starting in the office, was talking about little Robin Cornell and Lisa's story and how they'd been so brutally murdered.

At autopsy, it was confirmed that both Robin and Lisa had been sexually assaulted. Lisa also had defensive wounds indicating she'd fought back. As for the cause of death... The medical examiner determined that the cause of death was suffocation or asphyxiation in this case. There was also forensic evidence found in both Robin and Lisa's rooms. In Robin's, semen on her bedsheets. In Lisa's, someone's blonde hair. Investigators analyzed the placement of both Robin and Lisa, and coupled with the information they'd received from Jan, it was theorized that both had been sleeping when the perpetrator arrived.

These killings were cold calculated and premeditated. He had to travel from one bedroom to another. It takes several minutes to strangle slash suffocate somebody. They also found evidence that suggested the intruder had showered at some point while in the home. Items were strewn all over and the apartment had been ransacked. And don't forget about the pictures of Jan's children that had been taken off of the walls and arranged on an ironing board. The brutality and the violence that these two girls met and the way the crime scene was staged, it does seem really personal and obviously pointing towards more of a vendetta or something else.

Someone took the time to take photographs off a wall and place them the way that Jan or whoever was going to find Lisa and Robin would see that first. I mean, that is not only thought out, but it's sadistic even before we get to the crime. Because just imagine that terror, that fear factor that Jan had from the first moment she got into her home. And it was that line of thinking that began to shape some early police theories. The police thought two different things. The first thing was, is this somebody who knows Jan, who knows Robin and the other daughter, and carries some sort of incredible vindictive anger towards them that they would set up such a bizarre, horrendous scene of placing these photographs on an ironing board. On the other side of it, is this a sick, evil individual who's acting out some sort of fantasy and who uses these pictures as a prop. There were props used in these violent rapes. There was a sex toy found. There was an adult

magazine propped open in Lisa's room. I guess that didn't narrow it down very much for them because they're right back to, well, is this a complete stranger who's a sexual predator and a violent killer? Or is this somebody who knew them who's angry with them? If this was personal, then police are going to need information from Jan and others that were close to the family. And Jan was a completely open book. We knew a man did this. They had the name of every male in my life. As to the second possibility. The police checked every sex offender, sex predator in the area. Police looked for leads based on various items that had been observed inside the home. They also canvassed the neighbors and found some reports about a mysterious man in a red hat and a beige car parked illegally in the days leading up

to the attack. Neither produced any leads. They eventually attempted to track down Lisa's stolen watch as well, the one she bought her boyfriend for his birthday. It was recognizable because it had a personalized inscription on the back of the watch. One of the things police did have to go on, they could go to pawn shops, determine if something like that had been pawned. Even Lisa's parents jumped on the watch as a potential lead and made a billboard of the inscription, which they then put up on one of the major highways in town, Highway 41. They were hoping that the right driver would see and recognize it. Unfortunately, the watch has never been recovered.

Pawn shops, billboards, none of it provided the answers that were hoped for. However, there was still a very important piece of evidence they had at their disposal, the forensic DNA from the crime scene. Remember, this was 1990. DNA testing wasn't as precise and accurate as it is today. In those days, we had a different procedure than what we use today, where you needed absolutely gigantic amounts of blood or semen to be able to develop a DNA profile. And thus, much evidence used to get used up trying to do the testing because you needed so much under this old way of doing DNA to develop the profiles. There certainly wasn't enough in the right type of DNA testing in place to be able to determine a profile.

It would have been difficult to match it to anybody at that time. Even so, investigators were able to narrow down their pool at least somewhat. From the forensic sample, analysts determined that the killer was a white male with an O blood type. This at least gave them a basic set of parameters by which they could rule people in or out as potential suspects. They started with the immediate circle of people around the family to see if they could exclude those people. Anybody who knew Jan, who knew Robin, who knew Lisa, they conducted hundreds and hundreds of interviews. And as time continued to pass and DNA testing continued to evolve,

authorities were able to rule out more and more people. They collected DNA samples from over 100 people looking to see if they could make any kind of match. They looked at every local sex offender. They followed every tip, and they were able to eliminate suspects by comparing DNA. Jan also recalls how she provided investigators with her own list of names. Even those people she'd only had fleeting interactions with were reported to the police.

Every now and then, there would be an odd person that I would notice in this complex that I knew didn't live there, and I gave descriptions because Cape Coral was not gigantic at the time. They were able to track these people down and DNA them. But each lead, each report resulted in a dead end. And the idea that a killer was still on the loose was terrifying for the residents of Cape Coral. Police had purposely withheld many details about the crime from the media, fearing that it would hamper the investigation. But news

of the double homicide still spread quickly, which caused a lot of understandable tension around the community. There was a lot of fear, especially in 1990. It was really unusual to have a brutal double murder rape involving a young girl and a young woman. And the media was really focused on it, of course, including not just local media. We had national media. We had international media that was following this. And it became a whodunit. And the community was very concerned about,

who did this? Is this a stranger who's going from house to house and looking for somebody to victimize? The Cape Coral Police Department had a lot of pressure on them. These terrifying scenarios that the Cape Coral residents were envisioning had already happened to Jan, and she was still trying to process the brutality she'd seen that morning. I couldn't get my beautiful little baby with blood coming out of her nose and the fear.

Her eyes were not closed. I will never, ever, ever not see that fear. Never. And I look at her pictures and I see her big, wide, beautiful, bright eyes. And I always try to replace that vision with that. But I do see it still. Chan also felt immense guilt for not being home when the intruder had attacked. And I will never forgive myself for leaving that night.

You know, Scott, this was one of those points that quite honestly, I felt like my heart just breaking when I was listening to Jan, because here we are just so many decades later, and she has such a rawness and still feels that guilt. But this is no way anyone's fault other than the person who committed the crime. And all I kept thinking about, if she has such a rawness and still feels that guilt. But this is no way anyone's fault other than the person who committed the crime. And all I kept thinking about, if she had been home, that there may have been three victims instead of two. I felt the same way. I mean, her guilt and her pain was so raw. While she worked to process the unimaginable, to get up each

day and go on without her child and her friend, Jan wanted answers. Answers that just weren't coming. And that just added, I'm sure, to her pain. But sitting and waiting wasn't something that Jan was willing to do. At Robin's funeral, Jan made a promise. One that she intended to keep, no matter how long it took. It is the mantra that you heard at the very top of this episode. I promise you I will never ever stop for as long as I'm alive and I will find out who hurt you and I promise you they will pay. They will pay for what they did to you.

As days became weeks and weeks became months and then years, Jan Cornell did not sit around waiting for those answers. The push and pull of an active homicide investigation and a mother desperate for information made for a rocky relationship between Jan and law enforcement in the initial years after the crime. I called every day and they wouldn't return my calls. I would just show up there. Sometimes they'd see me, sometimes they wouldn't. I'd say, I'll sit here till you will. I don't care.

And I mean, this is the way it kind of was from the very beginning. We've talked about scenarios like this before. Police need to keep information and potential leads close to the vest. They didn't know the who in this case at all. And that unfortunately meant that even Robin and Lisa's own families had to be kept somewhat in the dark. They would tell me I had no right to know that information. I started going to the library because we did not have computers. And I would go to the library and I would read everything there was about murders and rights that people have.

Robin and Lisa's families had lost their daughters. They needed answers to help them move on. Some of those answers came up not from the police, but from the news. For example, Lisa Story's fiance was shocked to find out on a local broadcast that she had been suffocated, and her mother said that's how she learned that her daughter had been sexually assaulted. If this actually was a leak by someone on the law enforcement side or someone who had access to information, then let me tell you how I feel. I'm a bit taken aback by this. There is not a single news story that is important enough to lose the upper hand. And as someone who has had a career in both journalism and as a member of law enforcement, I am completely puzzled. Needless to say, there was lots of frustration and tension between the family and local investigators.

We really didn't have the best relationship. They just wanted me to go away. And I told them, you find out who killed my daughter and my friend, and none of you ever have to see me again in your life. In addition to pressuring the police for answers, Jan also kept an eye out for leads and clues herself. And sure enough, she found one. One day when she'd finally been allowed to go back into her condo, she saw something that she hadn't noticed before, a ripped up picture close to where she'd found Robin's body. It painted another chilling image of this twisted killer. Well, that picture was taken from Robin's book bag. She was returning it to school. The school

did these pictures called personality pictures, and you like to wear your favorite outfit, and you get your picture taken. And she didn't like the pictures, so I had to sign a form, put the proofs back in there, and send them back, and then they scheduled her a retake. But that picture was tore up. It was taken out of her book bag, and it was tore up. I went to a pay phone and called the police and said, you need to come and get this.

Whoever did this, their fingerprints are all over it. They did. They took it into evidence. The first question would be, there's probably a reason why this wasn't collected at the crime scene, or potentially it should have been collected at the crime scene. But, you know, as it turns out, nothing did come from the photograph. And I think you made a good point right there, Scott. First of all, nothing did eventually come of this, but like, of course it should have been collected. It does go to the humanness of this. Things get missed. You know, hopefully it was documented and photographed, but certainly as a prosecutor, I'd like to have this as another sign of the sadistic nature of

this person. They purposely took out a photograph of a child in a backpack and just left it there for someone to find. What a rollercoaster ride, even in the evidence sense, thinking that a clue may have been missed or could be the turning point that they hope can find the answers that they were looking for, but only to find great disappointment. In another instance, Jan found a ring of keys that she knew didn't belong to anyone in the house, and police guessed they were the killers, but ultimately it did not lead to anything. It does also speak to the kind of mindset that Jan was in. Nothing was too small for her to look into. Anything that was overlooked she knew just might be a potential clue.

It's obviously important to go back over evidence and look for things that may have been missed. But a case can become idle. So Jan wanted to create more awareness and reach for both Robin and Lisa. That involved an entity that up to this point, she'd been too nervous to turn to. I had not yet talked to any news media because the police were saying, you know, the news media is going to ruin this. We'll never find out who killed them. And so I had such a fear of speaking to them. And then one day, this really nice reporter contacted me at my office and said, I know you haven't done any interviews, but I am a reporter for the Fort Myers News Press. If you can find a way to talk to me, we'll talk about what you want.

She ended up being the first media person that I spoke to. The two actually ended up becoming friends. And encouraged by this interaction, Jan began to extend her media reach. She contacted television networks, asking them to cover this case. Maybe this killer had left the state and someone watching in another location would make the connection. And of course, I was writing to everybody in the country that had TV shows. I actually appeared on the Sally Jesse Raphael show. But nothing happened. No new leads were generated. No new clues came to light.

There was some amount of risk that Jan took in going public with this case and putting her face on national television. While she was eager to get word out about Lisa and Robin, she was also cautious because she was worried that the killer would be watching her. It was constant fear. I read everything the internet has to offer about these sick people that commit these crimes and then they'll come back and do an anniversary. And I kept thinking every May 9th, every May 10th, did he find out who Jeannie is? Is he going to find her? What an incredible cycle of emotion. On one hand,

fearing that you're putting yourself out there is putting yourself in danger. On the other hand, fearing that if you don't get out there and scream from the rafters that your daughter and your friend's murders remain unsolved, nothing will happen. Because of this, she refused to give anyone what was by then her new last name or Jeannie's in case it would put her older daughter in harm's way. I never used my marriage last name. I always referenced Cornell because I didn't want the murderer to ever know. The case progressed slowly over the next few years with small developments here and there. In 2001, police released a profile of the killer that was developed by the FBI

and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, also known as FDLE. In it, they detailed what the DNA had provided so far, like the blood type of the attacker and his race. They also pointed out potential characteristics. They believed there'd be a clear lack of guilt and remorse within his personality and a tendency to depend on others financially. So the profile suggested characteristics that might be associated with the killer, but in no way was it a definitive list. And, you know, Anna Segal, we've talked about the behavioral analysis unit the FBI has as they begin to develop a potential profile. You know, it's very helpful, but it's not a perfect science. While the profile didn't get investigators any of those fresh tips,

it did help make sure that the case never went at least officially cold. Authorities continued to pursue leads as the years went by. For example, two different serial killers were investigated in the early 2000s because of their connections to Florida, but both were ruled out by DNA. Neither had the right blood type. Every lead seemed to eventually turn into another dead end. Even so, Jan kept prodding and police, for the most part, kept quiet. And I felt that I had a right to know things.

I was her mom. At some point, Jan decided to go beyond the local police divisions. If the Cape Coral Precinct couldn't help her, maybe the governor of Florida would. I made, I don't know, maybe 30 calls. I called every day. And finally, my last message to the governor's office, I said, well, if I don't hear from the governor by the end of work on Thursday, I'm leaving Cape

Coral on Friday. And I am stopping at every news media outlet between here and Tallahassee. And anybody that wants to join me for this story will be there with me for him to answer these questions. And by the end of that day, I got a phone call. It was a validating moment, and Jan actually felt like she was being heard because the governor expressed interest in helping. The very next day,

he sent the commissioner of law enforcement and the director of the FDLE to speak to Jan. It seemed like they were listening to me now. As time went by, there was also some turnover in the local police department that renewed her faith in law enforcement even further. I did get a new detective. His name is Charlie Garrett. To this day, I said, I know they brought you in as the good cop. I know you've heard that I'm just crazy. I said to him, I'm her mom. I have the right to know everything. I said, do you think I'm going to tell one person that is going to keep them from finding out and prosecuting whoever did this to them?

I would never do that. I made my baby a promise and I am going to do everything in my power to at least get justice on the books for them. And I'm never going to stop. According to Jan, he let her engage in the case in a way that the former investigators hadn't.

He told her things that he thought she had the right to know that would not hamper the investigation and continue to hold back other things that he couldn't share. Charlie knew that I would do anything. I don't care if you want to ask me about that day again. I don't care if you want to ask me about this person I mentioned in the discovery. Call me. I don't care if it's to ask me about that day again. I don't care if you want to ask me about this person I mentioned in the discovery. Call me. I don't care if it's four o'clock in the morning. I don't care. We'll talk. Eventually, though, Charlie Garrett retired.

But one of the last things he did before leaving his post was in service to Robin and Lisa. The very last thing Charlie Garrett did before he retired was he flew to Philadelphia and he presented this case to the VDOC Society The VDOC Society is a pro bono investigative group It's made up by volunteer law enforcement, criminal profilers, forensic experts, you name it Their goal is to provide fresh eyes on difficult-to-solve cold cases They're very highly regarded but also particular about what cases they engage with. On their website, they state that they will only consult on cases where their assistance has been requested by, quote, police agencies with investigative jurisdiction.

Which is why it took Charlie Garrett traveling to Philadelphia and presenting this case for them to come on board. They actually did his case, gave numerous suggestions to the Cape Cod Police Department, had numerous questions. Did you do this? Did you do that? You know, but when you get a room full of brilliant minds that do this, they think of everything like, did you check the contents of the drain? Because at one point they thought that the murderer may have showered there. And no, they did not. They did do a lot of the VDOC's recommendations, but they were not able to really help. The renewed interest that VDOC provided was energizing, but ultimately, it didn't move the case forward in any meaningful way.

Still, it wasn't the end of the line for Jan. And after Charlie left, a new investigator was assigned to the case, one that Jan developed a rapport with, too. After Charlie, I got Christy, and we developed a very good relationship. And if they got a tip, she'd bring me in, we'd talk for hours. Because all the times they used to throw these names at me at work, or they'd get a DNA from somebody, I said, every time I get a random call, I think you're going to tell me they got them. Well, she had said to me years before, she said,

I'm never going to call you on the phone. I'm going to show up at your door. Years passed during which Jan visited Robin's grave often and continued to be vocal about getting justice for the murders. I knew if you let go of hope, regardless of what the circumstance is, that leaves you hopeless. And I was not going to be hopeless. So Jan remained determined, even as decades went by. So let's fast forward to 2016, 26 years after Lisa and Robin had been killed. It was around 9 a.m. one morning.

Jan was at home. The doorbell rang. Her husband went to answer it. When he opened the door and I heard him say, Christy, I knew they caught him. And from the minute I heard him say her name, I jumped out of bed with my bedhead, my pajamas. I ran into the living room. It was Christy. She looked at me and she said, we got him. This story is far from over. See you next time for part two. On the next Anatomy of Murder.

It was an old case, not a cold case. When STR comes about in 2000, this DNA gets sent out for new testing, much better profiles come out. And then of course you get the CODIS database coming out in the early 2000s. And I remember feeling chills as I still do to this moment all over my body when I realized that a case that I had known about since I moved here, and it was the talk of the town back then in 1990, had finally been solved. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. I said, who is he? We all agree that he should be arrested and that we are ready to indict him for two counts of first degree murder. He was a difficult defendant.

The whole three hours I was on that witness stand, I kept saying in my head to the girls, I said, okay, buddies, this is my last time I get to be your voice. Tune in next week for another new episode of Anatomy of Murder. Anatomy of Murder is an AudioChuck original produced and created by Weinberger Media and Frasetti Media. Ashley Flowers is the executive producer. So, what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?