Cold Case Files - REOPENED: DNA SPEAKS: A Fatal Path

Episode Date: September 3, 2026

When 14-year-old Nacole Smith is brutally murdered in 1995 on a wooded path in Atlanta, the police and community rally around her mother as she seeks justice. Decades and a second brutal assault later investigators finally reveal Nacole's killer.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This program contains disturbing accounts of violence and sexual assault. Listener discretion is advised. There are over 100,000 cold cases in America. Only 1% are ever solved. This is one of those rare stories. It's June 7, 1995. Aquanella Smith lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her three daughters. We lived in Landrum Arms Apartments.

It's off of Camelton Road. It wasn't a very safe neighborhood. but I was a single parent. I was always told, it ain't where you live, is how you live. I have three kids, including Nicole. I have an older daughter,

Nikita, a younger son, Aubrey. My whole life was my kids. I lived for them. Nicole tutored the kids in the neighborhood. She loved taking care of kids. Nicole, she wanted to be a pediatrician. She was graduating from middle school, going into high school.

This is Cassandra Bolding, Nicole Smith's best friend. Nicole wanted to be a magerette, and the magerette are the twirlers. Friday nightlights, so everyone would get together, and the majeurettes would be out front and center. Her sister was on the major red team, so Nakeda comes home, she says, she don't have the rhythm. She'll never make it. So Nicole, when she was reaching for something, she went forward. She made the major red team.

Nicole and I were eighth grade student, and it was the last week of school, so very much looking forward to high school life. That morning, I told her, Nicole, do not put your hair in a ponytail, because she had lots of hair, and all she wanted to do was just brush you back and put her in a ponytail. She looked at me, she said, Ma, you're so crazy, but I love you.

And Nicole and Nikita, they got dressed, and they left out. left out. 14-year-old Nicole and her 16-year-old sister Nikita head to school. About 920, I heard these gunshots. My head began to hurt. I couldn't understand why. It just wouldn't stop hurting. Dispatch sends Officer Reginald Boone to investigate. I received the call of a person who was down in the woods that needed medical attention. I thought it was somebody who probably gotten drunk and had a few too many. in, was laying out in the woods. As I approached the scene, I noticed a backpack. I saw clothing in the body of a young girl. She was partially clothed. I could see a wound in the back of her head,

and I knew she was gone. Former Atlanta Police Department detective Vince Velasquez takes up the case. So homicide detectives arrive, and they see a very young teenage girl. She's laying on her back. This young girl, two times to the face. These wounds are close contact. They know right away this was an execution and the way she's positioned. It has all the appearances of a sexual assault. What kind of person does that?

Who puts a gun to a child's face and just executes her? The detectives knew they were dealing with a monster. Investigators found two nine-millimeter shell case and they found a projectile close to where this young girl was found. They can clearly see a pattern on the bottom of a victim's shoes. But what was more interesting is intermixed with those impressions that they felt belonged to this young girl

were other shoe impressions. What they were able to determine was these other shoe impressions were from a brand of sneaker called K-Swiss. In 1995, it was a very popular sneaker worn by a lot of young people. Detectives then take a closer look at the red backpack found near the body. Investigators actually find her school ID. They have an address. She literally lives just 50 yards away from when she was killed. She's 14 years old.

Her name is Nicole Smith. Two officers knocked on my door. They asked me, did I have a daughter by the name of Nicole Smith? And I was like, yes. And they said, we found a body in the woods. And he said, we need a picture of Nicole. And I stood there for a second. second, and I went back to my bedroom, locked myself in the bathroom, and I started praying, God, please not let it be Nicole. I got myself together, went back up front with the officers. We called the school. They said that she wasn't there. And I just was not willing to accept that it was Nicole. So I lied in that bed in the fetal position. I remember being in class, and I remember

there being a lot of conversation about something has happened. in the neighborhood. And one of the assistant principals came to the class. And when she looked over at me, it's like my heart just sank. It wasn't until we made it to Nicole's house. And I saw people there, police officers. I just kind of knew I do remember going home after that. And just being in my room, in the bed, and just like a zombie.

I could not fully process that this was what has happened. It was so unbearable for me. The neighbors told me. They heard her screaming, saying, please don't hurt me. People heard her begging for her life, and nobody went to her rescue.

Nobody. Investigators interview Aquanelia, looking for the timeline of the hours leading up to Nicole's murder. That morning, Nikita and Nicole, they both asked me, could they walk with their friends that morning. I hesitated, and what I said to her was

only if you don't go through the path. That wooded area abuts to two apartment complexes. It's a path that's just worn out by people cutting through the woods. A lot of the kids just made that little path so they could go to school. For me to say to them, do not go through the path, usually Nicole would listen to me, so I felt it would be safe for Nicole to walk.

to school with Nikita. Nicole's sister Nikita tells police everything she and Nicole did that morning. Nicole Smith left home with her sister Nikita to go to school. They met up with another friend. They decided to go into the convenience store to get some snacks or some drinks

before they continue on their way to school. Nicole realized she forgot her homework. So she tells her sister and friends, you go ahead, head to school. I'm going to go back home. I'm going to grab my homework and then make it back to the bus stop. Nikita was watching her go over the hill,

and she said Nicole waved the whole time, telling her by, and she was waving back at her until she couldn't see her anymore. Nicole takes a shortcut, the path through the woods. It's the last time she's seen alive. Near the end of her interview with detectives, Nikita tells police something that grabs their attention. Nikita remembered someone at this convenience store

being in line, who she described as a black male around 20 years old-ish, light skin, and she said he was wearing white K-Swiss tennis shoes. So right away, detectives are thinking, this person that's in line at this convenience store more than likely is the killer. We know our killer is wearing K-Swiss tennis shoes, and now we have a witness, Nikita, who basically says, she saw somebody in the store wearing the same type of tennis shoes.

It all made sense. I feel that that person saw Nicole leave the store, followed her into the woods, and did what he did. Police soon have a second witness. A landscaper working in the area says he too saw the man in the K-Swiss sneakers. I asked the landscaper what he had seen, and he said that he heard screams and he heard shots. And then he saw a light-skinned black male run down the trail, Karen. a gun. This is a critical witness.

He actually sees the suspect almost exactly as Nikita described the guy in the store. 510, light skin, khaki pants, white tennis shoes. He's running out of the woods, holding the weapon wrapped in his bloody t-shirt, and then disappears. Police scour the neighborhood searching for the suspect. For hours that entire day, you had upwards of 100 people literally fanning out from the Nicole's crime scene and just knocking on every single door they could find. And it came up with nothing.

As police continue to hunt for the mystery man, the medical examiner performs an autopsy on Nicole's remains. The Fulton County Medical Examiner conducted Nicole's autopsy. They had a rape kit performed. They recovered semen from the sexual assault. Investigators send the rape kit off for DNA analysis, hoping that it will produce a DNA profile that will help find the killer. Many at the Deerfield apartments, they picketed in anger saying crime is out of control, while police brought in a small army to search for clues on the path in the woods,

even in garbage dumps. Nicole's murder makes news in Atlanta. Nicole Smith was 14 years old. Her life ended just before 9.30 this morning when neighbors heard shouting, then two gunshots. Once this got out, Nicole became Atlanta's daughter. Everybody felt that we failed to protect his. young girl. Most people had kids. They wanted to commit it to be safe. And when that happened to Nicole, it hurt a lot of people. Everyone at school was really terrified. Even people who did not know Nicole

definitely wanted this to be solved and quickly. Three days after the murder, as the investigation continues, 14-year-old Nicole Smith is laid to rest. My church, Saxon Memorial, it holds about 3,000 people. People had to stand in the lobby to hit a service. So many people came out to support again, those who knew Nicole, those who just heard of the story and wanted to come out and be supportive.

The mayor spoke my girlfriend, Jackie Davis. She spoke and she read the poem that Nicole had written about me, her beautiful black queen, which was me. And the way her funeral was, she would thought it was the first lady of the president service. She was well loved. Six months after Nicole's murder, fall turns to winter and police have yet to name a suspect. They focus on ballistics and the shell casings found at the scene.

Detectives tested every single 9mm in APD's inventory. They test fired them just in case one of those guns was found and maybe just the name connected to it. They compared them to shell cases that were recovered at other scenes where people were shot or murdered. The ballistics lead nowhere, and detectives hit another dead end with the DNA. The rape kit does produce a full DNA profile, but when investigators upload it to the national database, CODIS, they draw a blank. They put Nicole's sample in CODIS and got nothing. The suspect in this case had not committed a crime worthy enough of getting his DNA taken and placed into CODIS. Almost seven months after Nicole's murder, just as the case stalls, investigators develop a new witness based on a tip from Nicole's mother.

Detectives identify another witness that saw the man running from the woods. From this witness, they created a computer-generated composite of a suspect just from the chin up. They were dropping these flyers on people's doorsteps, stopping people on the street and conducting canvases. and passing these flyers out. While police investigate, Aquanella leads her own search with the help of family and friends, getting the suspect's sketch out to the public.

I would make flyers, make phone calls. The community was helping a lot. They supported me with that. Someone would go with me knocking on doors. They would go look for guys, you know, the description they had. They found this one particular guy

that lived next door to the wooded area. and they called him in the complex, and they began to beat the guy because they thought he was the one that killed Nicole. The Atlanta police are called out because there's a guy that literally is in a fist fight with Nicole's family because they felt he so closely resembled

this composite sketch that he had to be the person that killed Nicole Smith. When police arrived, they literally roll up on scene and they have to separate Nicole's family from this guy, Jamar Hendricks. They see this guy that looks like this composite sketch and lives nearby where Nicole was killed. So detectives dug in on who Jamar Hendricks was.

Detectives learned Jamar Hendrix worked at a local cemetery. Several witnesses testified to his whereabouts that morning. He was at work. He was not Nicole's killer. For months, the sketched. circulates around Atlanta. I was expecting that case to be solved within the first week, but it didn't happen. Less than a year after the murder, on March 26, 1996, Nicole Smith's case file is as cold as a Georgia winter freeze.

I had been fighting so hard. It was just so hard to give up. I just honestly want pain to go away, and it doesn't. The investigation is at a standstill, but Nicole's mother keeps the case. in the public eye. It's always kept the media in to deal with her story. I was fighting for information, fighting to get this person off the street.

You know, that's all I had to give her. I couldn't save her life. What happened to Nicole will haunt the community. Every time you went someplace, people were talking about it. Kind of made me feel badness happened on my watch. And I felt that I should be to find out who did it. I am still looking for that miracle for her to walk through the door.

It's so unbearable for me. Someone you brought into this world, you never thought you'd be here to see them leave the world. That's a mother's job to protect her kids. And I couldn't protect her that morning. Every day is a reminder. I just didn't want to live anymore. August 14, 2002.

seven years after Nicole's murder. I get a call from Don Scully. The district attorney's office received a letter from an inmate in Calhoun State Prison. And in this letter, this inmate is given information that he is incarcerated with someone that he feels may have killed Nicole Smith. Don Scully and I drive 180 miles one way to Calhoun State Prison. We meet with an inmate named Bernard Carr. who goes on to explain,

an inmate sitting right next to him in a day room named Rhodes blurt's out. I killed a little girl back in the day in the 90s in the woods. So Bernard Cardin wanted us to talk to Rhodes. So Rhodes says I was in a shootout with another guy and the little girl was caught in the crossfire. Though there wasn't a shootout at the time of Nicole's murder, investigators stay focused on Rhodes.

This is the first thing we've seen in this case since this thing went cold in 96. It's 2002. DNA science has advanced. So there's one quick way to figure out whether Rhodes is involved in this case. Let's check Cotis. It was two days later when we get notified it's not a match. There's absolutely no way he could be the killer of Nicole. Nine years after Nicole's murder, in 2004, Fulton County forms a

cold case unit, which Detective Velasquez immediately joins. The only case I took with me was Nicole's case. What better place to introduce a case to a team of seasoned homicide detectives? We must have had over 100 years of experience collectively in that room. We knew that Nicole's DNA profile was already in Kodas. We were tasked with finding old rape kits and reworking them to modern DNA standards so we can uplift them into Kodas and then hopefully get a match. It's August 26, 2004, and I remember coming to work that day.

And Sheila Ross was already in her office. When she saw me come in, she literally ran out of her office and said, you are not going to believe this. We just got a hit on the Nicole Smith case through DNA. That means Nicole's rapist and killer has struck again exactly nine years and 13 days after he killed Nicole. Welcome to Pluto foe. If you know the name of the movie you'd like to see, just stream it for free on Pluto TV, where all your blockbuster favorites are landing all summer long.

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And so much more. For showtimes, press nothing. They're free 24-7. That is so fetch. On Pluto TV. Stream now, pay never. It's June 20th, 2004, and East, Point, Georgia, nine years after Nicole Smith's murder, 13-year-old Betty Brown plans to spend the day with

friends. I headed over to my friend's house. We end up going to her family's function. It was like a barbecue, like a cookout at a park. When the cookout ends, Betty heads back home. As I'm walking, this gentleman, he approaches me. He just comes out of nowhere. And he starts talking.

Why are you out here so late? Where are you going? It was just a bad vibe. So we started coming up on the little empty area, like it's just all grass and wood. And he just grabbed me. And he pulled me into the wooded area. He immediately threw me on the ground

and we were hustling. And so he raped me. He says, don't say anything. I'll kill you. So in my mind, I'm like, oh my God, this is it. I don't know if I'm going to make it. But then something came over me, and I just was like, if we make it out of this,

we got to remember what he looks like. Eventually, he got up, and I started running in the direction towards my house. One of my mom's friends, she saw me running and crying. They drove me to my house. And when I got there, I had me broke down and told my mom what happened. Betty's mom calls 911.

Police, including Deputy Chief Russell Popham, immediately searched for suspects. We did go door to door in the area where the rape occurred as well as where Betty was at the Father's Day party. The canvas in the neighborhoods did not turn up anything. Police submit Betty's rape kit to Kodas to see if there's a DNA match.

Two months later, the results come back. I got a call. There was a CODIS match with the rape of Betty Brown that occurred on June 20th, 2004, to the rape and murder of Nicole Smith that occurred on June the 7th, 1995. Of course, you want to know a name, but it's an unknown offender. The police came by and told me that there was a DNA match from Mines to another victim, but that victim had been killed. I didn't know anything about Nicole Smith at the time. I felt like me and Nicole both went through something

that no one would ever understand. So I felt like we would always be connected. When I found about Betty, I was just, I was angry all over again because I thought they had found him. It just had a DNA. I didn't want to hear anything else. I wanted the person. Investigators of Alaskas and Popham analyzed the similarities between Nicole and Betty's cases.

They were both females that were walking alone. Betty was 13 at the time. Nicole was 14 when she was killed from the crime scene or the other crime scene. The distance is about 3.2 miles. My thought was that this was a local person. Although we don't have a name, this is the biggest lead we've had in this case since June 7, 1995. Police need a composite sketch of the perpetrator. So Betty is paired with a forensic artist.

He looked to be between his late 20s, early 30s, brown skin. He had a ball head. He worked a little round wire rim glasses. He had a gap in between his front teeth. I just remembered everything, everything I saw. When you look in that person's eyes and you see a soul. individual, you see evil. The sketch gives investigators new hope.

We have a composite sketch, and this is the first time since I picked this case up, I get to see what likely is Nicole Smith's killer. With a sketch of the suspect in hand, police canvas Betty's neighborhood. And unlike the earlier sketch, this one produces a solid lead. We're actually right in front of where Betty was at the Father's Day, cookout and one of the detectives called me. He said, I've got a guy that looks just like the sketch. I get there and I see a person with a bald head, round glasses, and a predominant gap in their front teeth. He told me his name was Terrence. He told me where he lived.

Terrence lives close to where Betty Brown was raped and where Nicole Smith was murdered. This guy was the only person that I've seen that looked exactly like. the sketch. Instantly, Terence becomes a suspect, and investigators Velasquez and Popham need to get his DNA. We want him to give us a bucle swab. He said no.

With no probable cause to take Terrence's DNA, he's free to go. If you got nothing to hide, you didn't do this crime, why wouldn't you give me a sample of your DNA? My suspicions were through the roof. So we have to do what we call a seraptitious sample. To do that, detectives

begin to surveil their suspect. I sat on his house for days, almost two weeks. If he takes his trash out, we can go through his trash and see what we can find. This guy didn't come out of his house. I didn't take his trash out. We were literally packing up to come up with another plan. I get a call that this guy is coming out of his front door. White T-shirt with some riding on the front heading toward you right now.

He should be coming in a clear view right when he gets to the intersection. When he takes a step out of his house and starts to walk, I see him light a cigarette. And I am like, this is it. That's our sample. You see him smoking? He's going to throw that out any second. I literally had a handheld camera, and finally Terrence flicks the butt. There he is, right?

And I'm zooming on you right there. You're looking at the cigarette butt, Woody? It's burning. Doesn't get any better than that. Detective send that cigarette with Terrence's saliva and DNA to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for. protesting. Then the waiting begins. I was prepared to call Nicole's mother.

Russell Popham was prepared to call Betty Brown and to say we got them. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation calls the investigators with the news. I looked at my phone and I realized that it was a GBI number calling. I'm like, oh, this is it. So I answered the phone and got the sad news that there was no way that the DNA compared to the crime scenes of Nicole Smith or Betty Brown. I am absolutely floored. Terrence is not our guy.

It's now December 2005, 10 and a half years after Nicole's murder. The billboard that we put up in December of 2005 was close to the crime scenes, really about a quarter mile from where Nicole was killed. We wanted to make sure that everybody in that neighborhood saw this composite sketch. We had now a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of this person.

The reward helps attract national attention. And in 2006, Cold Case Files, which was looking to focus on an unsolved murder, picks up Nicole's case. We were approached to see if we would be willing to actually have them air the Nicole Smith homicide, Betty Brown rape case, on an episode of Cold Case files. And we felt we got to do this. One of the things that they wanted to do was actually show us working, you know,

working the case as tips came in. This is the absent tardy list for Thoreau High School on the day Nicole Smith was killed. While we're filming the original cold case file episode, we get a tip on a guy named Stephen Burris. Right now he's wanted by Douglas County for probation violation. As we look into this tip in the sky,

He's got similarities to the composite. He's got glasses on in the photograph. Gold glasses. He's familiar through association of the area, both where Betty Brown was raped and when Nicole Smith was killed. And he had an active parole warrant outstanding, so we're going to lock him up. That gives us an opportunity to vet him

and figure out how he plays into this. What we're doing is this, so we're asking everybody, asking everybody that was either on that list that was absent, it's a submittal swab, right? So what that means is it's a cue tip we put in your mouth, ruby side, right? What's that for them? Okay, we're gonna compare it to evidence found at the crime scene.

Okay, basically what that means is this, if you have absolutely nothing to do with the murder of the Coastman, right? I'm worried about that. I didn't kill no back. Listen to what I'm saying. Or the rape of another young girl in East Point. The Cold Case Files crew and the investigators watch a Stephen Burris submits a DNA sample.

We submitted to the state crime lab. Like so many times before, it's not a match. In 2010, six years after it started, the multi-agency cold case unit disbands. But a new detective, Scott Demester, offers one last way to try to find Nicole's killer. I remember when we read the news article about how they solved the goal

Golden State Killer case out in Northern California. The first case that we thought of that we could potentially try to do something like that was Nicole Smith's case. One of the most heinous, unsolved murders in the Save Atlantis history. It's now April 2018, 22 years and 10 months after Nicole Smith's murder. Myself and a couple of my coworkers were sitting at her desks reading the article about how the Golden State Killer case had been solved through genealogy. Maybe we can try this.

We immediately started contacting those investigative agencies out in California, and they directed us to the genealogy services that were used. Investigators take the suspect's DNA, compile, and upload it to genealogy databases, hoping to find relatives. And finally, in October 2021, 26 years and four months after Nicole's murder, there's a promising lead. We were directed to a potential match on the trees to the Arnold family. This is the first lead connecting someone to southwest Atlanta.

According to his genealogist, he's able to zero in on a relative by the name of Kelvin Arnold. He appeared to have been living in the area when when Nicole was killed and when Betty was attacked. He looked very, very close in resemblance to the sketch. Kelvin Arnold has also been arrested numerous times and was once charged with felony aggravated assault. In 2002, between the time that Nicole was killed and when Betty was attacked, at the time, girlfriend had accused him of a sexual assault. Detective Scott Demeaster needs Kelvin Arnold's DNA

to compare to the known suspects' DNA. I was able to find a piece of evidence that had his DNA on it, and then they compared it to our known offender's DNA, and it was a match. Kelvin Arnold is a 100% match to the rape of Betty Brown and the rape and murder of Nicole Smith. This was a moment that culminated in, like, every resource you've ever put into this case.

We know who we're looking for now. we know who he is. Police move in to arrest Arnold, but discover they're too late. Calvin Arnold died at the age of 49. Of liver and kidney failure, apparently for alcoholism, he's dead. Calvin Arnold's dead. We got him, but we don't got him. I told Ms. Smith as soon as possible.

He says, I'm going to tell you the good news first. We have him. We caught Nicole's killer. And when he said the bad news, I knew he was dead. And he said, his name is Kevin Arnold. I just screamed. And I cried. Here's this man that's gotten away with murder.

We felt cheated. She's never going to be able to lay eyes on the man who took her daughter. Betty Brown will never have the day to look at her attacker in the eye. We didn't get that moment to go. to confront him to almost make him suffer the way I suffered. In January of 2022, Atlanta police give the city one last update on Nicole and Betty's cases. We have Nicole Smith's family who is here with us today, who has been incredibly resilient in solving what's been a 26-year mystery to this point.

No one at the press conference even utters the name of Calvin Arnold. We don't want to give any relevance to him as an individual. This is all about the family and just their incredible resilience. Today for me, as a bittersweet moment, I never imagined this person to be deceased. So many unanswered questions that I had for him. I'm happy that I'm finally here, that he's no longer out there able to do the things to me and Nicole to others. It's like my fight is over.

I'm really glad because I have granddores and when we thought he was still out there, I didn't feel safe for them. He was a monster and he won't hurt anybody else. Nicole will never be forgotten. So many people still love her and miss her. She cared about people. She loved unconditional. That made her special. She was my special girl.

She'll always be special. Welcome to Pluto Fo. If you know the name of the movie you'd like to see, just stream it for free on Pluto TV. Where all your blockbuster favorites are landing all summer long. Catch Anchorman, the legend of Ron Burgundy. Fantastic. The Matrix Trilogy.

Welcome to the real world. Mean girls. Shut up. Titanic. I'm the king of the world. And so much. More. For showtimes, press nothing. They're free 24-7. That is so fetch.

On Pluto TV, stream now, pay never.