Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Hunt for Maryland Mom Rachel Morin's Killer Heats Up as Cops Release Sketch of Suspect

Starting point is 00:00:00 Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this law and crimes series ad free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Have you seen someone who looks like this man possibly wearing a hat? Investigators in Maryland say a man who looks just like this murdered Rachel Morin, a mother of five and a beloved daughter and sister. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy. It's Tuesday and this is Crime Fix. The sketch of the man in the Air Jordan hat is the newest clue a little more than six months after Rachel Morin was attacked and murdered on the Ma and Pa Trail

Starting point is 00:00:36 in Bel Air, Maryland. The crime has rocked the small community where people once felt safe. The Hartford County Sheriff's Office just released these sketches of the man who murdered Rachel Morin. The search for her killer is a nationwide manhunt. Detectives don't know his name, but they have his DNA. Last year, we told you the sheriff said the man who murdered Morin in August was also involved in an assault in Los Angeles months earlier in March. Home security video from a house in L.A. recorded the man leaving shirtless, but it only caught a side profile of him. Now you're going to hear from the sheriff of Hartford County, Maryland,

Starting point is 00:01:15 on why he believes these sketches look just like the man who murdered Rachel Morin. Stay tuned for more on that and why that Air Jordan hat he is wearing is so important to the investigation. The sheriff's office has interviewed more than 100 people. Detectives have scoured the area for clues and surveillance video, and they've pleaded with the public for help. They've traveled to several states, and now they've even produced a new podcast, all in the hope of reaching people who can help solve Rachel Morin's murder. Joining me to discuss the very latest on the investigation into Rachel Morin's murder is Sheriff Jeff Gaylor of Harford County. Sheriff Gaylor, bring us up to speed. What's the very

Starting point is 00:01:56 latest since you've released these two sketches of the suspect? Obviously, the big news this week is that yesterday we released a composite. That's been a question since early on in the investigation. We had the video of the suspect leaving a crime scene in Los Angeles in March of were some ring doorbell camera, which gave us a short video and a side more more of a side picture in the back of the suspect. So working off of that and talking to witnesses and witnesses here in our county who saw an individual that they thought suspicious on the trail in the days and hours ahead of Rachel's homicide. We finally have a composite that we have a much higher level of confidence in. It's been shown to both the people here and the people in Los Angeles, and they feel that it's a good representation, an accurate representation

Starting point is 00:02:57 of our suspect in this case. So when you say it's been shown to people there in Maryland, in the Beller, Maryland area, Hartford County, and I'm assuming the person in Los Angeles, the house that this person was leaving, because that's where you got some of the DNA from, or, you know, the DNA matched, the DNA left on Rachel Morin matched DNA from that incident in Los Angeles. So somebody from that incident was able to say, yeah, that looks like him. Correct. And they were actually, and again, that case is still an active investigation being investigated by the Los Angeles Police Department. So we're limited on what we can say about that. But what I can say is there were multiple people in that home and everyone has been spoken to by our investigators and shown that picture.

Starting point is 00:03:48 I don't know that everybody's been shown that picture, but multiple people have been shown that picture from California. And again, the information that our investigators are getting back is they feel it is a good representation of what the suspect looks like. And obviously the baseball hat is a unique, it's a Michael Jordan, Air Jordan red baseball hat with a flat brim and the new sticker still on it the way some people like to wear it. That hat is what was recovered out there and what the DNA was pulled off of. So that is a big deal. The Air Jordan hat that you see in that composite sketch was actually recovered from the house in Los Angeles where the suspect was seen leaving on camera in March of last year, months before Rachel Morin was murdered. And that's where they got the

Starting point is 00:04:37 DNA for the suspect. That DNA is what linked the two crimes. Now that hat could be a key clue. One of the items collected by the Los Angeles Police Department was this hat. And we have reason to believe for witnesses who believe they saw our suspect here that he had a hat on. So it's not the same hat, but it could be a identical hat or something similar, but probably wears it in a similar style, flat brimmed with, again, in this case, it was an Air Jordan. And like many people in society do today, they like to leave the tags on it that come from the manufacturer. So just one more bit of information that we hope clicks in someone's mind and they say, you know, I might have an idea who this is. And that generates the tips that our investigators need to put the name of that DNA sample into that video and composite.

Starting point is 00:05:30 It'd be interesting if you could take maybe a serial number or something like that off of that hat and trace the sale. You know, with computers in this day and age, it's amazing what they can do in tracing sales. I will say, and we're not going into, you know, we're being careful not to release any investigative information that the investigators or the prosecutor wants us to stay away from. But I will just say, through this investigation, I have been amazed at what is possible through scientific and electronic investigative efforts. So our investigators, we've had so many tips through our social media and through the phone line. But I said yesterday in an interview, no one has proposed something that we haven't thought about

Starting point is 00:06:21 and or done to this day. And I say keep those tips coming because the next suggestion might be something we haven't thought about. Is the FBI assisting you at all with this investigation since, you know, it spans multiple jurisdictions? You have a DNA sample that's not in CODIS. And we know that the DNA, we know that the FBI has resources that it can use, including genetic genealogy, which I know you said you're not going into these things. But there are things that the FBI is capable of doing that maybe the Hartford County Sheriff's Office is not. So is the FBI assisting? Yes, certainly our federal partners have technology and resources that aren't available to us, but are available through partnership and a good working relationship. And they have assisted us through this investigation.

Starting point is 00:07:11 I don't know that they are, I would have to go to an investigator to see that they're actively involved at this point. To the best of my knowledge, they are, but I'm not 100% sure. But they certainly have assisted along the way. And I have no doubt that if we called on them to borrow for something, that they would be there assisting us. We've worked with other federal, state and local partners, just, you know, the Los Angeles Police Department. And it's something we shared previously was that our investigators traveled to Chicago. We were at the police department on doing an interview up there of not a suspect, but of a potential witness in the case. So we continue to work with all of our partners, even the private sector, who might help us solve this horrific crime.

Starting point is 00:07:52 This is a horrific crime and it's terrifying. You know, just to me, this is every woman's worst fear. You're attacked while you're out doing whatever, you know, you're out going to the grocery, you're out doing whatever. I know, you're out going to the grocery. You're out doing whatever. I mean, Rachel Morin went out for a run or a walk on a trail and never came home. And she, you know, has five children that she left behind. She has a family who loves her. You've got this incident out in Los Angeles where this guy just kind of walks out of this house.

Starting point is 00:08:25 I mean, God only knows what happened there because LAPD is not saying. So to me, I find this guy to be terrifying. You know, he's obviously very dangerous. And he was able to go from Los Angeles to Maryland, you know, 2,500, 3,000 miles away within a matter of months. So he could be anywhere by now and he could be laying low, but people who do these types of things, you know, sometimes they can stop. Sometimes they don't. Um, if he is somebody who's a rapist and a predator. So how concerned are you guys that he may strike again? Or maybe you will be able to catch him. I don't know. Or maybe he's left the country. I have no idea. And everything you said is spot on and very possible. We don't know whether he is from here

Starting point is 00:09:22 and happened to travel out to Los Angeles when that crime occurred and then has come back and then committed the act here. We don't know whether he's from there and traveled out here or he's just transient and traveled somewhere in between. is that investigators are confident that in the days and probably weeks ahead of time that he was here not just a random passing through for 10 minutes and found this trail and crime of opportunity they do believe based on witness interviews here that he was here for some time uh like i said a week or days ahead of the homicide. And in that time, he had to interact with people. You know, if he's even if he's not here now, in that time, he had to stay somewhere. He had to eat. He had to, you know, probably work somewhere. So we're confident that people here interacted with him and we need them to look at the composite.

Starting point is 00:10:19 We need them to watch that video and provide us with whatever investigative tips that they might have. But you hit it spot on. This is a very safe community. The trail is even safer than the community in general. I mean, nothing even remotely like this. We've had car break-ins for ladies' purses or computers left at the trailheads, but nothing, no sort of violent crime whatsoever up until Rachel's homicide. And again, yes, a lady who did nothing at all to deserve this, a victim of a horrific crime. The victims are her children, her family, her sister, her brother, her mother, who are all left with questions and with this

Starting point is 00:11:03 incredible loss. And although we can never bring Rachel back, what we can do, her mother, who are all left with questions and with this incredible loss. And although we can never bring Rachel back, what we can do, you know, hopefully our investigators pour their heart and have poured and will continue to pour their heart in this case is bring this suspect to the criminal justice system so that he's never able to do such a thing again, because I think he will. Sheriff Gaylor, have you all in your canvassing found any video of this guy around the trail or in the general vicinity? Because you're saying you think he was in the in the area for a while before this happened. I mean, was he staking out the trail, maybe looking for somebody to prey upon? I mean, have you have you been able to maybe piece his movements together at all? Again, I wouldn't I can't I'm not going to get too much into the investigation, but we have done witness interviews to have led investigators to believe that he was in the area

Starting point is 00:11:58 along the trail, you know, more or less canvassing or staking out a location in which to commit this horrible act so that there was some forethought put into it that it wasn't just a crime of opportunity where he and she passed on the trail at the same time. and had a plan. And one of the new tidbits that we did, pieces of information that we did release was that she was attacked on the trail, that she was, the initial confrontation occurred on the hiking trail and that he attacked her there and then moved her, I believe it's about 70 to 100 yards away to a drainage tunnel, which was in some of the news reports earlier, but we failed. We were not willing to confirm it before, but we are confirming that that's where the homicide took place. Sheriff Gaylor, there's a reward in this case, so tell us about that. Sure. In the days after this horrible crime, this terrible case,

Starting point is 00:13:02 the loss of Rachel, we put up a reward in the weeks that followed. Several organizations, the family as well, has worked to increase that. Recently, there was a $5,000 addition to the reward for information leading to that suspect's identity and arrest. And the prosecution is now at $35,000. So we're hoping that, you know, that might motivate someone who, and again, I think someone out there has seen that video or the sketch and has an idea who that is. And they need to share that with us. And hopefully $35,000 is some motivation to do so. shouldn't be needed because this, as we spoke about, this individual will commit one of these horrendous acts again if he's not removed from the ability to do so. And you've had a lot of tips coming in since you released that sketch.

Starting point is 00:13:56 We have, again, in the six months early in the investigation, as it goes with any investigation, the tips were rolling in. They've continued to come in over six months, but they've certainly slowed down a lot. The release of the composite, the additional information, us releasing it through sharing a podcast where we discuss the case, you know, something new to reach new people who don't necessarily read a paper or watch the nightly news, you know, reach a new audience. The tips have really picked up quite a bit. So hopefully in those, our investigators will find the tip that they need. Sheriff Jeff Gaylor, thank you so much for joining us. And we hope that this reward, we hope this sketch leads to the identification of a suspect in this case. We appreciate your time. Absolutely. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:14:41 Anyone with information about Rachel Morin's murder should call 410-836-7788. Or you can email rmtips at harfordshariff.org. That's Crime Fix for this Tuesday, February 13th, 2024. I'm Annette Levy. Thanks so much for being with us. We'll see you back here tomorrow night. Until then, have a great night. You can download Crime Fix on Apple, Spotify, Google, We'll see you back here tomorrow night. Until then, have a great night. Our senior director of social media is Vanessa Vine. Savannah Williamson is one of our producers. Diane Kay and Alyssa Fisher book our guests. And Brad Mabee is our audio editor.

Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Hunt for Maryland Mom Rachel Morin's Killer Heats Up as Cops Release Sketch of Suspect

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