Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Gorgeous young mom found in her own bed, AXE embedded in her forehead: SOLVED

Episode Date: June 10, 2023

Three-year old Sara Krauseneck was home alone for hours. Her money  29-year-old, dead in her bed with an axe lodged in her head.  James Krauseneck, Cathy's husband,  returned from work, walking in on the grisly scene.  Forty years later, the retired business executive arrested for the 1982 murder of his wife. Police say James Krauseneck used the axe to hack his sleeping wife.  Krauseneck convicted in the case, but a surprising turn during his appeal. The case stumped police for nearly four decades. Joining Nancy Grace to discuss the case: Kathleen Murphy: Family attorney Cloyd Steiger: 36 years with Seattle Police Department, 22-year homicide detective & author of "Seattle's Forgotten Serial Killer: Gary Gene Grant" Dr. Bethany Marshall: Psychoanalyst, Beverly Hills Dr. Michelle Dupre: South Carolina Medical Examiner & author of “Homicide Investigation Field Guide” Nancy Monaghan: Reporter for Democrat & Chronicle (retired) & co-author of book on the Krauseneck murder      Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetworSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. It was a blustery, cold winter night near Rochester when Detective Mark Liberatore arrives to his scene. What he sees then, he will never forget. A beautiful young 29-year-old mom, Kathy Krasnick, dead in her bed, an axe lodged in her head. In the last hours, a stunning, stunning turn of events. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thanks for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. When the detective arrived at the scene, husband Jim Krasneck tells cops he arrived home from work and found his wife's body.

His three-and-a-half-year-old little girl, Sarah, was also home and unarmed. Minutes later, husband wanders over to the neighbor's house, traumatized in shock with the baby girl, Sarah, in his arms. The neighbor immediately calls 911 after Jim says, Kathy's dead. That was just the beginning of a scenario that began to unfold that winter night. In the last hours, a suspect has been named.

But let's go back to the beginning. When officers arrived at the neighbor's house, they were ultimately led to the home of James, his wife Kathleen, and their daughter Sarah, who resided at 33 Del Rio Drive. Officers arrived at the house to find Kathleen deceased. She died from a single blow to her head from an axe. Gary Printy was an investigator on the case since day one. Printy says he'll never forget arriving to the scene that day. It was not a pleasant scene. It was the first one that I had ever seen this violent and I hope I never see another one. The police knocked on our door after midnight. First thing they said, there's been a, they didn't call it a murder,

there's been a homicide, and it was Kathy. Wow. You are hearing from our friends at WROC News 8. That was reporter Kayla Green and others. What happened to Kathleen? Kathleen found in her bed with an axe embedded deeply in her forehead. It sounds like the stuff that horror movies are made of. You don't expect that in real life. For this lovely wife and mother to be found with an axe embedded in her forehead it reminds you of the horrible

histories of nursery rhymes like um how does it go dr bethany marshall 40 wax lizzie how does it go dr bethany that's right and the the grim's fairy tales um where children are shoved in ovens and all the horrible fairy tales that we heard growing up. I do not remember the 40-wax. Okay, you know, Dr. Bethany Marshall, as much as I appreciate you and all your many, many, many degrees and papers, I had to go to Jackie Howard in the studio. How does it go, Jackie? Lizzie, what? Lizzie Borden took an axe, gave her mother 45.

Okay, thank you. See, I had to go to her institutional memory of horror. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. My point is, it's almost too awful to take in. With me, an all-star panel. And boy, do I mean it.

Joining me, Cloyd Steiger, 36-year Seattle PD, 22 years homicide, author of Seattle's Forgotten Serial Killer, Gary Jean Grant. You can find him at cloydsteiger.com. Kathleen Murphy. She knows her way around the North Carolina courtroom and beyond.

Renowned psychoanalyst out of L.A., Dr. Bethany Marshall at drbethanymarshall.com, South Carolina medical examiner and author of Homicide Investigation Field Guide. And you may not agree with me, but I got to tell you, that is quite the read, Homicide Investigation Field Guide. Dr. Michelle Dupree, joining me right now, reporter with the Democrat and Chronicle, former co-author of an upcoming book on this very topic at Krausnet.com, Nancy Monaghan. Nancy, before I go to you, I've got to go to Dr. Michelle Dupree. Dr. Michelle, an axe embedded in this woman's forehead, and she couldn't have been more defenseless. She apparently was asleep in bed, Dr. Michelle. What, Dr. Michelle Dupree, does an axe, actually,

one blow with an axe to the skull, I assume, depending on the velocity, would crack the skull and go directly into the brain? Yes, absolutely. What a gruesome thing that must have been. The ax would have obviously fractured the skull and gone deep into the actual surface of the brain, causing obviously extensive damage and death. How much force would it require to actually crack the skull? For instance, I've seen cases where someone had been bludgeoned dead, and the medical examiner would state, for instance, this is the same velocity as you would get from a car crash at 60 mph.

What velocity would it take with an ax, single blow, to crack open the skull, Dr. Michelle Dupree? Well, because the ax is a sharp force instrument, it is going to crack the skull with a little less force than you might expect. However, our skulls are very thick and it would still require an extensive amount of force to do that.

You know, when you say our skulls are very thick, would you explain what you mean by that? Because every time somebody feels a little lump or they have a pimple or a cyst they think they have brain cancer or a tumor but there is a very thick skull between your skin and your brain so how thick is the skull what nancy the skull actually varies in thickness depending on where we are talking about so the location though of though, of this, in this case, is the forehead. And the forehead is one of the thicker parts,

approximately a quarter of an inch to three-quarters of an inch thick in places. And the skull is made of, of course, bone. But what do you compare the density of the skull to? Is it like a board? Is it like cement? What's the density? Well, that's an interesting question. I've never really quite thought about it. That's the first time I've thought about it, doctor.

The density is certainly more like a board rather than a concrete. It is not as hard as concrete would be. And again, because the bone is somewhat porous, it is going to be less dense than that. Guys, we are talking about a beautiful young woman, Kathleen Krasnick, found bludgeoned dead. Well, I don't think bludgeoned is the right word. She was attacked with an axe. One blow to the head. interesting found wiped clean of any fingerprints and a window broken from the outside well there's another issue many times i've been asked how do you tell if a window screen has been sliced from the outside or the inside you may not be able to tell with the naked eye but once you put the

screen under a microscope you can actually see which way the metal in the screen is bent. If it's bent toward the inside of the room, it was slashed from the outside. If it's bent, and you really do have to look under a microscope to see this, outward toward the yard or the outside, then you know it was staged and it was cut from the inside. Let's go to our veteran reporter, Nancy Monaghan, formerly with Democrat and Chronicle, and co-author on a book on her murder. Nancy, thanks so much for being with us. It's a real pleasure to have someone so close to the case to explain a lot of the evidence to us. Tell me about the severity of the attack.

What can you tell me about the attack on Kathleen Krasnick, just 29 years old? It was one axe blow to her left temple. And how far that wound went, I think it was pretty significant. And she was asleep, as most axe murder victims are. It's hard to chase down somebody with an axe, so you wouldn't pick an axe if you had to chase somebody down the street. I do want to mention that the broken window was downstairs. It was the door from the garage to the kitchen that was broken. Hold on, hold on. Let me digest what you just said. So the broken window, on, hold on. Let me digest what you just said. So the broken window,

not in the bedroom. It was downstairs. It was the door between the garage into the kitchen. So it's the door from the garage into the kitchen. I wonder if that garage had one of the doors that you have to have a code to or you have have to have an access, or it may have even been left open. It was open. There was no, yes, it was easy to get access to the garage. The door to the garage was locked. And let me think now, from the garage into the kitchen. So do we know which side the glass was on? Yes, they determined that it had been broken from the outside.

Do you think the person crawled through the door or they just broke the door in order to get to the door handle? Just broke the window to get to the handle. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. crime stories with nancy grace in the last hours a bizarre turn of events in the investigation of the brutal murder of 29 year old mom kathy krausnick dispatch immediately sends first responders to the scene. Brighton Police Lieutenant Bill Flood arrived. He sees Jim Krasnick moaning and crying in shock. Jim Krasnick, a Kodak Company economist, had left for work that morning at the usual time around 6 30 a.m. Stayed gone all day as he normally did. Kathy had planned to stay home and take care of their little girl. Detective Bill Flood stated at the time he could tell little Sarah had been left

alone. It was very obvious to the detective this child had dressed herself and the little girl was very confused about what had happened. She kept saying she had seen a, quote, bad man sleeping in Mommy and Daddy's bed with an axe in his head. When asked if the assailant was black or white, she said he was, quote, many colors, but Detective Bill Flood is convinced little three-year-old Sarah had not seen a man in the bed at all. That it was her own mother in bed covered in blood.

The murder in itself was hard to believe. But then you add the overlay that the three-year-old daughter had been left alone in the house with her murdered mother who would do that joining me kathleen murphy north carolina family attorney cloyd steiger dr bethany marshall dr michelle dupree and nancy monahan i'm very curious cloyd steiger how they could tell she was asleep at the time she was attacked i would guess it was because the way the body was laying and the lack of any defensive wounds or anything like that. You know what's really interesting to me, so many facts and details, Dr. Bethany Marshall,

the ax was wiped clean. Now that is a big red flag to me. Because yes, it's anecdotal, it's based on all the cases I've investigated, tried, or covered. But typically, random attackers do not take time to stage the scene, to clean up the weapon. They leave the weapon in her skull, but they wipe it clean? Or is the weapon still in her skull, Nancy Monaghan? Oh, yes, it was.

Yes, it was. Wow. Okay, so Dr. Bethany Marshall, who would think to wipe clean the murder weapon? Well, this tells me that this was not a crime of opportunity, right? This is not somebody who just broke into the house to ransack and find jewelry or cash. This is not somebody who just wanted to commit a rape homicide. She wasn't sexually violated. So whoever did this knew her.

And I would want to know who had she been in contact with? Did she have any admirers? Was she having an affair? Was she being stalked? Was there a person in the neighborhood who had taken a special interest in her? The fact that somebody embedded an ax in her forehead and then wiped up the evidence means that this is somebody who had tremendous rage towards her. And to me, that speaks of a crime of passion, whether it's a spouse, a stalker, an ex-boyfriend, but somebody who took a very special interest in her and felt that she had maybe jilted them or rejected them in some way. I'm also curious to Nancy Monaghan, former reporter, Democrat and Chronicle. Nancy, was she sex assaulted or had anything been stolen from the home? No, to both. She was not and nothing had been taken.

I can't imagine the shock it would bring on when you come in and find your wife dead with the ax still embedded in her head. Dr. Bethany Marshall, I just keep saying it doesn't even sound real. It sounds like it's from a horror movie. Right. So you imagine her husband comes home around 5 p.m. Right. I imagine he was an executive. I think he had a doctorate. He comes in. He sees his wife with an ax embedded in her skull. I'm wondering, are there any 911 calls? Has anyone spoken to his demeanor when he called the police? Did he seem calm? Did he seem agitated? I mean, I think that type of behavioral evidence would be so important in beginning to

try to solve this crime since in these sorts of crimes, you always look to the spouse first. So I'm wondering, how did he behave after he found his wife with the ax embedded in her skull? Are there any detectives or policemen who were working that particular crime who spoke to that? Well, you're absolutely right. In every homicide investigation, the first place cops and detectives look is at the spouse, the boyfriend, the ex, the ex-spouse, and as you were pointing out, anybody in the neighborhood or at work that had been paying special attention to her. Take a listen to what her sister, Annette Schlosser, tells WHAM 13. James Krausnick told police he'd come home from his Kodak job to find his 29-year-old wife dead with an ax embedded in her skull. The couple's

three-and-a-half-year-old daughter had spent the day alone in the home with her mother's corpse. I remember dropping to my knees in my dorm room. I just couldn't believe it. She was my favorite sister and my best friend. To Nancy Monaghan, former reporter, Democrat, and Chronicle, and who has also co-authored a book on this murder, Nancy questioned, the sister gets the call about the murder, and the three-year-old little girl was in her crib all day with her mother dead? She was not in her crib. She was in the house all day long wandering around. She had been in the bedroom, saw her mother, actually had a little blood on her clothing, but didn't recognize that her as her mother. And she was wandering around the house all day. By the time her husband, Kathy's husband came home, little Sarah was back in her bedroom. And she had tried to dress herself.

She had on two sweaters backwards. You know what? Just that detail is so heartbreaking. To Kathleen Murphy, North Carolina family lawyer, to leave the three-year-old little girl wandering around the house all day long. She goes and finds her mom's body. Nancy Monahan clarified that because she actually had blood, I think she said, on some of the little girl's clothing. So she had made it to her mom and had come to try to dress herself, putting on her sweaters backwards. I mean, that's the kind of thing a child never

forgets, Kathleen Murphy. That child will never forget that experience. And Nancy, with that child wandering around the house for the entire day, I just wonder, what did she see? And at three and a half years old, what has she vocalized at that point to the police officers? Because at that age, she's old enough to tell somebody what she saw and what she interviewed. You know, I have a question to Dr. Bethany Marshall. What can you tell me about the brutality behind 29-year-old Kathleen's axe murder? And what does that tell you about her killer? It tells me that the killer had a relationship with her.

And what I mean by that was maybe in love with her, had a preoccupation with her, was fascinated by her, felt rejected by her. But whoever put this ax in her skull was obsessed with this victim. You don't kill somebody in that kind of an overkill, brutal kind of way unless you have feelings, right? Feelings of rejection, rage, envy, hostility, feeling jilted in some way. And unless those feelings have been brewing for some time. So whoever did this knew her over months or even years, Nancy, because these feelings don't just crop up in five minutes. You don't just break into a house, start looking for cash and jewelry, see a woman and, oh,

I am so enraged, I'm just going to put an ax in her forehead. No, you are going to have a relationship with that person. That's what the brutality tells me. Nancy Monaghan, former reporter with Democrat and Chronicle, who has extensively researched the murder. Tell me about the brutality of Kathleen's murder. I've done a lot of research on axe murders, and they are very personal. They are always filled with rage. And, I mean, it is a statement well beyond any other weapon that somebody someone

can use and all it takes and all it took in this case was that one major blow that cracked her skull open interestingly there was no blood on the wall you know it didn't spatter there was certainly after the you know after the axe went in the blood did run down and there was a lot of blood on her and the bed. And that's what the young girl, Sarah, the daughter saw. Well, we also knew this. There was premeditation because unless they sleep with an axe by their bed, somebody,

as Jackie's pointing out, had to bring that axe upstairs. Not only that, the killer thought to wipe the axe clean. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Libertarian partner Steve Hunt of Brighton PD. They say the first investigators at the scene found no real significant forensic clues like fingerprints or fibers. In 1982, at the time of the murder, DNA was not an investigative tool. But there was something about that scene that really struck them. It looked as if someone had been in the midst of a burglary and stopped.

There was a door leading into the house that had a pane of glass broken. Outside, there was a heavy axe called a maul, M-A-U-L. It was on the ground leaning up against the wall right beside the window. The axe was at the door and the one found lodged in Kathy's head. Both belonged to the Krausnicks. And in the dining room, there were very valuable items scattered everywhere, just strewn. There was a tea set on the floor, but oddly, everything was standing straight up. Did the perp plan to put it in a bag because there was a black garbage bag next to the silver tea set? A faint shoe print was there as if someone had stepped in it to hold the bag open. But the single most important aspect of a burglary was missing. Nothing had been taken.

Did Kathy Krausnick come upon a burglar? Well, in the last hours, a suspect has been identified. When we found out for sure that he never passed, he got his doctors well then we I knew then because he lied to her that he had it all the time. You are hearing Robert Schlosser Kathleen's father he's talking to the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle to Nancy Monaghan you know it may have been considered irrelevant at the time, but I find it very relevant when you find out for all the time you have courted and been married, your husband has been lying to you about earning his Ph.D. What can you tell me? Nancy Monaghan joining me, who has co-authored a book on Kathleen Krosnick's murder.

Nancy, what did he claim he had his Ph.D. in? Economy. He said he was a Ph.D. economist. He had not, in fact, earned his Ph.D., which was one of the really striking issues in this whole affair. He had finished his dissertation. He had done all the coursework. All he had to do was make a few changes in his dissertation, which had done all the coursework, all he had to do was make a few changes in

his dissertation, which he never did. He lied to his coworkers at Lynchburg, he got the job at Kodak based on the fact that he had the PhD, or said he had the PhD, and he never did. And even when Kodak was pressing him to show proof that he had the Ph.D. after he had started working, this was a major issue in the household and at Kodak because he was under pressure to produce it. He kept saying that there was some paperwork mix-up at Colorado State where he had attended and done all his work. And to the end, he claimed that he had the Ph.D., but he didn't.

I'm very interested in his lying about who he really is. I'm really curious about what he claimed he wrote his dissertation about. Because I remember how hard my sister, who went to the Wharton School and actually became a professor there, how hard she worked getting her Ph.D. I mean, it is hard. I mean, technically speaking, Kathleen Murphy, we're jurors' doctorates because we went through three years of law school but i don't think many lawyers had to write a dissertation it's very very hard to do kathleen murphy i couldn't imagine it except to say nancy that do you remember studying for the bar and taking the bar exam and knowing that if you didn't pass, you weren't going to be that practicing lawyer?

It's intense. And it is a professional responsibility. Kathleen Murphy, I can't, maybe I've blocked that out, but the bar either lasted two or three days. You'd have to go back. You didn't finish it in one day. And it would take eight hours. And I remember going in and I would not even get up while we were taking the test to even go to the bathroom. Because I did not literally want to miss one minute that could risk not completing it or not being able to go back over and check my answers.

And it was almost like I lost track of time and space during the bar. Can you imagine? It was like I sat down, and all of a sudden, the day, the eight hours were over, and when I finished the bar, Kathleen, it was being held in Atlanta and I had to drive back to my apartment in Macon, which was about a two-hour drive. I got in the car, and I had to get out from behind the wheel. Somebody else had to drive, and I had to lay down in the back seat because it felt like the moment I had finished the bar after whatever, two or three days and sat down in the car,

it felt like somebody hit me in the head with a cement brick. And I mean, I had never felt anything like it in my life. I could hardly even see. That's when it kicked in. But I remember Kathleen going to get my LLM at NYU. We had paper after paper after paper. But I guess you could compare it to that. To Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst out of Beverly Hills. Dr. Bethany, why do people lie about their credentials? I mean, he had a college degree. He could have

gone back and finished the dissertation, made the changes. He heard what Nancy Monahat said, but he didn't. He chose to lie about it instead. This guy falls into a very special category, and he's not alone. He's what we call ABD. ABD is all but dissertation. There's a subculture. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I've never heard that before. An A, B, D. I'm writing it down. All but the dissertation. Okay, go ahead.

I actually treated a couple a number of years ago where the husband claimed that he got a dissertation and the wife found out. And I learned all about this. It's a group of people who go through all of their training. The husband claimed that he got his dissertation and the wife found out. And I learned all about this. It's a group of people who go through all of their training. And for some reason, they do not want to defend their dissertation. And by defend, defending a dissertation means that you've already written it. You already have your committee of three people. Defending doesn't mean that you talk about your dissertation. You have to sit down and listen to your committee criticize and tear apart your dissertation.

So you have to hear what they have to say about your body of work. But think about this, Nancy. So if I think of my education, I have three years of college, four years of graduate school, and then 16 years of postgraduate in order to become a psychoanalyst. Imagine going through all of that and not being able to sit down and hear what other people have to say about your body of work. I mean, what I've seen with people who are ABD is that they are very avoidant individuals. And usually they are avoidant in every part of their life. They do not want to be criticized. They do not want people to look down on them. Sometimes they have social anxiety. So if Krasnick falls into this category, this is not

the only thing he's lying about in his life. There are probably many things that he has not faced or been responsible about. And this is not a man who can tolerate criticism because he did not want to present his dissertation to his committee. To Nancy Monaghan, who has actually written a book about this murder. Nancy, what was his undergrad degree in? And I'm sure his wife, Kathleen Krosnick, would have loved him if he had said, I'm working on my Ph.D. I don't think that would have changed his family. Kodak would probably have hired him anyway, knowing that he was working on his dissertation. What was his undergrad degree in, if you know, Nancy?

It was some sort of a business degree. But, you know, remember, Kathleen did not know this in the beginning. He went right from Colorado State and his dissertation to his teaching job at Lynchburg and was saying that he was working on it. His colleagues, they knew that he didn't have it and that he was supposedly working on it, just filing the corrections. So it was a good while. In fact, I believe it was after they moved to Rochester before Kathleen found out that there was no degree

and it was only a few months before her death. You know, I'm just very, I wouldn't say obsessed, but I'm fascinated with the desire to lie. And sometimes, Dr. Bethany, my children will come home and say, so-and-so Johnny said that his dad works for special ops. And then he this and he that, and he has, you know, a treasure chest of gold coins hidden, blah, blah. And I say, children, children wait be nice to johnny because not his real name because i believe people boast and lie to make themselves feel better about themselves because they obviously have some kind of insecurity they can't just be who they are. Why do people puff themselves up? Like, for instance, on their resume, not just to get a job, but in life. Why do you lie about it?

Why do people lie for three different reasons? First, there's the pathological liar. The pathological liar says whatever comes to their mind to actually manipulate the people around them. They're more callous, manipulative, and they kind of fall into this category of puffery. And they don't think they'll be caught for their lies. The second category of lying is what we call compulsive lying. Compulsive lying is when you quickly say whatever comes to your mind in order to please another person. Like I saw this couple where the wife would say to the husband, did you get the

milk at the grocery store? And he'd say, yeah, I got it. And she'd look in the refrigerator, there was no milk. And he wanted to please her in that moment, not thinking that she would catch him. We go back to the first category. I think this guy was probably pretty sociopathic in different areas of his life and probably lied extensively and had this whole kind of an alter ego or personality that he presented to the people around him and a part of it was a cover for the avoidance of not you know finishing the dissertation but i wouldn't be surprised if he told other stories about himself too more in that manipulative kind of way just it's puffery but it's also manipulation he's manipulating how people see him for his own gratification.

The way that the murder of Kathy Krasnick unfolded, her body there in the home, it acts literally in her head. Her little girl, three-year-old Sarah, wandering around the house in mismatched clothes, along with mommy's body. Sounds like one of the most horrific TV made-for-movie crime shows I've ever heard, but it's real. I find it interesting and probative. It proves something, that she was attacked in her face, in her forehead. Of course, you have to be a shrink to figure out what that means, but I know this. Although her husband, James Krasnick,

had the higher-paying job that he wanted, trouble was brewing. His bosses at Kodak were asking him about his Ph.D. He kept promising to give them evidence that he had, in fact, gotten the degree. Pressure was mounting at work. He became distant at home. Wife Kathy actually told her friends he would come home from work angry. Police later said it appeared he had been sleeping in the den.

The marriage strained. Kathy had started talking about leaving and taking Sarah home to Michigan. So many factors swirling around the murder of Kathleen Krausnick, just 29 years old at the time of her death, and then a twist in the case. Brighton police renewed their efforts on the case four years ago, enlisting help from the FBI. What led to the arrest today has not been revealed,

but Kathleen's sister believes she knows the motive. I believe, knowing my sister, she was all about education, that Jim did not actually pass his verbal dissertation, so he did not earn his phd and he lied about it and he was calling himself dr krausnick when she found out i am certain she confronted him on it he snapped and i believe that's when he killed her you're hearing kathleen's sister. Murder over a Ph.D.? That's a little far-fetched. You know, when people go that far to almost get their Ph.D.,

to go through all that education, you'd think they were well-reasoned and wouldn't commit a murder. But take a listen to this. The trial of the husband accused in the Brighton axe murder could hinge on what a nationally known doctor has to say about one small but key detail. Dr. Michael Baden is known as the celebrity pathologist. The expert has conducted over 20,000 autopsies and investigated the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.

Now, Brighton police say the timeline is crucial. 13WHAM reports that James Krausneck told authorities his wife and daughter were sleeping when he left for work at 6.30 a.m. His wife died of a single blow to her head with an axe. After an autopsy, the medical examiner ruled the time of death was actually between 2.30 and 9.30 a.m. Plenty of time for her husband to have completed the crime before he left for work. And that's why Brighton police are bringing on Dr. Baden to confirm the timeline. Wow. Our friends at WENY, that was Olivia Jaquith,

to Nancy Monaghan, former reporter, Democrat, and Chronicle. Nancy, after all these years, why do police now believe Kathleen's husband, James, is the killer? And what can you tell me about the evidence supporting their claim? Well, the time of death is clearly one of the big issues that they are pursuing. And whoever was speaking there, it was correct that they originally said it was between 2.30 and 9.30. He left the house at 6.30. And if they can narrow that time of death to anything that's close to being before 6.30, their case obviously is a whole lot stronger. That time of death has always been one of the key factors in this case. And the other thing is there was no DNA in 1982 when this

happened. I know that they had sent several pieces of evidence and did some DNA testing. However, it's really difficult to understand what exactly they would, if they found anything on the DNA that would be useful now against Mr. Krausnack. He lived there. His DNA was all over the house. So that's uncertain. They're keeping the evidence quite close to the vest. But time of death is clearly a key one. The case remained unsolved for decades, but the FBI's Cole Case Working Group took it back up in 2016 and carried out new forensic tests. Based on those forensic tests, detectives now point the finger at the husband who lied about his PhD.

No one else's DNA turned up in the home. No rape, no theft. The axed, wiped, cleaned that means this the scene was staged the grand jury unsealed an indictment against the husband charging him with secondary murder and the first of his four wives nancy monahan who are these other women he he married his second wife in michigan after after this happened he took sarah and went back to Michigan, and that was in 1982, and he married his second wife in 1986. They were only married a very short time and a difficult situation, and then he married his third wife around late 80s or maybe 1990.

I don't have the date in front of me, but we do know that. They were married about five years, and now he's married to his fourth wife. They've been married, oh, at least 10 years or so, probably a little longer. I can tell you this. The fact that the killer managed to walk free for all these years, in my mind, makes the case even worse. I don't understand the fact that there was no one else's DNA there. The scene was staged.

He leaves immediately after the murder and refuses to speak to police, then moves again. Did he ever, Nancy Monahan, submit to a polygraph, or did he ever sit down and talk to police? And where was the funeral? He talked to police that evening, that night, right after the discovery. But his parents drove from Michigan overnight, and he had promised to come back to the police station the next morning. He did not. He and Sarah went with the parents and went back to Michigan. He never had a polygraph. He was never interviewed by the police. He did hire a lawyer who, you know, as defense lawyers do, do not allow the police to talk to him without conditions.

So he, no, he never spoke to police until in 2016, an investigator from the Brighton Police Department did go to Gig Harbor in Washington, where he was living then, with an FBI agent, and they did speak to him then at that time. We also know that there were marital problems. He was sleeping on the sofa. We also know that he claimed he would let the daughter talk to police and have an interview, but that that never happened. While he seemingly appeared to be cooperative, he never followed through and left town. As it stands right now, the husband of Kathy Krosnick, murdered with an axe, convicted 40 years after her death. Nancy, not long after James Krosusneck was convicted of killing his wife, the convicted killer has died in prison.

Krausneck died from esophageal cancer while appealing his conviction. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.