Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Molly Matheson murder: Texts lead to suspect in TCU strangulation

Episode Date: May 5, 2017

Text messages on Molly Matheson’s phone led police to a man they suspect strangled the 22-year-old woman in her Fort Worth, Texas, apartment near Texas Christian University in April. Reginald Kimbro, 23, admitted he was with her that night, but he denied killing her. Kimbro, who knew Matheson when they were both students at University of Arkansas, had previously been arrested in two sex assault cases, but never prosecuted. Nancy Grace and Alan Duke discuss the investigation in this episode. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Tonight we are learning how police pieced together their investigation into a Fort Worth woman's murder. Molly Matheson was discovered dead in her home near TCU's campus April 10th. Detectives don't believe she was actually killed in the shower, but the killer tried to rinse her off there in an effort to destroy evidence. Her mother discovered her body around 4.30 Monday afternoon.

This is Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A family friend described her as the funniest person. Nobody could ever hate her, she was just so amazing. A woman who was involved in church and had a clever sense of humor. Though she lived near TCU, Molly was not a student here. After they unlocked her phone with her thumbprint, they found a text message from a number that read, I'm outside. It was sent just hours before Molly was murdered. And police say that number belongs to Reginald Kimbrough. In the last hour, we learned that a 23-year-old man has been arrested in a story we told you about the murder of a young sorority girl, just 22 years old, found brutally strangled in her apartment near Texas Christian University.

I'm talking about a beautiful young girl, Molly Matheson. She was renting a garage apartment just a couple of blocks from TCU, Texas Christian University. She was just 22 years old there in that Fort Worth, Texas apartment. Her poor mother, Tracy, discovered her body in that apartment bathroom. And the search was on. Why? Why? This morning, do I learn that the alleged perpetrator, Reginald Kimbrough, had been arrested on several other sex offenses? I'm Nancy Grace.

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Nancy. SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy for 10% off. SimpliSafe, thank you. Again, Molly was discovered by her mother in that garage apartment just a couple of blocks from Texas Christian. She had been renting the apartment. It was connected to a home nearby. Her parents released a statement about this. They are heartbroken. Now, according to Reginald Kimbrough's Facebook page, he lives in Plano, a very well-to-do suburb, and was studying marketing at University of Arkansas. Now, Matheson had also gone to University of Arkansas. Kimbrough was in his father's home in Dallas when he was arrested. What is really upsetting to me, why wasn't he already behind bars on the previous sex allegations? Joining me is the Duke, Alan Duke. Alan, what do you know? The family acknowledges that she briefly knew this young man, so there was that connection, and presumably

it was at the University of Arkansas that they met in 2014. According to the arrest affidavit, he went over to her house. Remember, this is the house that is the pool house. It's just a small one-bedroom pool house attached to a much larger, nicer house in a residential area a couple of blocks from TCU, and she was found in the shower. The theory of police is that he strangled her, killed her, put her in the shower to try to wash away DNA and other evidence of the crime. There are now suggestions that they had dated in the past. That's irrelevant to me whether they had dated or not. What concerns me as I asked you to start with, but somehow you managed to dodge the question, prior sex accusations against him. That's what's concerning me. Were there prior allegations

that he had molested someone or attacked someone in the past. Do we know about that? Yes, we do. Two instances where there were complaints filed against him, two different women alleging rape, one in 2012, one in 2014. None of them went to trial. There was DNA evidence. However, he claimed it was consensual. There never were charges prosecuted against him. whoa so there was dna evidence in one or both of them and one of them at least i know of there was dna evidence he admitted having sex so wait i'm already in my mind figuring out how to prosecute the case because you've got the woman who files a rape report you've got dna and he says it was consensual. Then you have another one of another rape allegation against him. That should have been brought in as a similar transaction

and these should have been tried. And this guy should have been behind bars if he was guilty on those instead of out free to murder Molly. This is the big deal, Alan. There are indications that this guy is really premeditated and cold with this. Did you see the text message that was on Molly's phone sent by this guy after he allegedly killed her? Yeah, hey, thanks again for the advice.

It's nice seeing how far you've come. I'm proud of you. Hmm. When you get up, I mean. And that abbreviation H-M-U doesn't mean hmm. It means hit me up, as in hit me up, call me when you wake up. It was sent about an hour after he allegedly killed her. So he was apparently trying to cover up.

And he's very cool about it. And there was another text message from Kimbrough, allegedly to Molly, a little bit earlier in the evening that said, quote, I'm outside. The police used these text messages to realize that Kimbrough had been in the apartment. The only way they were able to find these text messages, and now this is modern investigation, they took her thumb of the corpse, Molly's thumb, and put it on the iPhone thumbprint sensor, and that is how they unlocked her phone because they didn't have the password. He admits he visited. Well, he knew he was going to be busted on having at least been there,

so he writes that to try to cover it up to act like it was just a friendly visit. He admitted to police he had visited Matheson on the date in April, claiming that they kissed, but she did not want to have sex, and he left around 1.30. That's according to the arrest warrant. And I found that arrest warrant in the Star Telegram. Now, he admitted that he was there the day of her death, the night of the murder, that they kissed, but she is the one who rejected him and he left with no further incident. That's damning right there. You're placing yourself at the scene of the murder.

Then, of course, there's the DNA. And to think, Alan, that he put her in the shower or he took a shower to erase evidence. Yes, he spent a lot of time cleaning up the scene. So his fingerprints are everywhere. But this is what I don't get. He had been accused of rape twice. Twice, Alan. Why wasn't he in jail? We see from what he allegedly did the day of the Matheson killing that he was very careful or thought he was smart. And apparently

he was just smart enough to get away with the others, to convince investigators that it was consensual and there was no crime committed. But in this one, he went way too far. Well, now the charges against this guy, Reginald Kimbrough, have been upgraded to capital murder and the horrible, the brutal strangulation death for Molly Matheson. We covered this when it was still a mystery, when the killer was at large, when there were no leads. The charges against 23-year-old Reginald Kimbrough, the man accused of killing Molly at her Texas Christian University area garage apartment, have been upgraded to capital murder. Now, I just can't wait to hear what the defense is going to be.

When Matheson failed to show up for work on April 10 and did not answer her phone, her mother entered her unlocked apartment to find her little girl curled up on the bathroom floor wearing only a t-shirt. In the arrest warrant affidavit, Kimbrough admits he had dated Molly at University of Arkansas briefly, and they were, quote, hanging out at her apartment Friday that Friday night. He said they did not have sex because it would upset her boyfriend. That's not what happened at all. He says he left her apartment around 1 30 in the morning and had nothing to do with her death. I just can't believe this guy had two prior rape allegations against him and he was out walking free. And I'm sure Molly had no clue. Tarrant County DA's office says the charges are upgraded. In the search of her apartment, police found a pair of Molly's running shorts, underwear, a pillowcase, a fitted sheet in the washing machine, along with a pair of men's underwear still wet.

What an idiot. Did he leave his own underwear there? You know what? That's neither here nor there, except it could be more evidence. What I want to know is they've upgraded the charges. Is this going to be a death penalty case, Alan? This is Texas, and in Texas, that's what they do a lot. Again, thank you to our sponsor, SimpliSafe. You can get 24-7 connection to dispatch, lightning-fast response times, and emergencies with Simply Safe Home Security. Order today for that special 10% discount at

simplysafe.com slash nancy. simplysafe.com slash nancy for 10% off your home security system. SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy. SimpliSafe, I want to thank you again for being our partner on Crime Stories. This is the latest in the case of Molly Matheson, a young girl, beautiful young girl, whose mother finds her dead. I want justice for Molly Matheson. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend.