Dateline NBC - Deadly Hollywood Dreams

Episode Date: July 26, 2023

In this Dateline classic, Keith Morrison tells the story of dozens of women who followed their Hollywood dream of becoming a model. Many disappeared after posing for one particular photographer. Could a team of committed detectives track down the truth of what happened to them? Originally aired on NBC on March 13, 2009.

They stare at you from another time, from long forgotten rolls of film. The looks. Are they provocative? Or haunted? Worried? Vacant? They don't all look like they were willing participants in being photographed. Some are actually crying at the time and have the look of fear on their faces. Who are these ghosts? Are they alive or dead? And how did they come to be where they are? Deep in the center of the vast, unpretty belly of L.A. County, on a winding street lined with bland industrial warehouses,

is the L.A. County Sheriff's Homicide Division. And a huge room chock full of brown paper cases. In each one, an unsolved mystery. Each one, the story of a life taken and a case unresolved. Raped or strangled, suffocated. Each of the desks in that room is occupied by a sheriff's detective who works for the dead. Oh man, this is not looking good for her. And in the case of Bobby Taylor, who was once one of those detectives, a long forgotten. That's my job.

That's what I'm assigned here to do, to look into old cases that come out of dusty old folders and see if they can be resurrected. This story is about one of those brown paper cases, the dreadful history inside, and the images that spilled out. Those dozens of women, and nobody knew who they were. We'd like to, if possible, be able to say that they were all alive and well.

That's probably not going to be a reality, but that's what we'd like. Probably not a reality? Well, there's a reason for that. The pictures were found among the seized possessions of the man who took them, a drifter named Bill Bradford. In 1987, Bradford was convicted of murdering two girls, Sherry Miller and Tracy Campbell. The murders were very brutal. They involved sexual assault. They involved dismemberment.

Dismemberment? Yes, and mutilation. In fact, Bill Bradford had a rap sheet full of brutal sexual assault charges. He spent years roaming the country, altering his looks to blend into time and place, mutating from 50s greaser to 60s stoner to 70s barfly, and finally in the 80s settling on hip urban photographer.

It was a role that worked disturbingly well in Los Angeles' celebrity-obsessed subculture. Posing as a fashion photographer, Bradford lured young women with the promise that he could launch them on high-paying careers in the modeling business. It would start off as a above-table photo shoot, but then later escalate to a situation where he would try and get them to take nude shots. Little 15-year-old Tracy Campbell vanished after posing for Bradford in the summer of 84. He was the last person to see her alive. And when police searched Bradford's apartment, they uncovered a very significant clue. Photos of another young woman,

a 21-year-old named Sherry Miller, a model with big dreams and not much else. Detectives had seen that face before. A week earlier, her blanket-wrapped body was found dumped in a parking lot in West L.A. In the background of the picture Bradford took of Miller was a distinctive rocky outcropping. A friend of Bradford's told police he knew the place. It was a favorite haunt of Bradford's told police he knew the place. It was a favorite haunt of Bradford's out in the Mojave Desert. And when police searched the spot,

they discovered the body of that other girl, the missing 15-year-old Tracy Campbell. When Bradford went on trial in 1987, the evidence against him was largely circumstantial. It took the jury 12 days to find him guilty. But the chilling moment of the trial came as Bradford was being sentenced to death, and he turned to the jury box and blurted out, think how many you don't know about. Bizarre is what it was, hard to forget. And yet, for whatever reason, detectives did

nothing. They never responded to his taunt, never looked to see if Bradford had in fact killed other women. Why weren't those photographs investigated years ago? That I can't answer. I can't speak for what happened back then. I can only

say when it came to our attention, we picked it up and started running with it. And when the detectives started digging into the Bradford file, they found a picture of a woman named Donna Lee Duhamel. In 1978, her body was found in a canyon outside Los Angeles. The murder case involving Donna Lee had never been pursued past the initial stages, and we wanted to see if there was anything there that we could work on now. What made her murder connected with Bill Bradford, as far as you could tell? They had been at a bar in the Culver City, Venice area, drinking, and from that point in time, she was never seen again.

New interest in that old murder case would have the detectives chasing hundreds of leads from Oregon to Florida. What happened to Donna Lee Duhamel was suddenly crucial in the not-so-cold case of Bill Bradford. L.A. Sheriff's detectives burrowed into Bill Bradford's thick file of run-ins with the law. They were looking for more evidence that might connect him to the murder of Donnelly Duhamel.

And that's how they unearthed an amazing cache of aging and perhaps damning evidence, those hundreds of pictures of women, along with rolls and rolls of film, some of it not even developed. Until we can get some identification on any of them, we really can't go any further. And so the L.A. Sheriff's Department, with as much fanfare as it could muster, released a poster full of generation-old photos. Did anyone know who they were? And... I was 14 years old.

For some people, like model Alina Thompson, seeing those photos was quite a shock. I was at a photo shoot in Huntington Beach. He came up to me and said, I'm a professional photographer, and if I could take your picture by yourself, you know, you could probably get a really good photo out of it. When he was taking me off by myself, I was kind of thinking, where are we going? And then he finally took me to an alley. My father went looking around for me and found where he had me. Detectives have heard similar stories from other women pictured who have fortunately turned out to be very much alive, but many still remain unidentified, unclaimed. Why is it important to do this now? Number one, we're eager to find out if, in fact,

we're going to be able to make a case for prosecution, an additional case against Bill Bradford. But why would overworked detectives labor away at a massive investigation in order to hang another murder charge on Bradford, who, after all, was sitting on death row, awaiting execution, case closed, right? Well, not exactly. The best result would be full exoneration.

Darlene Ricker spent years pushing Bradford's appeals through one court after another. And as we all know, a lot of death verdicts and death sentences have been overturned in recent years by the appellate courts. That, thought Ricker, was why police suddenly released those pictures. They wanted to be ready to pin another murder charge on Bradford, just in case. The only reason I can think that may be is that Mr. Bradford is in the last stages of his federal appeal. I've seen the evidence, or rather the lack thereof. It was a purely circumstantial case.

There was nothing directly tying him to either of those homicides. And this is where the story takes another decidedly weird, only in L.A. turn. The lead investigator in the case was a local legend, now deceased, by the name of John St. John. Jigsaw John, as he was known, because he was so masterful at piecing together clues. In the mid-70s, there was even briefly a television crime drama on NBC based on St. John's career. That is significant because Ricker claimed Bradford was railroaded by a publicity-savvy St. John, who she said was writing a book about the case. In her appeal, she said

St. John had, quote, a personal and financial stake in seeing Bradford convicted of murder, and she argued her client never received a fair trial. A federal court judge agreed, opening the possibility that Bradford's conviction could be overturned in a new trial ordered. But remember Donnelly Duhamel? She's the would-be model whose mutilated body turned up after she left a Culver City nightclub in the company of Bill Bradford. All the clues seemed to point directly at Bradford. Detectives were hoping her thumb-worn old file would produce a genuine breakthrough

to keep the killer on death row. And then, disaster. What's happened to the evidence in the Donnelly case? It seems to have either been destroyed, lost, misplaced. Gone, and with it the main chance of pinning another murder on Bill Bradford. So then there was simply that curious poster of all those missing women, each given a number. And once those pictures were made public, tips started pouring in from across the country.

Texas and Louisiana. Could detectives, by following their trails, be hoping to pin at least one more murder on Bradford? Yeah, he's been to Oregon in 79. Taylor and the two dozen detectives on his team crisscrossed the country, sniffing out Bradford's old haunts of decades ago. And then in September of 80, Florida. Before the Miller-Campbell murders,

Bradford had been arrested in Florida on sexual assault charges. And Daytona Beach just happens to be the place where, in the early 80s, two young women suddenly went missing. Michelle Sprague disappeared from a Daytona Beach street corner. No one's ever heard from her again. Gone. Just... Denise Duarte was Michelle's best friend.

One of the photos captured my attention almost immediately. Which photograph? Number what? Number 31. Looks remarkably like my friend Michelle. And just up the coast from Daytona Beach in a small, sad house, another of the photos caught the eye of Fran Webb. 23 years, and I keep checking.

I keep checking everything. Missing girl number 33. Could this be her daughter, Darlene, who went out one Friday night in 1983 and never returned? And I want you to look at this and tell me. This is a picture of the missing girl number 33. Yes. Tell me what you think of the similarity.

There is such a close resemblance that it could be a twin sister almost. Investigators in L.A. agreed, and a detective was sent to Florida with a packet of additional photos. Would they finally find out what happened to these women? Two missing young women. Could their disappearances finally be solved? It's become imperative that we locate a number of photographs, identify women from a number of photographs. The detective, armed with more of Bradford's photos of the two young women,

flew across the country for a dramatic meeting with the friend of Michelle Sprague and the mother of Darlene Webb. Now, the photographs I'm going to show you are a selection or a couple taken from a wider variety of those. Fran struggles. I'm looking real closely on the background here. It looks like it could be Florida because of the palms. Both women were counting on this, on some kind of answer.

And... Hard to say. It's really hard to say. Fran is confused. She'd expected to see her own daughter. And the similarity is uncanny. And yet... How about this photo, Fran?

That face is so close. I say it does look like it's a younger one. That's what's throwing me. Now this one especially looks like Darlene. And we, watching this, felt the oxygen leave the room. On a scale of one to ten, ten being a positive, one being no way, how would you look at those photographs, how would you grade that? I would say a five. A five? I can't say with certainty whether it is or whether it isn't. Okay. Thank you.

Fran, the same question to you. I have to say a five. I can't say yes it is or no it's not. And back in L.A., the detectives at Cheros Homicide continued with their sad business. I'll go ahead and take some information from you. And then, a year into the investigation as leads and tips dried up, Sergeant Taylor got an unexpected phone call from the one person who had the means to solve every one of these interwoven mysteries,

Bill Bradford. And he said, yeah, when you're ready, I'll come up. I would be willing to go over and discuss the case with me. Because it turned out Bradford was dying of lung cancer. Maybe finally, Taylor thought, the murderer was ready to confess. Arrangements were made. And there suddenly was their man, Bradford. Detective Taylor and his partner set up shop in a san quentin holding cell turned on the microphone and camera and a show and tell began all those photos bradford had taken over the years yes he agreed he could and did identify lots of them that is those of the women who turned out to be alive

and well we called her sunny her last name was Converse, just like Converse tennis shoots. She went to Converse High School. But when he came across Donna Lee Duhamel's picture... We already know who that is, so that doesn't matter. Hold on, hold on. Well, don't, don't, don't skip over it like that. I mean, at least explain to us. There's nothing to talk about, either charging me with her murder or what, you know. Bradford was stonewalling, claimed he couldn't remember. I have no knowledge of who that person is, but I did not take it. That is all Bradford had to say about number 31, the woman who looks like Michelle Sprague.

Of 33, the spitting image of Darlene Webb, Bradford said he couldn't recall her name. What did it say to you that he denied knowing anything about 31 or 33 specifically? I think it directly related to him having something to do with their disappearances. But whether or not they are Michelle Sprague and Darlene Webb, we'll never know. There were other photos Bradford wanted to stay away from, too, in that room. Like the one numbered 29. When you find a dead body that you're with, so let's move on. I'm sorry, I'm coughing.

Tell me where to look. I would say the United States. Mr. Bradford would take us to a certain point and drop us off. For instance, we have two girls in photos number 45 and 46. So in talking to Bradford about those photographs, he admitted to taking them, which really surprised me. So I go, okay, we're getting somewhere here. Until I hit him with, well well whatever happened to the girls tell me about number 45 and number 46 according to you according to you picked them up hitchhiking

and took them on the spur of the moment to an isolated location near sand canyon off the 14 and took these photos well then if you are they in that area? I guess there's only one way to do it. You guys got the funding, so go out and dig the joint up. Again and again, Bradford denied killing anyone. Even though, Detective Taylor tells us, beyond his two convictions, police believe Bradford murdered at least eight others. So why did Bradford ask to talk to the very detectives who were trying to prove he'd committed those other murders? Well, that, said the detective, is when the whole business began to feel depraved. It appeared to me that he wanted the opportunity to take a firsthand look at what we had. You could actually see a heightened state of excitement as he flipped through the pages of the photo album.

Looking at the women he had taken advantage of. Exactly. He seemed to want to relive those times. He sure did. And it appeared that on one or more occasions, that took place. After two days of questioning, Taylor packed up his photos and headed back to L.A. And the next call he got from San Quentin, the man on the phone was a guard who told him Bill Bradford was dead.

So his secrets, what become of them? Unfortunately, he held the key. He held the key which would unlock the box containing all the information that we needed. He took it to the grave with him. So who are those women? Does anyone know? They can't be so forgotten that they don't even warrant one of those dusty, old, brown paper files? Can they?