Dateline NBC - Talking Dateline: Dark Intentions

Episode Date: June 12, 2024

Josh Mankiewicz and Andrea Canning sit down to talk about Andrea’s newest episode, “Dark Intentions.” In 1996, the murder and sexual assault of two women in the same apartment complex rattled the city of Arlington, Texas and stumped police. But when two other women from the area survive sexual assaults, police find evidence that connects all four crimes.Andrea tells Josh what she learned from the women who survived their brutal attacks, and she describes the involved investigation that finally cracked the case. Andrea also plays a podcast-exclusive clip and Dateline producer Haylee Barber joins in to answer viewer questions from social media.If you or someone you know has experienced sexual assault, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 800-656-4673 or visit online.rainn.orgListen to the full episode of “Dark Intentions” here: https://link.chtbl.com/dl_darkintentions

Hi, everybody. It's Josh Mankiewicz, and we are talking Dateline today with Andrea. Hi, Andrea. Hi, Josh. Andrea Canning joining us. Always a pleasure. So this episode of Andrea's is called Dark Intentions. It's about a violent string of attacks in Arlington, Texas, which began with two women who were both sexually assaulted and murdered, and then turned out some other women later survived attacks by the same guy, and they were able to provide information that allowed investigators to hunt him down. Now, if you've not listened to this episode yet, or if you've not seen it on TV, it's right below this episode. So go there and listen

to it or watch it on TV or stream it on Peacock and then come back here. Also, Andrea has a clip that she's going to play for us from her interview with Detective Tommy Lenore. And then later, we're going to answer some of your questions from social media. All right, here we go. Dark intentions, very good title. And you say in this at one point, this is every woman's worst nightmare, which can sometimes be a cliche when people say it, but it is 100% true here. I can't think of anything worse. If you're a woman living in this rental apartment and you wake up in the middle of the night and there's a guy next to your bed and he's got a mask on and he's about to attack you. It really is a woman's worst nightmare. What woman has not thought about that at some point in her life, whether it's in her own home or walking to her car or walking alone somewhere. I mean, unfortunately, women have to think about this kind of thing

much more than men. It is a very scary thing. And sadly, that nightmare became a reality for these women. This happened in 1996. I was surprised we didn't do this many years ago. This is a great story with a lot of suspects. It's not clear what's happening for a long time. It's a powerful story. And these women were just absolutely incredible. I mean, every one of them, every single interview, I walked away just in awe of these women and how they survived and how they're helping other people. I got to say, I thought you, I mean, I thought you really connected with everybody in this story. It's one of those stories where I walked away feeling like, I can't say that I'm going to be talking on the phone every week to these women,

but I'd like to think that I walked away with some new friends. You know, they're all similar age to me. And so I really put myself in their shoes, living alone for so many years, you know, in the news business. And it just that fear that I'm all alone and, you know, now I'm in a strange city and like anything could happen. And the only thing protecting you is a sort of flimsy apartment door. Yeah, exactly. A flimsy apartment door. I mean, that's it. And who knows how many people have keys to that?

Yeah, that's certainly what they thought. They immediately after, well, Christine, of course, they, you know, really were heavily suspecting the boyfriend. You know, according to Christine's family, he kept changing his story with them. So that was a big red flag. The story that her boyfriend tells sounds to me right off the bat. I think like, okay, this guy is, this is suspicious. Like you try to get in, you can't get in. You go back to your car,

you go back to your car a couple of times. I mean, I'm not surprised that the investigators looked at him. Yeah. And also, you know, he had scratches on him. Then the police said, where'd you get these scratches? And he said the dog scratched him. I mean, ultimately, it turns out he's telling the truth because his fingerprint does not match that scarred fingerprint. And although his DNA is present with Christine Vu, he's her boyfriend, and there's somebody else's DNA that obviously is not his. And it became extra crystal clear when the second bathtub murder happened in the same apartment complex, because now they're thinking, okay, we've, you know, again, this print from that scene doesn't match Tang Ku, the DNA found on Wendy Prescott, the second case doesn't match Tang Ku. So it's not really feeling like he's

the serial, you know, rapist killer in the community. Once Wendy was murdered, they immediately believed that this is somebody living in this complex, working in this complex, friends with someone in the complex. Like they knew that was the key. And you saw the scene where I was sitting with Detective Lenore at the Arlington police station and we're going through all the old records. And he shows me this list of suspects and these binders full of license plates. And, you know, so they're doing everything they can. And they turned out to be right about the person being connected to the apartments.

Yeah. He was suspect number 17. They just hadn't got there yet. I thought one really sort of eerie and poignant moment in this story is, you know, when Tasha Fry realizes she's the connective tissue between two of the victims. Like you think to yourself, wait a minute, I know her and I know her. Yeah. And I lived there. Am I missing something? Is this about me in some way? I know. I just got chills when you just said that again,

like all over again, because poor Tasha, first her best friend, Wendy is murdered. And then she finds out that Shima, the woman that took over her room in the sorority house has now been raped. And she's thinking, was this person after me? Or are they after me too?

Like, do I need to watch over my shoulder? And well, or I know these two victims. Do I also know the rapist? Of course. And she thought there was a time she thought it was her ex. But she very smartly mentioned her connection to Wendy to the campus police. And so that's what, you know, that really helped get the ball rolling. Let's talk about Shima for a minute, because hers was a story of just,

I just thought, a real heroism. I mean, she really, like, survived that and came out the other end. And good for her. I mean, she just came off as, I thought, incredibly strong. Yeah. And one of the sweetest people like our team has worked with. I mean, she, oh my gosh, she's so nice. Like just a nice person. And I have a fun fact about Shima. She was a contestant on Big Brother. Really? Which did not make the show. Yeah. So she'd been on television already.

Yeah. She was on Big Brother. And, you know, she had big aspirations of things she wanted to do when she was in college and everything, which, unfortunately, you know, some of those things didn't happen because of what happened. Doesn't take away from all the great things she's done. She's a mom now. But she has a great personality. And so. And bit her attacker.

Oh, yeah. she sure did in a intimate way yes ended up being a clue helping to convict him yeah yeah it was a piece of like an evidence a clue whatever you want to call it because adrian i believe also saw the scar, which just only further validated Shima's account. Yeah. So Adrienne Fields, she's afraid she's going to be the next victim. She's so scared. She can't sleep. She has to have someone stay over.

Then finally, she decides, okay, I'm putting on my big girl pants. I'm not doing this anymore. I'm not going to be afraid. Bang. There's a guy in her bedroom wearing a mask. I said to her, I'm sure you have a lovely family, but they probably thought you were nuts. Because, you know, most people with no connection to crime like that don't walk around thinking, like, I'm the next victim. No, and in fact, that's when your family and friends say to you, hey, come on.

Yes. Relax. Yes. Nothing's going to happen. You're freaking out about this for no reason. Come on, just get some sleep. You'll be okay. And that's what I meant by, I'm sure you have a lovely family.

I don't think they meant any harm to you by saying that. But she said, that's exactly what they said to me. They said, basically, knock it off. You're going to be fine. Get this out of your head because there's nothing to suggest that you're going to be the next victim. And Adrienne, what I love so much about her is that she has made it her life's work to help other survivors and other women. And she said it was her daughter that really helped her turn the corner because she could see that she was putting her fears on her daughter.

And so she said, I had to turn things around for my daughter. And she essentially saved her in that way. Well, yeah, because we talk all the time here and elsewhere about the ripple effect of murder and other terrible crimes, which is like, even if you might think that you've gotten over it, you are parenting your kids or you're giving advice to your grandchildren. And so good for her for trying to do something about that. Yes, she recognized that. She recognized it, which- Because a lot of people do not recognize that.

Yeah. I mean, I just felt, just felt just walking away from that Adrian interview. I just felt so almost empowered by her, what she went through and her attitude toward this horrible thing that happened to her. I mean, for her to just be so strong, whenever you come out of an interview like that, you're like, oh my gosh. And I was complaining about, you know, that someone put the orange juice carton back in the fridge yesterday and it was empty. You know what I mean? Like, that's the kind of stuff that gets me like, ah, I'm like, I'm upset. And I'm like, okay, this puts life in perspective. Those things don't matter. I feel like in this job, people put us in check all the time like that about what's really important.

And, you know, it is because look what she overcame. Okay. When we come back, we have more from Andrea's interview with Detective Tommy Lenore. There's no way to answer this question, but this whole episode made me kind of wonder, what happens if there's no DNA technology? What happens if instead of this happening in 96, this happens in 1966? Well, it would be the prints. They would go with the prints. Yeah. But one of two things would happen, I think, in all likelihood. One is they wouldn't catch anybody because that guy might not have been printed. Second, they also might catch the wrong person and lock up the wrong person because there were different men at different times in this who, for different reasons, were suspicious to law enforcement or who told conflicting stories or who just seemed not interested in participating. And that would have sort of drawn the focus of law enforcement's radar. Yeah.

And even with the prints, if you recall, it was Joel Stevenson, the crime scene tech, who said, you know what? I'm going to take another shot at the FBI fingerprint database. So they send one of the prints off to the FBI's database. And sure enough, they get a hit because thank God, Dale Chenette had been arrested for a burglary not too long before that. So they never had that before. They never had that burglary charge. Right. And that bumped him up to the top of the list. And then pretty soon they had their man. Yep. So it was good. It was really, really good detective work by Detective Lenore, by Joel Stevenson, by their whole entire team.

It was really good work by Lenore. It was really good cooperation from the other departments. Like they paid attention. They called him back. I loved it when he said, I'm going to listen to what you tell me. That's what he's saying to the victims, which is like, you know, I did a story, I don't know, about 18 months ago, same area of Texas, much more recent case in which these small departments, not necessarily these particular departments, did not listen to the victims,

did not say things like, I'm going to listen to what you're going to tell me. In fact, they tried to talk these women out of reporting the rape, saying we're not going to be able to get a conviction. This guy kept on raping. Eventually, he killed somebody. And then he did end up going away because Fort Worth PD was really on the ball. But this is one of those things that can go either way. Yeah, I mean, I just I did a story not too long ago from Connecticut where the woman was not believed that she was raped and then accused of having an affair with the person who raped her. So, you know, these things can go very sideways very quickly.

And I have to say, Detective Lenore is, he's just a really good detective. We actually have an extra clip from Detective Lenore if we want to listen to that. This is about Dale Chenette after his arrest. I get an evidentiary search warrant for his arrest. I get an evidentiary search warrant for his home, and I get an evidentiary search warrant for his car. And we find even more information from those two searches. What did you find?

Inside his car, there's a, I'll use the slang term, rape kit. He basically had a kit that had duct tape, gloves, scarves, burglary tools, electronic tools. He had everything in that bag that I know that he used in all four of those cases. All right? He is so diabolical. He's remarkably diabolical. We go into his residence, and I find a couple of things. Number one, I found what I

believed was Wendy Prescott's phone, her answering machine, and a coat that belonged to her. I mean, it's identical to what the family had described, and it was a woman's coat. He had a ton of stuff. Can you imagine being that sick that you methodically put together a kit of how you're going to torture your victims? It shows you what a careful planner this guy was, which is probably one reason why he didn't get caught right away. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and he's taking home trophies from his crimes. You know, it goes back to that woman's worst nightmare.

Like, not only is this guy in your bedroom, he's got a kit with him. Yeah, he's ready. It says exactly what he is there to do to you. Also very chilling, I thought, was when Adrian quotes the guy as saying, I want you to act like there's no tomorrow. And she says, well, is there a tomorrow? You know. And he said, yes yes there is a tomorrow you know she she went the psychological route with him which worked because i mean he let her live

right that was i mean well you know and and lenore detective lenore talked about this de-escalation like he stopped it was strange you know he stopped binding everybody with the duct tape and leaving him in the bathroom why he went from rape and murder to just rape, I don't know. Did they ever get anything like that out of him? Did he ever explain why he was sort of, you know, why he changed his behavior? I think the only thing I heard was, and it's all speculation, was that maybe because the first two murders were so close, you know, he changed it up out of fear of getting caught. I don't think anyone really knows.

For the families of murder victims, almost as agonizing as the loss is the waiting that follows. That is a great line. And it could be in almost every episode of Dateline. Yeah. The problem with the waiting is that you're in this limbo, right? So at the very least, if you can stop the waiting and they catch the person, you can close that chapter of wanting the person identified, wanting the person to go to prison, wanting the trial. And maybe feel a little safer. Yes. But I've never met anyone who had closure.

Like no one ever, no murder victims family ever has told me, oh, I have closure never met anyone who had closure. No murder victim's family ever has told me, oh, I have closure. We're good. Nope. It does not end there. Closure doesn't give you grandchildren. No. It doesn't bring your daughter or your son back. When you think about all the things that that person will miss and that you will miss with them because of an evil person that took that away from your family. After the break, Andrea is going to come back with Haley Barber, who's one of the producers of this episode and who at one time had a brief, unpleasant life as my assistant. They will answer some of your questions from social media. We are back with one of the producers of this episode, Dateline producer Haley Barber,

and she is here to help answer some of your questions from social media. And she knows everything there is to know about this episode. So let's get started. Hey, Haley, thanks for being on Talking Dateline. Hey, Andrea, thank you so much for having me. We had quite a lot of questions on this episode. As you know, this was a complicated story because we worked on this together. Yes, there was a lot of layers to this story, a lot of people involved in this story. So yeah, it was unusual in that way that we had so many victims. Yeah, we talked a lot about that. But our first question actually came from Seth982760, and he wanted to know when Dateline films B-roll at two, current residents know there was a murder there. Well, Haley, I defer to you on this one because as we know, the Pear Tree apartments are still there. Christine Vu's apartment is still there. Wendy Prescott's apartment is still there. So what did you find out? Yeah. So I looked into this a little bit. In Texas, when they're renting an apartment, they do not have to disclose if a murder took place, often because that can affect the desirability of somebody moving in. As a prospective tenant, it could be a little scary to think about

that. I personally would want to know because I would choose not to live there. I don't know. It just would freak me out too much. I'm with you on that one. In fact, whenever I look for a new apartment, I tend to Google the apartment, probably because I work at Dateline. Yeah, you're a Dateline producer, so no surprise there. All right, what's the next question? So this one was from Sally Balsamo. Sorry if I butchered your name, Sally. And this said, both of the women seem to have been very nurturing people. Yeah. And this is referring to Wendy and Christine.

And I mean, yeah, absolutely nurturing women. You just look at their profession, that one was a teacher, one was a teaching assistant. From everything we heard from their families, they were just super loving, cared so much about their family members, their families. They were just super loving, cared so much about their family members, their friends, and they wanted to be moms themselves. And also Wendy had a nephew that she was really close with. Her nephew, Stefan. And there was a few pictures of him with Wendy in the episode. And he's gone on obviously to grow up and he even played in the NFL. That was what was so impressive was his NFL career. And you think about how proud Wendy would have been of him to see the man that he became. She missed all of that.

Yeah, missed a lot. So our next comment, a lot of people also talked about the detective, Tommy Lenore, who you did a very long interview with. Danson Lionheart said, I'm really liking this detective. To me, he's truly a man of heart. He cares a lot. Yeah, that was so clear in just how much he cared and how passionate he was about his job. And now he's an investigator, I believe, with the district attorney's office, the prosecutor, loving that job. I'm sure putting his heart into that. I mean, he was, I feel like he was the right man for this job. It's so true. And many times when we're fact checking these episodes, we are contacting these detectives all the time. And he's someone who is always awake, always around, digging into his files. I mean, this just couldn't be more true. So our next one was from

NCTrigirl85. And she said, geez, the state line was immediately heartbreaking and has not stopped. And there was a lot of people on social media who commented on just how much tragedy this particular story. And like we said at the beginning, just so many victims. Yeah, it's hard to sit there and listen to what they're telling you because your heart just goes out to them. And it's like I try to stay composed, but I'm like melting inside, you know, because these stories are just so intense and so sad. But Haley, you and I and everyone who worked on the story, we just fell in love with these women. I mean, they were the survivors, the family and friends of the deceased. Incredible, incredible women.

Just so kind, so strong from what they've been through. Yeah, I think we talked about this a lot. They've all really gone on to be these strong, incredible women and been empowered by these experiences that they had. And that was something that we really loved seeing when we were filming this. So, all right, Haley, thank you so much.

These were some great questions from our viewers. They really were. Thanks for having me, Andrea. Sure. Great job on the show. Thanks for all your hard work. You too. If you or someone you know has experienced sexual assault, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 800-656-4673 or visit online.rain.org for more resources. That's online.rain.org. That is our Talking Dateline for this week. Thank you for listening to us.

Remember, if you have any questions about our stories or Dateline, reach out to us on social at DatelineNBC. And if you want to check out more true crime from Dateline, we have a brand new podcast for you called Dateline True Crime Weekly. Every Thursday, I dig into some of the biggest true crime stories of the week and bring you the latest on trials and investigations around the country. So join me for that wherever you get your podcasts. See you Fridays on Dateline on NBC.