Dateline NBC - The Dateline Correspondents' Year in Review: Year of The Cold Case

Episode Date: December 25, 2025

Listen to this week's special episode of the Dateline: True Crime Weekly podcast. Andrea Canning is joined by Lester Holt, Blayne Alexander, Josh Mankiewicz and Keith Morrison to talk about their biggest cases of 2025. Find out more about the cases covered each week here: www.datelinetruecrimeweekly.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You look nice, Andrea. How are you? Thank you. How are you? Well, I'm fine, but, you know, who the hell is that old dude with a weird hat on? It says, as seen on Dateline. Love it. There is no Dateline story meeting today. There are no producers catching up on breaking crime news because it is the holidays. And we wanted to take a look back at some of the biggest Dateline stories of 2025.

This year, our reporting has taken us from New York. York to Albania from Kentucky to the Bahamas, even a haunted house in Texas. It is December 25th. Welcome to Dateline True Crime Weekly's year in review. I want to say hi to everyone. Blaine, hi. Hello. Coming to us from Oxford, Mississippi Police Department. Yes, the finest conference room we could find here in between interviews. Nice. All right. Do not make any statements until we can get an attorney over there. Noted. Thank you. Josh Mankowitz from his office at home in California. I think it's called a lair, actually, Andrea. It's a lair. And there's the voice, Keith Morrison, coming to you from his home office in California.

And we have Lester, and Lester has his guitars behind him. Just reminds me it's time to practice. I haven't practiced in a couple of days. All right. Well, let's get into it. The big theme that our team noticed in 2025 was appropriate for this time of the year. It's cold. A good portion of the cases we covered were cold cases. A big one was Crystal Rogers, the case of the Kentucky mom of five, who disappeared in 2015. It took 10 years for her boyfriend, Brooks Houck, to be tried and convicted for her murder. So what do you think, guys? Can we call 2025 the year of the cold case? I actually, I was thinking about this. I had a couple of them. My first of the year actually kicked off with a cold case. And that was we talked. We talked. about the haunted house down in Texas. There was also the case of Leslie Prier and her daughter Lauren, who waited 20 years to bring her mom's killer to justice. I think that with the cold cases, there's always this feeling of like hope, but then hope that snatched away, right? Like time after time

thinking, okay, could this be it, could this be it? And then having kind of sit and say, okay, maybe it's never going to happen and trying not to get your hopes up again. So that was something that we kept seeing with Leslie Prier. I was just to say a cold case implies that it's something that's, you know, no longer active that it gives the impression that someone has given up on it. And I'm, you're absolutely 100% right about the families. These are not cold cases to them. Well, in many cases, the cops don't forget about them either.

They carry them around with them. They take it very personally, as it was in the case of one of my stories this year, which went on for like 30 years. Your Wisconsin story, Keith? Yes, the Wapaka story. It was a perfect example of that. 1992, when the crime occurs, two people are killed, a vicious, vicious attack in the middle of the night. Nobody can figure out why.

It was a terrible scene. There was a lot of evidence around the scene, but it was collected in 1992 ways. So for years and years, this case went unsolved. They investigated all kinds of possibilities, people who had grudges of one. kind or another, people whose character was known to be deficient. The detectives spent years and years and years and years, you know, analyzing every little piece of evidence that could possibly find, and they never gave up on it. At one point, they even exhumed the body of a potential suspect to compare his DNA with DNA found at the crime scene. That's why the episode was called

Raising the Dead. But Keith, police did get a match eventually to someone in town. It was a mild-mannered law-abiding citizen who lived a couple of miles down the road named Tony Hayes. And Tony Hayes was, you know, they inventively got his DNA by making him handle a big pen when they gave him a traffic ticket. But he was put on trial. He had a very good couple of defense attorneys who questioned the evidence that was brought against him, DNA evidence to show that he must have been, the person who left the DNA on the body of this young woman

and who left a palm print on the door. And the jury came back and found him not guilty. And so he continues to live just a couple of miles away from the other people in the town, many of whom believe in their hearts that he is a guilty party. Quite a story. The thing cops always say is two things solve cold cases.

One is changes in circumstance. People will no longer, they decide, you know, we're not married anymore, so I'm not going to lie for it. you. I'm no longer going to tell that story. I'm going to call the cops. I'm going to tell them what actually happened. And the other thing that changes is changes in technology. Like now you can test things for DNA that you didn't use to be able to or some kind of forensic technical data off something that wasn't available before. Sometimes it comes down to money, right? Just just good old-fashioned resources. So what made the difference in the haunted house confessions case was DNA

phenotyping. And so when I spoke with the investigator, he kind of made the point that he had to convince his bosses, his department to work up the money to actually go through with that. And it turned out to be the key in solving it. They took the DNA and essentially made a picture of what they thought the suspect looked like. And it turned out to be a dead ringer for this guy. So much so that when the picture was circulated in the media, he went on the run and ultimately resurfaced and came back and confessed in the middle of a Wednesday night church service. Oh, wow. Let's talk about the Crystal Rogers case, which is the case that I covered in Kentucky. that was a case where there wasn't necessarily, you know, there wasn't a smoking gun, there wasn't a ton of physical evidence or anything like that. It was more of the kind of case that I feel like we see a lot on Dateline, which is where it's just a big puzzle and you just start putting more and more of the pieces together. I think that's a very common thread with the cases that we cover is that they don't always have all the pieces that they want, but when you put them all together, you know, it's enough to say, let's go for it. You know, there's a saying among cold case detectives that the answer's in the box. You know, it's that when you find out who it is, it's always somebody that you already interviewed and discarded for one reason or another, or you made a mistake ruling they're out and you shouldn't have. And you see these wonderful stories in which, you know, these investigators end up retiring, but they're still working on the case.

They take the file with them. They copy it there. They're reading it when they're, you know, actually retired. and at home and still sort of making calls. I also think that like determined family members, they're the ones who keep calling, who keep pressing, keep pushing for answers, and ultimately that's oftentimes what makes the difference.

Josh, you deal with that with your Missing in America podcast, you know, all the time with the stories that you cover. You had a unique missing in America this year where you went in the time machine back to your D.C. days. Yeah, Nancy Snow went missing 19. And she has never been seen or heard from since. But the thing that made this an interesting story for me was that I had this weird feeling that I had met the victim in this case, Nancy Snow. She worked for the Republican National Committee in 1980 in their Senate races.

And in 1980, I was at ABC News. I was an off-camera reporter. And I was covering the Senate races. And I had this very strong feeling that Nancy Snow and I had been in the same room. at one time or another, at the same briefings or at the same events. Not that we were friends or that I knew her, but that maybe I had met her. Nancy Snow is still missing. There was only one suspect.

He has never been arrested or charged. And he's not talking with police. Josh, you had a chance to interview her daughters for this story. Let's take a listen. Your mom wouldn't have wanted this to take over your life. No, I don't think so. That's why I tried to change and become the mother that she was to me for my kids and pour my love and my heart and my time into them and make, mold them to be like my mom

because she was so amazing. She just believed that I was extraordinary and that I was capable of anything. So I think of all the things that she taught me, I think the most powerful is how to believe in myself and how to love myself and how to be present in the moment and to soak in the life around me. I want justice to be served. I want to know the truth.

I will never stop looking for our mom. It's so sad. You know, that tells you, and I don't think any of us need to have this underlined, but that does show how, these kind of events, the death of someone or the abrupt disappearance of someone, and then later it's pretty much assumed that they are no longer alive, how this splits the lives of people in that situation into two, because there's the part before and there's the part after. And the idea that you move on from this or that there's something called closure is nonsense. It changes you forever. And there is no pretending otherwise. And we hear over and over again that actually the situation,

those young women were in is in some ways more difficult than if they knew what happened or knew their mother was killed by somebody. Because this uncertainty is the thing that gnaws away day after day, hour after hour, all the time on the mind and they can't get it out of their heads. One of the interviews that I'm doing right now actually deals with that very thing, this notion of police departments, investigators, yes, working to bring someone to justice and working to get answers, but part of that getting answers for the family is bringing their loved one home in whatever way that looks like, right? Like bringing their body home, helping them be able to have a proper funeral, a proper burial. And I just spoke with an investigator who truly

got emotional. I mean, tears came to his eyes, speaking about how important that was for him to essentially put a fine point, finish the investigation, finished the job. He said, my job isn't done unless I can say that I've been able to bring your loved one home so that you can say a proper goodbye. You know, people certainly want their loved ones brought home, but they also have this desire to know why, because, you know, we use the term senseless murder, and they, you know, they are senseless murders. And it's so amazing to know that this story, this ordeal was not forgotten. Yeah. Yeah. Up next, we're going to talk about some of our favorite interviews from 2025. Also, we have

some trivia for you. Two killers featured on Dateline also were on the show Wheel of Fortune as contestants. Who were those killers, which datelines? And also, where did Dateline visit the most as far as which states had the most Dateline episodes in 2025? Think about that. And we'll be right back. Welcome back, and I want to hear what you think. Where were the most dateline shot in 2025, which states? Well, historically, I always thought that it would be Florida, because crazy things happen in Florida, as we all know. But then it turned out over the years, like the state that led the league for us was

California just because there were so many people in it. Like we did, you know, the Michael Jackson story so many times. So each of those was a California story. And so, and like, you know, the, the O.J. Simpson story, which we did again and again and again. So those, those all sort of counted as stories from California. So I'm going to say California because it has the most people. Any other guesses? My money's still on Florida. A money still on Florida. I'm going with you. I'm going with you, Blaine. Well, here's the answer. I'm here in New York. You guys are in California. It's a tie. New York had four, California had four, and Florida trailed.

It was next on the list at number three. Interesting. Get it together, Florida. All right, so I want to hear any favorite memories, any favorite moments from all of you from the road. Let's say I went my farthest. I went to Albania for an interview for the death of Dr. Schwartz. We spent more time getting there and getting back than we actually did on the ground in Albania. That was a great story.

It was a terrific story. Thank you. Any not-so favorite moments from the road? I had to get on a boat. I mean, Andrea, if you are our adventure girl on Dateline, I'm probably the opposite of you, right? I like to have my feet on solid, dry ground and preferably not moving. So, yes, I did an interview on a boat. I cannot swim.

But I think that being able to really kind of channel in, focus on what we were doing, I didn't feel crazy on the boat. It was the getting on, the getting off that maybe gave me a little pause, but the cameras weren't rolling then, so it's all good. so nobody knows. Josh, we have a fun moment of you in Palm Springs, driving around in an Impala with the person you were interviewing for the story, the Prince, the Wiskid, and the Millionaire. Hi, Barbara. Welcome to Palm Springs. Thank you. I'm starting to figure out what my problem is here, which is I'm not LaRue enough, and I don't have enough Doree me. Step on it, jeeps. Yeah, there's a crazy story happened to the desert outside of Los Angeles.

It was a giant con that ended up being a murder. Everything about it turned out to be lies. I mean, the people were lying to the victim. He was lying to them. He sort of bragged himself into an early grave by talking about how much money he had and how valuable his art was. Turned out none of that was true. And so we went out there, and part of the story was.

the environment of Palm Springs that the guy at the center of this story, Cliff Lambert, lived in. So I went for a drive with a woman who'd been a society columnist in Palm Springs who talked to us about sort of the life that Cliff led and how that ended up placing him in danger for living so lux. Lester, you had a road trip of your own down to Palestine, Texas, to interview death row inmate Robert Robertson. Tell me about that. Well, he's a Texas man sentenced to death in 2000. Three, for the death of his daughter, Nikki, prosecutors said Robertson shook his daughter to death. Subsequently, there's been a lot of research and new science about shaken baby syndrome, and it has caused a lot of courts to pause on some of the prosecutions, not, however, in the case of Robert Robertson. So I interviewed him a year ago, and then again, this past year.

Let's take a listen to a clip from your interview with Robert Robertson. Good morning to you, Mr. Hope. How are you? I'm blessed, I'm blessed. How are you preparing for your own death, your own execution? I'm at peace if it happens, but I'm not ready because I don't think I should be executed when I'm innocent. This is a guy who multiple times has come within hours of being executed, and it is, I have to say, it's a gripping moment when someone's describing to you, they put on the slippers, and then they took off the bracelets, and then they walked me here, and they walked me there, and trying to imagine what that kind of horror is. is alike. Simply, simply stunning. But I was glad I got the chance to interview him again,

but his execution has been stayed. A stay based on the shaky science of Shaken Baby? Yeah, the court wants to send it back to a lower court and wants them to really look at this issue of why some courts have exonerated individuals who were convicted under very similar circumstances. Keith, you had a very big interview this year. You interviewed Laura. Laurie Valo, doomsday mom in prison. Just even the ratings I remember that night were so big. I mean, people were really talking about that interview. We should remind people, Lori Valo was convicted for the 2019 murders of her children, JJ and Tiley, and for conspiring to murder her husband's former wife, Tammy. And you, of course, met up with her, Keith, in Arizona. That was one of the most frustrating experiences of my life interviewing people.

You know, when you're talking to someone who wants the interview to occur, but just wants to sabotage it at every turn. It was quite an experience. Doesn't she at one point say, I'm glad we're friends or something? And you're like, uh. Yeah. Like, what? I was on social media after that, and I saw this just wave of revulsion to the way she was talking to you.

Are you keeping track? Keith? Can we agree on that, Keith? Can I joke with you, Keith? Can we joke? Good one, Keith. You've heard a lot of stuff, Keith, and I'm here to say you've heard a lot of stuff, but what I tell you would be the truth. I thought we were going to be friends, Keith. Like, I'm not sure the rest of us would have had that. But to our audience, like, you cannot be rude to Keith like that, or you will suffer our wrath. That's how everybody felt. But it was a deliberate strategy that she was employing. she wanted to, yeah, and she was also practicing for her court case. I mean, she's a deeply troubled individual, and she'll spend the rest of her life in prison

for what she did. It was great, it was great, and the great thing was, you were not fighting her. You're just asking the questions, and she was every second, like, digging herself in a little bit deeper. Did you watch your children die? That's a really sad question. It's a terrible question, and it's one I hate to have to ask, but I mean, we've been talking about all of these...

I was not there. You did not kill a soul. Absolutely not. You didn't participate in killing a soul. No. You didn't conspire to kill a soul. Correct. You didn't do any of those things you've been convicted of doing.

Correct. She's such an odd person, such an interesting character. It was quite an experience. And this brings us back to our trivia question about who appeared on Will Fortune from Dateline. And can you guess who one of them was? I'm a Jeopardy guy. I don't know. Lori Vallow. She was on Wheel of Fortune?

Yeah. And the second Wheel of Fortune contestant? Any guesses? Donna Edelson. Yes. I knew that with Donna Edelson. Because her puzzle was mischief maker. Right?

Mischief maker was her puzzle. Another memorable interview, Josh, was from your episode, The Phantom, about Christiel Krug. That case, you interviewed Detective Andrew Martinez. this detective was extremely vulnerable about getting something wrong in this case. Christiel was being stalked. She thought by the guy who'd been her boyfriend back in high school. Turned out it was not him. But the only way police learned that was after the actual stalker had impersonated this high school boyfriend,

essentially made him a suspect for a while. He turned out that would absolutely nothing to do with it. and police could not get the search warrant information back in time from phone and internet companies to identify the stalker. And so as a result, they were led down this path by the person who actually did the stalking and ended up murdering Kristiel Krook. Let's take a listen.

It was just kind of like an earth-shattering moment of like the realization that I was on the wrong path the entire time trying to track down Anthony. You were on the wrong path the whole time. Yeah. Because somebody wanted you on the wrong path the whole time. I felt like a puppet. This is a difficult case for the police department in Broomfield, Colorado.

They worked on this really hard. They could not be accused of not taking this seriously. But they were not equipped, and they did not have the tools that they needed to solve this thing in time for her murder, which is one of the reasons why that family is now pushing for something that they're going to call Christel's law, in which requires phone and internet companies and texting companies to provide information on search warrants when those search warrants are legally signed and executed in a finite period of time. Because if you're working a cold case homicide, it doesn't really matter whether you get the phone records back Friday or Monday. In a stalking case in which somebody's life is in danger, it does matter.

And in this case, it really did matter and it might have made a huge difference. Mm-hmm. Yeah. All right. When we come back, we've got some rapid-fire news headlines and some holiday reading. So families, of course, are always on our minds at Dateline. And, you know, we talked earlier about how, you know, the pursuit of justice. Often the families play a big role in that, not just law enforcement. Blaine, your episode, The Pin at Apartment 210, was really an example of a family not giving up. We're talking about jazzy pace, and ultimately her killer was brought to justice. The family made that possible. It wasn't just the fact that they knew something was wrong about her behavior. They said, okay, these messages that are being sent from her accounts doesn't sound like her.

They tracked it down. They looked up the phone number. They found her car. then they found the apartment where she last was. And when nobody answered, when police weren't listening, they used a credit card, popped the lock, and went inside and found the evidence that ultimately led to getting the guy who killed her. So it was, you know, there was that line in speaking with investigators of,

could this have contaminated the crime scene? Could it have gotten the whole thing thrown out? But it was a risk that they took and it paid off for them. Yeah, you know, it reminds me of a story that I covered recently in my hometown of Blue Mountain, Ontario, Canada, where a mother was murdered by her husband, a firefighter. And I interviewed her sister Lindsay, the victim is Ashley Schwamm, and her sister Lindsay, said that there was, you know, this was, they believed this was an accident, that she had, her car had slid off the road and caught on fire and she died until she said a few days went by and she said it was like her sister was in her gut screaming at her. like something is wrong and it was so interesting how she described that you know this feeling that she had i've never heard i've heard people say oh you know something my gut was telling me she said

her sister was screaming at her from her gut um and and her instincts were right you know that this was this was actually a murder let's take a listen you gave a very powerful victim impact statement. What was your your core you know thought that you wanted to get across? She didn't have to go and it wasn't right

I just want him to pay for what he did. She just wasn't some victim that she was a sister and aunt a friend and mom

she was amazing he took her from you yeah he shattered your family he did and for me it was very interesting because you know this this crime happened three miles from my childhood home

I thought you did a great job on that story and I loved I loved the footage of baby Andrea the TV reporter I love that doing this series I've learned a lot about education over the last few weeks. Police are aggressively investigating the fatal collision looking for any clues. Thank you. Yeah, that was the station that I worked at an hour from my hometown in Barry, Ontario. That was one of my first jobs. So we thought, why not pull out some of the

archival footage? Not only that, we got to go back to the station. We went back to the TV station. I got to see a couple people who were still working there. And you know what's so nice is that this family, they have a chalet at the base of the mountain, which is, you know, I, you know, go home to visit my family at the mountain. And now I've made some friends. I wish it wasn't in this way, you know, but I'm, you know, really honored to call them friends. Again, just wish it was under much different circumstances. So to the final part of our show, I thought it would be fun to get your rapid fire reaction to some of the big news stories of 2025. So let's start with the heist at the Louvre in October. Big French museum. You know, you'd think it's a fortress in there

with all the artwork and jewels, but apparently it's not that hard. Is there any more proof that you need that the French understand a work-life balance in the way we don't? That robbery occurred in the morning, not in the dead of night. Everybody got a good night sleep and had a nice breakfast. Then they went to the Louvre and cleaned it out. I'm really surprised they got the suspects as quickly as they did. I guess I've watched too many of these movies where the guys, you know, get away with it because it's so sophisticated and so brazen,

but, you know, they nailed their performance pretty quick. I was surprised they got them at all, yeah. Me too. Assuming they got the right people. The Sean Combs trial was another big one for 2025. A lot of interest in that one as well.

A lot of people outside the courthouse every day. The details of this man that so many people have known, have listened to his music, have, you know, consumed his liquor, worn his clothes, sorted details and things to come out. I think no matter where you kind of stood on, it was just shocking to watch unfold in a public arena. Karen Reid, trial number two. Karen Reid hugging her attorneys tightly. She has been cleared of the most serious charge

of second-degree murder. Thoughts? If I were in some significant legal trouble, I would hire Alan Jackson. Yeah, he did an amazing job. Outside of OJ, it felt like that was maybe the biggest trial that I've seen. I mean, I was sitting in the courthouse when the verdict came in and the thunderous applause and screams from outside of all the Karen supporters was like nothing I'd ever seen before. Defendant, not guilty or guilty? So say you, Mr. Foreman? So say you all? I get asked about that case a lot in airports and by people I know. And I always say the same thing. I didn't cover it. Please call Andrea. I mean, you mentioned OJ. I think that like OJ, it's so interesting to me how there are some cases in which people have no stake but really are invested in this, right? That's so fascinating to me.

It is really fascinating. Another story that Keith, you covered, was the continuing story of the students who were murdered in Idaho by Brian Koberger. We saw a big resolution in that case this year with Brian Koberger taking a plea. Let me ask you, did you kill and murder? murder Madison Mogan, a human being? Yes. Did you honor about that same date, kill and murder Kaylee Gonzalez, a human being? Yes. And did you on that same date, kill and murder Zana Kronotel, a human being? Yes. Did you kill and murder Ethan Chapin, a human being? Yes. Were you surprised? Frankly, no, I was not surprised. There was a tremendous amount of evidence that had been built up. He had very good defense attorneys, very good advice, but they seemed to recognize that there really was no way out.

I think we put on our story in the kind of lead-up period before the trial. I thought your story was a perfect example of public service journalism, which is it made it very clear what happened and how strong the case against him was. I mean, felt like that's the reason he took the plea. Like he's like, like his lawyer said to him, you're not going to win. And if you, and if you go to trial, you're going away forever. Exactly. And he's still going away forever, but he is not going to be on death row. Yeah.

The Menendez brothers, that was another case that just got a ton of attention, you know, not only because of that Netflix documentary, but then so many people got on board of wanting to see them released. Yes, exactly. And that, that became such a cause one way or the, the other. It had taken on a new life and a different kind of life in social media that maybe didn't always comport with the facts. We should say things didn't turn out for the Menendez brothers the way that they had hoped and that so many of their supporters had hoped. A crippling blow

in the brothers fight for freedom. Eric and Lyle Menendez both denied parole this week. It might at some point in the future, you don't know. It may and it seems a little less likely now. after the election of a new DA who is very much opposed to an early release for the Menendez-Rothers, the only avenue for them now would be

clemency from the governor, I suspect. It seems unlikely. And that seems unlikely. There are all kinds of people speculating on whether or not that would be valuable for the governor to do and that's a mugs game.

Who knows what will happen? A mugs game? Is that what you said? it's an old expression Josh you're just such a young guy he wouldn't have heard it from the 1800s from when mugs were invented what yeah exactly I'm absolutely taking that yeah so before we go I just want to hear if anyone has any holiday traditions that they that they want to pass along that they do um yeah I um I go over to Keith's house and I buff his car with your shirt off make that's after we play And he gives me a shiny new quarter. It's a wonderful tradition. And we had our annual viewing of a Christmas story this weekend. Oh, that's fun. That show only gets better.

Christmas movies. Ours are a Muppet Christmas Carol. That is a classic that will never be defeated. And The Preacher's Wife, those are my two favorite Christmas movies. We just hope that all of our viewers have a safe and happy holiday. One thing you can do is you can listen to Keith reading, The Snow Queen. Just search for Morrison Mysteries, wherever. you get your podcasts. And we'll be back in January with new episodes. Merry Christmas and

happy holidays to all of you and your families. And thank you. Thanks for all the support all year long. Enjoy everybody. Happy holidays.