July 16, 2025 • 30 mins
Carla Walker’s brazen abduction after her high school Valentine’s dance shook Fort Worth, TX. Suspicion swirls around her boyfriend, while others are convinced of his innocence. Who could have raped and murdered the cheerleader? Everyone thinks they know.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
I don't know if you ever looked at a law
enforcement officer after a car wreck, but they stand back
and they observe everything that's going on to let emergency
medics or whatever do their things, but they're assessing. And
that's what I felt like I was doing that night.
I stood back and was just watching, and life changed
forever and always at that point.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
There's something that happens when a tragedy occurs. Everything slows down,
time freezes, and that's exactly what happened for Jim Walker
on a February night in nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
I was just watching everybody, you know, sitting back, watching
everybody and knock on the door.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
And it was the evening of the high school Valentine's dance,
and Jim was watching as his older sister Carla got
ready and her date, Rodney, finally arrived to pick her up.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Rodney was here, and my sister Carla gave him that shot,
you know that looked like like, dude, why why are
you running late? You know how important of a night
this is. When Rodney smiled at Carla, I'll never forget it,
and this beautiful smile kind of came across her face
(01:31):
all was good, and he came over and you know
they hugged and put carsaoge on it and poised for pictures.
The last time I saw Carla was in front of
that fireplace for pictures.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Carlo Walker's picture is on a wall in Texas, one
of hundreds of photos in a collage. Some look like
high school yearbook photos. Other were taken on a vacation
or at a wedding. Every face is framed in a hexagon,
and every face on the wall represents a mystery, a
(02:12):
crime that for years was never solved.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
We have like the Happy Face killer, we have multiple
victims of serial killers that we were able to identify.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Kristin Middeleman knows these faces by heart, and she knows
the stories behind each frame.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
This little boy, his mom murdered him and got away
with it, and then we were able to identify the
body and now she's serving life in prison.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Young women, old men, babies. Kristin taps her fingers on
photo after photo, sharing their personal stories.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Her name was Mary Catherine Edwards. She was a thirty
two year old teacher. Everyone said she was the nicest person.
She was raped and murdered, handcuffed, and found in her
bathtub by her family.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Kristen knows these faces because every one of them represents
a cold case, one that's been solved by the cutting
edge DNA technology she and her husband, David Middleman developed
here in their lab. Some of the cases are front
page news, like the Idaho student murders or the Gilgo
Beach serial killer, but most of these faces belong to
(03:27):
someone's mother or son, an uncle who disappeared, or a
sister who was kidnapped and murdered. Their cases were never
solved until now.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
If you look at the screen, you can see that
it doesn't really matter age, it doesn't matter background, it
doesn't matter type of crime. You're able to help resolve
all these crimes using DANA technology.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
The Wall of Faces is in the offices of Authrum,
Kristen and David's forensics lab. The lab is tucked away
in a nondescript office park in the Woodlands, Texas, about
thirty miles outside of Houston, and it's where a small
team of scientists and investigators are solving the coldest of cases.
They work with the most challenging evidence, bodies that have
(04:19):
been burned or thrown into the ocean, blood stained clothing
that's been left in the desert heat or covered in chemicals.
Human remains stuffed into walls and sewage tanks. This team
has seen it all, and they figured out how to
do the impossible. Analyze tiny specks of DNA evidence considered
too old or damaged to find new clues that lead
(04:41):
police to a killer.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Most of the people that we identify have gotten away
with murder in plain sight, and they are normal people.
They are serving your coffee. They're an IT specialist at
your office, right like you have no idea.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
On this season of America's Crime Lab, we'll meet families
who've lost loved ones, detectives who've chased every lead, and
we'll discover how science is unlocking the truth that our
DNA holds. Let's start with a cold case that shook
a community for forty six years. Producer Catherine Fenlosa is
(05:22):
here to bring us up to speed.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
I'm going to take you back to nineteen seventy four
in Fort Worth, Texas, and it's winter February. There's a
seventeen year old girl named Carla Walker. She's a junior
in high school. She has long blonde hair. Everyone describes
her as having flashing blue eyes, and she's very petite,
not even five feet tall, ninety five pounds. Her friends
(05:51):
describe her as silly, feisty. She loves animals. She has
a white poodle and she loves to paint his nails.
She wants to be a veterinarian. She's just sort of
full of love and energy. She's a cheerleader, which seemed
to fit her really well because she's like a little
firecracker of a personality.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I have a picture of her in my mind.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
So this is February. Carla was going to the high
school dance with her boyfriend, Rodney, and Rodney is the
quarterback of the football team. Sandy, blonde, super gentle guy,
and everyone describes them as the all American couple. So
the night of the dance, Carla's getting ready at her
house and her parents are there. She comes from a
(06:38):
big family. There's seven siblings. A couple of her siblings
are at home. Her aunt and uncle have come in
from West Texas for the occasion. There's music on the
parents have laid out plates of Southern food. Carla is
getting ready. She's picked out a powder blue dress and
(06:59):
she's waiting for Rodney to arrive, and he's running a
little late. He got home from work late. He gets
halfway to Carla's house realizes that he's left her corsage
at home, so he turns around, grabs the corsage, pulls
back up in his mom's car to the walker house
(07:20):
and when he arrives at the door, Carla's a little
annoyed because he's running late and she is very punctual,
but he presents the corsage and a huge smile breaks
out across her face. He pins the corsage on her dress.
(07:41):
Everybody gathers around. They take photos in front of the fireplace.
Mom says, you know, we'll be waiting up for you.
We can't wait to hear about the dance. Go have
a great time, and off they go.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I feel like that is out of a cute little
rom com movie or something completely This is embarrassing to admit,
but like as a little girl, I'd always dream of
my little prom moment when a guy picks me up
and has the corsage, and that's just really cute.
Speaker 4 (08:17):
This is so it and everyone, you know, they're all there.
The dance is at the high school, so the parents
and staff have decorated the whole, you know hall, there's
a DJ. Everyone is really really excited and they have
a great time. They leave the dance with another couple
(08:38):
and they do what teens do. They drive around Fort Worth.
They go to Taco Bell, they get something to eat.
One of the friends needs to use a bathroom, and
the bathroom for some reason at Taco Bell isn't working.
So they go to a bowling alley which is nearby,
and they go in. They get back in the car.
They cruise around town for a little while. The other
(09:00):
couple has a curfew, so Rodney swings them back home,
drops them off. And on this night, Carla, her parents
are you know, giving her a little leeway. She doesn't
really have a curfew tonight. They absolutely love Rodney. They're
like kids, have a good time. So Rodney and Carla,
you know, they stay out a little bit later, they
(09:21):
drive around a little bit longer.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Yeah, and she's seventeen. This is their big night out.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
So Carla needs to use the bathroom again, and they
know that the bathroom at the bowling Alley is working,
so they head back over there and when they come
back to their car, you know, they're teenagers. It's the
Valentine's Day dance. They're parked, it's dark, there aren't many lights,
and the parking lot is pretty much emptied out by
(09:50):
now because most of the bowlers have left. So Rodney
and Carla are in the front seat of his mom's car,
and it's a bench seat, and so they basically start kissing.
Carla is reclined and her head is sort of like
prepped up on the passenger door, and Rodney's leaning on her,
(10:13):
and all of a sudden, the passenger door flies open
and Carla's head drops back out of the door, and
Rodney leans forward to cradle her head and pull her
back in the car. And the next thing Rodney knows
(10:35):
is he's being beaten on the back side of his
head and blood is pouring down through his eyes. He's disoriented,
he doesn't really understand what's happening. Carla is screaming. She's yelling,
you know, stop hitting him, stop hitting him. Rodney looks
(10:59):
up and he can see a man and the guy
has Carla by the arm and he's yanked her out
of the car. And this man says to Carla, you're
gonna come with me, aren't you? Sweetie and Carla screaming.
Rodney's sort of blacking in and out, and she says, Rodney,
(11:24):
go get my dad, Go get my dad. This man
takes a gun and points it within inches of Rodney's
head and he says, I'm going to kill you, and
he pulls the trigger.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
So did Rodney die.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Rodney passes out in the front seat of the car,
and he wakes up some time later and his head
is absolutely throbbing. He's covered in blood, and Carla is gone.
He drives to the Walker's house, to Carla's house, and
(12:22):
now all of the adults at Carla's house are still
up there expecting Carla and Rodney to walk in the
door at any moment. So they're, you know, they're playing dominoes,
they're eating, they've got music on. Jim, Carla's brother, who's
twelve at the time. He has stayed up late because
(12:43):
he is also super excited to be one of the
first people just to get the lowdown on how the
dance went.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Oh totally. I mean, I have a daughter, and I
can imagine when she gets the age where she's going
out to a dance. I'll be so excited. I want,
you know, all the details. Yeah, the four one one
on everything that happened that night, So I can imagine
it's kind of festive in there. But they don't know
what just happened.
Speaker 4 (13:11):
No, they have no idea.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
So we had to porch light on waiting for Rodney
and Carlin. When he came to the house, I answered
the door. That's probably the first time I ever saw
fear death. You could see the blood and a big
slip across his cheek, and eyes were very wide open, bulging.
His lips were almost puckered. He was totally petrified, and
(13:39):
I heard Rodney yelling, mister Walker. Mister Walker helped me.
They have got her. They're going to hurt her bad.
I know they are.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
Everyone is trying to understand, Oh my god, what has happened?
What is going on here? And they bring Rodney into
the house and they sit him down, and Rodney starts saying,
these men they took her. I don't know where they went.
I think I've been shot. And so they're trying to
assess exactly what his wounds are, and you, thank god
(14:07):
hadn't been shot, but he's been severely beaten.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Police were being called. They started removing his shirt to
see where else because he said he was shot and
started compressed and trying to stop the bleeding.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
But Jim notices that Rodney isn't really bleeding anymore. It
turns out that he wasn't shot. The blood on his
head and his face is dry.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
It wasn't like it was running down like he just happened.
And that's one thing I noticed had bothered me for
a long time. He had a probably two to and
a half inch cut on his right cheek, and I
noticed it had started to coagulate. So that tells you
there's been some time from incident to current time. Right.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
What were Carla's parents feeling at this point? I can't
even imagine to have your daughter's date show up covered
in blood saying they took her.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
Carla's father, who's retired military, he yells to Jim, Carla's brother,
and he says, come with me, and the father goes
and gets his gun.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Whow Dad was out the door, and you know he
knew where Carla was last seeing he's out the door
with his weapon, and he would have absolutely absolutely killed
this guy. He was going to get his little girl.
He yelled at me, said Jimmy come on, and I
just I froze. I had never seen anything like this,
(15:38):
so he took off. You know, that's something I've lived
with for decades as well, and I regret that. I
regret that, but he never said anything to me about it,
and I don't think I've ever told anybody that before,
but I wish I had gone.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Can you imagine being twelve years old and all this
is happening. Your sister's gone, Your dad is heading out
the door with a gun, maybe to kill whoever took her.
It's like your whole world is bursting.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
It's absolutely heartbreaking. Carla's mom and aunt are taking care
of Rodney, and they've called the police.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
All hell was unleashed. We had law enforcement coming in.
They're trying to get details. Mom was very stoic. I
don't recall any yelling or screaming, cursing. I stood back
and was just watching. And life changed forever and always
at that point, New Walker's changed. My sister, Cindy slept
(16:42):
on the couch hoping to hear. You know, we were
just hoping somebody come by and push Carl out of
the car, just get her back. Sunday morning, everybody woke
up to the abduction in the newspaper. The high school
the west side of Fort Orth shocked. You know, they
just saw Carl before and Ridney and these other kids
and now kidnapped. You know all that comes along with that,
(17:05):
A big, ugly dude in a pretty young girl one
thirty ish in the morning. So the next morning people
were already out, you know, high schoolers were out searching
motor bikes, horses, right. Law enforcement next morning was was crazy.
And then you know, no word, you know, one person
(17:25):
said to my dad late and Carl is probably gonna
be had been raped. My dad was angry, So I
don't care. We just want her back. We want her back.
We will take care of everything. We want her back.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
So the night Carlo was abducted, her father gets his
gun and goes looking for her.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
Yeah, so he drives to the bowling alley where Rodney
says that Carla was pulled out of the car by
one or maybe two men. And it's pretty close, it's
only a mile away from Carla's house. The police arrived
quickly and they find Carla's yellow purse and a magazine
to a gun lying in the parking lot, and that's it.
(18:20):
There's no sign of where Carla was taken.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Did anyone see anything?
Speaker 4 (18:25):
No, So the parking lot had emptied out by the
time all of this had happened. And remember this is
nineteen seventy four, so there's no surveillance cameras at the
bowling alley, no cell phones, and the parking lot wasn't
well late. It was pretty dark.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
So the only things we have to go on are
rodney story of what happened, and a magazine from a gun.
But we don't even know if that magazine is related
to Carla's disappearance exactly.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
And remember this is Texas in the seventies, so it
wasn't super prising to find this magazine in the parking lot,
and there's so little evidence for police to work with. Now,
Rodney's treated at the hospital and he actually heads back
to Carla's house and he ends up sleeping in Carla's
(19:15):
bed while hundreds of people are out looking for her.
Carlo's brother, Jim says, this goes on for three days.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
I'm looking at the front door, and the front door
was opened, the screen door was closed because people were
coming and going, and homicide detectives, detectives from Fort Worth
and Sheriff's department and a couple other men, and they
were talking. My parents were listening when a news reporter
showed up at the front screen door and said, Hi,
(19:47):
you know, it's missus Walker. I'm so and so with
Fort Star Telegram. How are you feeling that that found
your daughter. I was in the middle of the living room.
My back was facing the fireplace, and I remember my
looking toward the fireplace, and that's the first time in
my life I ever saw his bomber pilot blue eyes
(20:07):
intents right water up. I didn't see tears, but I
clearly saw water in his eyes, and my mom was
leaning against him and her head went down. So that's
how they found out.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
With a shock.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, Jim says. They all fully expected Carla to be
found alive. They hadn't even thought that this could become
a murder, you know, a homicide case, that she wouldn't
be coming home, and that moment just completely changed everything.
The police get on the phone and then they're able
(20:54):
to confirm that Carla's body had been found in a
culvert the side of the road about five miles away.
Her blue Valentine's Day dress is ripped and bloody. Her
underwear and pantyhose are found a little bit away from
(21:16):
her body near the entrance of this culvert. And she's
been beaten, raped and strangled. There's nothing else there. They
don't find any fingerprints. They do find some bodily fluid
on Carla's bra, but you know, this is nineteen seventy four,
(21:37):
there's no DNA testing. The one piece of evidence that
they do have is the magazine club that they found
in the parking lot.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Can they identify the type of gun.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It belonged to, what's called a twenty two ruger handgun?
And so the police do. They go when they get
a list of everyone in the area who's bought this
type of gun, and they go when they interview all
of those people, they give them polygraphs, they check alibis,
and everybody passes. No one raises suspicion.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
There weren't any other indications that any of those people
were involved.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
Correct. Some of the people who had owned this type
of gun were able to show that, you know, produce
the gun, show the police, here's my gun, fully intact.
There was one person on the list. He was a
thirty one year old truck driver who passed the polygraph
and he said that his gun had been stolen a
while before, but there was no reason to suspect him,
(22:45):
so the police were really left with nothing and the
case goes cold. And this case really, from every single
person that I've talked to, it changed fort Worth.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
It was just such a shock because it was a
safe place to grow up. There wasn't a lot of crime.
Speaker 6 (23:08):
I wouldn't go outside, I wouldn't go anywhere by myself
after dark, and then still I would be like locking
my doors if I did go by myself.
Speaker 5 (23:21):
And sometimes you'd meet somebody and it's like is he
the one? Or you'd see somebody that acted weird and
you know, maybe he's the one. It just shattered our innocence.
Speaker 4 (23:34):
Typically a crime like this is committed by somebody who
knows the victim, so people do start to kind of
look at one another and wonder because everyone thinks someone knows.
Somebody knows.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
Yeah, somebody's got to know something, yeah, and.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
It's somebody in our community.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Cloud of sadness came over, hopefulness was gone. I think
my mom suffered in silence. She and dad had a
lot of intense conversations. Only kid living in the house
at the time.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
I mean, jim he's only twelve at the time, and
he's thrust into this horrible tragedy. I just wonder, how's
he feeling? How do you even begin to process what's happening.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
Yeah, I had the same question.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Nobody ever talked to me. I was a watcher. I
set aside and I watch. I watched these huge, bigger
than life homicide detectives come in. They would pull me in,
let me listen to stuff. Nobody ever sat down said, Jimmy,
you know, how are you feeling? So I watched and no, no,
(24:51):
no exaggeration. In the first ten minute conversation you and
I had, that would have been more than any conversation
I had with either one of my parents about what
happened to Carla. I was probably out of school for
you know, the entire week after Carla's abduction, and when
the Sheriff's department came by and said, you know, we're
(25:12):
positive it's her, but we we need you to go
down and identify the biding. That was a tough night.
And for some unknown reason, I went with them and
we drove down to the corner's office and it was
dark So there's two big glass pedestrian doors like we
see in businesses or hospitals today. One with door was
(25:32):
opened out there's a hallway, and I was just lined
up perfectly with the door, looking down the hallway, watching
mom and dad go. And as mom and dad entered
this hallway on the right hand side, a door opened.
Then it was left open, and my mom and dad
went into that room within fifteen seconds. And this is
(25:55):
something that used to I just couldn't hardly talk about
because I'd cried. I hope you never hear or have
to be around when a mama sees her beloved seventeen
year old daughter dead and bruised and beaten and bloody
on a table that kind of pulled back a blanket
(26:18):
to see the face and neck. I don't know if
you ever heard a mom's scream of pain when they
see their baby. It's worse than any sound, almost any
sound I think I could possibly imagine, other than a
child hurting, but even that's different. It was a gictorial
(26:43):
from the deepest part of her core, painful scream within
fifteen seconds of them entering that room. That's what I heard,
And that was really probably the beginning of me becoming angry.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
Before Carlo's murder, Jim says, he played sports, he hung
out with friends. You know, he's really happy. But now
he becomes absolutely consumed with finding out who did this
to his sister, and he wants revenge. Jim starts working
out every day so he can physically confront Carla's attacker,
and he canvases the neighborhood. He is looking for any
(27:29):
signs or anyone who looks suspicious. He actually becomes convinced
that whoever did this is driving by his house every day.
He becomes distrustful. He's short tempered, and he's getting into
fights like daily.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
I didn't again, didn't have the life experiences to realize
what I was looking at. So you know, as a teenager,
I was spitting bullets, ready to I was ready to
just kill some you know, some guy who did this
in my family. It changed, It went to season of
mourning and grieving, but with that was mixed intense intense
(28:07):
determination to find out what happened to Carla and who did.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
It and where's the investigation at this point, So this
is also part of the tragedy.
Speaker 4 (28:17):
Police chase down every single lead. They get and they
still only have Rodney's story to go on and that
clip from the gun in the Bowling Alley parking lot.
By the end of nineteen seventy four, Carla's case goes
cold and it stays that way for forty six years.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Next time on America's Crime Lab, it.
Speaker 7 (28:47):
Became very apparent that everybody had an opinion of what
happened to Carla right, And what was really unusual was
very few people felt like it was a stranger. Most
everyone felt like it was somebody who knew.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Carl Rodney's story had you know, it actually had some
question marks on it. I started remembering that cut on
his right cheek, and it wasn't freshly blaeding, it was coagulating.
Remember me saying.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
That Rodney doesn't show up to Carlo's house after she
was abducted for an hour and a half, and it
was like, well, where do you go?
Speaker 2 (29:31):
Why did it take him so long? America's Crime Lab
is produced by Rococo Punch for Kaleidoscope. Erica Lance is
our story editor, and sound design is by David Woji.
Our producing team is Catherine Fedalosa and Jessica Albert, our
executive producers. Are Kate Osborne, Mangesh Jadigadour, and David and
Kristin Middleman, And from iHeart Katrina Norville and Ali Perry.
(29:55):
Special thanks to Connell Byrne, Will Pearson, Carrie Lieberman, Nikki Eto,
Nathan Etowski, John Burbank, and the entire team at AUTHRM.
I'm Alan lance Lessor, thanks for listening.
I don't know if you ever looked at a law
enforcement officer after a car wreck, but they stand back
and they observe everything that's going on to let emergency
medics or whatever do their things, but they're assessing. And
that's what I felt like I was doing that night.
I stood back and was just watching, and life changed
forever and always at that point.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
There's something that happens when a tragedy occurs. Everything slows down,
time freezes, and that's exactly what happened for Jim Walker
on a February night in nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
I was just watching everybody, you know, sitting back, watching
everybody and knock on the door.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
And it was the evening of the high school Valentine's dance,
and Jim was watching as his older sister Carla got
ready and her date, Rodney, finally arrived to pick her up.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Rodney was here, and my sister Carla gave him that shot,
you know that looked like like, dude, why why are
you running late? You know how important of a night
this is. When Rodney smiled at Carla, I'll never forget it,
and this beautiful smile kind of came across her face
(01:31):
all was good, and he came over and you know
they hugged and put carsaoge on it and poised for pictures.
The last time I saw Carla was in front of
that fireplace for pictures.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Carlo Walker's picture is on a wall in Texas, one
of hundreds of photos in a collage. Some look like
high school yearbook photos. Other were taken on a vacation
or at a wedding. Every face is framed in a hexagon,
and every face on the wall represents a mystery, a
(02:12):
crime that for years was never solved.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
We have like the Happy Face killer, we have multiple
victims of serial killers that we were able to identify.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Kristin Middeleman knows these faces by heart, and she knows
the stories behind each frame.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
This little boy, his mom murdered him and got away
with it, and then we were able to identify the
body and now she's serving life in prison.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Young women, old men, babies. Kristin taps her fingers on
photo after photo, sharing their personal stories.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Her name was Mary Catherine Edwards. She was a thirty
two year old teacher. Everyone said she was the nicest person.
She was raped and murdered, handcuffed, and found in her
bathtub by her family.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Kristen knows these faces because every one of them represents
a cold case, one that's been solved by the cutting
edge DNA technology she and her husband, David Middleman developed
here in their lab. Some of the cases are front
page news, like the Idaho student murders or the Gilgo
Beach serial killer, but most of these faces belong to
(03:27):
someone's mother or son, an uncle who disappeared, or a
sister who was kidnapped and murdered. Their cases were never
solved until now.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
If you look at the screen, you can see that
it doesn't really matter age, it doesn't matter background, it
doesn't matter type of crime. You're able to help resolve
all these crimes using DANA technology.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
The Wall of Faces is in the offices of Authrum,
Kristen and David's forensics lab. The lab is tucked away
in a nondescript office park in the Woodlands, Texas, about
thirty miles outside of Houston, and it's where a small
team of scientists and investigators are solving the coldest of cases.
They work with the most challenging evidence, bodies that have
(04:19):
been burned or thrown into the ocean, blood stained clothing
that's been left in the desert heat or covered in chemicals.
Human remains stuffed into walls and sewage tanks. This team
has seen it all, and they figured out how to
do the impossible. Analyze tiny specks of DNA evidence considered
too old or damaged to find new clues that lead
(04:41):
police to a killer.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Most of the people that we identify have gotten away
with murder in plain sight, and they are normal people.
They are serving your coffee. They're an IT specialist at
your office, right like you have no idea.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
On this season of America's Crime Lab, we'll meet families
who've lost loved ones, detectives who've chased every lead, and
we'll discover how science is unlocking the truth that our
DNA holds. Let's start with a cold case that shook
a community for forty six years. Producer Catherine Fenlosa is
(05:22):
here to bring us up to speed.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
I'm going to take you back to nineteen seventy four
in Fort Worth, Texas, and it's winter February. There's a
seventeen year old girl named Carla Walker. She's a junior
in high school. She has long blonde hair. Everyone describes
her as having flashing blue eyes, and she's very petite,
not even five feet tall, ninety five pounds. Her friends
(05:51):
describe her as silly, feisty. She loves animals. She has
a white poodle and she loves to paint his nails.
She wants to be a veterinarian. She's just sort of
full of love and energy. She's a cheerleader, which seemed
to fit her really well because she's like a little
firecracker of a personality.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I have a picture of her in my mind.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
So this is February. Carla was going to the high
school dance with her boyfriend, Rodney, and Rodney is the
quarterback of the football team. Sandy, blonde, super gentle guy,
and everyone describes them as the all American couple. So
the night of the dance, Carla's getting ready at her
house and her parents are there. She comes from a
(06:38):
big family. There's seven siblings. A couple of her siblings
are at home. Her aunt and uncle have come in
from West Texas for the occasion. There's music on the
parents have laid out plates of Southern food. Carla is
getting ready. She's picked out a powder blue dress and
(06:59):
she's waiting for Rodney to arrive, and he's running a
little late. He got home from work late. He gets
halfway to Carla's house realizes that he's left her corsage
at home, so he turns around, grabs the corsage, pulls
back up in his mom's car to the walker house
(07:20):
and when he arrives at the door, Carla's a little
annoyed because he's running late and she is very punctual,
but he presents the corsage and a huge smile breaks
out across her face. He pins the corsage on her dress.
(07:41):
Everybody gathers around. They take photos in front of the fireplace.
Mom says, you know, we'll be waiting up for you.
We can't wait to hear about the dance. Go have
a great time, and off they go.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I feel like that is out of a cute little
rom com movie or something completely This is embarrassing to admit,
but like as a little girl, I'd always dream of
my little prom moment when a guy picks me up
and has the corsage, and that's just really cute.
Speaker 4 (08:17):
This is so it and everyone, you know, they're all there.
The dance is at the high school, so the parents
and staff have decorated the whole, you know hall, there's
a DJ. Everyone is really really excited and they have
a great time. They leave the dance with another couple
(08:38):
and they do what teens do. They drive around Fort Worth.
They go to Taco Bell, they get something to eat.
One of the friends needs to use a bathroom, and
the bathroom for some reason at Taco Bell isn't working.
So they go to a bowling alley which is nearby,
and they go in. They get back in the car.
They cruise around town for a little while. The other
(09:00):
couple has a curfew, so Rodney swings them back home,
drops them off. And on this night, Carla, her parents
are you know, giving her a little leeway. She doesn't
really have a curfew tonight. They absolutely love Rodney. They're
like kids, have a good time. So Rodney and Carla,
you know, they stay out a little bit later, they
(09:21):
drive around a little bit longer.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Yeah, and she's seventeen. This is their big night out.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
So Carla needs to use the bathroom again, and they
know that the bathroom at the bowling Alley is working,
so they head back over there and when they come
back to their car, you know, they're teenagers. It's the
Valentine's Day dance. They're parked, it's dark, there aren't many lights,
and the parking lot is pretty much emptied out by
(09:50):
now because most of the bowlers have left. So Rodney
and Carla are in the front seat of his mom's car,
and it's a bench seat, and so they basically start kissing.
Carla is reclined and her head is sort of like
prepped up on the passenger door, and Rodney's leaning on her,
(10:13):
and all of a sudden, the passenger door flies open
and Carla's head drops back out of the door, and
Rodney leans forward to cradle her head and pull her
back in the car. And the next thing Rodney knows
(10:35):
is he's being beaten on the back side of his
head and blood is pouring down through his eyes. He's disoriented,
he doesn't really understand what's happening. Carla is screaming. She's yelling,
you know, stop hitting him, stop hitting him. Rodney looks
(10:59):
up and he can see a man and the guy
has Carla by the arm and he's yanked her out
of the car. And this man says to Carla, you're
gonna come with me, aren't you? Sweetie and Carla screaming.
Rodney's sort of blacking in and out, and she says, Rodney,
(11:24):
go get my dad, Go get my dad. This man
takes a gun and points it within inches of Rodney's
head and he says, I'm going to kill you, and
he pulls the trigger.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
So did Rodney die.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Rodney passes out in the front seat of the car,
and he wakes up some time later and his head
is absolutely throbbing. He's covered in blood, and Carla is gone.
He drives to the Walker's house, to Carla's house, and
(12:22):
now all of the adults at Carla's house are still
up there expecting Carla and Rodney to walk in the
door at any moment. So they're, you know, they're playing dominoes,
they're eating, they've got music on. Jim, Carla's brother, who's
twelve at the time. He has stayed up late because
(12:43):
he is also super excited to be one of the
first people just to get the lowdown on how the
dance went.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Oh totally. I mean, I have a daughter, and I
can imagine when she gets the age where she's going
out to a dance. I'll be so excited. I want,
you know, all the details. Yeah, the four one one
on everything that happened that night, So I can imagine
it's kind of festive in there. But they don't know
what just happened.
Speaker 4 (13:11):
No, they have no idea.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
So we had to porch light on waiting for Rodney
and Carlin. When he came to the house, I answered
the door. That's probably the first time I ever saw
fear death. You could see the blood and a big
slip across his cheek, and eyes were very wide open, bulging.
His lips were almost puckered. He was totally petrified, and
(13:39):
I heard Rodney yelling, mister Walker. Mister Walker helped me.
They have got her. They're going to hurt her bad.
I know they are.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
Everyone is trying to understand, Oh my god, what has happened?
What is going on here? And they bring Rodney into
the house and they sit him down, and Rodney starts saying,
these men they took her. I don't know where they went.
I think I've been shot. And so they're trying to
assess exactly what his wounds are, and you, thank god
(14:07):
hadn't been shot, but he's been severely beaten.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Police were being called. They started removing his shirt to
see where else because he said he was shot and
started compressed and trying to stop the bleeding.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
But Jim notices that Rodney isn't really bleeding anymore. It
turns out that he wasn't shot. The blood on his
head and his face is dry.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
It wasn't like it was running down like he just happened.
And that's one thing I noticed had bothered me for
a long time. He had a probably two to and
a half inch cut on his right cheek, and I
noticed it had started to coagulate. So that tells you
there's been some time from incident to current time. Right.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
What were Carla's parents feeling at this point? I can't
even imagine to have your daughter's date show up covered
in blood saying they took her.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
Carla's father, who's retired military, he yells to Jim, Carla's brother,
and he says, come with me, and the father goes
and gets his gun.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Whow Dad was out the door, and you know he
knew where Carla was last seeing he's out the door
with his weapon, and he would have absolutely absolutely killed
this guy. He was going to get his little girl.
He yelled at me, said Jimmy come on, and I
just I froze. I had never seen anything like this,
(15:38):
so he took off. You know, that's something I've lived
with for decades as well, and I regret that. I
regret that, but he never said anything to me about it,
and I don't think I've ever told anybody that before,
but I wish I had gone.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Can you imagine being twelve years old and all this
is happening. Your sister's gone, Your dad is heading out
the door with a gun, maybe to kill whoever took her.
It's like your whole world is bursting.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
It's absolutely heartbreaking. Carla's mom and aunt are taking care
of Rodney, and they've called the police.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
All hell was unleashed. We had law enforcement coming in.
They're trying to get details. Mom was very stoic. I
don't recall any yelling or screaming, cursing. I stood back
and was just watching. And life changed forever and always
at that point, New Walker's changed. My sister, Cindy slept
(16:42):
on the couch hoping to hear. You know, we were
just hoping somebody come by and push Carl out of
the car, just get her back. Sunday morning, everybody woke
up to the abduction in the newspaper. The high school
the west side of Fort Orth shocked. You know, they
just saw Carl before and Ridney and these other kids
and now kidnapped. You know all that comes along with that,
(17:05):
A big, ugly dude in a pretty young girl one
thirty ish in the morning. So the next morning people
were already out, you know, high schoolers were out searching
motor bikes, horses, right. Law enforcement next morning was was crazy.
And then you know, no word, you know, one person
(17:25):
said to my dad late and Carl is probably gonna
be had been raped. My dad was angry, So I
don't care. We just want her back. We want her back.
We will take care of everything. We want her back.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
So the night Carlo was abducted, her father gets his
gun and goes looking for her.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
Yeah, so he drives to the bowling alley where Rodney
says that Carla was pulled out of the car by
one or maybe two men. And it's pretty close, it's
only a mile away from Carla's house. The police arrived
quickly and they find Carla's yellow purse and a magazine
to a gun lying in the parking lot, and that's it.
(18:20):
There's no sign of where Carla was taken.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Did anyone see anything?
Speaker 4 (18:25):
No, So the parking lot had emptied out by the
time all of this had happened. And remember this is
nineteen seventy four, so there's no surveillance cameras at the
bowling alley, no cell phones, and the parking lot wasn't
well late. It was pretty dark.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
So the only things we have to go on are
rodney story of what happened, and a magazine from a gun.
But we don't even know if that magazine is related
to Carla's disappearance exactly.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
And remember this is Texas in the seventies, so it
wasn't super prising to find this magazine in the parking lot,
and there's so little evidence for police to work with. Now,
Rodney's treated at the hospital and he actually heads back
to Carla's house and he ends up sleeping in Carla's
(19:15):
bed while hundreds of people are out looking for her.
Carlo's brother, Jim says, this goes on for three days.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
I'm looking at the front door, and the front door
was opened, the screen door was closed because people were
coming and going, and homicide detectives, detectives from Fort Worth
and Sheriff's department and a couple other men, and they
were talking. My parents were listening when a news reporter
showed up at the front screen door and said, Hi,
(19:47):
you know, it's missus Walker. I'm so and so with
Fort Star Telegram. How are you feeling that that found
your daughter. I was in the middle of the living room.
My back was facing the fireplace, and I remember my
looking toward the fireplace, and that's the first time in
my life I ever saw his bomber pilot blue eyes
(20:07):
intents right water up. I didn't see tears, but I
clearly saw water in his eyes, and my mom was
leaning against him and her head went down. So that's
how they found out.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
With a shock.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, Jim says. They all fully expected Carla to be
found alive. They hadn't even thought that this could become
a murder, you know, a homicide case, that she wouldn't
be coming home, and that moment just completely changed everything.
The police get on the phone and then they're able
(20:54):
to confirm that Carla's body had been found in a
culvert the side of the road about five miles away.
Her blue Valentine's Day dress is ripped and bloody. Her
underwear and pantyhose are found a little bit away from
(21:16):
her body near the entrance of this culvert. And she's
been beaten, raped and strangled. There's nothing else there. They
don't find any fingerprints. They do find some bodily fluid
on Carla's bra, but you know, this is nineteen seventy four,
(21:37):
there's no DNA testing. The one piece of evidence that
they do have is the magazine club that they found
in the parking lot.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Can they identify the type of gun.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It belonged to, what's called a twenty two ruger handgun?
And so the police do. They go when they get
a list of everyone in the area who's bought this
type of gun, and they go when they interview all
of those people, they give them polygraphs, they check alibis,
and everybody passes. No one raises suspicion.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
There weren't any other indications that any of those people
were involved.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
Correct. Some of the people who had owned this type
of gun were able to show that, you know, produce
the gun, show the police, here's my gun, fully intact.
There was one person on the list. He was a
thirty one year old truck driver who passed the polygraph
and he said that his gun had been stolen a
while before, but there was no reason to suspect him,
(22:45):
so the police were really left with nothing and the
case goes cold. And this case really, from every single
person that I've talked to, it changed fort Worth.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
It was just such a shock because it was a
safe place to grow up. There wasn't a lot of crime.
Speaker 6 (23:08):
I wouldn't go outside, I wouldn't go anywhere by myself
after dark, and then still I would be like locking
my doors if I did go by myself.
Speaker 5 (23:21):
And sometimes you'd meet somebody and it's like is he
the one? Or you'd see somebody that acted weird and
you know, maybe he's the one. It just shattered our innocence.
Speaker 4 (23:34):
Typically a crime like this is committed by somebody who
knows the victim, so people do start to kind of
look at one another and wonder because everyone thinks someone knows.
Somebody knows.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
Yeah, somebody's got to know something, yeah, and.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
It's somebody in our community.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Cloud of sadness came over, hopefulness was gone. I think
my mom suffered in silence. She and dad had a
lot of intense conversations. Only kid living in the house
at the time.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
I mean, jim he's only twelve at the time, and
he's thrust into this horrible tragedy. I just wonder, how's
he feeling? How do you even begin to process what's happening.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
Yeah, I had the same question.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Nobody ever talked to me. I was a watcher. I
set aside and I watch. I watched these huge, bigger
than life homicide detectives come in. They would pull me in,
let me listen to stuff. Nobody ever sat down said, Jimmy,
you know, how are you feeling? So I watched and no, no,
(24:51):
no exaggeration. In the first ten minute conversation you and
I had, that would have been more than any conversation
I had with either one of my parents about what
happened to Carla. I was probably out of school for
you know, the entire week after Carla's abduction, and when
the Sheriff's department came by and said, you know, we're
(25:12):
positive it's her, but we we need you to go
down and identify the biding. That was a tough night.
And for some unknown reason, I went with them and
we drove down to the corner's office and it was
dark So there's two big glass pedestrian doors like we
see in businesses or hospitals today. One with door was
(25:32):
opened out there's a hallway, and I was just lined
up perfectly with the door, looking down the hallway, watching
mom and dad go. And as mom and dad entered
this hallway on the right hand side, a door opened.
Then it was left open, and my mom and dad
went into that room within fifteen seconds. And this is
(25:55):
something that used to I just couldn't hardly talk about
because I'd cried. I hope you never hear or have
to be around when a mama sees her beloved seventeen
year old daughter dead and bruised and beaten and bloody
on a table that kind of pulled back a blanket
(26:18):
to see the face and neck. I don't know if
you ever heard a mom's scream of pain when they
see their baby. It's worse than any sound, almost any
sound I think I could possibly imagine, other than a
child hurting, but even that's different. It was a gictorial
(26:43):
from the deepest part of her core, painful scream within
fifteen seconds of them entering that room. That's what I heard,
And that was really probably the beginning of me becoming angry.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
Before Carlo's murder, Jim says, he played sports, he hung
out with friends. You know, he's really happy. But now
he becomes absolutely consumed with finding out who did this
to his sister, and he wants revenge. Jim starts working
out every day so he can physically confront Carla's attacker,
and he canvases the neighborhood. He is looking for any
(27:29):
signs or anyone who looks suspicious. He actually becomes convinced
that whoever did this is driving by his house every day.
He becomes distrustful. He's short tempered, and he's getting into
fights like daily.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
I didn't again, didn't have the life experiences to realize
what I was looking at. So you know, as a teenager,
I was spitting bullets, ready to I was ready to
just kill some you know, some guy who did this
in my family. It changed, It went to season of
mourning and grieving, but with that was mixed intense intense
(28:07):
determination to find out what happened to Carla and who did.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
It and where's the investigation at this point, So this
is also part of the tragedy.
Speaker 4 (28:17):
Police chase down every single lead. They get and they
still only have Rodney's story to go on and that
clip from the gun in the Bowling Alley parking lot.
By the end of nineteen seventy four, Carla's case goes
cold and it stays that way for forty six years.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Next time on America's Crime Lab, it.
Speaker 7 (28:47):
Became very apparent that everybody had an opinion of what
happened to Carla right, And what was really unusual was
very few people felt like it was a stranger. Most
everyone felt like it was somebody who knew.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Carl Rodney's story had you know, it actually had some
question marks on it. I started remembering that cut on
his right cheek, and it wasn't freshly blaeding, it was coagulating.
Remember me saying.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
That Rodney doesn't show up to Carlo's house after she
was abducted for an hour and a half, and it
was like, well, where do you go?
Speaker 2 (29:31):
Why did it take him so long? America's Crime Lab
is produced by Rococo Punch for Kaleidoscope. Erica Lance is
our story editor, and sound design is by David Woji.
Our producing team is Catherine Fedalosa and Jessica Albert, our
executive producers. Are Kate Osborne, Mangesh Jadigadour, and David and
Kristin Middleman, And from iHeart Katrina Norville and Ali Perry.
(29:55):
Special thanks to Connell Byrne, Will Pearson, Carrie Lieberman, Nikki Eto,
Nathan Etowski, John Burbank, and the entire team at AUTHRM.
I'm Alan lance Lessor, thanks for listening.
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.