MURDERED: Shari Smith & Debra Helmick
When 17-year-old Shari Smith is abducted from her driveway in broad daylight, it seems like her family’s nightmare can’t get any worse. But when her abductor starts calling them relentlessly, investigators hope that his recklessness will lead to his downfall… that is, until a second girl goes missing in an eerily similar manner.
John Douglas book When a Killer Calls
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Episode Source Material
- The FBI Files: Cat and Mouse (Season 2, Episode 2). Accessed via YouTube.
- Forensic Files: Last Will (Season 7, Episode 42). Accessed May 18, 2022 via YouTube.
- When a Killer Calls: A Haunting Story of Murder, Criminal Profiling, and Justice in a Small Town, by John Douglas and Mark Olshaker (Print Edition)
- The Herald (Rock Hill, SC): Crews Search for Teen, by Associated Press
- The State (Columbia, SC): Bell jury sees more evidence, by Margaret N. O’Shea
- The Greenville News (Greenville, SC): Officers seeking suspects in rash of abductions, by Associated Press
- The Greenville News (Greenville, SC): Autopsy report not conclusive on teen’s death, by Associated Press
Suggested Episodes
WANTED: Justice for Rhys Pocan & MMIW Part 1
In 2021, we set out to cover the case of Rhys Pocan, a 35-year-old Indigenous woman who was murdered in Wisconsin in the ‘80s. But while we were in the field, we uncovered a disturbing pattern of murders with similarities to Rhys’ that were just too blatant to ignore. So, we spent the next three years working with local and federal law enforcement to try and get to the bottom of it.
WANTED: The Keddie Cabin Killer
A family’s brutal murder rocks a tiny California town and leaves behind too many unanswered questions.
WANTED: Justice for MMIP
May is Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Month, and we want to highlight some of the many cases involving members of Native American communities that so often go underreported and underserved, and thus unsolved.
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