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And we're live on Matchday as Doug reaches for a buffalo wing. He's got it. Oh, and he's gone for a can of Pepsi too. What a finish. There's no doubt about it. It just tastes better. Matchdays deserve Pepsi. Welcome back to the 2020 True Crime Vault here on Cape Cod. The summer is wonderful. This is a place where people leave their doors open. Nine one one. This line's recorded. What is your emergency? It's CR 2002, Worthington homicide scene. There hadn't been a murder in Truro for 30 years. These things don't happen on Cape Cod. Everyone is thinking, oh my goodness, we have a murderer amongst us. Jealousy, anger, secrets, sex and money. That was all in this story. How does a glamorous fashion writer end up in Cape Cod, dead in a bungalow? Well, there were all kinds of rumors as to who did it. Who did the police question? Everybody. I couldn't imagine who could have killed her. It was January 6, 2002. I was an EMT on the trail, rescue squad. The pager that I had went off and said that we had a rescue call for an unresponsive female at 50 Depot Road. And I thought, gee, I think that's the Worthington residence. So I went in and just looked. And Christa was naked from the waist down, lying on her back, very dead. She was stabbed through the chest. Her cell phone was left on the kitchen counter with just the digit 9 punched in as if she might have been trying to dial 911-46-year-old Christa Worthington, an accomplished fashion writer, was found murdered Sunday in her Truro home. It was everyone's worst nightmare. A woman alone in her home with her 2 year old child in her beautiful cottage in Cape Cod, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, being found dead. It involved a single woman who was a mother with an out of wedlock child fathered by a local Lothario, murdered with her baby daughter left beside her for 36 hours unattended by anyone. Her two and a half year old daughter, Ava was found unharmed near the body. She had been with her mother's body for more than 24 hours. There's some evidence that she had taken her sippy cup and tried to feed her mother. And she's trying to wake her mother up. Ava had gotten a washcloth and gone wet it somehow gotten up on the stool, turned on the faucet, swabbed her mother's body. You know, she had been trying. She had been trying to clean up her mother. Heartbreaking stuff. The Cape had Never seen or witnessed an event like this ever in Truro. Amalia barrada new Center 5 and it was big because it happened in Truro and these things don't happen in Truro. On Cape Cod, the summer is wonderful. It is warm. All of the Patti Page songs about Cape Cod, beaches, the sunsets, all true if you're fond of sand dunes and salty air. Quaint little villages here and there for beauty, for beaches, for wonderful fishing, for shell fishing, for solitary walks. There's just nothing like it anywhere that I've ever been. People like to describe the Cape as like an arm. And Provincetown is at the very end of the arm and Truro is sort of at the wrist. Cape Cod alone is bucolic, but Truro is really. They call Truro the Garden of Eden of Massachusetts. Truro is known today as the most rural town in Cape Cod. We have no town center. We have no streets. We have a post office and a general store. And the people that see you every day are the same people, very much like Groundhog Day. The same trash guy, the same milk guy, the same grocer. I mean, this is a place where people leave their doors open. This is not a place where people get killed. The Worthington family goes back generations here in Truro, where they are rich in property. Christa inherited her mother's weather worn cottage. It was here that she came in search of solace. But instead it was where she was savagely murdered. Secret sex and money. That was all in this story. But the story I was interested in was the real story. Who was Christa Worthington? Krista was the only child. She grew up in Hingham, Mass. Which is south of Boston, kind of tony suburb. Her father was a Harvard educated lawyer and it was a very privileged upbringing. After high school, Krista went to Vassar. I was a Vassar classmate of Christa Worthington. Krista and I were in this English thesis class. Krista was someone you would know because she was so short. Short but interesting looking and pretty. She was brilliant in class. The first few decades of her life outside of college were high fashion, high society. She began a career in fashion writing. She actually was the bureau chief in Paris for Women's Wear Daily. She wrote for all the major magazines. Cosmo, Harper's Bazaar, New York, York Times. She works for Elle magazine. I met Christa when we were editors together at elle magazine, probably 1990. The Devil Wears Prada 25 Years later is more or less what the life was like at the magazine. Nice to meet you. Hi. Pleasure. You Love the show. It was kind of an ongoing party disguised as a publication. She interviewed people like Yves Saint Laurent, Martha Stewart. She even dated Anderson Cooper's brother. Chris is writing. Oh, she could make anything just sound like magic. The most boring thing in the world was all of a sudden fresh and exciting, smooth and refined prose style. The headscarf. The headscarf reveals as it conceals. The louder the go away message, the more audible the come hither. Isn't that great? I remember talking with Krista about her leaving New York City. There was nothing directly to predict that this could have happened to her. The question on a lot of people's minds is how does a glamorous fashion writer end up in some small town in Cape Cod, dead in a bungalow? There are the immediate investigation of all of the relationships that the victim has and has had, as well as putting together the tracing of her movements in the last days and hours. There was nothing to indicate who it might have been. The house at 50 Depot Road is isolated. It isn't something that you happen to walk by because it's sits well in on a long driveway. So you would have no idea of any activity going on in there. I couldn't imagine who could have killed her. I couldn't even think of it. There was so much talk about who did it and who had the motive. And believe me, everyone in this story had a motive. The whole thing was just really bizarre. January 6, 2002, Worthington homicide scene. This is the first murder in this town in 30 years. With all the media attention surrounding this is gonna put enormous pressure on the police department to solve this and solve it fast. I was told by the state police that Tim Arnold was their number one suspect. Her last live in boyfriend. He lived next door. He's the one who found the body. Why would he go there that night? Is that true that he was going to return a flashlight? 911, what is your emergency? It's Crystal Worthington. I'm sure she's dead. When he returns with more of a killing on the Cape. Come the late fall, the weather turns vicious. The loneliness, the sense of isolation definitely builds. The quiet is so thorough, so deep that I think it scares certain people. Cape is not a particularly popular place in the winter because it's cold and it's isolated. Christa, as a writer, kept diaries. I do feel stormbound. The cabin fever so intense. It's become part of my metabolism, pumping like blood. This crime happened in the dead of winter. In January there are even less people around in this small Town, everyone is thinking, oh my goodness, we have a murderer amongst us. After the murder of Christa Worthington, there was this free floating anxiety everywhere. People started locking their doors overnight. It was a transformation. Tim Arnold was the number one suspect in the first year of the investigation. Tim Arnold was a former boyfriend of Krista Worthington. They dated for a while, over a year. But at the time she was murdered, they were actually broken up. The police, they always take a close look at the people who are in the orbit. He was a boyfriend, he was an ex lover. Sometimes that generates hard feelings. So that was 1, 2. He found the body. You always take a close look at the person who found the body. It's picked up by Ty Law. It was a Sunday afternoon. There was an important Patriots football game going on into the end zone. Tim Arnold says he was watching the game with his father and his father suggested that he return a flag flashlight to Krista. His father drove him to Krista's house. He's heading to the home, spots two unopened newspapers. Immediately makes him wonder why are the papers unopened? And he looked through the kitchen door window and saw Krista lying on the floor. She was totally still. She wasn't even moving. He pushed his way into the house and he went and he found Ava next to her mother. And he leaned over and he touched Krista and she was cold. He picked up Ava and she knew him. She responded to him. He takes her in her arms and he takes the child out to his father. And he turns to his father and says, Krista is d e a d doesn't want to say it out loud. 911, this line's recorded. What is your emergency? Please send somebody to 50 Depot Road. Okay, what's the problem? It's Krista Worthington. I don't know what happened. I think she fell down or something. I'm sure she's dead. Okay, is there somebody there? I just, I'm a friend and I just was returning a flashlight to her and I saw a light on. Her two year old daughter was there nursing on her body. Okay, I'll send them right over. The police took Tim Arnold back to the station to question him that night. They spent some time with him and then they drove him home and he walked into the house and his father was in front of the tv. And I was very shocked when Tim told me that his father said to Tim, tim, did you do it? His own father asked him that. From that moment on, the whole town was asking questions like that. Did Tim do It it's clear that Tim Arnold and Krista had a tumultuous relationship. They had an intense relationship. He lived with her for a while. Ava started to call him Tim Mom. So he wasn't just him, he was Tim Mom. He's a very sensitive, artistic, educated, well spoken, gentle person. I think one reason Krista connected with Tim Arnold is that he was literary. He wrote a couple books. He wrote this book, the Winter Mittens, which is a children's book, but it's a very strange little children's book. It's very dark. When she pulled on the right mitten to take it off, it would not move. She pulled frantically at them with her teeth. But the Winter Mittens held fast to her hands, as if with a life of their own. Tim Arnold and Krista would fight. Tim said that she criticized everything. She would criticize him for humming, and she would say she didn't want Ava to become a hummer. So he couldn't even hum. They had broken up, but he still seemed to have affection for Christa. Now he lived nearby with his father, only 100 yards away. Tim told the police that he was out running one day and he stopped by Krista's house and knocked on the door. Didn't get an answer. So he walks around and he looks in a window. And she apparently got extremely upset with him. Krista had voicemails left on her answering machine. Now they were left by Tim, and they seemed to show that he was. He was upset with their relationship. Well, I think you've made it very clear where you stand on the issue of friendship. So I, at this point, don't expect me to be around it. Hi, Chris. Just to clarify, if you wanted to call to try to arrange for time for me to see Ava, that would be fine, and I'll see what I can do. But I don't really think that we should see each other, even briefly. Bye. There was a way in which she talked about Tim Arnold, that maybe he snapped and went berserk. It seemed like he had a motive because she pushed him away. They kept painting Tim Arnold as the jilted lover who wanted her so badly that he would take her life to prevent her from being with another man. It affected him a lot. It was devastating. To be under suspicion is a terrible thing. He told me that the state police came over once and really grilled him. You know, you get a jab from one side and then a right hook from the other. You know, more than once he would say something like, I had not killed Krista and he said they would come right back and say, oh, yes, you did. Tim is a logical person to look at. But there was just nothing to support that he killed her. And so they moved on to other suspects. Truro is a small town and Christa wasn't really a small town girl. She had a very complicated love life. Tim Arnold wasn't the only person who Christa had been involved with relatively recently. And most importantly, Tim Arnold was not the father of her child. They have to look at the father of Christa's baby, the local shellfish constable, Tony Jacket. She knew that she was getting herself ensnared in a big, angry hornet's nest, that she didn't care. Definitely Tony had a motive. The initial thought was, has to be this guy. He has everything to lose. Examined life isn't worth living, but the examined life will make you want to die. The first step in trying to solve a crime is, is to understand, get to know the victim, what's going on in their life, what is their personality. And you look at her life in New York, what went on in those relationships. When I first met Krista, she reminded me of kind of an old soul. There was something sort of ethereal about her, maybe a little wistful and mysterious. The paradox of Christa Worthington was that she presented as somebody who was really on top of things, who was elegant and refined. But there was a way in which emotionally she was disorganized, disorderly, undisciplined. She was no mild mannered, timid soul. She was an obsessive personality. She obsessed about books, she obsessed about money, she obsessed about sexual. Krista's love life was a mess. There was no other way to describe it. The people that she was with became stranger and weirder. She was involved with a guy named Thomas Churchwell, who was a magician. During the time that I was with Christopher, I was known as the Amazing Tarkin. I would go to a bar called the Barfly on 23rd Street. She would go and sit with her girlfriends and watch me perform. There was something deeply helpless and vulnerable about her. She had those eyes that would melt you. She brought out the protective feelings in friends, especially male friends. Probably had melted every man that she was with. Christa was somebody who was consumed with regret. There was always this regret elf sitting on her shoulder, whispering in her ear. Christa began to regret that she hadn't had a child. And so she began the process of trying to get herself pregnant. I later found out that we were having a sexual relationship. For Crystal to have a child. So we just broke away from each other. Crystal went public about her desire as a single woman to have a baby. This was the 1990s, at a time when women didn't really talk about these types of things. She wrote an article in Harper's Bazaar and it was am I selfish to try to have a child in vitro at age 40? There is at the moment no father for a child of mine, no husband for me. And what if there never is? I have to stare the scenario in the face and to my surprise, it hasn't killed me. It was a defiant side of her. I was very surprised that she'd gone so public with this. She went on a national TV show, the Lisa show, trying to figure out how to be the best parent to to your child, given that there is no father. And then Krista received a devastating diagnosis. She was told that she was in early menopause and likely would never be able to have a child. The worst has happened. The thing I dreaded and never really believed would happen and yet always knew would. It seems she wanted a change in her life. Krista decides to leave New York City to go to Cape Cod. This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome? That's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50 page restoration block. Or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it, ready to make anything online make sense. There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required compatibility and availability varies. 18. You thought this was your run club era. Turns out it was more of a thinking about run club era. The good news? Someone's marathon training is about to start. Sell your workout gear on Depop. Just snap a few photos and we'll take care of the rest. They get their race day fit and you get a payout for trying. Someone on Depop wants what you've got. Start selling now. Depop, where taste recognizes taste. Christo grew up going to the Cape in the summer. Truro was a safe haven for her. The Worthington family was Truro royalty. They went way back in time. This is Worthingtonville, you know. The Worthingtons have houses all around there, as they have for two generations. In the Cape Town, Krista seemed to access the truer version of herself. Throw the Hermes and the Givenchy to the back of the closet and just relax. She was living in a little tiny cottage right on the harbor that had belonged to her grandmother. That was the first time she noticed Tony Jack. I got to know her a little bit. I think there was a time that she asked me to do something up at her house and that was when I got to be more friendly with her. His title was Shellfish Constable. He really was sort of the police of the fish in the area. These are 20 bags. You're taking up 20 bags today. He was good looking and dashing. People talk about his thick black, curly hair. Tony was the kind of guy that women wanted and men wanted to be. Before you know it, he was going over to her house for tea. I remember thinking, go home, go home. And I would turn the right, go right up the driveway. And then of course, it became a little deeper. I think I got caught up in the idea of a romance. It was just exciting, you know. The thing that makes the relationship with Tony kind of tricky is that he'd been married for 27 years and had six kids. If there was a sweeter person on earth between the hours of 8 and 9:15, I would not believe it. Tony became tender and we were made new spellbound. I love him. It's a small town. You're nervous. At least aware that, you know, you could be seen the thrill of ordering pizza in public. That is adultery. When ordering pizza becomes a thing of beauty. This was no secret. You know, gossip, gossip, gossip. Everybody knew. She tells me that, I think you should sit down. I have something to tell you. I'm pregnant. So I'm thinking, how could I be so dumb? She had been told that she couldn't have babies. She became pregnant at 42. Now I'm at my desk looking at three sonograms of the baby, Tony's baby. Once she gets pregnant, they decide to end the relationship. And Krista initially says that she's gonna have the baby but not tell anyone. It's gonna be their secret. From her diaries, it's clear that as her pregnancy progresses, she's becoming more frustrated with Toni's lack of involvement. I wonder if it will always be like this. The emptiness around me, miles and miles of it. While my lover lies with his wife. I feel abandoned. He will do anything to tread water, to stay afloat on a way that makes no waves. That is what he's doing now. What I actually most remember is receiving the birth card of Ava and just kind of marveling that she pulled it off. I would babysit Monday to Friday, 9 to 4. She was just very, very sweet to Ava. I've never heard her raise her voice to Ava, very loving mother. Krista adored being a mom. Finally, there had been something in her life that she didn't regret and never would. When Ava is about a year and a half years old, she decides that she does want Tony to tell his wife Susan that they have a child together. She decides, I want Ava to know who her father is. And telling your wife, that's your problem, that's your job. I know he is preparing his denials every which way. I feel like ruining the joyful Christmas with a little letter on my birthday. Why should he get off so lightly? Krista wrote a letter addressed to Susan. She details the affair that she was having with her husband. The first day we slept together, we were in bed from 11am to 7pm this was a letter written by one woman to another meant to hurt, to injure. The letter would definitely be important for police. There were all kinds of rumors, you know, all kinds of rumors as to who did it, you know, was it Tony? Was it his wife? I suspected him as a suspect, the first suspect and then her as the second. My darling daughter, I am interested only in your welfare, only in you. In her diary, Krista talks about her adoration and her love for her baby. Ava, we took you to the ocean today. It was the waves. You are so brave and zoomed straight for the water. Fearless and joyful. She also feels tremendous resentment towards Ava's father, Tony Jacket. She feels abandoned by him. I get so upset that that creep is her father. How he has let me down. They decided that they would tell no one about the baby. But when Ava is about a year and a half years old, Krista demands that Tony tell his wife. Susan baby got to an age where she started to talk and was able to start asking questions like where's dad? That's when she wanted me to tell my wife. I was totally devastated. I was so shocked. He never wanted to leave. He was never unhappy. He was just a naughty boy. Susan, God bless her, welcomed Krista and Ava into their lives. Tony and Susan and Krista would have Sunday dinners together and the theme of this was let's give Ava a home. She wanted to develop a relationship with little Ava, knowing this is her husband's daughter. The last time Krista is seen alive for certain is in a surveillance video from a stop in shop Friday afternoon. We see her with her daughter Ava pushing a cart. It's always eerie, sad to see video of a victim in the last moments of the person's life. Little did she know that within a day she would be dead. Christa Worthington found stabbed to death in her Truro home. Her then two and a half year old daughter clinging to her lifeless mother. George Malloy was one of the first medical personnel EMT to arrest arrive at the scene. Most importantly, he's the one who has to comfort Ava. I just sat down and tried to communicate with this little girl. I didn't know whether she had witnessed her mother's death or what had gone on. I was asking her when was the last time you had changed? When was the last time you had anything to eat? There was no response. Really different people started to show up. Tony's one wife and Tony showed up and Jacket's wife said to me, don't listen to anything this little girl has to say. She's a liar. And I'm thinking to myself what Susan says she never called Ava a liar, that she was just making a lighthearted comment about her fibbing and that that's been taken completely out of context at this point. You've got to dead woman who he's had an affair with. You got his wife in front of me telling her that the two year old is a liar. I suspected him as a suspect, the first suspect and then her as the second. Then the investigators find a letter that Krista wrote to Susan about the affair. She never sent the letter in which she said when you thought Tony was taking your son to the bus station, he was me. This was a letter written by one woman to another meant to hurt, to injure. From September to the day your mother in law died. I was sleeping with your husband. I just thought you should know. The letter would definitely be important for police because they're going to be one if Krista was so angry at Susan, was Susan so angry at Krista? They asked Susan to take a polygraph test and she agreed and she passed. As the investigation turns towards Tony Jacket, the investigators realize that there may have been a lot of pressure on Tony Jacket. She wanted him to help her bring up this child, putting her on his health insurance and providing financial support. She got herself a lawyer and said, you're going to support this kid or I'm going to sue you. Maybe, you know, Tony wanted to get Krista out of the picture so he could just take Ava and raise her himself. Why would I want to kill her? But they're getting information that says otherwise, that Krista wanted money, that Krista was going to go to court. At the same time the murder investigation begins, Tony has a custody battle. Amira Chase was Christa Worthington's Very good friend. Krista had a will and in it she named Amira, guardian of little Ava. She's like a light in our family. She's a beautiful little girl and we love her. The DA was there. He had gotten up to speak and said, look, we can't rule Mr. Jacket in or out as far as being someone that could have committed this crime. He didn't want to put his family through even more pressure. So he stepped back and Amira stepped forward. The decision was is that Amira was going to get custody. The investigation seemed stalled. So what you do is you make the circle bigger. The state police drove down to New York T.C. churchwell, the magician. They said, well, we feel that you did this. And I'm like, why? And they said, well, because it's something that a magician could do. He could create this mystery. And I said, just because you can't figure it out does not mean that it was a magician that did it. There were so many different possible suspects. This case almost becomes like a game of clue. Even Christa's father and his girlfriend were potential suspects in this case. Christopher Toppy Worthington, 72 year old Harvard educated lawyer, turns out had a 29 year old girlfriend who was a former prostitute and heroin addict. Toppy was taking money and supporting Elizabeth Porter. The names on apartment number four are Worthington as in Christopher, and Porter as in Elizabeth. On top of the sort of social embarrassment of having her dignified elderly dad cavorting around was the fact that she was watching her future share of the estate go away. She wanted this stopped. Elizabeth Porter kept her hood up and her head down. Today, state police questioned her in the investigation into the stabbing death of fashion writer Christa Worthington this month. Perhaps the girlfriend offed Krista as a way of continuing the gravy train. Interestingly enough, Toppy and Elizabeth did not pass their polygraph tests. Unfortunately for the police, they had no evidence to link either one of them to Krista's murder. So now they keep looking. The police and the district attorney were desperate. They found no evidence that any of the people they had been investigating were involved in Christa's murder. Every one of the initial set of possible suspects denied having any role in Krista's death. The pressure was mounting to bring someone in. No one elects prosecutors to have crimes remain unsolved. They turned to what many people call a forensic Hail Mary. Investigators took the controversial step of launching what's called a DNA dragnet. It's like, are you kidding me? 2002 Worthington homicide scene Truro, Massachusetts. Crime scenes are extremely important in figuring out potentially what happened. Where did it start, where did it end, and what occurred in between. Krista's house is just a mess. There's things stacked and it's disorganized. Things aren't put away. If you don't know her and know how she lives, you would think that the bad guy has rifled through her stuff. She lived in a disorder that is almost impossible for you to understand. Her emotional life mimicked the way the house looked. I mean, it was topsy. There's nothing about this case that looks like this was a breaking into her house to steal things. This was all about her death. So here's this murder scene and Cheerios and a sippy cup and little footprints of Ava's through the blood on the floor. Chris's vehicle is in the driveway. Her keys are outside and some other personal items. There appears to be some sort of tussle or drag marks up to the door. The door was damaged, like potentially somebody kicked it. It tells you that there was a fight outside and that she ended up on the ground. So there's a disagreement. It's very difficult without any eyewitnesses. So what you have to turn to in a case like this is the body itself. You're looking for some sort of evidence from beyond the grave. She's got some defensive wounds on her hands and other places suggesting she did put up a fight. She was stabbed through the chest, through the trapezius muscle to where the blade nicked the floor. The murder weapon is. Has never been found, but there is a strong suggestion that the murder weapon was from her butcher block in her kitchen. What you try to do is sort of follow what you think the bad guy did. Where did he go? What did he do? What did he touch? They have problems here because this crime scene was managed very poorly. People made all sorts of accusations about the. The crime scene. Police interviews, forensic tests, crime scene analysis, all that stuff. Peter Manzo wrote about the investigation in his book Reasonable Doubt. The police here have not had to deal with a murder in maybe a generation two, generation three, who knows? These people are not trained to handle a murder scene. The blanket was thrown over the victim that contaminated the body. I can tell you that one of the rules of protocol is not to take a piece of evidence from a crime scene and cover the body with it. Even for decency's purposes. People were moving things around and touching things. The floor wasn't taped off for safe ways to walk on the crime scene. There are so many fingerprints from everybody touching everything. There's just a huge difference between CSI and Cape Cod. Csi District Attorney Michael o' Keefe told us first responders have to, quote, assess the threat and treat the injured. No crime scene is pristine. This one was better than many. While the crime scene was not pristine, they found critical evidence. DNA, sperm and saliva. We believe that Christa Worthington was involved in an intimate relationship with a person prior to or relatively contemporaneous with her death. Investigators and Worthington's family say they hope the $25,000 reward they are now offering will help establish the identity of that person, presumably the last to see her. About that mystery man, the district attorney will only say he is not necessarily Worthington's killer. Oh. What we would like is a resolution and some closure for Krista and for her daughter Ava. The police and the district attorney were desperate. They had not solved this case. So they decided to do a very unusual thing. Investigators took the controversial step of launching what's called a DNA dragnet. They asked all of Truro's roughly 800 male residents to voluntarily give DNA DNA samples. Who did the police question? Everybody. And they did so indiscriminately for literally hundreds of people, myself included. The post office, the filling station, coffee shop, and the Highland Grill are all locations in Truro where police asked men this morning to use this kit and voluntarily give saliva samples containing their DNA. They approached you and asked to be able to swab you men only. Almost everyone in town was a suspect. I mean, have you ever heard anything so ridiculous in all of your life? I mean, it's like, are you kidding me? The reaction was swift. This DNA sweep is what catapulted the case to a national profile, a national debate. Invigorated police tried to find the killer by asking every man in a small town to submit DNA. Civil libertarians were outraged. And it wasn't so much to get the DNA. It was to find out who's reluctant to give it. The district attorney says investigators will look more closely at those who do not cooperate. I would just say to any member of the public that they should have no trepidation about cooperating with the police. This is Big brother. This is 1984 type stuff. After three years of investigation, the police finally get this DNA break and they make an arrest, but they arrest someone that no one would have expected. We were stunned, especially since the person who was arrested was not anybody we had ever heard of. It's like he came out of nowhere. Choice hotels get you more of what you value. Comfort Inn. It's calling your name on the stain. Oh, and free waffles are yours to claim. Book direct@joycehotels.com teens share everything that may include the bacteria that can cause meningococcal disease known as meningitis. Even if your teen's been vaccinated in the past, they could still be missing meningitis vaccinations. Ask your teen's doctor or visit meningitis.com today. Sponsored by GS. Christa Worthington found stabbed to death in her Truro home. How does a glamorous fashion writer end up in some small town in Cape Cod, dead in a bungalow? It was everyone's worst nightmare. A woman alone in her home with her two year old child. She had been with her mother's body for more than 24 hours. Secrets, sex and money. That was all in this story. There were so many different possible suspects. This case almost becomes like a game of Clue. Who did the police question? Everybody. They arrest someone that no one would have expected. It's like he came out of nowhere. I think there is so much mystery that still surrounds this case. Last night at approximately 7:15pm Detectives from the Massachusetts State Police arrested Christopher A. McGowan, age 33, for the murder of Christa A. Worthington. Christopher McCowan was Christa's trash collector. I remember seeing the film of him being brought out of his house and he was just completely lost. He's been arrested for murder of the most high profile case in Cape Cod in half a century. We have matched the DNA from the crime scene to this person. So it turns out that the DNA dragnet did not find them. Their killer DNA they got a hit on. They had had for maybe over a year. It had been sent to the DNA lab and it's taken that long to finally get it processed. I think some of the town wondered why did it take so long for the police to look at this person who picked up Krista's trash every week? They did talk to him. They talked to him not that long after the murder. It would be standard that you're going to look at people who logically had interaction with her one time three months after Krista's killed, another time, two years. In both cases, he basically says he hardly knew her. He was cooperating with them. He wasn't fleeing, he wasn't hiding. He's volunteering his DNA. He didn't act like somebody who was guilty of this. When the trash collector at her home has twice denied even knowing really Christa Worthington and then you match the sperm and saliva found on her body back to him. Prosecutors, police are going to be thinking, we've got our guy. Who was Christopher McCowan? My wife knew him. It wouldn't be to quite sometimes after the arrest that we really learned who Christopher McCown was. You know, he just seemed like a quiet, low key kind of guy. Little known person had previously worked for a moving company on the cape. Christopher McCown was 33, had three kids with three mothers and had moved to the Cape from Florida. Family wasn't on the Cape. That's the first place you go to the family for a reaction. What do you think about your son being arrested for murder? That's Chris, see him, he's seven years old. He wanted to be friends with Everybody. I'm Roy McCowan, I'm the father of Chris McCowan. I'm saying to myself, Christopher McCowan is a player, he's not a murderer. And then when I read about the knife and the woman's chest, stuck it so hard where it stuck to the floor, I said, there's no way in the world is that Chris. Christopher loved his job. He always wanted to move up, wanted to get his own truck and he wanted to like partner with his boss. So I thought that was great. I met with Chris McCowan. In my mind he was not a person capable of this type of crime. There was no motive. It's a guy who was a father who loved children. Chris's daughter was the same age as Ava. Was the same age as Ava. This is not a cold, deliberate, calculating person. This is not a person who had a reason to do harm to another. There are a number of people who don't believe that Christopher McCowan could ever would have done this. And that includes his boss. They've got the wrong person. This person just would not do that. When he would get in an argument with another driver over some silly thing and Chris would just walk away from it, he would not fight. His appearance was outside the norm for outer Cape residents. Over six feet, dark skinned, muscular. Automatic thought I think was that Chris would be a scary, intimidating man. But when you got to know him, he was so much the opposite. As far as I'm concerned, Chris has no violence in him. Did you kill Christopher? Do you have any comments? 33 year old Christopher McGowan had no comment as he arrived at Orleans District Court this morning for his arraignment on charges of raping and murdering 46 year old Christa Worthington. Christopher McGowan is charged with murder, but he's also charged with rape. And that turns out to be a very controversial charging decision. Between the time of the murder and the arrest of Chris McCowan three years later, there was not a word about rape. Not one word about rape. They were never looking for a rapist here. They wanted to know who her boyfriends were because they knew there was a semen in her. The sperm sample that they found, it was degraded that the sperms had no tails. So it might have been a couple days old. It might have been from. Not on the night of the murder, but from prior to the murder. There was a rush to judgment. You had a black garbage man. The Cape is not very heterogeneous. Nationally, black people make up 13 and a half percent of the population. Cape Cod, you know, the home of Jack Kennedy. The figure is 1.2%. There was no question that there was a DNA match, but there was in a lot of people's minds, a question of whether there could have been a consensual relationship. McCowan says that he had a number of consensual relationships with women who were on his route when he was collecting garbage. Chris was quite the ladies man. He was very charismatic. He had many, many girlfriends. He was pretty much of a stud. The question is, would Christa Worthington have a consensual sexual relationship with the African American trash collector? Some say, well, why not? Christa's need for love and affirmation was so great that it wouldn't surprise me in the least if she had slept with him. Despite McCowan being well liked, when police did a background check, they found some information that was disturbing. McCowan had a criminal history for grand theft and burglary and had served time. Most importantly for this case, he had five restraining orders out against him from women who he knew. The allegations ranging from grabbing someone's neck, strangling, pushing, scaring, restraining orders. I think when the general public look at him and go, he did what? They have to. Look at the nature of this homicide. I mean, stabbing somebody, you got to literally be right on top of them. Does he have the capacity to do that? There's nothing in his history that would suggest that. I mean, typically people who commit these types of homicides, they've used knives before. He doesn't really sort of fit a person that would commit this type of homicide. 33 year old Christopher McGowan was arraigned this morning in Barnstable Superior Court. The records show that Defendant Krista M. McGowan is in the court, when charging the defendant with murder in the first degree, how do you plead, guilty or not guilty? Not guilty. Not only did Christopher McCowan say he did not murder Crystal Worthington, but he points the finger directly at someone else. Good afternoon, sir. In a nice loud voice, can you tell us your name for the record? Jeremy Frazier. Did you kill Crystal Worthington? Detective unit arrested Christopher A. McCowan, a 33 year old garbage man. Cowan's arrest brings much needed relief for Truro residents. For Cape Cod, this was the trial of the century. This is a small town in Massachusetts that hadn't had a first degree murder case in 30 years. The parking lot is chock a block full. Satellite TV trucks, reporters all over the place with cell phones, computers. The courtroom, the Barnstable courthouse, it's this sort of antique space and hanging from the ceiling is this beautiful silver codfish. As if everything that goes on here has this cod God above it. 33 year old Christopher McCowan was arraigned this morning in Barnstable Superior Court. The prosecution claiming McCowan's DNA links him to the violence stabbing of fashion writer Krista Worthington. Robert Walsh is the lead prosecutor and he's going to make an argument that they can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Chris McCowan raped and murdered Christa Worthington. So if you please raise your right hand. Do you solemnly swear the testimony you shall give to the jury. The first witness is Tim Arnold. He was the ex boyfriend. He's the one who found her body. There was blood around her head. Her knee was up in the air with the legs together or spread apart somewhat? Spread apart. It's not just that she was stabbed to death. She was also horribly beaten and there are bruises all over her body. The photos were very graphic. I think those photos helped us to get the reality of the crime scene, to get the reality of a murder was committed. The defendant was completely indifferent to her suffering. And that's based on the statement that you'll hear that he made a major component of this case. Was Christopher McGowan's statement given to the police during a very long interrogation? The prosecution relied upon it. Christopher Mason, the lead detective from the Massachusetts State Police, was a professional police officer who presented very well and he was credible. And did you have occasion to interview a Christopher McCowan? Yes, I did. The first two times that McGowan was questioned by the authorities, basically denied knowing her. But then they hand him the DNA report and everything changes. And I informed him that the report from the state police crime lab concluded that. That it was his DNA on the body of Crystal Worthington. And after you showed him that report, slid it across the table to him. What did he do that? So Mr. McCowan then stated, it could have been me. It could have been me. It could have been me. So McCown is saying, it could have been me who had sex with Christa because It was his DNA. Some of the strongest evidence against Christopher McCown is his statement. I mean, he denies knowing her, and then his semen is inside her. I mean, hello. And then his statement gets more and more incriminating. In his statement to police, Chris McCowan first says that Christa asked him to help dispose of a Christmas tree. Mr. McCown explained to me that he had had a discussion with Crystal Worthington that evening in that house about getting rid of the Christmas tree that Friday night. Is that correct? That's correct. McCown statement to the police progressed to the point where he admitted that he had sex with Crystal Worthington on the living room floor. His response was, I don't know. Is that a direct quote, sir? Yes, it is. He changes the story and introduces another person, a friend of his that he would socialize with. He also goes on to say, I wasn't the only one there. Jeremy Frazier and I went up there. Jeremy Frazier went, becomes a player in this case. He's young, under 21, knows Chris McGowan because they apparently hang out and run in the same circles. Sorry I didn't give it up to my man Frazier. Jeremy Frazier admits that he was with Chris McCowan earlier in the night, the night that Crystal Worthington was killed. I ain't gonna kick it yet. And there's video in this bar where you can see. In a statement to police, McGowan says that he and Frazier leave the juice bar and go to Krista's house. Mr. McCowan stated that he gave Jeremy Frazier directions and that Jeremy Frazier drove him, drove them to Crystal Worthington's residence. McCowan claims that he asked Jeremy to drive him to Christa's so he could have sex. He didn't want to drive himself. He was afraid of getting busted for drunk driving. He was wasted. He then indicated to me that Krista Worthington was, quote, startled to see us. Stated that he probably said something like, I'm tipsy. I just wanted to get some real quick. Mr. McCowan informed me, quote, she was cool with it. McCowan's account was that he went up there and he and Krista got it on. And Jeremy, meanwhile, was taking her possessions. He indicated that following the sex, Crystal Worthington confronted Jeremy Frazier about. About what he was doing. He and Jeremy Frazier then left the residence and that Krista Worthington followed him. Allen. At which point, again, this is the McCowan account. Christa comes barreling out of the house and starts screaming at Frazier, you. You thief. I want my stuff back. What did he say, sir? He stated, Jeremy lost it. And I just followed suit. It was pandemonium. They get into a fight in the driveway. He stated that Jeremy beat her. He beat her. He said, we put the boots to her. He said, I still can hear her hit the ground. She hit the ground hard. He stated that Jeremy dragged her under the arms and brought her into the house. McCowan says that Frazier was beating on her and he punched her in the face and in the chest. And he said it was Frazier who said took a knife and stabbed Krista through the chest. They asked Mr. McCallan what would he say. Troopers in Truro and I determined that Jeremy Frazier was somewhere other than Truro on that evening. And what was his response to that? Please, sir. His response was, then it's all. Then it's all on me. If Jeremy can account for his time. That was the final version that emerged from the six hour interview. Do you have all of those versions which was from I did have sex with her to being around but wasn't involved in the homicide to literally sounds like being in the same room when the homicide occurred. He changes the version, but he never puts a knife in his hand. He never vacillated from the fact that he never killed Krista Worthington. The defense said that Christopher McCowan's statements to the police could not be trusted. The statement is not worth the paper it's written on? McCowan's mental and emotional condition lent itself to false confession. He was putty in their hands. Evening. Buyer's remorse. Buy a new car. I'll be moving in. Let's get started. Sorry, I think there's been a mistake. I bought it from Carvana. You what? Yeah, Great price. I even have seven days to love it or return it. So there's no. No, no buyer's remorse. More like buyers rejoice. I guess I'll let myself out. Congratulations. I mean it. Buyers rejoice. Buy your car today. On Carvana, limitations and exclusions may apply. See our seven day return policy at Carvana.com @avocado, we know that not all mattresses are created equal. While other beds trap heat, ours sets it free. Made without polyurethane foams and crafted with natural latex, cotton and wool. Breathable, comfortable and supportive. No overheating, just clean organic sleep that performs. Save 15% on our award winning mattresses. This July 4th sale, avocado celebrate organic shop@avocadomatress.com or leading retailers nationwide. At the courthouse is actually a sculpture of Lemuel Shaw. It was Lemuel Shaw who who formulated more than anyone else the doctrine of reasonable doubt. If these jurors think it is reasonable to believe that someone else killed Christa Worthington, that's reasonable doubt. And that's an acquittal for Chris McGowan. The defense said that Christopher McCowan's statements to the police could not be trusted. The statement is not worth the paper it's written on. McCollum was spoken to for about six and a half hours. That interrogation was reduced to a 27 page report by state trooper Chris Mason. The interview was about six hours, is that right? That's correct. I took notes. Now six hours of talk translates more to three to 400 pages. They should have recorded him at a minimum, audio recorded him, preferably video recorded him because it was too crucial a statement. Mr. McCowan indicated. I declined to have my interview electronically recorded. Apparently under Massachusetts law, someone being interrogated can refuse to have it recorded. And I indicated to Mr. McCowan that the courts prefer that the interview be recorded to ensure accuracy. That it was his decision to make. Christopher McGowan says that he did not say the things that the investigators say he said. And he says that he was under the influence of Percocet, cocaine and marijuana. He doesn't even really remember giving this statement. He was completely wasted when he was taken into that police station. I know he wasn't comprehending what was going on. There was Testimony about his IQ being like 76, 78, 80, just above mental retardation. Having an IQ of 78 and being subjected to that kind of stressful, prolonged interview makes him also very susceptible to manipulation. He has a personality, as a lot of children do, where they want to please their interviewer, they want to please the adult in the room. Bob George wasn't just saying he didn't do it and they can't prove their case. He was saying that there are a lot of other much more credible suspects out there. And McCown's attorney is raising other issues about the evidence in the case. There is no forensic evidence tying Christopher McCowan to the scene except the degraded semen in Crystal Worthington's body and skin Cells on her breast. The seminal flu could have been on her body for three to five days. The physical evidence does not match up to their version of events. There were no fingerprints. There were no footprints. They had palm prints that were unidentified. And they had unknown male DNA from three individuals under her fingernails. From the prosecution perspective, the key is not what other evidence they could have found or might have found. It's the evidence that they did find. It's his DNA at a scene he had initially said he'd never been at. The most important evidence in the case that was ignored was there were blue and white fibers found in her vaginal area, which came from clothing. Did you conduct any testing on some trace material cover from Krista Worthington's pubic area? Yes, from the pubic area. There were various colored fibers. Most of them were blue and white. Chris McCowan was not alleged to have been wearing anything that was blue and white on the evening of the homicide. But he was with somebody who was wearing a blue and white sweater, and that was Jeremy Frazier. They're doing their song. Jeremy Frazier took the stand as a witness for the prosecution. Are you a member of any gang or group? No. The defense is trying to portray Jeremy Frazier as the. This dark, shady, gang affiliated young man. Who would be the type of person to commit a horrific crime. His demeanor, his presence. He was arrogant. Did you kill Crystal Worthington? No, I didn't. Jeremy Frazier's getting on the stand and saying I wasn't at Crystal Worthington's house. And did the police ask you where you had been that day? Yes. And did you remember? No. It was very clear that he claimed that he didn't remember anything. He couldn't recall anything. In fact, you didn't even remember where you had been after the juice bar the first time they talked to you, right? Yep, until they found me. Pieces of information. Where I was that night. When you say feeding you pieces of information, who was feeding you pieces of information? Stay, please. Jeremy Frazier is a prosecution witness who is now saying that the state police were feeding him information. Jeremy Frazier's testimony was like an early Christmas present for the defense. In all of the trials that I have covered, I don't remember a prosecution witness ever sending up red flags like Jeremy Frazier did. Jeremy Frazier admits that he was with Chris McCowan earlier in the night. But he said, he says that everybody split up. Chris went one way, he went another. And he stayed at Sean Mulvey's house, a friend of theirs. You can see Jeremy Frazier, Sean Mulvey, Chris McCown together at that juice bar. On the video, Mulvey alibis Frazier. Jeremy was probably the most intoxicated out of everybody, so I told him to come with me. Did Jeremy remain at your house the whole nine? Yes. You did? There was an initial meeting with the police where you told me I basically didn't remember anything. Is that correct? Yeah, that was the first time advice from my father. So was that a lie in the first statement? Yes. And then he changed his story. He then suddenly provided an alibi for Jeremy Frazier on the night of. It doesn't take straight Sherlock Holmes to figure out that there's something shaky about that alibi. But the police and prosecution were satisfied with Jeremy Frazier's alibi. The DNA at the crime scene does not match Jeremy Frazier. They believe that the only person at Christa's home that night is Chris McCown. Adding to the mystery was an incident that occurred the day before Christa's body was found. The car was coming down here, didn't even put on brakes. Christa's neighbor, a guy named Gerard Smith, says he saw a black vehicle speeding out of Krista's driveway, went right out through here and kept on going. It was clearly somebody that was trying to desperately get away from Krista's house. But why? Gerard Smith was a very well respected member of the community in Truro. He was taking his morning constitutional on Depot Road. It was Saturday, the day before Christa's body was found, and Smith saw a car tearing out of her driveway. The car was coming down here, didn't even put on brakes. It went right out through here and kept on going. This one like that. And that was why it drew my attention. I turned around to see who was driving the car. According to Gerard Smith, the driver of that car was a white man, not a black man. Gerard Smith was a compelling witness. Could you describe the person? He was Caucasian. He was a little dark, but he was not black. It wasn't really given great weight by the Commonwealth because it didn't fit the scenario that they went to trial on. It's like, well, then who? Who could that have been? One thing is clear. That person who killed Christa Worthington or had something to do with killing Christopher Worthington was white and he wasn't Chris McCowan. At trial, Bob George presented a different scenario for what happened the night Crystal Worthington was murdered. He says Chris McCowan never went to Worthington's house after the juice bar that Friday night, but he was there the day before on Thursday. That was garbage Pickup day. He says he was on his route on a Thursday. Krista called him into her home because she wanted him to remove her Christmas tree. He says that one thing leads to another and they do have this encounter, but that it's consensual and he didn't rape her because there's no evidence of rape. Chris says he didn't tell the police because she wanted it to be kept private. He says she wanted it to be. Be a secret. It's absolutely possible that he had sex with her on Thursday, was not there on Friday. Somebody else killed her, and then that's your bad guy, not him. There's nothing to suggest on her body that she was violently sexually assaulted. The autopsy did not use the word rape. There is no bruising. There is no tearing. There's no evidence of any violent sexual contact with the victim in this case in the form of injury, is there? There's no report of injury, right? That's correct. He says she came onto him. And that was just too much for some people to believe that Crystal Worthington, this Vassar educated woman, would have sex with a garbage collector. So as soon as they see the black garbage man, it's raped. The truth is he went up there looking for sex. Crystal Worthington confronted him, and it got very ugly. I went into closing argument believing I had, at the very least, a case of reasonable doubt. The 12 members of the jury sat in this box. There was only one African American woman on the jury. So it wasn't really considered to be much of a jury of his peers. The government's case is based on a assumptions that aren't true. And it's based on incorrect and ignored evidence. Mr. George has tried to play the race card during this trial and said that the police couldn't accept the idea of consensual sex between the black garbage man and Crystal Worthington. And I suggest here this defendant will be facing the same evidence in the same trial with the same jury if he were white. The jury in this case reported themselves deadlocked. They deliberated for eight days before coming to a verdict. After many days, the verdict comes in. It's a stampede up here to the courtroom. We, the jury analyst, return the following verdict. Guilty of first degree. Guilty of murder in the first degree. An extreme atrocity of cruelty. You know, felony murder. McCown, of course, was devastated, and he started to cry. I watched the verdict come in, and having been a prosecutor, I always look at the defendant for a reaction. This reaction was completely unusual. He shook his head vehemently and Cried. I feel sorry for the. Felt that his family, her daughter and her. I never meant for this to never take place. You know, all this time, I've been innocent. The court hereby sends you to be in prison for and during the term of your natural life without the possibility of parole. Three life terms. Holy moly. You know. Three jurors submitted affidavits charging they were coerced into their guilty verdicts by other racist jurors. Soon after the trial, Bob George heard from a few jurors who had information that was potentially a game changer. I immediately filed a motion to set aside a verdict as a result of racial bias. In the jury room, it is incredibly unusual to have a hearing to look back at how a jury reached a verdict that it did. It almost never happens, according to these jurors. Two other jurors repeatedly describe McCowan as big and black. The black man this and the black man that. And he's so big, and he scares me when he looks at me. Peter Manzo attended the entire trial, but he really aligned himself with the defense. This is part of the files for my book. In researching his book, Reasonable Doubt, he recorded recorded an interview with the sole black juror, who in her affidavit claimed racism was at play during deliberations. For some of the jurors, they all are attacking me every day anyway. All of them, like, I'm the only one in that room who gave this man a benefit of the doubt. That, you know, suggests that maybe he's innocent. I don't know if he did it, but I know it hadn't been proven to me. That's all I know. Show me the evidence. Race did not play a part at all in deciding Christopher McGowan's guilt or innocence. It had no effect on the verdict. There's just no way around the DNA. The judge found that the words big and black were just descriptors. The judge concluded that the verdict was stamped. Chris has never spoken before, but at this point, Chris wants to get his story out there. This is a global tel link prepaid call From Krista from McCallum, an inmate at a Massachusetts correctional institution. Hi, Chris. Hello. Hey. So you had sex with her on a Thursday, and then she ends up dead on a Friday. Can you understand why people think that that is odd? Christopher McCowan has been in prison for 11 years now. He's maintained his innocence the entire time Chris didn't testify. So you've never really heard from Chris as to what he said actually happened at this point, Chris wants to get his story out there. Chris wants to explain. Chris regrets not testifying. We're sitting in a hot room instead of in a prison. Interviewing your client in person. Why is that? The Department of Corrections wouldn't allow an interview on camera with Chris. This is a global Tel Link prepaid call from Christopher McCall. Hi, Chris. Hello. Hey. Let's go back to how this all started, okay? In the garbage man. You know, I get to go by everybody's houses and, you know, get to talk to them briefly. She asked me to come in the house and to look at a Christmas tree. Were you attracted to her? She had something with her. Standing there that close enough vicinity with her, you know, one thing just led to another. What do you mean one thing led to another? It's just like it was just a mutual thing between two people, I guess. And we started kissing and we winded up ending up having sex. So how many times were you intimate with Christa? Just one time. You had sex with her on a Thursday, and then she ends up dead on a Friday? Can you understand why people think that? That it's odd that you must have killed her? There's a lot of speculation on the exact timeline when she was killed. But I didn't have nothing to do with her. You've told your defense that the police manipulated you. What do you mean by that? Because they kept on switching everything up. I was so intoxicated off of all them that I really didn't know what the hell was going on. Were you at Krista's house on the night of Friday, January 4, 2002? No. No. After the Juice bar, where did you go? We went to an after hours party. What did you do after that? I went straight home. Do you ever remember going to Krista's house with Jeremy? No. But you also named Jeremy as Krista's killer. That's what they said. That I did. I didn't do that. So you don't remember telling the police that Jeremy stabbed Krista? No. The District attorney, Michael o', Keefe, made a statement to ABC News which said the evidence against Christopher McCowan and only Christopher McCowan for the rape and murder of Christa Worthington was overwhelming. The jury unanimously convicted the defendant. The Supreme Judicial Court then exhaustively reviewed the case and upheld the conviction. The defense has always believed there's more evidence, which could lead to a new trial for Chris McCown. This is the state police phone record, exhibit number 70. You see that, right? Yes. At trial, the defense tried to suggest that Jeremy Frazier Was very close, cozy almost with the state police. The defense believe that Jeremy Frazier got some special treatment from the police and that they bought into his alibi a little too easily. You see all of the phone numbers that the police went over with you on that day. On the night of the murder, Jeremy Frazier got a call from the state police barracks. Now, it says that you received a phone call when someone at the state police barracks here in south Yarmouth at 1203. It's. You see that, don't you? Yes. Why would somebody from the Massachusetts state police be calling Jeremy Frazier on a Friday night when he's out partying? And if you believe the defense, probably on his way to Truro at that moment. Do you have any memory whatsoever of talking to a state police troller on the evening that you're supposedly killing Krista Worthy? No, I did not talk to state police officers. He said, I don't talk to the police. But phone records don't. Much was made about this mysterious phone call to Jeremy. The defense wants you to believe that Jeremy Frazier was some informant and that he's somehow getting a pass on a murder charge because he gives information on marijuana or drug cases that suggest he reject that. What's interesting in looking at the telephone records of Jeremy Frazier, he keeps calling a 978 exchange repeatedly on January 4, including around the time of the murder. See these highlighted phone calls to a beat up pager? Yes. Jeremy Frazier says it was actually him calling his own pager because he'd lost it and he was trying to find it. You see the pager there that says 978. Are you positive that's your pager? That's my pager, yes. And you told the police that when he talked with you. That's my pager. We suspect that that is not the case. And if that's not his pager number, that certainly raises a lot of questions. Did you ever run these numbers to find out who was carrying that pager? I don't believe a subpoena was done for that pager Number nine. They didn't consider him a possible suspect and so his phone records to them weren't that relevant. I've asked for subpoenas to show a couple of things. To show a cell phone towers to see where he was that particular evening, but also to see the identity of the person whose number that traces back to. This is really a last ditch and long shot effort by McCowan's attorney to try to find some sort of new evidence that might get him a new trial. Are you optimistic about your attorney's new motion for a new trial? I don't deserve to be in his home. Yes. Now, when you were questioned by the police, you told them you didn't know her. Why did you lie to the police? To the police? I didn't tell them about we had sex or anything because she asked me not to say anything because she didn't want people to know about her personal business. Didn't you realize that perhaps they would find out that you had had sex with her? I didn't have nothing to hide. If they would have asked me if I had any kind of intercourse with her, I would have told them. Yeah, but they never asked me that question. What do you think happened to Krista? That's a good question. I wish I knew. Whether or not you believe that Christopher McGowan is an innocent man or a convicted killer. The tragedy here is that Ava Worthington was deprived of a relationship with a mother who clearly adored her. One of the images about this trial that sticks with people is of the little two and a half year old Ava by her mother's body. What happened to little Ava? Where is she? How is she today? I think there is so much mystery that that still surrounds this case. This case still has fog around it that needs to be cleared. We often say cases as they get older, do not get better. Memories fade, and more Importantly, evidence disappears. McCown's attorney has been told that now, this many years after the fact, Jeremy Frazier's phone records have been destroyed. They don't exist anymore. That is a significant blow to this defense and this motion for a new trial. Can you at least confirm if you knew Christopher McKeown? I don't know anybody. Since the trial, Jeremy Frazier's gotten himself in a lot of trouble. Jeremy Frazier's been charged with rape of a child with force. Now, of course, that's going to be of interest to McCowan's defense team. This tells us that Jeremy Frazier may be a hunter, horrible person, but it doesn't tell us that he killed Christa Worthington. In the 15 years since her death, I think about her regularly. If I were to tell Christa's daughter who Christa was, I would say that she was a person of great loyalty and intelligence and generosity and humor. Eva's little with a bunch of curls here. Krista was still alive when that picture was taken. That little girl, who was two and a half at the time, is now 18. She's a college freshman. She was raised by one of Krista's friends. She did get to see Tony Jacket and Susan and her brothers and sisters growing up. She's very popular and she seems to be well adjusted and we're very happy for that. She's fun, she's very affectionate, very smart and she's just very well rounded. Wonderful girl. Amira did a wonderful job raising her. It's unfortunate that Krista didn't have the opportunity to watch her grow into a young, lovely woman. Truro, unfortunately, will forever be marked by the fact of her death. Ultimately, I don't know that we will ever really know what really happened at 50 Depot Road that night. And you can find all new broadcast episodes of 2020 Friday nights at 9 on ABC. We all prefer things a certain way, like groceries. If you want groceries just how you like them, you gotta try Instacart. They have a new preference picker that lets you pick how ripe or unripe you want your bananas. Shoppers can see your preferences upfront, helping guide their choices. Because when it comes to groceries, the details matter. Instacart get groceries just how you like.
Original Air Date: June 30, 2026
Host: ABC News
Episode Focus: The shocking murder of Krista Worthington, a prominent fashion writer, in the quiet town of Truro, Cape Cod, unraveling a tangled true crime mystery steeped in secrets, relationships, systemic failures, and lasting questions.
This episode revisits the 2002 murder of Krista Worthington, whose violent death shattered the tranquility of Truro, Massachusetts, and became one of the most infamous and debated true crime cases on Cape Cod. Through interviews, diary readings, courtroom testimony, and analysis, the episode probes the murky complexities around Krista’s life and death: her relationships, the police investigation, the controversial trial and conviction of trash collector Christopher McCowen, and enduring doubts about justice and truth.
On the town’s transformation:
"People started locking their doors overnight. It was a transformation." [21:35]
On Krista’s resilience:
"There is at the moment no father for a child of mine, no husband for me. And what if there never is? I have to stare the scenario in the face and to my surprise, it hasn't killed me." – Krista Worthington, diary, [41:50]
On the controversy of the DNA dragnet:
"This is Big Brother. This is 1984 type stuff." [1:39:40]
On the crime scene handling:
"People were moving things around and touching things. The floor wasn’t taped off for safe ways to walk..." [1:37:23]
On McCowen’s interrogation:
"He was putty in their hands… Having an IQ of 78 and being subjected to that kind of stressful, prolonged interview makes him also very susceptible to manipulation." [2:13:25]
On racial bias during the jury deliberations:
“Two other jurors repeatedly describe McCowan as big and black. The black man this and the black man that. And he's so big, and he scares me when he looks at me." [2:29:15]
On Ava’s outcome:
"She's fun, she's very affectionate, very smart and she's just very well rounded. Wonderful girl. Amira did a wonderful job raising her." [2:49:40]
This episode delivers a layered, haunting chronicle of a murder that irreparably changed a seaside town and left reverberating questions of justice, truth, and prejudice. The tragic image of Ava Worthington, two years old beside her slain mother, remains as the episode’s indelible imprint, alongside a sad admission: “Ultimately, I don't know that we will ever really know what really happened at 50 Depot Road that night.” [2:48:50]