S1:EP 7 - The Mount Everest of Cold Cases Part 2

Summary

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America's Crime Lab

Episode: S1:E7 – "The Mount Everest of Cold Cases Part 2"
Release Date: August 20, 2025
Host: Aylin Lance Lesser
Produced by: iHeartPodcasts & Kaleidoscope

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Overview

This episode concludes the two-part series investigating the 1959 abduction, rape, and murder of nine-year-old Candy Rogers in Spokane, Washington, a case that haunted the community for over six decades. The show chronicles the unrelenting hunt for her killer, the breakthroughs enabled by forensic genetic genealogy, the emotional toll on both investigators and the family of the perpetrator, and the seismic impact of finally solving what was once considered an unbreakable case.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Where Last We Left Off: The Search for the Killer (02:58–04:05)

• The case had just reached a breakthrough: DNA from Candy’s underwear yielded a profile. Using forensic genetic genealogy, Othram analysts narrowed the pool to three deceased brothers—the Hoff/Rahoff family.
• Investigators searched for children of the brothers, finding potential leads with John Rahoff, who had four children.

2. John Rahoff’s Background and Early Red Flags (04:34–07:34)

• Rahoff grew up in Spokane, led a troubled youth with petty crimes, was sent to the army at 17, and returned to Spokane by age 20—Candy’s age at the time of the crime.
• Potential connections: Rahoff’s younger stepsister, a Campfire Girl like Candy, possibly linked their families socially.
• Additional red flags:
  • Convicted of a near-fatal assault on a female property manager after pretending to rent an apartment (paralleling details from Candy’s murder).
  • Served short jail time, was declared a deserter, and dishonorably discharged from the army.
  • Linked by geography and history to the area of another unsolved child murder (Sherry Edgell) with disturbing similarities.

3. Encounter with Rahoff’s Family & The Emotional Toll (08:34–11:43)

• Sergeant Zach Stormant describes the agonizing moment confronting Kathy, Rahoff’s daughter, and her granddaughter, with the shocking news that their father/grandfather might be Candy’s killer.
• Quote: “You're essentially pulling up their root and tearing it out of the ground and saying, no, your family's not what you think.” – Sgt. Zach Stormant (08:34)
• Kathy, nine when her father died, agrees to provide a DNA sample, feeling the weight and trauma of the moment.

4. The Waiting Game and DNA Breakthrough (11:43–15:56)

• Forensic scientist Brittany Wright rushes Kathy’s DNA for testing, working overnight.
• The DNA match is definitive, linking the child to the semen sample but not yet specifying which of the three brothers is responsible.
• Family complications arise: Rahoff’s wife had an affair with one of his brothers, raising paternity doubts.
• Further interviews confirm Kathy was John Rahoff’s biological daughter, but full certainty awaits testing Rahoff’s own remains.

5. Exhumation and Final Identification (18:02–21:06)

• Investigators secure a warrant to exhume Rahoff’s remains to directly test his DNA.
• The exhumation is wrenching: Rahoff is buried mere yards from Candy in the same cemetery—a cruel irony that devastates both families.
• After initial difficulties, DNA is recovered from his teeth, providing a conclusive match.
• Quote: “The DNA test on the body comes back very definitively... we know it is John and not one of the brothers.” – Sgt. Zach Stormant (20:47)

6. Public Announcement and Ripple Effects (21:52–24:15)

• A press conference in November 2021 draws a packed house, including retired and current law enforcement and family members.
• Unexpected, poignant moments: The original detective who found Candy’s body attends at age 93, emotional after a lifetime awaiting the answer.
• Quote: “I waited every single day my entire life to hear this answer. This can’t come fast enough.” – Retired Detective (24:26)

7. Aftermath for Rahoff’s Family & Community (29:54–31:04)

• Rahoff’s widow and children are adamant: he should not remain buried near Candy. His remains are cremated and reinterred elsewhere, and his headstone is destroyed.
• Kathy and her siblings grapple with shame, disbelief, and a loss of innocence.
• Quote: “He got to die with people thinking he was an upstanding man, and he wasn’t.” – Rahoff family member (31:04)

8. Broader Impact: Science, Policy, and Closure (31:23–36:04)

• The Candy Rogers case became a landmark for the use of forensic DNA in cold cases, proving that even decades-old, degraded evidence can yield answers with the right technology.
• As a direct result, Spokane cleared a backlog of 38 unidentified human remains cases and committed to using DNA and genetic genealogy on all future unidentified remains.
• Quote: “If there’s an unsolved crime and there’s DNA evidence, there’s an answer that’s waiting.” – Gwen Washington (32:06)
• Sgt. Stormant reflects on the immense, generational pain caused by one act of violence:
  • “It's incredible what one person's selfish actions in a small amount of time, the damage and the ripple effect that spread through the decades can have. It's incredible.” (35:51)

9. Lingering Questions and Final Reflections (32:19–35:33)

• The reconstructed timeline and geography of Candy’s abduction reflect possibilities shaped by Rahoff’s military background and access to now-demolished military facilities.
• Candy was held for days, and details from her autopsy and discarded mint boxes suggest a thwarted, desperate act.
• The case’s public files remain open for new insights—the search for full understanding continues.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote/Description | |-----------|--------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 02:46 | Sgt. Zach Stormant | “There’s going to be a moment in time where you as the cold case detective are the only person in the world that knows who killed that person.” | | 08:34 | Sgt. Zach Stormant | “You're essentially pulling up their root and tearing it out of the ground...” | | 10:51 | Sgt. Zach Stormant | “This is the one. This is the case.” (describing his feelings when delivering the DNA sample) | | 20:47 | Sgt. Zach Stormant | “The DNA test on the body comes back very definitively... we know it is John and not one of the brothers.” | | 24:26 | Retired Detective | “I waited every single day my entire life to hear this answer. This can’t come fast enough.” | | 31:04 | Rahoff family member | “He got to die with people thinking he was an upstanding man, and he wasn’t.” | | 32:06 | Gwen Washington | “If there’s an unsolved crime and there’s DNA evidence, there’s an answer that’s waiting.” | | 35:51 | Sgt. Zach Stormant | “It's incredible what one person's selfish actions in a small amount of time, the damage and the ripple effect that spread through the decades can have.” |

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Important Segments & Timestamps

• [02:46] Cold case detective’s burden
• [04:34–07:34] John Rahoff’s background and red flags
• [08:34–10:27] Confronting Rahoff’s family, seeking DNA
• [11:43–15:56] Lab analysis and paternity complexities
• [18:02–21:06] Exhuming Rahoff and final DNA match
• [21:52–24:15] Press conference and community response
• [29:54–31:04] Aftermath for Rahoff’s family
• [31:23–35:33] Scientific, emotional, and societal impact

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Conclusion

Episode 7 of America's Crime Lab powerfully demonstrates how persistence, compassion, and new science finally unraveled an infamous cold case. The host and guests blend detective work with deep empathy for victims and families—on both sides—showing how the consequences of one horrific crime radiated across generations. The narrative closes not only with a hard-won answer to Spokane’s longest-running mystery but with a reminder that even the oldest cases can be solved, and that the pursuit of truth matters, for both justice and healing.

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Transcript

[Narrator/Host]

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[Gwen Washington]

I'm Gwen Washington, the host of Snap Judgment from KQED. Every week we don't just tell stories, we drop you inside them. Real people, real voices. Real moments that split a life in two. What do you believe? What do you risk? What do you want? Snap Judgment New episodes every Thursday. Wherever you get your podcast.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

There'S going to be a moment in time where you as the cold case detective are the only person in the world that knows who killed that person.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

When police discovered the body of nine year old Candy Rogers in the woods outside of Spokane, Washington, she'd been raped and strangled. The attack was so brutal that it shook veteran officers. Many had a hard time speaking about what they'd seen at the crime scene. For 62 years, all leads turned up cold and Candy's murder became the largest case file in Spokane's history. But in 2021, detectives had their first big break. This is America's Crime Lab. I'm Ailin. Lance Lesser. This is part two of the Candy Rogers case. If you've missed the previous episode, you'll want to go back and listen. Producer Kathryn Fenollosa is here. So when we left the story, semen from Candy's underwear had been tested. And once they had a DNA profile, Othram did forensic genetic genealogy and that led them to three brothers.

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah, the three Hoff brothers. And all three did live in Spokane, but unfortunately they've all since died. So investigators looked to see if any of them had children and two of the brothers did not. But one did. John Rahoff actually had four kids. And Sergeant Zach Stormant decides to reach out to Kathie, a daughter. And Kathie actually agrees to meet with Sergeant Storman at the police station along with her own daughter.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

So what do we know about Kathy's dad?

[Narrator/Host]

Well, he grew up in Spokane. He was the oldest of the three brothers. And Aylin, do you remember the boy's home that David Middleman asked Sergeant Stormant to look into?

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Yeah, that came up when they were doing genealogy research.

[Narrator/Host]

So Othram found a clue showing that someone in the killer's family was connected to a boy's home in Washington state. And Sergeant Stormant says it turns out that John Ray Hoff actually spent some time living at that home.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

He's caught stealing, he stole a car, he did some petty theft type stuff. His parents were concerned enough about his behavior that somehow they came to the agreement that he was going to join the army early at 17 and they signed in for him to do that.

[Narrator/Host]

So John Rayhoff joins the army and he ends up serving as an inventory clerk while he's deployed to Korea. Now while he's gone, Alan, his wife actually has an affair with one of his brothers. And that detail will become important later. So just kind of like tuck that away. He returns to the Spokane area and in 1959, when Candy is murdered, John Rahoff is 20 years old and he's living just a mile from Candy's house.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Did they know each other? I mean, did he know Candy's family at all?

[Narrator/Host]

So there is a connection. John Rayhoff had a younger stepsister who was just a year older than Candy and she was also in the Campfire Girls. You know, that group sort of like the Girl Scouts that Candy was a part of. But police don't think that Jon ever actually met Candy.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

It still just shows what a small world it is. So he had these early run ins with police. Are there any other red flags?

[Narrator/Host]

Well, a few years after Candy's murder, John Rahoff is convicted of assault. He pretended he was interested in an apartment and when he arrived to look at it, he attacks the female property manager. He actually strangles and undresses her and he ties her up with her own clothing, which is also how Candy was restrained. Luckily the property manager survives the attack. John Rahoff serves six months in jail and he's declared a deserter and he's discharged from the army. And Ailin, there's also another murder that happens about six months after Candy's death.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

A girl named Sherry Edgell.

[Narrator/Host]

Sherry is also nine years old when she's abducted, assaulted and strangled. Her body was found in a blood soaked nightgown in a tall grassy area off a highway. And Aylin, this happened about 45 minutes from the boys home where John Rahoff had spent some time several years before.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

This guy has ties to that area because that base over There is Lewis McChord. That's a joint army Air force base. And he did spend some time serving there as well. And it makes me wonder about him.

[Narrator/Host]

That case is still unsolved.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Those two cases have some strange similarities. And what happens to John R.A. hoff after he's kicked out of the army?

[Narrator/Host]

So he sells silverware door to door for a time. Then he works in a lumber yard and a meatpacking plant. And then when he's 31 he takes his own life. Oh wow.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Do we know why he killed himself?

[Narrator/Host]

Well, at the time he was married with four children and his family just thought he was depressed.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

At any point in the investigation was his name on any suspect list?

[Narrator/Host]

No, his name never pops up on detectives radar until Othram builds out the family tree. And that's all based on the DNA from the semen found on Candy's underwear. And now Sergeant Stormant is sitting across the table from John Rahoff's daughter Kathy and his granddaughter.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

My impression of it was I'm destroying what I would view as my Father. I'm seeing it personally because I don't know how she sees her own. And I'm thinking, God, this is horrible. And same with the daughter who's thinking about grandpa. You're essentially pulling up their root and tearing it out of the ground and saying, no, your family's not what you think. She was very affected by what happened at camp. It was the horror of what happened to this little girl. And anybody that knows this case knows Candy. Candy died very hard. There's no other way to say it.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

And the whole case could rest on this moment because Kathy could get up and walk away.

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah. I mean, he knows he has to win her trust.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

It does not take a lot to turn one of these from stone cold. No one's ever going to solve this, to red hot. I am a cold case detective, and I think you can help me with a homicide. And it's. It's a. A lightning bolt. So few people are going to be hit with this opportunity or responsibility or dread.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

I wonder what Kathy's thinking at this point.

[Narrator/Host]

Sergeant Stormant says she was listening super intently when her father died. She was nine years old, just like Candy. And in this moment, it's becoming very clear to Kathy that her father is a prime suspect in Spokane's oldest cold case and that detectives need her DNA. And Kathy agrees to give a sample.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

She very willingly gave that. I collected buccal swabs from her at that moment, and obviously I had a million more questions for her. I told her we're going to talk more, but I wanted to get the DNA to the lab.

[Narrator/Host]

Sergeant Stormant literally races out of the room with Kathy's DNA because he wants to get it to the lab before they close. And he meets Brittany Wright from the state crime lab.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

And she has tested so many DNA samples on this case, trying to find our guy. And it's always been, nope. And she met me at the window, and I said, this is the one. This is the case. And she kind of. She was. We'll see. There's been so many. Brittany worked, I believe, through the night on this. She had that done in 24 hours. And it is a. It's a lightning bolt moment for both of us. It's incredible. It is like, holy. Forgive my language, holy. This is the. Actually the gonna be the end of the Candy Rogers case.

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[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Yes. So, I mean, is he worried about paternity?

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah. So there's still a possibility that it could actually be one of his brothers.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

And families being what they are. Kathy believes she knows who her dad is, but I've got to make sure I'm worried about what do we know?

[Narrator/Host]

So he reaches out to Kathy's mom, who's still alive, and amazingly, she agrees to talk to him.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

And we had some conversations and we got very much into the personal life. And I hate having those conversations, especially with an older lady. I feel, you know, a duty to respect your elders. And I'm having conversations about paternity.

[Narrator/Host]

And this is where it gets a little even more complicated because David Mittleman says Kathy's DNA test comes back.

[Gwen Washington]

Her doing the DNA test then further confirmed that she was in a parent child relationship with a contributor.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

So Kathy is the child of the murderer.

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah, exactly.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

But with this whole affair her mom had, we don't know if the Killer is actually John Rayhoff or one of his brothers.

[Narrator/Host]

Correct. And all of these questions and sort of messy family dynamics make it so tricky for Sergeant Stormont. Even though he's getting closer to an.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Answer, there's a lot of overwhelming joy in it, but I didn't want to embrace that yet. There was a horrible process that I still had to go through. I felt a lot of pressure on it.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

So what's this process he's talking about? I mean, how do you narrow down which of the three brothers committed the crime? They're all dead, and John Rahoff is the only one who had kids.

[Narrator/Host]

Right. So really, the only thing investigators can do is test John Rahoff's own DNA to prove either that he's the killer or to rule him out, which would.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Mean one of his brothers is the real killer.

[Narrator/Host]

And the thing is, Ailin, David Mittleman says testing John Rahoff's DNA is way more complicated than getting DNA from a mouth swab.

[Gwen Washington]

So the investigators pursued a search warrant that allowed them to, believe it or not, exhume the remains of this person.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

They have to dig up his body, and then I'm guessing if it's not him, they've got to go through this whole process exhuming the bodies of his brothers, too.

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah. And the search could actually be even wider than that.

[Gwen Washington]

You can never be sure.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Right.

[Gwen Washington]

Because who's to say that there wasn't a half brother that nobody knows about or a secret brother that no one knows about?

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

I mean, when it comes down to it, families have secrets, and who knows what anyone wants to admit to?

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah. That is so true. And it gets even worse. So Sergeant Stormont reaches back out to Kathy and her mom because he needs to find out where John Rahoff is buried so they can exhume his body.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Dad was buried and still intact, hadn't been cremated. That led to another horrible revelation, as he was buried in the same cemetery as Candy. She's in a mausoleum there at Riverside State Park. And he was buried in a plot about several hundred yards away. And that was disgusting to me. And disgusting to them as well, to their credit.

[Narrator/Host]

Sergeant Stormant gets a warrant to exhume John Rahoff's body. And when he arrives at the cemetery, he brings a few people. Brittany Wright from the state crime lab. There's someone from the medical examiner's office, and there's a funeral director now, ailin. It's been 50 years since John Rahoff's body was buried, so they're not really sure what they're going to find.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

We were concerned about water infiltration. We were concerned about collapse on the coffin. And we started with a backhoe, just digging very carefully. And we actually saw as we were going that we could see it collapse.

[Narrator/Host]

So there's a vault around the area where his coffin was buried, and it was built with pieces of concrete rather than poured concrete.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

They're pretty fragile. And the pressure of digging caused it to collapse. And then we started digging by hand. So that was myself and two detectives with just buckets, just scooping dirt in until we got to the lid and good luck again, was on our side. The vault was dry. It hadn't been filled with water. Brittany was concerned enough that we didn't know what's going to yield DNA here. We decided we're going to take the whole body.

[Narrator/Host]

So they take his entire body back to the police evidence facility. And Aylin, initially, they actually have trouble getting DNA from his remains, but ultimately they're able to get some from his teeth.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

The DNA test on the body comes back very definitively, but it's one of those astronomical numbers that it's definitive. So at this point, we know it is John and not one of the brothers.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

So John Rahoff was in fact, the killer.

[Narrator/Host]

Yes. And this is a huge effort. So everyone is massively relieved, including David Mittleman.

[Gwen Washington]

I think there was a lot of pressure applied to Detective Stormont, to the agency as a whole, because they are going out of their comfort zone trying a new technique. They had been faced only with failure in previous attempts to identify him. So there's a lot of naysayers. Several labs had said this work can't be done. They refused to take the work and thought it was impossible. Is Detective Stormant chasing a white whale? And perhaps the most wild thing of all is he had never been under consideration for being related to this case.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

It's honestly shocking that for six decades, John Rahoff was never on the suspect list.

[Narrator/Host]

I know. So Sergeant Stormont decides to hold a press conference to announce who the killer is. And in November 2021, Kristen Mittleman travels to Spokane for the event.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

I will remember every part of that day for the rest of my life. It was a snowy day in Spokane, Washington. It was hard to get into the airport. We drove up to where the press conference was being held, and I don't know what I thought I expected. I think I expected a few people, but there were. It was a full room. The entire police station was filled.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Once it was solved, I. I just started looking up everybody that was involved in it that I could to find who wants to know.

[Narrator/Host]

And that's because this case affected so many people.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Yeah.

[Narrator/Host]

I mean, Aylin, remember the men who died during the helicopter crash while they were searching for Candy? And then all of these detectives over the years who really became so emotionally invested in the case.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

I have a picture up here on my wall. This is Roscoe Goering. And you got to think of the people at the time. Roscoe served in the Marine Corps and landed on Okinawa. Sorry. His daughters got a hold of me after it was announced it was solved. And incredibly, they knew a lot about this case. They. They said that their dad and other detectives at dinner would sit and talk about it. Unfortunately, Roscoe had passed away. But they said their dad had mentioned a belt buckle. They said his dad knew that if they'd known him by his belt buckle. And that that was new to me. I hadn't heard that before, but I think that speaks to how she was restrained, obviously, But I wish she'd have been around to find. Find out those guys that took me under their wing and when they retired, essentially took those boxes and put them on my desk. I felt responsibility to them and almost silly and undeserving of being the one in the seat when the stars aligned, when something like Othram emerged in this incredible technology.

[Narrator/Host]

Back at the press conference, current and former detectives are gathered, and Kristin Mittleman notices one older man who is visibly emotional.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

And so I introduced myself and said, can I help? Are you okay? And the person told me that they were actually the detective that found Candy Rogers that day, 62 years ago. And he would have been very young. He was in his 90s, and he was 93 years old, I believe, at the press conference. And he said one sentence. I waited every single day my entire life to hear this answer. This can't come fast enough.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

And, yeah, it hit him so hard. Yeah, I said, he thanked God he lived long enough to see it solved. They took it very personally.

[Gwen Washington]

I can't tell you how often I hear, oh, I'm a little ocd. I like things neat. That's not ocd. I'm Howie Mandel, and I know this because I have ocd. Actual OCD causes relentless unwanted thoughts. What if I did something terrible and forgot? What if I'm a bad person? Why am I thinking this terrible thing? It makes you question absolutely everything, and you'll do anything to feel better. OCD is debilitating, but it's also highly treatable with the right kind of therapy. Regular talk therapy doesn't cut it. OCD needs specialized therapy. That's why I want to tell you about NO cd. NOCD is the world's largest virtual therapy provider for ocd. Their licensed therapists provide specialized therapy virtually and it's covered by insurance for over 155 million Americans. If you think you might be struggling with OCD, visit NOCD.com to schedule a free 15 minute call and learn more. That's NOCD.com this Labor Day say goodbye.

[Commercial Announcer]

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[Hill House Home Advertiser]

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[Narrator/Host]

Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford, and I'm the founder of meaningful beauty. When Dr. Sabah and I decided to do a skincare line together, he said to me, we are going to give women meaningful beauty. And I said, that's exactly right. We want to give women meaningful beauty, which means each and every product is meaningful. It has a reason to exist. It's efficacious. You're going to get results.

[Commercial Announcer]

And then you just go out and live your life.

[Narrator/Host]

Meaningful beauty. Confidence is beautiful. Learn [e-mail] Now, Alan, after all of this, there's still the question of what do you do with John Rayhoff's body? I mean, no one was comfortable with the fact that he had originally been buried so close to Candy. Just knowing her family has been walking near his grave when visiting hers. I mean, it's. It's kind of creepy. So Sergeant Stormont reaches out to John Rahoff's wife and his daughter Kathy.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

And they were both of the opinion, no, we don't want him to go back there. They had the same. He shouldn't be there with her. So we arranged to have his headstone destroyed. And that was done.

[Narrator/Host]

They eventually cremate his body and bury him in a different cemetery.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

And how is Kathy dealing with all of this?

[Narrator/Host]

So this has been incredibly hard on her and her siblings.

[Commercial Announcer]

Disbelief. But not that I didn't believe it, but it's just. It takes a while for it to.

[Narrator/Host]

Like, sink in and anger. Sadness.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

It's just really sad to find out that someone that.

[Narrator/Host]

Not even that just your dad, but just someone in your family could do something like that. And he committed suicide.

[Commercial Announcer]

I had lived most of my life.

[Narrator/Host]

Thinking he did it because he was.

[Commercial Announcer]

Very depressed or something. And now I think, no, you know, that's.

[Narrator/Host]

He was evil. He was evil and he was.

[Commercial Announcer]

It was an escape away from it.

[Narrator/Host]

But he got to.

[Commercial Announcer]

He got to die with people thinking he was an upstanding man, and he wasn't.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

62 years later, we finally know that John Rahoff is the person who raped and Murdered Candy Rogers. And to think that so many labs said they couldn't work on this case because the DNA was so small and degraded. I mean, this was so close to being an unsolvable case.

[Narrator/Host]

Yeah. And at the time, it kind of came down to luck. Paul Holes was working with the Spokane Police Department, and he'd just come off the Carla Walker case with Othram. So it was really a situation where detectives had run out of all options. And Paul was like, wait a second. I think Othram can actually crack this case. And David Mittleman says, in a lot of ways, the Candy Rogers case was a turning point.

[Gwen Washington]

We've demonstrated now that it doesn't matter where you're from when the crime happened, what the circumstances were. If there's an unsolved crime and there's DNA evidence, there's an answer that's waiting.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

And now that we do have an answer in Candy Rogers murder, does that help us understand other details of the crime, like what actually happened that night?

[Narrator/Host]

Kind of. I mean, Sergeant Stormont has a few theories. So first he mapped out where authorities found the boxes of mints that she was selling.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Some of the mint boxes were found right on the roadway. One other box was found a little bit off. There's a little off ramp that kind of goes into a wooded area. Can't help but wonder if that is where he assaulted her and what his intent was if it was to assault and let her go.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Oh, so why didn't he?

[Narrator/Host]

Well, Alan, if you remember, both Candy's family and the police immediately just had a feeling that something was wrong.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

I wonder if. Because the parents were looking so quickly, and if you look at the geography, that little area looks up back up the hill where her house is, and that area would have been flooded with people looking, flashlights and police cars everywhere. And he had to come up with a different plan. And if sexual assault changed to buying time and restraining her somewhere else, so.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Maybe he panicked and took her. But how does her body end up in the woods?

[Narrator/Host]

Well, the thing theory goes that since John Rahoff had been in the military, he may have been familiar with the woods because they were around a military base that was in the process of being decommissioned. So it also would have been fairly vacant.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

He would have known those buildings were available. And we know that Candy was held for a period of days. And I go back to. We know what she ate. She ate that cookie at grandma's house. And then at autopsy, it looks like she's eating an orange. She was restrained. Her body was found with. Her hands were free, but her feet were bound. But a ligature. Her hands had obviously been bound at some point. And a ligature is found around her neck. Presumably the one from her hands was moved to her neck when she ultimately was killed. I suspect that he obviously couldn't take her home. He had a family there. I think that those are the most likely spot that he could have had privacy.

[Narrator/Host]

Sergeant Stormant says this is all speculation on his part and he's actually hoping that someone will read through the case file because it's all public now and see if his theory adds up. And there's something else that happened. Aylin. After Othram was able to point detectives to Candy's killer, Spokane city officials had a request.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

They had a backlog of, I believe it was 38 unidentified human remains. They said, we will fund clearing and identifying every single one of them using your methods. We're in 2025 and their backlog is cleared. But we continue to work cases with the PD there and the medical examiner's office in real time. You can see how even though we know who killed Candy, there are still so many questions. And I get the feeling that Sergeant Stormont isn't ready to completely walk away from this case.

[Narrator/Host]

And maybe that's why stories like these capture our attention. I mean, they are so horrific. And maybe the only way to process it is to try to understand what makes people go off the deep end in the first place.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

It's incredible what one person's selfish actions in a small amount of time, the damage and the ripple effect that spread through the decades can have. It's incredible.

[Narrator/Host]

I'm very, very sorry for what my dad did, that he took her life horribly and that he took her mom's life, really took her dad's life. He took more lives than one. And even though I didn't do it and I'm not responsible, I hope that it gives peace knowing that even though it's not really justice because he doesn't get any punishment, but that his name has this on it now and they can know it's solved and everybody can know it's done.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

Next time on America's Crime Lab. This is the second largest case of unidentified human remains in this country, second.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

Only to the World Trade Center. She couldn't believe it and she was.

[Narrator/Host]

In shock and disbelief. And I remember her even telling me.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

I'm not going to believe it until.

[Commercial Announcer]

I have his ashes in my hand.

[Sergeant Zach Stormant]

That is an absolutely daunting undertaking to try and identify all those people, but it's exactly the right thing to do. Doing the right thing isn't always easy, but it's always the right thing.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

America's Crime Lab is produced by Rococo Punch for Kaleidoscope. Erika Lance is our story editor and sound design is by David Woji. Our producing team is Catherine Fedollosa and Jessica Albert. Our executive producers are Kate Osborne, Osborne Mangesh, Hadi, Kadur and David and Kristen Mittleman. And from iHeart, Katrina Norvell and Ally Perry. Special thanks to Connell Byrne, Will Pearson, Kerry Lieberman, Nikki Etor, Nathan Netoski, John Burbank and the entire team at othram. I'm Aylin Lance Lesser. Thanks for listening.

[Commercial Announcer]

This Labor Day say goodbye to spills, stains and overpriced furniture with washablesofas.com featuring Annabe the only machine washable sofa inside and out where designer quality meets budget friendly pricing. Sofas start at just $6.99, making it the perfect time to upgrade your space. Anibe's pet friendly stain resistant and interchangeable slipcovers are made with high performance fabric built for real life. You'll love the cloud like comfort of hypoallergenic high resilience foam that never needs fluffing and a durable steel frame that stands the test of time with modular pieces you can rearrange anytime. It's a sofa that adapts to your life now through Labor Day. Get up to 60% off site [e-mail] Every order comes with a 30 day satisfaction guarantee. If you're not in luck, send it back for a full refund. No return shipping, no restocking fees, every penny back. Shop [e-mail] Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. Every day has a to do list, but adding Enjoy Belvita to yours can help you knock out the rest of it. Belveda Breakfast Biscuits are a tasty and convenient breakfast option when paired with low fat yogurt and fruit that provide steady energy all morning while Belvita Energy Snack Bites give you the perfect mid morning refuel. Best part? They both taste great, so make the most out of your morning with a bite of Belvita. Pick up a pack of Belvita at your local store today.

[Gwen Washington]

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[Commercial Announcer]

It's summer time to enjoy long days, lazy nights, and great food. Because Uber Eats has deals all summer long. So when hunger strikes, don't sweat it. Delicious deals are just a tap away on Uber Eats. Enjoy all your favorite grocery items delivered straight to you. Get ice cream, soda and snacks from.

[Narrator/Host]

Your favorite stores like Wegmans and cvs.

[Commercial Announcer]

And make the most of every moment. Now that sounds like a good summer order. Now on UberEats Terms apply. Product availability varies by region. See app for details.

[Aylin Lance Lesser]

This is an iHeart podcast.