S3 EP 5 - Going Down the Rabbit Hole

Summary

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American Nightmares – Gardens of Evil: Inside the Zion Society Cult

Host: Paul Wagner (Gamut Podcast Network)
Season 3, Episode 5: Going Down the Rabbit Hole
Date: November 1, 2022

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Episode Overview

This episode of American Nightmares (Season 3, Ep. 5: "Going Down the Rabbit Hole") dives deep into the investigative breakthroughs in long-unsolved cases, focusing on how advancements in forensic genealogy revolutionized cold case investigations. Using gripping detective interviews and detailed case studies—including the hunt for the Potomac River Rapist—the episode explores missed opportunities, changing investigative philosophies, the emotional toll on law enforcement, and how persistence and new technology brought justice decades after initial crimes.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Revisiting the Potomac River Rapist Case

• Background: In the late 1980s and through the 1990s, a serial assailant terrorized the D.C. and Montgomery County area. Early DNA efforts could link crimes but not find a suspect.
• Breakthrough: A previously untested rape kit from 1996 revealed a link to the Potomac River Rapist when tested over 15 years later ([04:26]).
• Investigation Delays: Budget and technology constraints led many police departments to leave rape kits untested unless there was an immediate suspect ([04:36]).
• What Changed: The utilization of forensic genealogy decades later—searching genetic databases and constructing family trees—catalyzed breakthroughs in cold cases ([15:19]).

2. The 1996 MacArthur Boulevard Attack

• Details: In 1996, a woman was violently attacked in a wooded area, mirroring the perpetrator’s known patterns ([02:49]-[06:45]).
• Victim's Account: The survivor’s composite sketch and description led to an updated outline of the suspect: “A black man in his late 20s to early 30s, neatly dressed, possibly connected to the neighborhood” ([06:55]).
• Narrative Shift: Investigators recognized serial rapists sometimes break from their preferred patterns—moving between “fantasy” crimes and opportunistic attacks ([08:46]-[10:53]).
  • Quote: “The lesson is the guys will… if they see an opportunity, they're going to take it.” – Dean Combi ([09:52])

3. The Debate: Can Serial Offenders Just Stop?

• Theoretical Divide: Detectives contemplated whether the Potomac River Rapist simply stopped, was incarcerated, or died.
• Detective’s View:
  • Quote: "I just can't wrap my head around this guy committing eight or nine heinous offenses… and then he's just going, okay, I'm done." – Mike Farish ([12:13])
  • Farish and others find it almost impossible to believe a violent predator could simply quit.

4. The Forensic Genealogy Revolution

• Notable Case Studies:
  • Jerry Lynn Burns: Convicted decades after the murder of Michelle Martinko using forensic genealogy ([15:19]-[17:55]).
    • Quote: "Jerry Burns seems to be in utter disbelief that he'd been found." – Paul Wagner ([17:55])
  • Marlon Michael Alexander: Solved serial rapist case with family tree research ([21:41]-[24:14]).
  • James Essel Murder: Breakthrough using genealogy led police to Hans Uits, who died in a police standoff ([24:22]-[27:14]).
• Spotlight on Officer Steve Smugareski:
  • Nicknamed “Smuggs,” recognized for his methodical and obsessive family tree digging, credited with solving multiple cold cases ([21:41] and throughout).
    • Quote: “I had thought really, you know, this, this is really crazy.” – Steve Smugareski ([24:14])

5. Methodology: How Forensic Genealogy Works

• Process:
  • DNA is uploaded to public genealogy databases (e.g., GEDmatch, Family Tree).
  • Lab (Parabon Nanolabs) generates phenotype predictions and composite sketches ([19:39]).
    • Quote: “Instead of treating DNA like a fingerprint, we treat it like a blueprint of that person.” – Dr. Ellen Greytech ([19:39])
  • Cold case investigators painstakingly trace family trees using public records (census, obituaries, directories) to pinpoint suspects ([32:11]-[36:53]).
  • Final DNA matches from suspects or relatives confirm identities.

6. Emotional Impact on Law Enforcement

• Officer Smugareski’s Reflections:
  • Becomes emotional discussing the significance of bringing closure to victims’ families ([40:11]-[40:42]).
    • Quote: “I think I got some help from upstairs… Sometimes I think I got somebody up there pointing me in the right direction.” – Steve Smugareski ([40:11])
  • The thrill and exhaustion of closing cases, and the pain when discoveries reveal suspects are deceased ([38:22]-[39:48]).

7. Culmination: The Potomac River Rapist Identified

• Revelation: In November 2019, authorities announced they had finally identified and arrested the Potomac River Rapist after decades of terror ([42:16]-[42:46]).
  • Quote: “A man terrorized our community… we collectively are announcing that an arrest has been made of a man who was known as the Potomac River Rapist.” – D.C. Police Chief Pete Newsham ([42:16])
• Public Call: John Walsh’s impassioned plea underscoring the community’s—and law enforcement’s—unrelenting need for answers ([06:45]).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "[The rape kit] basically hadn't been processed… sat on a shelf for more than 15 years, a common problem…" – Mike Farish ([04:26])
• "This is a dangerous sexual predator. This is a hunter of women. Somebody knows something about this guy." – John Walsh ([06:45])
• "The DNA is showing… it's not just our supposition." – Dean Combi ([10:53])
• "Test it. See if it is… We did. How would your DNA be there, Jerry? I don't know what happened that night… Wait for the test to come back, Jerry. I don't think it did. It did." – Interrogation of Jerry Lynn Burns ([17:29]-[17:55])
• "Everything. I look at geography, I look at family dynamics… because with the databases, the public databases, if you're five generations out, you could have relatives out in California and you could be the only person here in Maryland…" – Steve Smugareski ([31:37])

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Discovery of the 1996 attack and untested kit: [02:49]–[06:45]
• Pattern break and timeline analysis: [06:55]–[10:53]
• Forensic genealogy explained and Jerry Lynn Burns case: [15:19]–[17:55]
• Officer Smugareski’s genealogy work: [21:41]–[40:11]
• Emotional reflections and identification of Kenneth Earl Day: [40:11]–[41:30]
• Public announcement of Potomac River Rapist’s arrest: [42:16]–[42:46]

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Conclusion

Through the voices of determined detectives, gripping case studies, and the remarkable advances in forensic genealogy, this episode illustrates how dogged investigation and new technology can deliver justice—even decades later. Each strand of DNA offers a new thread to pull, leading investigators "down the rabbit hole" until long-cold cases finally find closure.

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Transcript

[Steven Deaner]

Let's face it, more people are seeing UFOs and some of these sightings completely defy explanation.

[Paul Wagner]

You have things that going hundreds of knots under the water, anti gravity.

[Steven Deaner]

But it has to be something like our own secret tech or maybe even adversarial, right?

[Paul Wagner]

So the claim that it's our tech

[Mike Farish]

or that it's an adversarial tech.

[Dean Combi]

No it is not.

[Steven Deaner]

This is Steven Deaner from the hit podcast uap and I have conversations like that every week as I keep up with all the latest relating to UFO topics. Just search UAP wherever you get your podcasts. As we continue to ask the question, are we alone in the cosmos?

[Paul Wagner]

Previously in episode four of WTOP's American Nightmare series. Unknown Subject when you get a murder

[Dean Combi]

that's like this and you have not much of anything to go on, you do a lot of wheel spinning.

[Mike Farish]

Back in the early days of DNA, it took so long, I mean to get your result.

[Dean Combi]

Code has notified Montgomery county that there was a match to like, like eight rapes that they had up there. And so you know, I contacted Joe Madonna.

[Paul Wagner]

Do you recall getting the notification that the Mirzaian murder was connected to your rape cases?

[Steve Smugareski]

Yeah, yeah I do.

[Dean Combi]

And I was like shocked.

[Paul Wagner]

It's a Thursday in June in 2012, six months after the FBI joined the search for a serial predator they were now calling the Potomac River Rapist, reporters in Washington D.C. were told for the first time in years that D.C. police had new information in the case. We were told to meet the police chief not at police headquarters, but on MacArthur Boulevard, a leafy street in an upscale section of the city and near the German Embassy and about a mile from Canal Road where Christine Rezaion was killed. When I arrived, I recognized a number of high ranking police officials, including the two detectives assigned to the case, Todd Williams and Tony Brigadini, as well as Montgomery County Police Detective Joe Madonna. I was also surprised to see John Walsh there. I knew the host of America's Most Wanted had profiled the case before and I was anxious to hear what he had to say. When then D.C. police Chief Cathy Lanier stepped to the mics, she had surprising news to share. Here's what she told us. After the FBI held its last news conference In December of 2011, a woman came forward to say she thought the man police were looking for, the so called Potomac River Rapist, had also attacked her two years before Christine was killed.

[Steve Smugareski]

Again asking for the public's help in

[Paul Wagner]

identifying and locating this violent offender who's responsible now for several brutal attacks. When she came forward. The woman was in her 70s, but at the time she was attacked, she was 59. She told police she was walking home from the bank at MacArthur Boulevard and Arizona Avenue, heading southeast towards the Georgetown Reservoir. And as she was passing a dense wooded area that extends down to Canal Road, a man came out of the woods armed with a stick. She tried to run towards the street, but the man grabbed her. There was a struggle. She screamed, but the man overpowered her and dragged her into the woods. The attack was vicious. He stripped her naked, beat her and raped her and left her at the bottom of a ravine. When the man ran off, she was able to get back up to the street where two cyclists saw her and called for help. The woman was so badly injured, she spent days in the hospital recovering. She described the man who attacked her as Hispanic or black, tall, with a heavy build and a light complexion. She said he was possibly in his late 30s and neatly dressed in a collared shirt and chino type pants. She got a good look at his face and a composite sketch was made. It sounded chillingly similar to how Christine was attacked, but it had never before been linked to Christine's killing because investigators never tested the evidence.

[Mike Farish]

For whatever reason. I don't know. But her rape kit basically hadn't been processed or at least uploaded into CODIS for the cold hit.

[Paul Wagner]

Yes, you heard that right. That's former homicide commander Mike Farish. The evidence taken from the woman in 1996 was collected and preserved in a rape kit, which then sat on a shelf for more than 15 years, a common problem in many police agencies at the time because of the high cost of processing the kits in a lab. If investigators didn't have a solid lead on a suspect, the evidence usually went untested. And when they finally tested the kit all those years later, it was a match. The same man who killed Christine had also attacked this woman. Detective Todd Williams knew he had one opportunity to get the word out, and he wanted reporters to know a few things. The veteran homicide investigator who shares a resemblance to actor Russell Crowe, said the fact the rapist had struck twice in Northwest D.C. meant he was likely familia with that part of town and may have had some connection to the area. It may have been a job that took him there, or perhaps he knew someone who lived in the neighborhood. The smallest piece of information could be the lead investigators need to identify this guy. It was a shot in the dark for Detective Williams. Sixteen years had gone by. Was someone really going to call the police after all that time? John Walsh who had a reputation for using colorful language, told reporters. This is a dangerous sexual predator. This is a hunter of women. Somebody knows something about this guy. Later that summer, on June 29, America's Most Wanted aired an episode featuring the three detectives and D.C. police Chief Kathy Lanier discussing the case. All four were interviewed by Walsh. And in the wooded area where Christine was killed. At the news conference, detective Joe Madonna, who had been investigating all those rapes in Montgomery county, told reporters this new case gave investigators fresh leads to follow.

[Mike Farish]

Well, this case, I think in D.C. has the victim actually got a good

[Dean Combi]

look at the suspect, where in most of our cases, they did not?

[Paul Wagner]

Based on the woman's account, police released a second composite sketch and a description of the suspect. A black man in his late 20s to early 30s, wearing a polo type shirt and khaki pants. Detectives now have a new key piece of information about their serial predator. But in some ways, it's even more perplexing to investigators. Okay, let's take another look at the timeline. Where does this new attack fit? Christine was killed in August 1998. The attacks in Montgomery county began back in 1991. The rapist struck four times that year, then again in early 1992 and 1994. Then there's a three year gap with no reported rapes until 1997. It's during this gap that the woman was attacked on MacArthur Boulevard in D.C. july 20, 1996. And it's a sudden change of tactics. She's pulled off the street and into the woods. Investigators already knew the man was addicted to high risk attacks, but a street attack was something new. But then in 1997, the rapist goes back to his indoor blitz attacks. In February of that year, he attacks the woman whose husband owned a car dealership. And in November, he attacks the woman who lived in a home with two dogs the attacker was somehow able to corral. The attack on Christine comes in August of 1998. The last known attack tied to the predator. The police were now calling the Potomac river rapist. Another case on the street rather than inside a home. Detective Dean Combi, at the time, we

[Dean Combi]

all felt that was extremely unusual, you know, because the thinking of it at the time was that those guys, you know, that do the preferential kind of stuff like that, you know, they kind of. That the setup is part of the fantasy and so that they, you know, that's what they get off on. And to do something outside of it would be extremely unusual. So that was kind of. We were just like. Because that's why we never would have connected them because it wouldn't have occurred, you know, didn't occur to us that that was, you know, thing.

[Paul Wagner]

But Detective Combi pointed to an August 2019 article in the Atlantic titled why Don't Police Catch Serial Rapists? It detailed a 10 year effort by prosecutors in Cleveland to test thousands of old rape kits, some decades old. At that point, they ended up indicting more than 700 people by testing every single rape kit. What's more, the article said it's led to a revolution in criminology, giving investigators valuable insight into the criminal mind.

[Dean Combi]

When they started going through and testing all these, they were finding that they had serial rapists that they had no idea were operating for one thing, and that they had some rapes that were unsolved, of course, but were connected by DNA. They didn't know who it was that were, you know, followed a particular pattern. So they had identified those as being, you know, part of the, part of the person's series. However, they found that those guys were also committing other rapes that were out of their pattern. They were just more like crimes of opportunity. So the lesson is the guys will, you know, they may have a preference about what they do or how they want to do it, but if they see an opportunity, they're going to take it and we'll do it.

[Paul Wagner]

So, you know, is that kind of the thinking now?

[Dean Combi]

That's kind of the thinking now. That's kind of the thinking now because that's, that's what it shows, you know, it's what the, the DNA is showing. Not, not just our supposition or whatever, you know, so, you know, they may have had a, where they were doing a series and they were, they were raping, you know, women who were in their 30s and, you know, in their homes and breaking in through a window or something like that and getting them or something, something like that. And then, but they would, when they, the DNA results, they were finding that women who were getting attacked outside in their 70s or in their teens, you know, coming back from the grocery store, stuff like that, and just, he's just walking down the street says, oh, that looks good, you know, and, and going over and grabbing them. Now, it's hindsight, of course, but, you know, I might have looked at, I might have called around earlier to see if they're, you know, you know, they had any unsolved ones around. But, you know, I know we, we had contacted, you know, various sex, you know, various sexual assault units, and nobody really had anything. You know, they kind of jumped out at anybody, you know, at the time

[Paul Wagner]

and the idea that he may have just stopped. Keep in mind, by 2012, there had been no sexual assaults tied to this unknown subject in 14 years.

[Mike Farish]

I just can't wrap my head around this guy committing eight or nine heinous offenses culminating in a murder in 1998, and then he's just going, okay, I'm done.

[Paul Wagner]

I know. That's the question, isn't it? That's where.

[Mike Farish]

That's a huge question for me. He got that out of his system, or whatever you want to call it. I just call BS on that.

[Paul Wagner]

That's retired D.C. police homicide commander Mike Farish. And as an experienced detective like yourself, you find that to be almost. You'd have to suspend reality to believe that he didn't do anything else after he allegedly killed Christine.

[Mike Farish]

Regardless of whether I'm an experienced investigator or not. I mean, I just. If I was a mechanic, you know, and, God, I know I couldn't do that, but if I was even a mechanic, I would not go, yeah, this guy just didn't stop. There's just no way. There's just no way. I mean, unless he. And, see, I can't even wrap my head around that. Even if he had some kind of medical issue that rendered him impotent, that would, to me, almost make his violence increase. Because now he's impotent. He can't exercise his violence through the act of raping somebody. What other heinous crap is he gonna do? You know? I don't care if he found God and a good woman. This guy has some sick impulses that aren't going to be fixed on their own in any way, shape, or form.

[Paul Wagner]

The working theory at the time was the Potomac River Rapist was either in prison or dead, not that he had just stopped committing crimes. The discovery of that one rape kit confirming the 1996 attack had detectives wondering if there could be others. But as the years went by and the FBI's CODIS database failed to link any other cases, investigators began to wonder, is it possible? Did he really just stop?

[Steven Deaner]

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[Paul Wagner]

You literally are my favorite UAP alien UFO podcast, Or Nick Pope from the

[Steven Deaner]

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[Paul Wagner]

The way in which there are similarities between that and how scientists now think we might open a wormhole. It's uncanny.

[Steven Deaner]

Find out why millions of others have already downloaded UAP and listen now just by searching uap wherever you get your podcasts.

[Paul Wagner]

For years, DNA was the frontier of solving cold cases. Now there's something even newer. Forensic genealogy. And it's leading to some remarkable discoveries. A number of cases have been solved using forensic genealogy and show some men are capable of committing despicable acts of violence and then going on to lead normal lives. For example, take the case of Jerry Lynn Burns. In February of 2020, a jury in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, convicted burns in the 1979 murder of Michelle Martinko, an 18 year old high school student who was found stabbed to death inside her family's car in the parking lot of a local mall. The investigation had gone nowhere until 2006, when a cold case detective reviewing case files discovered unidentified blood he suspected may have been the killer's. A DNA profile was developed, but when it was loaded into the FBI's CODIS database, there were no matches. More than a decade went by before detectives turned to what was their last hope, forensic genealogy. And the DNA from the blood was entered into GEDmatch, the same genealogy website used to catch the Golden State Killer. A family tree was built and investigators narrowed their search to three brothers. One by one, investigators tailed the siblings, surreptitiously collecting DNA the men had discarded. And one by one, the brothers were ruled out until they got to Jerry. Detectives collected a straw from a drink Burns had been consuming at a restaurant. And when investigators had the straw tested at the lab, they were told the DNA was a match to the blood found in the car. Detectives then confronted Burns with a hidden camera inside an office at the Iowa business he owned.

[Steve Smugareski]

The reality is we're not. We're not here on a whim. We're here to confirm what we already know. How would we get your DNA at the crime scene there, Jerry?

[Paul Wagner]

I don't know. Test it. See if it is. No, no, no. We did.

[Steve Smugareski]

How would it be there, Jerry? I don't know what happened that night.

[Paul Wagner]

Wait for the test to come back, Jerry. I don't think it did.

[Steve Smugareski]

It did. I don't think so.

[Paul Wagner]

When I was researching other cases involving forensic genealogy and learned about this one, I found this exchange gripping. Jerry Burns seems to be in utter disbelief that he'd been found. When detectives ask him, how did we get your DNA at the crime scene, Jerry? He says, I don't know. Test it to see if it is. The detectives told him they already have tested it. It's his, Jerry. Burns says, I don't think so. Although Burns maintained his innocence throughout the trial. He was convicted and is now serving life in prison without the possibility of parole. He is appealing that conviction. Investigators in Montgomery county began using forensic genealogy around 2016 and have had tremendous success solving what for years had been the unsolvable. The COL case unit began by recruiting a bike cop with a natural talent for research and put him to work building family trees. You may remember the name Steve smugareski from season two of WTOP's American Nightmare series, Murder in a Safe Place. Smuggs, as he's called on the force, is just one of those guys who has a knack for locating people through documents and records. He's the type of guy who can go down the rabbit hole, follow the clues and actually connect the dots. He had some help. Montgomery county began working with Parabon Nanolabs, a Virginia based company that specializes in helping police departments find those unknown subjects they've been looking for. What we do is we analyze the

[Steve Smugareski]

DNA and pick out the pieces of

[Paul Wagner]

it that actually determine what someone looks like. So instead of treating DNA like a fingerprint, we treat it like a blueprint of that person. That's Dr. Ellen Greytech with Parabon. She says part of the lab's process is taking an unknown subject's DNA and turning it into a composite sketch, a facsimile of what the person may actually look like. A process that has astounded investigators when they compare the composite to an actual photo of the person they've been looking for. But that's just part of the job. Parabon also takes that DNA and enters it into private databases looking for relatives of the unknown subject. Databases like GEDmatch and Family Tree, which allow law enforcement to search members genetic profiles. It's all on the up and up. Members are given the option of allowing those kinds of searches. They can say yes or no. So what Smuggs gets from Parabon is identifying information of someone who may be a distant relative of the unknown subject he's tracking. And he works from there building family trees. He has been remarkably successful. In just the last few years, he has helped close three cases that had baffled detectives for years. Two murders and a serial rapist who had been targeting elderly women. First, let's take that last case. It's interesting to note, while Smokes had accepted the position in the cold case division, he hadn't officially started yet. He was still working as a bike officer. But his new bosses asked him to take a look at new information they had just received from Parabon Nanolabs.

[Dean Combi]

So

[Steve Smugareski]

I sat down on a, on a Friday night after I got done with my shift and I just started playing around with a couple genealogy sites and, and I started making a few connections here and there family wise, working on up from our, our shared person. And by midnight on Saturday, I had hit on. Because a lot of, a lot of everybody was coming back to Frederick and West Virginia and, and such in different areas and nobody really to Montgomery County. And then by midnight on Saturday, I hit a line that came back to Montgomery County.

[Paul Wagner]

So, all right, so you, by Saturday night you get a line on a family from Montgomery county, is that right?

[Steve Smugareski]

Yes.

[Paul Wagner]

And tell me about that. What happened next?

[Steve Smugareski]

Well, I was going to call my, my buddy in, in Cold Case at midnight and I was like, nah, he's probably asleep.

[Paul Wagner]

Because you're excited at this point.

[Steve Smugareski]

I'm excited at this point. I'm like, I think I got something. But you know, I don't know, I haven't been doing this all that long. And so I called him the next morning on Sunday and you know, I told him what I found and at this point I didn't isolate on a single like a person yet. And we start playing around with a few, few things over the phone and he said, how does this person fit? And I was like, let me check. And I went back to the, to the obituary that I found and I found his name and I said, let me do a little more research. And I found another obituary to tie this person definitely to the tree.

[Paul Wagner]

The person Officer Smugareski mentioned fit perfectly into the suspect's description based on the DNA connections in the family tree and. But more work needed to be done before detectives were convinced the puzzle pieces fit.

[Steve Smugareski]

Ultimately, they got a search warrant for his DNA based on their investigation.

[Paul Wagner]

And when the lab compared the suspect's DNA with the rapist DNA, it was a moment, Officer Smugarenski told me, that left him stunned and proud. What did you think at that point?

[Steve Smugareski]

I was totally blown away. I was, I, you know, I had thought really, you know, this, this is really crazy.

[Paul Wagner]

That's right. Officer Smugarevsky, who had not even technically begun his temporary assignment with the Cold case division, had just helped solve a case that had baffled investigators for more than a decade. Marlon Michael Alexander, a father of four, pleaded guilty in February of 2019 and is now serving life in prison. At that point, Smuggs was just getting started. The detectives in Cold Case then asked him to do a deep dive on another cold case, the murder of shopkeeper James Essel. The 57 year old man was working behind the counter of his market in Comus, Maryland, in a rural part of Montgomery county, when a man walked in and purchased a bottle of cheap wine. Then, in an apparent attempted robbery, things turned violent. James essel was stabbed 20 times, including with pieces of the wine bottle the killer had just purchased. For years, it was a senseless, unsolved crime. Police had DNA. The killer had cut himself and left blood behind on the cash register. But the DNA profile sat in codis, the national DNA database, for years. There were no hits, nothing. Then, in 2016, Montgomery County Police turned to forensic genealogy. They were able to build a family tree and trace it first to a man named Henry Uits, according to a court affidavit filed in the case, before confirming the man they were actually after was Henry's brother, Hans, who was then living in Virginia beach, working as an auto mechanic and married to a retired D.C. police officer. When police moved in to arrest Hans, investigators say he produced two guns. Oh, yes. You do. You have kids. Don't do this. Police. Drop the gun, man. Don't do it. He's got kids.

[Steve Smugareski]

I think he's got kids and they're telling him not to do it.

[Paul Wagner]

For the kids sake. Drop those guns. Come out.

[Steve Smugareski]

Oh, he's got multiple guns.

[Paul Wagner]

Don't do this.

[Dean Combi]

Don't do it.

[Paul Wagner]

Drop the gun. Drop the gun.

[Dean Combi]

Oh.

[Paul Wagner]

The shooting was ruled justified. What's extraordinary about this case is the fact that police could find no criminal record for Hans uitz. It's as if he killed James Essel, according to police, and then, with tremendous remorse, said nothing about it to anyone and decided to live the rest of his life on the right side of the law? Could that also be the case with the man known as the Potomac Boy River Rapist? After his terrifying attacks on women and after he crossed the ultimate line when he smashed that rock into Christine's head, Did he just stop? By 2018, it had been 20 years since the man left his ugly mark anywhere. It had been six years since police held that news conference announcing the discovery of the other attack, when John Walsh, the host of America's Most Wanted, pleaded for anyone with information to come forward. Nothing. Fresh off his success in the James Essel case, Montgomery county put Smuggs on the Potomac River Rapist. Smuggs, as he's known, is a big guy with an easygoing manner. He has sandy brown hair and the build of a man who could play tackle or tight end for a football team. When I first interviewed Smuggs, he was not allowed to discuss the Uits case. Or any of his work on the Potomac River Rapist. So instead, to get a feel for how he does his work, I asked him about another case he helped solve. The ugly rape and murder of Lee Betwee, a children's hospital research scientist who was found beaten, raped and strangled outside her Rockville, Maryland home on October 3, 1994. Detectives had DNA, but were never able to link it to a suspect. Just to be clear, this is not a case connected to the Potomac River Rapist, but it helps show how Smuggs does his work. Like the UITS case, detectives turned to the Virginia based Parabon Nanolabs for help in locating a family tree with links to the killer's DNA.

[Steve Smugareski]

This case they had sent in to Parabon, and Parabon had come back with that, they had found lower matches, which were probably third to fourth, maybe even fifth cousins out. So at that time, it was fall of 2018, they had. Parabon had not recommended that we go forward with the, with the genealogy because it was a lower centimorgan match. It was pretty far out.

[Paul Wagner]

A centimorgan is a unit for measuring genetic linkage. It's defined as the distance between chromosome positions, also known as loci or markers. But at this point, you're on your assignment now.

[Steve Smugareski]

At this point, I was on my assignment and Sergeant Hamrach came to me and he said, what do you think? He said, you know, this is what, this is what Parabon's got on it. What do you, what do you think on that? And I said, I said, well, I said, they're pretty far matches, but if, you know, if we get the information, I should be able to. It's going to take some time, but I, I should be able to trace this, this family out.

[Paul Wagner]

You were willing to give a shot.

[Steve Smugareski]

I was willing to give it a shot because, you know, was the process. It just takes a little time. You just gotta get, get out there and start eliminating lines or see if, see if you come down to a, to a section of the family that is right where our crime is and such.

[Paul Wagner]

You're look, you're looking for geography in a way.

[Steve Smugareski]

I look at everything. Everything I look at geography, I look at family dynamics. I look at everything like where, where most of the family is concentrated in, because with the databases, the public databases, if you're five generations out, you could have relatives out in California and you could be the only person here in Maryland, but all the rest of your family comes from California. And so that's where the records are. That's where you have to search the Databases.

[Paul Wagner]

And when you search databases, what kind of records are you looking at?

[Steve Smugareski]

I'm looking for anything that, anything that makes a connection, anything that tells me who a parent is or who a child is or who a grandparent is. Anything of that. Anything of that.

[Paul Wagner]

So we're talking about birth records, death records, what other records?

[Steve Smugareski]

Census records, funeral records, obituaries, you know, anything that, anything that'll give you another even, you know, US public records with like directories and stuff. You can, you can link up stuff with addresses and, and, and such.

[Paul Wagner]

A deep dive.

[Steve Smugareski]

Yeah, yeah, very.

[Paul Wagner]

And in this case, a very deep dive.

[Steve Smugareski]

Yes, yes.

[Paul Wagner]

So you get started on it and tell me where it took you.

[Steve Smugareski]

So we get, we got the return back in January of 2019.

[Paul Wagner]

And when you say return, this is from Parabon. Okay.

[Steve Smugareski]

So they did their, their 15 hours of genealogy on it, and they worked it from two low matches, which were in the 100centimorgan range, which is usually between third and fourth cousin, probably closer to fourth cousin. They had worked it to a common ancestor or a common relationship that was several generations back.

[Paul Wagner]

Several generations, yeah.

[Steve Smugareski]

It was at least four, maybe five generations back. I think it was four generations back. Without my chart in front of me, I can't tell you for sure.

[Paul Wagner]

But at this point you're still sitting there going, I'm going to take a shot at this.

[Steve Smugareski]

Yep, yep. So they come back with that and you know, they said, you know, you can pay for more genealogy, we can work it a little harder. But we don't know, we don't know if after, you know, 15 hours more, if we're gonna be able to find your suspect or not. So they, we got the return and they gave it to me and said, alright, what do you think? So I started working on it.

[Paul Wagner]

Smuggs worked the case for two or three weeks before he had to shift back to bike patrol. Still, he kept working on it.

[Steve Smugareski]

We were taking a break from bike patrol and I got on the computer and I started doing some of my searches again, trying to update, you know, update my charts and fill in the blocks. And I started seeing, you know, coming down from this relationship, there were several paths that I could take. And I started seeing in one, one path all the people were coming up to be too old in the spot that I needed to be. And then, and when you say you're

[Paul Wagner]

going, there's several paths you could take. So you could go on one path doing detective work and you could go down a rabbit hole and be completely wasting your time. So you, you have to make a choice at that point, which path to go.

[Dean Combi]

Yep.

[Paul Wagner]

Okay, go ahead.

[Steve Smugareski]

And for me, more information is better. So I like to follow it all the way down to the end and then at that point, you know, do my research on it or dish it to the detectives and, you know, see if we can eliminate that branch or such and then. And then work down. And in this case, I was doing the one branch and like I said, you know, everybody was falling too old where I needed them to be, and then another branch they were falling, were too young where I needed them to be. So I took this other branch and I started working on it, working on it. And everybody was coming back to West Virginia, West Virginia roots and such. And I clicked on one public document, and it was a man who lived in Silver Spring, Maryland. And I said, wow, all right, this is the first connection I have to Montgomery county in this case. So then I start playing around with him and found his children. And when I did, I clicked on one of his sons and started doing some research on one of his sons. And all the son's addresses started popping up in Rockville all around the Metro station. And then I started looking at his criminal history, and it was, it was spot on for the kinds of crime, or not, not rape, but, you know, assaults and, but at this point, not

[Paul Wagner]

the kind of crimes that would have, that would have. His DNA would have been taken.

[Steve Smugareski]

No. And the biggest thing in this, in this case was the, the phenotype, which is the composite that came back from Parabon nanolabs, and in this case said that the suspect there was a percentile, high percentile, that our suspect would have either green or blue eyes. And so I threw him into. I threw his name and everything into a law enforcement database and popped up with a picture, popped up with his eye color. And I put it next to the. I put it next to the composite, and I was like, wow, this is, this is him. His eye color was. Was hazel, was green. And so I called my buddy up in Cold Case and said, I think I got it.

[Paul Wagner]

That's extraordinary. I looked at what you sent me. I looked at the Parabon composite next to his mugshot, and it's astonishing how close they came. Astonishing. So you're now excited and you're going, I think I might have.

[Steve Smugareski]

I think I found him. And so I sent.

[Paul Wagner]

What was, what was the reaction on the other end of the line at that point?

[Steve Smugareski]

Well, I. It went to his voicemail, so I left him a message and then I sent him. I sent him What I found through email, and. And then I called him back again because I was really excited. I was like, why aren't you answering your phone? And then finally he called me back, and I said, did you see the stuff I sent you? And he's like, yeah, on the dead guy. And I was like, what do you mean, dead guy? And in all my excitement, I overlooked that our Suspect died in 2017, and that was a little bit of a letdown at that point. But to still find this person was. Was really exciting. And to be the second time to do it really gave me more confidence that the first time just wasn't a fluke.

[Paul Wagner]

And this time it took you how much time?

[Steve Smugareski]

This time it was. We got the return back in, I believe, mid January. I don't know the exact date. And then we found. I found him, like, the second week of February.

[Paul Wagner]

Wow, that was quick. So you've now had two cases where you found an individual when we know now that they were definitely connected to these cases, and in a matter of weeks, you found these people, and these are cases that had baffled detectives for years. Mm. What do you think of that?

[Steve Smugareski]

I. I think I got some help from upstairs, Really. I think, you know, sometimes it's. It's. It's just very overwhelming, you know, and, you know, some of the. Some of the stuff to find is really difficult to find. And sometimes I think I got somebody up there pointing me in the right direction.

[Paul Wagner]

I can see you're emotional about it. That's. Yeah. It just goes to show you how. How important this work is and how getting answers to things where people have been victims of crimes, brutal, awful crimes, and then you can get answers to it. I mean, that's something. That's saying something. Tell me again how you were able to positively identify this man and what was his name?

[Steve Smugareski]

Kenneth Earl Day.

[Paul Wagner]

So Kenneth Day is dead, but he has an extensive criminal record. And you told me that there had been an autopsy in West Virginia. So how are you able to make a definite connection, a DNA connection, between that man and the killing of this woman, the scientist?

[Steve Smugareski]

Well, we had obtained a blood card from the medical examiner's office in West Virginia, and we were able to do a direct comparison of the DNA left behind from the crime scene in the murder and. And compare it to Mr. Day's DNA. And it was a direct match.

[Paul Wagner]

And that must have been another euphoric moment.

[Dean Combi]

Yes.

[Steve Smugareski]

Yes.

[Paul Wagner]

Officer Steve Smugareski wasn't allowed to talk about the Potomac river rapist case in 2020, and he's still not. That's because police announced In November of 2019 Smuggs had found him.

[Steve Smugareski]

I'm Pete Newsham. I'm the Chief of Police for the Metropolitan Police department here in D.C. between 1991 and 1998, a man terrorized our community as he brutally preyed upon and attacked multiple women across this region. Today, joined by law enforcement partners, we collectively are announcing that an arrest has

[Mike Farish]

been made of a man who was

[Steve Smugareski]

known as the Potomac River Rapist.

[Paul Wagner]

That's next in episode six of Unknown Subject, season three of WTOP's American Nightmare series. Written by me, Paul Wagner, with editorial assistance from Jack Moore, Julia Ziegler and Craig Schwab, this episode would not be possible without the help of Officer Steve smugareski and retired D.C. detectives Dean Combie and Mike Farish. Reporting and production of this podcast was supported by a grant from Spotlight DC Capital City Fund for Investigative Journalism. For grants, Please apply to spotlightdc.org Our show relies on people like you leaving ratings and reviews on Apple to help us climb the podcast charts and attract new listeners. We hope if you like what you hear, you will take a minute to do so. If you have questions or comments about the show, send us an email through our website, American Nightmare podcast.com we are also on Twitter and Facebook mnightmarepod. The music in the show is Ethereal Thoughts by Olive Music and Steadfast by Moments. And as always, thanks for listening. Sa.