Episodes

Fort Worth Cold Case detectives solved the murder of 17-year-old Carla Walker after it had gone cold for nearly five decades. They analyzed old evidence using genetic genealogy and new DNA extraction technology pioneered by Othram, a forensic genealogy lab in the Woodlands, a suburb of Houston. 17-Year Old Carla Walker Abducted in August of 1974 Othram matched the DNA to a test submitted to a genealogy site by a member of the killer’s family tree. Othram did not disclose the relative’s name. Col...

This is a story about two botched murder attempts by hired hitmen. And what happened when 65-year-old Joyce Sturdivant took matters into her own hands? One of the most common forms of homicide is when one half of a couple kills the other. Women are usually the victims of this form of homicide. Only one percent of male victims are killed by a partner. Joyce Sturdivant 76-years old - TDCJ Inmate #01783322 But in this case, 65-year-old Joyce Sturdivant knocked off her husband after the hitmen she h...

The men and women of the Texas Highway Patrol work alone, often at night, on remote stretches of highway. They drive distinctive black and white cruisers and SUVs with bright gold emblems in the shape of Texas on the side doors. Help might be a hundred miles away if a traffic stop turns bad. For example, in 2021, Texas Department of Public Safety Trooper Chad Walker was killed in an ambush. Walker stopped to help a driver in a disabled vehicle. The driver jumped out of the car armed with a handg...

Former NYPD Detective Randy Jurgensen walked a beat in Harlem all the way into Hollywood’s greatest crime dramas of all time. He is known as the cop who killed Sonny Corleone in The Godfather. Gene Hackman pats down NYPD Detective Randy Jurgensen to learn proper police procedures to use in the filming of The French Connection His walk of fame started when William Friedkin, the director of The French Connection, asked Jurgensen to demonstrate how to put a suspect against a wall for the “pat down....

When you hear about violent crime, do you think to yourself, “it would never happen to me?” When 29-year-old Colleen Reed went to a self-service car wash in Austin, Texas, none of her family or friends thought it would be the last time they saw her. Reed never imagined that serial killer Kenneth McDuff was stalking her. McDuff is featured in the first season of True Crime Reporter®. I want you to understand that it can happen to you because “they walk among us.” Sexual predators and killers don’...

After listening to our episodes about serial killer Kenneth McDuff, you have no doubt that McDuff is what FBI profiler Roy Hazelwood described as a textbook psychopath. But it’s not only criminals that are psychopaths. CEOs of major corporations, politicians, and entertainers score high on the checklist of psychopathic behavior. Think about your work colleagues or social circle. Is your boss a narcissistic manipulator with no remorse? Do you know someone who takes pleasure in hurting others and ...

In this “Best Of True Crime Reporter®”, we take you back to the first episode in our series about serial killer Kenneth Allen McDuff. It was a Webby Award Honoree for Best True Crime Podcast in 2021. McDuff is the only criminal in Texas history to have received three death sentences. Serial Killer Kenneth Allen McDuff is being escorted to a holding cell in the Texas Death Chamber. McDuff was believed to be the only condemned inmate in the nation ever paroled and then returned to death row for...

What is it about Waco, Texas? A whirlwind of bizarre events and violence seems to dump all sorts of strange creatures into Central Texas. Whether it is serial killers on the hunt for victims or the Branch Davidian Cult ending in a fiery inferno, it spins out true crime stories that are stranger than fiction. Investigative reporter Robert Riggs and former federal prosecutor Bill Johnston have been deeply involved in all of them. In the previous episode called Murder, Mayhem, and Meth, they talked...

If you were a Breaking Bad TV series fan, get ready to listen to the actual version in Texas. The TV series featured a fictional high school chemistry teacher named Walter White, diagnosed with a deadly brain tumor who manufactures high-grade meth to put away cash for his family’s future. It is not far from the truth. During the 1980s, Central and East Texas were dotted with illicit meth labs set up in remote farmhouses. But these “Walter White” meth kingpins typically became addicted to their o...

Texas Ranger Stan Guffey 1946 – 1987 Courtesy Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum, Waco, Texas In the previous episode of True Crime Reporter™ Texas Ranger Files, we told the story of brave Rangers who kept up the pursuit of kidnappers while their car was being riddled with gunfire and was engulfed in flames. Thirteen-year-old Amy McNiel the daughter of the pioneer in the development of the first hand-held calculator, was kidnapped by five men on the way to school in January 1985 Retired Ran...

The Texas Rangers constitute the oldest state law enforcement organization in North America, dating to 1823. You can read more about the Texas Rangers' history and influence on popular culture on our blog at the True Crime Reporter®website. L to R Bill Johnston, Ret'd Ranger Captain Bob Prince, Robert Riggs True Crime Reporter™ Podcast Robert and Bill interview retired Ranger Captain Bob Prince, a legendary modern-day Texas Ranger, about his most memorable case. Our story begins with the rescue ...

In our previous episode of the True Crime Reporter® podcast, we presented the murder case of Annie Laurie Williams. Williams bludgeoned her 8 and 9-year-old sons to death and then dispassionately dismembered their bodies to dispose of them. Her acts are unthinkable. Robert Riggs and Bill Johnston contacted forensic psychiatrist Dr. Richard Taylor in the United Kingdom to gain perspective and understanding of such a crime. Dr. Taylor is the author of The Mind of a Murderer. He has worked on more ...

The 1950s were called the “Happy Days.” The war was over, the economy was booming, and the American Dream was in full swing. In 1957, it was estimated that one baby was born every second. The Lone Ranger was a hit TV show. Little boys acted out their mythical western adventures on stick horses. But the dream became a nightmare for two brothers in Texas. Their murders at the hands of their knife-wielding mother shocked the nation. Annie Williams 1955 Mug Shot This is the story of how Annie Wil...

46 years after the abduction, torture, and murder of a 17-year-old girl, cold case detectives with the Fort Worth police department arrested a 78-year old Glen McCurley and charged him with capital murder. McCurley abducted Carla Walker from the parking lot of a bowling alley in 1974. Walker had been to a Valentine’s day dance with her 17-year old boyfriend. McCurley pistol-whipped Walker’s boyfriend and tried to shoot him in the head three times but the pistol’s magazine fell out. Walker’s life...

Serial killer Kenneth McDuff fixated on the female reporters who covered his capital murder trial. After a Texas jury sentenced McDuff to death by lethal injection, he sent off a letter to one of the reporters. Rebecca Rodriguez Reporting Live For CBS 11 News in 2000 The letter written behind bars sickened reporter Rebecca Rodriguez She had covered the abduction of Colleen Reed, a petite 29-year-old accountant, from an Austin, Texas, self-service car wash shortly after Christmas in 1991. Colleen...

Husbands who murder their wives often go to great lengths to concoct stories about their disappearance or sudden death. They may give tearful appeals for help on television newscasts. They typically think that they are smarter than the police and can get away with murder. But there are no perfect crimes. Murderers often slip up when they try to make the crime scene look like what they’ve seen on television shows. Eagle-eyed investigators can see right through it. This episode goes inside t...

The Texas Rangers are among the world’s most legendary law enforcement agencies and North America’s oldest state law enforcement agency. The Rangers have inspired scores of books, movies, radio, and television. Their roots date to frontier Texas. In 1823, Stephen F. Austin, known as the Father of Texas, founded a group of ten men to protect new settlers. Texas Rangers at the El Paso County Courthouse 1896 They are deeply embedded in Texas lore. As former Ranger Capt. Bob Crowder once said, “A...

Willie Nelson sings about riding in the wide-open spaces with lyrics titled “Don’t Fence Me In”. “Don’t Fence Me In” was the ballad of Texas inmate Dennis Wayne Hope. Hope bragged that there wasn’t a prison in Texas that could hold him. The convicted armed robber even imitated the prisoner played by Paul Newman in Hollywood’s Cool Hank Luke. Hope purchased a Jaguar for his girlfriend with money stolen during robberies in Dallas, Texas. While on the run, Hope sent imprisoned convicts letters abou...

Kenneth Allen McDuff ranks among the most heartless and sadistic serial killers in American history. But what creates the McDuff’s and Ted Bundy’s of this world? Two former FBI profilers, who were among the founders of the Behavioral Science Unit based at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, gave me invaluable insight. I met profilers John Douglas and Roy Hazelwood after they had retired from the bureau. At that time, they were not widely known outside of law enforcement circles. Today, the Ne...

You are about to hear how the murder of Colleen Reed on December 29th, 1991, by serial killer Kenneth McDuff impacted the life of her then-ten-year-old niece. Ms. Reed was abducted from an Austin car wash shortly after Christmas by McDuff and his accomplice, Alva Hank Worley. You can hear Worley's confession about the grizzly details of the young accountant's brutal murder in episode 6. At the time of this recording in December 2020, Ms. Reed’s niece had spent 29 years suffering from guilt. It i...

The scandalous release of serial killer Kenneth McDuff and corruption inside the parole system triggered the passage of numerous legislative reforms dubbed “The McDuff Law.” But mysteries remain. How many violent inmates bought their way out of prison and were free to kill again? How many women did McDuff abduct and murder? McDuff always liked to have an accomplice to witness his evil acts. Did other accomplices get away with murder? Investigators sit down with investigative reporter Robert Rigg...

Investigative reporter Robert Riggs traced serial killer Kenneth McDuff’s footsteps from Texas’ Death Row to its Death Chamber at the Walls Unit in Huntsville, Texas. The day before McDuff's execution, the prison system gave Riggs and his camera crew access to the Texas death chamber. Riggs fills in precise details about how the lethal injection was administered down to McDuff’s last words. It's a step-by-step account that most people have never heard before. McDuff’s body went unclaimed by fami...

Serial killer Kenneth McDuff held back on revealing where he buried Colleen Reed's body. McDuff and his accomplice Hank Worley abducted Ms. Reed from an Austin car wash in 1991. Seven years have passed, and the clock is ticking down toward McDuff's execution for her murder and that of Melissa Northrup. Prison investigator John Moriarty, federal prosecutor Bill Johnston, and U.S. Marshal Mike McNamara spent hours on Texas death row trying to get McDuff to reveal the location of his victims' bodie...

Serial Killer Kenneth McDuff matter-of-factly described the last moments of his victims' lives as "using them up" to his accomplices in murder. Afterward, he would dispose of the young women's bodies in unmarked burial sites at remote locations. With time ticking down toward his execution, author Gary Lavergne met with McDuff on Texas Death Row to try to find out where the serial killer buried countless bodies. His victim's families just wanted to give their loved ones a proper funeral.