on memorial day weekend in 1984, someone placed a body in a cardboard box and slid it down an embankment. the cause of death was homicide, but investigators had no idea when the murder occurred. but science uncovered an important detail of the victim's last night alive. would it be enough to identify the killer?

on a sunday morning, a fishermen enjoying the river in central pennsylvania saw a large cardboard box at the river's edge. inside was a garbage bag. >> he pulled back the piece of plastic a little bit and discovered it was the part of a person, didn't know male, female. >> the torso was later identified as female. the rest was a mystery. >> there was no indicator as to how she met her death. >> above the box on the side of the hill, the underbrush had been tamped down indicating the box had slid down.

>> the box had slid after the dew had settled and had been wiped off after the passage of the box, and that was important in developing a timeline of this case. >> investigators noticed a grease stained puncture hole in the box, and in the grease was small pieces of styrofoam. >> whoever pulled that out of the trunk, when they were lifting it out, caught the box on the latch. that's what i believed it was from. >> someone had gone to great lengths to conceal the victim's identity by removing the head, arms, and legs. to do this, the killer needed time and privacy. >> the part that didn't make sense to me about that was if someone could make a person's head, arms, and legs disappear from that day until this day, they could easily make the rest

of the body disappear. so there was some reason for the body to be discovered. >> the body had three large moles and a scar on the abdomen. blue jeans and a belt with a zodiac buckle were the only other keys to the victim's identity. at the autopsy, the pathologist found evidence of insect activity, which was sent to a forensic entomologist for analysis. this is an expert in the study of insects. he identified the eggs as those of the bluebottle fly and the back blowfly. both common in areas of the united states. both the weather conditions and the stage of the egg and larvae development allowed the entomologist to give an estimate to the time of death. >> it was roughly two days prior to our finding the torso. >> this meant the victim died

sometime late friday night or early saturday morning. the autopsy was not able to identify the cause of death. the pathologist found semen present during the autopsy, but there was no evidence of rape, and there was no way to identify the man since this was before dna testing. police knew that in order to identify possible suspects, they first had to identify the victim. >> we said from the very beginning, if we find out who she is, we'll find out who killed her. >> missing persons reports were checked, but no one fit the description of the torso. seven months later, she was buried, still unidentified in an unmarked grave and soon forgotten. one year later, a telephone call

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one year after jane doe, the unidentified murder victim, was buried in a pauper's grave in pennsylvania, police received what at first was a routine telephone call. a woman told police that her ex-sister-in-law, edna posey, has been missing for a year. she was able to provide police with a detailed physical description. >> she started explaining how edna would say, i can't wear a bikini because of my moles. >> this sounded strikingly similar to the birthmarks found on the body of their jane doe a year earlier. the caller also said edna posey always wore a belt with a she was a single mother of an 11-year-old boy, randy. and she was no stranger to the seedy side of life in the nearby city of harrisburg. >> she would generally be perceived as a tramp.

unstable relationships, short term. problems with alcohol and not having a stable home environment for randy, among other things. >> edna would meet men in bars, quickly move in with them, and just as quickly move out only to repeat the same pattern again and again. and she would sometimes disappear for months at a time without saying a word to anyone. edna was able to admit that her life was out of control and had asked donald ruby, her son randy's boy scout leader, if randy could move in with him. >> donald ruby had a buy scout troop that was comprised largely of boys who had problems with their lives. most of them were in families with mothers only. the boys had been in trouble, and donald took this group of boys and formed his own troop with it.

>> randy moved in with donald ruby and his wife and lived with them as if he were their own son. 42-year-old ruby worked as a machinist and had no children of his own. while many applauded him for his efforts with troubled youngsters, some questioned his motives. >> well, it's in the eye of the beholder. he did some things i would have winced at myself, such as the kissing on the lips and such. i was never that way, even with my own children. >> edna moved 150 miles away to virginia, where she took a job as a dental technician while she tried to get her life back on track. this is edna's co-worker, who asked not to be identified, for fear of her safety. >> she was saving her money, and sometime in that particular time period, she met a young soldier in the army band in virginia, and they became quite close and was going to move in together

and bring randy down to be with them. >> and police believe that donald ruby was threatened by the loss of randy. >> the evidence was that she intended to take randy back with her. we believed and argued that donald did not want to give up randy as his son. >> did this mean that donald ruby had a motive to kill edna posey? ruby told police that edna posey had come to their home to visit randy on friday night and planned to stay for the entire memorial day weekend. the next day, ruby and his wife said they took edna shopping and dropped her off downtown. when they returned later to pick her up, edna never showed up. >> given the lifestyle that edna

lived for decades, you could sell it very easily that she just decided to disappear off the face of the earth. >> but edna's son, randy, told police a slightly different story. he said he last saw his mother on friday night when she kissed him good night. >> i love you. see you tomorrow. >> a short time later, he said he heard a loud noise coming from the bedroom where his mother was sleeping. >> i think he described it as if somebody had fallen out of bed. >> he said when he woke up the next day, his mother was gone. if the forensic entomologist was correct in his estimate of the time of edna's death, the noise randy heard on friday night may have been his mother's murder. when police searched donald ruby's trunk, they found the

same type of grease that was found on the box holding edna posey's torso. and they discovered the hole in the box was the same size and shape as the trunk latch in ruby's car. prosecutors now believed that donald ruby murdered edna posey on friday evening. everybody knows that. well, did you know words really can hurt you? what...? jesse don't go! jesse...no! i'm sorry daisy, but i'm a loner. and a loner gotta be alone. heee yawww! geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. jesse?

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when donald ruby was charged with the murder of edna posey, police heard some unsettling news about his life with edna's son, randy. >> we had testimony that when they would come home from camping trips, he would physically touch randy's private parts, allegedly to feel for ticks. >> prosecutors said that was evidence of pedophilia, that ruby had a sexual fixation with randy and killed edna to keep her from regaining custody of her son. they said that the grease and styrofoam evidence on the box containing edna's body, though circumstantial, tied ruby to the

crime. three years after edna posey's disappearance, donald ruby was convicted of her murder and sentenced to life in prison. edna's family and friends believed that a cold-blooded killer had gotten justice. from behind bars, donald ruby maintained his innocence. he said edna had countless low-life lovers and any one of them could have committed the crime. his lawyers petitioned the court for a retrial. they claimed there was no proof that donald ruby was a pedophile and that his rights were violated when jurors heard that testimony. ruby's defense attorneys also decided to have the forensic evidence re-examined. so they called dr. neal haskell,

one of the country's premiere forensic entomologists. dr. haskell analyzed the eggs and larvae from edna posey's body. flies lay eggs, which develop into larvae and then into flies. but in reading the medical examiner's report, dr. haskell noticed an inconsistency. at the autopsy, the medical examiner said he found eggs but not larvae. and he noticed something else. at the original autopsy, the eggs were scraped from the body and placed in a petri dish. the scrapings also contained bits of flesh and blood. this meant that the eggs had three additional days to feed on the flesh and develop before

they were analyzed. >> i'm trying to avoid saying the cops screwed up. i'm trying to be diplomatic. >> dr. haskell analyzed some of the eggs found on edna posey's body. after three years, they were so dry they were almost dust. they were then placed in a saline solution to rehydrate them. dr. haskell believes these eggs were on edna posey's body for only a short time. meaning that edna posey was killed sometime late saturday night or early sunday morning, not friday night as the original entomologist estimated. >> scientific entomological evidence that was presented in this case clearly showed that the time when the death of this individual had taken place had to be much shorter than what the prosecution was alleging. >> the meteorological evidence also pointed to early sunday

morning. when the fisherman found the body on sunday morning, he said there was no dew or condensation along the path the box traveled down the embankment. and another factor supporting this time frame was the autopsy report. the medical examiner said there was motile or moving sperm in edna's body at the autopsy. sperm remains motile in a deceased person for only 24 hours after death. donald rudy had an alibi for all day saturday and saturday night. after six years in prison, donald ruby was granted a new trial. and ruby's new defense team had a surprise piece of evidence. new dna testing of the semen found during edna posey's autopsy uncovered a tantalizing

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ensure. take life in. eight years after edna posey's death, forensic scientists analyzed the semen recovered during her autopsy,

this time using new dna technology which wasn't available at donald ruby's first trial. in a shocking development, dna testing revealed there was semen from three different men, and donald ruby's dna was not among them. the autopsy notes revealed that the semen contained motile sperm at the time of the autopsy. sperm remains motile in a dead person for only 24 hours. >> we had at least three people, by the evidence, who were with her and had sex with her less than 24 hours before her body was discovered. >> we were able to exploit that in the trial by planting the suggestion that edna, true to form, had gotten on the wild side when she was dropped off in middletown by don.

>> at donald ruby's second trial, his defense was the same as the first trial, that he and his wife dropped edna off on saturday morning to go shopping. but this time, new forensic evidence helped bolster his story. his attorneys implied that one or more of the unidentified men who had sex with her on saturday night may have been the killer. >> oh, that was clearly defense insinuation, that somebody that edna was picked up by might have committed this murder. >> the other new piece of forensic evidence was dr. haskell's testimony with his view that the original time of death was inaccurate. he testified that improper preservation of the entomological evidence caused an inaccurate estimation of the time of death. he told the jury that edna posey

died late saturday night or early sunday morning, not on friday night as originally claimed. further helping ruby's case was edna's son, randy. at the original trial, randy said he heard a loud thump from his mother's bedroom late on friday night. but eight years later, randy, now 21 years old, recalled nothing about that. >> and thus we did not have the thump in the night to use as testimony. >> the defense also claimed that the hole in the carton carrying edna's body could have been made by thousands of vehicles with the same type of hood latch and grease as was in ruby's car. after a nine-day trial and six hours of deliberation, the jury found donald ruby not guilty, a verdict which baffled edna's friends and family.

>> just a total state of shock. they could not believe this. they had proven a case and to have it thrown out like that and a murderer walking the streets. >> and the case, while officially closed, remains open in the minds of those involved. >> who should be scared of mr. ruby? virtually anyone with children. i don't propose to be an expert in pedophilia, but certainly be my lay opinion that a leopard doesn't change his spots. >> i'm convinced that don did not kill edna. he might have had reason to, but he did not do it. who did kill her, i have no clue. i just know it's not don. >> donald ruby left town soon

after the trial, and no one, not even his own lawyers, know where he is today. >> i have had a letter that he sent me later that year that basically thanked me for testifying on his behalf, and that he was going to have a certain place in his heart for the welfare of the flies in the future. when a young woman walked outside her home to investigate a strange noise, she was abducted at gunpoint. but the victim knew something about forensic evidence, and she was determined to prove she had been inside the assailant's truck. the clue she left behind and her recollection of detail led police straight to the criminal's front door.