in the fall of 1987, a map maker was surveying the grounds of a boy scout ranch in eastern missouri. suddenly something strange caught his eye. at first, it looked like a turtle shell, but it was a skull. a mystery now unfolded. to solve it, detectives would have to put a face on the grisly discovery. the s bar f boy scout ranch covers 54 acres of picturesque

countryside in rural missouri. the mapmaker had discovered the human skull in a remote area of the ranch. teena orling was his supervisor. >> he was a professional mapmaker from finland, and he saw the skull within the first few days here. he did not say anything to me or to anyone else about it because he was afraid. >> but three months later, just before he returned to finland, the mapmaker finally told teena about the skull. using a detailed map of the ranch and following the mapmaker's directions, teena and the scout ranger searched for the skull. they found what they were looking for in a sparsely wooded clearing. along with the skull, searchers found a few strands of hair, a lower jaw, and about 40 bones, including a pelvic bone, a femur, and some ribs.

>> my initial thought was it may possibly be an indian grave until we saw the blue jean material. >> searchers unearthed the tattered remains of a pair of jeans, pieces of a flowered shirt, remnants of a plastic shopping bag, and a metal button. to begin the task of identifying the victim, the physical evidence was sent to the forensic crime lab in jefferson city, missouri. they began their evaluation with the tattered blue jeans. the outside seam was intact. this helped criminalist tom grant to determine the overall height of the victim. from cuff to waistband the outside seam measured 37 inches. >> based on that outside measurement, the inside seam length would have approximately 27 to 28 inches, which is from a short person who would have worn that pair of jeans. >> grant estimated the victim's height to be about five feet and

scientists discovered evidence of foul play in the dirt itself when they analyzed a white substance which they found mixed in with the soil at the grave. >> the trace section of our laboratory analyzed those and determined the presence of calcium carbonate, which could have been a byproduct of lime. >> people put lime there to stop the odor of a decomposing body or to cause it to decompose faster. >> scientists analyzed the hair found at the grave site. hair can be identified as caucasoid, negroid, or mongoloid. but the hair was badly damaged. the only conclusion scientists could reach was that it was not negroid. the preliminary information indicated that the victim was a female caucasian. she was short, about five feet tall. police sent this information to

the national crime center, a database of all missing persons in the united states and canada. >> and that was unsuccessful. we believed it to be murder. the problem was identifying who the victim was. >> really the first thought on my mind was this was probably going to be one that we won't be able to decide on. >> but were investigators even on the right track? one tiny piece of evidence unearthed from the shallow grave would change the course of the investigation and take medical detectives halfway around the world. ♪ a good host, is a good host no matter where he's hosting. ♪ an hors d'oeuvre for the table? ♪ perhaps even an elegant gesture for the neighbors.

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investigators believe that the skeletal remains found in the shallow grave had been there for less than eight years and were those of a petite caucasian female. one piece of evidence had puzzled investigators from the start. the small metal button found with the remains. >> half of it was somewhat rusted and deteriorated. but the upper half had a logo that was stamped on it.

the letters texwood. and in the os, there was a star type pattern that was present. none of us at our laboratory had seen or heard of that logo before. >> not even the fbi had heard of a product or company by the name of texwood. >> so we began calling over the united states, canada, and mexico. couldn't find it. so i called a friend of mine with u.s. customs. >> u.s. customs special agent timothy quinn entered the name texwood in his computer. what he discovered gave investigators the first crucial break they needed to identify the victim. >> checks of our computerized importer files were negative. then had to make a series of phone calls, the last of which was to our national import specialist in new york. from the office of the national import specialist were able to determine that the name texwood

is a make of jeans that was manufactured strictly for consumption in asia. the brand was not intended to be exported to the united states. >> this meant either that the victim had traveled to asia before her death and purchased the jeans there or was, in fact, asian. to find out more, the bones were sent first to anthropologists at the university of missouri, and later to colorado state university. >> if you have the right bones, you can find out everything you need. you don't need a complete skeleton. the more you have, the more complete picture you can have. >> for instance, the skull can tell an anthropologist about gender and race. the first step was to determine whether the skull was caucasoid, negroid, or mongoloid, which includes native americans or asians. the anthropologists confirmed

police suspicions that the skull was mongoloid. >> the bridge of the nose, the small cheekbones, the overall features led us to believe this was mongoloid. they confirmed that the victim was indeed female. since the cranial sutures were closed and judging from the wear of her teeth, they estimated she was young. most likely in her mid 20s. the bones had smooth surfaces, an indication that the victim was not particularly muscular. anthropologists estimated her weight to be approximately 120 pounds, and they learned something else from examining her pelvic bone. when a woman has delivered at least two children, the separating process of the pelvic bones creates a groove like this one. such a groove was found on the pelvic bone at the grave site. investigators now knew that the

victim had given birth to at least two children. still they were at a dead end. >> it's very frustrating because you cannot start the investigation of who committed a crime until you determine who the victim is. >> with little else to go on, the next step was to give the unidentified skull a face. when cigarette cravings hit, all i can think about is getting relief. only nicorette mini has a

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the skeletal remains told authorities what they were looking for. an asian female who had given birth to at least two children. they knew she was petite, standing about five feet tall and weighing about 120 pounds, but what did she look like? police asked the anthropologist to bring the skull to life through the technique of facial reconstruction. first, the reconstructionist makes a latex mold of the actual skull. once the mold is made, the skull can be returned to police to be used as evidence. then a plastered cast is made from the latex mold. using this plaster cast, rubber pegs called landmarks are glued onto the cast. they represent tissue

thicknesses on various points on the face. facial tissues thicknesses differ from men and women and vary with race and age. next the landmarks are connected with strips of clay following the contours of the skull. >> each individual skull is like a blueprint or a fingerprint. no two are alike. we follow this blueprint then to create our faces, following the shape, the bends of each skull. >> the spaces between the clay strips are filled in to flesh out the face. plastic brown eyes are carefully aligned and set into sockets and lids are molded. final touches include a nose and lips. and because the victim was presumed to be asian, the bust was given a black wig. the identity of the victim was still unknown, but police now had an important tool in their

investigation, a face they hoped would jar someone's memory. they sent photographs of the bust to newspapers and television stations in the nearby cities hoping for a response. the wait lasted just three days. >> skeletal remains of a woman were found -- >> wilaiporn cox was watching television when she saw the bust on a local news program. >> then i call my husband, tell my husband what i saw on the tv. >> her husband karmen picked up a newspaper, looked at the bust and thought he recognized her as well. >> called her back and i said, it's awful close. i think we ought to do something. >> they said the bust looked like their friend who lived in a nearby town whom they hadn't seen for the past five years. they told police she left her

husband richard and had returned home to her native thailand. when police questioned richard, he did not believe that the skull found at the boy scout ranch 100 miles away from his home was that of his wife. richard said she told him she missed her family in thailand and she wanted to divorce him. he said he personally drove her to the st. louis airport five years earlier to take her flight to thailand. he said that was the last time he and his children saw her. and they never heard from her again. and neighbors confirmed that she had, in fact, spoken of returning to thailand. i knew she told me she had gotten her passport. she had gotten her citizenship and her passport. so it wouldn't have surprised me, you know, if she had done that. >> she mentioned to me, you know, she's not happy.

she like to go to thailand, see family. >> if she was, indeed, the woman found in a shallow grave, why hadn't her family in thailand reported her missing in the last five years? for the information police needed, scientists once again looked for answers in the bones. creeping up on you... fight back with relief so smooth... ...it's fast. tums smoothies starts dissolving the instant it touches your tongue ...and neutralizes stomach acid at the source. ♪ tum, tum tum tum... smoothies! only from tums.

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had bunchee nyhuis left behind her two children and returned to thailand as her husband claimed or were her remains those found in the shallow grave at the boy scout ranch? the answer lay in the skull and skull and a technique called skull photograph superimposition. police obtained this photograph of bun chee from her husband richard and sent it to the anthropology department at colorado state university. police also included a photograph of another asian woman who was reported missing in georgia. the photographic work was done by the late dr. michael charney, a world renowned forensic anthropologist at colorado state university. charney positioned the skull in the same pose as the photographs

of both women, then superimposed slides of the skull over the photographs. the skull did not match the woman from georgia, but it did match the photo of bun chee nyhuis perfectly. >> face is at an angle. she is clowning around, making a face. we find the jaw line is within the chin. the top is within the top of the head. the cheek is within. the eyes are in the orbits. the nasal opening corresponds to the nose, and the teeth match up very nicely to the jaw line here. in spite of the fact that it is a very difficult angle to approximate and expression to approximate, we felt this was a very good match. >> now armed with a positive scientific identification, police turned their attention to richard nyhuis. they suspected that he knew more about his wife's disappearance than he was telling them. >> her friends indicated they had a very volatile

relationship, that they argued quite a bit. >> and police also learned of a disturbing coincidence, that richard nyhuis was a boy scout leader and often camped at the boy scout ranch where police discovered bunchee's grave. >> i turned to my partner and we looked at each other. we just couldn't believe it. that's when we knew we had to formulate a game plan and we would have probably just one shot at him. >> it all started fitting together at that point. all the pieces start coming into place. >> when police confronted richard nyhuis with the forensic evidence, he confessed, although he gave conflicting accounts of what actually happened. he said bun chee fell during a scuffle and hit her head accidentally, but admitted suffocating his wife. >> was bleeding real bad. there was blood all over the place and she was yelling. so i put my hands over her mouth

and her nose and suffocated her. >> in light of the confession, forensic pathologist dr. mary case examined the skull. she studied the small wound on the back of the skull and concluded that it was not the result of an accident, but rather, the result of blunt trauma to the head. >> this is a very limited area. it's pushed inward. and we tend to see this kind of depressed skull fracture when you strike the head with something that has very forceful impact over a very small striking surface. a hammer would be a good example of something that could do that. it is a tool. it is meant to strike. and all of the force is directed on to a very small striking surface. >> based on the forensic evidence and parts of nyhuis' confession, prosecutors believe that richard and bun chee argued one night in the basement of their home. >> we're not moving! we've been through this before! we are not moving!

all right? >> bun chee wanted to move into a new house. richard refused, saying they couldn't afford it. >> i'm taking the boys and leaving! >> the blow to her head was not fatal, but while she lay bleeding on the floor, richard suffocated her. he used a service merchandise bag to contain the bleeding, wrap the body in a sheet of plastic and placed her in the freezer. where she remained for the next three months. nyhuis fabricated the story about driving bun chee to the st. louis airport for a flight to thailand. when spring arrived and the ground thawed, richard took bunchee's body to the boy scout ranch, a two-hour drive from his home. he chose a secluded area deep in the woods for the burial. but made a number of mistakes.

the lime he spread over the body most likely aided decomposition. but the grave was only two feet deep. not deep enough to keep burrowing animals from bringing her bones to the surface. and bunchee was buried in texwood jeans which told a story, since they were made and sold exclusively in asia. nyhuis never anticipated that his wife's remains would be discovered. and if they were, that they would ever be successfully identified. finding the texwood button, the pelvic bone that revealed the victim had at least two children. the mongoloid skull, the forensic sculpture, and the photographic superimposition, all were essential elements in the identification. during the trial, dr. case testified that it takes between

three and five minutes to suffocate an individual. after a minute or two, the person would only be unconscious. it was entirely possible that nyhuis put his wife into the freezer while she was still alive. richard nyhuis was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 50 years. >> it was great forensic science, and of course that's how it's supposed to work. you get a button, you get a hair, and i admire that. i think it is wonderful. >> it took all the different scientific and forensic people to make this thing happen. any one piece of which could have stopped the investigation. >> one of the unique things about the case was actually having the remains to do the trial, and bunchee nyhuis actually came alive in her own trial.

this was one of the few cases where a prosecutor got to try a murder case with the victim actually in the courtroom with him, speaking to the jury. 4-month-old ryan stallings had spent an entire weekend vomiting. when he also developed breathing problems, his mother decided to take him to st. louis children's hospital. somewhere along the way, patricia stallings made the wrong turn and got lost. it was a mistake she'll regret for the rest of her life. ♪ patricia and david stallings had been married for about a year and had recently moved into a home overlooking a lake just