♪ oh ♪ ♪ i'm back in my body ♪ ♪ oh ♪ >> deborah: tonight, a notorious murder back in the national spotlight. >> david: just this week, a wildly controversial parole decision.

is a convicted killer now walking free? an all-new "20/20" starts right now. pound for pound, one of the greatest true crime stories of all time. >> this would turn out to be a notorious, surreal case. >> a woman brutally murdered in cold blood. >> investigators at the time believed that sherri rasmussen was the victim of a burglary that had turned into her own murder. >> as i walked in, there was blood. >> she was literally clawing at the front door. >> trying to get out. >> people were on edge during that era, and add to that we were the serial killer capital of the world. >> it's like being hit by a train. just like being hit by a train. i don't usually talk about that day or that time. >> how soon was it after the murder that your father and your mother start to think this wasn't a robbery? >> i expected it was gonna be burglars. male burglars. >> and there was another piece of evidence that caught the

attention of investigators. a bite mark on sherri's forearm. >> a suspect that the lapd could never have fathomed. if you walk down hollywood boulevard, you can't help but notice the stars on the sidewalk and the glitter on the pavement. and you think, "wow, this is tinseltown." but it doesn't take long until you realize that there are deep cracks in that pavement exposing a criminal element that you could never have anticipated. and the case of sherri rasmussen was a rude awakening for anyone living in la la land.

>> president reagan in los angeles. >> today, the torch entered the city of angels. >> for aids, a walk-a-thon in hollywood. >> it was 1986, and a beautiful young nurse only three months into her marriage, brutally murdered in her own townhome. >> as a television journalist, i've been reporting on true crime stories for decades on numerous outlets. you think you're never going to be shocked anymore ever again. well, this proved all that very wrong. >> it was a huge story. it had all the elements. you know, sex, and betrayal, and lies. it just gripped the nation. >> it's definitely, pound for pound, one of the greatest true crime stories of all time. >> everything we always heard or was told about aunt sherri was about what a great person she was. >> tell me about your sister. >> she was the middle sister and she was a clown.

if everything got too serious, she would make everybody laugh. she had a very unique little giggle. >> uncle john and aunt sherri are spending christmas with rachel on her first christmas. >> sherri was all about family. sherri was our glue. she kept us all together. >> from a young age, sherri, the middle child with that infectious giggle, seemed mature beyond her years, according to her sisters connie and theresa. she leapfrogged from the eighth grade into high school and graduated early at the age of just 16 and enrolled in nursing school. >> she had certainly an interest in caring for other people. >> by the time she was 21, sherri was fearless and determined, and she moved from her hometown of tucson, arizona, to los angeles.

>> when she passed away, she was the director of critical care at the glendale adventist hospital. >> when i think of sherri, i think of her kindness and her generosity. >> sherri's father nels, who was a dentist, had encouraged her to enroll in medical school to become a doctor. but she had other plans in mind. >> sherry always wanted to have a family and a husband and children. >> in the spring of 1984, sherri met a young engineer named john ruetten. >> john ruetten was a tall, handsome, bright, athletic young man from san diego, california. >> sherri was so tall. she often had difficulty finding guys who weren't intimidated by someone with her stature. and i know that john was just taken with her. >> sherri and john were very happy together. sherri was always smiling and

laughing and happy. >> they settled into sherri's condo in van nuys, and in november of 1985, the couple got married. >> it was a joyous celebration. >> you could tell that they were in love. >> she was just beginning her life. she'd met the man of her dreams, and she had a great job, and she was doing very well. and it was all coming together. three months later, and now it was all gone. >> february 24, 1986. john had just returned home from work. and as he's walking up the steps into the townhome, the door is ajar. he walks into the townhome and sees his gorgeous bride dead in a pool of blood on the living room floor.

he calls 911. >> i was patrolling, and i got a call to balboa boulevard. >> veteran lapd patrol officer rodney forrest was one of the first cops to arrive at the scene. >> the call was a death investigation. i thought that was particularly interesting, why a murder in a kind of upscale part of town? >> when forrest and his partner got there, they were met with a grim warning from paramedics. >> somebody said, "you're not going to be prepared for what's in there." i'm thinking, "well, i've seen it all, so let's go see." oh wow, this brings back memories.

it's kind of an eerie feeling to be here after 30 plus, almost 40 years. as i walked in, i saw sherri rasmussen on the ground. she had been covered with a towel, and one of the paramedics raised the towel for me to see her face. and she had considerable trauma to her face. and there was blood. i thought after that, this is actually a murder. >> at that point, officer forrest called the lapd's van nuys division to notify the homicide unit, which took over the investigation. >> it's a horribly violent crime bruises all over her body. the struggle ensued for quite some time. >> my partner went upstairs to

check the upper floor for any suspects. and there were no suspects still around. >> investigators knew that something catastrophic had happened to ms. rasmussen. >> you'd think, given the ferocity of that fight, that somebody would've heard something. >> you would think. it was a heck of a fight. i mean, sherri fought for her life, literally. >> that night, news of sherri's murder reached her family in tucson. >> i'll probably never forget it, unfortunately. my dad called me to tell me that sherri was dead. and i was like, "that isn't --" i certainly didn't believe it. >> beyond the pale. >> yeah. i was like, "no, what are you talking about? that's not true." and he said, "no, it is." and then i started screaming. >> in the wake of sherri's murder, her family struggled to understand what had happened. could this be the result of the rampant violence that had plagued the city of los angeles

in recent years? >> a grim statistic from los angeles. >> more murders in 1980 than ever before. >> in parts of los angeles, there is a dangerous new tension. >> or had it been something far more personal? >> this was a cold, calculated murder. >> when investigators looked further into the crime scene, they uncovered a major clue that could change the course of the investigation. >> this would turn out to be a notorious, surreal case with a twist no hollywood writer could have come up with. ♪ ♪ have you always had trouble losing weight and keeping it off? same. discover the power of wegovy®. ♪ ♪ with wegovy®, i lost 35 pounds. and some lost over 46 pounds. ♪ ♪ and i'm keeping the weight off. wegovy® helps you lose weight and keep it off. i'm reducing my risk. wegovy® is the only fda-approved weight-management medicine that's proven to reduce risk of major cardiovascular events

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♪ ♪ for myself as a reporter in los angeles, the '80s was the wild, wild west. turn on the tv and what are you hearing about? violent crime. >> crime running unchecked. the police seemingly unable to stop it. >> that frustration reached the breaking point in one neighborhood in los angeles. >> anyone that worked in the city of los angeles, they knew that they're going to have their hands filled. >> there are more than 100 street gangs in los angeles. >> it was out of control. >> people were on edge during that era. and add to that, we were the serial killer capital of the world. >> the nightstalker killer. >> strangled, tortured bodies were found sprawled on hillsides. >> by 1986, the homicide rate in los angeles had reached alarming

levels, so when sherri rasmussen was murdered inside this apartment, it sent neighbors into a panic. >> it was a dark period in our history. people were terrified to leave their homes. >> residents bought guns, learned martial arts. >> people had bought up every single burglar alarm in the city. went to the l.a. county dog pound and literally adopted every single dog for watchdogs. >> the home invasion murder, the one similar to sherri's, is going to cause a lot of fear in the community. >> people were nervous. it was certainly a shock for me. >> alan tarsky lived across the corridor from sherri, but he says he wasn't home at the time of the murder. >> i had come back to work probably quarter to six in the

evening, and it was shortly after that that the madness started. i do remember there was electronic stereo equipment right here that i saw when i came in, and that suggested to me that it was possibly a burglary, and a burglary interrupted. i put this together with the stereo equipment stacked over here, and it seemed to me that she could have struggled with the burglar, and she obviously lost that fight. >> sherri's newer-model bmw was taken, her purse was taken. >> the rasmussen crime scene had all the makings of something police call a "hot prowl," a home invasion. >> investigators at the time very much believed that sherri rasmussen was the victim of a burglary that had turned into her own murder.

based on what investigators could see at the time, it appeared as though sherri rasmussen was working at her dining room table on the second level of her condominium when the intruder came in through the front door. >> she had ligature marks on her wrists, indicating at some point someone had tied her up. >> all over the place in these pictures you see some of the implements that were used to hit sherri. >> right. >> the vase that was smashed over her head. >> the shards had blood on them. >> the assailant or assailants were grabbing at anything they could find to make sure this woman didn't breathe another breath. >> her fingernails were left broken at the front door. >> because she was literally clawing at the front door? >> trying to get out. >> but before sherri could escape, she was shot, police say, at point-blank range. >> the bullets indicated that a

.38 revolver had been used. >> it was basically an execution. >> not a single neighbor heard a gunshot, and ballistics tests showed that it appeared the assailant had used that quilt over the barrel of the gun as a silencer. >> and there was another piece of evidence that caught the attention of investigators, a bite mark on sherri's forearm. >> they took the sample in an abundance of caution, because if there was blood there on that bite mark, it could be possible for blood typing analysis to be done. >> i learned later about the bite mark. that led into my curiosity of why there was a bite mark on her arm. i had no clue. it kind of reinforced what i was thinking when i initially got there. there was something up, something more than i originally

saw. >> former patrol officer forrest, who wasn't part of the investigation, says to him, the crime scene didn't jibe with the burglary theory. >> i thought to myself, "this is a burglar?" burglars don't usually pick a place five condos from the street. they want to get away. they pick something next to the street, they don't want to be seen. it's just strange that they would pick this place. >> officer forrest says he was also taken by the demeanor of sherri's husband. >> i noticed john ruetten. he was sitting at the table, and he seemed to be sobbing. my reaction was his sobbing, his crying should have been more extreme with his wife laying there on the floor dead. i guess people grieve in different ways.

>> did you see john at any point directly after the murder? >> we saw him at the van nuys police station, and i do remember that he didn't have any marks on him. that's the first thing you look at for any kind of domestic violence, so -- >> even though he was your brother-in-law, even though you liked him, the first thing you did when you saw him is give him a visual inspection. >> a look-over. yes. yes. >> did you talk? >> we weren't allowed to talk to him. they were keeping everybody separated. >> because the first suspect in murders like this typically is -- >> is the husband. >> ruetten wasn't permitted to speak with sherri's family. but on the night of the murder, he sat down with investigators at the lapd's van nuys station. >> you didn't harm your wife, did you, john? >> the question for investigators is, was he telling them everything they needed to know a catch a killer? my moderate to severe

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♪ so you and sherri were living here in southern california together?

>> yes. >> how was that? >> it was fun. actually, we also gained teresa also. so all three of us were in a mobile home together at loma linda. >> oh, wow. the three daughters. that must have made your dad so happy. >> yeah. i've kept a lot of sherri's clothes. >> and now it's all back in style, right? >> the 1980s are all coming back. i remember her telling me that she had met john. >> what was your impression of him once you met him? >> he was very likable. they made a really cute couple. they were both tall, thin, athletic, both driven with their careers. >> it was a whirlwind romance, and within a year, the two were married. >> and did she seem like she had it all? >> yes. she had a new job that she enjoyed. just got married. she was a new aunt. we were really looking forward to the future.

>> family was just so important to her and you can really see that in the photos and just how happy everyone was together. >> sherri really loved christmas. it was one of her favorite holidays. >> here's john holding his baby niece rachel. >> everybody here thinks there's going to be a baby ruetten pretty soon. i think they'd better talk to sherri. >> this would be sherri's last christmas. >> sherri's now showing why she's a leader of nurses. >> just two months later, sherri and john's love story came to a tragic and sudden end. and in the aftermath of her murder, questions would linger. >> when you're going through this process, you're pretty much helpless because you have no control. i mean, the information you get

is what they give you. >> nels rasmussen was determined to find out what really happened to his daughter. >> and so were the police who wanted answers. on the night of the murder, detective lyle meyer questioned a very emotional john ruetten on what he knew about the day sherri was killed. >> she had everything going. i mean, she -- >> hey, so do you, buddy -- hey, hey, hey, john? john? for a couple of minutes, i need you to be tough for me, buddy. >> investigators looked at every possible direction. of course they looked at john. >> what was the first thing you saw? >> well, i saw sherri right in front of me when i walked in the door. i saw her lying on the ground. i knew right away that there was -- she was dead. >> he was shaken up that evening. he did his best to give an interview that helped investigators. >> at one point, detective meyer

asked ruetten a very difficult question. >> you didn't harm your wife, did you, john? >> no, i did not harm my wife. >> you didn't harm your wife. okay, very good. >> john ruetten agreed to do a polygraph examination, and the results came back inconclusive. but he had a rock-solid alibi. >> he was at work that day. he had left work. he had stopped to pick up his dry cleaning and then came back between 6:00 and 7:00 p.m. and found his wife murdered in the living room area of the house. >> detective mayer believed the murder had happened in the early morning hours after ruetten had already left for work. >> when i left, she was in bed but she was awake. >> what time did you leave for work? >> 7:20 is when i left. >> what time did you get to work this morning? >> i got to work about ten to 8:00. >> in the eyes of lyle mayer, the lead detective, john ruetten was legitimately and seriously a

grieving husband. they didn't feel he was hiding anything. and as far as they were concerned, he was not a suspect, and they told him so. >> i'm usually a pretty good judge of character. i'm fairly certain that you have absolutely nothing to do with this, okay? >> mayer basically made a decision that night based on the evidence that he saw at the crime scene, that this was a burglary gone wrong. >> i believe your house was burglarized today. once those persons, or that person, or whoever was inside, i believe they were trying to steal your stereo and probably some other items. >> why would they do anything to her, though? why wouldn't they just run? >> i don't know, john. i don't know. john, things happen, okay. i think sherri came downstairs, and i think she surprised them and she was hurt. she was shot. >> oh, god.

>> and detective mayer was so convinced he'd solve the case, he even told john ruetten. >> john, i know how you feel. i know what you're going through. we're going to catch these persons, or this person, all right? you've got to have a little faith in me. we're very successful at what we do. very, very successful. >> at this point, detectives don't have a single witness. they have no murder weapon. they have no fingerprints. for even seasoned detectives, there's a lot of work ahead. >> but there would soon be a break in the case. these are sketches that were lapd-issued? >> right. >> would another home invasion in the same neighborhood lead investigators to sherri's killers?

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♪ they look like they were from "charlie's angels." >> i know. you're almost on different parts of the country but yet, you almost had the same haircut. >> i know. >> i was still in the stage of shock, that this could happen to my sister. >> it was like being hit by a train, just like being hit by a train. i'm sorry. i don't usually talk about that day, or that time. >> less than a week after sherri rasmussen's murder, her loved ones said their painful goodbyes. a heartbroken john ruetten

addressed family and friends. >> when i saw john at the memorial, he was just ashen. he couldn't stop walking in circles and was just shaking. >> i want you to know that sherri was the best professional in the world. she was the best wife that anybody could ever have. and she was the best sister, daughter. she wanted to make everybody happy. >> you have to understand that was the love of his life. and trying to deal with that grief is devastating. >> back then, investigators wasted no time theorizing what they think happened to sherri rasmussen. >> they looked at the crime scene. it looked like a burglary, smelt like a burglary. >> not long after sherri's murder, investigators jump on a new lead. there's been another burglary

here in this same van nuys neighborhood with a similar m.o. >> that burglary was interrupted by a woman coming home, seeing two men in her house, one of whom had a gun, and they fled. and witness sketches were produced of those suspects. >> these are sketches that were lapd-issued? >> right. these composites were attached to this case. they started to utilize that sketch in this case to see if the persons that were responsible for sherri's death were the same people that were depicted in that sketch. >> were they ever arrested? were they ever found? >> no. it might as well have been me and you. >> despite these suspects, there was literally nothing that could tie anyone directly to the murder of sherri rasmussen. >> on the surface, it appeared to be a burglary gone wrong.

but not everyone was convinced. how soon was it after the murder that your father and your mother started to think that maybe this wasn't a robbery like police were saying? >> the very day we went to the van nuys police department. >> that first day? >> it didn't make sense that they wouldn't take anything other than the car and yet fight with her to the extent of her death. >> sherri's father nels believed that there was another reason behind the murder because, he says, sherri told him about a series of disturbing events in the weeks and months leading up to her death. >> my father told the police about an incident of a nurse that didn't get promoted and then she was upset with sherri. and so she sort of got into an argument with sherri. >> she felt that she had damage to her car. so when sherri was murdered, that certainly came up to the forefront of my dad's mind that maybe that conflict accelerated. >> according to family members,

there was another woman who raised alarm bells for her, an ex-girlfriend of john ruetten. >> she had come to sherri's office after they were engaged. and i think she was sort of provocatively dressed, and said to sherri, "when this marriage fails, i'll be waiting to pick up the pieces." and sherri said, "don't worry, we won't be needing your services." >> just about a month before the murder, there was an even more disturbing encounter that sherri, again, told her parents about. she was home getting ready for work and heard something downstairs, and went downstairs and found john's ex-girlfriend standing in the living room, and sherri told her to get out and not come back. >> in the days leading up to the murder, nels said sherri confided in him that she was

being followed by someone who she described as having "piercing eyes." >> sherri never disclosed a name for the ex-girlfriend. it would have been nice had we had that, because we could have shared that with the detectives. >> nels claims that he told the original detectives about the alleged incidents involving an ex-girlfriend of ruetten. >> one of the original detectives in this case told me personally they had never heard any of those alleged incidents, and none of them were entered into the official case record known as the murder book. >> the single most important document in an lapd homicide investigation is the murder book, and it's basically the place where any investigative work that is conducted, any step that is performed, everything needs to be committed to writing. and the reason that it's so important is that homicide is

obviously a case with no statute of limitations. >> nels rasmussen told me that he had been telling them for years about an ex-girlfriend of john's. when exactly that conversation occurred, he could not tell me. but i believe that it occurred. >> but on the night of the murder, john ruetten told detective mayer that he didn't know anyone who might want to harm sherri. >> she's not having any problems with an ex-boyfriend, or you with an ex-girlfriend? >> no. >> has anybody been hitting on her, following her home or anything like that at all? >> i would say nothing out of the -— you know. i don't think there was anything out of the ordinary. >> but ruetten says, in the days and weeks following the murder, he did tell investigators about an ex-girlfriend, the same one nels said he had mentioned to police. ruetten says he never brought it up in his recorded interview

with detective mayer because never considered her a girlfriend, and it never crossed his mind that she could have been involved in sherri's murder. "20/20" reached out to detective mayer for a response to the allegations raised by sherri's family and her husband, but he did not respond. "20/20" also reached out to the lapd regarding those same allegations, and they declined to comment. >> i had come to the conclusion in my mind that it was never going to be solved, and it was something that i would have to deal with. the unknowing of what happened. >> with zero suspects, sherri's homicide investigation was heading toward cold case purgatory. >> but years later, with brand-new technology and a fresh set of eyes, investigators take another look at the bite mark that was on sherri's forearm. >> and could that be the key that unlocks the mystery of the murder of sherri rasmussen?

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♪ ♪ times like this, i need a tissue attached to me. it has been very difficult to continue to live without sherri.

sherri was like the bridge to kind of pull us all together. >> for connie rasmussen, the pain of losing her sister sherri is felt most when she visits her grave near the family home in tucson, arizona. >> it's like a heavy weighted blanket sitting on you, because you can't move 'cause it's still unresolved. >> when sherri was murdered, my grandfather, he was struggling with the fact that they were unable to find the murderer. >> it ate at my dad. as a father, you think your job is to protect your children. and he felt he had failed that. >> sherri's father, the late nels rasmussen, gave this interview shortly before his own death in 2020.

>> it's probably difficult for people that know me, that i hang on the way i do. but i am learning every day how to deal with this. and i still don't have all the answers. i probably never will. >> in 1991, lyle mayer, who's the lead detective on the case, retires from the lapd and the case is then handed off to other detectives within the van nuys homicide unit. >> there were no active leads or items that were coming in at the time that were giving investigators new avenues to pursue. >> i never thought that time was going to help solve the case, that it was going to ever get solved.

>> after sherri's murder, time seemed to stand still for her family. but the decade that followed would bring a new chapter to the city of angels. >> the beating of rodney king. >> o.j. simpson, who's a fugitive -- >> freeway that collapsed -- >> not guilty of the crime of murder. >> lyle and erik menendez found guilty. >> smalls was shot several times. >> the impact of el nino. >> the staples center is just amazing, all beautiful and brand-new. >> mr. gore, the democratic nominee, is in los angeles. >> the lakers gave l.a. one more thrill. >> 2001 was also a pivotal year for the los angeles police department, marking the launch of the lapd's cold case unit. that year, detectives were handed over 9,000 unsolved murders spanning more than two decades. and sherri rasmussen's case was one of them.

>> i was a detective with the los angeles police department on the cold case squad. her case was one of the last cases i looked at. >> in 2001, detective cliff shepard would oversee the rasmussen cold case investigation. why does a case like this go cold for so long? >> manpower. priorities within the police department. >> in fact, shepard says sherri's case had barely been touched for ten years. >> up to that point, nobody else had looked at it other than mayer and myself, really. >> to get started, shepard said he made copies of select files from the rasmussen murder book, creating his own cliffs notes. why not just take the murder book so you have all the evidence with you? >> yeah. well, yes and no. our problem was space. we were in a little office. it wasn't practical to take the entire murder book. >> breathing life into an old

case is no easy feat, especially when you don't have all the evidence. like a key piece of evidence relating to that bite mark found on sherri's arm. >> when i was going back over the reports, they indicate that a bite swab had been collected. and when i looked at the evidence, no evidence for a bite swab. so i checked with our property. they verified they did not have the swab booked with our evidence room. there's no record of it. >> generally speaking, how often does evidence go missing from a case file? >> extremely rarely, because there are professionals in the evidence rooms. there are professionals at the labs. they document everything. >> to track down the swab, shepard enlisted the help of jennifer francis, a criminalist at lapd's scientific investigation division. >> and she had to make several

calls and several searches had to be made before eventually the bite mark swab was located. >> investigators are able to track down that missing bite mark evidence recovered from the murder scene. and the cold case team finds it here, in a freezer at the l.a. county medical examiner's office. >> the reason why it was way back in the freezer is because all those years ago, it had been tested for blood type. and there it stayed all that time. >> by 2001, dna technology had come into its own, so francis sent out the swab for analysis. but shepard says given the lapd's case backlog, it would take two full years for the results to come back. and those results would eventually turn the entire case on its head.

>> she informed me that, "i obtained a dna profile." >> the dna profile was entered into the law enforcement database, but there was no match at the time. so it was a big jump in the case, but it wasn't quite enough. >> it gave us a profile, but it didn't give us a name. >> with little else to go on, this case is riding on that piece of dna. >> once you've got the dna, did that prod you into doing any of the other investigative things, like interviews? >> at that time, no, i couldn't. i had a lot of cases going on, so it was as i had time. i just didn't have enough time. my biggest regret is not interviewing ruetten, the husband. not meeting with him and having a face-to-face. i knew he restarted his life, and it was down in the san diego area. but for me to just leave l.a. and go down to san diego to interview him, i had other things going on. i couldn't do that at that time.

>> by 2005, detective shepard had moved on from the rasmussen cold case investigation. four more years would pass before there would be another significant development in the case. >> i'm not sure how much work was done between 2005 and 2009. i think it really took somebody going back and going through the murder book in close detail and thinking about this case. >> for years, sherri's cold case would remain unsolved. that is, until investigators took a closer look at the dna from that bite mark. and it would lead them to a very unlikely suspect, one who had been hiding in plain sight. (♪) “the darkness of bipolar depression made me feel like life was moving on without me.

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covering a case like this. sex, lies, law enforcement, innocent victim. >> from what you could tell from the crime team, there was an assailant, but sherri fought back? >> oh, she did. >> with incredible vigor and strength. >> absolutely, she did. >> if i grab your arm. >> yeah? >> and you want to release my hand, what's -- very close -- exactly. so sherri rasmussen knows this is life-and-death situation. sherri tries to escape. >> co-counsel summarized the case as a bite, a bullet, a gun barrel, a broken heart. >> where she talked about her belief that there was a personal motive for this crime. >> for a cold case, it was running on empty. i mean, this should have jump started it. why didn't it? >> it didn't give us a name. >> they eliminated the first four suspects, but they began to zero in on suspect number five. >> and suspect number five just happens to be a cop. >> can you imagine that moment?

after all these years, the answer is behind a badge. >> it's crazy that you've been working just down the hall from the murderer you'd been looking for for years. >> yes. yes. february 24th, 1986. investigators get a 911 call to respond to the condominium of john ruetten and sherri rasmussen. when they arrived, john is distraught. he has just found his newlywed wife laying on the living room floor. >> sherri rasmussen was attacked in her home, bludgeoned and then executed, shot three times while she was down on the ground. >> the investigators also found a bite wound on her forearm.

>> this'll be important in the case, because the bite marks will leave dna. >> but in 1986, dna testing was just in its infancy. >> detectives don't have a single witness. they have no murder weapon. >> nobody really saw anything. >> detectives at the time had characterized it as a burglary gone wrong. >> and the trail went cold for 15 years. >> but in 2001, the lapd formed a new cold case unit to look into cases that would qualify for dna testing. >> investigators had reignited that cold case on the back of dna evidence stored here. criminalist jennifer francis, who had been instrumental in tracking down and testing the bite mark swab, had a stunning revelation -- it was female dna.

>> i assumed it was going to be burglars. male burglars. a female? who is she? >> once you got the dna, you realized it was a woman. were you curious about the fact that a woman might've been involved? >> i was curious what woman. >> this could be the break that the lapd needs. >> i think there are times that we felt sherri's case would never be solved, but with the results of the dna, it gave us renewed hope that sherri's killer would be brought to justice. >> the dna analysis that revealed sherri was bitten by a woman seemed not to have any effect on the direction of the lapd's investigation. >> 'cause what you could tell from the crime scene is that there was an assailant, but that sherri fought back -- >> oh, she did. >> -- with incredible vigor and strength. >> yes. and i thought, okay, we've got one with a gun, doesn't want to use it. the other one's, you know,

presumably the female who helps her partner out when he's starting to get beaten up. >> by 2005, detective shepard had moved on from the rasmussen cold-case investigation. the bite mark came back to a female when it was tested for dna back in 2005. for a cold case that was running on empty, i mean, this should have jump-started it. why didn't it? >> it didn't give us a name. it gave us a profile, but it didn't give us a name. >> four years went by with no forward momentum. but in 2009, a detective by the name of jim nuttall assigned to the van nuys division received the rasmussen case file to check for updates as part of cold case standard procedure. >> one of the first things that nuttall notices is this 4-year-old dna report by jennifer francis that indicates that it was a woman who attacked and killed sherri. >> and he just isn't buying the burglary story.

near the door, there were stacked stereo components, which ostensibly you'd think the burglars were going to grab on their way out. >> it made him believe that the murder occurred first and that they were intentionally left there. >> nuttall and his team of detectives believe that this may have been personal. they conduct new interviews with those close to sherri, including her parents and her husband, john ruetten. >> he wanted to exclude all of the potential female sources or female individuals that were surrounding sherri's life at the time. >> the detectives make a list of five women in sherri's orbit and eliminate them as suspects one by one. sherri's mother and sister, theresa, were on the list, as was her good friend, jayne goldberg. >> they took my dna. the one detective came unannounced, and he said, "i'm just coming to get a dna swab." >> the first three suspects on the list were able to be eliminated almost immediately.

the fourth name on the list was a nursing colleague. there was an indication of tension and bad blood between them. >> investigators obtained a dna sample from her which didn't match that from the bite mark. >> they eliminated the first four suspects, but they began to zero in on suspect number five. >> it's suspect number five that grabs the attention of detectives. ruetten told detective nuttall about an old friend and former romantic partner named stephanie lazarus. >> once number five was developed by detective nuttall, detective nuttall spoke to john rutten again to learn a little bit more about his connection with stephanie lazarus. >> we want to walk you through a timeline. it's very important. starting -- we believe we're close, but we'll have to have you kind of spell this out for us. >> ruetten tells detective nuttall that stephanie lazarus is a name he's already given to

detectives, decades earlier. >> i know that she went to go see sherri. i know that she was upset that we weren't going to have the relationship. that's the reason for identifying her. that's the reason i identified her 23 years ago, you know, when we talked. one of my concerns is that was never, you know -- appears to be recorded. >> we know files have been lost. >> i'm not trying to be inflammatory. >> there's a certain level of frustration on our part. more could have been -- more should have been documented. we're now forced, 23 years later, to literally almost start over again because we lack the documentation that would have been crucial in this case. >> there's no official record of ruetten mentioning lazarus at the onset of the investigation. but there is a single reference made in the case file nearly two years after the murder. >> and it's a notation along the lines of, "john ruetten called

stephanie lazarus, p/o, ex-girlfriend." >> and, when john ruetten spoke with the cold case detectives, he confirmed the meaning behind that p slash o. >> i gave them the name and i said, she's a police officer. >> not only was lazarus a police officer, but she's still on active duty as a detective. >> think about this. you're the cold case unit investigating one of your own, and her office is just down the hall on the third floor of police hq. police like to talk. that's why they're cops. they ask questions. these cops needed to keep this quiet. like a relentless weed, moderate to severe ulcerative colitis symptoms can keep coming back. start to break away from uc with tremfya... with rapid relief at 4 weeks. tremfya blocks a key source of inflammation. at one year, many people experienced remission...

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♪ for over two decades, sherri rasmussen's murder went unsolved. until 2009 when cold case investigators begin zeroing in on stephanie lazarus, a 25-year veteran of the lapd. she'd been hiding in plain sight all along. >> she presented herself as very smart, capable, athletic. she was a division i athlete. >> lazarus's connection to the rasmussen case was through sherri's husband. her history with john ruetten went back more than 30 years, when they first met as students at ucla.

>> and stephanie made no bones about the fact that she envisioned a big romantic future with john ruetten. the problem is that john has never, in his own words, looked at her in the same way. >> after stephanie graduated from ucla, she joined the lapd in the early 1980s at a time when the department was striving to bring more women on to the police force. >> she seemed to excel and do well in specialized assignments. but it was always competitive. >> and that competitive fire coupled with being a stellar athlete was a perfect entrée for lazarus to participate in the california police olympics. >> the california police olympics were an athletic competition, open to police officers throughout the state.

>> anita ortega was one of the other few female lapd officers at the time, and a teammate of lazarus. >> stephanie was an outstanding athlete and a basketball player. i thought her tenacity was incredible. she never quit. >> she may have been tenacious on the hardwood, but off the court, anita got to know a softer side of her teammate. >> she seemed like a very nice person, always energetic, this happy-go-lucky kind of person. i really enjoyed hanging around her. stephanie shared with me that she met her boyfriend john at ucla. said he was a great guy. i never met him. but i thought they were going to get married. >> thing was, not only was lazarus not dating john in the summer of 1985, he was engaged to sherri rasmussen. >> stephanie never mentioned sherri to me or the fact that john was in another relationship. >> but entries in lazarus' own diary seem to reveal her level

of despair after learning that ruetten was getting married. stephanie lazarus had a 600-page diary. what was the story that it told? >> there were these tidbits of information right up to the wedding, right up to the killing, where she was indicating to herself how despondent she was. >> despite her apparent inner turmoil, to outside appearances, lazarus seemed upbeat and happy. >> she had a really nice smile, bright eyes, just a real positive kind of personality about her. >> fitness trainer brian brase says he had an immediate connection with lazarus. but then, just a few weeks after meeting, brase says there's an odd encounter at his apartment. >> there was a knock on my door. two female police officers, fully uniformed. at my door. stephanie lazarus being one of

them, showing up unannounced. i had never given her my address. >> brase says it's an uncomfortable moment, and he doesn't invite the women into his one-room studio apartment. stephanie had shown up for reasons unknown, he says, and just as quickly, she leaves. >> i really didn't know what to say or how to react. >> brase says despite his discomfort over that visit, the two decided to go out on a date anyway. but when he later had to break the date, brase says he saw a different side of lazarus. >> the next time i saw her, the look that she gave me was just like dark and menacing. and i just kind of stopped in my tracks. >> by the spring of 1986, after sherri rasmussen's murder, lazarus' career at the lapd was thriving. >> daryl gates and the rest of the lapd brass loved stephanie lazarus because having

her face out there, her exuberance, her athleticism, it got people excited. she was a walking, talking recruitment drive. she even made an appearance on the game show "family feud" pitted against arch-rivals, the l.a. fire department. >> she continued on an upward trajectory, and she became a detective for the los angeles police department. >> in 1992, she was assigned to the personnel division as a background investigator, someone interviewing and passing judgment on applicants to the lapd. it seems eventually stephanie puts john ruetten behind her. she marries another police officer and the couple adopt a beautiful young daughter. >> one of her last assignments was to be assigned to the art theft detail, a very specialized division. >> the art theft detail

investigated anything that was of value that was stolen as art. >> at the time, the unit was the only one of its kind in the country, and with its rich and famous clientele, attracted local media attention. >> i was a contributing writer to the "la weekly" and i had heard about don hrycyk, who ran the art theft detail. so, he reluctantly agreed to do an interview with me. >> also in attendance, the junior member of the unit, detective stephanie lazarus. >> every time i talked to don hrycyk, stephanie lazarus interrupted me and she kept interjecting snide, sarcastic, and semi-humorous comments after my questions. it was extremely disruptive. i asked, "detective lazarus, what do you know about art?" and her answer was, "it hangs on the wall." >> by 2009, the future looks bright for stephanie lazarus. she has a family now and is

working in a prestigious unit. >> she seemed like the happiest, luckiest person in lapd. >> all seems great. she has no clue that a net is closing in around her. ♪ jardiance! -it's a little pill with a ♪ ♪ big story to tell. ♪ ♪ i take once-daily jardiance ♪ ♪ at each day's staaart. ♪ ♪ as time went on it was easy to seeee, ♪

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>> nice to meet you guys. >> how's it going? >> good. >> have a seat. >> okay. >> it's june of 2009 and stephanie lazarus has unwittingly walked into her own interrogation for the murder of sherri rasmussen. it's been four months since cold case detective jim nuttal first opened the case file and started carefully and quietly piecing together what he believed happened 23 years earlier. >> when detectives zeroed in on stephanie lazarus, one of their own, it appeared that they really wanted to keep that close to the vest. >> how important and how difficult was it to keep this under wraps and keep it secret? >> the detectives took every effort to scrub her name from their investigation. any references to her at that point were only oblique references, like "suspect number five." >> you know, it is difficult to

track your own and know that one of your own is being accused of a crime or something illegal. >> and to complicate matters, lazarus' office is right down the hall from robbery homicide. >> so the determination was made to not contact stephanie lazarus directly and to collect a sample of her dna surreptitiously. >> this is where the special investigations section comes into play. now this group, s.i.s., their job is watching stephanie, following her, and get evidence. >> as luck would have it, she went to costco a couple days after the surveillance had started, and she had a drink. and once she discarded that drink, the officers were able to collect her cup without her knowing it. >> and when you collect the dna from the cup, you match it against whoever the suspect

number five is. what do they get? >> they matched her dna to the bite mark sample. >> can you imagine that moment? after all these years? and now we know the answer is behind a badge. >> the dna is a match, but the cold case detectives still have to confront her face to face. >> one of the detectives approaches stephanie one day in her office and he says something to the effect of, "you know, stephanie, we've got this suspect who seems to know about some big art heist. he's down in the lockup. we need to bring you down there." >> instead, it was just another detective. and so that was a stage that was set for that interview. >> we've been assigned a case that we've been looking at. >> okay. >> it's a new case. >> so, through the course of this police interview with

stephanie lazarus, they are recording. she doesn't know. >> do you know john ruetten? >> john ruetten? oh yeah, i went to school with him. what's this all about? >> well, it's relating to his wife. >> immediately, they start talking about the sherri rasmussen murder. >> do you know what the circumstances were regarding her death? >> mmm, jeez, um, let me think back. um, jeez. i don't know if it was, you know, if it was a burglary or something. >> she's using every skill she has to talk her way out of being connected to this in any way. >> connected to the crime or her old flame, john ruetten. >> we dated, i can't say that he was my boyfriend, i don't know that he would consider me his girlfriend.

>> the detectives were able to get stephanie lazarus to confirm that she had gone to her hospital to speak with sherri rasmussen. >> and yeah, i may have met her at a hospital. >> but being that you were kind of -- used to see john, you know, was it -- everything okay between you guys? i mean, there was never anything uncomfortable or anything between you and her? >> you know, god -- i don't know, it's been so many years. >> you're probably a student of liars, at this point in your career. does that seem like a particularly adept liar, to you? >> it was gold, for us, because we had all of the evidence that disproved everything that she was saying. >> finally, when they say to her, we think we've got dna from the crime scene -- boom. >> 'cause, now, now, now -- >> because now -- >> now, i'm thinking i probably need to talk to a lawyer. >> okay. >> i mean --

>> well -- >> because i know how this stuff works, okay? >> she knows. she absolutely knows. she knows at that point that she talked way too long. >> and now it almost sounds like you're trying to pin something on me. >> when the interview ended, you can hear her getting arrested. >> you're under arrest for sherri's murder. >> stephanie, you know you have the right to remain silent. do you understand? >> yes. >> do you want to talk to us right now? >> no! >> all right. >> okay. >> this is crazy. >> at this point, had you heard the name stephanie lazarus? >> no, the only lazarus i knew was the man raised from the dead that jesus did, that's it. >> this is the case that rose from the dead. >> yeah, it did. >> on the third floor of parker center this morning, police detectives arrested one of their own. >> detectives assigned to the los angeles police department's robbery homicide division cold case squad arrested los angeles police detective stephanie lazarus. >> it's crazy that you'd been

working just down the hall from the murderer you'd been looking for, for years. >> yes. >> stephanie lazarus didn't quite serve and protect, did she? >> uhh, no. >> when they said it was a police officer, i went, you're kidding. absolutely kidding. a police officer committed this crime. i couldn't imagine that. >> i was very shocked. but i also know how effective dna testing is. and it kind of made me realize that, yeah, that stephanie must have committed the murder. >> they were kind enough to come to our home. they let my parents know that they had made the arrest. i mean, i cried because i was so excited, number one, that

justice for, for my sister. but also for my dad. >> i was so relieved, and so happy, and so sad. we had waited so long, but at last. >> i'm totally in shock. >> it was just a stunning turn of events. then a whole new chapter begins. >> the prosecution is armed with what appears to be rock-solid evidence. but this is l.a. after all, and strange things have been known to happen in court. so, you have to wonder, would a jury really believe a veteran detective is capable of committing a cold-blooded murder? one of these friends can order whatever she wants from the menu. the other has food allergies. you do your best to avoid food allergens, but accidents can still happen. xolair is an fda-approved injection proven to significantly reduce allergic reactions from accidental food exposures.

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♪ 26 years after sherri rasmussen was murdered, the stephanie lazarus case

finally comes to a courthouse here in downtown los angeles. a los angeles police detective accused of murdering her rival? that sounds more like a hollywood blockbuster than a decades-old cold case finally going to trial. at her arraignment, stephanie lazarus pleaded not guilty to the charge of first-degree murder. >> there was a lot of buzz in the air. folks across the country very interested in this case. and why wouldn't they be? it had sex, lies, law enforcement, an innocent victim. >> i covered the trial from "a" to "z." had a side view at stephanie lazarus. she sat in that orange jumpsuit. what a dichotomy from her police blues. >> your co-counsel summarized the case as "a bite, a bullet, a gun barrel, and a broken heart." >> right. it highlighted all of the strong pieces of evidence.

>> so the bite mark, of course, referred to the dna evidence found on sherri rasmussen's left forearm. the prosecution considered this their ace in the hole. >> you had four separate analyses done. so by far, that was the most important piece of evidence. >> to explain how the bite mark got there, prosecutors presented their theory of how they believe stephanie lazarus was able to attack and kill sherri rasmussen. stephanie lazarus points the gun. sherri grabs the arm? >> if i grab your arm, and you want to release my hand, or get me to release my hand, you could grab me, or what -- what's very close? exactly. >> and the prosecution described the terrifying details about how they say sherri attempted to escape with her life. >> stephanie lazarus fires that gun twice and two shots go out the back slider. so sherri rasmussen knows this is a life-and-death situation.

sherri tries to escape, and she goes down these stairs. she did not get out. they collected her fingernails at the front door. >> because she was literally clawing at the front door? >> trying to get out. stephanie was able to get her to the living room floor and hit her over the head with the pottery and hit her again with the firearm in the face. at that point, stephanie grabs this quilt and wraps the gun with this quilt. and she muffles the sound of those gunshots by putting that quilt right up to sherri's chest and shooting three times. >> then there was the matter of the so-called broken heart described by the prosecution. >> sifting through her diary, there were these tidbits of information where she was having contact with john ruetten. she would see john. she would follow john. she would stalk john. >> in lazarus' journal, she wrote things such as, "i saw john ruetten's car. i put a note on it and watched the car for half an hour.

i did visit john ruetten, but his girlfriend was over." 80 really didn't feel like working. too stressed out about john. i have a real hard time concentrating these days." >> when stephanie's journals were entered into evidence, it clearly identified to me that she really never gave up on her obsession with john. >> john ruetten testified about his love for his wife and how he did not expect or know that stephanie was capable of committing this crime. >> ruetten said he never once promised anything to stephanie. he described a friendly relationship that involved casual sex. but then he made a jaw-dropping admission, something he had told investigators back in 2009. after he got engaged, he gets a call from stephanie. he reveals that somehow they ended in bed and had sex. >> when john was on the stand, i

learned for the first time that he had relations with the defendant shortly before marrying my sister, and that was very devastating. >> when it came time for the defense to present its case, lazarus' attorney mark overland tried to cast doubt on the chain of custody on the bite mark swab, suggesting that the evidence was tainted and lazarus may have been framed. >> the envelope that the vial was stored in was found in a pretty ratty condition. >> he showed it to the jury. "would you trust this? you don't know who opened that vial." >> the strength of this evidence is that each piece was collected over a course of a long period of time, which would've made framing stephanie lazarus extremely implausible, if not impossible. >> in his closing argument, defense attorney mark overland claimed those journal entries didn't amount to obsession, arguing john was mentioned only

five times among almost 600 pages. after almost three weeks of trial, the case went to the jury. they returned with a verdict in less than two days. >> we, the jury, in the above-entitled action find the defendant, stephanie eileen lazarus, guilty of the count of murder of sherri rasmussen. >> it was just like a rush of relief that it's over. >> relief for my father, that he finally was vindicated and he had his answers. >> stephanie lazarus' sentencing hearing was held in march 2012. >> people versus stephanie lazarus. we are to set the date for sentencing. >> a statement from nels rasmussen was read by the prosecutor. >> sherri was a beautiful,

talented, gifted person, and a loving daughter. her senseless death caused pain that will never ever heal. >> and john ruetten tried to describe the heavy burden it seems he will carry for the rest of his life. >> the fact that sherri's death occurred because she met and married me brings me to my knees. i have resigned myself to trying to endure the daydreams about a world where sherri is still with us and this pointless tragedy never occurred. >> thank you, mr. ruetten. >> the judge is about to announce stephanie lazarus' sentence for first-degree murder and use of a gun. >> the court will now pronounce sentence. >> but this case is far from over. sherri rasmussen's friends and family have no idea about the shocking turn of events that await them in the not-too-distant future. will a killer walk free?

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it's march 2012, and stephanie lazarus has just been found guilty for the murder of sherri rasmussen. >> never admitting guilt, lazarus waved goodbye and smiled to her family as she left the

courtroom. >> what was her sentence? >> she received 25 to life, first-degree murder, and two years for the use of a gun. >> there had never been an arrest of an active lapd detective for murder under circumstances this salacious, a cold case. and once the rasmussens step forward, allegations of a coverup. >> lapd should want to know why it took so long, and there should be accountability for that passage of time. >> the rasmussens took action in two ways. one was to file a complaint directly with the lapd, alleging a coverup to protect officer lazarus from criminal prosecution. they also filed a civil lawsuit against the lapd making the same allegation. >> the day that stephanie lazarus was arraigned, the

rasmussens asked to get answers as to what happened in 1986 and what happened that nothing was done, despite our repeated requests. >> the lapd denied the rasmussens' allegations, citing immunity, and the lawsuit was eventually dismissed because of the statute of limitations. as for that complaint the rasmussens filed directly with the lapd, the lapd's internal affairs department launched an investigation in response to the allegations. journalist matthew mcgough obtained a copy of the internal affairs file, which wasn't released publicly. >> a total of 6.8 hours were devoted to trying to determine whether or not stephanie lazarus was protected in an internal cover-up. more than a year passed before it was closed with no one being interviewed. no investigative conclusions. >> the rasmussen complaint was classified as unfounded because

the judge had dismissed the lapd from any liability. "20/20" reached out to the lapd with questions about the handling of this case, and they declined to comment. while the rasmussen family continued to raise questions about why lazarus was not arrested for so long, they were certain that she'd spend at least decades behind bars. but just last november, there was a development that took everyone by surprise. >> it was late 2023 when stephanie had her first appearance before the california parole board. this was years before anyone thought she'd be eligible for early release. >> it turns out that in the years since lazarus' conviction, the state of california passed a new law giving special consideration towards paroling so-called "youthful offenders" who committed their crimes when they were under the age of 26.

lazarus was 25 when she murdered sherri rasmussen. letters supporting lazarus's release were submitted to the parole board by friends, family, and fellow prisoners. >> she took responsibility for committing the murder for the first time, something that she had denied throughout her trial and throughout her incarceration until all of her appeals were exhausted. >> she showed absolutely no remorse and brushed it off as if my aunt sherri did not fight her, then she wouldn't have -- >> fight back. >> -- that she wouldn't have killed her. >> the only reason she confessed is because she wants to get out on parole. >> and at the conclusion of that parole hearing, lazarus, to the outrage of many, was granted parole. what was your reaction to her being granted this parole? >> it was a miscarriage of justice. >> however, before that decision became final, california

governor gavin newsom intervened in the case and requested it go to the full parole board for reconsideration. have you made it your mission to try to keep stephanie lazarus behind bars? >> yes. i mean, i'm going to do everything in my power. >> in a follow-up hearing with the full parole board, sherri's supporters came out in force to argue against lazarus' release. >> moderator, we will now take speakers in opposition to stephanie lazarus. >> she deceived and lied to everyone for almost 40 years. how can this board believe that she has changed? >> before he died, sherri's father, nels rasmussen, recorded a video message to be played in the event that stephanie lazarus ever came up for parole. >> if one looks at the damage that she did to my daughter's face.

it's almost like she wanted to destroy the beauty that sherri exuded. >> the board's earlier decision to approve parole was put on hold, pending yet another review. >> i say expect the worst and prepare for our next step when that happens. >> and what's that next step? >> just keep fighting. >> for the family and everyone else concerned, the day has arrived where we'll find out if stephanie lazarus is released or remains behind bars. apple intelligence is pret-ty awesome. (man) nice. (woman) you can get it when you trade in any phone.

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with an extra 20% off during the friends and family sale. plus, earn kohl's cash. at kohl's. ♪ my dad had a boat down in san diego. we enjoyed the ocean and the beaches. >> was part of your father lost when the killer wasn't found? >> i think i would say yes. i mean, she was just glued to my dad. we have lots of pictures of them, just arm-in-arm. >> and he never stopped fighting for her? >> nope, never.

>> and that struggle to keep sherri's killer behind bars came to a head just this week as parole officials met for the third time to determine stephanie lazarus' fate. >> i served as the pool reporter for the parole rescission hearing held for stephanie lazarus. after lazarus, her attorney and all the victim's family and representatives had spoken, the commissioners announced they would adjourn to deliberate, and after about 25 minutes or so, announced their decision. >> stephanie lazarus will not be released from prison, at least for now. a panel decided to rescind her parole. >> the parole board's decision in the hearing was unanimous. lazarus did not speak about the crime itself or express any remorse to the family members of sherri who were there.

>> she was denied parole. it's most likely that she would appeal it and ask for another parole hearing, every year. so, the victim's family will go through this every year. >> and as long as stephanie lazarus tries to win her freedom, theresa, connie, and their children say they'll continue the fight to keep her behind bars. >> teresa and i have continued to battle of behalf of our sister sherri. >> we really have to keep her in, because she has no regard for what she did. she does not have remorse. >> i remember promising my grandparents that we would always continue the fight. >> we were fortunate enough to have three children, all girls. sherri was the middle one. in many respects, sherri was the

one that held, not only her sisters together, but her mom and dad. >> my aunt sherri no longer being with our family has left a hole that can never be filled. the memories we could have had. >> how would you like sherri to be remembered? >> she was a very kind-hearted person. she was funny. >> she was just a wonderful, wonderful person who touched everybody she came in contact with. >> i think about her every day. i mean, i have this picture in my house. i wake up, i see her. >> i don't think sherri is ever gone. she's always here. >> deborah: sherri rasmussen's

family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against stephanie lazarus in 2016 and won a judgment of $10 million. >> david: it will be four months before stephanie lazarus is eligible for a new parole hearing. that is urprogram for tonight. i'm david muir. thanks for watching. >> deborah: i'm deborah roberts. from all of us here at "20/20" and abc news, good night. a wildfire definitely did extensive damage to at least one house tonight in lake county. the fire took off in the searing heat, and winds fanned the flames. good evening. >> i'm ama daetz, and i'm dan ashley. thanks for joining us. that fire started just before noon today and has burned more than 400cr