about everything, if he needed left, she was going to help you. whether you wanted her to or not. >> i'm guessing that the reason that galareh wanted to help so many people is that you both thought or that that was the right thing to do. >> yeah. >> that's where she was. >> and i was angry and she told me, i am like you. really. >> and she was. >> a person who is so helpful, so full of energy and so positive, imagine all the things she could've done for so many other people in her lifetime? >> i'm craig melvin and this is "dateline". >> this was the christmas choir banquet. she was dressed up to the nines. >> this young girl catches his

eye. >> she got everyone's eye. she didn't come home that night. there was blood everywhere. there was blood splatter all over the inside of the car. it was very frenzied attack. >> the theories were just awful. drug rings, prostitute rings. >> and the entire town was going crazy. >> i thought eventually, enough people were gonna come across a suspect. >> it was fascinating how they went about the investigation. we >> got a call, we've got three brothers. we think one of them is the color. >> that they didn't know which one. >> so, you've got a live one? >> we've got live one here. >> what do you think at that moment? >> we're ecstatic. we're ready to go. >> he was sitting at a booth right by the window. . there. >> you are the next -- ? >> it's hard to enjoy your food when you think you're staring at that killer. >> hello and welcome to "dateline".

teenager michelle martinko was blessed with beauty, brings and compassion. but her promising future was cut short when she was savagely murdered. that dreadful night was ice cold, and after four decades, so was her case. then, a stunning scientific breakthrough helped detectives whittled down a list of suspects to unmask a killer hiding in plain sight. here's dennis murphy with "and then there were three". >> it was an act of unspeakable violence. >> it was a really horrific crime. everybody was scared. >> a murder that shattered a family. >> my parents were devastated. my mother eventually did not cool out of the house. >> a who done it that grabbed hold of the city and wouldn't let go. >> it's been a cloud hanging over the community for 40 years. >> a case that touched

generations of investigators, who refused to quit until the killer was found. >> we've cared about this family, they cared about solving this murder. they weren't going to give up. and they didn't. >> kurt thomas says he was a lucky kid. he got to grow up in cedar rapids, iowa. it >> was a magical level. we didn't know anything but fun. >> a lot of that fun happened at the mall,. four teenagers, it was the place to shop, eat and hang out. that's where the kids hung, her? >> it was a place you could go at anytime. and it was feebly deal. >> high school senior michelle martinko was normal right. but she did shop and work at one near her home. michelle was a top student, i gifted baton taller, and some in the school choir, along with her friend jane hanson. >> why do you think you guys hit it off as well as you did? >> gus, we had a lot of things in our life that we're >> was she>> december 19 and they went for a stroll. at one point, passing by a shopgirl court had a crush on. teenage drama at the mall. >> and it pops in my head, well, i'm never going to get again, to dance with that girl. because -- gifted baton taller, and some in the school choir, along with her friend jane hanson. >> why do you think you guys hit it off as well as you did? >> gus, we had a lot of things in our life that we're

parallel. >> was she what used to call a girly girl? or was she a little bit of a tomboy? what do you remember? >> oh, no. she was a girly girl. >> december 19th, 1979, was a big night for michelle. it was for school choirs christmas banquet at the sheraton inn. with her hair done up to perfection and decked out in her favorite black dress and rabbit for court, she looked like an angel. her nickname was fara. john is michelle's brother in law. >> it was for a faucet majors. the hairdo. >> with that here. >> so, she was farah. >> the it was a school night, after the banquet, michelle asked jean to go with her to the mall. that jane had homework to do. >> so when michelle said let's go to the mall tonight, jane, that was going to work for you? >> correct. i turned her down. >> so, going solo, michelle got in her parents 1972 buick electra and headed off to the brand new westdale mall on the southwest side of town. she had $180 cash on her to pay for equal her mother had picked

out. kurt was also at the mall that night, working a shift at the men's store. >> i saw this beautiful girl and a rabbit for quote, black dress, high heeled shoes, blonde here. then i was like, that's michelle. >> kurt and michelle were friends from school. she joined him for his break and they went for a stroll. at one point, passing by a shopgirl court had a crush on. teenage drama at the mall. >> and it pops in my head, well, i'm never going to get again, to dance with that girl. because -- >> it got miss america here on my arm? >> yeah. >> curse as he and michelle spent his entire break catching up. until he had to get back to work. and waterton exit. >> and that's when we're seeing our goodbyes. and she said, well, don't be a stranger. >> did you think you see her again? >> yes, of course i did. >> since there was school the next day, it was an a night to

stay out late. so, when michel hadn't returned home, even well after the mall had closed, her sister says their mother janet started to worry. >> my parents started calling around to see with her other friends, what the situation was. >> and why she not back here? >> yes. >> and janet did call the police as well. the police say, well, you know we can't look after every teenager who is missing for a couple hours. and janet resisted that. said no, no, she's very dependable. she should be home. she has a testimony. she has to study. >> michelle's mom kept making calls late into the night. at 2:30 am, she dwelled michelle's friend, jane. >> i was sound asleep and my dad came and walk me up. said misses martinko is on the phone. >> those are not good calls. >> she wanted to know if i knew where michel was. >> but jean did not know. nobody did. so, in the middle of the night, in a panic, michelle's mom called the police again. this time, they dispatched and

officer. jim kincade got the call out for in. they >> sent me out to the mall to see if i could look at this car. just hours earlier, the mall was bustling with christmas shoppers. now, it was dark. deserted. in the distance, officer kincade spotted a car in the far reaches of the parking lot. a long walk from the entrance to the jcpenney. >> it seemed to match the description. >> looking from your vehicle, could you see what had happened there? >> no. >> couldn't see into the windows? >> could it see into the windows. they were's frosted over. i opened the back door. i could see that there was a woman, slouched down. at first, i thought just an intoxicated person. so, i walked around the car and looked into the passenger side from the window. and obviously, it wasn't an old woman, drunk. >> could you tell she was gone? >> yes. there were no signs of life. she was obviously deceased. >> beautiful, by vicious, high school senior michelle martinko

was dead. she was just 18 years old. for her family, and close friends, a christmas season and life as they knew it ended that night. and that brand-new westdale mall had become a crime scene. >> coming up -- what had happened to michelle? >> a very frenzied attack. there was blood everywhere. let's better all in the inside of the car. >> michel had really deep defensive wounds on her hands. she put up a fight. >> against a killer who knew what he wanted. >> the officers found glove prince on the outside of the car, in the dark, on the door handles. >> so the killer came to do business. >> oh, yeah. >> when "dateline" continues. ♪ i've got symptom relief ♪ ♪ control of my crohn's means everything to me. ♪ ♪ ♪ control is everything to me. ♪ feel significant symptom relief with skyrizi, including less abdominal pain and fewer bowel movements at 4 weeks. skyrizi is the first and only il-23 inhibitor

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>> on a dark, high school morning, cedar rapids robin detectives were called to the mall parking lot to begin a murder investigation. the body of michelle martinko and her black dress and for cool with slumped halfway off the passenger seat at the families buick electra. >> she had multiple stab wounds. >> doug larsson was a college freshman when michel was killed. matt denlinger only in kindergarten. but years later, as cedar rapids investigators, they'd come to know every detail of this case. >> very frenzied to attack. there was blood everywhere. there was blood spatter all over the inside of the car. >> did the color leave a blood trail away from the scene? did you get lucky in that?

way? >> no. there's no blood trail away from the scene, but the killer did live some signatures. the officers found glove prince in the car, on the, car on the door handle. they looked like dishwashing gloves from the late 70s early 80s that everyone would have in the house. >> so, the killer came to do business? >> oh, yeah. >> the color came to do business. michelle had deep defensive wounds on her hands, she put up a fight. >> the blood told them the struggle took place mostly on the passenger side. but. >> the gearshift has blood on, it the steering wheel as building on it, and we know michelle is not driving the car. >> so what does that suggest you? what is the connect the dots there? >> well the connect the dots thought that doug and i both had is the colors touching these things after he's murdered michelle. >> they thought that killer might have cut himself during the attack, leaving his own blood behind. but linking that led to a suspect in 1979, almost impossible. >> back then, they didn't have the dna analysis to go by. they used blood typing. type a blood or type the blood.

which doesn't really narrow it down very much. >> still, police collected the blood for analysis. there wasn't much else at the scene to point to a who or white behind the killing. >> there was no obvious signs of a sexual assault. we really didn't have a good foundation for deciding what the motive was at that time. >> that left investigators back in the day, hanging. >> this almost like this is the heartland of the country and no place is safe anymore. >> we got the call about 6:00 in the morning, maybe 5:00 in the morning. >> janelle says that her parents broke the awful news to her. through sobs and pleased hurry home. >> they were devastated. >> even, then she said her parents might never recover given how hard they had willed michelle, their second and last child into this world. >> this is my mother and father 's miracle baby. you know? she's the child that they had tried to have for all those years.

>> a child who grew up in 19 sixties and seventies, midwest america. hanging out at the roller rink, going to the lake. in middle school, a back brace for school eoc, turned her into a shy preteen. but by high school, she had done a one 80. >> when she got her brace off, that's when she just blossomed. >> gayle dawson and mike went the same halls with michelle. three close high school friends. >> all the time that she spent not wanting to be noticed, then she spent to be notice. you know? if that's when that here changed and she got into her fashion, her style. >> the pharaoh here do worked for michelle. and she intern worked. >> she was a head turner? >> she was ahead turner. there is no way you cannot notice her. >> because she had gone through that more difficult period in june or high school, i think she knew what it was like to be on the other side of that, and she would go out of her way to be kind to everyone. >> oh, yeah. >> that makes a beauty and sweetness made my, a year head

of her school, fall for michelle. >> how serious were you with her? >> well i was very serious. it was my first girlfriend. this is the most serious relationship i've ever had. >> but it ended when he went to college, michelle had plenty of admirers, she had dated and broken up with a guy named andy. her friends thought this andy had a hard time letting go, which may have prompted this exchange. >> she was a little bit weekly in class that day, and when i asked her what was happening, what was going on her's response was that she was just tired of -- >> by her senior year, michelle was focused on college. >> she definitely conveyed to me that she was ready to put high school and cedar rapids behind her. >> kirk thomas, the guy she hung up with before she was murdered, said she was prepared to leaving the building when they said their goodbyes. >> you don't think that that person is going to walk out the

door and never see them again. >> he says that he still feels guilty about how he remembers that goodbye. >> i could've walked or to the car. i could've done something. >> we are standing where the vehicle was found. >> now more than 40 years later. the accounts of michel's final steps to her car is mostly guesswork. >> and just the other side of jcpenney's would've been the public entrance that she existed from. >> i think she's gonna need to walk in the cold to get to the vehicle. >> it's a long walk. >> it's mid december. it's dark. the company is probably not well lit in 1979. she has a long walk. >> a long walk through a dark lot. now police were eager to speak to one of the last friends known to see michelle alive. >> coming up! >> the principal turned and said mister thomas, i need to talk to you. okay? >> a possible suspect. >> it was just like they do it

on tv, this guy leaned on over and said why did you killer. >> talk about deer in the headlight looking kid! >> and an ugly rumor. >> the theories were just awful, i mean it when everything from drug rings to prostitute rings. when dateline continues? e continues? why give your family just any eggs when they can enjoy the best? eggland's best. the only eggs with more fresh and delicious taste. plus, superior nutrition. which is now more important than ever.

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kurt thomas remembers the moment that morning at school, principal showing up in his classroom and looking straight at him. trouble. >> the principal turned and said, mr. thomas, we need to talk to you. okay. and i get up and when i walk there he said, i need you to go out in the hallway and talk to these gentlemen. >> these gentlemen were the two detectives forced the sign to the case. kerr says he didn't know why they'd wanted to talk to him,

because he hadn't heard about the murder yet. soon, he was inside an interrogation room, answering questions about the previous day. >> go through the night, kurt. what time did you get a school? did you drive from schools? you know? >> they want to timeline. >> very factual. >> he says after hours of back and forth, the detectives finally told him michel had been murdered. the unhappy fact was you were the last person in her circle of associates not seen her life. >> that realization hit me like a brick. that's >> not a good place to be in. >> oh, no. at that point, i was somewhere in shock. >> then he says, they hit him with it. >> and it was just like the do it on tv. this guy wheeled around and put his hands on the desk and leaned over and said, why did you kill her? >> now is the time to give it up and do yourself some good. >> oh, talk about there in the headlights looking kid. >> but then his store manager for the white mall was on the line. she told detectives kurt had gone on break, return to the store at around 9:30, and helped her close up shop about ten. police believed michelle left them all sometime in that half hour. >> this detective said mr. thomas, you can go.

i didn't know what that meant. as stupid as that is to say, can i really go? >> for the moment, at least, kurt was in the clear. in fact, michelle brother-in-law's, john, already had someone else in mind for her murder. old boyfriend andy. he was >> he was very possessive after they broke up. he parked down the street sections when it was someone else. he drive fast around the block. so, i was pretty sure it was andy. if i can't have her, nobody can have her type of thing. >> sure enough, andy was brought in for questioning. matt denlinger and doug harrison understood why the

first detectives took a hard look andy. >> and he was at the mall that. >> watt was historic? why did he see was there? >> he was there to buy her christmas present. >> her? his ex girlfriend? >> yeah. >> the night she's killed, he's at the mall to buy her if president, even though there are no longer boyfriend, girlfriend. >> correct. >> i mean, that sounds cute curious even out, just saying it. >> because a lot of the detectives thought that might be too much of a coincidence. >> and he recounted his movements for detectives. he and a budding bumped into michelle at the moment around 8:30. he said he had no idea michelle was missing until her father called his house about 3:30 am. he told detectives he and his mom jumped in the car to go searching. but couldn't find her. so, was the early thinking we're going to get this young guy and he and have a case here? >> i think so. yes >> kind of sweat him a little bit, and he'll come. >> yeah. >> the andes story never changed. and police had no physical evidence to connect him to the murder.

and without a quick arrest, the cedar rapids gossip mill started churning. it as time slip by, people became suspicious of michelle, herself. >> the theories were just awful. i mean, it went everything from drug rings to prostitution rings. >> that somehow this young girl brought it on herself, right? >> absolutely. because surely, she had to be involved in this. >> painful for your parents? >> horrible. my mother eventually did not go out of the house. she just stayed at home. >> michelle's death and the failure to find her killer, also had a profound effect on the city where she had lived. >> people were really upset and traumatized by it. >> trish is the court reporter for the cedar rapids paper the gazette. >> back in 1979, cedar rapids was smaller than it is even now. it was a close knit community. >> cedar rapids in those days was very may very like. and honestly, what happened to michelle kind of stripped away,

not just our innocence that the innocence of the whole town. >> it settled over the city. the thought that michelle's killer might never be caught. the seventies became the eighties, and then the nineties. the dawn of dna testing finally gave police new hope. in 1997, they sent scrapings from that gearshift of michelle 's car off to a state lab. >> the lab was able to sort out all of those dna points and left a partial meal the any profile. >> at the time, it was an enough to match to a suspect. but in 2005, doug larsson took over the case. he wondered if anything else from the car might yield a more complete dna profile. he sent michelle's blood stained dress back to the state crime lab. >> got the phone call from the lab analysts that they had found a full dna profile on the dress, which was very exciting. >> that's a pretty exciting phone call? >> that's great.

all we had to do with submit the profile to codis -- >> codis? >> an fbi computerized systems that come teens millions of profiles that have been collected from crime scenes, from jails, people who have been arrested. >> and anything come back? >> nothing. no hit. >> to larsson, that meant michelle's killer was likely someone about any prior arrest or run-ins with a lot. that meant compute people police police had talked back in the day had to be reconsidered. >> my thinking is, let's start going through this case. let's start finding potential suspects. and the school get their dna and start eliminating them from that partial profile. >> so, now are we back to andy and all those other boyfriends? >> correct. >> nearly 30 years after michelle the's death, everything old was new again. boys with alibis back in 1979, we're now middle aged men with something more valuable than a story to offer. they had there dna.

>> coming up -- >> you're going to take a molecule of human genetic material and turn it into an image of some kind? >> correct. >> using dna to paint a portrait of a color and trees his family tree. >> so you've got a lot live on at the bottom of this tree. >> we've got live one here, only 20 minutes away. >> what do you think at that moment? >> we're ecstatic. >> you can taste it at that point. we're ready to go. >> when "dateline" continues. ♪♪ voltaren. the joy of movement. ♪♪ mom. can we get a puppy, mom? please? girls, pets are a big expense.

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get you the latest on that late huge earthquake in turkey in syria. the death toll passes 25,000 and some 80,000 people alone are being treated in hospital and more than 1 million are being left homeless. in syria, that number who lost their homes is closer to 5.3 million. the u.n. emergency relief coordinator is warning that the overall death total could toe

double, rescue workers are continuing the round the clock search for any remaining survivors. and now, back to dateline. >> welcome back to "dateline". i'm craig melvin. michelle martinko's unsold murder marked a loss of innocence for her friends and family. but not a loss of hope. cold case detectives were determined to catch the killer using a modern arsenal of tools. the same technology used to crack a legendary case in california, was about to reveal a tantalizing clue. back to dennis murphy with "and then there were three". >> the decades old investigation into michelle martinko's 1979 murder had emergency. detective doug larsson had a dna profile of the killer and

the original list of suspects. >> doug started with the really obvious suspects. all the ex-boyfriends. kurt thomas, old high school buddies that had been at the mall. >> at the top of that list was ex-boyfriend andy. >> i thought it was just a matter of time before andy was found to be a killer. >> that andy's dna was not a match. more than 25 years after he was first considered a suspect, he was cleared. justice for andy -- >> nothing to do with it. he had to live with that cloud over him because so many people did think he was involved. >> kurt thomas, the last person in her circle known to a scene michelle at the mouth, was also tested. police called his lawyer with the result. >> they got him on the phone and said, the dna is not a match, and they hung up. but >> the headline was, the dnc says it's not you. >> right, right. >> another possible suspect cleared. another setback for the cedar

rapids police department. but when matt denlinger took over as lead investigator in 2015, he still thought dna would solve the crime. so, he did another deep dive into a case file that had been built by so many before him. >> now, we're just trying to find men who were listed in these reports, that could have possibly had a connection to her, or men that would've had a connection to the mall. i thought eventually, if we come enough people, we're gonna get our suspect. >> that after more than 125 tests, no one matched the killers d. o. t.. they were out of leads. and then parabon comes into this. what is that? >> parabon is a private lab. what parabon was offering is to take the genetic profile that we had and to create an image. >> create an image? >> yeah like an actual -- a >> me like an up in the office photo to be on the lookout for this guy? >> exactly, a computer generated, philly sketch.

>> excuse me i sent a little skeptical. that sounds like food science fiction. [laughs] you're gonna take a molecule of human genetic material and turning into an image of somebody? >> correct. >> three sketches were greeted from the dna profile. the suspected killer imagine that is 25, another age 50, and one with a typical 1979 hair cut. police released the pictures to the public. >> we were hoping that 100 people would call in and say, that looks like person a. the problem is, we got 250 people call in and say it looks like 100 people. >> oh, man. more needles, more hair stacks. >> yeah, a lot of rabbit holes we went down. i tracked down another 50 people and swapped them. each time, hoping that this would finally get our guy. >> but with each dna test result, that hope was dashed. then, in 2018, parabon helped

solve the golden state killer case, using new technology called genetic genealogy. >> i got an email from parabon saying hey, check out what we just did. >> parabon offered a similar genealogy search for the martinko case. using their dna from the crime scene, they would try to identify relatives of the killer, by searching through genetic profiles on an online database. denlinger gave them the green light >> we said that in the spring of 2018, and by the summer, they had sent us report. and they said, that they had found the relative of our killer. >> a relative of your killer? >> yeah. they hypothesized that she was a second cousin, once removed, from our killer. >> well there's a headline for you guys. >> yeah. >> that person related to the killer was a woman living in vancouver, washington. now the trick was to build a family tree to see if police could link a family member to

cedar rapids in 1979. denlinger reached out to the woman, she agreed to answer all his questions. >> we have to start building her family tree. >> denlinger traced the woman's family tree back to the early 18 hundreds. >> so, you're looking through all historical records, census data -- >> absolutely. >> tombstones? >> tombstones. anything we can find. >> created four branches of the family, going back to great, great grandparents. the first branch lead to someone living in ohio. denlinger got a dna sample. >> we sent their dna back to parabon, and they recalibrated and told us that we can eliminate that branch of the family tree. >> don't waste your time on that tree. >> do we certainly. that that person shares no dna with your color. this one here, we wonder in nebraska. and said that one in. same thing. boom. get rid of that one. we don't need to worry about that branch of the family tree. >> on the next branch, denlinger found a relative living in iowa. so, you got a live one here at the bottom of the street?

>> we've got lies one here. this was a gal in lisbon, iowa, she's only 20 minutes where. >> she's not your color of course? >> definitely not the killer. we all see the killer was a man. we took a dna and sent it to parabon. boom. she shares enough with that color to be a first cousin. >> it turns out the woman sheer dna with three first cousins. three brothers. after four decades and so many disappointments, a suspect list had narrowed to three. >> all three of them are still alive, still living in iowa. >> what do you think at that moment? >> we are ecstatic. you can taste it at that point. we're ready to go. >> detectives are about to get up close and personal with the three brothers, without them knowing it. coming up -- >> and he and his son leave, we grab the cup off his table. my partner put some gloves on, grabs the straw, the glass, packages it up. and we disappear.

>> then, not a confession, but not eternal, either. >> what happened that night? >> did you murder that night someone that night, jerry? >> tested. even >> when "dateline" continues.

♪ ♪ ♪ >> and then there were three. after chasing down hundreds of leads over four decades, that suspect less in michelle martinko's murder had narrowed down to three brothers living in iowa. when you run the computer check. criminal records? anything come up? >> no. >> so they're leading respectable middle class lives as far as you can see. >> yeah, very much. >> the family name was burns and all three brothers were adults in 1979. but did not seem to have any connection to michelle martinko. investigator math denlinger and two colleagues decided to secretly connect dna from all three. so, this is when you become a double agent. it's really shifting gears here? >> it is shifting gears. >> they track the brothers one at a time, starting with middle brother kenneth. a married father of three, he sold from equipment in manchester, iowa. about a 50-minute drive from cedar rapids. >> the collected his dna from a

straw and it immediately goes to the state lab. they told us, hey, he is not your suspect. the next brother was donald. >> this brother donald, was a father of three and had five grandchildren. he lived in davenport, iowa, and was the manager of a lumber yards before retiring. went denlinger to his house and staked it out surreptitiously. >> the first time we corrected was out of the trash by the set by the curb. we found a toothbrush in there and collected some dna off of that. >> and what did the lab think about his genetic material? they >> said the same thing. >> he's not your guy? >> he's not your guy. >> it came down to the youngest brother, jerry burns, who like brother can't, worked lived and worked in manchester. denlinger did some intel on him. >> in 1979 he had two young kids. he lived in manchester. he sold farm implements. was in a bowling lead. >> so, these married with children, 9 to 5 guy? >> yeah.

>> on an october morning in 2018, denlinger and his team set out for manchester in three unmarked cars. so jerry's places right out here? >> it's in seconds is going to come up on us, in no. time. >> police followed him throughout the morning. finally, at lunchtime and opportunity. burns and his son had pulled into the pizza ranch restaurant. >> he parked in the parking lot there and he went in and i was sitting at a booth right by the window there. >> denlinger and his partners went in and signed a. both you're in the next move over? >> and then closer him as you and i are right now. >> you've got to be thinking, this is my color? >> yeah, it's hard to enjoy your food when you think you're staring at the color. >> burns was drinking a soda from a straw. denlinger didn't take his ivs off of it, making sure nobody else touched it. >> then he and his son leave, they drive away from the pizza ranch. we grab the cup off the table. my partner put some gloves on, grabs the straw and the glass, package it up, and we disappear. >> the sample was sent for testing. it was the moment of truth. jerry was not one of the last burns brother, he was the last possible suspect.

denlinger we'll never forget the moment he spoke to his contact at the crime lab. >> he says, that's your guy. >> he's the color? >> he's the killer. >> the lab reported that the scientific probability was 100 billion to one. that meant the dna from the crime scene belonged to jerry burns and not anyone else on earth. finally, it was the culmination of relentless decades long investigation. but denlinger was it ready to make an arrest. there were just too many questions that needed answers. >> it's time to go talk to him. he's not going to be ready. which is the best time to try to interview someone. >> so, on december 19th, 2018, denlinger headed back to manchester. he pulled up to burns a's place of business a little before noon.

the door was open. denlinger walked in. a hidden camera recorded everything. >> hello. >> you have backup? >> a lot of backup. we had no good expectation or what to expect from him. what to expect from his behavior. >> what's in his desk or? >> yeah. correct. >>'s camera was hidden in a travel mug. he introduced himself and set the mug down on burns's desk. >> he sits there and he's putting the shop cat, who's climbing all over the duster in the interview. >> we've got cat here, ha? >> what's the cat's name? >> no. >> denlinger and it burns a business card and then got down to business. >> we're following up on an old case. it's a homicide that happened in westdale mall. then he described the computer sketch released to the public that was developed from dna found at the crime scene. he said someone called in with a chip and that's how burns's came up. that wasn't true. but denlinger wanted to see how he would react. >> that's the picture we created. >> it looks a lot different than i look here. i look like that? >> well, i kind of think you do a little bit. enough that we bother to come up here to talk. >> burns remained calm and polite. he denied knowing michelle it but didn't say much more.

you're holding the major's card here? >> right. >> here's what science says. do you confirm with that? >> we did. we directly confronted him with. that. >> we have your dna the crime scene. so, we know you were there that night this happened. how will we get your dna the crime scene there jerry? >> i don't know, tested, see if it is. >> no, we did. how would it be, there jerry? >> i don't know. >> what happened that night? >> did you murder someone that night, jerry? >> tests the. dna. >> jerry. >> tests the dna. >> it wasn't the confession denlinger was hoping for, but he didn't think it was internal either. so, 39 years to the day after's murder, jerry burns was cuffed and placed under arrest. >> we have the right to remain silent. anything you can say cannot will be used against in the court of law.

>> the church was first degree murder. for jury burns's daughter and his brother, the news was a gut punch in. possible to comprehend. >> it almost seems like a dream. that it was it really happening. it was really true. >> could you believe it? >> no. >> my brother had said dad's been arrested for murder. just like, who -- i was so in disbelief. >> the arrest just didn't square with the image of the devoted father, the good kid brother that they could always known. they felt certain there was something wrong with that dna evidence. >> there's lots of other stories out there where there's a mistake of dna found at crime scenes. and there's an explanation for why it's their. does it mean that whoever's dna it was is that person that committed the crime? >> there's nothing to substantiate when it came there, how it got their. >> today, now you see this just cannot be right.

>> no, they can't be right. >> jerry burns's family was convinced he was instant. could prosecutors convince her journey he was the killer? >> coming up -- a damning discovery. >> there were files found on mr. burns computer. >> extreme pornography? fair to say? >> i think it was described publicly as deviant pornography, violent pornography. >> and the risk of relying on dna evidence. >> i taught fifth grade. i know how hard it is to teach somebody something. you have to repeat over and over again. i'm concerned about that. >> when "dateline" continues. gh , you know how i feel. ♪ ♪ breeze driftin' on... ♪ [coughing] ♪ ...by, you know how i feel. ♪ if you're tired of staring down your copd,... ♪ it's a new dawn, ♪ ♪ it's a new day... ♪ ...stop settling. ♪ ...and i'm feelin' good. ♪ start a new day with trelegy. no once-daily copd medicine has the power

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the search that started with more than 100 potential suspects was pared down to three brothers. investigators were now convinced only jerry burns could have killed michelle martinko. prosecutors were preparing to present their dna evidence in court. but the defense had their own dna card to play. harris dennis murphy with the conclusion of "and then there were three". >> 40 years after michelle martinko's martin murder, cedar rapids investigators were confident that a dna match proved jerry burns was for killer. first, assistant prosecutor for lynn county, nick maybanks certainly had motive to. >> there were files found on mr. burns computer -- >> extreme pornography, fair to

say? >> i think it was described publicly as deviant pornography, violent pornography. >> featuring prominently young, blond women. >> long women with the search team that was used. >> defense attorney leon spies filed a motion to bar the computer evidence from the trial. >> there was it jermaine to the case. this is a material was found on mr. burns's computer 39 years after the crime. >> and a pretrial hearing, the judge agreed. dealing a blow to the states case. which will down to a single piece of evidence against jerry burns, that dna match. >> good morning, ladies and

gentlemen of the jury. >> the trial began in february 2020. 's sister janel and her husband john, traveled from their florida home to attend. determined to see it through to the. and every day. >> every day, if the jury has to be there, will be. there >> you examined the dress -- the >> prosecution put detective dug larison on the stand to tell jurors the police found followed sound practices when they handled's clothing. >> we wore rubber gloves, for one. thankfully tried not to disturb the clothing items. just to get a quick look at them and re-insert them back into their original packaging. >> dna analysts, linda, since retired, testified the dna collected from that evidence could only be long to one person. >> the probability of finding two unrelated and officials is so small, that they can be discounted. >> the defense attorney spies was rolling over for the state 's dna case. >> jerry lynn burns is not guilty of the killing of michelle martinko. >> the defense attorney went after the cops for the way they handled the evidence over four decades. spies argued key items like michelle's dress were jumbled up with her other clothing, containing them forever. >> when you opened up the original packaging of the dress, the panties and the pantyhose, where the items all bundled together? >> as far as i recollect, they were, yes. >> and there was another reason to question the prosecutions, the defense attorney said. something called dna transfer. he quizzed his own expert

witness. >> is it, doctor spends, a plausible explanation that the possibility. >> the defenses dna expert told the court might burns have left his dna at the mall innocently, on a door, on the bench. after all, he told investigators that he had visited them. all >> janice burns's danny -- >> jerry burns the defense argued, was a victim of coincidence and sloppy defense work. >> ladies and gentlemen, the evidence has been submitted to you. >> after eight days of testimony, their jury got the case. when it goes out to the jury what do you think? >> i mean, we are hoping for the best. if he wasn't guilty, great, we have might at home. if he was guilty, it just meant more work. we're fighting for him. >> gentle was worried for a different reason. she knew that prosecution's case, that dna testing, the

genetic genealogy was complicated. dense data. >> i taught fifth grade. i know how hard it is to teach somebody something. you have to repeat it over and over and over again. i'm concerned about that. >> thank you. >> as it turned out, the jury reached a quick verdict. judge hoover read the decision allowed. >> we, the jury, find the defendant jerry lynn burns guilty of the charge of murder in the first degree. >> how did he take it, the verdict? >> i think he was shocked, to. he was very much expecting to come home. >> don, you're in court for the verdict? >> i was surprised at the verdict. i had a hard time believing that the jury sat down and even reviewed the case.

>> three hours? >> yeah. >> not even three. >> i couldn't believe they came back with a verdict they did. >> outside the courthouse, john and janel were emotional. >> to finally have the closure on this and to actually no -- i wish my parents could be here to see this. >> we left cedar rapids -- but cedar rapids never left us. >> i could feel the pressure of 40 years and countless police officers that have worked on this case. i felt like we as a team had finally done justice for the martinko family. >> jerry burns was sentenced to life without parole. he is appealing his conviction. >> as we were looking through pictures, we realized that she wasn't part of that christmas. she wasn't part of that birth. she was part of that party. we kept going deeper and deeper into the box, trying to find where was michelle? she had missed everything. >> the family album goes on,

but she's not in. >> she's not in it. >> no, she's only in the old photos. a girl smiling out into a world of possibilities. stolen, on a cold, december night. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline". i'm craig melvin. thank you for watching. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> hello ever