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narrator: up next,a masked gunman attacks a suburban family. -911. caller: someone's justshot our neighbors. 911 operator: who shot them? caller: i, we don'tknow, someone in a mask. sgt. marshall slot: thisis the most horrible crime i've ever investigated. narrator: the killerleaves several clues.

sgt. marshall slot: my firstthought with the black glove was, not another oj. -whoever the crookswere made a mistake leaving behind evidence. narrator: but theforensic evidence reveals something far worsethan police ever imagined. devin stasicha: that isa pinnacle moment for me in my forensic career becauseit doesn't happen that often. [music playing]

narrator: in sugar land,texas, just outside of houston, everyone knew thewhitaker family. 55-year-old kent whitakermanaged a construction business that had been in thefamily for a generation. pastor matt barnhill:business did well, i mean, in constructionbooms, they did real well. and when constructionwasn't booming, they still held their own. so it was a, it wasa great business.

narrator: kent and his wife,tricia, and their two sons, bart and kevin, werein a festive mood on the night ofdecember 10, 2003. 24-year-old bart was aboutto graduate from college with a criminal justice degree. sgt. marshall slot: theysaid let's go out and eat, and let's celebrate. narrator: when theyreturned home from dinner, they were ambushed.

[gunshots]911 operator: 911. get over here. 911 operator: who shot them?caller: i, we don't know. someone in a mask.please get here soon. 911 operator: ok. narrator: moments later, bartwhitaker also called 911. bart whitaker: i've been shot. 911 operator: whereis your wound? bart whitaker: in my arm,my shoulder, i think.

i can't move my arm. i chased him. i'm in the living roomright by the kitchen. i went after him.911 operator: ok. when he left, bart, did heleave out your back door? bart whitaker: yeah.i chased him that way. [sirens] sgt. marshall slot: thedispatcher had said, we've got a quadruple shooting.

i initially thought she wasjoking because sugar land is just not the town where aquadruple shooting occurs. narrator: both kevinwhitaker and his mother, tricia, were killed bygunshot wounds to the chest. kent and bart, bothconscious and alert, had been shot intheir upper arms. pastor matt barnhill: myinitial reaction was shock. just didn't know whatto make of it all. narrator: investigatorsfound the murder

weapon on the kitchen floor. eric hanson: a nine-millimeterpistol, a glock, we also had empty shell casings. narrator: investigatorsalso found a glove in thefront of the house. there were no signsof forced entry. it looked like robberymight have been the motive, but there was nothing missing. billy baugh: they had opened updrawers of the master bedroom

about two or threeinches, not enough even to pull anything out. narrator: a couple ofhours later, police learned of another shootingjust a few miles away. eric hanson: the suspectwent into a house, confronted the people who live there,tied them up, roughed them up. billy baugh: thisindividual left the scene. the houston police[inaudible] got in a chase with this individual.

narrator: officers pursued thesuspect to a nearby apartment complex. but as they closed in,the gunman killed himself. sgt. marshall slot: wethought that if somebody was willing to kill themselvesrunning from the police, that they must havedone something really, really bad, like a homicide. narrator: the man was identifiedas 22-year-old lathan jackson. he'd been releasedfrom prison three

months earlier fordrug possession. sgt. marshall slot: he had beenin prison for felony crimes before-- somewhat leant itselfto us believing that he might have been involved inthis violent crime. narrator: to find outwhether jackson was involved in the whitakershootings, police used trained sniffer dogs. eric hanson: anytime there'sa high-profile crime, or a crime where they feelthat scent would be an issue,

or evidence, they'll,they'll call these dogs. -god designed themto do much more work than we could do with our noses. narrator: the bloodhound pickedup a scent from the glove found at the whitakers' home and thenine-millimeter pistol found in the kitchen. fred feldman: so now we knowthat the shooter had the gun, had the gloves, and touchedthe drawers in the house. narrator: but thedog didn't find

the same scent onjackson's clothing. so the whitaker killerwas still on the loose. the whitaker family had justreturned home from a family dinner celebratingbart whitaker's upcoming college graduation. kevin whitaker walkedtowards the front door, followed by hismother and father. bart whitaker was checkingmessages on his cell phone, and was the last one in.

[gunshots] kevin and tricia whitakerwere killed by the gunman. kent and his son bart wereboth shot in the upper body, but survived. apparently the killer exitedthrough the rear door. billy baugh: close to the backdoor of the residence where the kitchen, there was a blackglock nine-millimeter handgun. it had, uh, force-bentshell casings. narrator: therewere no valuables

missing from thewhitakers' home. billy baugh: the only thingearly on in the investigation that we knew was missing wasbart whitaker's cell phone. that couldn't be accounted for. narrator: when questioned,kent and bart told police that the shooter waswearing a ski mask, was about 5 foot 11 inchestall with a medium build. but there were thingsabout the crime scene that bothered investigators.

first, it lookedas if the shooter knew exactly when thefamily would arrive. sgt. marshall slot: the factthere were four shots and four hits was very unusual,just because that was a really high hit ratio. you don't see thatwith police officers. he's either reallylucky, or really good, or had time to planout what he was doing. narrator: and when investigatorstraced the serial number

of the murder weapon,they discovered it was registeredto kevin whitaker. [gunshot] he kept it in a locked safein a second-floor bedroom. the killer used somekind of tool or crowbar to pry the safe open. devin stasicha: whatevertool had been used to pry it open kind of had acrowbar-like look to it. and there were littleflecks of blue paint

in it, suggesting that the toolthat was used had been painted. narrator: and thelocation of the safe was another sign the killerwas familiar with the layout of the house. fred feldman: the shooterknew exactly where to go. there's only one way in andout of that damn second floor. narrator: as investigatorssearched for the man who attacked the whitakerfamily, journalists were busy conductingtheir own investigation.

on the night of theshooting, the whitaker family was at dinner celebratingbart's upcoming graduation from sam houstonstate university. reporter eric hansoncalled the university to find out whattype of degree bart whitaker was goingto be awarded. eric hanson: the personwho answered the phone, the first thing he toldme was that bart is not a student here, andis not graduating.

and i was really,really surprised. i mean, i was justflabbergasted. narrator: insteadof going to class, bart whitaker wasusing his parents' money to have a good time. eric hanson: they wouldgive him money for tuition. and they just assumed thathe was going to school, and trusted him. and he wasn't.

-his father says hejust believed him. they never asked himproduce any grades. fact is, i think thatlater on the father actually did say that bartwhitaker gave him a transcript and it may have been faked. narrator: even more appalling,bart not only told his parents he was graduating, but saidhe was graduating with honors. fred feldman: they think thathe's graduating magna cum laude, i mean high up in,high up in graduation.

and so they're going out tocelebrate him graduating. so he comes on home, theycelebrate at the house, they give him arolex watch, okay? narrator: despitethis information, kent whitaker had a difficulttime believing this had anything to do with the murders. pastor matt barnhill:it wasn't that they believed hehad no problems. they believed he had problems.

they, they just didn't believethat his problems had the depth and the, and the,were as destructive as they obviously were. narrator: then investigatorsnoticed something troubling on a photograph thefamily took of bart sitting next to his brotherjust an hour before the murders. billy baugh: and onone of the pictures we noticed bart wasmaking obscene gesture towards the camera or theperson taking the picture.

narrator: investigators nowwondered if bart's hostility went further than aninappropriate gesture. after the murder ofhis mother and brother, and the attemptedmurder of his father, bart whitaker wasexposed as a fraud. he told his family he wasgraduating from college, when in fact he hadn'tattended in years. -i was even madderabout the fact that he received a graduationcard from a family friend,

and in it, it had a checkfor $25, $50, something, you know-- after he gotout of the hospital, he cashed the check. this is after hehad been exposed as not having graduated. he still cashed the check. narrator: when news reports ofthe whitaker family shootings were broadcast throughouttexas, one of bart's friends, adam hipp, came forward with astartling piece of information.

two years before thewhitaker murders, adam hipp claimed bart triedto hire him as the shooter. adam said the motive wasfinancial, that bart wanted to cash in on his parents'multimillion dollar estate. hipp knew specifics ofthe crime only someone familiar with theplanning could have known. -the one specific plot thatmatched the homicide scene, he drew out the entryway tothe whitakers' residence. he drew out specifically wherehe and bart had agreed that he

would stand, in the entryway,to shoot kent, kevin, and tricia as they walked throughthe front door. it was an exact match. -adam hipp has anairtight alibi. on the day of theshooting, he's up in dallas working in the bank. narrator: in anothersurprise twist, investigators learned thatbart's parents, kent and tricia whitaker, found out aboutthis plan two years earlier.

sgt. marshall slot:kent and tricia didn't believe there was anycredibility to the report. they were able to contact oneof the other individuals who was actuallyinvolved in the plot. that individualconvinced kent and tricia that it was all a joke,and all a misunderstanding. fred feldman: so his fatherasked bart whitaker about this. bart whitaker was so goodat being able to deceive his father, his father neverdouble checked into anything.

his father didn't even questionhis schooling after that. narrator: and when police toldkent whitaker that bart might have arranged this shooting too,he had difficulty accepting it. sgt. marshall slot:kent was very naive. um, he's just very naive. narrator: so investigatorswondered, if bart arranged his family's murder, whodid he get to help him? eric hanson: so it actually,when these crimes happened, they looked to see who bart washanging around with this time.

narrator: bart'stwo closest friends were chris brashearand steven champagne. -brrashear was aroommate, and steve champagne liveda few doors down. narrator: when questioned,both champagne and brashear denied any involvementin the shootings. sgt. marshall slot:both chris and steven were college agedkids who were kind of struggling to find their way.

uh, neither one of them hadreally decided on a career path, bouncing betweenjobs and parties. -police asked them fordna and scent samples, and they did agreeto provide those. narrator: investigatorsasked them to use gauze pads and distilledwater to wipe their hands. sgt. marshall slot: theyhandled the gauze pad, they're the only who'sever handled the gauze pad, and we hand it tothem, have them drop it

into the plastic bag,and seal the plastic bag. narrator: then investigatorsused scent dogs to see whether thosescents matched the scents from items foundat the crime scene. sgt. marshall slot:we took scent samples from every item insidethe house that we believed was touchedby the suspect. narrator: police callthis a scent lineup. sgt. marshall slot:most people are

familiar with aphotographic lineup. a scent lineup is conductedvery much in the same way. narrator: none of thescents from the crime scene implicated stevechampagne, but the dog did come up with something. fred feldman: guesswhose scent they hit on? chris brashear's. out of three different tests,they hit on chris brashear. narrator: unfortunately,this kind of evidence

is not admissible in court. sgt. marshall slot: we wantedto work this thing to the point where it was beyonda reasonable doubt before we ever wentforward with charges. narrator: police would need moreif they wanted a conviction. police believed bart whitakerhired his roommate, chris brashear, to murder his mother,father, and his brother. they also suspectedone of bart's friends, steven champagne,was also involved.

-we felt we knew who did it,but you can't go out there to the public andjust tell them, hey, don't worry about it.we know who did it. it's just, you know,we can't prove it yet. fred feldman: we'vegot wire taps. all we're doing istrying to stir up the pot to see if these guys want tostart talking to each other. and they're telephoning, butwe're not getting anything. narrator: still,police never let

them forget they wereunder investigation. and a year and a halflater, their persistence finally paid off. sgt. marshall slot: itbecame evident very quickly that the efforts we were takingto talk to steven champagne's circle of friends was working. it was getting to him. narrator: steve champagnefinally broke down and admitted to police that bart whitakerasked him and chris brashear

to kill bart's family. champagne insisted that chrisbrashear was the shooter, and that he wasmerely the driver. -bart wanted me to, i guess,be in chris' shoes before. and then i told him no way. and, i mean, [coughs] iwas already to the point to where i was, i guess,had knowledge of this, and, you know, had beenthreatened, things like that and couldn't, felt likei couldn't go anywhere.

so i was already involved, andthe way that i looked at it was i tried to eliminate myselfas much from it as possible. narrator: champagne saidthat, after the murders, they had throwna bag of evidence into nearby lake conroe. police frogmen searched the lakeand, miraculously, after a year and a half on the floor ofthe lake, found the bag. inside was a chisel, ahalf-full bottle of water, bart whitaker'scell phone, and some

unused nine-millimeter bullets. -it's the sametype of ammunition that was usedduring the murders. it's a nice little connection. narrator: scientistsweren't sure that the paint on thechisel could be tested. devin stasicha: it was corroded. it looked like ithad fungus on it. i was able to find enoughof the light blue paint

that i could scrape off. narrator: there was enoughto test with infrared light, and its chemicalstructures measured. the findings showed thatthe paint from the chisel was the same as thepaint chips on the safe in kevin whitaker's bedroom. devin stasicha: i was elated. i was absolutely overjoyed. that is a pinnacle momentfor me in my forensic career

because it doesn'thappen that often. narrator: analysts nowturn to the water bottle. amazingly, even though it hadbeen submerged for 18 months, analysts found agenetic profile. the bottle's screw topsealed someone's dna into the plasticthreads of the cap. fred feldman: they sent it off,had chris brashear's dna on it. isn't it amazing? it just shows thatsteve champagne

was telling the truth. narrator: almost twoyears after the murders, chris brashear andsteve champagne were arrested and chargedwith capital murder. ironically, neitherbrashear nor champagne was ever paid a cent for theirparticipation in the crime. fred feldman: i mean, theyweren't even good hit men. they didn't even know whatthey were going to get. narrator: the ringleader,bart whitaker, fled to mexico

but was later apprehended. fred feldman: whenmarshall arrested him, bart whitaker wassitting in the backseat. and marshall justleaned over and said, you know, bart, when allof this is over with, i just want to knowhow you did this. you know, how wereyou able to do this? and bart says,it's easy, you just offer people what they want.

narrator: prosecutorsbelieve the murders were meticulously planned. bart called his parents withthe bogus story he had passed his final exams andwas set to graduate. his parents invitedhim home to celebrate. when the familywent out to dinner, chris brashear entered the homewith the key bart gave him. but he dropped aglove outside, which later tied him tothe crime scene.

once inside, brashear brokeinto the safe in kevin's room, stealing the glocknine-millimeter handgun, leaving the paint chips thattied the chisel to the scene. to make it look like a robbery,brashear opened some drawers in the house, but the attemptclearly looked staged. steve champagne wasat the restaurant and called brashearas the whitakers left. when the whitakers camehome, brashear was waiting. [dramatic music playing]

he shot kevin andtricia in the chest. he shot kent in thearm as he turned sideways, whichsaved kent's life. brashear then shot bartin the arm, as planned. when he tried to pick upthe gun, in his haste, he probably picked up bart'scell phone by mistake. then he ran outsidethrough the back door and met steve champagne,who was waiting for him two blocks away.

brashear took a sipof water, then put it in the canvas bag,along with the chisel and bart's cell phone, andthrew the bag into the lake. 18 months later, whenthe bag was recovered, brashear's dna wasstill on that bottle. sgt. marshall slot:steven champagne had provided a confession. all of the keypieces of evidence that were needed tocorroborate his confession

were contained in that bag. billy baugh: you had to getthe forensic evidence out of lake conroe. or you had to have thedog scent from that night, just like a jigsaw puzzle. and once all the pieces werethere, it makes your puzzle. and that's what this did. narrator: chris brashearwas convicted of two counts of capital murder, and wassentenced to life in prison.

in exchange for histestimony, steven champagne was convicted of capitalmurder and sentenced to 15 years in prison. judge: hereby find thedefendant, thomas barton whitaker, guilty of theoffense of capital murder as charged in the indictment. narrator: bart whitakerwas sentenced to death. sgt. marshall slot:forensic evidence tied all of the other keycomponents of this case

together and allowed usultimately to present the district attorney's officewith a case that was, you know, by the grace of god, asairtight as it could get. -it didn't matter whetherbart whitaker really had a legitimate reasonto hate somebody. if he just decided thathe was superior to you, and that whatever you had,he deserved because he's better than you,he's getting it.