INFAMOUS: The Mulholland Drive Murders

0:00Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Britt. And the story I have for you today is a perfect example of why we need to keep cold cases alive by talking about them and revisiting them with fresh eyes. Because when a detective went the extra mile to name a victim who couldn't speak for herself, his work led to a break in a case that seemed impossible to solve for decades. And it led him to another case that could be connected. But police still need more information to solve these cases once and for all. So we need you, crime junkies, to listen closely and share these details far and wide in case someone out there is sitting on answers.

0:39This is the story of the Mulholland Drive murders.

1:14It's January 2003, and homicide detective Cliff Shepard is kicking off his year digging through boxes of paperwork in the LAPD's archive unit. Detective Shepard's an almost three-decade vet of the department, and he's recently been assigned to the cold case unit. So he's reviewing cases from the late 1960s, especially ones with evidence that can be tested with new technology. But the archives are a disaster. I mean, over the years, files have gone missing or haven't been logged correctly. Some case materials haven't been touched in decades. And so he's sorting through it all, trying to make sense of a backlog that's been gathering dust, skimming case summaries, trying to figure out which files are even complete.

1:55But when he pulls one box off the shelf and lifts the lid, he sees something that should never, ever be in these boxes. A tan lace bra, stained with blood, not sealed, not tagged, just like shoved in this box with yellowing case files. And this is not how he should be finding evidence. But like, on the other hand, it like. It's evidence. It's still evidence, like evidence with blood on it that may still be testable, which is like kind of exactly what he's looking for, right? So he sees the file it's in belongs to the case of someone known only as Jane Doe 59 because she was L.A. County's 59th Jane Doe found in 1969.

2:37Even if the blood just belongs to this victim, like he sees huge potential to be able to use it to give her a name, which might actually kickstart an investigation that, as he goes on to read, didn't make it very far. So what he sees is that on November 16th, 1969, a 15-year-old boy was hiking Mulholland Drive to go birdwatching when he found the woman's body in a ravine tangled up in branches and brush about 15 feet down the hillside. LAPD arrived on the scene by nightfall and determined that the victim was white, about 23 years old, 5 '9", and she had been stabbed in the neck over 150 times with what police thought was likely a small knife.

3:18Now, to them, it looked like she'd been stabbed while laying on her back, like maybe her killer like sat on top of her to like subdue her. And she had her head turned to one side because most of her wounds were on the side of her neck. But she fought back or at least tried to block the blade from coming down on her because she had defensive wounds on her hands. Now, police didn't find the murder weapon at the scene, but they were pretty sure of one thing. This wasn't where she was killed. There were bloody drag marks left on Mulholland Drive like her killer had parked there, dragged her across the road, and then put her body over the edge of the ravine until it like fell down the hillside.

3:57Were there any tire tracks nearby? None were mentioned in the case file, but you can see faint tire marks in some of the crime scene photos. Like, problem is police wouldn't have known how relevant they actually were because this was a busy road. So like, it could have nothing to do with this. Okay, if this was a busy road, like, how did no one see someone dumping a body here? Well, Mulholland Drive had, or still has probably, some stretches with, like, houses right by the road and then stretches that had just, like, hills and ravines on both sides. So the area where this woman was found was more secluded, like, still near some houses, but, like, none of them, like, overlooked this specific stretch.

4:37So no one would have seen this car stop from their window or anything like that. And it's very possible they dumped her in the overnight hours when traffic and activity in the homes would have been light. There's not an exact time of death, though. All the coroner could tell during her autopsy was that she had been dead like 24 to 48 hours. And she had eaten about two hours before she died. And there were no signs of sexual assault. Her clothes, a sweater, corduroy jacket, jeans, boots, and that tan lace bra, those were all still intact. And not much else is found at the scene until a few days later when a road worker turned in a pair of prescription glasses found nearby.

5:18Now, these were either missed by the investigators who did the initial search or they were left there after. And like, so therefore might not even be relevant. But either way, they looked like men's glasses and therefore theoretically could be connected to their killer. Definitely not their victims. Now, the CBC reported that work had already been done on this lead back in the day. And all that police really got to was that the prescription was for a very nearsighted man. But the brand was pretty common. So it wasn't something they could actually trace. Could there be any DNA still on the glasses?

5:50So Detective Shepard told us that the glasses weren't in evidence when he picked up the file. So, like, I don't know if they're lost. I don't know if they were destroyed over time. But there's no trace of them. And so, like, when he... There's no trace of them. so there's no trace of DNA to test. Did they try to test her bra or anything else at the time? Well, detectives told us that back then all the bra could have been tested for was blood type, but he didn't even know for sure if they did that or not. He also said that no one scraped under her fingernails or anything. So like, you know, there were definitely missed opportunities for sure.

6:23And when no one came forward to claim this woman's body, that's when she became known as Jane Doe 59. They tried IDing her using the clothing that she was found in. They thought that basically what she was wearing was a little heavy for L.A., even in November. Plus, some of the clothes were made outside of the U.S., so they contacted law enforcement in Canada and Interpol, checked with police throughout the U.S., ran her fingerprints, but nothing came up. And after that, the case just went real cold, real fast. So this is what Detective Shepard starts out with. This isn't the kind of case he usually looks for.

6:58Like, no ID, no suspects, all the evidence is basically gone. And to top it all off, Jane Doe 59 was cremated by the coroner's office because her body was never claimed. But there is this bloody bra, which at this point is like a North Star for him. Now, Detective Shepard told us that LAPD was a little behind other departments on when they started testing DNA. but they finally got it going at around 2001 when the cold case unit was formed. So this is like two years before he picks up the case file. So right away, he submits the bra to the state's missing persons DNA program. But even that was lagging behind.

7:35And this is really what he needs because he's looking to ID the victim first and foremost. So results are going to take a while and Detective Shepard has to put any investigation kind of on the back burner until he has something to investigate. Right. But even with 133 cold cases on his plate, this one stays in the back of his mind. And he doesn't know what it is that jogs his memory or why it happens one random day in 2005. But he starts thinking about the book Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi. It was a book that he read back in 1976, like very early on in his career. The author was a prosecutor in one of the most infamous murder trials in American history, The Tate-LaBianca case, which I'm sure like a lot of crime junkies know about.

8:22And Helter Skelter was basically like the first definitive account of the Manson family and their crimes. Anyway, for some reason, he feels compelled to pick this book up again. And what do you know? In the epilogue, there is a paragraph about Jane Doe 59. In it, Bogliosi floats his theory that Jane Doe 59's murder might have been linked to the Manson family because of when she died. Her body was found a week and a half after the mysterious death of a Manson follower. By that time, the Manson family was under investigation for multiple murders. So Bogliosi wonders whether she may have witnessed the follower's death and then was killed to keep her from talking about it.

9:05Now, Bogliosi is clear that he doesn't have any evidence to back this theory up. But honestly, it's not even all the Manson stuff that catches this detective's attention most. I mean, yes, it's interesting. Yes, it's how he got here. But it's another detail in that paragraph that stands out to Detective Shepard. Bogliosi mentions the name of another young woman, 17-year-old Marina Habba, who was also brutally stabbed to death just 10 months before Jane Doe 59. and her body was found within two miles of Jane Doe 59's in a different ravine off Mulholland Drive. And now Detective Shepard is thinking, what if these two young women are connected?

9:45And if so, are they really connected to the Manson family or does he have a different serial killer on his hands? When Detective Shepard looks into Marina's case, he learns that it wasn't investigated by LAPD. It was in a different jurisdiction, so the sheriff's department took it. Which may be why neither department made any connection initially, even though Bugliosi eventually did. But because Detective Shepard doesn't have the case file, he starts by reading through old news coverage. He learns that in December of 1968, Marina, a college freshman and aspiring artist, was home for winter break after her first semester at the University of Hawaii.

10:26She was staying at her mom's house off Sunset Boulevard, right where West Hollywood borders Beverly Hills. On the night of December 29th, Marina went out with friends to celebrate New Year's a little early. And around 3.30 a.m., so this would have been the morning of the 30th now, her mom finally heard her sports car pull into the driveway. And then seconds later, she heard another car outside, one with loud pipes. It sounded kind of like an older model. It's been reported that she told detectives she looked out her window and she saw Marina's car parked in the driveway with a man standing next to it.

11:01And then another car, a black sedan, was also parked in the driveway. Now, I'm sure this all happens fast, but the black sedan starts backing out, and the man runs toward it yelling something like, go, before jumping in, and they speed off just as Marina's mom goes outside. But when she's out there, there's no sign of Marina. Even though when her mom checked her car, the keys are like still in the ignition. And in an instant, this bad feeling just courses through her mom. And by 3.45, she was on the phone with police reporting her daughter missing. When they arrive at the house, all she could tell them about the man she saw was that he was young.

11:39Like, not super helpful. Police do check out Marina's car, and they made note that the glasses her mom said that she needed for driving and likely kept in her car, those were missing. They also noticed that the emergency brake was pulled all the way up, like as far as it can go. And I don't know exactly how they got to this from that, but they thought whoever pulled it used more force than Marina could have. They say because she was a smaller girl. And like, I don't know what this car is, but like I can fully pull up my emergency brakes. I'm even thinking of like the trucks that I used to drive in high school.

12:14I don't know how accurate this is. Maybe we don't know the cars at the time or maybe men didn't know women at the time. That's probably that one. Yeah. So even though police were quick to dismiss missing teen girls as runaways at the time, That didn't happen here. They actually took Marina's disappearance seriously right away. And that might have been because Marina's mom told them that they had a close relationship. Marina didn't need to keep secrets from her. And because her mom was an actress and her dad, a writer in Switzerland, was in the industry too, police wondered right off the bat if Marina may have been kidnapped for ransom.

12:48So while her mom waited by the phone for a ransom call, police worked on building a timeline of Marina's last known movements, pieced together by questioning the friend she went out with the night before, and her date, a family friend named John, who she had known since she was little. And John told police that Marina came over to his house in Bel Air on Sunday afternoon. Around 8.30 p.m., they got in a limo with this group of friends. One of their dads had, like, arranged it, and they went to a club called Troubadour, which is still in West Hollywood today. The group left at around 11.30 p.m.

13:23and the limo dropped Marina and John back off at his house. He says they hang out until like 3.15 in the morning when Marina left to make the 20-minute drive from his house back to hers. So that timeline would put her back at around 3.30 in the morning, exactly when her mom heard her car pull in. And we asked Detective Shepard what he thought about all of that, like if he thought Marina drove herself. And he says yes. He didn't think that whoever took Marina would go to the trouble of driving her car back to her house and like parking it in the driveway. He thinks it's more likely that she made it home and then was just taken as she pulled in.

14:00Okay. And we totally believe John, right? Like I know anyone theoretically could have followed her, but can anyone confirm that Marina was actually there for those four hours where he said she was? So that's the thing. It seems like John was cooperative with police when they talked to him, but we don't know if anyone backed up his story or if police just kind of took him at his word. I would love to ask John, but we just missed our window. He passed away in 2024. And what did any of the other friends say? Like, how was Marina that night? Was anything, like, off? So this is the good news. So we actually did get a hold of someone who was with her that night, like, in that group.

14:38And it's Marina's best friend's boyfriend. And he told us the same thing he told police back then. Like, everyone had a good time. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood. There was no drama that he noticed. But, and this hasn't been reported as far as we know, he said that there was a rumor going around that night that Marina's boyfriend was married. John? So this is the catch. He didn't know the guy's name, but it was whatever guy she was with that night. And that night, her date was introduced to them as her boyfriend. So, like, we think so. I can't prove it. Yeah, we don't have anything saying definitively yes.

15:15Yeah, and we showed him a photo of John, and he said John's face looked familiar, but all these years later, like, he couldn't be sure if that is the person who was with them that night. Now, he did remember that the man she was with seemed a little older than the rest of the group. Most of them were around 18 to 21. I know John was 23, which, you know, and at that age, it can feel older. And I had our reporter try and find out whether or not John was married at the time. Turns out John was. He and his wife got married and had a child in 1967. So why was he out on a date with a 17-year-old? And I don't know if his wife was asking the same question, but they got divorced in 1970, a little over a year and a half after Marina's murder.

16:00But then they remarried in 72 and then split for good a few years after that. So scandalous if it was him. I say if because, again, we don't have 100 % confirmation that John was the one with Marina. And according to the Chicago Tribune, Marina's family said she and John were just friends and she had a different boyfriend who they didn't name. Then a college friend of Marina's told the Honolulu Star advertiser that Marina had decided not to come back to the University of Hawaii after winter break because apparently her boyfriend was going to be discharged from the Army soon. and they planned to get engaged over the holidays.

16:38So Marina wanted to transfer to a school in California to be closer to him. Now, John wasn't serving in the army before the holidays, but he just graduated from college in 1968. So maybe Marina was talking about him, but for whatever reason, like she like fudged some details. Like it's the only thing I can, if she's talking about him, like some of the details are wrong, right? Right. And does the family know who the other guy is and they just like weren't saying? Is he real? Could she have made up a fake boyfriend because she was dating this older guy? She knew it'd be a little bit scandalous.

17:12I don't know. Marina's parents have passed away. Friends we reached out to haven't gotten back to us. Like I said, we got that one person who was there that night and our FOIA request was denied. So we haven't seen the case files. That being said, if anyone out there does know anything about this or you were there or friends or connected to the family, email me tips at audio check. Now, her missing persons case only stayed a missing persons case for two days. Because on New Year's Day, Marina's body was found. It was actually her purse that was found first at a Mulholland Vista point. Nothing seemed to be missing.

17:47There's still money, credit cards, some kind of ID inside. And then her body was found a few hours later at around 4 p.m. not far away. Police knew it was her right away because she was still wearing the outfit John described to them. Brown capris, a white turtleneck, and a fur-trimmed coat. She'd been stabbed at least twice in the neck, had six or seven stab wounds on the front and back of her torso, and there were signs that she had been strangled as well. And she had what looked like a cigarette burn on her skin. And along with two black eyes, her body was badly bruised. Now, the coroner couldn't confirm sexual assault at the time, but we spoke with detectives who said that Marina had been sexually assaulted.

18:30And it seems like a sexual assault kit was done. But we are still unclear what happened to that kit based on our reporting. Now, here's the part that really stands out. When Marina was found, rigor mortis was still setting in. And fresh blood found in her lungs and airways hadn't clotted. Blood usually dries and clots pretty quickly. So that, combined with the rigor, meant that she likely died within 8 to 12 hours of being found. So probably between 4 a.m. and 8 a.m. on January 1st. And very interesting, she had eaten recently. And the food had moved to her small intestine, which happens about two to five hours after a meal.

19:18So that narrowed down her time of death to just a few hours after she ate. And just as an interesting flag, that Jane Doe also ate two hours before she had died. Like, almost like someone had had a meal with both of them. Like, they'd both eaten a meal with possibly their killer before being killed. Yes, and it could have been multiple people. Because that's an idea that was entertained because they believe more than one knife was used to kill Marina. The coroner noted some of the stab wounds had two sharp edges. Other ones had one sharp and one rounded. Caveat here is, yes, that could mean different types of knives, but it also apparently can also just mean different angles of entry.

20:02So could be multiple, could just be one. But two makes sense, like at least to me, knowing that Marina's mom saw like a guy by the car and met another guy who yelled go. Right. Clearly to another person that he was with. Driving probably. Right. Yeah. But the question still is who and why? It didn't seem like a ransom plot to police anymore, though. I mean, they never got any demands before finding her. But they quickly find a new angle to explore. They said there had been multiple sexual assault attempts in Marina's neighborhood before she went missing. And they started to consider whether her kidnapping might have been connected to those.

20:40So they put word out about this, even questioned at least one guy that they suspected in another abduction. but nothing ever stuck to him relating to Marina. In August 1969, they investigated the Michigan co-ed killer, John Collins, because he'd allegedly killed girls from Northern California earlier that year. But John didn't even arrive in California until June of 1969, which is months after Marina's murder, so he gets ruled out. Then came the Manson murders later that August. Then Jane Doe 59 was found dead that November. And in December, state officials sent LAPD a list of unsolved cases that might match the Manson family MO, particularly violent stabbing deaths.

21:25And that list included Marina's and Jane Doe 59s. Initially, they thought maybe Marina was stabbed with the same knife used in the Tate murders by the Manson family, but that couldn't be proven. And then there was nothing else physically connecting the cases. So even though more was able to happen in Marina's case than in Jane Doe 59's, they both ended up in the same spot by 2005. Cold as ice. Until Detective Shepard gets that bee in his bonnet and rereads Helter Skelter. But he has the benefit of hindsight. So he knows investigators in 1969 were eager to tie almost every unsolved stabbing murder to the Manson family at the time.

22:07And he's taking Bogliosi's theory with a grain of salt. Like, to him, yeah, okay, the Manson angle is possible. But without proof of that, anything is really possible. So Manson stuff aside, does he think that the two are connected for sure, though? He thinks there are a lot of similarities worth looking into. And he wants to see if Marina's sexual assault kit still exists so he can run DNA tests. Because if Marina and Jane Doe 59 were killed by the same person, the answer to both cases might lie in one piece of evidence. So soon after, he contacts the sheriff's department about Marina's case, but he can't get much out of them.

22:47No one there seems to be actively working her case or even knows much about it. And it's not like he can go over there. He has no jurisdiction there. He can't go banging down doors. So he just like ends up not being able to get answers on her case or answers as to where that kit is or if it still exists. Right. It could just be like stuffed in a box somewhere. Like the bra he found. Exactly. And he ends up hitting another wall even in his own case because the DNA that he does have isn't the slam dunk he was hoping for. In May 2006, so this is three years after he submitted that bloody bra for testing, Detective Shepard gets word that the lab was able to recover a female DNA profile.

23:30But the only national database they can put it into right now is CODIS, which isn't showing any matches. So this is great if you can ever find a family member to compare it to. But until then, she's going to still be Jane Doe 59. So Detective Shepard has no choice at the time but to shift focus and tackle other cases with more promising leads. Over the next few years, his work helps bring down serial killers like, I don't know if you've heard of him, Rodney Alcala, the dating game killer, Lonnie Franklin and Chester Turner. In early 2012, he is set to retire. But still, in the months before he does, like he just wants to see Jane Doe's case solved.

24:13So he reaches out to media outlets while he's like wrapping things up, hoping someone's going to run her story. And someone out there will see it. Someone out there is looking for her. But almost everyone he turns to turns him down, telling him to call back when he has a suspect and a better story. But he won't have a suspect until he gets an ID. which he can't get without press, which you aren't giving him. Exactly. One person hears him, though. Michelle McNamara. Michelle. So for those of you who don't know, she was an incredible true crime journalist who wrote, like, infamous book, I'll Be Gone in the Dark.

24:52It's incredible. Highly recommend. Yeah, she's pretty big in, like, the true crime space, right? And she is kind of like us, right? She's, like, doing her blog. You're not, like, tied down by, like, these big organizations above you, like telling you what you have to get. She can kind of pick and choose what she's going to cover. Yeah, and she's like, I'll absolutely take this on. But unfortunately, right then, that's not what moves the needle. So no one comes forward with new information by February 2012 when Detective Shepard retires after 37 years with LAPD. He hands the case off to another detective, Luis Rivera, and hopes that someone someday will bring Jane Doe 59's name to light.

25:31But his work wasn't for nothing. Because in 2015, Detective Rivera gets a call from the coroner's office. They've just heard from a woman in Canada who thinks Jane Doe 59 may be her sister, Reet. And guess how she made the connection? Michelle's blog. She ends up telling Detective Rivera that she learned about the case from a friend. She came across the blog post, which had a picture of Jane Doe 59's face taken during her autopsy. and she thought the woman in the picture looked like this woman, Reet. Reet Jervitsen. She was only 19 when she left Toronto for LA in late 1969. Her friends and family lost contact with her after that and no one had seen or heard from her since.