and cared for them. she definitely was the mom. reporter: except on weekends when the school chums remember sneaking around the base to get a glimpse of the true stars among the young men there. no surprise it was the macho fighter pilots. the man in the uniform. yes, definitely, the jumper suit. very hot. kathy and i would always joke and say, do you think you are going to marry a pilot? and of course she ended up marrying one. reporter: it wasn t a direct route. first kathy struck up a serious relationship with a pilot who in the end just couldn t seem to commit. and, so, just like rachel, years later in napa, california, kathy was a young woman on the rebound when she met fighter pilot todd. where the first one didn t work out or maybe it didn t work to the way she wanted it to,
maybe she felt like this is what she needed to do and todd came into the picture. having that pilot probably maybe is what caused her to marry todd. patterns. that time, too, todd was ready to commit. right away. reporter: young did they date before they got married? i wouldn t say it was a very long time at all. reporter: okay. she appeared to be happy. she had married her pilot, so i thought her fairy tale was coming true. reporter: the air force sent todd to japan soon after the wedding. it was an exhilarating time for kathy. kathy was excited to move to japan, and she was going to be an english teacher. reporter: later after todd left the air force, katey s friends how she was there for him. she was very nurturing in the fact that she was supporting him in whatever different career he
was going to choose. reporter: it was a difficult time for todd. we did spend thanksgiving with them one year and todd had put on a lot of weight. i know that he wasn t working and he was depressed. reporter: but todd always had a knack for making money. he got into the booming wifi business. pretty soon they moved into a big lake side house in georgia with a boat and fancy cars and of course an airplane. kathy, always so nurturing, told her friends she was ready to take the next step. i remember kathy calling me and telling me that they were living in georgia and that she was excited about it and that she wanted to have children. i was excited for her because i could see her with little kids. reporter: but nine years into what looked like a happy marriage children had yet to arrive. and now we know, because of what was in that blue box they never would. time to find out what happened.
kathy. just never got over it. but then kathy was his mentor, his protector, perhaps his only true friend. they grew up on an air force base. kathy was outgoing, strikingly attractive and popular. they were school chums. they remember what a knock-out she was, but there was more to her than that. she could have her choice of young men. she was beautiful inside and out. it wasn t just her exterior beauty. she had a sweet, kind, caring personality that it was attractive to everybody. reporter: it was a small miracle, perhaps, that she turned out so well given what was demanded of her, said her friends. her mother left when they were young. her grandmother lived with her for a while but she was the caretaker of her siblings. kathy pretty much mothered them
so what happened to her? the prosecutor would have to find out. and that s when she set out to follow a trail that led to a man in georgia and jar rold johnson, a judge now. but back in 1999 a rookie detective. it really shocked me i was getting a case in california. had you forgotten all about that case? no, sir. i actually over the years, i have thought about that case many times. the case, an auto accident in the fall of 99, an accident that killed the first mrs. winkler, kathy. my father called me that night and told me that kathy was no longer with us. reporter: what was that like for you? it hurts. it still hurts. reporter: so many years later, charles still smarts from the loss of his big sister