look at an old lead. he just said it s a match a person no one would hav ever suspected of murder we were going to end this was suddenly suspect number one. perfect murder. almost hello welcome to dateline . she was a new bride marrie just three months, then she wa found murdered what happened to her remained mystery for decades partly because police told us the thief must have killed her during a break-in gone bad they discovered it wasn t murder, but a suspect whos trail right to their own front door here is josh mankiewicz with the smoking gun. february 1st, 2009. the detective arrived before dawn at the los angeles police department s van nuys station. i was tired i was tired. he had hosted a super bow party the night before and the beer had flowed freely that seemed to be a good da to have a cup of coffee an caught up on my reading. a couple of aspirin maybe he reached for a file sitting on his desk for months the file of sherri rasmu
beyond just being sloppy, o the fact they didn t close the case and they didn t listen to the family, those two things are not evidence of a cover-up it wasn t that they didn close the case. they didn t do anything to create a case. he says that in 1986, the detectives were protecting stephanie lazarus. they actively covered up th identity of the person who committed this crime the rasmussen s lawsuit alleging a cover-up wa dismissed in 2011. charlie bec was then the lapd chief and he spoke with us about the case i can accept somebody tha is unable to solve a crime tha is solvable. i cannot accept somebody that covers up a crim or covers up an individual involved in a crime and i have no absolutely no indication that is what happened here there is intoing to suggest they deliberately looked awa from stephanie or not a road they didn t want to go down? i think it was a lack o ability, not an act to exclude stephanie. in february of 2012, nearly 26 years to the day s
started routinely routinel enough for lapd detectiv stephanie lazarus. she took th train to union station i downtown l.a. reporting for he normal shift that morning at police headquarters in parke center. after arriving stephanie was told to meet wit two detectives. the man sh didn t know from lapd s elit robbery homicide division, t help them interrogate a suspec involving some stolen art work which was stephanie s beat as detective. so lazarus went dow to a secured area in the basement to meet with her tw colleagues in a small intervie room. because it s part of the jail, all cops who enter her are required to give up thei guns. unarmed and unsuspecting lazarus didn t realize she was being recorded by an undercove camera i don t know if you know my partner.
she met and dated john ruetten long before he and sherri go married. after graduating in 1982, lazarus surprised he family by joining the lapd this when only a handful o women entered the force. i don t think i knew that she was applying she seemed to be someon above suspicion. stephanie ilene lazarus had grown up i southern, california, a tomboy of sorts and loved sports. she attended u.c.l.a. where sh played basketball. it wa during her college days that she met and dated john ruetten long before he and sherri go married. after graduating in 1982, lazarus surprised he family by joining the lapd this when only a handful o women entered the force. i don t think i knew that she was applying stephanie s brother, steven i was very proud of steph. thought it was a cool thing. stephanie lazarus quickly rose through the ranks of lapd from patrol officer to detective. she was popular friendly, and well-regarded. her assignments also include project d. a. r. e., a dru
for the lapd? it was a bittersweet day. a 23-year-old cold case they believed ha finally been cracked, but th prime suspect worked right beside them. for the rasmussen family, stephanie s arrest was a vindication, but it also brought back their memory of the original lapd. i think she was a polic officer, so they figured the would cover this one up. the family hired a prominen l.a. attorney john taylor, who filed a lawsuit agains detective lazarus and also the lapd, claiming the departmen deliberately ignored clues tha pointed to a fellow officer. the earlier missteps of lap weren t missteps. they wer intentional conduct, intentional ignoring o evidence, and intentiona dereliction of duties.