brittani or knew somebody in the family. or there was something there was more of a connection to there. the brutal nature of the attack, did that tell you anything? i mean, this person seemed like they were full of rage. it does. we started trying to figure out who was brittani hanging around with? who might be a suspect cause it really at this point, we had no suspect at all so everybody is. morales believed the attack had just started when brittani s mom arrived. i don t think he was anticipating diane showing up. the pattern of blood at the scene indicated the attacker actually chased diane when she fled the house, but stopped for some reason. maybe, morales thought, when diane started screaming. and he panicked. so instead of going out a sliding glass door whether it was locked or unlocked, he jumps out of a dining room window, i mean, not through the screen, he jumps through the glass to get out. inside the house, morales found a room full of evidence. so on
individual off in the future is the fact that the statute of limitations ran. for help, morales turned to cold case prosecutor david waymire. even if the defendant was ultimately identified through dna, even if he admitted the crimes, the statute of limitations, once it hits, it s an absolute bar to prosecution. but waymire had an idea as to how they could get around that hard deadline. indict the dna profile as a john doe. a creative legal maneuver, but one that had never been tested in state court. although we felt like we were on solid ground to do it, we didn t know for sure that it would be upheld by the new mexico courts. with no other options, waymire went ahead with the unusual indictment. a good thing because the investigation was at a standstill. morales was afraid the only way he d catch brittani s attacker, was if he struck again. i cannot believe somebody that would commit a crime of this nature would not mess up
the police were trying to find out who did it. albuquerque police detective jason morales was the lead investigator. you ve seen a lot of murders in your career. how how brutal was this attack in this house? it was very brutal. morales said brittani had been hit repeatedly with a shovel, so hard it crushed the left part of her skull. when i got here, the crime van was already parked out front. they had been here for a little while. they were waiting on the condition of the victim, brittani, to see if she was going to survive or if she s gonna die. morales said the fact brittani s purse and sunglasses were found right in the entryway led him to believe the attacker came up behind her as she entered the house. did you get the sense that maybe this was a burglary in progress and brittani just happened to come home? or do you did you feel like the perpetrator was someone that brittani knew? this just seemed so personal. it seemed, to me at the time, that we re looking at
attack, did that tell you anything? i mean, this person seemed like they were full of rage. it does. we started trying to figure out who was brittani hanging around with? who might be a suspect cause it really at this point, we had no suspect at all so everybody is. morales believed the attack had just started when brittani s mom arrived. i don t think he was anticipating diane showing up. the pattern of blood at the scene indicated the attacker actually chased diane when she fled the house, but stopped for some reason. maybe, morales thought, when diane started screaming. and he panicked. so instead of going out a sliding glass door whether it was locked or unlocked, he jumps out of a dining room window, i mean, not through the screen, he jumps through the glass to get out. inside the house, morales found a room full of evidence. so once we were able to go inside, you could see it was pretty violent. there was blood on the floor. a shovel. there was duct tape. and, t
brittani marcell case was inside-out. police had the suspect s dna, but not his name. fingerprints, but too smeared to read. and two eyewitnesses, who couldn t identify the attacker. you re not only the victim in this, you re the the key witness. i mean, you know who did this to you. you may not know his name. but you you saw him. uh-huh. it s like that s that s that s the kinda, the scary part. it s almost like a nightmare. ironically, for investigators, the fact that brittani didn t die posed a problem. there s no statute of limitations for murder. but attempted murder is a different story, and two years into the case, morales worried he was running out of time. i wouldn t want something