more than a thousand people attended cathy s funeral. pretty impressive. the kind of person cathy was. she touched a lot of people, and they remembered her. reporter: she left her mark. she did. reporter: cathy had hoped for a dozen red roses that february. instead her family remembered her with a headstone. your smile will shine forever. that wasn t the only promise cathy s mother made. i didn t know how long i d be i would have to wait. but i knew that we had to do everything that we could to get the answer. reporter: because? because she was my daughter. and someone had taken her away from me. someone had done something horrible to her and they someone needed to be accountable. reporter: no one could have imagined at the time just how long mary s quest for justice would take.
they became estranged. reporter: which made it difficult for tina, who was still married to sam s older brother, armando. police continued to work the case, but the fact was, they had no solid leads. they weren t even close to arresting anyone. but then two years after cathy torrez was murdered, an unexpected meeting put this investigation in the fast lane. coming up: a teenager with a familiar last name inspires a renud search for a killer. that is a weird convince coincidence. we don t believe in coincidences. and then a tip that catch one investigators attention. that had to make everybody sit up straight. it did. when the promise continues. 86 picture t did. when the promise continues. 86 picture and every time we move, things change. apartments become houses, cars become mini vans.
either way, larry thought sam knew more than he was telling. the guilty person knows a lot. cannot forget all that he knows. so when he s talking, all that information is in is in his brain, and it can slip out. reporter: another reason to think sam knew much more than he was saying? in his second interview after cathy s body was found, police spoke with sam for 90 minutes before he asked them a single question. and when he finally did so did you do you guys know how she was killed? uh, yeah, we do. reporter: larry noticed a telling statement. thought you were never going to ask. well, i didn t want cause i don t want memories to come back, you know? well, that s an interesting statement, i don t want memories to come back. what memories does he have that he doesn t want to remember? if he s innocent, he has memories of cathy, good times, what they did.
prosecutor matt murphy later reviewed the case. he noted blood on everything the killer must have touched the steering wheel, above the glove compartment, the driver s side armrest and, of course, the trunk release. but one noteworthy place where there was no blood? the driver s side seat lever. 4 11 cathy drove her car with the seat moved closest to the steering wheel. but when police found the car, the seat was racked all the way back. suggesting that somebody taller than cathy was operating the car. not only operating the car, but did that before the murder itself took place. because that was touched, and that seat was moved without any transfer of blood at all. so the seat was moved back before the killing started. reporter: and, if so, perhaps it was because cathy knew her killer and opened the door for him or her. investigators also found cathy s
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