Killers: Caught on Camera (2023-…): Season 1, Episode 3 - Gretchen and Kerry - full transcript

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It sounds like something bad
is happening to her.

-I heard her scream, no, stop it.
-I heard some gun shots.

Drop it, whatever it is, drop it.

It is not true that I killed my wife.

We know what happened because
the video tells us what happened.

The camera doesn't lie.

This time
on Killers Caught on Camera.

In West Virginia,
a schoolgirl is killed.

Mind if we take a look
in her bedroom?

-But hidden from view.
-No one realized she was missing.

And in the UK,
during a minor traffic stop,



a woman is found
with two heavy suitcases...

-Can I just explain?
-...full of body parts.

What the...

In the US, Berkeley County,
West Virginia.

Home to 15-year-old
Riley Crossman

who lived with her mother, Chantel,

two younger brothers and her
mom's boyfriend, Andy McCauley.

Riley was dating her classmate,
Hayden Lacey.

Jasmine Cooley was her best friend.

We became friends in middle school,

and it was very quick
how close we became.

We would sit out here
for hours on end and just talk.

We would talk about boys, we would
talk about our friends, our lives,

especially like school and stuff,
and what was bothering us.



Our friendship reminded me
of sisterhood more than anything.

And I feel like she was the sister
my age that I never got.

She'd stay here for days on end.

She would stay so long that my mom
would give her chores to do.

She was such a good dancer
and she showed that on stage.

My dear Jasmine
Happy birthday

She just danced her heart out,
or sang her heart out.

And she was just so good
at what she did.

But on May 7th, 2019
everything changed.

I got a phone call, just some
preliminary information

about a missing 15-year-old,
Riley Crossman.

It's not abnormal for a teenager
to be missing a couple of hours.

Chantel was really struggling
to make ends meet.

She worked two jobs at the time.

She would finish one shift
and then have a short break

and then start another job,
so she worked pretty long hours.

It was the end of another busy day
for Chantel.

Chantel had worked a long shift
and was feeling unwell.

Chantel comes home.

She said she walked in, that she saw
Andy McCauley sitting in a chair.

She went upstairs.
She saw Riley's door shut.

She wasn't going to disturb her.

Chantel went to bed.

But the one thing that stood out
that following morning,

is Riley almost always
would walk into her bedroom, say,

"Hey Mom, have a good day,
I love you,"

and then leave for school.

She doesn't remember Riley
saying that.

Riley normally walked to school
in the morning

before Chantel dropped
the boys off in the car.

Chantel dropped them off,
and she went about her day.

It wasn't until around
the evening hours

that she started to notice
that something was wrong.

Riley hadn't been in touch
with her mother all day.

Riley was glued to that cell phone,

and a lot of the communication
with her mom

was through that cell phone
because Mom was always at work.

It wasn't until that evening
that she got the call from school

that said she wasn't present
for school that day.

No one realized she was missing.

She immediately starts looking
around, calling Riley's friends.

I came home from school,

Mom was on the phone
with Riley's grandmother.

She asked me if I'd talked to Riley
today, I said, no, I don't think so.

So I tried to text her,
and it didn't go through.

I went on Snapchat to see if she
posted anything, nothing was there.

Chantel also tried calling Riley.

It immediately went to a voicemail.

The police got involved.

They kind of took it
as a runaway complaint.

Riley's father lived nearby.
He didn't believe she'd run away.

He, in his heart thought there
was something more to this.

So Captain Stapleton
at the Sheriff's Department

drove back out to the location.

The police headed out
to Riley's home.

They met with Riley's mother
Chantel and her boyfriend Andy.

Mind if we take a look
in her bedroom?

Go up the steps.

-This is hers straight back?
-Yes, Sir.

So, this is a photo
of Riley's bedroom.

And at first it was
this messy bedroom.

But the more they looked at it,
it isn't matching up.

This is her bookbag she wore
but the kids went through everything.

Her bookbag is there.
Her eyeglasses were there.

-Are these the glasses she wears?
-Yes.

-She uses them all the time?
-Yes.

All the things if you're a runaway,
a teenager would take with them.

The cell phone was missing, but her
purse was there, money was there.

Money.

School ID?

As they begin to look around
this room more,

there's a pile of clothes everywhere,
you start to notice blood.

Blood was on her sheet.

The blood was also on the comforter.

This is the only mirror like this
so I came in yesterday morning

and I don't remember that there.

According to Chantel,

Riley's room looked different
to how she last saw it.

I feel like I'd have noticed
her bookbag being here

and especially her glasses,
this is not exactly the way it was

I've been in here looking for a note
or anything like that.

There was no note.

The blood samples
were sent off for DNA profiling.

A missing child's investigation
was launched.

They checked her school,
the neighborhood

and community centers.

Dogs were brought in
to track Riley's scent.

We also called K9 out
to check the area

because where she lived at was
walking distance to her school.

We didn't find anything.

So they reached out
to the cell phone provider

and they were unable to give a ping,
because the phone was turned off.

And Mom was like Riley
always had her phone charged.

It was always plugged in.
She never let it go silent.

Nobody knew what happened
to Riley,

but Riley went missing
so everybody just lost it.

She wasn't the type to go missing,

so whenever anybody would say, like
do you think she would run off?

I'm like, no.

There was so many
law enforcement officers.

Got a couple of minutes
to help us search?

They were just everywhere
at that point

and any evidence anybody had,

the last text messages, anything
anybody had they were on top of.

They wanted to know who was
the last to speak to her,

who last had conversations with her.

Police started to question
the family.

Everything that Chantel said,
all of her statements matched up.

Her younger brothers went to school.

What happened that day?
Their statements matched up.

Then it was this discussion
with Andy.

When's the last time you saw her?

-Like 9:00, maybe 10:00ish.
-At night?

-Yeah.
-And what context was that?

Here in the house. She went to bed
by... I don't know what time,

but all the kids were in their rooms
by 9, 9:30.

-See her leave in the morning?
-No.

I got up at 4 o'clock in the morning,
about 5, to go to work.

Detectives tried to piece together
events.

On the Wednesday morning
Andy's colleague, Johnnie Walter,

picked him as usual.

Normally when they picked up Andy
at home in the early morning hours,

someone would have to go
and bang on the door.

Come on, we've got to go to work.

I call him, see if he's up.

You remember if you called him
or he called you?

Wednesday morning,
I wanna say he called.

This particular morning,
Andy couldn't wait to go to work.

Andy confirmed to police
that he got to work on time

and stayed there all day.

-Were you at work all day?
-Yeah.

But Chantel said Andy
was missing from work.

An absence confirmed
by his colleague.

-And he gets back at roughly...?
-It was about 2:45.

-So he was gone a while then?
-4, almost 5 hours I think.

Detectives wanted to know
where Andy went for 5 hours

the day Riley went missing
and called him back in.

-You know I just talked to Johnnie?
-Okay.

Would you be surprised that he told
me something completely different?

Well, maybe.

Do you not remember leaving
and going to Red Hill?

Oh yeah, oh, I'm sorry we did,
I'm sorry, we did, you're right.

You're right, we did go
and did a shelf.

How long were you there at Red Hill?

The rest of day.
I think the rest of day.

Were you at that house
the entire time fixing the shelves?

-No.
-Okay, where were you at?

I was at the other house.
I got some...

-I went and got some more drugs.
-Okay.

There's many reasons why people
might confess to a lesser crime.

One that's less serious than
the one you're being accused of.

One of the main reasons is to divert
the attention of the police

and to basically say,
hey, look over here.

So it's effectively an alibi.

Or I am trying to muddle up
the investigation

and say, yes, you caught me,
but for this other thing,

not for the main thing
you're actually interested in.

So, it's a distraction technique
most of the time.

Was there enough to still do
another line each?

-A couple of lines each?
-Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

-So you didn't need any more coke?
-No.

He left to go back to get drugs,
which doesn't make sense,

because Johnnie Walter
is already telling us

there was enough cocaine left
to do a couple more lines.

Okay, how long were you gone
roughly?

About an hour maybe,
hour and a half.

We went from this story
to this story

now we're gonna get a third story.

This is when you really need
to think what you're telling me.

Because you're not being honest.

A changing story or changing some
of the details of a story

is by no means itself an indicator
that someone's guilty.

But, if those changes, those
fluctuations in the story are huge,

then we should pay attention
and say, hey, something's wrong,

and either all or part of this
is a lie.

With guilty people,
there's another problem,

which is that they often think
that they can outsmart the police,

they can come up with a story
that is plausible,

that is an alternative to what
the police are presenting them.

Another problem was that Andy said
he left his cell phone at home00

when he went to work.

Police were unable to track his
movements through phone data

and had to change tack.

We were lost. He fell off the grid,

we knew that he came back to work

roughly 4 and a half hours
from the time that he left,

he was unaccounted for.

So he left this neighborhood,
got in his truck

and basically tore out of there.

Detectives turned to CCTV footage
for answers.

The task force had already been
going up and down Route 9,

and they canvassed every business
and every home.

We found cameras
from various businesses.

A camera attached
to Hedgesville School

gave them their first breakthrough.

These are the cameras you can see
up on the right corner

and in the left corner here that
captured Andy leaving his worksite.

That was our starting point.

We knew direction of travel,
and that he was on Route 9,

and that was our tracking point
at that point in time.

One of the key factors that we hit
him with that he could not deny

was these video cameras,
these surveillance photographs.

More crucial evidence emerged
from Hayden, Riley's boyfriend,

who revealed Riley's final messages.

Hayden goes to sleep, we believe,
around 10:30 on May 7th.

And then you have the series of text
messages that come forward.

Andy's in her bedroom.
She's reaching out to Hayden.

Andy's in my room. I'm scared, babe.

Hayden fell asleep

and didn't see her messages
until the following day.

Detectives put the evidence
to Andy.

What if I told you her last texts
to her boyfriend

were saying "don't talk" because
she still has the FaceTime on?

"Andy's in here, I'm afraid".

That's what it said?

-What if I told you that?
-I would say that's crazy.

The DNA profiling of the blood
samples from Riley's bedroom

offered up evidence
of extreme violence.

The DNA that came back
matched Riley's DNA.

The blood was also mixed with saliva.

The crime team also found
two additional spots on the sheet.

Again, came back for Riley's blood
and the saliva was mixed.

We believe,
Riley's face forced into the pillow.

It almost looks like that
that's where her nostrils were.

That's where her mouth is.

There's a separation
in between the blood.

Riley's last text and the results
were a major development.

Riley was still nowhere to be found

and police needed to find out
exactly what Andy was doing

the day Riley went missing.

Cameras on the Bank of
Charles Town provided another clue.

We started tracking westward
on Route 9

and we came to the Bank
of Charles Town here

and we were able to capture video
of the same green truck

going in that direction.

So, this was another camera
that put us in the right direction.

And there was a camera
right on the corner here.

Very close to the roadway,
and it gave us great footage.

Here you can see
the green Dodge Ram

with the ladder rack on the back
heading towards Berkeley Springs.

Glimpse by glimpse, frame by frame
the cameras tracked Andy's truck.

This is the next camera
that was successful

that we found Andy McCauley on
was at Murphy's gas station,

which is literally within a mile
and a half maybe,

from the Bank of Charles Town.

About 4 mins later he's picked up
again, same Dodge Ram truck,

at the Murphy's Shell gas station
that's in Hedgesville.

Andy was also caught on camera
rapidly paying for fuel

at the Roc's petrol station.

So the significance of the camera was
we had the same truck on Route 9.

We had the high school,
the Bank of Charles Town

and then this camera saw him
going towards Berkeley Springs.

But Andy went off grid again.

Until he was spotted by his former
girlfriend, Denise Deaver.

We had an eyewitness that put his
truck here, at a specified timeframe,

that told us the truck
was actually backed up.

Police now believed
Andy killed Riley.

And he hid her body in her bedroom
until everyone left.

Then went back
and moved Riley's body.

This is where the residence was.

It was bulldozed and demolished
I believe in 2021.

It's hard to understand it,
to get a feel to it

but there used to be just a gravel
driveway right here

and he actually backed his truck.

Instead of pulling in, he backed
the bed of his truck to the backdoor.

Police had to find evidence that
Riley's body was in Andy's truck.

They brought in a specialist team
with a cadaver dog

trained to respond to the scent
of decomposing human bodies.

When this truck is impounded,
that was one of the places

where Rock was brought in
to do his investigation.

When we go in and we search things,
they don't tell me anything

because they don't want it tainting
how you worked your dog.

So in the Riley Crossman case,
when we search the vehicle,

as we are going around, we got
to that back end of that vehicle

and he, I saw that change
in behavior with my dog.

I ask if we can drop the tailgate
on the truck.

So we do and he immediately went in

and as we went in he kind of
went up on the head rack area

and along the wheel well
and up underneath the toolbox area,

come back along the driver's side
wheel well.

And at that point he gave me
an indication.

As soon as we went up in there,

I knew he was in scent
because of the way he was acting.

So we knew that there was an odor
of decomp.

And odor of decomp
can come from anything.

Brandy was good at explaining
that to us.

So we knew that this
was a construction vehicle.

You're on job sites,
you're cutting drywall,

you're working with tools.

There could be an easy explanation
why this dog, why Rock,

indicated the presence of decomp
in the back of the vehicle.

They knew a dead body had been
in Andy's truck,

but they still didn't know
where he went

on the day Riley went missing.

Until a chance encounter
on the edge of town

revealed the unexpected evidence.

I believe one of the officers
traveled past that,

it was just a little store in
the secluded area of Berkeley County.

An officer frequents that store
and he just happened to go there.

He asks, hey, you know,
can I check your video?

He checked it
and we saw the truck down there,

so that was a complete jackpot
if you want to say.

And I think finding that video
at Hernandez's

was probably the turning point
in the investigation.

Then one final camera provided
a geographical focus.

There's actually a residential home
that gave us our last video footage

of Andy McCauley driving that green
Dodge truck up the mountain.

What was key was it gave us
a general sense of timeframe,

because not only did it capture him
traveling as we are up the mountain,

it got him coming back down.

It was right around a 20 minute
time frame,

maybe a couple of minutes
under that.

So we knew that he had traveled up
that mountain

and turned around
and came right back.

Police got a team together
and headed up the mountain.

The only reason
you come up here is

one, you live in this area,
you're trying to get home,

or you are trying to circumvent
the other areas of traffic

and you are going to go to the
Back Creek area, the fishing portion.

So, there's absolutely no reason
that somebody would come here.

On May 16th, eight days
after Riley was reported missing,

investigators started to search
the area.

Also on the scene was Brandy
with her cadaver dog, Rock.

I have to look after my dog,
he is my asset,

and I can't put him
in any kind of danger.

I got Rock out the vehicle,

Rock actually wanted to go
down the hill

and I pulled him back up
and we went back up the other way.

And as that officer
was driving down the hill,

he noticed there were a lot of birds
in one location.

And he smelled something
that he had smelled before.

And he got out
and he saw this body over the hill.

Part of our training
is looking out for evidence,

especially in cases like this.

And so as we walked up
on the side of the cliff

where her body
had been dumped off of,

I saw a bunch of these screws
that were there.

I mentioned to the forensics,

I think I saw these screws yesterday
in the back of that vehicle.

They were crucial screws,
very unique, very identifiable

and they were found right here
lying essentially next to her.

That was another link
to everything with him.

Upon finding that body,
the first thing we did

was put eyes on Andy McCauley,

he was working at that job site
up by Hedgesville high school.

Eight days after Riley
was reported missing,

her mother's boyfriend,
Andy McCauley, was arrested.

Our theory in the case was, is that
when Andy went into that room,

he was intending to do something,

and I don't have any direct
evidence of this,

but I believe he wanted
to sexually assault her.

And I think Riley
was trying to get help.

And the only thing she could possibly
do is scream for her mother

and he wasn't going to allow it.

Andy couldn't escape the evidence
caught by the cameras.

Without the videos
and without the footage,

it would have made this case
very difficult to prosecute.

Sure it helps to have a camera
catching the crime,

but we had probably the second best
evidence with the cameras

catching every other thing
involving Andy's movements

and statements
that weren't matching up.

The jury was able to draw
a reasonable conclusion,

and were convinced beyond
a reasonable doubt

he committed the crimes.

There is no explanation for anyone
else other than Andy McCauley.

The cameras showed every one of
those omissions and then the lies.

It was critical for those cameras
to paint a picture for the jury.

On 4th November, 2021,

Andy McCauley was convicted
of 1st degree murder

and child abuse resulting in death.

He was sentenced to life in prison
without the possibility of parole.

This candle is the candle I got
from her vigil,

the day they announced
that her body was found.

And then the day they announced
that Andy was guilty,

they did these personalized necklaces
and it's got her name on them.

When he was guilty,
we did a big balloon releasing.

There is no reason that she shouldn't
have graduated high school.

There is no reason she shouldn't
have had her 18th birthday,

but I feel like I will do everything
in my power to outlive that for her

and get those experiences,
because she deserved them.

Everything I do is for Riley
at this point.

In the UK, in 2020, there were
over five million CCTV cameras.

The Covid pandemic
led to a sharp rise

in home surveillance
and doorbell cameras.

And this helped catch more criminals
on camera.

CCTV sources
and video evidence in general

has now become crucial
in solving crime.

Without multiple camera sources,
a lot of cases would be abandoned.

There would be simply not
enough evidence to progress them.

And now in the UK you're
increasingly likely to be filmed

even outside the main cities.

There is a significant increase in
the use of cameras in rural areas

because that's where there's
a significant increase in crime.

The Forest of Dean,
Gloucestershire, England.

On the 12th May, 2020,
the UK was in lockdown.

Everyone was grounded,
confined to their home.

Coronavirus restrictions meant all
but essential travel was forbidden.

Despite the emergency laws
an unfamiliar vehicle is spotted

driving up and down a remote road
near the Welsh border.

This is a home security camera
that we can see.

A concerned citizen is actually
asking the police to investigate

why this car is moving, and
the police goes there to investigate.

Dr. Vasileios Karagiannopoulos
is a digital forensics expert

in the School of Criminology
and Criminal Justice

at the University of Portsmouth.

The home surveillance camera
actually allows the police

to identify the license plate.

And when they check,

the car is registered at an address
in Wolverhampton.

This is more than 80 miles away
from the location

where this footage is received from.

So, the police have a very good
reason to investigate

why this car is moving so far away
from its registered address.

Police officers pulled the car over

and spoke to the male driver
of the vehicle.

He said he was waiting for a friend.

Police reminded him
of regulations

and sent him on his way.

But by 10 o'clock that night the
same vehicle was spotted again,

lurking near the woodland.

The police knew something
wasn't right.

They went back to check out
the vehicle.

A woman had just been dropped off
by the side of the road,

with two suitcases,
in the middle of the night.

The police visit the scene
where the car was spotted

and they actually find a woman

in the area with some pieces
of luggage close to the car.

Okay, can I just explain?

As I've said before...

-Like, I don't... I've had...
-Step away please.

-I've had issues before...
-Step away please.

Just stand there.

The police officers enquire
about what's in the luggage

and the suspect is
trying to prevent them

from opening the luggage.

You'll get arrested
for obstructing police.

-I don't want to stop you guys.
-You are stopping us.

Emi Polito is a Forensic Video
and Audio Analyst,

working with police forces
all over the UK.

So on this recording,
we're actually seeing the suitcase.

We don't know what's inside yet.

What the...

A very grim discovery is made
at the scene

where they find out that the suitcase
contains the remains of a body.

The woman found with the suitcases
was 28-year-old Gareeca Gordon.

The suspect Gareeca Gordon
is caught red handed

with a suitcase containing
a dismembered body.

But in order to convict her,

the police need to find a lot more
evidence to start building the case

and making sure the case
is as robust as it can be.

Gareeca was arrested
and charged with murder.

The driver was held
for assisting an offender.

A chance traffic stop turned
into a major investigation.

The Police had to start from scratch

to find out
how Gareeca was involved

and the identity of the body
in the suitcases.

Lozells, Birmingham.

With a population of 12,000,

an inner-city area
that has high rates of violence,

drugs, and weapon possession.

Gareeca Gordon was living
at a Hostel.

She came to England from Jamaica
aged 7.

A troubled life ensued,
she was sexually abused

and had to leave the family home
after coming out as gay.

After Gareeca's arrest
forensic analysis of her phone

revealed she made a call
to a helpline.

Part of the transcript revealed
issues with another woman.

Phoenix Netts was also living
in the same hostel.

A 28-year-old woman who dreamt
of becoming a paramedic.

As a child she was a keen rider
and close to her family.

Phoenix was desperate
to move back to London,

but lockdown stalled the move.

On the 7th April, Phoenix sent
a worrying text to a friend.

There's a girl who keeps
asking me to be sexual.

I think I'm going to move back
to London. It's scaring me.

There's a clear indication that
she was concerned about this girl.

Coral Dando served on the frontline

as an officer in the Metropolitan
Police in London,

she is now a Professor
of Forensic Psychology.

They may have had a friendship,
a female friendship.

And Gareeca wanted
to take that further.

It would appear, and it seems
as if Phoenix didn't want that.

The information suggests that
she was very anxious, very upset

about Gareeca's sexual advances
towards her.

Of course,
that is a form of sexual violence.

And it can happen
in same sex relationships,

in the same as it can
do in any other relationship.

Unwanted sexual attention can have
a significant effect psychologically,

emotionally, can trigger anxiety.

And it seems as if Phoenix
was a vulnerable young woman.

And I think it triggered
a vulnerability response,

an anxiety response in a way
exactly as we would predict.

Vulnerable people are more likely
to be perpetrators and victims.

Both the victim and the perpetrator
were vulnerable.

So these weren't people who came
from really stable environments

with lots of resources.

These are people who had,
in different ways, needs

and these needs weren't being met.

Hostels are also an in-between space

where you're not meant to stay
forever,

you're meant to be there
as emergency housing

or for a temporary amount of time.

They can have a very transitional
feel in that people are in and out

and you're encountering strangers

and sleeping in very close proximity
to strangers.

In no other context would you be
doing that in the same way.

And so, it can open up new
and different dynamics,

which can also lead to violence
or difficult situations.

It's not that hostels
are inherently dangerous,

There are a lot of people with
existing vulnerabilities in them.

With Gareeca in custody,
digital forensic teams

checked the footage obtained
from outside the hostel.

So we have here
from the suspect's home,

and it's the job of the police
to go back days, weeks, even months

to try to find valuable evidence
as to what has happened.

On the 11th April,
Phoenix was captured on CCTV.

But in the early hours
of the 16th April,

another woman living in the hostel

heard noises of drilling and banging
and someone shouting for help.

At around 5.30 am, a search
was made on Phoenix's phone.

Mobile phones and smart phones
are important to an investigation,

not just because of call records,
of text messages.

In this case, the police identified
a number of searches conducted

that were of interest
to the investigation.

One of the searches
was how to fix a punctured lung.

One was internal bleeding. Can
one recover from getting stabbed?

Over the next few days
CCTV from outside the hostel

captured a series
of unusual activities.

The police are trying to get a better
picture of what's happened.

In fact, the CCTV reveals
a number of suspicious activities

carried out by the suspect.

A cover up appeared
to be underway.

The suspect is found at the store
buying cleaning products.

On the 20th April,

a van arrived to collect carpet,
a bed and some black bags.

The suspect can be seen
carrying bin bags,

even though the footage is at night
and it's a bad quality.

When the search history was cross
referenced with CCTV footage

and card purchases, a gruesome
picture began to emerge.

We also know that the perpetrator
was looking for a circular saw.

We can actually see from footage
a person delivering a big box

to the suspect's address

that could actually be including
the circular saw she purchased.

The pathologist's report confirmed

the body parts found
in the suitcases

were dismembered
with a circular saw.

And police determine
through DNA analysis

that the dismembered corpse
was Phoenix Netts.

If you picture dismembering
someone,

the intense, emotional, visceral,
sort of gut reaction to that is

that is the worst thing
I can possibly think of doing.

And so, we assume that someone
who has gone through

with dismembering a body

must also have felt that way
as they were butchering up the body.

But in reality, what we know,

is that people often see dead bodies
no longer as human beings,

correctly, because they are dead,

but they see them as a problem
to be solved.

They see them as evidence.

And so that evidence
needs to be gotten rid of somehow.

Closer inspection, detectives felt

the messages
from Phoenix's phone

after the 16th April
didn't add up.

Another interesting piece of evidence
is this message saying,

feel free to reach me by email

because obviously e-mail
is far more impersonal.

You don't have to speak to anyone,

and anyone can send an email
pretending to be Phoenix.

That's when they realize Phoenix
is not using her phone anymore

and someone else has her phone.

It's not unknown
to use the victim's phone

to send out text messages,

to send out information,
to deceive the outside world,

to suggest that that person
is still alive.

And that's clearly
what's happened here.

In a lot of the cases
I've seen recently,

people have at some point pretended
to text on behalf of somebody else

or they've sent an email
lying about their whereabouts

or the victim's.

And it's usually to buy
themselves more time

and to fake that this person
is alive for some period of time.

As well as impersonating Phoenix
in text messages.

A voice altering app was used
to send voice notes

to Phoenix's friends and family.

Of course, these apps can be used
in various different ways,

and we can see here they can be
used for criminal purposes as well.

Nowadays, you don't need to be a
tech genius to create a deepfake.

Plenty of apps can be downloaded
to your phone or your laptop.

You can just capture somebody's
voice using a machine

and I can get them to say
things they never said.

Colin Robinson is an
expert in audio forensics

at Liverpool John Moores University.

He has examined audio evidence

from some of the most
high profile cases.

A deepfake is a computerized
representation

of a person's voice or their face.

All our voices have
very special nuances.

The thing is, if you distill it
down to numbers,

which is what a computer does,

you can manipulate
those numbers

and then put in those nuances
that weren't there before.

When we use a phone,

our expectations of the quality
is quite low.

We know it's not quite the voice
that we're hearing.

It's a representation of the voice
because the microphone and phone.

This is where the criminal
can take advantage.

The police have to be on their toes
to be sure they know.

When audio evidence
appears suspicious,

Colin has to look for clues to show
the audio has been manipulated.

Now to the untrained eye,
this may look normal,

but to the trained eye
they will notice that this line here,

this line here, indicates an edit.

And what that means is a piece
of audio has been taken out

and it's been cut together
and spliced together.

When we analyze audio files,
these are just some of the things

that we look for to see whether
the audio has been manipulated.

All the fake audio and text messages
sent from Phoenix's phone

meant her disappearance
went undetected.

In the coming days,
there is a lot of footage collected

relating to the suspect.

Leaving her house, cycling about,
taking the train.

The whole pattern of her movements
and how she's moving around the city

and the area in general
is looking very chaotic.

Meticulous analysis
of Gareeca's phone records

and thousands of hours
of footage showed regular trips

to the Forest of Dean
70 miles from Birmingham,

despite early lockdown restrictions.

Just 11 days after the night
of the murder on April 16th,

CCTV revealed another mistake.

What is really telling is her visit
to a police station.

She goes in, she's asking for
a charger for a particular phone,

but then hands in
another brand of phone.

The police officer here
is actually telling the suspect,

that she's given the wrong brand of
phone for the charger she asked.

She takes out a different phone

and hands it in to get charged
and takes the other phone.

She has two mobile phones.

Strong evidence that Gareeca
had Phoenix's phone all along.

And the most crucial
piece of evidence

was also captured on CCTV.

We also have footage in the daylight
of the suspect carrying suitcases.

But at this stage it became clear
dismemberment wasn't enough

to destroy the evidence
of the crime.

Gareeca was then caught
on camera

filling a jerry can with petrol
in Gloucestershire.

We have seen
from her internet searches

that she's actually looking of ways
to dispose of the body.

Now we have evidence
of her getting petrol

in order to achieve that.

That night Gareeca was found

with two suitcases containing
charred body parts.

You're going to get arrested
for obstructing police.

-I don't want to stop you guys.
-You are stopping us!

It seems very much
by the truncated, short,

sharp responses that she gives
the police officer's questions

that she hadn't expected to have
to give an account.

-Don't... I've had...
-Step away please.

-I've had issues before.
-Step away please.

Yeah, just stand there.

She'll be paddling
really hard cognitively

to try and discourage
that police officer

from accessing,
opening the suitcase,

which she clearly knows
have got body parts in them.

And once that's been accessed,
the game is over.

What the...

The body worn cameras, footage,
the home surveillance cameras,

the text messages,
the Internet history.

We have a puzzle
of information

that the investigators
can put together

and create a very thorough
and strong case

to convict the suspect.

The driver of the vehicle
was released without charge.

But Gordon was comprehensively
"caught on camera".

She pleaded guilty
to Phoenix's murder

at Bristol Crown Court
on the 21st of April 2021.

She was given a life sentence
with a minimum term of 23 years.

She planned this murder meticulously,
it would seem.

And certainly,
after the murder was committed

where it was carried out was cleaned,
the body was dismembered.

She'd clearly thought about how
she was going to dispose of it.

In England and Wales
in the year ending 2020,

fewer than 7 percent of the homicides
were perpetrated by women.

The vast majority of women who kill,
kill an abusive partner.

So they're either killing
as a form of self-defense

or they're killing someone who,
after many years of abuse,

they've taken revenge on.

It's very rare for women
to kill other women.

It's also very rare for women
to kill someone

who they don't know intimately.

Remote rural home surveillance
was crucial.

If police officers
hadn't been alerted

to a suspicious car
driving during lockdown,

they wouldn't have come
across Gareeca

near isolated woodland
with the suitcases

and Phoenix's murder
may never have been solved.

Translated by: Blue Lightning
Iyuno