Forensic Factor

On September 29, 1990, the body of twenty-two year old college student, Linda Yalem, is discovered off a bike path in a suburb of Buffalo, New York. Yalem has been raped and strangled with a garrote. DNA evidence recovered from her body allows police to link the crime to six other recent rapes in the Buffalo area. But other than DNA evidence police have little to go on.

In small-town Bartow, Florida four bodies are found slaughtered in a factory. It's the largest mass murder in county history. Each victim is somehow connected to the factory and the family business -- and each victim seems to have been executed by a professional assassin. When investigators finally zero in on a prime suspect, they are foiled by his picture-perfect alibi...

A series of bombings and bank robberies have left the usually serene city of Spokane, Washington reeling. Claiming responsibility for the reign of terror, is a deadly, almost invisible sect called the Phineas Priests who seem to strike at will. The phantom cell, driven by a perverted code of hate is considered be the most radical and dangerous in the entire white supremacist movement.

Glamorous Las Vegas, Nevada is famous for wealth, lady luck and second chances. But when homicide detectives discover the charred remains of a prominent business man, Sin City reveals a darker side. With a long list of suspects and millions of dollars on the line, investigators are suddenly thrust into a dangerous world of high stakes deception fueled by passion, greed and revenge.

A double homicide in Hudson, Wisconsin leaves a small town reeling and two young detectives with little to go on. The victims are upright citizens, shot execution style, with no apparent motive. In Agatha Christie-like fashion, a tantalizing array of suspects emerge but after two years, there are still no arrests.

A series of over sixty spectacular fires rips through California's San Joaquin valley, killing four people and devastating the landscape. An extensive investigation by the ATF, police and forensic scientists reveals a common pattern among all the blazes, and to their horror, authorities soon realize that a serial arsonist is on the loose.

Summer, 2001 and Southern Louisiana is held in the terrifying grip of a serial killer whose initial 'hot zone' is the Louisiana State University area of Baton Rouge. The number of victims is growing and all are attractive, successful young women -- women whose mainstream, "low risk" lifestyle should never put them on the radar of a killer. But this is the hardest kind of serial killer to catch.

One by one, prostitutes in Spokane, Washington are being hunted down and discarded in remote wooded areas by a vicious serial killer. On each victim's head, police find his macabre calling card - a plastic bag emblazoned with an ironic Smiley Face. Investigators soon realize they are dealing with the worst type of serial killer - an Average Joe with no criminal background.

On the outskirts of Hamilton, Ontario, a jogger makes a gruesome discovery - the partially mummified remains of a human body. Using state of the art forensics, police are able to identify the body as that of a suburban wife and mother of two. She has been brutally bludgeoned to death, but no missing person's report has ever been filed.

The world's top criminal investigators, forensic scientists and behavioral analysts go behind the scenes of some of their most challenging serial murder cases to reveal the cutting edge forensic science, technology, behavioral psychology and investigative techniques involved in tracking down a serial killer.

When the police in Farmington, New Mexico discover a broken window at a local head shop called The Eclectic, they expect to find evidence of a robbery. Instead they uncover a horrific crime scene, with two badly mutilated bodies. One year later, a battered body is found tossed into a canyon, the eyes and genitals gouged. Then the bloodied corpse of a naked woman is discovered on a remote road...

A self-appointed angel of death on a mission beyond the law. A sniper who targets abortion doctors and then disappears into the shadowy underground that supports and protects him. But when the sniper's mission moves to murder, a city is thrown into blind panic that spreads across the country and beyond.

A reign of terror that spans more than eighteen years. A serial rapist who stalks and preys on elderly women living in isolated Southern Ontario. With the victim count pushing ten, the attacker's thirst for violence suddenly escalates to murder. Who is this monster that continues to elude Colchester police? Only a revolution in forensic science can strike fear into the heart of this predator.