Hey weirdos, before we unleash today's macabre mystery, we were wondering, have you ever heard of Wondery Plus?
It's like a secret passage to an ad-free lair with early access to episodes.
You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or in Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
You're listening to a Morbid Network podcast.
Listening on Audible helps your imagination soar.
Whether you listen to stories, motivation, expert advice, any genre you love, you can be inspired to imagine new worlds, new possibilities, and new ways of thinking.
Listening can lead to positive changes in your mood, your habits, and ultimately your overall well-being.
Audible has an incredible selection of over 1 million audiobooks, podcasts, and Audible Originals all in one easy app.
Find the genres you love and discover new ones.
Explore bestsellers like my sister's title, new releases, plus thousands of included audiobooks, podcasts, and originals that members can listen to all they want with more added all the time.
I have been listening to the Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club, which actually Elena recommended to me.
She did not listen to it, but she said, girl, this title sounds so you.
And let me tell you, it did. I've been listening to it while I walk, and I am absolutely loving it.
I love all the different narrators. I love Audible.
There's more to imagine when you listen.
Sign up for a free 30-day Audible trial, and your first audiobook is free.
Visit audible.com slash morbid. On November 13th, 2022, four University of Idaho students were murdered.
Today, finally, the true story. Based on over 300 interviews, in their own words, family members talk about their heartbreak and grief.
Students and townspeople describe that terrifying night.
Police detail the dramatic investigation and arrest of Brian Koberger.
You've never read a true crime like James Patterson and Vicki Ward's The Idaho Four.
The true story, it's finally here. Hey, weirdos.
I am Ash. Who are you, girl? I'm Elena. And this is morbid?
Question mark? Is it? Maybe. I was like, I look over and she was literally just looking at me.
I was like, do you know your name? I zoned so hard for a second.
You were looking right at me too. I was like, whoa.
I was looking through you and at you all at once.
Wow, girl. Wowzers. Kind of like the LAPD.
They were literally looking at the suspect in this case. right in the eyes, but they didn't even know it.
Look at you with the segues. I am a segue sister.
And what is it that, and that's why we drink calls them, they call them like segues or something.
They call them something really hilarious and they came up with it.
And I think of it every time someone says segue.
So shout out to them. That's That's funny.
I love them. I think of Paul Blart Mall Cop whenever I think of a segue.
Yes. Both wonderful, wonderful things. Truly, truly.
But yeah, I am remaining in a place of LAPD with my case this week.
Oh, boy. I was there last week and here I am again.
It's a lot. It's the most. My case this week is the murder of Sherry Rasmussen.
Ooh. And this was a case that went cold for a long, long, long time, but then finally was reopened thanks to some new guys on the squad.
Some new guys on the squad. New guys on the street.
So should we get into it? No. Well, what are we going to do then?
Let's just chat. Okay. Sorry, guys. Wait, are you like, I feel like you're like me-ing right now.
Yeah, I am. I'm having a moment. I feel like I'm Elena and you're Ash.
You're Ashing. I'm Ashing right now. At least, yeah, you're not Ashy.
You're just Ashing. I'm just Ashing. And you're Dashing.
I'm dashing, too. One might even start smashing.
Through the snow. In a one-horse open sleigh.
Ooh, it's the holiday season. It's the holiday season.
I wonder how many times I said that last year.
A lot. This year you guys should drink every time I say it.
But then you might die, and I don't want that to happen to you.
Yeah, don't do that, actually. Yeah, don't do that.
If you are going to do it, make sure that you're 21 and that you're responsible and that you're not going to be driving.
Yay! Woo! All right, so let's talk about it, actually.
I decided we should talk about it. Okay, let's go.
All right, so like I said... It's a late night recording, everybody.
Late night recording. As you can tell. Yeah.
Let's get into this. So, so, so, so, so, like I said, remaining in a place of LAPD, and we are going to be talking today about the murder of Sherry Rasmussen.
So Sherry was just 29 years old when she was killed.
Oh, jeez. And she had only been married to her husband, John, for three months.
I was about to say we love a John. I love a John, but I'm going to keep it there.
I'm going to not show my cards yet. Okay.
So John and Sherry had met two years before our story starts, and they instantly hit it off.
John had just recently graduated from UCLA.
I don't know why, but I feel like I always have to say it very like UCLA.
I was going to say, what just happened there?
It's just the letters. Yeah, they're like kind of aggressive.
UCLA. UCLA. Do you see LA? Yeah, I see it.
And so did John. He graduated from there.
He got his degree in mechanical engineering.
And Sherry, she was already well established in her field, which was nursing.
She had actually enrolled in college classes when she was only 16 years old.
Oh, okay. And became a full-blown nurse when she was What?
By the time she met John, she was actually already the director of nursing at Glendale Adventist Medical Center.
What a badass. She was an absolute badass.
Oh, and look at how pretty she looks in her nurse's uniform.
Oh, she looks beautiful. The quintessential.
Yes, so true. Sherry's mother, Loretta, later said of her, she liked taking care of people and making sure things were done right, that people were cared for properly.
Like this woman was a nurse because she genuinely cared about people.
She has those kind of kind eyes. Doesn't she?
Like her face is just like very friendly.
It is kind and friendly. And even her father said, he elaborated on what her mother said of her.
And he said that Sherry told him, I'm going to elevate the stature of nursing in the nation.
And he said that she was well on her way to do so.
Her parents absolutely loved her. Her two sisters adored her.
Everybody in her family was beyond proud of her.
And John was also very impressed with not only her work ethic and her drive, but her beauty.
Like we were just saying, Google a picture of Sherry, you'll be in awe.
She was gorgeous. And they had a lot in common too.
They were interested in the same things.
They both loved running. Their lives really matched up with one another's.
And of course, their relationship had its hiccups, which we will definitely get into.
But by all accounts, the two of them were really happy and overall loved each other.
But the morning of February 24th, 1986 would change absolutely everything.
So John was headed into work that morning while Sherry debated whether or not she was going to go in.
Because that morning she'd been called in to supervise a human resources class for the nurses.
And she just really didn't feel like going in.
Okay. You know, just it wasn't for her that day.
It happens, man. You know, you just you wake up and you're like, fuck this.
Yeah. Sometimes you just need a you day.
Mental health day. Don't take those days.
Self-care, man. Self-care. Don't take too many of those days because you'll lose your job.
But take a couple of those days every now and again.
You deserve that day. You certainly do. But John said he was like, I don't know.
I think you should just go in and get it over with.
Like, you know, let's just get it done with.
And with those few words of advice, he was off to start his own day.
He had some dry cleaning to start to drop off before work.
And then he was heading right into work.
So he left the townhouse that they owned together around 7.20 in the morning.
Now, later that morning, he called home to see if Sherry had gone in or not.
And when he didn't get an answer, he assumed that she must have gone into work.
So he called her office, but he was told by her secretary that she actually hadn't seen Sherry in the office that day.
So you might think that's weird. I thought that was a little weird when I first read that, like her secretary didn't see her.
But this wasn't super weird to John or Sherry's secretary because this day was a Monday, which meant that Sherry would actually spend her day going along to teach different classes.
So it wasn't unlike her secretary to not see her on a Monday.
It was a busy day for her. Because she was just kind of bopping around.
Exactly. So John just figured that in the hectic going-ons that Sherry's secretary had just missed her.
So he tried her at home a couple more times that day, and he didn't get any answer, which did make him slightly nervous.
But at the time, he didn't want to overreact.
Maybe she'd just gone out to run errands after work, something like that.
Everybody's been there where you're like, I'm not going to go straight to the worst case scenario because I don't want to.
But it is in the very back of my mind. Yeah, always.
So John got home later that night and things were off when he pulled up to their garage.
The garage door was left open, which was weird in and of itself.
And what was stranger was that Sherry's BMW that he'd gifted her after they got engaged was gone.
So for a second, John rationalized that, you know, she's just off running errands.
Everything's fine. Yeah. But then he saw broken glass scattered upon the driveway and would later realize that their balcony door on the second floor of the townhouse had been smashed to pieces.
And that's what this glass was for. And as for the door leading into the home, wide open.
Something was very off here and there was nothing left to rationalize.
Oh, what a scary, like, scene to come home to.
Absolutely. So John entered the home cautiously and he immediately found his wife, 29-year-old Sherry Rasmussen, laying dead on the living room floor.
Aw, Sherry. She was still dressed in the oversized t-shirt that she'd gone to sleep in the night before.
And she was wearing a robe that she usually wore when she was kind of bopping about in the morning getting ready for her day.
Her arms were raised up slightly, like she'd been in defense mode up until the last second, and one of her legs was slightly bent at the knee.
Her face showed very obvious signs of a very intense beating, like insane.
And John also saw evidence of at least one gunshot wound to her chest, which was in the center of her chest.
Oh my god. It would later be revealed that she was shot three times in the chest.
When John reached out to touch her, she was already cold.
And when he checked for any other signs of life, there were none.
So he raced to the phone and he dialed 911.
Now, it was immediately clear that the LAPD wanted to write this crime off as some kind of home invasion gone wrong.
Huh. Does that sound familiar? Yeah. No, I've never heard them say things like that.
Yeah. Even last week, it wasn't a home invasion gone wrong.
And especially in like the 80s, you never heard of them getting anything wrong.
No, never. They were on top of everything.
Yes. Spoiler alert, this is not a home invasion gone wrong.
Yeah, I don't know not a lot about that.
No. Looks like a home invasion gone wrong.
That's the thing. It would have gone very wrong.
Yeah. Like the beating and the shots to the chest.
Yeah. And we're going to get into like how none of that really makes sense.
Mm-hmm. But there had been other burglaries in the area, and the culprit hadn't been caught yet.
So the investigators, they kind of looked about the scene, and they realized that this was a home invasion, they said.
They believed that the home was broken into by two men, and Sherry caught them off guard by being home, at which point they became violent with her and shot her to death.
Sherry's murder was one of 831 reported homicides in LA that year.
Wow. And we know what happens when certain places have too much of a caseload.
Important details fall by the wayside, and that is exactly what happened here.
Sherry's case would promptly be placed on the back burner for the remainder of the 80s and the 90s.
That's wild. And it would remain a cold case until 2009.
Wow. Wow. Almost 22 years later, when new investigators finally gave it the attention it deserved all along.
Now ultimately, Sherry's killer would be put away for good, even though said killer was one of the LAPD's very own.
What? Yep. But before we get to the conclusion, we've got to get to the nitty gritty in the middle and the initial quote unquote investigation.
So Detective Lyle Mayer was the homicide detective initially assigned to Sherry's case, and he arrived immediately to survey the scene.
He noted that it looked like Sherry had been badly beaten to the face.
It really wouldn't take a professional to do so.
Yeah. He did. And he said that it seemed like she was struck with some kind of heavy object above her right eye.
There was also a very intense and very human bite mark inside her left forearm.
What? Yeah. A bite mark? Yes. Home invasion, right?
Holy shit. All burglars bite their victims, right?
What the fuck? They saw a bite mark and said this is a home invasion?
Yes. Wow. Like, absolutely wild. Not only that, she'd also been shot in the chest three times.
That's a lot of times for a home invasion.
And they could determine that she had been shot with a .38 caliber pistol.
That was the cause of death. Around two of the bullet holes, there were contact wounds.
Oh, so it was close. Yep, exactly. Meaning that those shots must have been fired at point-blank range.
Okay. Excuse me. You're not excused. I want to be.
And when he saw a pink and green quilt on a nearby chair with a bullet hole through the middle of it, the detective realized what had happened here.
Whoever this was must have shot Sherry once, but then worried about noise from the gunshot and used the blanket to muffle the two shots that were fired at point blank range.
Wow. Wow, that's really spooky. Firing through her blanket, her pink and green quilt.
And to just like make that decision too, that's just such a, I hate, it's those kind of very blatant, thought out decisions during these kind of acts that you're like, wow.
And I'm happy that you said those couple of words, blatant and thought out.
Yeah. That's not a home invasion. No. Thought out.
No. You're saying that she caught these people off guard, but then they thought that out?
No, that doesn't make sense. Yeah, I don't know about that.
No. So looking around the townhouse, Detective Mayer saw that the place had been absolutely trashed.
But it wasn't ransacked. It looked like this was a violent struggle.
There was a huge stereo speaker lying overturned on the floor with its wires torn out.
And the remainder of the set stood where it should be.
So these had been overturned from like the top of a shelf.
A vase had been smashed on the floor. Wooden shelving from the cabinets had been pulled down off of the cabinets.
Jesus. And the television's amplifier and receiver had both been knocked over and were hanging from the TV.
Huh. Why choose a Sleep Number smart bed?
Can I make my site softer? Can I make my site firmer?
Can we sleep cooler? Sleep Number does that.
Cools up to eight times faster and lets you choose your ideal comfort on either side.
Your Sleep Number setting. Get early access to Sleep Number's biggest sale of the year.
25% off the i8 bed. Our most popular. Plus free home delivery.
Limited time. All Sleep Number smart beds offer temperature solutions for your best sleep.
Check it out at a Sleep Number store or sleepnumber.com today.
Why are there ridges on Reese's peanut butter cups?
Probably so they never slip from her hands.
Could you imagine? I'd lose it. Luckily, Reese's thought about that.
Wonder what else they think about. Probably chocolate and peanut butter.
At the foot of the stairs, which led to the second floor of the townhouse, there was a VCR and a CD player stacked on top of each other.
And the CD player had a bloody fingerprint smudged onto it.
And there was also blood smeared all along the wall leading up to the stairs.
And like I said, one of the glass doors that was on the second floor, which led out to the second floor balcony, had been completely smashed out.
The scene is like not making sense. Not at all.
And why are all these electronics left? Right.
If this is a home invasion gone wrong, they didn't even carry one of those things out, not even the CD player.
Yeah, like you'd think they grabbed something.
Yeah, like anything, especially if it's right by the stairs.
And if you're going to kill this woman during a home invasion, you're going to steal things.
That's the whole point. Exactly. You came in here to steal things.
Exactly. You killed her so that you can continue to steal things.
That's weird. Precisely. Yeah. So after taking in the scenes and, excuse me, the scene and taking notes, Detective Mayer wanted to sit down with John to talk about the morning before he left and what he saw and did when he first got home and discovered Sherry's body.
Essentially, he was trying to rule John out as a suspect because, as we all know, nine out of ten times, the husband did it to him.
Detective Mayer, though, was actually able to rule John out as a suspect pretty quickly.
Wow. Yeah. He's not a police officer. So it wasn't John.
Okay. All right. Good. So we all love it, John.
Right, right. Okay. Well, we love one John.
We love the John. Yeah, we love the John.
Yeah. The reigning John. The reigning John.
There you go. So it was clear that this John was absolutely distraught, and he described Sherry and his marriage to her by saying that they were having the best time.
Like, they loved being married. That's sad.
To Mare, it didn't seem like an act. He felt like this was genuine.
Okay. So he told John, and this is a direct quote, I believe your house was burglarized today sometime before 10 a.m., Huh.
Huh. oh okay he then said that sherry either ran from or traced the intruder to the dining room and that's where the first shot was fired mayor thought that thought that the shot must have gone through sherry's body which shattered the glass door behind her oh okay i was wondering that one so that makes sense i guess and at that moment when the other intruder heard the shots they got startled and left which was why the electronics were still stacked by the stairs, he said.
Okay. Maybe. Then Sherry ran downstairs from the remaining intruder, which accounted for the blood smeared along the wall going down the stairs. but you're also leading me to believe that she'd been shot through the chest and then ran down the stairs.
Yeah. I don't really know about that. I mean, crazier things have happened, but that's a lot to assume.
Feels like a little bit of a stretch. Yeah.
But I see, like, the other pieces a little bit.
I do see the other pieces slightly. And then she was met with the killer in the living room where they hit her over the head with the vase, which is why the vase was smashed, and then grabbed the quilt lying nearby and used it to quietly shoot her two more times.
Okay. Then they got out of there using Sherry's BMW and abandoned the plan to rob the house in the first place.
Man, if that's what happened, that is really brutal.
Like a really brutal home invasion. That's a lot to assume from just walking around for a few, like a little while.
Yeah. You know, like I don't know exactly how long it took him to survey the scene, but that's a lot to conclude after being there for less than a day.
Yeah, that is. And by the way, Sherry's car would be found later parked down the street with the keys still inside.
Hmm. That, Detective Mayer said, was why nothing else was missing.
But he was wrong there, because one thing other than Sherry's BMW was missing.
Her and John's marriage certificate. What?
Yes. Okay. But for some reason, that was left out of the original notes on the case, along with a few other details.
That's strange as fuck. Now satisfied that this was the case, Detective Mayer headed out and the criminologist for the L.A.
County Coroner's Office came to the scene to examine the body.
This man was Lloyd Mahaney, and he arrived around 2 a.m., and luckily he did a very thorough investigation.
He found that there were multiple abrasions and contusions to Sherry's face.
To him, it seemed like she'd been in a fist fight, and there was a large cut open just above her right eye.
But he felt like something other than a fist had created that cut.
He surmised that she may have been struck in the face with the gun that actually shot her.
Oh, jeez. He also saw abrasions on her arms close by to her wrists.
And to him, it seemed like she'd actually been tied up at some point with some kind of rope or cord.
Oh, this gets worse and worse. And then this is a lot, just so you know.
He discovered that two fingernails were missing from one of her hands and later discovered them by the front door.
Oh, this was a brutal attack. Now, he believed that the initial gunshot wound is very... Sorry, I sneezed in the background, but I tried to cover it, everybody.
It's okay. Bless you, bless you. Thank you.
Now, he believed that the initial gunshot wound is very likely what killed Sherry, but he did also admit that it could have been the other two.
He didn't know. Okay. Now, one shot had gone completely through her body, like I said, the one that shattered the glass door behind her, presumably.
And the other two struck through her heart and lungs.
Wow. And then became lodged in her chest and spine.
Oh, this poor woman. She went through the most brutal attack.
Yeah. Now, her body was checked for any trace evidence like hair, dirt, fibers, anything that may someday connect them to the killer, but there wasn't much to find, unfortunately.
She didn't seem to be sexually assaulted, but erring on the side of caution and wanting to be as thorough as possible, he did do a rape kit and a number of swabs and included all of them within his report.
This guy was not fucking around. I was going to say, this coroner was on it.
He was. He also finally measured and photographed the bite mark on Sherry's arm and swabbed the injury.
Wow, look at this guy doing his job. I'm saying.
Noted the time and date of the collection after placing the swab into a sealed tube, initialed it, and added it to the physical evidence envelope.
He noted that there was very little hemorrhaging and almost no inflammation near the wound, which led him to believe that this wound was likely inflicted right as she died.
Almost like a final, like, fuck you. That is, I don't know what it is about that.
You know what that is? That's personal. That's so personal.
And it's so degrading. Yeah, absolutely.
You know, like, ugh. Absolutely. So this examination took four hours.
This man was thorough. And after those four hours, Mahaney drove the evidence and his report down to the coroner's office, having no idea that in due time, much of this hard work would be lost.
Stop it. Are you fucking kidding me? Just lost.
Lost. He spent four hours collecting things that should have already been collected.
Yep. Wow. And then it was quote unquote lost.
But don't worry, it does become found. Okay, good.
So after reviewing Mahaney's report and going over his own notes, Detective Mayer also couldn't shake the feeling that something about this case was personal.
He still leaned on the air of this was a home invasion, but he...
What home invasion ends with someone biting someone?
That's the thing. That's wild to me. He said that the level of violence and brutality was unlike anything he'd ever seen before in a robbery gone wrong.
But the LAPD as a whole agreed that this was the case, that this was a robbery, and that's how they pursued the case.
No, guys. No. I'm here to tell you it's not.
It's not. Yeah. And although the investigators said that they conducted hundreds and hundreds of interviews, they never asked to speak with Sherry's own sister, Teresa, who was at the townhouse the day before Sherry was killed.
They never spoke with her neighbor, Alan Tarski, who lived 20 feet away and was there right after Sherry's body was discovered.
And they never spoke with her close friend, Jane, who knew of somebody that Sherry was having problems with.
Damn. They did, however, speak with John and with Sherry's parents...
But they did not interview the one main person that John had told them about and that Sherry's parents had told them about.
And they treated Sherry's parents terribly when they pushed the point of speaking to the same person.
Now, why wouldn't they want to speak to this one person?
John's ex-girlfriend, Stephanie Lazarus.
Why wouldn't they want to talk to her? Why not?
Most likely because she was one of their own.
An LAPD officer. A rookie at the time, but one of their own, no less.
Oh, that whole we protect our own. Mm-hmm.
Sherry's parents actually pushed the LAPD to speak with Stephanie because, like Sherry's close friend Jane, they knew that she was having lots and lots of problems with this woman.
Sherry's father, Nels Rasmussen, called Detective Mayer the day after his daughter was killed and wanted to know if they had spoken with Stephanie yet.
He emphasized... Some of the issues that Sherry had been having with this particular LAPD officer recently were calling four separate occasions where Sherry was made uncomfortable by this woman.
What? So the first was when Stephanie stopped by Sherry and John's townhome to see if John could wax a pair of skis for her.
Are you fucking kidding me? Like, what? Now, this was shortly before Sherry and John's wedding, and it was pretty obvious to Sherry that Stephanie wasn't there for the favor she asked for.
This was about more than just skis. Yeah.
And also, like, was that a euphemism? Well, I'm like, what the fuck?
Weird. Like, who asks that? I don't know.
You're also in L.A. Yeah, like, what the fuck?
The hell are you using skis for? Unless you're going to, like, Big Bear or something.
Like, where are you going? Weird. Weird.
Sherry was like, this is... Something's weird.
Fuck off. She knew that this was about lingering feelings.
Also, go away. Yeah, like, get out of my house.
Don't come to our house asking my soon-to-be husband to wax your skis for you.
I can promise you that those skis would be so far up your ass and protruding out your mouth if you asked my husband to wax your fucking skis.
That is a no for me. Wait until I can actually say husband.
My husband. Not yet. But... So after Stephanie left, Sherry told her soon-to-be husband just that.
She was like, I'm uncomfortable with Stephanie being in our home, and I would prefer it if you didn't take care of those skis for her.
Like, this is a weird situation. You have every right.
But John was like, no, no, no, no, no. Nothing's going on between us, and our relationship never got that serious.
He said they simply dated in college, and he just felt like it would be easier to placate Stephanie versus getting into something bigger than necessary.
Yeah. Yeah, it's always good to placate somebody instead of just being upfront and honest.
Yeah, totally. Yeah, definitely. If you're ever in a situation where it's like, should I placate this person?
Right. Or just be honest. Yeah. Definitely placate them.
That always ends up great. This also tells me that he knew that Stephanie had a wild temper.
Oh, yeah. Because if you're worrying about getting into an argument with somebody because you're not going to wax their skis.
Because your fiance is uncomfortable with it.
Like, I think most people would understand that.
Yeah. But clearly she's not somebody who is going to.
Something's up here. So Sherry hoped that that would be the last time she saw Stephanie, but as we know, it was not.
There were more occasions, three more. Stephanie stopped by the house a few days later to pick up her skis, and Sherry made it clear on that occasion that she was not welcome within the house.
Good. This all happened outside, which, like, high five, Sherry.
She assumed that this would be the last she saw of Stephanie.
But again, it was not. Just a few days after that, John had already left for work, and Stephanie showed up in uniform a bit after he left, at the townhouse.
And she told Sherry that she was on a break and just wanted to stop by and say hi to John, but she didn't expect Sherry to be there.
Usually Sherry was at work at this time.
At that point, Sherry started to wonder if there was something going on between John and his ex.
Did she usually come over when Sherry had already left for work and John was still home?
Or was this her entire intention to make Sherry feel that way when it simply wasn't the case?
And that's the worst, too, because your first initial reaction is always to get mad at the other person instead of directing it at the person you're with who you're supposed to trust.
Right. And it's like this must have been hard to just be like, Okay, which one is it?
Yeah, exactly. Is it her being crazy and overbearing and like trying to cause issues or is something else happening?
Exactly. Exactly. So John maintained that this was not the case.
There was nothing going on between him and Stephanie.
Then why the hell did she feel comfortable showing up in the middle of the day to have lunch?
Why would she feel comfortable? John. Yeah, John.
So now finally one last uncomfortable interaction and this one is the fucking crescendo.
Oh no. So just a couple days before Sherry and John's wedding.
Stop it. A couple of days before the wedding, Stephanie stopped by Sherry's office provocatively dressed.
Stop it. And pushed past Sherry's secretary to tell Sherry that she and John were very much still romantically involved and that Sherry shouldn't trust her husband.
She then elaborated and said that if she could not have John, nobody would.
Wow. Yeah. Wow. So remember, Sherry's father is recalling all of this to Detective Mayer.
And do you want to know what his response was?
To tell this father, whose child was murdered yesterday, that he watched too many cop shows on TV.
Are you kidding me? Nope. Not only did they tell him he watched too many cop shows on TV, all of the other investigators would lean over him trying to intimidate him.
They treated this man like an idiot. What the fuck?
And it's also like, okay, how many cop shows have I watched that have a female cop threatening another woman?
Can you point me to those ones that I'm coming up with this?
I don't think I've seen any of those. Like, what the fuck are you talking about, you idiot?
You're the one watching too many cop shows sitting here trying to intimidate the parent of a murder victim.
Right. I'm just telling you what my daughter told me before her death.
And like, yeah, I know you want to think this is a home invasion, but I'm telling you about multiple experiences she had with an unhinged woman.
No matter whether she works at your department or not, she's fucking unhinged.
There is a bite mark on this woman. Right.
I don't, you got to give me a page list of home invasions that were home invasions.
Actual home invasions. That ended. With a bite.
And not murders, not like serial killers.
Home invasions. Not anything, not domestic disputes.
I want straight up home invasions by an actual stranger.
Exactly. That ended with a bite. Nope. That is like animalistic.
Oh, absolutely. This whole attack was animalistic.
Because if you really put into your head a visual of somebody biting someone, especially after they've been beaten and shot three times, the rage, they have to look like an actual wild animal.
Oh, absolutely. Like it is an actual terrifying picture to have in your head.
How did this woman lose two fingernails?
No. Not in a casual home invasion. Like, I'm sorry.
No. This was exactly what you said. Oh, I'm so angry.
Me too. For her parents. Absolutely. Like, fuck these people.
And the fact that, and we know this, like, no spoiler alert, it takes over 20 years to get to the bottom of this.
That's awful. And it's, they were door after door after door after door slammed in these poor people's faces.
That's fucked up. It's fucked. It's fucked.
So as far as the detective was concerned, it was absolutely out of the question.
It was a robbery gone wrong or somebody who wanted to hurt John and Cherry personally.
John had previously told, if you remember, Detective Meyer to talk to Stephanie.
He literally said, like, you might want to talk to Stephanie.
Yeah. But at this new time, he told the detective he didn't actually know anybody who would have wanted to hurt the two of them personally.
Except for Stephanie. Exactly. Because she literally said it.
She straight up said it. She literally threatened her.
It is unclear whether or not Sherry shared those last two interactions with John.
So if she didn't, perhaps that's why he didn't think to bring up Stephanie again.
Okay. Just playing devil's advocate, we simply don't know.
Yeah, that's a possibility. So Sherry's parents flew from Tucson to L.A. to meet with the detectives in person once they realized that their concerns were not being taken seriously.
And when they arrived at the station, Detective Mayer showed Sherry's father two sketches of two possible suspects that they thought were responsible for the murder and also for a string of robberies near Sherry and John's home.
Hey, weirdos, we need to tell you about something that has completely blown our minds collectively.
There's a new show called Lawless Planet that's uncovering true crime stories so massive, they're affecting the entire planet.
Post-Zack Goldbaum is investigating real cases where environmental destruction meets murder, conspiracy, and cover-ups.
We're talking about activists who disappear in the Amazon rainforest, whistleblowers who risk everything to expose deadly corporate secrets, and communities being silently poisoned while powerful people profit.
What makes these stories truly terrifying?
They're happening right now. This isn't history.
It's a massive criminal conspiracy unfolding in real time, with consequences that affect us all.
Each episode feels like opening a case file into the darkest corners of corporate and government power.
Trust us, once you start listening, you will not be able to stop thinking about these stories.
Follow Lawless Planet on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can listen to new episodes of Lawless Planet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.
The town of Agde in France is famous for sun, sand, sea and sex.
But lately, life on the coast has taken a strange turn.
The town's mayor, a respected pillar of the community, has been arrested for corruption.
His wife claims he's been bewitched by a beautiful clairvoyant.
Then there's the mysterious phone calls that local people have been getting.
I am the Archangel Michael. The whole town has been thrown into chaos.
As the mayor is unable to carry out his duties, I would like to address you all.
Legal proceedings have been initiated. Join me, Anna Richardson, and journalist Leo Schick for The Mystic and the Mayor as we investigate a story of power, corruption, and magic.
Binge all episodes of The Mystic and the Mayor exclusively and ad-free right now on Wondery Plus.
Start your free trial in Apple Podcasts, Spotify or the Wondery app.
Nels was absolutely shocked that they still hadn't looked into Stephanie and thought the entire theory of this burglary gone wrong was preposterous.
Because it was. For one thing, if the investigators believed that this was indeed a burglary, then they also had to believe that the fight that happened before Sherry's death lasted over an hour.
Yeah. Yeah. based on like her time of death she would have had to fight with this attacker for more than an hour yeah that makes total sense if these two men were the ones that were the ones that nels had been shown then they were big guys and it was near impossible to think that sherry could have fought off even one of them for that long two of them without sustaining more injuries it was completely completely preposterous and for another thing how about the cause of death If this truly was a robbery gone wrong, then wouldn't the killer want to get away as fast as humanly possible?
You would think that one gunshot would have been sufficient.
What kind of burglar would fight somebody off for an hour, shoot them once, and then take the time to look for a blanket to quietly shoot that person twice more?
And, again, at what point would they bite their victim?
And that blanket trick... That shows a little familiarity with shooting a gun.
Absolutely. To me. Absolutely. Because I don't know, like, a lot of just, like, I mean, I don't know any home invaders, but I'm saying, like, not that I know of, at least.
But I also, like, I don't think they come in there thinking, like, well, like, I could use this to muffle this.
Like, they're not... No. Usually home invasions...
If they're there to rob, they're not looking to hurt someone.
They're not looking to kill someone. They're there to intimidate if they have to, but to get the shit and get out.
That's the thing. That's the main goal here.
It's not to kill someone silently. That's not the goal.
That's the point. Like, later on, the DA says, like, why not just fire one shot even in the air and then run away?
Like, that's probably what they would have done.
Or even fire one shot at the person and run away.
Exactly, and run. But they're not going to take the time to find a fucking blanket and shoot her two more times and then bite her.
Yeah, no. What? No. What? The evidence just was not adding up to being a burglary.
But unfortunately, it wasn't really adding up to anything.
And after the initial round of interviews and a couple of weeks following up on evidence, there weren't any leads whatsoever.
Right. Probably because they weren't following up on the correct evidence, I would say.
That's exactly that. But at some point, they packed all the evidence they had into boxes and put the case on a shelf.
Wow. Technically still an active investigation, but at this point, a cold one.
So years and years and years went by. And then in 2001, a new unit formed within the LAPD.
And it was dedicated to cases that were, yes, still technically open, but hadn't seen activity in years.
So there were thousands, thousands of unsolved cases dating back to 1970.
How sad is that? Isn't that so sad? And that's at one department.
Yeah. Like, imagine throughout the world how many unsolved cases there are.
Countless. Absolutely. So sad. But within that caseload was Sherry's case.
So her case landed on the desk of Rob Bubb toward the end of 2008.
Bubb? Yes. I love that. I know. He's like Rob Bubb.
Spoiler alert. He's like the hero of the story.
Oh, thank goodness. Okay. Detective Bubb.
That's what I start calling him, Detective Bubb.
And every time I wrote it, it was making me so happy.
Oh, I love that. I felt like Bubba was like with me.
Bubs would do that as a detective. She would be the hero.
Absolutely would. That's very true. So yes, it was about 22 years after the murder that Sherry's case landed on his desk.
Wow, 22 years. Crazy. And at first, nothing really significant jumped out at him.
But then he saw the note about the bite mark on Sherry's arm.
And back in 2004, he realized within the caseload that an error was discovered relating to the evidence in this case.
After Lloyd Mahaney's four-hour examination, you remember, he drove the evidence, including the swab done on the bite mark, down to the coroner's office.
Well, somehow it was never delivered to the LAPD scientific investigation unit and instead sat in a freezer at the coroner's office for 18 years.
Are you shitting me? Never even made it to the LAPD at all.
Wow. Sat in a freezer for 18 years. Wow.
However, once that error was discovered, the evidence was tested.
And while the saliva from the bite mark didn't match anybody that the LAPD had in their criminal system, it was determined to be a woman's saliva.
I knew it. Mm-hmm. I knew it. So Detective Bubb went back to the suspect list and he looked for a woman's name.
There was only one name on that list. Stephanie Lazarus.
Oh, shit. Who was now a high-up detective within the LAPD.
I knew it. And not the rookie that she was in the 80s.
I knew it. Now, Detective Bubb did not know Stephanie personally, but he knew her name well enough.
She was very, very well-respected in the force.
She had gone to UCLA with John. and then joined the LAPD right out of college.
And she'd done a really good job impressing her superiors and made quite the name for herself.
In 1996, she got married to another officer, Scott Young.
Later, they adopted a daughter together.
And she was, Stephanie, was described by friends as intelligent, athletic, good with people.
She was very logical and analytical, which are two objectively good skills for detective work.
She was known to drop off sweet treats to her neighbors come the holiday time.
She'd also been very active within community policing initiatives.
She was involved with D.A.R.E. She had internal roles on the police force.
She actually served as treasurer of the Los Angeles Women Police Officers and Associates.
Whoa. And worked briefly within internal affairs.
Back in 1993, she was promoted to detective.
And in the late 90s, she actually worked as an instructor with the police academy.
This is horrifying. It's the most, like...
It's insane. This is horrifying. And she was also part of a new two-person unit on the force.
She was one of two people on this force investigating art thefts.
She'd actually gone out of her way to learn different painting techniques and other aspects that would help her solve these cases and recover previously stolen artwork.
Essentially, she seemed very far off from being a cold-hearted murderer.
Yeah. And all of that made Detective Bubb nervous.
Yeah. It was going to be a big deal for him to investigate a fellow detective anyway, but somebody as well-regarded as Stephanie?
Yikes. Oh, no. But at the same time, he still wanted justice for Sherry and was really more worried about his investigation on Stephanie flying through the rumor mill that was the LAPD.
And that's – how sad is that, that he was like, oh, shit.
Yeah. Like, she definitely did it. But, like – Right.
This is going to be a problem. Exactly. No.
Right. If the evidence points to her, then this shouldn't be a problem.
That's the thing. But it's true that it would have been.
Not only was he worried that it was going to fly through the rumor mill and get back to her, but he was also worried that somebody else would become involved and try to protect Stephanie, whether it was legal or not.
Can you imagine? Which tells you that this does happen, right?
Yeah. Absolutely. Like, if he's worried about that, there's a precedent that was set.
That should never be a worry. Never. It should be the evidence is pushing this way.
We're going to pursue it. Exactly. Wow. But his concerns were entirely valid because it seemed like at least one person had already tried to cover up Stephanie's involvement in the original investigation.
According to Mark Bowden from Vanity Fair, quote, "...the case record suggests that one or more persons during the initial investigation... and continuing through the next 10 years, were not just disinclined to consider that one of their own had murdered Sherry Rasmussen, but actively conspired to hide evidence that might have proved it.
For one thing, all of the records in the Rasmussen file pertaining to Nell's suspicions about Lazarus, and even the interview with John the day after the murder, where he discusses Lazarus with Meyer, are missing.
What the fuck? Mayor, are missing. There are audio recordings and notes of every other interview in those first days, which was standard operating procedure, but there are none for the ones where Lazarus was specifically mentioned.
End quote. Can you imagine being so broken?
Absolutely not. As a human being. I won't even imagine it for a second.
That you would help cover up a crime like this.
No. Against a woman who did nothing. Literally nothing.
Married a man she loved. Not even that there's a justification out there for that.
No. But this is like... I just want your husband.
Yeah. And I'm just mad that you like. And when you really break it down, you're covering up the murder because you have the same job.
That's so wild. It's like, okay, so like people that work in human resources, do you feel compelled to cover up crimes for other people because they work in human resources?
No. No. Where else does this happen? Like other than politics.
Like, that's insane. Because you have the same job.
Like, when I was a hairstylist, I promise you, if I thought that one of my other fellow hairstylists has murdered somebody, I would not be defending them.
No. I would not be planting anybody else's hair at that crime scene.
No. No, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no.
We might have the same job, but we do not have the same integrity.
I've got some. That's it. Boom. I've got some.
I like that. I've got some. I've got some integrity.
That felt like very Real Housewives at the end there.
I want to be on the Housewives like so bad.
So bad. When I turn 50 maybe. There you go.
That's your time to shine. I was going to try to come up with like a 30 flirty and thriving, but with 50.
50 thrifty and thriving. No. Anyways. And thriving.
There you go. 50 on the Real Housewives and thriving.
But anyway, this is fishy as fuck. It's just fucked up.
It really is. People went out of their way in this case to cover up for somebody simply because she was a cop.
Yeah. I can't. I know, of course, that's not going to make your department look awesome if there's a murderous cop on your squad.
But also, at the time, she's a fucking rookie anyway.
It's also not going to make your department look great to cover up a murderer.
Yeah, it's a lose-lose. But at least you can win in the fact of justice and if you guys all came forward and said well the evidence points to this and we follow the evidence because that's our fucking job i'd make you like a lot more people would be like wow integrity good job everybody exactly instead of being like hey sorry we covered it up because like she has the same job as we for as we as we she has the same job as we for fucking 22 years oh my god get fucked all of you that did that if you're still alive and you're somehow for some reason listening to this fuck you yeah that was shitty as fuck Fuck you.
But instead of letting that scare him off, all of that, Detective Bub just got crafty.
Hell yeah, Bub did. Right? There were officers and investigators within his team that he trusted implicitly.
And he was also their supervisor. So he was like, I pretty much trust you.
And like, you're fucked if you fuck up. You're fucked.
You're fucked. So he called on them to do an outside of regular hours investigation.
The team was made up of him and detectives Jim Natal, Pete Barbara, and Mark Martinez.
They were the only four with any information about this investigation, which they did outside of regular work hours.
And they all made up cover stories in case anybody asked why they were suddenly so interested in old DNA evidence.
Oh my god, this is badass. They also encoded their notes on the investigation and had a code name for Stephanie Lazarus, which was number five.
Number five. I don't really know why. And they kept all the information regarding her specifically in a separate binder that only they had access to.
Wow. Fucking badass. That's crazy. Now, in all honesty, they actually weren't super confident in the beginning of this investigation that they had the right suspect.
But then a literal smoking gun fell into their laps.
Oh. They found within Stephanie's file that there was a record showing that just two weeks after Sherry Rasmussen was murdered, Stephanie reported that her .38 caliber backup pistol...
Was stolen. Oh. Stolen, you say, Steph-Steph.
Oh. As we know, that was the exact gun that Sherry had been killed with.
And interestingly enough, Stephanie had made the decision to file this report in Santa Monica, even though she worked for the L.A. department.
Huh. Weird. Yeah, that's strange. Very clearly she was going out of her way to avoid suspicion.
Of course. And she had clearly gotten rid of that gun, because she had to, because she used her cop gun to kill someone.
Wow, she got away with this for so long.
Yeah, it's so fucked up. Wow. The detectives then looked over the notes on the scene, and it became clear to them that this was staged, or at the very least had just all happened...
Within the struggle of everything. Yeah.
And even if they had decided to ignore all of that, these home invaders, why would they take the time to get in such a wild fight with the homeowner instead of just firing the gun, like I said earlier, and dipping?
Yeah. It doesn't make any sense. And if these were like the home invaders that the cops initially were trying to say they were, they had a ton of robberies like this under their belt.
They wouldn't go and rob somebody at 9 a.m.
Yeah, it's like, why are they totally breaking what has been working for them?
Exactly. Clearly. Exactly. So at first, they were simply trying to rule Stephanie out as a suspect.
But the more and more investigative work they did, the more and more confident they became that one of their very own was responsible for a senseless murder and had spent the last 22 years cosplaying as somebody who was supposed to protect the community and pretending like she wasn't a cold-blooded murderer herself.
Wow. She was just like at the D.A.R.E. program hanging around with kids.
Mm-hmm. Wow. And her name only showed up in this investigation one time.
That's not shocking. One time. Not shocking.
But they knew that Sherry's parents had been adamant that John's ex be looked into.
But these investigators relooking at the case didn't know if John's ex and Stephanie were the same person.
And they weren't going to be like, hey, do you ever need a guy named John whose wife got murdered?
Because that'd be kind of obvious. Yeah.
Yeah. So instead, Detective Jim Natal placed a call to Sherry's father and asked him about his original statement that he'd made to the police about looking into John's ex.
Meanwhile, he's like, hi, yeah. Oh, he must have been absolutely elated to get this call.
Validated. Like, jeez. He still didn't know the woman's name, but he knew... that she was a female police officer.
Boom. Boom. So this investigative work took about four months.
But by the end of those four months, Detective Bub's team was sure that they had their prime suspect.
There was a problem, though. Pretty much all of their evidence was speculative.
Hmm. No actual smoking gun here. Sort of, but no actual one.
Yeah. And in order to make a good case, they knew that they were going to need physical proof or evidence.
Yeah. But they knew that the swab test from Sherry's bite mark injury proved that the attacker was a woman.
And so they figured they needed to prove that that woman was Stephanie Lazarus.
Mm-hmm. So that meant that they would need to collect a sample from her.
But again, they didn't want to raise suspicion on her part.
I'm getting comfortable because this is getting... I'm like, ooh, what are they going to do?
This is the just absolute best. This is... I love that.
So in May of 2009, Detective Bubb went to his commanding officer and arranged a meeting with the deputy chief at the time, Michael Moore.
In that meeting, they laid out their entire case against Stephanie, and Moore authorized the use of a special internal affairs unit.
Hell yeah, he did. Which meant that an undercover police officer was now going to become involved and follow Stephanie into a Costco.
Okay. You know, the land of free samples that nobody can pass up.
Oh. My. Gosh. Well, you know, just like the rest of us, Miss Stephanie Lazarus also couldn't pass up a free sample.
I mean, no one can pass up those free samples.
No, like, come on. Just like the rest of us, I said.
Wow. Her sample of choice was a drink. It was a drink.
So she used a little straw and a little cup to sample that drink.
And she said, mm-mm-mm. And then she tossed that straw and that cup into a nearby trash bin.
Oh, my God. And as soon as she walked away, that undercover officer skedaddled right over to that trash bin, picked that up, and threw it in an evidence bag.
I bet he did a little soft shoe over to that.
I'd be so excited. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he did a little boop-boop-boop-ba-doop-ba-doop-ba-doop.
He be-bop-a-loop-a'd, baby. Oh, hell yeah, he did.
At-ma-t-m. Ha-ha. And then he brought that directly to the lab where it would not sit on a shelf for the next umpteen years.
Hell yeah. And just one week later, Detective Bub got a call.
Ring-a-ding-ding. The criminalist at the lab was able to develop a partial DNA profile from the cup and the straw.
And you know who it was a match for? Who was it a match for?
It was a match for Stephanie Lazarus. Hey!
She was at least the woman who bit Sherry Rasmussen.
But also likely beat and then shot her. Holy shit.
Holy shit. So it was time to bring Stephanie Lazarus in for some questioning.
Let's get that bitch in. She is just walking into Costco buying some bulk fucking items.
Yeah. Like she didn't just murder a woman.
Brutally murder a woman two decades ago.
Like talk about having skeletons in your closet.
I'm just like... Holy shit, the amount of people in that Costco that just walked by her buying the 20-pack of Rice-A-Roni and had no fucking clue that she is a savage murderer.
Oh, yeah. To the point of biting the victim.
What's that statistic? We walk by, like, how many murderers in our lifetime?
It's, like, 30-something. Yeah, that's crazy.
Like, 32 or something like that. Like, at this point, you and I have definitely already walked by at least five murderers.
That's wild. Crazy. Hopefully not at Costco.
But I'm just like, you just think about it.
You're like, it was like the Golden State Killer.
Yup. You know what I mean? Like, it's just like, just going about her day.
Just going to Costco. She got married. She was able to adopt a child.
She was someone's mother. She was somebody's mother.
She worked in D.A.R.E. She was somebody's D.A.R.E. officer.
She said, don't do drugs and don't kill people.
I did, but like, it's okay. But don't do it.
But you shouldn't. Yeah. Wow. Wow. So she was brought in for questioning on June 5th, 2009.
And that morning before that was a pretty typical one for Detective Lazarus.
Until she arrived to work at the LAPD's administrative building, Park Center, in downtown LA.
She was getting settled for the day when Detective Dan Aramillo poked his head into her office and asked if she could help him with something.
Oh my god, this must have been really fun to do.
Oh yeah, she agreed, and he explained that they had somebody at the station who was under arrest relating to an art heist.
Ooh. And he asked if she would be able to interrogate the suspect, you know, with her incredible knowledge of art and heists.
Hell yeah. I'm sure the flattery went straight to her fucking ego, and she agreed.
And Detective Aramillo directed her to the basement, where the holding cells are located.
But instead of taking her to a holding cell, he took her to an interrogation room where there was no suspect.
Oh my god, I love this. But instead, his partner, Greg Stearns, detective.
And so they said, Steph, can you sit down?
And she said, sure. And then, Detective Aramillo explained to a confused Detective Lazarus that he had taken her down there because he didn't want to create a scene upstairs.
Oh, my God. You know she knew. Oh, she was shitting herself.
You know she knew. As soon as she walked down there and didn't see a suspect, you know her brain went, they got it.
Oh, because she absolutely thought that she had gotten away with this.
Oh, my God. Every single day for the remaining 22 years that she had to get away with it.
Yeah. So, she had follow-up questions, but the other detectives were not answering them.
Instead, they told her that they were assigned to a case and they wanted to know if she knew a man by the name of John Rutten.
And she told them that, yeah, she went to school with him.
She met him at the dorms at UCLA, but... nothing really more than that ucla yes excuse me ucla yeah now she was getting slightly standoffish and she clearly was becoming more and more suspicious but she was still maintaining a professional and friendly demeanor so they asked her a few more questions about john and finally she was like what is this all about so detective aramillo explained that it was about john's wife who had been murdered and he said did you know her And at first she said that she may have met her, but then as time went on, she knew all about Sherry.
She'd actually met her on one occasion at least, knew where she worked, knew actually that she'd been murdered in some kind of a burglary gone wrong scenario.
Wow. I broke. That escalated. It did. She also said first that her and John had casually dated, but then as she got to talking more and more, she said to the detectives...
I'm thinking that because he would date other people and I would date other people, I think at one point he may have been dating her.
I don't know. Maybe he was married. I don't even remember.
And I'm like, why are you calling me if you're dating her or living with her or married to her?
I honestly don't remember the time frame.
I'm like, come on, knock it off. But now I'm thinking I may have gone to her and said like, hey, you know what?
If he's dating you, he's bothering me. I
I think we had a conversation about that one or two, maybe.
It could have been three, but I don't want to say that I had three conversations with her or whatever.
Ma'am. Ma'am. Ma'am, this is an interrogation room.
This is not a Wendy's. No. Like, what the fuck did you just say?
I'd be like, what was the answer to the question?
Was it in there? What? Was it? First, it was no.
Then it was, I don't know if I knew her.
Then it was, I might have known her. Then it was, okay, you might have been married to her, perhaps.
I don't really know. Maybe we had a conversation about it.
Maybe we had three. I don't really want to say that we had three.
Yeah. What? And I was all like, oh my god, if he's married to you, then he's bothering me.
He's bothering me. Suck my dick. What the fuck?
Then she went on to say that, you know, she couldn't remember exactly what had happened, but whatever had happened between her and Sherry was water under the bridge.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Detective Aramillo then asked Detective Lazarus if she'd ever been to Sherry and John's home.
He said, you ever been there? I remember.
And she said she couldn't remember entirely, but if she had, it was probably just a nice visit.
Oh, yeah, I'm sure. Not for any romantic reason at all.
No, like, it was just a nice visit. Just stopped by.
After all, you forget if you even met her or possibly had three conversations with her about John.
But, yeah, I can understand why you wouldn't know if you actually, like, had a nice visit.
Yeah, who knows? At her house. Like, she's like, oh, it was probably a nice visit.
Yeah. I thought you didn't even fucking, did you even know her?
Seriously, like, what are you doing, ma'am?
What's your answer? What are you doing? My God.
Now, Detective Armio then noted that some of Sherry's friends had concerns and some of Sherry's family had concerns because they believed that Sherry and Stephanie were having issues relating to the John situation.
Oh, there's always a John situation. Yeah, there is, unfortunately.
But she kept going with the, so long ago, can't remember, act.
So then Detective R. Mio just laid it on her.
He was like, yeah, we processed the scene and originally we couldn't do a lot with the evidence, but like, you know, DNA and all.
Kind of come a long way. Yeah. Now we can.
Yeah. So it was becoming pretty clear now that Stephanie knew what they were hinting at.
And they told her that this was all just part of the job.
But if she would be willing to provide a DNA sample for them, then it would kind of rule her out, you know?
It would rule. It would rule. If she could just give them a DNA sample, that would rule.
It would not drool. It would rule. But it would be of her drool.
So she wasn't really interested in that or speaking with them anymore, and she told them, I just can't even believe it.
I mean, I'm shocked. I'm really shocked that someone would say that I would be doing this.
Yeah? Maybe because you, like, did this.
You're really shocked? And then she told them that she probably needed a lawyer, and with that, she walked out of the room.
But she didn't make it very far because Detective R. Murillo walked out of the room, too, and he placed her under arrest for the 1986 murder of Sherry Rasmussen.
Wow. Yeah. What a day at the job that was.
For everybody. Truly for everybody. Yeah.
So now, since she was under arrest, they were able to get a proper DNA sample, which made their case even stronger.
The first Costco sample definitely confirmed their suspicions, but this second sample sealed the motherfucking deal.
I can't believe this matches the bite mark.
Oh, it's insane. You can't get out of that.
Oh, just listen to this. According to the Deputy District Attorney Shannon Presby, the results of the DNA test found that the odds of Sherry's killer being someone other than Stephanie Lazarus were 1 in 1.7 sextillion.
So you're saying there's a chance. That is 17 with 20 zeros.
That's a lot of zeros. Many. Many. So with that, Detective Lazarus was now headed to trial.
Bye. Bye, bitch. In early December 2009, she was indicted for the murder of Sherry Rasmussen, and the DA, the one I just mentioned, had attached special circumstances of lying in wait and murder during the commission of a robbery.
Stephanie pleaded not guilty and was held on $10 million bond until her trial.
Wow. And her lawyer, Mark Overland, did file a motion to have the charges dropped, claiming that, quote, the Los Angeles Police Department investigators were negligent and showed reckless disregard in the investigation of their colleague.
Wow. Like, we shouldn't investigate people who are simply colleagues.
Yeah, no, don't do that. Now, uh... No.
This referred to Detective Bubb and his team's secret investigation, but the Superior Court judge found that her rights had not been violated by the investigation and that she would stand trial for murder.
But they were going to take the death penalty off the table because the Superior Court judge did find that the special circumstances attached to the case were inappropriate.
They didn't fit. Okay. So the trial started in February of 2012, and the DA argued that Sherry's death was not the botched robbery that the initial detectives believed it was, but was instead a straightforward case of jealousy and passion gone terribly wrong.
This is wild. It's insane. It's absolutely insane.
John and Stephanie had indeed met in college in the beginning of their relationship.
Things weren't that serious. But in 1981, after their graduation from UCLA... he and Stephanie had been romantically involved dozens of times.
Aw, come on. However, he was clear with Stephanie that this was purely sexual and he had no intentions of making her his girlfriend or even his wife.
In John's mind, this was 100% casual. But in Stephanie's mind, no matter what she said after Sherry's murder...
She had serious feelings for John that led to serious feelings of jealousy directed towards Sherry.
That's why you don't cheat on your spouse.
Yeah, exactly. Well, not until this point he hasn't.
He wasn't married when they had sex up at this point.
Oh. But when Stephanie found out that Sherry and John were engaged in 1985, she actually called John and begged him to come over to her house.
She also wrote a letter to John's mother in August of that same year saying, quote, I'm truly in love with John and the past year has really torn me up.
I wish it didn't end the way it did and I don't think I'll ever understand his decision.
Wow. So when John finally did agree to meet up with her, she declared her love for him.
She begged him to please choose her. She said what they had was so much more special than anything he could ever have with Sherry and that they were the ones who were supposed to be together.
But John told her no. He loved Sherry and he was going to go ahead and marry her.
But he still had sex with Stephanie that night.
Oh, come on, John. Are you kidding me? What the fuck is wrong with you?
This sounds like my ex. It absolutely does.
It really does. Either way, this sounds a lot like that.
It sure does. It really does. It's like...
What the fuck were you thinking? Yeah, it's like, come on.
You're sitting here ending things with her and then having sex with her.
While you're engaged to someone else. What is wrong with you?
Like, you can't do that. That's going to muddy all of the waters it could possibly muddy.
Obviously, it's on nowhere near the same level of what Stephanie is doing.
And by no means is it a cause and effect situation.
No. But it's a situation where it's like, dude, like, come on.
Like, think with the head on your neck. That's the thing.
It's like, that's just wrong to do. That's shitty to do.
What are you doing? Like, you're engaged to someone else.
You're talking someone else off a ledge, telling them that you are in love with this other person.
Right. And then you have sex with them. That is going to confuse a human being.
And also, what about that gets you going?
Yeah. Ending things with someone else. That's just very piggish.
It's disgusting. That's very piggish. So Stephanie's roommate at the time confirmed this and also said that John might have been done with Stephanie, but she certainly wasn't done with him.
Whenever she did date somebody, which was rare, she always compared them to John and said that they weren't as good for her as he was.
And he also, her roommate, knew that she would drop by to remind John that she was still around, just like when she dropped the skis off and all the other instances that Sherry's father had reported to the original detective.
So this really was a situation where when she said, I'm stopping by, and John was like, there really isn't, like, she doesn't, like, we don't have lunch together.
He was telling the truth. Technically, I guess.
Yeah. But I don't know, because that's what I'm saying.
Like, I don't really believe that. No, I think.
I believe there was some stringing along going on here.
I mean, having sex with her after you break up with her automatically is stringing her along.
But then I think it continued. And that's the thing.
Like, we can hope that that was the last time and that, like, she just held on to that.
But who knows? I'm not so sure. Either way, it's just.
I mean, I hope. What a fucked up situation.
For Sherry's sake that it ended there. You know?
Yeah. I hope for Sherry. I would hope that it didn't even happen.
But unfortunately, he did testify that it did.
Ugh. It's wild. What a messy, messy situation.
But when Stephanie realized that John wasn't going to leave Sherry, she ultimately lost it and brutally attacked and murdered somebody.
So Nels was called to the stand for the prosecution and recalled telling the police on multiple occasions to investigate Stephanie Lazarus and told the jury how many times he'd been dismissed.
It was clear to him that the LAPD was simply unwilling to investigate one of their own, and he also testified that his daughter had told him she was sure somebody in disguise was following her.
In the days and months leading up to her death.
She said she believed that it was a woman dressed as a boy.
And whoever it was, she said, had eyes that would look straight through someone.
Ooh. And check out Stephanie Lazarus's eyes.
Oh, I just looked it up. If you got a second.
Yeah. She's got like piercing. Yeah, her eyes are very unique.
Very unique eyes. They give a vibe. He had also heard from friends of Sherry's in the following years that actually Stephanie showed up everywhere Sherry went and that Sherry was scared of her.
What? Like, move on, girl. Seriously. Seriously.
Like, what the fuck? Like, I'm sorry. No one is that good.
No. No one's worth that. For you to end somebody else's life and throw your own away?
Like, it's... No. No. No. It's just not that good.
I don't care who you are. No. You can move on.
Now, John was also called to the stand, and he testified that Stephanie was most likely upset because she never got any closure from the end of their relationship.
Yeah. And that's why he slept with her that night.
He went to her house telling her he planned to marry Sherry.
To give her closure? He thought that was closure.
Wow. He said that he was stupid and young and also used those excuses to explain why he had sex with Stephanie two more times after Sherry had been killed.
Are you fucking kidding me? One of those instances was while they were both on vacation to Hawaii with other people.
I am baffled. Also, dude, you had sex. Like, now you know.
Yeah. You had sex with the woman who murdered your wife.
Like... In your home. And also, what are you doing?
You're the one that sat there and told the detectives to talk to her. obviously you felt some kind of something you were obviously you obviously knew that she had this in her yeah like if you're telling them to talk to her then you really believe she could have done this exactly you're not just gonna send the detectives after somebody being like yeah she's kind of like a kooky ex-girlfriend like maybe go run after her like no you have to be like you know what she could have done this yeah then you have sex with her two more times What is your deal, John?
I gotta go. What the fuck? I gotta go. Oy.
So that happened. And then the DA also presented the physical evidence, including not only the Costco sample, but the one following that, and also the fact that Stephanie's backup gun, the one that she had reported stolen just after the murder, matched the .38 caliber slugs that were removed from Sherry's body.
Jeez. And at that time, those were standard LAPD issue.
Oh, look at that. Crazy, huh? Wow. Then it was Stephanie's lawyer's turn to make his argument, which was going to be pretty hard to make, especially because of the DNA of it all.
I was going to say, you have your work cut out for you.
Yeah. He argued that John and Stephanie's relationship went much further than a casual fling, which, like, you can argue that all you want.
It did, in my opinion, and absolutely was more than casual.
Obviously, but that doesn't mean anything.
What defense is that? Yeah, if anything, that makes it worse.
Exactly. He said they went on trips together, they had sex many times.
Stephanie even considered it serious enough to get to know John's mom and his brother really well, and she believed that the two of them had a future together.
He argued also that there had been no hairs, fibers, or fingerprints at the scene that could be tied back to Stephanie, and nothing in Sherry's stolen car that could point back to her.
Except the bite mark that had her own saliva on it.
Yeah, there was that whole thing. How did your saliva end up on a murder victim?
Well... He said that the swab taken from the bite mark simply couldn't be trusted because over the course of almost 22 years, it had been mishandled by multiple agencies and had also sat on a shelf for two decades before it was even processed as evidence.
And isn't it wild that it matches the one suspect that makes the most sense?
Still, after all those years. My goodness, how DNA degrades strangely.
That it just turns into the perfect piece of evidence that fits with somebody who has every motive in the world and everything points to that person.
Precisely. Isn't that very convenient? So convenient.
Yeah, wow. Luckily, in the end, the DNA spoke for itself.
And on March 8, 2012, the jury began their three-day deliberation.
Ultimately, they found Stephanie Lazarus guilty.
Okay, you were giving me a face and I was like, I swear to you, if you tell me that she got off, I will riot in the streets.
I would be rioting in the streets. I would not be sitting here in this pod lab.
No, she was found guilty of first degree murder and she was sentenced to 27 years to life in prison.
Now, after sentencing, her lawyer filed an appeal saying that her right to do process had been violated.
Shut up. And that the trial court had made several errors relating to search warrants and allowing the DNA in in the first place, just like grasping at straws.
Shut up. The appeal was reviewed by the Second District Court of Appeals, and they found no prejudicial, it's so hard to say that, error, and upheld the court's guilty verdict.
They said, shut up. They said, generate silence.
Exactly. Now, Stephanie has filed many appeals since then, all of which have been denied.
As for Sherry's parents, Nels and Loretta, they still believe that a cover-up absolutely happened somewhere in the original investigation.
Absolutely. Same. And they filed a civil suit against the LAPD, but unfortunately it was dismissed and they were unsuccessful with appeals.
I'm shocked. John has since remarried and seems to live a quiet life, and her parents remain sure that he had no knowledge or didn't have any kind of involvement in her murder whatsoever.
I don't believe he did either. Neither do I. I really don't.
I think he made some stupid choices. I think it also probably sucks to have to sit at your wife's murder trial and talk about your fuck-ups that aren't murderous.
Like, you're just having to reveal... That you are being a shitty husband and a shitty person.
And it's like, who knows if his new wife was there at the trial and had to hear all of that.
Like, I'm sure that probably caused some issues at home.
That's rough. Yeah. But I agree. I mean, if her parents are sure, like, it makes sense.
That doesn't, from what you were saying, it doesn't really, like, stand out.
That he was, like, looking to get out of that marriage.
No, they don't even marry three months. He was looking to be with Stephanie.
I mean, there was definitely something weird going on there because he was still going afterwards.
Right. Yeah. I don't know. No, I don't think he was involved at all.
No, I don't either. I think he seemed, like, from all accounts, genuinely shocked to find her.
And I think it's terrible that he had to find his wife of three months like that.
You know, like, that's horrific. Yeah. And I think she was clearly...
Somewhere, you know, she's on a level that none of us will ever understand and shouldn't ever understand.
Yeah, Stephanie absolutely is. He obviously couldn't have known that either.
No. He could not have known that she is on that level.
But then it's like on top of it, it's like, dude, you knew she was like a little bit, you know, out to lunch here because you were mentioning her to go talk to her.
So it's like... And again, not that I'm blaming anything, but it's just like, oh man, what a mess.
And that's why you don't do this stuff. That's why you don't do this stuff.
That's why you don't cheat. It's always messy.
Separate. Be single and sleep with whoever you want.
Clear me. you're not capable of being married if you're doing that like two seconds after you ask somebody to marry you.
Like all I can hope is that like obviously people change.
So let's hope that. I mean they were in their 20s.
I was gonna say that's very early so like hopefully that's changed but it's like dude you were too young clearly.
Yes. Oh the whole thing is just a mess and poor Sherry.
I know. All she did was exist. and get married to someone she loved and be like an incredibly kind like wanted to change nursing throughout the nation like determined like she had so many goals that she never got to to get to because of stephanie all these every murder we talk about is senseless but like these kind of things are just like what the fuck right she just woke up that day Just existing.
Yep. Doing her own thing in her own house.
It's really wild. It's so sad. I'm really sad for her family.
But yes, that is the case of Sherry Rasmussen.
We hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep it weird.
But not so weird that you Stephanie Lazarus it.
Don't do that. Don't do anything like Stephanie did.
Also keep her behind bars. Rebel. Rebel.
If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.
Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com.
