DNA Clues ROCK New Mom Murder Mystery: Report

We are finally following potentially a big development in the case of the New Jersey mom found stabbed to death inside her home. There's one everywhere. It has been more than five months and still no arrest in the case of Brooke Hanley. But there's a new report claiming that investigators found DNA under her fingernails. They also just recently returned to her home and took some very specific items from the house. This is the place where she used to live with her husband and child. Who the DNA may belong to and what it means for an investigation that remains very much a mystery, almost half a year later. We're on the case presented by Law and Crime. I'm Kristen. It is incredible that it has been more than five months and not only do we not have an arrest in the case of Brooke Hanley. Investigators have been so tight-lipped about what they may or may not have in this case. They have released the 911 call and it's really hard to listen to because you are listening to a husband who says he found his wife stabbed multiple times inside their home. I don't know what to do. What the ****? What the ****? Brooke Hanley's husband has denied having anything to do with what happened to his wife. We have the autopsy report for Brooke Hanley and her death has been categorized as a homicide. But other than that, we haven't had a lot to go on for the five months that this investigation has gone on and you can imagine the people who live near the Hanley's are very concerned about who may be responsible for what happened to this young mom. But we may have just learned a critical piece of evidence that was found during this investigation because there's a new report alleging that there was DNA found under Brooke Hanley's fingernails. We'll share more about what that may mean for this investigation here in just a moment. At the same time, last week, we saw investigators once again at Brooke Hanley's home. Now, there have been reports out there saying that Brooke Hanley's husband solos the property. People have reported seeing him there doing yard work. But this was really the first police activity we had seen in some time at this home in Morris County, New Jersey. On the fifth, not only were police at the house, there were witnesses who say they saw items being taken from the home. Fox News Digital says that the items were wrapped in brown paper and evidence tape. And the outlet also says that officers were there taking what appeared to be a big bed comforter from a second story window. Witnesses told People magazine that it seemed like officers took a laundry hamper, a bed frame, and a bedside table. And they also saw what they think is a large frame which could have been a piece of walleye. Brooke Hanley's husband was reportedly there as investigators took items from the house. Again, he's not having anything to do with his wife. But it has been very difficult to cover this story because authorities have been radio silence when it comes to this investigation. And I'll show you the autopsy report here in a moment. It is heavily redacted. And that has been par for the course with how authorities have investigated this case. She was found dead in her home in June. And we're going to talk about this DNA development here in just a moment. But let's go back to how this case started. That's the voice of Brooke's husband who made a 911 call run 430 in the afternoon on June 6th. This couple lived in Chester Township, New Jersey. Nice quiet suburb, place where people go and raise a family away from the hustle and bustle of New York City. At the time of Brooke's death, this couple had a one year old baby, which is incredibly sad. And the autopsy report says that Brooke at the time of her death was wearing green shorts and a green tank top. June 6 was a Saturday. And it just seems like she was wearing a casual outfit for the summer. Chester Township, is that correct? Okay, is there a floor apartment of room numbers as a private home? Okay, tell me exactly what happened. I know you said your wife is a party. Okay, she's not breathing her conscious. You hear Brooke's husband there saying that she has a laceration on her chest. The medical examiner said an autopsy found her cause of death to be multiple sharp force injuries and her man or a death was ruled a homicide. We're getting up there to stand the line in this more information. Okay. She is bleeding and she's not okay. Okay. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. All right, the parents have been sent to stay in the line. If there's a defabulate available, send someone to get it now and tell me when you have it, sir. No, I don't have one. I don't have one. I don't have one. Not available. Okay. Okay, please put your phone on speaker. Speaker so your hands are free to help us or? It's on speaker. It's on speaker. Are you not moving? No, please. I'm not moving. No, no, no, no. All right. Listen carefully and I'll tell you how to do chest compression. So, place the heel of your hand on the breastbone in the center of the chest. Right between the nipples. I'm sorry. What was that? There's blood everywhere. Okay. Can you place the hand of the heel of your hand on the breastbone in the center of the chest right between the nipples and put the other hand on top of that? Yep. Okay. All right. Pump the chest hard and fast at least twice per second and two inches deep. Okay. Let the chest come all the way up between pumps. We're going to do this 600 times or until help can take over. Okay. Count out loud so I can count with you. Okay. One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four keep going. One, two, three, four. Sir, try and take a deep breath, sir. Try and take a deep breath, sir. Hello, sir. Are you still doing the chest compression, sir? Keep going, sir. They're getting there as quick as they can, sir. - Know as you hear the dispatcher leading Brooks husband through chest compressions, you can also hear him yelling to his wife on the call. - One, two, three, four. - I need you. I need you. - Try and take a deep breath, sir. Three, four. - Four, one, two, three, four. - Three, four. - And sorry, I know you said where are you in the house? - A second, four. - A second, four. - Okay, okay, keep going. - Four. - I got this, I got this, you got it. Come on, baby. Come on, come on. - Keep going, sir. - One, two, four. - What the fuck happened? - And where's there a big, a large country? - There's one on a repress. There's one on a repress. - Okay, okay. Just keep going, sir. - Four. - Four. - Four. - Okay. Keep going, sir. We have responders pulling up. Just keep going until they take over. (beep) - One, two, three, four. Just keep going, they're right outside. Just keep going until they take over, okay? You're doing a great job, sir. Do you set the front doors open, sir? - Yes. - Okay, I'll update the responders. [Music] Keep going until they take over sir. Keep going until they take over. Are those the responder sir? Okay, you can speak with them sir, okay? It is really difficult to listen to if Brooks Husband truly just found his wife and she had been stabbed to death multiple times and he's been raised to make us believe otherwise and he's yelling, "I need you, I need you." And you hear him say this over and over again as it appears he's trying to perform CPR. Now at the end of the call, you can hear him tell the first responders that he "found her." And we also hear in that part that Brooks is on the second floor of the house. So you also think of where the bed comforter was coming from. Some of the items that seemed to be from a bedroom that were reportedly just taken from the Hamlin's home. And one one call lasted six minutes and 38 seconds. We know that Brooks Husband has denied his involvement because the Daily Mail eventually got in touch with them and asked if he had anything to do with what happened to his wife and he said, "Of course not." Now one of the major questions now is who may have also been in touch with Brook Hamlin, who may have also been in the home when Brook Hamlin was killed. The Daily Mail is reporting that there's a source that has told them that DNA was found under Brook's fingernails and here's the twist. The DNA reportedly does not belong to Brook and it doesn't belong to her husband. This source told the outlet that law enforcement put that sample through the FBI's national database and it did not get a match. So that means that this person who potentially does DNA belongs to, if authorities have it, is somebody who's never been convicted of a crime or detained. And if you've been following the Nancy Guthrie case, which I know is a very different case than what we're talking about here in New Jersey, you would be very familiar with how CODIS works because DNA has been such a big part of that investigation, which is ongoing. So the investigator Joseph Scott Morgan, regular here on the case, one of the best in talking about DNA and forensics. He's going to be here in just a moment to walk us through what this may mean. Now we do have Brook Hamlin's autopsy. That was recently released. It is seven pages long, but you can't really learn a lot from it because it is heavily redacted. It's clear from what is not redacted in this report that the corner believes that Brook Hamlin was stabbed seven times. It also says that she died of sharp force injuries and her manner of death was ruled homicide. But beyond that, police have not said much in this case, they have not said whether they have any suspects, they haven't said whether they have cleared any suspects. But the other Brook Hamlin's husband is a suspect in this case, but it does appear he has been cooperative throughout the investigation. But when you think about who Brook Hamlin may have been in touch with, it is important to talk about what she did for a living. She was a psychotherapist. We found an online profile for her that said she was known for quote providing a warm supportive and nonjudgmental environment. It was a licensed mental health counselor in New Jersey, according to WebMD, a psychotherapist, which is the specific type of mental health care provider that she was, helps people manage emotional issues, mental health problems or just difficult parts of life. So she did heavy work. So you do have to wonder who were the people that came in contact with her and what were they going through at the time that Brook Hamlin was allegedly killed. So when you take down potentially these developments in the Brook Hamlin case, Joseph Scott Morgan, Professor of Applied Forensics at Jacksonville State University, and of course you can find him body bags now on YouTube as well, the host of that always great to have you on the show. When you look at this and we hear and this is from the daily mail, there has not been a lot of developments in this case, but the mail has been pretty on top of the story from the beginning. If they were able to find DNA under Brook Hamlin's nails or fingernails, what does that tell you? And it goes back to a principle in forensic science that we talked about is literally called individualization seems rather simplistic, but when you think of the clarity that it lends, you cannot and Lakart's principle as well, you cannot interact with something in your environment without picking up a trace of it. And that's kind of a low down dirty truth, people don't want to think about you sit down in a chair, you stand up and if anybody's DNA is left in the chair, you're going to get it could could transfer to your body, but we're talking about beneath fingernails, that's something a little bit different. We're not talking about the pads of the fingers, we're talking about actual contact where you have to get under that edge, that leading edge, the nail. And you know, Chris, one of the things I'm curious about this development, I want to know, and this is something we do in the more we make note of from where we take the sample, so just let me break it down to you how this would have been collected and it'll give you kind of an insight each finger, the nails are scraped. If folks out there are familiar with like a wooden cuticle press that you can, you know, you see people working on their nails, it looks similar to that it comes in each one of these kids, you scrape beneath the nail. Then we have nail clippers just like you would buy at the drugstore, you clip the nail and you retain that that's individually packaged okay so. If we have 10 fingers well thumbs right and we have contact which of those sources did they collect this DNA from is it a single like this or is it double like this or is it like almost like a claw like a defensive get away from me i'm scratching. You know you could I guess it could be argued that you could take a single a single derivative you know kind of pulling off that way and it would be less compelling but if you've got it under multiple multiple sites here, I think that that's that's going to be interesting the trick is how do they tie that DNA recovered. That's too a specific individual and also how robust is this DNA sample are we talking about touch DNA or are we talking about where we've actually got tissue you know where they scrape something away from from a person that may have been in her space at that particular time. The allegations and just how she how brookanland died is horrific you know the idea that she was stabbed multiple times yes and when I you know read you know that there was DNA reportedly under those fingernails like I was thinking like this is a struggle right this is somewhat who's fighting for their life. It's only mean that though because according to this article there is this is a third person that you have brookanland you have her husband who's denied being involved in this he's the one who calls 911 and then you have this mystery individual that they have the DNA for and they don't know who it is apparently. The fact that they have the DNA does that mean like how likely is it that we're talking about this being a suspect that this is someone who she was she was struggling with how do you know if it's that as opposed to a handshake that she gave to someone or you know of and i'm kind of just going off here but like a friend earlier said hey can you scratch my back and and she does it that way like how do you know if that DNA is actually someone who might have had something to do with brook staff okay it would be it's analogous to. Going up to a wall that's got chipping paint on it and you might brush up against it and get a bit of the chip paint been you know on your surface alright that would be deposition that would be kind of passive. When you're talking about getting DNA from beneath the nails we go back to the example of the wall is almost like a paint scraper where you're like scraping it's an action event we're doing this and again that's why I go back to how many how many of of the fingers and the nails were involved in this did they get it from multiple sides that's why it's really important that when you're collecting these you keep each one separate and they would have packaged each one of these separate. So we can if you can begin to think about the the nail. That corresponds to that particular finger what was the action that was going on here are you you know if it's a pinky nail as opposed to say all all five all five nails scraping the body. Then you've got these sources inoculated with all of that DNA are we talking about rolled up skin here are we talking about bits of hair maybe even blood that's contained and that goes to the level of violence here too right if you're getting if this is a blood source DNA that you're getting out of this we're talking about a deep injury. on that person. Also, that's a major clue, right? So if she's interacting with somebody in a violent manner and there is enough contact, enough contact with that source, they're going to have marks on them. And I think that the police will go into this and anybody that they're questioning, and like you said, they've done a very good job of kind of really playing us close to the vest. And I think that they should, you know, she's a therapist. So she's got a lot of folks in her circle. And it might not be a patient or a client could be somebody peripherally associated with someone, could be someone that thought that she had money in her in her house or on a person or some or could be just somebody that had specifically targeted her because they're angry or obsessed with her. The next step, so I would think given the technology that we have now, Chris, is there going to take that sample because if I am not mistaken, have they tried, they have gone through Kodus and I think that they've got a negative hit on Kodus at this point in time. Yeah, there's been nothing. And I remember, I mean, we talked about Nancy Guthrie, you know, a lot. And I think for people who, you know, maybe don't follow true crime all the time. And maybe, you know, kind of tune in for some of these bigger stories, like we all became very aware of Kodus and what that is throughout the Guthrie investigation. And so they have this, according to this article, they have this DNA sample, this mystery person, they put it into Kodus. There's nothing that that comes up. And yeah, what does that mean? Like, I don't know. I mean, I'm dying to say this at get excited about, you know, thinking about what they can do with it, depending upon how robust that sample is, and they're saying they have DNA. And if they put it into Kodus and they have enough sample that they've burned it up, familial DNA, dude. I mean, we're talking about forensic genetic genealogy here. But you would need a suspect to be able to, or like an idea of who the person may be. Derive that from the sample itself. You plug that into an open source database, you know, like our friends down at Authrom do, you know, you plug that into that open source database. And you've got like a fourth, fifth or sixth cousin point in their finger at you. That's, that's powerful. I mean, that's a powerful investigative tool. So with that said, and this thing is kind of creeping along at this point, Chris, I'm really wondering if maybe that's not what's going on here. You know, and yeah, yeah, go ahead. No, please. Well, it's going to just ask because this happened in June. And, you know, to the credit of law enforcement in New Jersey. And especially when you're in the New York City area, you feel like someone has a leak somewhere, you know, there's always information that comes out, you know, just with some of the outlets, what, you know, whoever covered these cases and like we haven't heard a thing. I mean, this is it, you know, this is about it in terms of like big developments in this, in this investigation is this article. How long does it take if you have this sample to put it into code us, you don't get a hit. And then if you want to go, you know, with another organization that maybe does the, the, the genetic genealogy, like, how long does it take to get your answers there? Well, I think that that's dependent upon how long they kept it with code us and working that angle. How long did it take it to get through that pipeline first? Then after that is done and done, right? Because you don't want to run to that expenditure after you have exhausted, exhausted the potential with, with code us. So once they have said, not a, we're not getting, we don't have, we don't have anybody in our database that marries up with that. We're now going to seek out whoever it is. And, you know, there's a couple of, I think, Parabond, you've got off from a couple of these places out there. Who are they, who do they have contracts with in order to facilitate this? And also at the urging of local law enforcement, who is it? Who is it that's going to really press this thing forward and say, we want this bumped up to the front of the line? This is a very, you know, you're talking about how leaks and all this sort of thing. That's again, that's why I'm kind of amazed by this. This is a high profile case. You know, we're talking about a person that is seeing clients out there. And it's kind of, it's quite terrifying. You know, you can imagine anybody that was part of her clientele that she had counseled in the past, had contact with her. And not just from the perspective that they, they could be individuals that would be looked at. But also, you're in the space with somebody if, if this turns out to be one of the clients or when somebody that's associated with him, that makes it all the more terrifying. Are they going to go try to find another therapist now to do this? Because it's very specific, you know, who who's going to target her? I mean, and why, you know, and I hate the wide question. But what would be the motivation to take her out? She's, you know, a mother, a wife, the husband has been cooperative. He has stated multiple times that he is staying in contact with the police. I think the police have confirmed that. And as you know, in all of these cases, we're going to look to the intimate's first. Anybody who's in that intimate circle, that's who we're going to chat with. But he's, you know, it's not like he's disappeared into the mist of time here. He's still here. So I think that the DNA is is going to be the key. I find it interesting. This recent search warrant or this recent investigative trip, we'll say it's the police have taken back to that location. And Chris, it's not like they're just carrying out one or two things. I mean, they're carrying out things like the bedding, headboard. We're talking about picture frames, tons of paper bags, you know, all kinds of things. There was even a laundry hamper that was being taken out. What would they be doing with that? Because you would think in the weeks after, I'm sure that they, you know, crime scene investigators, you know, they gather information, but like why five months later, are they now digging it out of the house? Yeah. So I think maybe if there is, they're looking for a cleanup, that would be my first thing. Okay. Like did anybody attempt to clean up in this environment? The laundry hamper is a curious choice here. Because, you know, you put dirty clothes into a hamper, you don't wash the hamper, you wash the clothes that come out of the hamper to go into the washing machine. Why the hamper, you know, is there any kind of contact trace on the inner of the outer portion of that on the headboard as well? Maybe they have a DNA profile which they would, you know, if they've run it through code, is they're going to have some kind of semblance of a profile? Well, are they finding that same unknown profile at any of these other locations in the house? And if they are, that implies another kind of relationship to the scene, the body, somebody that spent time in that environment, how old is this sample? Where does it come from? Point of origin, you know, because you're, you know, you're talking about intimate spaces in somebody's life here. It's not like, you know, you're sitting on the sofa in the family room, you know, watching television, you got a buddy over watching a football game, what if the case might be, we're talking about somebody's laundry room, their bedroom, those are very, very intimate spaces. So yeah, I've got questions about what they're taking out of that house. And it's not, it's not just like a couple of things they took out. It was robust. Robust and specific, because like you think of like a hamper, you know, like they, I mean, clearly when you have a search warrant, you know, specifically what you're going in for. It's not just picking items off a shelf saying, hey, this looks good, but, you know, it was interesting. It was interesting to see the development. He, the husband of Brooklyn was at according to multiple reports. He was there while going for some executing this. They apparently sold in the home. And he's been seen at the house multiple times. But it's just, it is interesting. Five months, still not a lot of information seems like they, you know, at least from a DNA perspective, if this story is accurate, that they're working that angle. And we'll see what happens next. Joseph Scott Morgan, always great to have you on long crime. Good to see you Chris. That'll do it for on the case presented by law and crime. I'm Chris Stewart. See you next time.