this week on fox 10 "newsmakers sunday." we focus on the murder of actor bob crane, the most high profile murder committed in the valley. fox 10 has retested the original d.n.a. evidence in the case looking for answers. who killed bob crane? his murder in scottsdale in 1978 remains one of the top unsolved celebrity murderers -- murders of all time. he was best known for his role on "hogan's heros." the maricopa county attorney's office allowed me to retest the

murder case. tonight, we present our results to the world. >> it's the musterry behind bob crane's murder that haunts family and friends. >> during my career, i had a lot of big cases but the bob crane case tops them a. >> of all of the murder cases in the valley, this one keeps coming back. >> it seems to have taken on a life of its own. >> reporter: for five decades, bob crane has been a constant presence in our lives. the wise-cracking hogan adored by millions and his unsolved murder continues to fascinate. the physical evidence still

the maricopa county attorney's office. it is like opening a time capsule. bob crane's fingerprints taken in the morgue, his keys to his scottsdale apartment. his blood taken on that day. >> on that day in 1978. >> reporter: are we fortunate this >> reporter: this memo ordered that the evidence be destroyed. can you explain why it wasn't destroyed? >> no. >> reporter: so we lucked out. >> we did. >> back then, you needed amount of blood to determine d.n.a. and now it takes so little with the new sciences that we may be able to really figure this thing out. >> reporter: we will retest the d.n.a. contained in these vials and try to unlock the

>> what will this evidence tell us? as a prosecutor, i'm not afraid of the truth. >> reporter: we will send the d.n.a. to one of the top labs in the nation. in june of 1978, bob crane was performing in dinner theaters across the country still riding the popularity of "hogan's heros" but privately crane was obsessed with a consume him, taping him with women. >> this all-american image of him as colonel colonel hogan is not who we thought he was. >> reporter: he introduced him to this new technology. >> carpenter liked being in the limelight. he liked the benefit of having women that he would never have the opportunity to get.

with crane on the road. the two would pick up women and videotape their sexual exploits. >> it became a hobby that went too far. i think their friendship resolved around electronics and women. >> reporter: crane was performing at beginner's luck in scottsdale. carpenter met up with him. instead of staying with him as he had in the past, crane booked him in the >> towards the end of my dad's life, he was pulling away from carpenter. >> reporter: weeks before his death, he told his son he was tired of carpenter hanging around. >> i'm making changes. >> reporter: police believe that crane was severerring his relationship with carpenter and carpenter was angry. he was heard six days before his

my life. i will be 50 in two weeks. >> reporter: bob crane never made it to his 50th birthday. in the early morning hours of june 29, 1978, while bob crane was asleep, someone entered his bedroom and bludgeoned him to death. this never seen before video taken from inside bob apartment as the medical examiner shaves his head. >> we have two blows here. >> reporter: an electrical chord cut from a video was around his neck. >> there was no forced entry. >> reporter: focus turned to john carpenter.

the police never heard by the public. >> what i was under the impression, correct me if i'm wrong, that i was coming here to help you out, not put me in. >> reporter: the morning of the murder, carpenter flew back to l.a. the plan was for crane to drive him to the airport clearly noted in his day planner, john leaves, 10:00 a.m. he layed out items he planned to give carpenter that morning. carpenter's swim trunks unclaimed still in evidence. at the time crane's body was discovered before the outside world knew he was dead, john carpenter made suspicious phone calls back to scottsdale. >> he called the dinner theater at a time he knew that crane wasn't going to be there.

around asking him if he had seen him. >> reporter: he called bob crane's son. >> i'm back in town. let me know if you need anything. we're on the phone for 30 seconds. i do one of those where you look at the phone, why did he just call me? the trip is over. why would he call me? >> reporter: highly unusual? >> highly unusual. >> reporter: suspicious? >> suspicious. >> reporter: carpenter called a detective answered. this in your mind is a guilty person returning to the crime scene. >> absolutely. >> reporter: carpenter never asked why police were in crane's apartment because he knew the answer. blood was discovered in carpenter's rental car. >> how did the blood get in the

whose is it? how did it get there? >> reporter: can d.n.a. evidence prove who killed bob

on the afternoon of 1978, after bob crane was found bludgeoned to death in his apartment, that morning, john carpenter one of the last people to see um-hum alive left scottsdale and flew back to los angeles. before he left, he returned his rental car,. when scottsdale police searched it, they made a shocking discovery. police find seven blood stains

carpenter's rental car. it was immediately processed by d.p.s. and photographed. >> you're talking about a case in 1978 where blood typing was it that is all you can do with blood. >> reporter: d.n.a. testing was still 10 years away. carpenter was questioned about the blood. >> the blood that came from my car and when you said to me, why i didn't. i would never do that. >> this is the tube from carpenter's blood. >> reporter: that is john carpenter's blood? >> it is. >> reporter: taken when? >> 1978. >> reporter: still liquid. >> it is. >> reporter: police need to know whose blood is in the car. is it john carpenter's or bob crane's? >> you will have explaining to

>> reporter: he was fingerprinted that day signed by john carpenter. this is john carpenter's prints given to one of the investigates from scottsdale p.d. >> they are. >> reporter: exactly as they were. >> yes. >> reporter: he is one of three people whoever questioned carpenter. what were your impressions of the guy? >> he was stoic. he told me i had direct contact with bob bob crane's >> yes, we will get to that. >> first time i talked to him, we were dealing with a guy who would be hard to crack. >> reporter: did you think he was lying to you? >> yes. >> reporter: you felt he was deceptive? >> oh, yeah. >> reporter: the blood in the car was type b. same as bob crane found in only 9% of the population.

window planning his escape? type b. blood on the door. before d.n.a., there is no way to prove it came from bob crane with no murder weapon or eye witness. ron deen and the detective confront carpenter a second time never before heard. >> we're trying to talk t about the murder of bob crane. >> i think it is great but when you accuse me of killing my best friend, one of my best friends. >> i still think you did. >> fine, i'm not going to say another word. >> i don't know if you should say another word or not. >> i'm sorry. >> what do you mean you're sorry you killed him or do you think you deserve it? tell me about that. i think you're about ready to

right with it. what happened in scottsdale, arizona, to cause you to kill bob crane? >> reporter: it was the last time detectives would question john carpenter. 14 years would pass before he was charged from the crime. hidden from public view for 22 years, these are the original sections of the rental car. the missing pieces are where the blood was found. cutouts were tested separate times in the 1980's and 1990's. the cutouts stored for years in the sealed vials are what we will test in maryland, the same lab that performed d.n.a. testing in several high-case murder trials, o.j. simpson and bob crane. the county attorney's office will package the blood evidence.

and send it off like you would do in any case? >> yes. >> reporter: it hasn't been tampered with? >> no. >> reporter: with the advancements in d.n.a. science in the past 20 year, will our tests finally reveal who killed bob crane? next, john carpenter goes on trial. there is no doubt that john carpenter killed bob crane? >> no. >>reporter: theur doubts. what will the new d.n.a. tests

within days of bob crane's murder, police believe it was his close friend john carpenter. they believe that carpenter went into a rage because bob crane was about to end their friendship. attorneys thought the evidence was weak and they refused to put carpenter on trial. 12 years had passed. >> i'm not here to criticize the 1978 investigation. would it have been done differently today, absolutely. >> reporter: how frustrating was it when you thought you identified the killer and nothing was happening? >> it was hard to take in the beginning. >> reporter: in 1990, rick romly reopened the case. >> a lot of years had gone by. we lost evidence.

reigns who took it a fresh look. >> i had to treat it like it happened yesterday. >> reporter: they started from scratch. >> we reinterviewed everyone. >> reporter: all roads lead to john carpenter. no doubt? >> no doubt. reporter: the crime scene photos of a v-shaped blood stain helped detectives ideif murder weapon, a camera tripod. >> he layed the tripod over the bloody sheet and the top of the legs to the top of the tripod were the identical length to the wounds. >> reporter: the tripod seen in this photograph was missing from crane's apartment.

fled the murder scene and placed the bloody tripod in the rental car depositing the blood on the door. a photograph reveals a tiny red speck that pathologists determined was tissue from bob crane's battered skull. the sample was lost or never collected. you believe in your heart hearts john carpenter killed bob crane? >> absolutely. >> when you put it all together, the blood, the tissue, it had to be him. >> authorities in torrence, california, arrested john henry car carpenter on his way to work. >> reporter: he is arrested and charged with bob crane's murder. 16 years after the murder, john

d.n.a. testing was in its infancy. prosecutors could not prove the blood came from bob crane. how big of a deal was that to you guys? >> that was a big deal because that was the most crucial evidence they could have given us. >> mike lake was the foreman. >> if we had that from the car, he would have been found guilty. >> reporter: without a d.n.a. match, the jury found carpenter. >> first-degree. >> they wanted the d.n.a. in the end, we didn't have sufficient evidence to be able to get a guilty per verdict. >> reporter: when he was acquitted, how did you feel that day? >> just disgusted. >> my life is back together after 16 years. i'm sorry for breaking down but that is a lot of weight off of me. >> reporter: carpenter never took the stand.

until his tko*et -- death four years later. we recase the d.n.a. in the case. will it prove that john carpenter was the kill center. >> -- killer? >> reporter: the results of the d.n.a. test in the bob crane murder. is it possible that you chased the wrong guy for 40 years? >> sure, if it is somebody else's blood. if it is not crane's d.n.a., we have the wrong guy. >> everything points to john carpenter, yet, there is a nervousness. i guess it is the nature of being a prosecutor. there is no absolute certainties in this world. welcome back the moment of truth in the bob crane case. i am with people who lived and breathed this case for 40 years,

who prosecuted bob crane. the foreman of the jury and the investigator of the case from scottsdale p.d. and we're joined by john carpenter's attorney in oakland, california. thank you for being with us. several jurors told me if they had d.n.a. that proved the blood in the john carpenter's rental car was bob crane's they would have found him guilty. we retested using the latest d.n.a. science and this time around we got a result. we got a result. tonight, for for first time we're revealing those results to the world. the d.n.a. found on the door of

the test picked up two d.n.a. profiles, a major contributor is from a man, whose identity is unknown. second profile is a partial profile oo degraded to reach any conclusions. this is an explosive development. i think we went into this expecting this was going to come back john carpenter as the guilty man. bob c father's car. case closed. >> shocking. >> reporter: what do you make of this? >> i'm shocked right now. there were always two people in my mind, john carpenter or my stepmother for different reasons. it was on john's car. >> i think we're all frankly stunned. steve in oakland tonight, you have said from the beginning

your client did not kill bob crane. >> the reason i said that is i took an objective view of the evidence that we had at that time. i knew my cline and i stated from day one that he did not kill bob crane. this is wonderful news for his family. this is wonderful news for john who passed away to know he had finally been vindicated in a court of law but in the court public opinion. >> wouldn't we get something from bob crane from that sample? >> i don't believe so. >> it does not change your mind? >> not at all. >> you prosecuted this case. if you had this evidence in 1994, would you have gone forward with prosecuting john carpenter? if you had what we had tonight. >> information come to me that john carpenter is quite ill and

obligation that we would bring somebody to trial. all of the other evidence was pointing to john carpenter. >> michael, you rendered a verdict. again, we felt if we got a sample, it would be john carpenter's -- bob crane's blood in john carpenter's car. how do you feel about your verdict 22 yrs >> i agree with them. it could still be them. >> reporter: you still think john carpenter did it? >> yes, to come forward with conjecture that it is contaminated without evidence it is outrageous. >> i think a lot of us are stunned. i think we went into it thinking that. what do you make of that as you're hearing it that it might

someone unknown to us? >> john carpenter has always been number one in my mind. my stepmother patty, number two. they were going through a brutal divorce. it wasn't huge but nice. no one gained but patty. it was somebody that will he was comfortable with. he went to bed. he would not have gone to bed with somebody -- >> reporter: with a there is no violence in the apartment outside of the actual murder. nothing got tossed. >> we tested exactly what you guys tested in 1994, the same two sample. s. one of the samples, we got nothing off of, the blood was washed off of it. we got a hit on the second sample. you're doubting it. you're doubting the science, i know. >> i do.

from the beginning until the end. i wasn't able to watch how the evidence was handled when it was tested and the various locations that it went to. >> reporter: you're hearing this, final thought? >> my final thought is mr. lake and the jurors did the proper thing. they followed their oath. they said before we convict anybody who is presumed innocent of a crime of this magnitude, we need real evidence. what we're the evidence that you have now produced, which was not available to me when i tried the case, you have conclusive evidence that blood in the car was not mr. crane's. >> when i came to you a year and a half ago hoping to put some closure on this case, we get this result tonight. are you glad we did it? >> absolutely. i applaud you and your crew and the work you have done. everybody you gathered on tape

you have done your job. you have done great work. >> reporter: the mystery into who killed bob crane goes on and on. such an obsession i wrote a book about it. i've been working on it for a year. i offer my theories as to who killed bob crane. for more information go to whokilledbobcrane.com and you can sign up for the book and interviews. thanks for joining us on

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