Serial Killer Documentary - Kenneth Jackson

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On September the 13th, 2007, a woman's body was found
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in the burnt-out remains of a stolen van in Hillsborough County, Florida.
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When she was jogging in the early morning darkness, he
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abducted her and dragged her into a secluded location just
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off of a main roadway where he raped her and
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stabbed her to death.
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She did nothing wrong.
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She was just a victim of an evil person.
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Investigators were struggling to find any clues, but the killer's
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loose lips soon led detectives to his door.
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When the news came on about a body, he seemed
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kind of excited about the whole conversation. It was almost
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as if he had more information than what she even
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heard on the TV.
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The man in question was unemployed 25-year-old Kenneth Jackson.
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Kenneth Jackson showed absolutely no remorse for what he had done.
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He's a psychopathic killer.
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He was so proud of what he'd done that he
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had to talk about it.
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Kenneth Jackson had inadvertently revealed himself as one of the
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world's most evil killers. On June 5th, 2013, 30-year-old Kenneth
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Jackson was sentenced to death after being found guilty of
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murdering mother of three, Cooke Tran. He'd ambushed her while
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she was out on an early morning run in her
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hometown of Sefna, a small community just outside Tampa in Florida.
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We're talking about a very small area of Florida. So
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you can imagine that a murder would send shockwaves through
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that small community. They were literally horrified.
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I think the impact only reinforced the notion that women
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aren't safe running alone in the dark.
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They're an easy target.
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No matter how many self-defense classes they may take or
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they may carry a pepper spray, it's not enough. It's
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just the element of surprise and the strength of the
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predator is too much for any woman to overcome.
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Kenneth Jackson showed no remorse for taking the life of
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an innocent woman.
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He had no emotion to the fact that this was
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a woman with school-age children that she was working to
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take care of.
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He didn't have respect for.
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Life in general, he didn't seem to care. Everything was
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only about himself at all times.
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This killer story begins on June 26th, 1982. Kenneth Ray
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Jackson was born in Hillsborough County, Florida. He was the
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product of an inappropriate and unlawful relationship.
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It's hard to imagine a less satisfactory childhood than Kenny Jackson's.
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His mother, when he was conceived, was 14. Her partner
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at the time was 28. She gave him up, effectively,
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at the age of six months to her mother, his grandmother,
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and her boyfriend.
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Kenny did have a rough upbringing. He was moved around
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from different family members. He suffered some abuse when he
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was growing up, physical abuse. He saw a lot of abuse.
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And it wasn't just at home where Jackson had a
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difficult time.
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Probably inevitably, Jackson's school reports reflected that he was aggressive,
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he was belligerent in class, he was just a really,
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really difficult boy.
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His teachers raised concerns about his behavior, about the way
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he was turned out when he came to school, and
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they had huge difficulties finding who his guardians even were,
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who it was who was supposed to be looking after
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this child. I don't think he had any stability in
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his life, so not surprising that he turned towards criminality.
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In 2003, at the age of 21, Kenneth Jackson was
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sentenced to five years in prison after a spate of
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car thefts. He was released four years later on July
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the 26th, 2007, and headed to the small residential community
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of Sefna in Hillsborough County.
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When he got out of prison, he ended up moving
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in with a couple, the O'Neills, Linda and Wally O'Neill,
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and they allowed him to move into the trailer with them.
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Wally was Jackson's grandmother's old boyfriend. the boyfriend who'd been
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with his grandmother when he arrived with her at the
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age of six months. Although they must have had a
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very strange relationship, it was probably the only place in
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which Kenny Jackson felt at home.
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On September 13, 2007, 12 miles away in the neighboring
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town of Gibsonton, Hillsborough County Fire Rescue were called to
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a van engulfed in flames at 7 o'clock in the morning.
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What they discovered when they got there was a scene
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of unimaginable horror.
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When the fire department put the vehicle fire out, they
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discovered a body inside. That, of course, triggered phone calls
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to the homicide section, and supervisors had detectives respond to
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the area. So I went down to the Gibsonton area.
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At that point, I was assigned to be the lead
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detective on the case.
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The body was charred beyond recognition. It was literally a mess.
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With no identification to be found on the charred remains,
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detectives turned their attention to the burnt-out car.
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I was told at the time that they had recovered
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a license plate off of the vehicle, and, of course,
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that was a start. We were able to make contact
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with the owner. We learned that the vehicle had been
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listed at the gentleman's job site as for sale. It
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had been parked in the parking lot there. He worked
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part-time at an auto parts store, repairing it to sell it.
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He had a sign for sale in the window. After
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we determined that this vehicle must have been stolen, we
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had the van taken back to our crime scene offices
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at the sheriff's office. But during this time, during the
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course of the day, there were other events unfolding that
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I wasn't immediately aware of.
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In a seemingly unrelated incident 12 miles north of the
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torch car, a discovery had been made in the grounds
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of a church in Sefna.
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The sergeant was notified that there were some clothing items, shoes,
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and some blood that had been located in front of
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the St. Francis Church on 579 north of MLK.
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There had been a yard crew, and they had actually,
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in mowing the lawns, found this bloody clothing, and a
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sheriff's officer deputy had gone out there, and they had
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recovered some of that clothing and items that were left behind.
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At this stage, police were unsure about whether these two
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events were connected until a panicked young man contacted them
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for help.
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Three in the afternoon or so, I received a call
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from my dispatch saying there was a young man there
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who was looking for his mother, and she'd been missing,
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that she had left early in the morning and had
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never came back. We had this person that we believed
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was a female and could not identify at that point.
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It's like, yeah, we need to check this out.
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Where they were calling in from was just north of
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where that St. Francis Church was and where the clothes
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and the blood was located. I went up there, and
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I looked at the area, and that was when it
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was very evident that there was not a little bit
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of blood. Somebody had died there.
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The missing woman was 50-year-old Vietnamese immigrant Cuc Tran. Meanwhile,
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more information was coming through about the unidentified body found
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in the van. It was becoming increasingly likely that the
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missing person's report and the body were connected.
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It appeared she had Asian features. And in learning that
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this was an Asian male that was reporting his missing
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Asian mother, of course, everyone was starting to think, this
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is our woman. I asked for some details about some
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particular jewelry because this body that was burned up in
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the van still had lots of jewelry on.
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We were able to link jewelry from pictures in the
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house to what was on her person. So at this
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point in time, we were pretty positive that Cooke Tran
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was our victim.
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The small community of Cefna was left in shock. Detectives
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had no clue who had committed this terrible crime, but
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the killer was about to make a huge mistake that
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would lead police straight to his door. On the morning
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of September 13th, 2007, in Hillsborough County, Florida, a pile
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of bloodied clothes had been discovered in the grounds of
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a church. 12 miles away, the charred remains of a
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woman had been found inside a burning van. Detectives believed
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her to be 50-year-old Vietnamese immigrant Cuc Tran from the
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town of Cefna.
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She was a mother of three.
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She had an older son who was off at college,
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a 16-year-old that was going to high school, and a 10-year-old.
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She worked a full-time job as a nail technician, She
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lived at home in a trailer park, and she would
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get up very early in the morning to try to
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find a little bit of time for herself to go
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for a walk or a jog to try to take
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care of herself.
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Cooke Tran had settled in Hillsborough County after leaving her
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homeland in search of a better life.
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Her and her husband were part of the exodus from
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Vietnam in the 70s and 80s, after the communists took
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over South Vietnam after the Vietnam War.
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It sounded like a pretty horrific struggle after the war
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for her and her children and her husband to come here.
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For Mrs. Tran to leave a war zone and come
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to the United States was an example.
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Of the American dream.
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She was escaping violence of the war and coming to
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a country where people are believed to be safe and
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given opportunity.
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For Cook Tran, however, the United States was far from
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the safe haven she'd hoped for, and her life had
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been cut short in the most brutal way. With no
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immediate suspects, police started to look into Cook Tran's life
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for clues.
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There were some issues with her marriage. They weren't necessarily
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living together, but they were still good friends. Both parents
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were still very much focused on taking care of the kids.
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She would get up, do some exercise. Her husband would
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come by in the mornings, help get the kids ready
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for school. She would get back from her morning exercise routine,
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and she would get them to school, and then she
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would go to work. She was a responsible employee, got
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along well with everyone. She was evidently well-liked by her customers.
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She did nothing wrong. She was just a victim of
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an evil person.
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Cook Tran's daily morning run would take her past St.
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Francis Church in Sefna.
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It was a very large church property where it had
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quite a bit of open land between the roadway and
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the church itself.
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If a car was going by at 5 in the morning,
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they wouldn't see you down there.
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Detectives started working on the theory that Cooke Tran was
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ambushed by her killer while she was out on her
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morning run.
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She had a routine. She would run at 5 a.m.
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in the morning before work. This was her only free time.
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It was really the only time she had to herself,
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which was even more tragic. That's all she had, and...
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She never dreamed that there was this predator waiting.
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There for her.
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This isn't an area where there'd be lots of women
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to choose from. So this person had probably gone to
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that area before, checked it out, waited around, seen how
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many people were around, whether they were likely to get caught.
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I don't think that this was opportunistic. I think this
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was targeted.
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We wanted to get the guy. I mean, that's the
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whole goal, right? You want to solve this thing.
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Detectives were convinced that Cooke Tran was killed in the
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grounds of the church and then her body driven away
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in the van that was found on fire 12 miles away.
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The autopsy confirmed the horrific circumstances of her death.
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The medical examiner was able to determine there were multiple
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stab wounds in the neck. The carotid artery had been cut.
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One of the stab wounds had cut through the victim's
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windpipe and would have probably prevented sufficient air from being
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able to go through the vocal cords so that she
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could vocalize.
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She was dead before the fire ever started. There was
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no soot in the windpipe or carbon monoxide in the blood.
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The autopsy also discovered a possible motive for the crime.
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She had been raped.
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The medical examiner had collected blood slides and the vaginal
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swabs and all for DNA, but we didn't have any
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comparisons at that point.
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Usually when people use fire to destroy a body, it's
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because they want to eliminate any forensic evidence at all.
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They think, I'm never going to get caught because I
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have destroyed every single piece of evidence. Well, fire doesn't
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always destroy every piece of evidence. This would have been
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an overconfidence, I think, in that person.
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Desperate to find Cootran's killer, detectives started to hand out
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flyers in the trailer park where she'd lived, appealing for
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information from her neighbors.
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There was probably 100 or so trailers In this trailer park,
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we went house to house, handing the flyers out, talking
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to neighbors. There was one trailer that I actually stopped at,
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which was within eyeshot of where the victim's house was,
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00:16:37.429 --> 00:16:41.250
her trailer. And there was an elderly individual that was there,
249
00:16:41.269 --> 00:16:44.570
a man, who was very inquisitive as to why I
250
00:16:44.610 --> 00:16:49.710
was there. So I finished walking through. It was extremely
251
00:16:49.750 --> 00:16:52.940
hot out that day. I was thirsty, so I decided
252
00:16:53.000 --> 00:16:55.659
to go to the gas station at the corner of
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00:16:55.840 --> 00:16:58.659
MLK and 579, which is just to the south of
254
00:16:58.700 --> 00:17:02.460
where St. Francis Church was. And I walk in, I
255
00:17:03.179 --> 00:17:05.829
get my drink, and I'm soaking wet. I've got a
256
00:17:05.910 --> 00:17:09.190
shirt tie. I walk up, I pay, and all of
257
00:17:09.210 --> 00:17:12.230
a sudden, something hit me of saying, you know what,
258
00:17:12.670 --> 00:17:15.289
I'm going to go get a flyer. I come back,
259
00:17:15.349 --> 00:17:17.769
I give the flyer to the clerk. As I start
260
00:17:17.809 --> 00:17:21.400
talking to her, she starts explaining how There was this
261
00:17:21.559 --> 00:17:26.259
individual who was in the store, and when the news
262
00:17:26.319 --> 00:17:30.500
came on about a body and an investigation, he seemed
263
00:17:30.599 --> 00:17:34.180
kind of excited about the whole conversation and the subject
264
00:17:34.240 --> 00:17:36.900
matter and everything that was being said, but also it
265
00:17:36.940 --> 00:17:39.269
was almost as if he had more information than what
266
00:17:39.329 --> 00:17:41.430
she even heard being said on the TV.
267
00:17:42.569 --> 00:17:44.589
But really what stuck out to her was he was
268
00:17:44.630 --> 00:17:48.130
telling her he had seen Cooktron jogging, and the only
269
00:17:48.170 --> 00:17:50.670
time she did that was very early in the morning
270
00:17:51.109 --> 00:17:54.170
right around 5, 5.30 in the morning. And that's when
271
00:17:54.210 --> 00:17:56.490
she was abducted. So that was pretty critical.
272
00:17:58.039 --> 00:18:01.859
The stranger's story confirmed what the police already knew about
273
00:18:01.940 --> 00:18:06.299
Cootran's morning routine, but it wasn't information they'd released to
274
00:18:06.339 --> 00:18:06.880
the public.
275
00:18:07.480 --> 00:18:10.779
This guy's talking, and he's saying things that really haven't
276
00:18:10.799 --> 00:18:11.700
been publicly made.
277
00:18:12.920 --> 00:18:17.339
So that's a clue. That was a very.
278
00:18:17.200 --> 00:18:22.130
Strong, okay, we need to jump on this And that
279
00:18:22.190 --> 00:18:23.150
started the ball rolling.
280
00:18:26.210 --> 00:18:28.549
I started asking her questions. Well, you know, who is
281
00:18:28.589 --> 00:18:32.390
this individual? Do you know where he lives? And she
282
00:18:32.430 --> 00:18:38.299
proceeds to tell me that his name's Kenny and he
283
00:18:38.500 --> 00:18:40.660
had just gotten released from prison. So I asked her,
284
00:18:40.940 --> 00:18:42.740
what did he go to prison for? Do you know?
285
00:18:43.720 --> 00:18:47.890
And she said, I think Grand Theft Auto. At this
286
00:18:47.950 --> 00:18:51.549
point in time now in the investigation, we know that
287
00:18:51.589 --> 00:18:54.009
the van that was burned with our victim in it
288
00:18:54.710 --> 00:18:58.029
was stolen from the advanced auto parts literally two blocks
289
00:18:58.509 --> 00:19:01.250
from where I was standing at the gas station and
290
00:19:01.730 --> 00:19:05.599
just south of where the victim was murdered. I said,
291
00:19:05.759 --> 00:19:07.460
where does he live? Do you know anything about him?
292
00:19:07.839 --> 00:19:10.099
She said, yeah, he lives in the trailer park north
293
00:19:10.160 --> 00:19:10.480
of here.
294
00:19:12.420 --> 00:19:16.119
It turned out that this man, Kenny, lived in exactly
295
00:19:16.140 --> 00:19:18.279
the same trailer park as Cook Tran.
296
00:19:19.759 --> 00:19:23.140
Detectives finally had a breakthrough in the case, but all
297
00:19:23.200 --> 00:19:26.109
they had to go on was a single name, Kenny.
298
00:19:26.730 --> 00:19:29.730
They knew they had to find this man and fast
299
00:19:29.990 --> 00:19:44.180
before he killed again. On September 19th, 2007, six days
300
00:19:44.339 --> 00:19:48.440
after the murder of 50-year-old Cooke Tran in Hillsborough County, Florida,
301
00:19:48.819 --> 00:19:54.380
Detectives have therefore... lead. A man called Kenny, who'd aroused
302
00:19:54.400 --> 00:19:57.680
the suspicion of a gas station clerk when talking to
303
00:19:57.720 --> 00:20:00.900
her about the murder, lived in the same trailer park
304
00:20:01.089 --> 00:20:05.269
as the victim. Troy was reminded of a strangely inquisitive
305
00:20:05.329 --> 00:20:07.650
man he'd interviewed at the trailer park.
306
00:20:08.359 --> 00:20:10.180
Now all of a sudden, the red flags start going
307
00:20:10.240 --> 00:20:12.720
off even more because now I realize, wait a minute,
308
00:20:13.299 --> 00:20:16.099
I wonder if this Kenny guy is the guy that
309
00:20:16.259 --> 00:20:19.180
I was sitting there asking myself. This guy's awful nosy.
310
00:20:19.220 --> 00:20:21.279
He's asking, like, a lot of detailed questions.
311
00:20:22.609 --> 00:20:25.970
Troy made his way back to the trailer park. The
312
00:20:25.990 --> 00:20:30.190
man he'd previously spoken to was Wally O'Neill, who'd once
313
00:20:30.250 --> 00:20:34.869
been in a relationship with Kenny's grandmother. Wally confirmed that
314
00:20:34.990 --> 00:20:37.529
Kenny was, in fact, 25-year-old.
315
00:20:38.630 --> 00:20:39.549
Kenneth Jackson.
316
00:20:40.410 --> 00:20:43.569
Police discovered this wasn't the first time he'd been on
317
00:20:43.589 --> 00:20:45.619
the radar of law enforcement.
318
00:20:48.000 --> 00:20:51.680
He had had several arrests in the past. He had
319
00:20:51.720 --> 00:20:54.759
recently gotten out of prison. He hadn't been in the
320
00:20:55.019 --> 00:20:56.029
area long.
321
00:20:57.809 --> 00:21:01.470
Wally confirmed that Jackson had been living with him, but
322
00:21:01.569 --> 00:21:04.809
told Troy that he'd left town just two days before.
323
00:21:05.390 --> 00:21:08.809
We learned that at the time of the murder and
324
00:21:08.829 --> 00:21:11.089
the vehicle being burned, that.
325
00:21:10.890 --> 00:21:12.869
He was not at home.
326
00:21:13.390 --> 00:21:16.309
So they couldn't give an alibi as to his whereabouts,
327
00:21:17.069 --> 00:21:19.349
but they did know for a fact that he did
328
00:21:19.410 --> 00:21:21.950
happen to be in the area where the burned van was.
329
00:21:23.230 --> 00:21:26.019
We haven't made contact with our person of interest yet,
330
00:21:26.680 --> 00:21:29.819
but we are getting verification that he's in the right
331
00:21:29.900 --> 00:21:32.839
place at the right times to be associated to it.
332
00:21:35.549 --> 00:21:38.809
Detectives learned that Kenneth Jackson had gone to live with
333
00:21:38.849 --> 00:21:43.869
his girlfriend in North Florida. On September 20th, a week
334
00:21:44.029 --> 00:21:47.279
after the murder, they drove upstate to find him.
335
00:21:48.160 --> 00:21:50.099
We went up there and asked if he was willing
336
00:21:50.119 --> 00:21:50.740
to speak with us.
337
00:21:51.900 --> 00:21:53.519
He rode with us in the.
338
00:21:53.480 --> 00:21:58.369
Car over to the Carrabelle Police Department office where we
339
00:21:58.390 --> 00:22:01.509
could sit down and do an audio recording and try
340
00:22:01.549 --> 00:22:03.170
and find out what he might know.
341
00:22:07.579 --> 00:22:12.359
While collecting DNA samples from Jackson, the detectives got a
342
00:22:12.460 --> 00:22:13.200
lucky break.
343
00:22:13.579 --> 00:22:16.390
During the course of this conversation, we got around to
344
00:22:16.430 --> 00:22:19.329
the clothes that he was wearing, and he said, you know,
345
00:22:19.349 --> 00:22:21.410
I think this is what I was wearing that day.
346
00:22:21.430 --> 00:22:25.930
It's like, can we get that for, you know, testing?
347
00:22:26.569 --> 00:22:29.059
And he said, well, I don't have anything else. I said,
348
00:22:29.559 --> 00:22:32.400
we'll take you to go buy clothes. We went and
349
00:22:32.500 --> 00:22:36.930
we bought him new shoes, new shirt, so he gave
350
00:22:36.990 --> 00:22:38.349
us permission to take his clothes.
351
00:22:39.490 --> 00:22:44.140
He considered himself smarter than the police, so that made
352
00:22:44.180 --> 00:22:45.220
him so careless.
353
00:22:46.559 --> 00:22:50.039
It was time for investigators to sit down and interview
354
00:22:50.099 --> 00:22:54.000
their prime suspect. They were certain of Jackson's movements on
355
00:22:54.039 --> 00:22:56.500
the day of the murder, but they wanted to hear
356
00:22:56.559 --> 00:22:57.980
it from the horse's mouth.
357
00:22:58.500 --> 00:23:01.500
During a course of our investigation, we put him down
358
00:23:01.539 --> 00:23:04.000
there where the van was burned. And that was huge
359
00:23:04.359 --> 00:23:07.259
because he had a family member that identified him being
360
00:23:07.339 --> 00:23:08.579
down in Gibsonton.
361
00:23:09.720 --> 00:23:10.000
Why?
362
00:23:10.299 --> 00:23:12.960
He lives in Sefner. Why would you be down in Gibsonton?
363
00:23:13.960 --> 00:23:16.990
So everything just started falling in. So we wanted to
364
00:23:17.029 --> 00:23:19.349
get him locked into a timeline as to where were
365
00:23:19.369 --> 00:23:22.289
you at? What were you doing? And we were able
366
00:23:22.329 --> 00:23:24.430
to do that. But we were also able to get
367
00:23:24.470 --> 00:23:27.309
him to give too many inconsistencies in his interviews that
368
00:23:27.329 --> 00:23:29.470
could prove that he was lying. And he could not
369
00:23:29.619 --> 00:23:32.170
stick with a solid alibi because he didn't have one.
370
00:23:36.049 --> 00:23:38.650
In all of the lies that he told law enforcement,
371
00:23:38.730 --> 00:23:41.119
the one thing he was consistent on was that he
372
00:23:41.180 --> 00:23:44.720
did not know Cooktron. And they showed him photographs of her.
373
00:23:45.599 --> 00:23:48.259
that were very good depictions of her in the year
374
00:23:48.319 --> 00:23:51.759
or two before her death. And he insisted, I don't
375
00:23:51.799 --> 00:23:54.240
know her. I don't know anything about her. I've never
376
00:23:54.380 --> 00:23:58.609
seen her before, even though she lived about five trailers
377
00:23:58.690 --> 00:24:02.170
down from his. And you could step out from the
378
00:24:02.210 --> 00:24:05.349
doors of those trailers and see the other trailer is
379
00:24:05.390 --> 00:24:07.390
how close he lived to her. But he insisted he'd
380
00:24:07.430 --> 00:24:08.349
never seen her before.
381
00:24:08.369 --> 00:24:16.309
I don't know nothing about this lady. I ain't never
382
00:24:16.329 --> 00:24:16.730
seen him before.
383
00:24:18.509 --> 00:24:22.759
He was obviously super confident that he'd obliterated all of
384
00:24:22.839 --> 00:24:25.599
the evidence and that he could sit and play games
385
00:24:25.640 --> 00:24:28.559
with the police, almost, because they were never going to
386
00:24:28.640 --> 00:24:30.220
pin this one on him.
387
00:24:31.440 --> 00:24:33.390
We both believed that we had our guy.
388
00:24:34.750 --> 00:24:37.670
After that first interview, we had our DNA that he
389
00:24:37.710 --> 00:24:40.529
gave us, we had the clothing that he gave us,
390
00:24:41.269 --> 00:24:43.380
and Troy and I got in the car and we
391
00:24:43.410 --> 00:24:47.299
drove from Carrabelle, Florida, back to just north of Gainesville
392
00:24:47.539 --> 00:24:50.140
to meet up with one of the detectives from Hillsborough here,
393
00:24:50.619 --> 00:24:52.839
who was meeting us halfway so we could pass that
394
00:24:52.940 --> 00:24:55.980
off so they could immediately get that back to FDLE
395
00:24:56.000 --> 00:24:58.839
the next day to start the DNA comparisons.
396
00:25:01.430 --> 00:25:05.859
Six days later, on September 26, the DNA reports came
397
00:25:05.940 --> 00:25:10.000
back from FDLE, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
398
00:25:12.200 --> 00:25:15.410
I received a phone call from FDLE stating that they
399
00:25:15.470 --> 00:25:20.470
had just gotten the report from their DNA analysis that
400
00:25:20.589 --> 00:25:25.440
said that the samples collected from Kenneth Jackson did match
401
00:25:26.019 --> 00:25:30.400
the semen that was collected from the medical examiner during
402
00:25:30.440 --> 00:25:31.819
the autopsy of Cook Tran.
403
00:25:32.900 --> 00:25:36.299
At that moment, it's like relief. You realize, okay, we
404
00:25:36.359 --> 00:25:38.559
knew we were on point. We knew we had our guy.
405
00:25:40.220 --> 00:25:44.140
Jackson had lied to detectives, but the evidence gave away
406
00:25:44.220 --> 00:25:44.730
the truth.
407
00:25:45.250 --> 00:25:48.589
We had dealt with Kenneth Jackson for hours, and he
408
00:25:48.670 --> 00:25:51.230
said that he didn't know this person, he had never
409
00:25:51.329 --> 00:25:53.490
met this person, didn't even know that she was a
410
00:25:53.509 --> 00:25:57.039
neighbor in his trailer park. and now we have his
411
00:25:57.099 --> 00:26:01.259
semen in her. That is enough to get an arrest warrant.
412
00:26:02.500 --> 00:26:06.140
As soon as the DNA samples come back and they
413
00:26:06.200 --> 00:26:10.869
are confirmed as being Kenneth Jackson's, the police fly by
414
00:26:10.900 --> 00:26:14.450
helicopter to his new abode in North Florida to find him.
415
00:26:15.150 --> 00:26:16.990
But when they get there, he's not there.
416
00:26:19.109 --> 00:26:22.769
We had the sheriff's office up there and the local
417
00:26:23.130 --> 00:26:29.660
township PD and also the girlfriend's mother's assistants. She had
418
00:26:29.700 --> 00:26:32.720
some ideas, and she thought, well, maybe they're over this
419
00:26:32.799 --> 00:26:35.599
one place fishing, and they were, in fact. So this
420
00:26:35.640 --> 00:26:38.279
was like 1 in the morning, but they were both
421
00:26:38.720 --> 00:26:39.839
up there sitting at the dock.
422
00:26:40.960 --> 00:26:44.019
Kenneth Jackson's luck was about to run out.
423
00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:47.579
I talked with Kenny and said, we've got some new
424
00:26:47.619 --> 00:26:49.900
information we need to talk to you about. Would you
425
00:26:50.160 --> 00:26:52.440
mind coming with us back to the station to talk
426
00:26:52.480 --> 00:26:52.779
about it?
427
00:26:55.339 --> 00:26:57.759
No matter what it was that we talked to him about,
428
00:26:57.940 --> 00:27:02.990
he was very obstinate against anything that we said. Even
429
00:27:03.049 --> 00:27:07.190
when we could point out his inconsistencies, it didn't matter.
430
00:27:07.730 --> 00:27:10.829
He just was like water off a duck's back, you know?
431
00:27:11.049 --> 00:27:11.829
He just didn't care.
432
00:27:13.029 --> 00:27:16.730
But this time, investigators were armed with a smoking gun.
433
00:27:17.390 --> 00:27:20.859
I focused on the point of DNA again, because I
434
00:27:20.890 --> 00:27:23.599
had asked him at the first interview, will your DNA work?
435
00:27:24.190 --> 00:27:26.750
show up on this lady at any point? And he
436
00:27:26.769 --> 00:27:28.730
was like, no, no, no, I've never met her. There's
437
00:27:28.750 --> 00:27:32.690
no way possible. He knew he had burned up this
438
00:27:32.750 --> 00:27:36.680
victim in a van. He believed he had absolutely nothing
439
00:27:36.700 --> 00:27:40.099
to worry about because that was all burned up and
440
00:27:40.160 --> 00:27:43.859
there was nothing to be found. He felt that he
441
00:27:43.920 --> 00:27:48.359
was safe. Well, in fact, your DNA is on her, Kenny.
442
00:27:49.059 --> 00:27:49.880
How did that happen?
443
00:27:50.680 --> 00:27:52.099
Denial, denial, denial.
444
00:27:52.619 --> 00:27:55.920
So that your DNA just miraculously just appeared on this woman,
445
00:27:56.279 --> 00:28:00.049
on this dead woman. It just miraculously appeared. Someone who
446
00:28:00.089 --> 00:28:03.390
you've never met before. Someone who you don't know who
447
00:28:03.450 --> 00:28:04.930
it is. And you're going to sit here and tell
448
00:28:05.009 --> 00:28:06.809
us that you don't know how on top of the
449
00:28:06.869 --> 00:28:08.569
other lies you told us. And you're going to tell
450
00:28:08.650 --> 00:28:10.190
us that you don't know how that happened and you
451
00:28:10.230 --> 00:28:14.359
want us to just believe that, right? We know what
452
00:28:14.380 --> 00:28:16.920
we're believing. Forensic evidence is proven to us.
453
00:28:17.900 --> 00:28:20.819
And he finally said, well, if you have such good information,
454
00:28:20.859 --> 00:28:25.069
why don't you arrest me then? It's like, okay, we
455
00:28:25.109 --> 00:28:25.710
will do that.
456
00:28:29.400 --> 00:28:34.359
On September 27th, 2007, two weeks after the murder of
457
00:28:34.440 --> 00:28:40.240
Cook Tran, Kenneth Jackson was formally arrested. Despite his constant denial,
458
00:28:40.579 --> 00:28:43.950
detectives were convinced he was a dangerous predator.
459
00:28:44.650 --> 00:28:48.349
He planned that entire event. He stole the van from
460
00:28:48.390 --> 00:28:51.509
the advanced auto parts, left it parked where he knew
461
00:28:51.589 --> 00:28:54.930
he could ambush Cooke Tran because he knows she walks,
462
00:28:54.990 --> 00:28:59.019
runs in the mornings, and he targeted her. And it
463
00:28:59.119 --> 00:29:00.380
is as evil as it gets.
464
00:29:01.660 --> 00:29:05.660
This type of attack, a stranger in the dark jumps
465
00:29:05.900 --> 00:29:11.059
out of the bushes to attack you, is the nightmare
466
00:29:11.099 --> 00:29:15.279
that sits in the head of every single woman. And
467
00:29:15.980 --> 00:29:20.009
if it actually happens to you, all of those nightmares
468
00:29:20.069 --> 00:29:25.009
come to life at once. So for Cook Tran, that
469
00:29:25.210 --> 00:29:30.829
must have been the most terrifying moment that she had
470
00:29:30.910 --> 00:29:31.950
ever experienced.
471
00:29:33.390 --> 00:29:36.509
He thought everything through all the way up until the getaway.
472
00:29:37.769 --> 00:29:39.730
Like once he burned the van, he didn't have a clue.
473
00:29:40.619 --> 00:29:42.880
of what he was going to do after that. But
474
00:29:43.079 --> 00:29:45.440
I am convinced that he would have killed again. Given
475
00:29:45.460 --> 00:29:48.730
the opportunity, had we not have caught him, he would
476
00:29:48.769 --> 00:29:49.269
have killed again.
477
00:29:52.430 --> 00:29:56.950
After he was arrested, information on Kenneth Jackson continued to
478
00:29:57.009 --> 00:29:57.349
come in.
479
00:29:58.210 --> 00:30:00.829
One of the other significant pieces of evidence that the
480
00:30:00.869 --> 00:30:05.109
police received was from a relative of Jackson's who gave
481
00:30:05.190 --> 00:30:10.480
them a DVD, which he apparently habitually watched. It was
482
00:30:10.500 --> 00:30:17.240
a pornographic DVD, which included particularly Asian women and also
483
00:30:17.259 --> 00:30:18.440
had elements of bondage.
484
00:30:19.420 --> 00:30:21.619
Everything lines up that he's living out his fantasy.
485
00:30:22.339 --> 00:30:26.730
To me, Jackson appears to be on his first outing
486
00:30:26.789 --> 00:30:32.210
as a potential serial killer. He wasn't responding to some provocation.
487
00:30:32.569 --> 00:30:37.180
He was acting to please himself. And I think the
488
00:30:37.259 --> 00:30:41.299
violence pleased him. The fire pleased him. The cat and
489
00:30:41.339 --> 00:30:43.339
mouse he thought he was going to have with the
490
00:30:43.420 --> 00:30:47.599
police excited him. This is a really dangerous individual.
491
00:30:49.769 --> 00:30:53.869
Prosecutors felt they had enough evidence to charge Kenneth Jackson
492
00:30:54.289 --> 00:30:54.750
with murder.
493
00:30:55.369 --> 00:30:59.950
He was charged with first-degree premeditated murder. He was charged
494
00:31:00.069 --> 00:31:04.200
with sexual battery with a deadly weapon. And he was
495
00:31:04.259 --> 00:31:07.220
charged with grand theft motor vehicle of the van that
496
00:31:07.259 --> 00:31:10.539
he stole so that he could dispose of Ms. Tran's body.
497
00:31:11.759 --> 00:31:17.279
Despite denying everything to detectives, Kenneth Jackson suddenly rediscovered the
498
00:31:17.400 --> 00:31:20.319
loose lips that had put him on the police's radar
499
00:31:20.559 --> 00:31:21.460
in the first place.
500
00:31:22.019 --> 00:31:25.619
While he was in custody for all that time, again,
501
00:31:25.640 --> 00:31:27.910
that man talked.
502
00:31:28.670 --> 00:31:31.130
He ran his mouth to everybody.
503
00:31:31.150 --> 00:31:35.150
He did discuss about how he raped the woman, he
504
00:31:35.190 --> 00:31:37.519
killed the woman. He burned her up in the van.
505
00:31:37.859 --> 00:31:40.829
But one of the common threads from each of these
506
00:31:41.269 --> 00:31:45.549
statements we got was that he never was talking in remorse.
507
00:31:46.250 --> 00:31:48.250
He was bragging about it.
508
00:31:49.150 --> 00:31:52.869
He was so proud of what he'd done that he
509
00:31:52.950 --> 00:31:54.079
had to talk about it.
510
00:31:55.180 --> 00:31:58.299
But if Jackson thought his fellow inmates would listen to
511
00:31:58.359 --> 00:32:01.839
his secrets in confidence, he was gravely mistaken.
512
00:32:02.539 --> 00:32:05.440
Multiple inmates came forward with all the stories Kenny was
513
00:32:05.460 --> 00:32:05.960
talking about.
514
00:32:06.710 --> 00:32:09.190
There were two of them that were in federal custody
515
00:32:09.230 --> 00:32:13.130
being held in the local jail on federal charges. He
516
00:32:13.190 --> 00:32:16.789
made statements to each of them independently where he talked
517
00:32:16.849 --> 00:32:19.049
about the fact that he had seen her running, had
518
00:32:19.089 --> 00:32:22.259
seen her jogging, had determined that he was going to
519
00:32:22.599 --> 00:32:27.180
abduct her. He gave descriptions of the murder and how
520
00:32:27.220 --> 00:32:30.000
he went about stabbing her and what was going on,
521
00:32:30.059 --> 00:32:34.549
how she was reacting to him. He used a pretty
522
00:32:34.589 --> 00:32:39.869
offensive pejorative in describing how he sexually assaulted her. So
523
00:32:39.910 --> 00:32:43.190
it was pretty compelling evidence to have that in front
524
00:32:43.210 --> 00:32:43.750
of the jury.
525
00:32:45.069 --> 00:32:49.750
Getting those leads and that information from other prisoners saying
526
00:32:49.829 --> 00:32:53.930
that he's bragging about what he did only boosted our case.
527
00:32:55.319 --> 00:32:59.140
With the trial on the horizon, prosecutors in Hillsborough County
528
00:32:59.220 --> 00:33:04.309
had DNA evidence, witness statements and jailhouse informants. But would
529
00:33:04.349 --> 00:33:07.809
the jury find Kenneth Jackson guilty? Or would he be
530
00:33:07.970 --> 00:33:21.319
able to outsmart everyone and get away with murder? In
531
00:33:21.420 --> 00:33:26.079
October 2012, five years after the death of 50-year-old mother
532
00:33:26.119 --> 00:33:29.849
of three Cooke Tran, Kenneth Jackson, the man accused of
533
00:33:29.880 --> 00:33:32.970
her rape and murder, stood trial in Florida.
534
00:33:33.569 --> 00:33:36.569
It was one of the most heinous murder rapes that
535
00:33:37.289 --> 00:33:40.089
had occurred that year. So there was a lot of
536
00:33:40.130 --> 00:33:42.329
TV there and print media.
537
00:33:43.910 --> 00:33:46.910
We had many, many witnesses, and it went on for
538
00:33:46.990 --> 00:33:50.339
several weeks. We were seeking the death penalty in this case.
539
00:33:50.900 --> 00:33:55.410
The DNA was direct scientific evidence, but we wanted to
540
00:33:55.450 --> 00:33:58.690
give the jury an understanding of how the crime occurred
541
00:33:58.730 --> 00:34:01.490
and why it occurred. So we had lots of different
542
00:34:01.529 --> 00:34:05.250
types of evidence in this case, from DNA scientific evidence
543
00:34:05.269 --> 00:34:09.230
to jailhouse snitches to other witnesses that he had made
544
00:34:09.289 --> 00:34:11.269
statements to that connected him to the crime.
545
00:34:12.250 --> 00:34:14.750
He planned this entire thing out to the point of
546
00:34:14.869 --> 00:34:18.010
stealing a van so that he can then stalk his prey.
547
00:34:18.800 --> 00:34:23.989
This was an extremely premeditated murder driven by an extremely
548
00:34:24.210 --> 00:34:25.510
evil motivation.
549
00:34:27.769 --> 00:34:31.429
Prosecutors were ready to present their case of what they
550
00:34:31.489 --> 00:34:36.269
believe happened on the morning of September 13th, 2007.
551
00:34:36.269 --> 00:34:39.159
He had seen her jogging in the early morning hours
552
00:34:39.280 --> 00:34:42.480
before he had become obsessed with her apparently and with
553
00:34:42.519 --> 00:34:47.079
the idea of abducting her. He positioned himself in an
554
00:34:47.260 --> 00:34:51.039
area in front of St. Francis Assisi Church where he
555
00:34:51.079 --> 00:34:54.119
knew she would be running or jogging. And when she
556
00:34:54.159 --> 00:34:58.400
came along in the darkness, he grabbed her, probably put
557
00:34:58.440 --> 00:35:00.800
the knife to her throat and forced her off of
558
00:35:00.880 --> 00:35:01.610
the roadway.
559
00:35:02.320 --> 00:35:06.449
Mrs. Tran was surprised by this man leaping out of
560
00:35:06.489 --> 00:35:09.730
the darkness. There was no way she could have defended herself.
561
00:35:09.750 --> 00:35:11.070
It was just all too sudden.
562
00:35:11.670 --> 00:35:14.170
He took her down into this little valley, which was
563
00:35:14.369 --> 00:35:17.949
concealed from view from the roadway. And he forced her
564
00:35:17.989 --> 00:35:20.449
down on the ground. He took her clothes off of her,
565
00:35:20.909 --> 00:35:23.880
probably ripped them off of her. And he raped her.
566
00:35:24.820 --> 00:35:28.940
And when she was screaming or yelling in pain and
567
00:35:29.019 --> 00:35:32.039
begging for her life, he began to stab her in
568
00:35:32.059 --> 00:35:37.079
the throat. He knew he was going to kill her.
569
00:35:37.480 --> 00:35:39.179
He knew he was going to rape her. This just
570
00:35:39.460 --> 00:35:43.360
speaks to an extremely depraved level of evil.
571
00:35:44.880 --> 00:35:50.619
He made the decision to take advantage of someone in
572
00:35:50.659 --> 00:35:55.380
the dark that he felt he could overpower. Then when
573
00:35:55.619 --> 00:35:59.380
he was in fear for maybe being found out because
574
00:35:59.440 --> 00:36:03.760
they were struggling, they were fighting, they were screaming, decided
575
00:36:03.800 --> 00:36:06.360
he could kill them. And then at that point, to
576
00:36:06.420 --> 00:36:10.050
think that he could make all this go away by
577
00:36:10.320 --> 00:36:14.530
destroying this person literally by trying to burn them up,
578
00:36:15.409 --> 00:36:16.150
that is evil.
579
00:36:20.530 --> 00:36:25.309
On October 15, 2012, Jackson's trial began at the Hillsborough
580
00:36:25.349 --> 00:36:26.590
County Circuit Court.
581
00:36:27.800 --> 00:36:29.960
In my opening statements, I told the jury he was
582
00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:33.860
trying to burn his biological evidence out of her body.
583
00:36:34.570 --> 00:36:37.090
His intent was to try to destroy her body because
584
00:36:37.170 --> 00:36:39.449
her body was evidence of the rape and the murder.
585
00:36:40.489 --> 00:36:41.650
It was all preplanned.
586
00:36:41.769 --> 00:36:47.789
It was extremely cold-blooded, calculated. It stayed with me for
587
00:36:47.829 --> 00:36:49.579
a long time, even today.
588
00:36:51.900 --> 00:36:54.840
Jackson, who'd been all too keen to blab about the
589
00:36:54.880 --> 00:36:58.800
murder to his fellow inmates, suddenly didn't seem able to
590
00:36:58.880 --> 00:37:00.260
speak up in the courtroom.
591
00:37:00.800 --> 00:37:04.000
He didn't show any emotion at all throughout the trial.
592
00:37:04.260 --> 00:37:07.610
He just was sat quietly. It was kind of eerie.
593
00:37:08.590 --> 00:37:14.429
He had an eerie presence, this sort of calm, strange
594
00:37:14.809 --> 00:37:19.989
demeanor throughout. I thought he didn't mind being caught that much.
595
00:37:20.630 --> 00:37:23.989
Watching him, I think he had always wanted from the
596
00:37:24.050 --> 00:37:26.219
beginning to be able to boast about it.
597
00:37:27.010 --> 00:37:30.650
He appeared to enjoy the attention of the trial. He
598
00:37:30.769 --> 00:37:34.360
seemed to be very immature. He smiled a lot. He
599
00:37:34.880 --> 00:37:38.539
just didn't seem like he was taking the whole process seriously.
600
00:37:40.340 --> 00:37:43.280
He has got all eyes on him. This is his
601
00:37:43.630 --> 00:37:47.610
moment in the sun. He's not even thinking about what's
602
00:37:47.670 --> 00:37:53.139
going to happen afterwards. He couldn't hide his enjoyment at
603
00:37:53.199 --> 00:37:55.360
getting so much attention.
604
00:37:58.989 --> 00:38:03.010
Troy Morgan, the detective who'd made the initial breakthrough in
605
00:38:03.050 --> 00:38:05.110
the case, was called to testify.
606
00:38:05.670 --> 00:38:07.750
I took great pride in being able to get up
607
00:38:07.789 --> 00:38:11.010
there and testify, finding out the information that kind of
608
00:38:11.199 --> 00:38:14.719
linked everything to him. And that was pretty much all
609
00:38:14.739 --> 00:38:16.880
the testimony, you know, that I really had to bring
610
00:38:16.920 --> 00:38:19.599
to the table was being in the right place at
611
00:38:19.639 --> 00:38:21.639
the right time and asking the right question.
612
00:38:23.449 --> 00:38:26.949
The gas station attendant who Troy Morgan had spoken to
613
00:38:27.309 --> 00:38:30.250
wasn't the only witness called by the prosecution.
614
00:38:30.829 --> 00:38:34.539
There were witnesses who put him near the area where
615
00:38:34.780 --> 00:38:37.440
the van was found, and that was in the city
616
00:38:37.460 --> 00:38:40.460
of Gibsonton. The murder happened in the city of Sefner,
617
00:38:41.039 --> 00:38:44.820
and they are separated by about 10, 11, 12 miles,
618
00:38:45.150 --> 00:38:49.090
so it's a significant distance. And there were witnesses, one
619
00:38:49.130 --> 00:38:52.789
of which knew him, put him walking on foot in
620
00:38:52.849 --> 00:38:56.550
Gibsonton that morning. And that really stood out to her.
621
00:38:57.289 --> 00:39:00.929
Why is Kenny down here in Gibsonton walking? How did
622
00:39:00.969 --> 00:39:04.780
he get here? That was significant because he told the
623
00:39:04.840 --> 00:39:08.099
detectives and never would come off of the fact that
624
00:39:08.139 --> 00:39:11.900
he rode a bicycle from Sefner down to Gibsonton through
625
00:39:11.940 --> 00:39:15.159
the night. And that's why he was in Gibsonton.
626
00:39:16.630 --> 00:39:21.380
With the overwhelming evidence laid out, the prosecuting attorneys began
627
00:39:21.440 --> 00:39:22.639
their closing arguments.
628
00:39:23.260 --> 00:39:26.570
I remember arguing to the jury, there is probably no
629
00:39:26.690 --> 00:39:31.940
crime that is as personally and viscerally as a crime
630
00:39:32.000 --> 00:39:35.619
where a person is putting part of their body into
631
00:39:35.679 --> 00:39:40.099
another person against their will. And I think this may
632
00:39:40.139 --> 00:39:43.280
have impacted the women on the jury, and I argued
633
00:39:43.300 --> 00:39:46.019
to the jury, the last voice she heard and the
634
00:39:46.059 --> 00:39:49.420
last person's face she saw in her life on this
635
00:39:49.500 --> 00:39:50.920
earth was this defendant.
636
00:39:51.920 --> 00:39:55.199
The jury took less than a day to reach their verdict.
637
00:39:56.360 --> 00:40:00.659
The jury determined that he was guilty for the murder,
638
00:40:01.119 --> 00:40:04.099
the sexual battery, the grand theft auto, and the arson.
639
00:40:06.820 --> 00:40:09.699
It seemed the jury had no doubt in their minds
640
00:40:09.800 --> 00:40:11.119
about Jackson's guilt.
641
00:40:11.599 --> 00:40:14.179
When a jury returns a guilty verdict, the defendant is
642
00:40:14.260 --> 00:40:18.829
entitled to have the jury polled. A clerk asks each
643
00:40:19.030 --> 00:40:22.809
of the individual jurors to confirm that that is their verdict.
644
00:40:23.429 --> 00:40:25.949
And I've never heard this before. In any case, I've tried.
645
00:40:26.929 --> 00:40:31.300
Several of the jurors, when they responded yes, didn't just say, yes,
646
00:40:31.550 --> 00:40:35.760
that's my verdict. They said, yes! I know two of
647
00:40:35.800 --> 00:40:38.960
the women looked directly at the defendant and said it
648
00:40:39.059 --> 00:40:43.159
very vehemently like that. So that's what kind of stood
649
00:40:43.239 --> 00:40:47.389
out to me, was proof. how much they believed in
650
00:40:47.429 --> 00:40:48.869
that verdict of guilty.
651
00:40:50.349 --> 00:40:54.590
The verdict was exactly the outcome the hardworking detectives had
652
00:40:54.630 --> 00:40:55.110
hoped for.
653
00:40:56.070 --> 00:40:58.800
To be able to get a positive result, it's what
654
00:40:58.820 --> 00:41:01.900
you want for every case. With this one here, everything
655
00:41:01.940 --> 00:41:03.539
just kind of fell right into place, being at the
656
00:41:03.579 --> 00:41:06.420
right place at the right time. Sometimes it's better to
657
00:41:06.440 --> 00:41:07.179
be lucky than good.
658
00:41:08.699 --> 00:41:10.369
I mean, it's horrible what the people went through, and
659
00:41:10.869 --> 00:41:14.769
the families, what they've gone through, but it's a huge...
660
00:41:15.090 --> 00:41:20.909
feeling of satisfaction when you can conclusively say, this is
661
00:41:20.949 --> 00:41:21.610
what happened.
662
00:41:22.570 --> 00:41:23.349
We got the guy.
663
00:41:24.429 --> 00:41:28.960
It doesn't change what happened. It's still a tragedy, but
664
00:41:29.980 --> 00:41:32.099
this is what we can give you for some sort
665
00:41:32.139 --> 00:41:32.599
of closure.
666
00:41:37.860 --> 00:41:42.079
A week later on November 1st, 2012, the next phase
667
00:41:42.119 --> 00:41:44.070
of Kenneth Jackson's trial began.
668
00:41:44.829 --> 00:41:48.809
The murder conviction comes first, and then there's basically a
669
00:41:48.949 --> 00:41:53.530
second trial with the same jury to consider the death penalty.
670
00:41:54.070 --> 00:41:56.469
And then they come back to the same jury and
671
00:41:56.840 --> 00:41:59.860
ask for a vote. In this case, it was 11
672
00:41:59.860 --> 00:42:03.099
to 1, which at the time was all that the
673
00:42:03.179 --> 00:42:03.880
state needed.
674
00:42:05.599 --> 00:42:11.179
On June 5, 2013, 30-year-old Kenneth Jackson was sentenced to death.
675
00:42:12.230 --> 00:42:16.190
When the death penalty was imposed, he had absolutely no reaction.
676
00:42:16.909 --> 00:42:18.340
I don't even know that he cared.
677
00:42:19.219 --> 00:42:19.840
I couldn't tell.
678
00:42:20.340 --> 00:42:24.360
He just looked blankly ahead, and he didn't offer any
679
00:42:24.679 --> 00:42:26.880
remorse or anything like that.
680
00:42:28.110 --> 00:42:30.570
I will say it was very satisfying to find that
681
00:42:30.610 --> 00:42:32.889
he was found guilty, number one, but number two, that
682
00:42:32.929 --> 00:42:35.190
he was given the death penalty.
683
00:42:39.210 --> 00:42:44.280
That wasn't the end of Kenneth Jackson's story, however. In 2016,
684
00:42:44.269 --> 00:42:49.199
the United States Supreme Court agreed that Florida's capital sentencing
685
00:42:49.260 --> 00:42:53.960
scheme was unconstitutional, which led the Florida Supreme Court to
686
00:42:54.039 --> 00:42:58.159
abolish the state's existing death penalty law and require that
687
00:42:58.239 --> 00:43:01.679
a jury's recommendation for death must be unanimous.
688
00:43:02.260 --> 00:43:04.960
Any case where we didn't have a unanimous verdict in
689
00:43:04.980 --> 00:43:08.230
the penalty phase was now subject to collateral attack, and
690
00:43:08.269 --> 00:43:11.969
that's what happened with Mr. Jackson's case. The case got
691
00:43:12.030 --> 00:43:16.099
reversed because we didn't have a unanimous verdict. The decision
692
00:43:16.159 --> 00:43:18.860
was made to allow him to plead to life, and
693
00:43:18.900 --> 00:43:21.940
that's what happened, and he was resentenced to a life sentence.
694
00:43:26.829 --> 00:43:30.349
Whether he does life in prison without parole or whether
695
00:43:30.389 --> 00:43:31.409
he does death penalty.
696
00:43:31.769 --> 00:43:33.449
Either way, he's off the street.
697
00:43:34.190 --> 00:43:36.989
I know for a fact that that person won't be
698
00:43:37.170 --> 00:43:40.750
hurting anybody outside of those prison walls, and that's what
699
00:43:40.789 --> 00:43:41.250
we're after.
700
00:43:42.510 --> 00:43:46.889
This case really haunted me, I think because it was
701
00:43:46.949 --> 00:43:50.219
the first time I had encountered.
702
00:43:49.760 --> 00:43:53.099
What I thought was a true psychopath. I think there
703
00:43:53.139 --> 00:43:53.719
was every.
704
00:43:53.579 --> 00:43:57.500
Possibility that Kenneth Jackson if he had not been caught,
705
00:43:57.679 --> 00:44:00.809
would have gone on to kill other women, and that
706
00:44:01.630 --> 00:44:04.329
one day he might have been labeled a serial killer.
707
00:44:08.699 --> 00:44:13.699
Kenneth Jackson stalked, raped, and killed 50-year-old Cooke Tran, an
708
00:44:13.840 --> 00:44:17.269
innocent woman who'd done him no harm. He burned her
709
00:44:17.349 --> 00:44:20.789
body in the attempt to destroy any evidence, but he
710
00:44:20.889 --> 00:44:23.909
wasn't as clever as he thought, and when his DNA
711
00:44:23.949 --> 00:44:27.949
was found on the victim, his fate was sealed. He
712
00:44:28.030 --> 00:44:32.360
showed absolutely no remorse for leaving three children without a mother,
713
00:44:32.840 --> 00:44:36.059
proving that Kenneth Jackson is one of the world's most
714
00:44:36.420 --> 00:44:37.360
evil killers.