- 5/22/2025
Killer at the Crime Scene - Season 4 Episode 6 -
Raveesh Kumra
#CinemaJourney
Raveesh Kumra
#CinemaJourney
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00I got a call in the middle of the night.
00:04Here was the dispatcher.
00:06They had a home invasion and possible homicide.
00:10Responding officers find a door that was open.
00:13It's a target of time.
00:16There's a seed inside to the Silicon Valley.
00:20It was finding some, in my opinion, bad habits.
00:23We're talking about drugs.
00:25We're talking about sex.
00:26The faces in the room were completely stunned.
00:30It was kind of a drop-mic moment.
00:31It's about power.
00:33How did they come into contact if he wasn't there?
00:37Our role as CSIAs is to find the evidence to catch
00:41the killer in the crime scene.
00:43You've got a community in fear.
00:45Is this going to happen to them?
00:46Are they at risk?
00:48The science will tell the story.
00:50Science doesn't lie.
01:26Police race to the scene of a violent robbery
01:29after a woman makes a frantic 911 call.
01:33One of the bad guys had gone into her bedroom,
01:38punched her in the face, and then
01:40made her go out there with her husband,
01:41where they bound her as well.
01:44The homeowners have been assaulted, tied up, gagged,
01:47and blindfolded.
01:49Then they pretty much ransacked the house.
01:51Once gone, the woman managed to break free
01:54and still blindfolded, desperately call for help.
01:58They found the female victim, cut the tape off of her eyes,
02:02and continued searching for the other victim.
02:05They found him on the floor unresponsive.
02:08He had been bound by the wrists with a tablecloth,
02:13but they had used duct tape to tape around his head.
02:18Responding officers cut his bindings,
02:21rolled him over onto his back, started CPR and rescue
02:25breathing until the paramedics can come in.
02:28It's not clear at the initial outset
02:30whether the victim is alive or dead.
02:33The paramedics came in and checked him,
02:35put leads on him, oxygen sensor on him,
02:38and declared him deceased.
02:42I was definitely shocked.
02:44I recognized him.
02:46I had met him before.
02:47It was Mr. Coomer.
02:50Mr. Coomer was definitely a very successful businessman,
02:54and he knew a lot of people in the community.
02:56I didn't find anybody that disliked him.
03:02I had met him several times at different things,
03:05mostly at bars in town.
03:08He used to go to one that was called Last Call,
03:12and that was mostly all locals.
03:16And he always seemed to be sort of like the ambassador
03:20or the mayor of that group.
03:22Always happy, always nice, buying people drinks.
03:25Everybody loved him.
03:28His wife is sent to hospital with facial injuries.
03:33And when we talk about that world of criminality,
03:35unfortunately, you have individuals that are
03:37prepared to do extreme things.
03:40Not only did they lose a family member,
03:43it's going to affect the living victim probably
03:47the rest of her life.
03:49It is a traumatic event.
03:50It is super traumatic.
03:54Investigators cordon off the scene
03:56and begin a forensic sweep.
04:00The house is an absolute state.
04:03Everything's been thrown everywhere.
04:04It's going to be a long and meticulous examination of items
04:09within that scene you might get forensic evidence from.
04:13This property was huge.
04:14It was about seven acres in size.
04:18The house itself was about 7,000 square feet.
04:22You can't even really see the neighbor's house.
04:24Me and my sergeant, we talked about,
04:26where should we be looking the most?
04:29Two crime lab people walk with us.
04:33What's important, what's not important,
04:35what needs doing urgently, and what
04:38can take a little bit longer?
04:39So what are your quick hits?
04:41What are your fast track actions that are
04:43important in this investigation?
04:45DNA evidence was going to be our best evidence.
04:48The female homeowner tells officers
04:50there were multiple offenders.
04:53There was at least a suspect in the house
04:56and maybe one outside who was doing the driving.
05:00Where there's been more than one offender and more than one
05:02victim, you'll get mixed DNA profiles.
05:05That means DNA from two or more individuals.
05:09Sometimes you can separate them out.
05:12One of the first things you need to work out
05:14is, how has the offender got in?
05:16The intruders have made off with expensive jewelry
05:20and over $30,000 in cash.
05:24I couldn't tell at that point if it was a targeted situation,
05:30but it was just a theory that we started with.
05:33You just passed 30 other houses with no gates.
05:36Why are they picking this house?
05:39There was no sign of forced entry.
05:41That makes me think that it's either
05:42someone that has got a key to get in
05:45or someone that's been let in.
05:46Or there's been an insecure door or window
05:49where they've climbed in or walked in quite freely.
05:54There was no broken doors, but there
05:56were a couple of unlocked doors.
05:58The sliding glass door that was just off of the family room
06:04where the TV was on and we figured
06:06that Mr. Coomer was watching, that door was unlocked.
06:11It looked like they had encountered him in that room,
06:15kind of struggled with him, taped him up and left him there.
06:19It seemed that they would have had
06:21to have had some sort of knowledge of the residents
06:25and of the people that were living there.
06:27If there's no signs of forced entry,
06:29that says to me that the offenders have really
06:31planned this out.
06:33Your first point of call would always
06:35be people that they know.
06:37Ravisha's wife tells police the man who assaulted her
06:40used his nickname Ravi, suggesting
06:44that her husband might have known him.
06:47He could have done any house.
06:48So there had to be a reason.
06:50Homicides in Monticerino, I think
06:54that this homicide was probably the first one
06:57in 20 or more years.
07:09In California, the peaceful community of Monticerino
07:12has been haunted by the first murder
07:14in the neighborhood for decades.
07:17During a violent robbery at his home,
07:19Ravish Kumar has died after being beaten and bound.
07:25Everybody in the neighborhood was super concerned.
07:27It's a very affluent area.
07:29A lot of CEOs and sports athletes and people like that
07:34live out there.
07:35Very quiet, very nice place to live.
07:40The home of the wealthy.
07:42We're talking about exclusivity.
07:44You know, we're talking about the super rich.
07:47In our area, we would see things mostly burglaries
07:52where people are breaking into cars.
07:54In the downtown area where the shops were,
07:56we'd get a lot of theft during the day.
07:59When a crime of this magnitude happens within the local area,
08:03it sends the police force into a bit of a frenzy
08:07because the rich and the wealthy are going to want answers.
08:12An autopsy determines the cause of death
08:15is asphyxiation after being gagged with duct tape.
08:18The victim had been bound around his head and nasal passage,
08:22which has obviously restricted his breathing.
08:25There was also a huge amount of bruising
08:26on other areas of his body.
08:29He had succumbed to a vicious attack.
08:32The pathologist also finds that the 66-year-old
08:35had a heart condition, putting him more at risk.
08:39We know the wife of the victim was saying he's ill,
08:43you know, he's poorly, despite the fact that
08:45there may not have been intended to kill.
08:48They were very prepared to engage in high levels of violence.
08:52It's Sergeant Erin Lunsford's first time
08:55leading a homicide investigation.
08:58It was definitely a little bit overwhelming.
09:00Everybody was looking at their video cameras.
09:03Unfortunately, anything we did get was super grainy.
09:06There's going to be a lot of pressure on the police
09:08to be able to solve this crime.
09:12At the crime scene, CSIs have identified
09:14a number of potential leads.
09:18One of the sinks within the property
09:20contained a number of latex gloves,
09:23about 21 separate gloves.
09:25And it appeared that these had maybe been washed.
09:28There was a lot of soap on them.
09:31As we searched, we found more gloves
09:34in some of the cabinets in the kitchen.
09:36They had used a white duct tape with black mustaches on it
09:42to tape around his head.
09:45We collected all the pieces of tape,
09:47because we figured there's going to be some DNA on those.
09:52We even collected the empty tape roll.
09:55I'm just going to swab the end of the tape here,
09:59potentially where it might have been held by the offender.
10:03There's a lot of contamination from the victim.
10:05But on the ends of the tape, there
10:06may well be fingerprint evidence in the sticky side.
10:09But there also may be DNA evidence.
10:1220 exhibits from the crime scene are sent off for DNA analysis.
10:17These things were left around and kind of suggested to me
10:19that maybe there was some DNA evidence in there.
10:23They were left around and kind of suggested to me
10:25there may have been panic that had set in.
10:27Could it be that they watched and observed
10:31at the moment where Ravish was, you know,
10:33taking his last breaths?
10:34And maybe it's like, now I need to leave
10:36without really thinking about the kind of evidence
10:39that they were leaving behind.
10:42Detectives are convinced the attackers were helped
10:44by someone close to the Kumhars.
10:47One of the theories that we were working on
10:50was that somebody who had been to the house
10:53had given the information to the suspects
10:57to be able to commit this crime.
11:00The fact that there's no forced entry to the property
11:03means that potentially it might be somebody
11:06that the victims know.
11:08The first people we look at are family members.
11:10You've got to look at them and talk to them,
11:12see if they have any idea of what happened.
11:15From there, then you go to employees or close friends.
11:18We hired a lot of people to work at the house.
11:21They had personal assistants.
11:23They had gardeners or handymen.
11:25Just trying to paint a picture of the life of the victims
11:28and where the bad guys would have contacted them
11:33or come into their lives.
11:37Ravish moved to California from northern India in 1970
11:42and went on to make his fortune in the mobile phone industry.
11:47He made a ton of money.
11:48He took his money and bought a winery and a concert venue
11:52in Saratoga, California, just a little ways down the road.
11:56And he did that for a while until he sold that off.
11:58And I don't know what he was doing at the time
12:00besides being retired.
12:03This is a well-known member of the community.
12:05People would have seen him out and about at parties,
12:08at social events, spending money.
12:10So there may be individuals in the community
12:12that are familiar with this wealth
12:14and familiar with this success.
12:17We need to know, what does he do every day?
12:19Who comes over to the house a lot?
12:21What are his habits?
12:23Who's he talking to?
12:25At the scene, investigators seize his laptop.
12:28His cell phone was actually found out
12:30in the middle of the street, all smashed up.
12:32So the laptop was definitely one of the most important
12:36pieces of evidence that we found.
12:43There's a huge amount of knowledge
12:44that can be obtained from a laptop.
12:47What websites have been looking at,
12:49any contact details of people.
12:51The police have to go through each one of those contacts
12:53to see where they were at the time.
12:55Did they have an alibi?
12:56Are they a potential suspect?
13:00As detectives look at Ravisha's contacts,
13:03forensic scientists examine the multiple latex gloves
13:06found at the scene.
13:11The gloves would be exhibited separately.
13:15Be important to kind of look at
13:18whether these gloves have been worn.
13:20This glove looks like it's been taken off
13:22and pulled inside out.
13:23So therefore, you have to look at the best place
13:25to swab for DNA.
13:27So the best place would be around the cuffs
13:29and also on the inside of the finger areas.
13:33So therefore you need to tease them open.
13:37There'll be a lot of pressure on the police
13:40to investigate this quickly.
13:42And from a forensic perspective,
13:44you don't work quickly.
13:46You work slowly and meticulously
13:48and it takes as long as it takes.
13:50And sometimes that's quite hard
13:52to manage people's expectations.
13:55As scientists analyze each glove,
13:58police looking into Ravisha's lifestyle
14:01have a development.
14:03When I started looking into the backgrounds
14:05of the people that Mr. Kumar liked to hire,
14:09I was finding some, in my opinion, bad habits.
14:14It was determined that Mr. Kumar
14:18liked the company of sex workers.
14:22It was something that he did a lot of
14:24and it was several women.
14:28So when we talk about offenders
14:29and the pool of offenders,
14:31that net starts to get wider and wider.
14:36Detectives look more closely
14:38at Ravisha's finances to trace the women.
14:42Meanwhile, forensics has a breakthrough.
14:45They've identified three suspects,
14:48Lucas Anderson, Javier Garcia and D'Angelo Austin.
14:55Garcia's DNA has been found
14:57on one of the gloves in the sink
15:00and Austin's is recovered from a piece of duct tape.
15:04D'Angelo Austin was living up in Oakland, California,
15:08an hour north of where we were at.
15:10We immediately focused on him
15:12and people that he hangs out with.
15:15We've got Silicon Valley, where Ravisha comes from,
15:18but hasn't seen a homicide in two decades.
15:21And then we've got Oakland,
15:22which has the highest crime rate in California.
15:25And even though the worlds are completely different,
15:28there's some common themes that bring them together
15:30and then align them.
15:32Money.
15:34Austin and Garcia are identified as members
15:37of the notorious ENT gang
15:39in the ghost town area of Oakland.
15:42You notice gang has a number of names.
15:45You've got ENT, you've got stubby,
15:47you've got M-O-E-T, you know, money over everything.
15:50This kind of highlights what the group is all about.
15:54Austin is considered one of the founding members of ENT.
15:58You know, he would hold so much status.
16:00He's an individual that would be well known.
16:03He grew up in an environment
16:04where these behaviors of criminality, violence,
16:07chaos even, would have desensitized him.
16:11The third suspect, Lucas Anderson,
16:13appears to have no connections to the gang,
16:17but the evidence against him is damning.
16:21So one of the samples we would take at a post-mortem stage
16:23would be fingernail scrapings and fingernail cuttings.
16:26This is to see if there's any DNA or any fibers or hairs
16:31that have been caught under somebody's fingernails.
16:33If someone's been putting up a fight
16:35or putting up, trying to protect themselves,
16:37there may well be DNA or fibers under their fingernails
16:40that would link back to the offender.
16:43Lucas Anderson's DNA is matched
16:45to a sample from Ravisha's fingernails.
16:50It felt really good.
16:52It felt good.
16:52Felt like I was finally starting to get the evidence.
16:56We figured that we had three suspects
16:58and we had three good suspects.
17:00DNA found at the scene or on the body of the victim.
17:03They all had criminal histories.
17:05So I felt, man, we finally got this.
17:09But first, they need to find them.
17:12It was very frustrating.
17:13We could never pinpoint where D'Angelo Austin was at.
17:16He didn't really have a residence.
17:19He was couch surfing
17:21or the money he was getting from robbing people,
17:24he was using it to stay in hotels
17:27and just spending money everywhere.
17:30They're known to the police for a reason.
17:32They're criminals.
17:33They're not gonna be easy to find.
17:36Lucas Anderson is the exception.
17:40I was able to find that Lucas was already
17:43in the county jail in custody on something else.
17:47He was arrested a few days after the attack on the Kumhars
17:50on unrelated burglary charges.
17:55I went down to the jail to do an interview.
17:58He came in to our interview room.
18:01He was acting nonchalant or like he didn't care.
18:08We are gonna be charging you with a crime tonight.
18:12You're charging me with a crime?
18:14Yeah.
18:15For what?
18:17I wonder.
18:18He was shown pictures of the victims.
18:23He said he didn't know them.
18:25He didn't know where Montessorino was.
18:27He had never been there in his life.
18:29Your DNA was found in our crime scene on our victim.
18:34It's starting to ring some bells.
18:36I don't know what you guys are talking about.
18:37I don't.
18:39And he just said,
18:40well, if you think I did it, like whatever.
18:44We have my DNA's there.
18:46He goes, I have no idea.
18:48I wasn't there, never been there before.
18:50I don't know what you guys are talking about.
18:54With no alibi and his DNA on Ravisha's remains,
18:57Lucas Anderson is charged with first degree murder.
19:02Santa Clara County assigns him a public defender.
19:06Immediately, something doesn't add up for Kelly Paul.
19:11Lucas was pretty open when we first met.
19:13He's the kind of person that all clients are.
19:17You can imagine with histories that people can be guarded,
19:20he's not that person.
19:22Doing some kind of a sophisticated gang level crime
19:25did not fit who he was, nor did it fit his criminal history.
19:32Born on the streets,
19:33Lucas Anderson has a mental health condition,
19:36alcohol addiction and brain trauma
19:38after being in a serious traffic accident.
19:41When we do a social history workup for a client,
19:45we're going to work to get to know Lucas,
19:48not as just in that crime,
19:51but who Lucas is as a person, how he grew up.
19:55You're looking at every aspect of someone's life
19:58that could be mitigating.
19:59That includes childhood trauma,
20:01that includes mental illness, it includes many things.
20:04But for Lucas in particular,
20:06we knew there had been a mental health history,
20:09so it required us to start pulling records.
20:13The first step for us was to just hit every county hospital
20:17because we knew that Lucas had grown up in the area.
20:22As Kelly's team hits the phones,
20:24police have a location on D'Angelo Austin.
20:29We've determined that he had a sister, Katrina Fritz,
20:33and that he was supposed to be staying with her
20:35because he was out on parole at the time.
20:38He was calling his sister and she was lending him a rental car.
20:43Then we were able to work with them to get the GPS
20:46so that we were able to pinpoint him to a car
20:49and where it was going.
20:51Surveillance teams also locate Javier Garcia.
20:56Both are brought into custody on suspicion of murder.
21:00Guys like this who have been questioned by the cops a lot,
21:02they're just going to shut you down.
21:04Both of them denied everything
21:07and they invoked their rights to an attorney.
21:10Based on the DNA evidence,
21:11they're charged with Revesia's murder and burglary.
21:17Sergeant Lunsford still needs to work out
21:19who provided them with information about the Kumhras.
21:23Then it's my job to connect the dots more.
21:27So we obtained records for cell phones,
21:30we obtained records for calls and text messages.
21:34Another thing that we collect, the records from the cell towers.
21:39DNA is the big centre block
21:41and then everything else is connecting the dots.
21:45The team's strongest forensic evidence is Lucas Anderson's DNA,
21:50found on Revesia's body.
21:52But after scouring through medical records,
21:55his defence team has made a case-shattering discovery.
21:59I think it was the investigator called and said,
22:03you've got to see these.
22:04The DA called me and said,
22:05hey, the defence attorney for Lucas wants to have a meeting,
22:10says that she has an alibi.
22:12And I said, well, that's interesting.
22:15In our world, alibis have to be perfect
22:18and it was an absolute, airtight, complete alibi.
22:22How did his DNA get there?
22:23It was on his person.
22:25So how did they come into contact if he wasn't there?
22:34Police investigating the death of Ravesh Kumra
22:37have charged three men
22:39after forensically linking them to the crime scene.
22:43Lucas Anderson's DNA was found on Ravesh's body,
22:46but his defence team is convinced he's innocent
22:50and have called an urgent meeting.
22:52So, we went, me and the DA, on this side of the table
22:56and then we went to the other side of the table
22:59and then we went to the other side of the table
23:01and then Kelly, the defence attorney,
23:03and all of her people on the other side of the table.
23:08They hand out a binder
23:10and I start looking through it right away.
23:14And saw that he had been in the hospital
23:18at the same time the crime was being committed.
23:21We learned that Lucas had been hospitalised
23:25from before the homicide happens until after it happens
23:31and that he's on literally 10 to 15 minute bed checks
23:34throughout the whole evening.
23:38The faces in the room were completely stunned.
23:42It was kind of a drop mic moment.
23:44They made no comment at the end
23:47and they said, we'd like to discuss this
23:48and we'll get back to you.
23:53As a crime scene manager,
23:54it makes you then question
23:57how his DNA actually got into that scene.
24:02Sometimes it's quite hard to timeline
24:03when that's been placed there.
24:05So, just because you find someone's DNA in a crime scene
24:08doesn't mean to say that it was put there
24:10at the time of the offence.
24:11It could have been put there several days earlier
24:14or even potentially several weeks earlier.
24:17Lucas insists he can't remember anything from that night
24:20or ever meeting Ravish.
24:23Lucas struggles.
24:25He had significant mental health issues.
24:27He also had traumatic brain injury,
24:29which affected his ability to be a historian
24:31and his ability to communicate.
24:33He had a series of friends
24:37that also lived on the streets with him.
24:41We had walked the streets during the investigation
24:44to meet those individuals and they were very protective
24:46because of some of his deficits.
24:48You know, him being an individual
24:50that's just thinking about somewhere to sleep
24:52or just being able to, you know, have something to eat.
24:55If I was in that situation where I was told
24:58that my DNA scientifically was at a crime scene,
25:03I'd be feeling scared.
25:04I'd be thinking anxious.
25:06In California, anytime that someone's charged
25:08with a homicide, one of two things is possible.
25:12If convicted and those allegations are found true,
25:15a person is eligible for the death penalty
25:17or they may have life without the possibility of parole,
25:21meaning that they will never get out of prison.
25:23If he is innocent and he's sitting in jail because of me,
25:25I need to get him out.
25:28Lucas has already been in custody for several weeks.
25:32An inquiry into how his DNA was at the crime scene
25:34is launched.
25:37We knew we had an innocent person on our hands.
25:41It's like, oh, good Lord, now what?
25:44Because now we're fighting to get somebody out of custody
25:48and that's its own battle.
25:49In particular with, again, everybody's beliefs around DNA
25:54and that it's the gold standard of guilt.
25:57You really only had two options.
25:59One was lab error, contamination within the lab,
26:03or there was transfer.
26:06There's a potential that if I touch a surface
26:09that someone else has touched,
26:10I could pick their DNA up from that surface
26:13and move it somewhere else.
26:15Because it's so sensitive,
26:16you could have secondary and tertiary transfer of DNA
26:19and that can become a massive problem.
26:22The first thing they did was they looked at the crime lab
26:25and they looked at cross-contamination.
26:27All the forensic scientists must have been
26:29seriously worried about where the contamination
26:31has come from.
26:33I think that was more of a stress point for me
26:36until they did their internal investigation
26:40and said, no, it wasn't at the lab.
26:42And once that happened, then it was like, okay,
26:45then I've got to figure out how this happened.
26:50Sergeant Lunsford looks at whether Lucas
26:53could have had any interaction with the Oakland gangs.
26:57We had no information of how they had tied Lucas
27:01as one of the perpetrators.
27:02For people that do have significant gang connections
27:06or gang crimes, you'll see a history over that
27:08from juvenile all the way through adulthood.
27:10There was none of that for Lucas.
27:13If you were some gangsters wanting to commit a crime,
27:16you're not really gonna take Lucas along for the run.
27:20On Lucas, I've struggled finding anything.
27:23I found more and more and more on the other suspects.
27:29The gang have a history of drug trafficking
27:31and committing residential burglaries.
27:34These home invasions are the typical ML for a lot of gangs
27:38because it's get in, get out.
27:40Intelligence has found the gang
27:42targets Asian heritage families.
27:45Some criminals target particular groups of people.
27:48And when we're talking about people
27:50from the South Asian community,
27:52we're talking about these stereotypes
27:53that they hold loads of gold and jewelry
27:56and cash within their households.
28:00They found to have posted a number of music videos
28:03bragging about money.
28:04Typical of many inner city gangs,
28:07to talk about their love of music,
28:09to talk about their lavish lifestyles,
28:11the things that they can attain through criminal activity.
28:14It glamorizes a particular lifestyle.
28:17Money is not just about what you hold,
28:19it's about power, it's about status, it's about respect.
28:23In one video, experts notice a chilling lyric.
28:28They mentioned duct tape,
28:29which really signifies that duct tape
28:31is definitely a tool that they utilize
28:33whenever they engage in these particular criminal behaviors.
28:37Convinced someone who knew the Kumaras helped them,
28:40the team tracks the men's movements
28:42on the night of the murder using phone data.
28:46All I had was DNA.
28:48I was just trying to make sure that I could show that
28:52with the evidence to show that my theory was correct.
28:57You can watch them on their phone
28:59traveling all the way down to our area and then back again.
29:04Cell site data is good,
29:06but it can't exactly pinpoint where someone's been.
29:10So although the offender's been in the area,
29:12they need further evidence to tie him
29:14to the actual crime scene.
29:16We obtained records for calls and text messages.
29:20So I was able to go through the text messages
29:23and see who they were calling,
29:25what the conversations were about.
29:28As Sergeant Lunsford trawls through hundreds of hours
29:31of call and text logs,
29:34inquiries into Ravisha's finances
29:36reveal things aren't what they seem.
29:39With all of the spending
29:40and the luxury lifestyle that he lived,
29:43it comes to a point where the wealth starts to decline.
29:46He doesn't have as much money that he once had.
29:49Discovering that now starts to enable
29:52the investigation team to start thinking about,
29:55well, who are the potential suspects?
29:57Who did he owe money?
29:59Who has he been giving money?
30:02Ravisha has been giving several of the women
30:04he paid for sex large amounts of money and lavish gifts.
30:10He actually started families,
30:11had relationships with them,
30:13paying them to raise their children,
30:16his children and theirs.
30:17And we were trying to determine
30:19if any of the women that he had hired
30:22or had relationships with were involved.
30:24It was several women.
30:27We had to find an interview
30:30and see if there's somebody out there
30:34that maybe had not been able to get that extra money.
30:40One name stands out, Katrina Fritz, Austin's sister.
30:46When we started looking at D'Angelo,
30:48you're looking at who his family is.
30:49So that name popped up there.
30:51We found out that Mr. Coomer
30:52had been having a relationship with Katrina Fritz
30:55for probably around 10 years.
30:57Katrina has visited Ravisha at home hundreds of times.
31:02She was seen as the main girl.
31:04She would have been around Ravisha
31:05in some of these most intimate moments.
31:09So she would have seen absolutely everything.
31:12She would have access to the residence.
31:15She would be able to know
31:16which doors are commonly gonna be unlocked,
31:18what he's gonna do at night,
31:20how the house is laid out.
31:22It was kind of putting it together to me
31:24that she could have been the inside guy.
31:29It was making me feel like,
31:30okay, I'm really getting this down now.
31:32I think I have.
31:34How Mr. Coomer was possibly targeted,
31:36how they were linked together
31:39and how they knew to go up to this house
31:41up on the mountain, up outside of town.
31:46It was enough for me to get an arrest warrant
31:48and they were able to find her and take her into custody.
31:52We interviewed her for probably two hours the first day.
31:56She tied some things together
31:58all in regards to her relationship with Mr. Coomer.
32:03He had been paying her for sex.
32:06He was also just giving her money,
32:09what their plans had been,
32:12you know, trying to create a family.
32:16The beginning of their relationship
32:17was at a time when Ravisha was in the midst of his life.
32:22He was in the midst of his glitz and his glamour.
32:24We knew that a car was being brought and jewelry was given.
32:29On his laptop, detectives find he signed a letter
32:33agreeing to pay her $30,000
32:35towards a down payment on a house.
32:38Then financial issues on his end
32:41was leading to less financial assistance for Katrina.
32:46So they just kind of drifted apart.
32:48We know that there was a decline in his money
32:50in the amount that he once had.
32:51He may have got to a point where he didn't want to give
32:54as much money or give her the gifts
32:56or the things that he once was giving.
32:59She insists she doesn't know anything about the robbery
33:03or her brother's movements.
33:06When we started talking about her brother,
33:07she just told us a bunch of stuff that was just lies
33:11and I knew were lies.
33:12Call data shows in the hours before the murder,
33:15they spoke four times.
33:18During the calls, Austin tells his sister
33:21he's outside the Coomera's home watching Ravish.
33:26Confronted with the evidence, Katrina clams up.
33:30She ended up ending the conversation after about two hours.
33:34Katrina Fritz is also charged with murder.
33:39But although convinced they finally found the go-between,
33:43police believe there are more people involved.
33:47There is still unaccounted for DNA at the crime scene.
33:52When the crime lab was processing the DNA samples
33:56that we found, there were several partial DNA strands
34:01that they found.
34:03If it's a partial profile, it's really difficult
34:05to load that to any database
34:07because it could hit against hundreds of names.
34:09When you actually can identify who the suspect is,
34:13then you can match that suspect against that partial profile.
34:16To make their case watertight,
34:18the team needs to not only identify the other intruders,
34:22but solve the mystery of how Lucas's DNA
34:25was found at the crime scene.
34:28You need to ensure that no other DNA in that scene
34:31could be as a result of contamination.
34:34That actually, for the defense team,
34:36can be utilized as an opportunity to say,
34:39well, if there's doubt about that DNA,
34:42then there's also a potential doubt about the gloves,
34:45about the duct tape.
34:47During my trace of Mr. Kuma's last 24 hours,
34:50I looked to see, well, is there a place
34:52where he could have run into Lucas?
34:54And I couldn't find any of that.
34:58Lucas was living on the streets,
35:00kind of a four to eight block radius in downtown San Jose.
35:02So you kind of, if you are looking for Lucas,
35:05you know where to go look for him.
35:06I looked at from both sides and I couldn't figure it out.
35:09What linked Lucas Anderson and his hospital trip
35:14to my victim?
35:18And in the end, I figured out how it happened.
35:29Police in California investigating the murder
35:31of tech entrepreneur, Ravish Kumra,
35:35believe they've solved the mystery
35:36of how Lucas Anderson's DNA appeared at the crime scene,
35:40despite him never being there.
35:44It was the paramedics.
35:47On the night of the murder,
35:49paramedics were called to treat Lucas
35:51after he was found blackout drunk
35:54outside a store in downtown San Jose.
35:59Two paramedics transported Lucas to the hospital
36:04and an hour or so later were called to my crime scene.
36:08They treated Mr. Kumra, determined that he was deceased.
36:12So that was the common link between the two.
36:15I spoke to them and I said, well, how did you treat him?
36:18And they said, well, what we would do is we come in,
36:20put the leads on him, put a pulse oximeter on his finger.
36:25I mean, I can't a hundred percent prove it,
36:27but logic says that they did not clean
36:29the equipment well enough.
36:31And that's how I believe it happened
36:32is their pulse oximeter transferred a little bit of DNA
36:36to the fingertip of Mr. Kumra.
36:38And that's how Lucas DNA got there.
36:42You're talking nothing.
36:44You're talking a few cells now
36:46that they're able to do a full profile on.
36:48So we're in a whole different world.
36:51It's quite scary to know that your DNA
36:53can be found at a crime scene.
36:55The fact that science has been developed
36:57so much in modern society, that mistakes don't happen.
37:03It really does make you question
37:05everything you do at a crime scene.
37:07This man could have been put into prison
37:10for the rest of his life
37:12for something that he hadn't done.
37:15After five months on remand,
37:17the charges against Lucas are dropped.
37:21It was a huge relief, I think, for everybody
37:23because it just wasn't fitting together.
37:26Custody is stressful on anybody,
37:29but in particular for those that suffer from mental illness,
37:32it exacerbates symptoms.
37:34It is not a good place for him.
37:35So it was good for us to get him out as soon as possible.
37:40Lucas's story sent shockwaves
37:42through the criminal justice community.
37:47This case was groundbreaking.
37:51It was the first criminal case in the United States
37:54of what we call direct transfer proven on a homicide case.
37:59And initially, I'll tell you, there was a lot of resistance,
38:02not only within the legal community,
38:04but within the scientific community.
38:07DNA evidence, however good it is,
38:10it's also really important to check
38:12the provenance of that DNA.
38:13How has it got into that scene?
38:15And how relevant is it?
38:18DNA evidence, when done properly, is solid evidence.
38:22But when we say things like, can we trust it?
38:26It's not, can we trust the science
38:28if science is done well?
38:30It's, can we trust juries and people
38:32to interpret it properly?
38:36I think a lot of us that participated,
38:40we all asked, now we know better, how do we do better?
38:43And so what Lucas's case taught us is,
38:46you got to check yourself on that bias.
38:49Because he's an individual that's coming
38:51from an impoverished background,
38:52the why and the hows can sometimes become a blur.
38:56And unfortunately, there's a lot of individuals
38:58that can't defend themselves in society.
39:00A lot of individuals that probably don't have the finance
39:02in order to argue.
39:07I think that Lucas has a great deal of resilience to him.
39:10He's had childhood trauma.
39:12I mean, he was raised on the streets.
39:14But one of the reasons why he has always given me permission
39:18to talk about his case is it broke his heart
39:21because on the news, they put his photograph
39:23up as a murderer.
39:25And he was always concerned that his mother had seen that.
39:29And so he has always been a proponent
39:31of wanting his story to get out there,
39:34not just because he wants other people
39:36not to have what happened to him happen,
39:39but also that his mother would find out
39:41that he wasn't a killer.
39:44After almost jailing an innocent man,
39:47the case against the three other suspects
39:49must be bulletproof.
39:52So far, Javier Garcia, D'Angelo Austin,
39:56and his sister, Katrina Fritz,
39:58have refused to speak to investigators
40:00about the fatal robbery.
40:03But then, Fritz unexpectedly asks to meet with police.
40:08Her attorney contacted the district attorney's office
40:11and said that she would like to speak with us again,
40:15talk about giving a statement.
40:17We transported her back to the police station
40:20and we spent the rest of the day,
40:22it was probably a good five, six hours,
40:23doing an interview of her
40:25and her just telling us everything.
40:28Katrina was quite instrumental in this home invasion.
40:32She knew it all.
40:33She had access.
40:35She created a map and in that map,
40:37it showed what rooms were gonna be open,
40:40where things may be,
40:42things that these intruders could have utilized
40:45to execute their plan.
40:48She insists she didn't know the robbery would be so violent
40:53and eventually agrees to a plea deal.
40:56She gave us the identity of a third guy that was there
41:01it turned out he was a friend
41:03of D'Angelo Austin's, Marcellus Drummer.
41:08She gave us his phone number
41:10and that phone number was traveling with D'Angelo Austin
41:15on that night to the scene and back.
41:19Drummer is part of the Oakland gangs.
41:22He's brought into custody.
41:24Searches of his home turn up a bracelet
41:26stolen from the Qumras.
41:29His DNA is compared to outstanding profiles
41:32found at the scene.
41:34Partial DNA profile that matches the suspect
41:37can actually help to corroborate stories.
41:40A partial sample from Ravisha's right hand gets a match.
41:46The police are happy that she's telling the truth.
41:49Drummer is also charged with murder.
41:52Four years on from the fatal robbery, the trials begin.
41:56I always wondered why homicide trials
41:58took three to five years.
42:00It's because of all the laws and the buildup and everything.
42:03It's just a long process.
42:06Some of the family was there for the trial.
42:09I tried to make sure that they were okay.
42:12I can answer a lot of questions for them,
42:14try and help them come to some final conclusion.
42:18I felt pretty good about the case that we had.
42:20If I'm gonna try and put somebody away in jail
42:23for the rest of their life, I need to be 100% positive.
42:26And I was 100% positive.
42:29Austin and Garcia are brought before the courts.
42:32They just acted like it was a normal, everyday thing.
42:35There was no remorse or anything.
42:37So you've got young people that live with the abuse
42:39and they're just trying to get away from it.
42:42And they're just trying to get away from it.
42:44And they're just trying to get away from it.
42:46So you've got young people that live within these particular environments
42:49that unfortunately grow up where these things are normal,
42:53where criminality is normal, where violence is normal,
42:56where homicide is normal, desensitizes human beings.
43:00As part of her plea deal, Fritz takes the stand to testify
43:04against her brother and his co-defendants.
43:08Where people may be getting sentenced for long periods of time,
43:11sometimes it's every man for themselves.
43:14After hearing the evidence,
43:15the jury retires to consider their verdicts.
43:20I was very nervous because if you have to go to jury trial,
43:23it's a 50-50 shot.
43:25The district attorney and I are both standing
43:28and I think my palms were sweaty.
43:32It was such a relief when they came through with the guilty verdict.
43:36D'Angelo Austin, Javier Garcia and Marcella Strummer,
43:41a sentence to life without parole.
43:45Fritz is sentenced to 17 years for robbery and false imprisonment.
43:53I was happy that who I believed did it actually did do it
43:56and I proved that forensically and through other evidence.
44:00I was equally, if not more, happy that I was able to prove
44:05that Lucas Anderson did not do it.
44:08On the other side of it, though, is you have to make sure
44:12that the family is taken care of.
44:17A home invasion is extremely traumatic.
44:20It's a violation of your privacy.
44:22Home is supposed to be a safe space.
44:25They've been victimised and I think good cops have to remember
44:29to help the victims through the process.
44:31Crimes like these impact families a lot.
44:34Super hard for them.
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