The BEST episodes of Cold Case Files (1999) season 1
Every episode of Cold Case Files (1999) season 1, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Cold Case Files (1999) season 1!
Unsolved crimes locked away in dusty file cabinets. Time is an ineffectual balm. Painful memories are left to a victim's loved ones. What happens when a killer gets away with murder? Thanks to the efforts of a special breed of modern detective, no one escapes the laws of justice - no matter how old the case.
#1 - The Answer in the Box/Maternal Instinct
Season 1 - Episode 4 - Aired 1/23/1999
Answer in the Box Alison Parrott was a runner. Not only was she was runner she was a great runner, So much so that she had the local media interested in her, So when she got a call from a photographer to take some pictures of her running she didn't think anything wrong with it. She left to go to her photo session and wasn't seen alive again. The police had a fellow runner as the lead suspect but nothing ever happened with that lead. A cold case detective named Vic Matanovic was going through some files 10 years later and came across the case. When the detective was looking for clues to solve the case the Answer is in the Box. Usually DNA is enough to prove a case but in this case the criminal who lured Alison to her death had a plan to lure the jury to believe in the lie he was about to tell. Maternal Instinct 1981 a brother and sister fell victim to a heartless mother with no regard for life. 3 month old Seth Davis was rushed to the hospital because of insulin poisoning. He was left brain damaged. 5 months later his sister, Tenga Davis, is rushed to the hospital. There she dies of Caffeine poisoning. Even though the autopsy that was turned in by the M.E. stated cause of death was a homicide, the police treated this as an accident. Their mother Mary Beth Davis moves on with her own life by moving to a different state. She starts a new family and forgets all about what happened back in her past. That is until 10 years later when Mary Beth gets a knock on her door by the cold case detectives which brings back her past as the detectives are there to prove a case of murder.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#2 - The Boy and the Monster/Secret in the Cellar
Season 1 - Episode 2 - Aired 1/8/1999
The Boy and the Monster In Wisconsin in the winter of 1991 a young woman's body was found naked, badly beaten and to make it harder to identify her, her fingertips were cut off. After months of trying to figure out who she was they finally came up with a name. Doris McLeod. After finding out who she was the police find out a lot more about her. She had a troubled past. After being on the streets she ended up connected to a pimp. Only one month of being on the streets she is never seen again. It takes a 3 year old boy to finally tell the police about Doris and the Boy and the Monster. Secret in the Cellar The second part of this episode is about a young woman from South Portland, Maine who was in search of her mother. She contacts the police but they get nowhere. They question Bill Bruns, the missing woman's husband who told the police a story about how Pearl drank and ran off with another man. Elaine Woodward, the missing womans daughter, went to the media for help. An investigator takes the case and with the help of science and man power he finds out what happened to Pearl with the Secret in the Cellar.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#3 - Terror in Telluride/Signature of a Killer
Season 1 - Episode 9 - Aired 2/26/1999
Shoot outside her bedroom, Eva Shoen was shot to death. Living in Telluride, on the mountain side. Eva was married to the son of the billion dollar Shoen family who owned the U-Haul empire. With lacking evidence the case runs cold. Even though the police believe that her death was related to a fued in the family business. Years later the case is solved by a secret that was finally revealed and a recorded conversation is played. DNA also helped the killer to confess to the crime. Signature of a Killer Taylor Courtney was a 20 yr old man who was brutaly murdered in his apartment. The crime scene was bloody and vicious. A single print is found but in 1974 when fingerprint technology was still in its infancy it meant nothing. 20 years would pass before a cold case detective would pick up the case and look at it again. What they found was a match in the system which leads to a friend of Taylor's who had committed this murder because of mistaken suspicions and jealousy.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#4 - The Texas Drifter/The Fingerprint File
Season 1 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/15/1999
Texas Drifter Two women in two separate towns in Texas who where raped. The rapist uses a knife to threaten these women then rapes them and leaves his DNA behind. Back when these happened DNA was not profected yet so having the DNA was useless. Many years later when CODIS was developed which is a database for DNA a match to the rapists DNA was found. It was to a known serial rapist. Fingerprint File It was two days before Christmas a woman if found stabbed to death with the only clue left is a fingerprint left on a pop bottle. The forensic people were able to lift the print but had no success in matching it to anybody. Years later a man still working on cold cases finds a match to the fingerpprint which gives the police a lead to a killer. Rose Among Thorns Juliet Rowe was the victim who got shot in the bedroom of her English Countryside home. She was shot execution style then was shot again in the heart. The killer wanted to make sure that Juliet was dead. After thousands of endless attempts her case remained unsolved. 8 years later a stranger comes into a pub and starts talking to Mr Rowe Juliet's husband. The stranger's name was Keith Rose. He was arrested on kidnapping charges 6 weeks later. Because of his arrest he brings attention to himself to the cold case investigators who then look at him in the "Rose Among Thorns" case.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#5 - The Burning Secret/Justice Delayed
Season 1 - Episode 13 - Aired 3/26/1999
A rapist is captured seven years after the crime, but when he is released on a technicality his victim is determined to fight back. Fifteen years after a fire claimed the lives of a father and son, detectives interview the grown surviving son and learn a tragic tale of a mother who burned her family.
Watch Now:Amazon
#6 - One Night on the Bayou/The Buckeye Misdemeanor
Season 1 - Episode 7 - Aired 2/12/1999
In Louisiana, in 1994, police find the body of a victim who's throat was slashed and body stabbed. With no evidence the case goes cold for many years until years later when a man is arrested for theft. The man is looking to find a way out of jail and tell the detectives of a tale of a murder, fishing and revenge one night many years ago One Night on the Bayou The second story line in this episode is about two men wielding guns in a motel lobby.The only clues left are a few finger prints. Since there were no other clues the case goes cold and is filed in the Buckeye Misdemeanor file. It would be 20 years before the police would look at that file again. With new technology they restart the search to find a killer.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#7 - Diary Of A Serial Arsonist/The Lost Clue
Season 1 - Episode 10 - Aired 3/5/1999
Every 2 years, a group of fire investigators meet for a conference. While attending the conference in 1987 in Fresno, California, 3 suspicious fires break out near the conference. They were in 3 different fabric stores nearby each other. The only clue being left behind is one latent pint. Two years later when the conference is held again in Monterey, California another group of fires break out. The firefighters at the conference begin to think that it's one of themselves. With fingerprinting in it's more advanced stage they were able to tie the arsons to one of the investigators. While searching through his things they find a manscript called DIARY OF A SERIAL ARSONIST which contained not only information on arson but instructions on murder. In the second story line an elderly woman from San Antonio, Texas lay in her room naked from the waist down with her throat slashed. In the next room was her 80 year old husband who had just suffered his 3rd stroke. But there was no evidence to charge him. With pressure from a Texas Ranger the case is re-looked at where in they find the LOST CLUE in solving the case.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#8 - The Mark of Cain/Death on The Freeway
Season 1 - Episode 8 - Aired 2/19/1999
James McCutcheon who makes his home in Florida is reported missing. His roommate Jim Drysdale has basically taken over James' life since his dissappearance. Using his car, taking over his checking account and business. Jim becomes the prime suspect but disappeares before he is arrested. Nearly 4 years would pass before police would catch a break. Jim makes his first mistake from high on the mountain tops of Tennessee where he had been hiding out. He files a clain with Social Security. Where police converge and arrest Jim. While taking him back to Florida Jim confesses to the murder and shows police where the body is. He does this showing no remorse at all. After doing his shift at work, LA Sheriff’s Sergeant George Arthur get into his van and heades home. But what differs on this ride home is that George was shot in his van. Blood was collected from his van and eyewitnesses claim to see a man running from the scene. Without DNA advancement and tecnology the case goes cold. However in 1999 DNA has advanced so far that the this cold case was able to be looked at again. In the investigation police DNA swabs were voluntarily collected from all of Georges friends. That is until they came to former Sheriff’s Deputy Ted Eugene Kirby who refused to give his swab. Suspicous of this police dig and find out that Ted was dating George's soon to be ex wife. He was also treated for head injuries for head injuries shortly after the murder and he called off sick for almost 2 weeks after it as well. After having to file for a search warrant and got the ok, the police collected a swab and found the DNA matched. As police rush to arrest Ted he is missing. Later it turns out that Kirby committed suicide.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#9 - Hour 1 - Cold Case Files
Season 1 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/1/1999
Felicia Prechtl is found raped and murdered in Dallas. Surrette Clark disappeared with nobody to even recognize that she was gone. Bob Crane was strangled and beaten to death in his own bed in 1978. Ronnie Bullock was a man who had served 10 years of his sentence for raping an 11 year old girl until DNA evidence was found.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#10 - The Hunter Homicides/The Skulls Of Stanley Park
Season 1 - Episode 5 - Aired 1/29/1999
In the first story line in this series called Hunter Homicides 2 hunter were out hunting in 1993 when they were robbed and murdered. Many years pass with this murder gone cold until 1997 when one of the hunters guns shows up in a pawn shop. This case was solved by using psychology not evidence. This case takes you into the mind of the killer. In Vancouver’s Stanley Park in the 1950's skulls were found all being childrens. The case remains cold for almost 50 years until DNA was perfected. Using forensic technology and hundred of volunteers the case of The Skulls of Stanley Park. is re-opened.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#11 - Through Eyes of a Child/The Killer Next Door
Season 1 - Episode 6 - Aired 2/6/1999
George Morgan is serving time in an Illinois prison. For some unknown reason while he is serving his time he wants to talk about a cold case. The difference with George is he wants nothing in return for what he tells the detectives. Going back in his childhood, George talks about his childhood and his abusive step-mom. And the death of his 4 year old sister at her hands. With no evidence, only details, the detectives have to go back 30 years to look for evidence. The Killer Next Door is the second plot in this episode. John McRae began his killing at age 15. After his release and his proclaim to being reformed, the killings started again. His sexual motive was sadism and his preference was male boys. It would take 50 years, 4 homicides and 3 different state to find where the dumping grounds were.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#12 - Presumed Dead/The Tow Truck Killer
Season 1 - Episode 16 - Aired 4/23/1999
One will take 10 years and one will take 17 years to solve but they do get solved. Dedication, science, luck, and even hypnosis is used to make sure justice is done for the dead.
Watch Now:Amazon
#13 - Vanished
Season 1 - Episode 19 - Aired 5/7/1999
The story of serial killer James Rodney Hicks, who left a trail of bodies and kept police, prosecutors, and the FBI quite busy working on his cases for over 20 years. Hicks murdered his wife, his children's babysitter, and a girlfriend.
Watch Now:Amazon
#14 - Family Secret/Blood Trail
Season 1 - Episode 23 - Aired 6/4/1999
Forty-one years after the crime, a woman implicates her brother and cousin in the murder of a New Jersey policeman. And members of the Vidocq Society, a group of law enforcement professionals who volunteer their expertise to crack difficult cases, find blood-spatter evidence that helps solve a Texas murder.
Watch Now:Amazon
#15 - Killer on the Strip/The Doll Murder
Season 1 - Episode 11 - Aired 3/12/1999
In the beautiful byways of West Palm Beach, along the canals a woman was fond dead in the canal. After some research they found that the woman was a prostitute. Even with all the evidence and DNA collected at the scene The detecives still had nothing to go on so the case went cold. Four yeas would pass before her case got looked at again. One of the Cold Case detective's who was reviewing some cases where crimes were committed in the area in which he worked his beat. With some new perspective on the case he finds signs that this womans killer has all the signs of a serial attacker and a kille. His trickery is to pose as a police officer to the local prostitutes and lures them into hidden places where he has privacy and assults them and rapes them. And at least 1 case he murders them. Doll Murder A woman from For Collins, Colorado thought she was safe in her own home, but one night in 1989 that myth was shattered. She was found murdered in her own home. The only things that were missing from her home were all her underwear. Semen and fingerprints were collected bt since there was no testing of DNA back then the case went cold. It would be 6 years when across town the womans underwear was found in a furnace. With this new discovery the case was re-opened to be looked at to finally settle the case
Watch Now:Amazon
#16 - Reconstructing Murder/Fire Flicks
Season 1 - Episode 14 - Aired 4/9/1999
In Wisconsin, advances in forensic clay modeling help investigators identify a murder victim whose skin was stripped from her head, neck, and legs. And in California, police track down two boys who enjoy satanic rituals and setting fires.
Watch Now:Amazon
#17 - Silent Witness/Innocence Lost
Season 1 - Episode 21 - Aired 5/21/1999
The murder of scientist Helena Greenwood, who was helping to develop DNA forensic technology when she died, is solved 12 years later with the help of DNA evidence. And a Los Angeles County prosecutor uses criminal profiling to nab the notorious South Bay Rapist, who abducted and raped six young girls.
Watch Now:Amazon
#18 - The Missing Informant/Man's Best Friend
Season 1 - Episode 17 - Aired 4/30/1999
Police solve a murder when divers find a skeleton in a car at the bottom of a river. A dead dog’s DNA helps crack open a six-year-old case.
Watch Now:Amazon
#19 - Portrait of a Killer/The Tortured Truth
Season 1 - Episode 18 - Aired 4/30/1999
The accidental discovery of a human scalp leads to the conviction of a man for murder 18 years after the killing. And a teenager who likes to kidnap younger boys and break their bones, kills one and tortures another.
Watch Now:Apple TV
#20 - Killer in the County
Season 1 - Episode 15 - Aired 4/16/1999
Time is not always on the killer's side. He never knows where or when. Bt somebody is inevitably going to find something out and find out who committed the crime. Even if you have changed for the better since then. As taken from the Baretta TV series. "Don't do the crime if you can't pay the time." Terror struck Wichita Falls, Texas when three women, Terry Sims, Toni Gibbs and Ellen Blau were murdered and raped. Ten years would pass before a task force was assembled to compare the three murders. They found that the three semen samples all matched. That was the easy part. Finding who those samples were linked to was another story. John Little, an investigator, revisited the files and after careful and time consuming work he found a name in one of the files of a man who was a suspect but was never investigated. Faryion Wardip was the suspect and after some research on him it was found that he was already convicted of killing a woman named Tina Kimbrew in 1986. He was however paroled because of a very publicized meeting in which Wardip begged for forgiveness from Kimbrew's father. Little thought that Wardrip was still a major player in his cases so he found out where he was living and watched him. One lucky night, Little obtained a discarded coffee cup of Wardrip and brought it back for DNA analysis. Much to his satisfaction, the DNA from the saliva on the cup and the DNA from the semen matched. When detectives finally approached Wardrip with all their overwhelming evidence, Wardrip, without a struggle, turned himself in and also during this time confessed to a fifth murder, one he was not even a suspect in.
#21 - The Missing and the Dead
Season 1 - Episode 20 - Aired 5/14/1999
When a passing motorist spots a fire along a country road in South Carolina and calls it in, police arrive to discover the badly burned and battered remains of a woman, her skull smashed in to 97 fragments. After a forensic anthropologist at the University of South Carolina painstakingly pieces the bones back together, investigators use the skull to solve the murder.
#22 - Frozen in Time/Little Girl Lost
Season 1 - Episode 22 - Aired 5/28/1999
Using a hair dryer to thaw a frozen corpse, detectives get to the bottom of a grisly murder. And the discovery of a child's skeleton in a Chicago garden puts police on the trail of an "oddball" family.
#23 - Bodies In The Bay/'Til Death Do Us Part
Season 1 - Episode 24 - Aired 6/11/1999
A sunset boat ride in Florida leads to death for a vacationing woman and her two daughters, and police investigate a Texas man whose three wives all died in mysterious fashions.
#24 - Murder Illustrated/Blood Relations
Season 1 - Episode 12 - Aired 3/19/1999
Nine years after police had to release the teenage suspect in a woman's murder due to lack of evidence, they find a new lead in the case. Twenty years after a young woman is murdered while babysitting her nephew, police are able to find DNA evidence that points to her killer.