The road to justice

A large collection of interview and investigation transcripts, hair and blood samples, lab work, testimonies, videos and photographs from the 1985 Helen Wilson murder case have been tucked away in the Beatrice Police Department evidence lockers for more than 20 years.

It was this evidence that enabled investigators and prosecutors to identify Bruce Allen Smith as the lone killer of 68-year-old Helen Wilson.

The Attorney General’s office held an informal press conference Thursday afternoon at its downtown Lincoln office releasing evidence from the 1985 homicide. Evidence included 11 large binders packed with transcripts and police reports, several binders of the 1989 transcripts from the 1989 Joseph White murder trial, DNA lab results, numerous photographs, video and paper transcripts of suspect interrogation and a video taken of the crime scene.

“We want lessons to be learned from what happened here,” Corey O’Brien, Nebraska Assistant Attorney General involved in the case, said.

Last week, Nebraska Attorney General John Bruning announced that Smith was the sole killer of Helen Wilson, who was found dead in her Beatrice apartment. The six people originally convicted in the killing, White, Thomas Winslow, Ada Taylor, Debra Shelden, James Dean and Kathy Gonzalez; have been found innocent in connection to the case.

In 1985, Smith, who died in 1992 of AIDS, was first identified as one of 10 original suspects in the case and law enforcement retrieved DNA samples from him. Smith was in Beatrice at the time of the murder, according to the investigation.

On Feb. 5, 1985, Smith was drinking in a Beatrice bar with local residents before leaving at midnight to head to Blue Springs for a party. After upsetting and threatening to rape one of the individuals at the party, he was thrown out. But, not before threatening to "get even," according to testimony.

At approximately 3:30 a.m. on Feb. 6, Smith was then driven back to Beatrice and dropped off at Sixth and Court and last seen walking north, according to evidence. It is then believed that Smith entered the apartment building, where Helen Wilson resided, and committed the crime.

Smith left Beatrice days after the murder and returned to Oklahoma. Law enforcement traveled to Oklahoma to retrieve DNA samples from Smith. It was tested in the Oklahoma State Crime Lab.

However, due to testing methods available at the time of the murder, he was excluded.

With the DNA evidence releasing White and Winslow in the case, investigators and prosecutors had to go back to evidence from more than 20 years ago to find the answers, O’Brien said. For months, prosecutors and investigators worked through a large cache of information, evidence and other materials to determine the killer.

One piece of evidence included a video that was taken of the crime scene. The video revealed that the crime was unlikely motivated by burglary, but a sexual crime, O’Brien said. As the apartment of Wilson was recorded, cupboards, shelves, items of value, including $1,300 in Wilson’s purse, were left untouched.

Authorities also went back and completed DNA testing on many of the hair and blood samples collected from suspects in 1985.

A task that was not easy as they played out several case scenarios that could have occurred, he said.

“We just felt like we kept running into a brick wall because we kept getting DNA results back to this one individual,” O’Brien said.

Once they determined that it was one individual and it was evident that it was a sexual crime, it was unlikely the six convicted were involved. O’Brien said a task force, comprised of different law enforcement agencies, investigators and prosecutors, went to work to figure out who their suspect was.

“We had a ‘war room’ set up at the Beatrice Police Department conference room,” O’Brien described to reporters. “It was lined with pictures, it was lined with maps, it was lined with reports and our main purpose was finding out who this person was that was responsible for Helen Wilson’s murder.”

The task force also went back and spoke with original investigators and witnesses involved in the case.

The task force believed Wilson’s true killer was one of original suspects identified and developed by the police department back in 1985.

One-by-one, the task force weeded out the potential suspects.

Smith was originally questioned and profiled by police in the days following the murder.

But, the task force went ahead and tested him anyway, sending a pubic hair sample to the University of Nebraska Medical Center to complete a DNA test. Smith’s DNA matched the DNA collected at the crime scene.

Now that they had their match, the search was on for Smith. Their search led to find that he died in 1992 of AIDS.

It is hard to determine why the early investigation didn’t lead to Smith, O’Brien said. It was a complex case that unraveled over a long period of time.

“This is probably the most fascinating case that I’ve ever worked,” O’Brien said.

Prosecutors and investigators involved in identifying Smith as the killer were glad to come to a conclusion, O’Brien said.

“I’m disappointed that we won’t ever get to go to court and find him guilty,” he said.