in Memphis Tennessee a horrible crying terrified local restaurants most never heard the young mother's screams but they felt their loss as local authorities searched for the perpetrator they found many who had motive investigators were forced to consider whether this was a random act of violence foreign of deliberate calculation [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] when a wealthy young woman was abducted in front of her in-laws home the police had no shortage of suspects the 25 year old victim left behind a tumultuous marriage an ex-husband and old boyfriends all were on the FBI shot list I'm Jim calstrom from head of the FBI's New York office the suspects are interviewed the case grew no clearer to find the woman and her abductor investigators would have to first determine the motive [Music] Tunica County Mississippi just south of Memphis Tennessee is America's third largest gambling destination got a seven five-year-old Shannon Sanderson had recently become one of the regulars the housewife from nearby Memphis Tennessee visited her favorite casino managed to turn 500 into 5 000 at the high stakes blackjack team come back 3 30 A.M cashed out and headed home I'm sure can I have security security when players win big most casinos provide a security escort to protect customers from theft this casino was no exception upon Shannon's request a guard followed her to the parking area that was great [Music] she knew the route well she loved to win but could afford to lose less than a year earlier she'd married her boss a multi-millionaire who was 33 years her senior [Music] earlier that evening she had dropped off her three young children from her previous marriage at the home of their grandparents in Northeast Memphis it was about 4 45 AM when Shannon pulled into the grandparents driveway to pick up her children she needed to get them off to school on time in the morning inside the house Shannon's former in-laws were awakened by a piercing scream [Music] her former father-in-law rushed to the window to see Shannon struggling with someone in a baseball cap he raced to his sister [Music] neighbors also heard the commotion and witnessed the crime within seconds the mother of three had been abducted less than 50 feet from the front door [Music] the distraught grandfather called 9-1-1 Memphis police were immediately dispatched [Music] cases at Christmas arrived within minutes and interviewed Shannon's former father Memphis Police Captain Richard David Wilson the sergeant at the time recalls that the shaken man did his best to recall what he had seen her ex-father-in-law heard a commotion and observed a car driving away at the same time some other neighbors on the street heard the commotion and and also looked out and saw a car drive away and gave a description of the driver and description of the car I think that's an interesting thing this one piece will make 52 layers watch on mobile devices or the big screen all for free no subscription required download really now despite the dim light Witnesses agreed that the driver had worn a red baseball cap but their descriptions of the vehicle varied some described it vaguely as dark colored and sports another witness was certain that it was a maroon Chevy Beretta none of them could describe the driver's face on the driveway close to the street police found two metal buttons assumed to have been torn from Shannon's cloak close by they recovered a single artificial fingernail the victim's car was searched but police found nothing to suggest the identity of her abductor or Shannon's whereabouts her ex-father-in-law had seen Shannon earlier that evening when she had dropped off her children he and his wife had agreed to babysit their grandchildren while Shannon celebrated her new husband's birthday at the casino their former daughter-in-law had divorced their son less than a year before till their relationship with her remained amicable and she visited regularly with the children good all right Shannon's former father-in-law told police the name of the casino where Shannon and her new husband like to play [Music] the casino confirmed she'd been there and won five thousand dollars but no one could say if she was with anyone in particular later that day news that the mother of three was abducted just steps from where her children slept horrified local residents according to Memphis District Attorney Jerry kitchen and she appeared to be a person who was very conscious about the upbringing of her children because she had returned back to Memphis to pick her children up to make sure that they got to school Memphis Police questioned Shannon's ex-husband who was the father of her three children is anybody here with you after 11 30 no sir okay sweetie he was at work when the abduction occurred in front of his parents home we know his relationship with Shannon had been stormy they remained married for almost eight years finally divorced after Shannon fell in love with her present husband [Music] Memphis police were reluctant to eliminate him as a suspect so early in the investigation though Shannon's ex-husband's Alibi was solid that was the reason why people get a divorce but there's always got I've never heard of a good divorce she still made him pay alimony even though she was married to a wealthy person join us police look to her present husband to learn more since he was a multi-millionaire they considered the possibility that Shannon may have been kidnapped for ransom he owned a large security company here in Memphis and he was well known everybody wanted to help him because they knew him our new Lobby and being that he was wealthy she would be a prime target to be kidnapped for money was though so far he had received no Ransom call or letter he'd been distraught since being woken at 5am with the news of his wife's abduction [Music] and regrettably the last time they'd spoken that night they'd had a fight engaged in whatever she was doing [Music] it was his 58th birthday and his teenage daughters from a previous marriage had stopped by to celebrate happy birthday to you that same evening his wife Shannon had planned to take him to the casino foreign [Music] after dropping off her children she called to say that she was on the way to pick him up he told her he wasn't ready his daughters were there and he wanted to spend more time with him before going out [Music] tonight Shannon became angry according to her husband she felt he was putting his children ahead of their plans he told her he could be ready in a half hour but she hung up on him hello he expected that she'd cool down and pick him up but when he tried to call later she did not answer she knows I guess there's just such a difference in our age police asked if he knew anyone who might want to harm Shanna last thing I said she said to me the husband mentioned an ex-boyfriend against whom Shannon had filed charges of harassment a year earlier he believed the ex-boyfriend drove a Chevy Beretta [Music] at headquarters police checked with DMV but found no records that her ex-boyfriend or any of his family owned a Beretta a criminal background check did confirm that a judge had ordered her ex-lover to have no contact with Shannon over the past year [Music] his went to question Shannon's ex-boyfriend but he was not at home nor had he shown up for work [Music] his sister lived in the same neighborhood a few blocks from where Shannon had been abducted [Music] she reported that she had seen a suspicious car drive past her house on the night of the crime he was out on the porch around the time of the abduction when a maroon Chevy Beretta sped by heading out of the neighborhood she said she didn't recognize the driver at first when she saw a photo of Shannon's wealthy husband in a news report she was sure it was him though Memphis Police had first considered the possibility that Shannon had been abducted for ransom they now began to consider another possibility always in the back of your mind due to her being married to a wealthy person and the difference in their ages that uh something could have happened to her to get rid of her um we just didn't know so we tried to cover every angle that we could Memphis Police asked Shannon's husband to provide a formal statement with his lawyer present he filled in detectives about his relationship with Shanna police knew that he had met Shannon while she was still married working at the security company he owned she worked for him but soon their relationship took a personal turn [Music] their romance led to marriage but the magic didn't last long nothing else nine months later they began negotiating a postnuptial agreement outlining terms in the event that troubled Union broke both had previous marriages that ended in divorce and Shannon needed to feel certain that she would retain custody of her children they'd filed it just 10 days before Shannon's abduction feeling sufficiently well to come to Shannon's husband emphasized that it was his wife who wanted the agreement he claimed money was not the issue since they kept separate bank accounts [Music] and police asked the husband agreed to reinforce his statement with a polygraph this meeting to cover all possibilities police checked local morgues jails and hospitals after a week investigators had no solid leads to Shannon's whereabouts police in Memphis received dozens of calls from local residents most were well-intentioned but unproductive in your name again all had to be checked yes one was from a woman named Sharon powers in nearby Clarksdale Mississippi 80 miles south of Memphis abduction was reported in the paper and on the news and description of the car was given she had contacted the Memphis Police Department saying that she thought that maybe her husband was involved because of description of the car [Music] she told Mississippi Police that she believed her husband Lee may fit the suspect description the day after the crime was reported he had won a red cap and left town in their red Chevy Beretta to see his mother the woman said that she and her husband had been fighting police asked her to have him call when he returned they weren't optimistic her report sounded like a possible domestic dispute unrelated to the crime [Music] on May 3rd 1996 police responded to another call from a concerned citizen trying to help at a casino in Tunica County Mississippi a witness believed he had spotted Shannon Sanderson dressed as a casino employee [Music] when an officer approached her he realized that it was a case of mistaken identity [Music] call among hundreds of false leads that frustrated the investigation [Music] after two weeks of searching local investigators were no closer to finding the missing mother of three her family was left only with the hope that she was still alive [Music] in the spring of 1996 Memphis Police continued their search for 25-year-old Shannon Sanderson who had been abducted from the front of her former in-laws home investigators had questioned her wealthy husband past lovers and area residents but none offered Clues to her whereabouts in any investigation authorities try first to eliminate those people closest to the victim after more than two weeks of searching Memphis Police Captain Richard David rolson feared that time was running out due to her past boyfriends and lovers we just didn't know what happened but as the days went by the chances of finding her life were Slimmer and slimmer on May 6th Shannon's ex-boyfriend finally came in for questioning he had only recently completed his year-long probation of harassment charges against Shannon he claimed to be asleep in his mother's house at the time of her abduction according to the ex-boyfriend he avoided Shannon as his probation required but Shannon continued to call him complaining that she wasn't happy with her new marriage he added that he would have to talk to his lawyer before agreeing to take a polygraph [Music] he remained a potential suspect but as with Shannon's husband no hard evidence existed to prove nor disprove his involvement then on May 9 1996 40 miles south from where Shannon had been abducted sheriffs in DeSoto County Mississippi were called to a rural plot of land in the town of Eudora [Music] two people had been inspecting their new property and they noticed a strong odor [Music] then they discovered a woman's decomposing body [Music] DeSoto County crime scene technicians set up a grid around the immediate area they conducted a line search looking for anything that might be a clue go they labeled and recorded every item they came across as they drew closer to the body 15 feet away they found a woman's high-heeled shoe [Music] closer to the body they marked the location of another DeSoto sheriffs checked their records but found no women reported missing locally they broadened their search to include larger towns and cities in the region [Music] when they contacted Memphis authorities police there told them that a 25-year-old mother of three named Shannon Sanderson had been missing for more than two weeks [Applause] DeSoto deputies learned that she was blonde approximately five five hundred and thirty pounds had a small tattoo and was last seen wearing a dress high heels a jacket with metal buttons and pink artificial fingernails [Music] that description fit the body but they needed an autopsy to confirm her identity and cause of death the medical examiner determined that the victim had been killed by a single 25 caliber bullet to the right Temple yes sir date and time [Music] the victim's clothes were removed and preserved to check for trace evidence that might lead to the Killer the body did an estimated two to three weeks was too decomposed to recognize but over her left breast examiners found a small tattoo that was still visible [Music] it said I love you Robert Shannon Sanders had such a tattoo the medical examiner compared her dental records to x-rays from the body okay definitely they confirmed the ID this was Shannon sanderson's Body the abduction was now officially a homicide [Music] in Memphis assistant District Attorney Jerry kitchen was called in his first task would be to somehow narrow the suspect list the police had developed over the past three weeks here in Memphis it's somewhat unusual in that we have relatively few murder cases that we would classify as mystery homicides where someone's not either developed as a suspect rather quickly or arrested soon after the incident but in this particular case it was a mystery homicide with numerous Suspects that were listed as potentially being involved in the abduction and killing of the victim the assistant district attorney first called the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to conduct polygraph examinations to help eliminate potential suspects he also contacted the FBI since Shannon's body was found across the Tennessee State Line supervisory special agent Jennifer Aiken from the FBI's Memphis field office signed as case agent they felt they needed some additional resources the case was a very difficult case it crossed jurisdictions and they wanted the FBI to be involved as part of the team working towards a solution because it was it was not an easy an easy case Memphis authorities hoped that agent Aiken's experience would help unravel the complexities of this case local residents were fearful the challenge killer was still out there not knowing if or when he would strike again go over to that trail there Brian I believe in the spring of 1996 the body of 25 year old Shannon Sanderson a mother of three was found in Eudora Mississippi 40 miles from her Memphis Tennessee home FBI together with state and local investigators needed to shorten the lengthy suspect list that included Shannon's husband and past mothers assistant District Attorney Jerry kitchen hoped polygraph examinations could help Focus their search [Music] this investigation was difficult in that there were a lot of suspects in this particular case throughout the victim's life she had of course been divorced and naturally in any type of murder case so you some you you do focus in and you do look at uh relatives or acquaintances or husbands any type of relationship that the victim may have been involved in that could lead back to some type of dispute or domestic violence Tennessee State authorities tested several of Shannon's ex-lovers they asked them their whereabouts on the night of the abduction they asked directly if they had abducted or killed Shannon all denied any involvement the tests revealed no deception investigators corroborated their Alibis and eliminated them as potential suspects they also polygraphed the witness who claimed to have seen Shannon's current husband driving a maroon Chevy Beretta in the neighborhood moments before the abduction occurred it was the same type of vehicle other Witnesses had described that Shannon was forced into but the woman was found to be deceptive [Music] the police now believed her claim was false that she had seen Shannon's husband driving the getaway vehicle they also knew that Shannon's brief marriage with her wealthy husband had been Rocky they wanted to confirm once and for all that he had not been involved in any way [Music] honesty this crime occurred at four o'clock in the morning the victim's husband had indicated that he went to bed and that there was no one else that he was with and so he really had no alibi and so that was an area that was difficult for us to get over because we could not lock down exactly where he was and what he was doing without other than what he was telling us investigators contacted Shannon's husband to be polygraphed though he had previously agreed to do so on advice from his lawyer he declined heart medication that he was taking may have induced a false reading according to his lawyer are you feeling for Captain rolson your husband's refusal didn't alleviate the suspicions that surrounded him well you couldn't understand if he didn't have anything to do with it why he wouldn't be wanting to cooperate and being a homicide detective you're suspicious and and uh it just made him that more suspicious in terms of incriminating evidence the investigation was at a standstill supervisory special agent Jennifer Aiken hoped to refocus the investigation by examining leads that may have been overlooked we have to look at all of the possibilities and and that's you know part of the battle in the beginning is not to get too far down the road in speculating about what kind of of guidance could be um and and what you know what his relationship or you know non-relationship would be to the victim what we did then is identify what else what other possibilities do we still need to explore [Applause] [Music] one possibility though not a promising one was Sharon Powers who earlier reported that her husband may have matched the vague description of the suspect but now she wasn't so sure about her previous claim she told police she'd overreacted reinforcing their belief that she'd only been trying to get back at her husband for leaving her she said that her husband had left town that they had had some you know marital disputes they felt that perhaps this report was really just sort of sour grapes and that she was trying to get her husband maybe estranged husband into trouble of some kind so they really just simply did not know how much weight to give this rather conflicting and kind of half-hearted story that she was telling though her husband wasn't a serious suspect police wanted to talk with him bulletin for Gerald Lee Powers was issued that he was wanted for questioning in Tennessee [Music] FBI agents and Tennessee investigators met to review the casino surveillance tape of the blackjack table where Shannon had won the now missing five thousand dollars her growing pile of chips would certainly make her an attractive Target [Music] they viewed the tape to see if a stalker could be seen [Music] but if that was the Killer's intention agent Aiken questioned why he would wait so long to make his move [Music] clearly she had been winning for a while she was there late at night there were a number of factors that made her visit to that casino rather high risk and yet we had this abduction occurring almost an hour to an hour and a half after she left that environment so first we had to determine did it have anything or nothing to do with her visit to that casino the tape showed Shannon but was inadequate to reveal whether she was being stalked investigators were no closer to finding the truth as they contemplated what to do next the investigation veered in an unexpected Direction [Music] on May 22 1996 near hebronville Texas 750 miles from where Shannon was seen forced into a car described as a Chevy Beretta a vehicle fitting that description erratically swerved away from a border checkpoint the vehicle had Mississippi plates one of the patrol guards raced after it they're leaving the driver to be a potential border jumper or smaller [Music] in may of 1996 as the investigation continued into the kidnapping and murder of a young Tennessee mother U.S border Patrol agents chased down a fleeing maroon Chevy Beretta with Mississippi plates the type of car described by Witnesses in the abduction caught at a dead end the suspect resisted up against the car then back down and confront confronted by the agent's gun s he had 14 100 bills in his pocket the driver said his name was Gerald Lee Powers but held no driver's license to prove it the cursory search of the car revealed no illegal drugs or aliens the trunk border agents recovered a stolen weapon registered in Arkansas the car was locked and remained in that spot under armed guard until FBI agents could conduct a more thorough search special agent Evan Ray from the FBI field office in Laredo Texas was contacted since assaulting a border patrol officer as a federal offense [Music] agent Ray confirmed the identity of the driver when he learned that Gerald Lee Powers had been involved in another altercation at the Mexican border I spoke to U.S customer service officials who had indicated that they had had an incident that day as well in which an individual had fled and had left several pieces of identification behind on the counter when they fled and so we were then in possession of several pieces of identification of Mr Powers a license plate check revealed that the vehicle was registered to his wife Sharon in Clarksdale Mississippi agent Ray also discovered that Gerald Lee Powers had a violent past and was currently wanted for questioning in the abduction and murder of Shannon Sanderson after contacting Memphis authorities he traveled to hebronville to process power's car on site the Chevy Beretta matched the vehicle Witnesses had described at the abduction agents hope something inside would link the vehicle and powers to the murder of Shannon Sanderson a sheet and pillowcase along with the trunk liner were bundled into evidence bags tape this stuff up we'll get it back to headquarters when you're retrieving evidence like that you have no idea what the results of the laboratory examinations are going to be in the end you just try to get the best and the most evidence that you can and let the lab do their job agents were less hopeful they'd find something in the car's interior since it appeared to have been recently cleaned and vacuumed hundreds of miles from the nearest evidence Response Team agent Ray improvised with the tools he had at hand one item that we needed to search for were hairs and fibers in the back seat area we didn't have the specialized equipment that the evidence response team would have and so I used an an unopened lint roller that I had at the office of the type one might use on a on a suit to as an adhesive lift initially obscured by the front seat the agent found a pink artificial fingernail on the floor it was similar to those the victim had worn at the time of her abduction Memphis prosecuted Jerry kitchen believed this could be the clue that could definitely Place Shannon Sanderson in power's car [Music] AJ Ray had called us and told us that he had found a fingernail in the back seat area of the floorboard of this vehicle which is where we had felt that based upon the witnesses uh information they had given us that that the victim had been placed in the back seat of the vehicle that took her away Memphis authorities came to Laredo to question Gerald Lee Powers about the movie Powers told them that he knew nothing more than what he'd heard on the news he admitted to being at the casino that night but had left early to check on his terminally ill neighbor while the interview continued investigators spoke to his neighbor in Clarksdale Mississippi who denied that powers had been there at that time [Music] we weren't 100 convinced Gerald Powers was our suspect we just felt it was kind of suspicious that he was he was trying to give a false Alibi and that of course the neighbor was very ill and could have been mistaken because he had been there at different times investigators hope that power's wife Sharon might be able to corroborate the neighbor's statement she had initially told police her husband fit the description of the suspect who witnesses Glimpse at the abduction a man who wore a red baseball cap now she added that he made frequent trips to the casino where the victim had spent her last night still she did not know if he had visited their neighbor that night and denied that her husband had anything to do with the abduction and murder of Shannon Sanderson [Music] investigators feared they might just be wasting their time but FBI special agent Jennifer Aiken wasn't so sure we sensed her ambivalence we knew that she you know had come forward even with her kind of half-hearted story we knew she'd come forward for a reason and that there was more she needed to tell seconds later Gerald Lee Powers agent Aiken realized that she would need to invest a great deal of time to develop the trust of Sharon powers as the dialogue with Sharon Powers continued over several weeks the FBI contacted Tom Scott director of surveillance at the casino with a victim had gambled prior to her abduction Scott was asked to confirm if Gerald Lee Powers had been recorded that same night on any of the 600 cameras in the 95 000 square foot Casino Jennifer Aiken from the FBI gave us a a basic description of what the suspect possibly was wearing on the night in question and that's what we went with with as a general description from color shoes to jeans to a certain type jacket and possibly a ball cap any given day you can have approximately three thousand to ten thousand people within a casino Scott and his team searched hundreds of hours of footage looking for a man in a red baseball cap and yellow shirt their main focus was the blackjack table where Shannon spent most of the night if the suspect was stationary it's it's pretty easy but uh in a casino it's quite an exciting place to be in and everybody kind of wanders around they go to slot machine a slot machine or restaurants or table games we could not locate the individual investigators look to Sharon powers for more detail about her husband's activities that night they did what they could to make her feel comfortable one of her neighbors a police officer provided her with reassurance and support she was a woman torn between her empathy for the victim and her feelings towards her husband she was in love with this man I think it was difficult for Sharon to accept the fact that the victim had been a mother of three young children she herself was a mother of three children and I'm very much related to the victim slowly Sharon Powers worked through her internal conflict open up revealing what her home life was like with her husband Gerald Lee powers she said he ruled the house her three kids from previous marriages were afraid of him Sharon admitted that she was too he kept a bell on his chair when he rang Sharon came running despite his controlling temper her feelings for him were deep this is a woman who had really kind of lived under the thumb of Gerald Lee powers for a number of years I Believe by then they had been married four or five years and she um I don't want to say liked it that way but that was what she was used to that was familiar it was not it was not familiar to her to be breaking with him to be disloyal despite her fear Sharon continued to open up to investigate on April 19th a day Shannon Sanderson was abducted Gerald came home acting nervous I said shut up and sit down Sharon was angry because she thought he'd spent the night with another woman she noticed blood on his shirt and a cut on his arm he claimed he'd fallen down at a casino he'd been visiting Sharon didn't believe what he told her but she didn't press it for now Sharon refused to say any more and neither would her husband without something stronger prosecutor Jerry kitchen would be unable to press charges on Gerald Lee powers we still didn't have anything concrete that he had been involved and it was just a instinct I think that was was leading us at this point that he was our man but at the time we did not have the results back from the lab investigators hope the FBI would reinforce their hunch that Gerald Lee Powers was responsible for leaving Shannon sanderson's children motherless in the summer of 1996 after Gerald Reed Powers was indicted for assaulting a border patrol officer in Texas the FBI and Memphis investigators suspected he was also responsible for the murder of a 25-year-old mother of three but lacking physical evidence Memphis prosecutor Jerry kitchen was unable to charge powers for his involvement or to know for certain if one of the victim's former lovers had hired him to commit the crime there was always that possibility the way she was killed in the manner in which she was abducted that it appeared like it wasn't just something random that it had been something planned all the other suspects that appeared to have a motive or possibly uh emotional reasons why someone would would want to have someone kill like jealousy or rage or other factors what river investigators hope the suspect's wife Sharon Powers could tell them more [Music] The Reluctant at first after many meetings over several weeks Sharon grew more comfortable she finally opened up to FBI special agent Jennifer Aiken when she finally told the story and and in its entirety what we heard was really a chilling tale of of his stalking of the victim and and the Abduction of the victim and then taking her to this rural area and uh and robbing her of of not only the five thousand dollars that she had won that night but also of of the jewelry that she was wearing Sharon's story was strong but without corroborating evidence it would not be enough to convict or even indict Gerald Lee powers for murder trying to help she told investigators that her husband had thrown the murder weapon a handgun into an abandoned Canal near the casino in Mississippi Memphis Police Captain Richard rolson accompanied local divers to help search for the handgun Sheriff's departments divers dove into this hole and crawled inch by inch searching for this pistol we never did located and then that's when Miss Powers told us that he had thrown it into the river which was about a hundred yards away the current at that location was too Swift for anybody to dive in the Mississippi River it left investigators with more doubt and no corroboration that Sharon Powers was telling them the truth the suspect's wife also told them about a school bus driver from Mississippi whom her husband believed had seen him close to where he dumped Shannon's body [Music] police Tracked Down the driver who confirmed Sharon's story [Music] 7 A.M about two hours after Shannon Sanderson had been abducted the driver noticed a maroon Chevy Beretta backing down the dirt roadway of the vacant property where the victim's body was later found the bus driver remembered it because the property had been vacant for so long um if the driver didn't see who was in the car and didn't get the license plate searching for further corroboration investigators turned to Tom Scott director of surveillance at the casino this time Sharon Powers provided the locations of where to look for her husband in the 95 000 square foot Casino we did a recreation and did a walk through on where if we were the suspect where we would have gone through certain areas and we pulled some tapes eventually we were able to identify just from his shoes in a particular location where the suspect was standing we pulled a bunch more shots connected the shoes we finally put some legs to the shoes and were able to identify a person in a distant shot walking through the casino from the upstairs looking down towards the suspect we then connected more shots and followed the suspect down an escalator walking past the table where this uh victim was playing and followed the suspect out through our front door on videotape the video was compelling and confirmed Gerald Lee Powers was in the casino that night but it didn't prove that he had abducted or murdered Shannon Sanderson hoping for physical evidence that would connect powers to the victim investigators searched behind a Tavern in Mississippi where Powers wife claimed he had buried the victim's jewelry the suspect had told her they were wrapped in tin foil under a couch in the back [Music] just as Mrs Powers described investigators located a small bundle of foil inside they found pink plastic wrap holding Rings identified by the victim's husband is belonging to Shannon now they needed to prove forensically that Gerald Lee Powers had in fact been the one who wrapped them investigators went to power's home to search for the source of that plastic in the kitchen they found a roll of pink wrap they forwarded the Roll Along with the bundled rings to the lab for comparison while they waited for the results investigators turned their attention to the pink artificial nail found inside power's car after he was arrested in Texas [Music] from autopsy photos investigators found at least two nails were missing from the victim's hand if the nail from the car matched those remaining on the victim's hand it would prove that Shannon had been in power's car that night but there was a problem Shannon had already been buried and her husband was against exhuming her remains she had already been interred and so we had a a hearing in court to have her disentered and to have the ability to examine these fingernails to see if they were in fact her fingernails or not against her husband's Wishes the judge ordered the body exhumed early July three months after the murder investigators retrieved the body of Shannon Sanderson the remaining artificial nails were removed and sent to the lab for comparison with the others [Music] results were negative the nail in the car wasn't hers to get his hope the other evidence that the FBI lab in Washington DC would provide more promising results inside the tin foil ball recovered in Mississippi examiners remove the pink plastic wrap wound tightly around some rings the FBI needed to connect the Rings physically to Gerald Lee powers to do so examiners compared the plastic they were wrapped in to the sample retrieved from power's home the FBI agent who examined it indicated that it wasn't the exact piece that was was torn off but that it matched that role exactly as far as the polymers and the dye and all that would show that this was the source that the material had come from that was wrapped around the Rings it was the first piece of forensic evidence linking powers to the victim Ace was by no means complete more compelling proof came from a single fiber among several found in Powers otherwise Immaculate car we have a dress fiber that was found in the vehicle that he was driving that night that matches the fiber from the dress that the victim was wearing and that was very significant as well authorities were convinced that Gerald Lee Powers had murdered Shannon Sanderson that they weren't convinced he'd acted alone [Music] they believed it was possible that others from her past could claim a motive for wanting Shannon did [Music] Memphis prosecutor Jerry kitchen decided to confirm it with powers himself so we went to Laredo to interview the defendant before we charged him with this murder uh and there was the possibility if he cooperated and was able to prove to us that someone else was involved that we would withdraw seeking the death penalty uh but there was nothing that he was able to provide us with so we were convinced then at that point that no one else had been involved in her abduction and murder and proceeded uh with charging him alone Powers had plenty of time to contemplate this murder [Music] he watched her for several hours in the casino Then followed her for another hour back to Memphis [Music] he had ample time to change his mind instead he hardened his resolve D get out of there he abducted a mother of three robbed her then shot her at Point Blank the criminal court in Tennessee didn't need much time to decide Powers fate after deliberating only 15 minutes the jury recommended death for the murder of Shannon Sanderson Gerald Lee Powers awaits execution at Riverbend maximum security institution in Tennessee [Music]