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American Morning

New DNA Evidence Could Now Exonerate Man Thought to be Boston Strangler

Aired January 22, 2002 - 07:40   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back. History knows him as the Boston Strangler, one of the most notorious serial killers in U.S. history. Albert Desalvo took that reputation to his grave. But, apparently, new DNA evidence could now exonerate Desalvo. Could he have taken the rap for someone else?

And, if that is true, is the Boston strangler still among us? Here's Bill Delaney.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL DELANEY, CNN BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): Who was Albert Desalvo? A killer, the Boston strangler, who stalked and choked innocent women, or himself a kind of innocent? Desalvo said this, while confessing he raped and strangled 19-year-old Mary Sullivan, last of the Boston strangler's 11 victims in January, 1964.

ALBERT DESALVO: This is very serious stuff. I did penetrate her. I had intercourse with here. She's alive. She allowed me to do it to her.

DELANEY: Chilling, but a lie, says Casey Sherman, Mary Sullivan's nephew. No more than the ravings of a troubled man, desperate for notoriety.

CASEY SHERMAN, VICTIM'S NEPHEW: Now the only thing that ever connected Albert Desalvo to the crimes was his confession. There wasn't a witness, no fingerprints, no physical evidence. I put that confession tape up to the autopsy report, and (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and it does not match up. Albert Desalvo is confessing to events that simply never happened.

DELANEY: Sent to prison for a series of unrelated rapes, not for the Boston strangler killings he later confessed to. Desalvo was stabbed to death in 1973 in Massachusetts' Walpal (ph) State Prison for reasons still unclear.

(on camera): And now, nearly 40 years after the killing of Mary Sullivan, more mystery. Private investigators working for the families of Mary Sullivan and Albert Desalvo exhumed their bodies. They took DNA samples. They found semen-like substance on Mary Sullivan's body that could not have come from Albert Desalvo.

Who do you think killed Mary Sullivan?

SHERMAN: Well, the police, at the time, had a prime suspect in her murder. This man failed two lie detector tests. I know that he does live in Northern New England. He's never spent a day in jail. And I've contacted this person. I've had a conversation with him, and I asked him, "Would you take a DNA test?" And he said, "No," he wouldn't. So we're in the process of trying to get that done.

DELANEY: Former prosecutor, Julian Soshnick, though, who interviewed Albert Desalvo three times says the strangler case is closed for a good reason.

JULIAN SOSHNICK, FORMER PROSECUTOR: I'm absolutely certain that he was the strangler, that he was without any doubt the strangler. He knew things that were not in the public domain.

DELANEY (on camera): He knew things about Mary Sullivan's apartment and the murder itself that he could only have known if he had had something to do with it.

SOSHNICK: That is my belief.

(voice-over): And, after all, Desalvo did confess. Though not long before he died, he said to have recanted. The Sullivan family says what he wanted was fame and money.

SHERMAN: Albert Desalvo was in jail on unrelated charges with no means to support his family. What a great way to make money by confessing to these crimes, signing on a movie deal and a book deal, which he did.

DELANEY: Several investigators now believe there were, in fact, several Boston stranglers, not the lone killer portrayed in the movie by Tony Curtis. The enduring question, whether Albert Desalvo portrayed the real-life murderer, too.

Bill Delaney, CNN, Boston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: We should point out that tomorrow is the deadline for the appeal to overturn the judge's decision. Also, tomorrow, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) pathologist Dr. Michael Bodin (ph) will join us here to look at this famous case -- Paula.

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