Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
The National Sales Event is on at your Toyota dealer, making now the perfect time to get a great deal on a dependable new car like a legendary Camry. Built for performance and available with all-wheel drive, you can count on your new Camry to get anywhere you need to go. Or check out an affordable and reliable Corolla with a trim for every lifestyle. From the hip sedan to the sporty hatchback, there's a Corolla built just for you. Check out more National Sales Event deals when you visit buyatoyota.com.
Toyota, let's go places. This episode is brought to you by Progressive, where drivers who save by switching save nearly $750 on average, plus auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Quote now at Progressive.com to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates.
National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customers surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary, discounts not available in all states and situations.
Hey, look at you. Florist by day, student by night. Student by day, nurse by night. Since 1998, Penn State World Campus has led the charge in online education, offering access to more than 200 degree and certificate programs taught by our expert faculty.
We offer flexible schedules, scholarships, and tuition plans to help you reach your educational goals online. Penn State World Campus delivers on your time. Click the ad or visit worldcampus.psu.edu to learn more.
Today marks 20 years since emergency responders found a murdered woman inside of a burning home in Kill Devil Hills. The victim was 33-year-old Denise Johnson. You wouldn't know it looking at this home that something terrible happened here 20 years ago, a horrible crime that is yet to be solved. I remember seeing heavy black smoke up in the air. I just remember a pool of blood and her laying in it. We knew obviously something was way wrong. This wasn't just a routine call.
On July 13th, 1997, someone brutally murdered 33-year-old Denise Johnson inside her childhood home in North Carolina, then set it on fire. For 22 years, Johnson's killer has eluded police, leaving among us undetected. This is CounterClock, the investigation into the unsolved murder of Denise Johnson. I'm your host, Delia Diembra. ♪♪
In the spring of 1997, just a few months before she was murdered, Denise put an ad in the newspaper. Roommate wanted. And she quickly got a response. A woman named Karen Bittinger replied and asked to live with Denise. She moved in in May of 1997, just two months before the crime. Shortly after the murder, the Johnson family says Karen pretty much disappeared, but not before police interviewed her. With only her name to go on, I began researching Karen.
Donnie Johnson's faint memory of the young woman helped me narrow my pool of people. She was 20 at the time, so she'll be 40 now. In 1997. And the last time you talked to her was in 1997? Oh, yeah, like two days after the murder. And that was it? Mm-hmm.
That's very interesting. Yeah.
And I said, well, you can come get your cup. She goes, no, I want you to mail it to me. And I said, no, I'm not mailing you no cups. You want your cup? Come get it. And that's the last I ever heard of her.
Karen was a complete mystery. A few newspaper articles from 1997 had a sentence or two about her, but that was pretty much it. She completely dropped off the radar after Denise's funeral, which took place just a few days after the crime. Karen gave the Johnson family little explanation of why she wasn't around at the time of the murder.
Donnie says in July 1997, Denise had complained that her air conditioning unit on the house had broken.
Karen leaving because it was too hot would have made sense, and Donnie mentioned that the last time she'd heard about Karen, she was told she lived in Florida and had gotten into some trouble down there. I began checking criminal arrest records and public records databases. I researched every county jail in the state, and I eventually got a hit. Karen Bittinger was now 41 years old and, as of 2012, living in Jacksonville, Florida.
Jacksonville County Sheriff's Office has an extensive arrest history for Karen. She's been arrested 11 times there, not for violent offenses, but mostly drug crimes and prostitution. Karen had a different address on almost every arrest report, which means she moved around a lot. Her earliest arrest in Jacksonville was in 2007, 10 years after Denise's murder.
The home address on her jail paperwork listed her as being from Norfolk, Virginia. The Johnson family told police that Karen Bittinger, that rented from Denise in 1997, was from Norfolk, Virginia. The most recent arrest report had a telephone number listed for Karen, so I called it.
Hi, I'm looking for Ms. Karen Bittinger. Hi, I was just calling. Yeah, my name is Delia D'Ambra. I'm actually a journalist. I'm working on a story. I was trying to get in touch with Ms. Bittinger. What kind of story are you working on? If this is her or she's around, I'm actually doing an investigative piece on a murder from 21 years ago in Kilduva Hills, North Carolina of a woman named Denise Johnson. Denise Johnson? Yes, ma'am. Yeah, this is Carrie.
But Karen on the other end of the line was the woman I was looking for. When was the last time that you were ever contacted by investigators about this case? Karen and I had more than two decades separating the last time she discussed Denise's murder with anyone.
How did you end up with Denise as a roommate in her house? I was with this guy since I was really young and I just didn't want to be with him anymore. I just, I mean, I wanted to leave him. So I opened up the newspaper and I went to this roommate wanted ad, seriously. And when I called her, she actually said that she had already filmed the spot or the room and I
She said, but don't get your hopes up because I already told somebody that they can have it. She goes, but just come over anyways.
She had this dog. His name was Kayridge. He was a really huge, I think it was between like a bloodhound and like a golden retriever. He was like 120, 130 pounds. I mean, he was a big dog. Yeah. And the dog immediately liked me. And I actually opened the door and walked in. She goes, I've never seen him, my dog, ever do that. He never lets anybody in the house, especially people he does not know.
She goes, and I've had this dog since he was a puppy. I've never seen him take to anybody the way he just took to you. She goes, so that must be something really good. There must be something really special about you. He doesn't ever let anybody in the house. She changed her mind right then and said, you know what? I want you to live here, not this other person. Who was the person that she ended up saying no to and took you instead? Who was that person? I don't know. I just know it was Guy.
Maybe she did tell me, but I never thought about it. And actually right now. So just like that, the summer of 1997 was off to a decent start between the two. It was like immediately to the right. I think I lived there for like maybe two or three months. It was before the beginning of summer. Maybe springtime is when I moved in. It was, I wasn't there very long because of what happened.
A few weeks before the murder, Karen says she got a job at a new seafood restaurant and bar. Denise was working as a waitress, too, in another restaurant. The two bumped into one another often at the house in between their schedules. They weren't best friends, but Bittinger says they never really had any problems. In the hours before Denise's murder, Karen says she and Denise did see each other.
Denise wanted something from Karen. Her request was specific, and according to Karen, could be a big piece of the puzzle in solving what happened to Denise later that night. Karen says Denise asked her for money in the hours before she died. She actually came to my work that night, and she wanted her rent money early. I just gave it to her.
She wanted it, and it was like she wanted the money, and she was really adamant about it. Not like asking, but kind of like demanding. Anyways, I just gave her, no, it was like $300, $400. And I'll never forget it. The next day, I'm thinking, oh, my God. I just gave her like, I don't know, $300 or $400, and I was like, now that's gone. Now I just screwed myself. That's why I remember her coming in that much. I gave her a large amount of cash because she demanded on having it.
Karen's story that Denise wanted rent money early and came into Karen's work to get it isn't anywhere in the timeline that police gave me about Denise's movements in the hours before the crime. Investigators have gone on record saying they have actual proof that Denise was first at work, then left, went to the Amco gas station near her house and made a purchase, which they found a receipt for. Then she ended up at home before someone killed her.
I asked Karen more about her alibi and where she told police she was in the early morning of July 13, 1997. She says around 2 in the morning, she clocked out of work. She intended to go home and even promised a co-worker a ride. But right at the last minute, Karen decided to go to a friend named Jan's house in Nags Head. That's a town 20 minutes and several miles south of her and Denise's home. If I had gone home, when I said I was going to go home,
I probably would have been dead on the floor too.
Why did you go to Jan's that night instead of going home? I don't know. I'm telling you, and I tell my fiance, I was like, I don't know. I have no idea because it doesn't make any sense. I planned on all night long going home. I know it sounds very maybe not believable, but I don't know. Maybe God came down and just made sure I just didn't go in the other direction I was supposed to go in because maybe I wasn't supposed to be there.
Fate or not, Karen decided not to go home the morning Denise was killed. She made a left turn out of where she worked and headed in the opposite direction instead of making a right turn that would have put her in the path of the killer within a matter of minutes of leaving work. When the cops got to the crime scene and found Denise dead the next morning, Karen was someone they needed to talk to right away. I left Jan's house and immediately went to my house because that's what they told me to do.
The day after the murder, police and firefighters walked you through the crime scene? Yeah. Yeah.
Deliberate fires and intentional arson is what really disturbs Karen. That scared me. It still scares me. It disturbed her so much so that she moved out the next day and never went back. Do you think whoever did this targeted Denise or do you think they were coming after you? I don't know. I wondered the same thing. I still have very bad dreams. I'm still scared of the dark to this day. I don't like to be alone by myself like at night ever.
I asked Karen outright if she killed Denise or planned the murder. You don't know anyone that had any ill intentions toward Denise or would have...
But what was it about this guy that seemed weird? I mean, why was he coming to the... The next-door neighbor. Right.
This was the first time I'd ever heard anything about a next-door neighbor being tied to Denise. The only neighbor I was able to find that had any connection to the case was Rob Constantino, who had called 911 the morning of the crime. Karen seemed to know a lot about the man who lived directly next door to her and Denise. She could only remember his first name, Eric.
and that he periodically had a young boy visit that she assumed was his son. But what she remembers most? The man's girlfriend from out of town.
Yeah.
Right. When was the last time there was, like, a bad episode of that in relation... Right.
I remember being at the house one night and Denise came from his house. She goes, "Oh man." Then his girlfriend walked in and she said she didn't have all of her clothes on, shirt was off, and the girlfriend just saw it. And I mean, she was a psycho, psycho, psycho. And as soon as that fire happened, it's like they completely disappeared into thin air.
This mystery couple was an entirely new lead. As her roommate at the time, you remember seeing this man come and go from Denise's home. I needed to know if police had ever looked into the information Karen was telling me. When you talked to police after Denise's murder, did you tell them any of this? No, they just...
They waited way too long to talk to me. Did you know they never, how can they say that he found multiple types of fingerprints? You know how I know that's a bunch of crap? Because they never even took mine. How do they know whose is whose?
So clearly Karen didn't have a great experience with law enforcement. To this day, she still doesn't trust them. It's not necessarily surprising. She's been arrested multiple times for felony crimes. But still, she said she tried to make sure in 1997, Kill Devil Hill's detectives investigated the man next door and his girlfriend. I told them, I was like, look, you need to talk to that guy right there. He totally denied about having sexual relations with her when I know for a fact that
That's pretty brutal.
Just like Donnie Johnson and Rob Constantino, there was a detail Bittinger brought up to police that she thought was strange. K. Rich. She would never let that dog outside. Just like, okay, I'm going to bed. Now you go sleep in the backyard. No, it wasn't that kind of dog. That dog go outside and then it would be inside. She didn't make the dog stay outside.
Right.
Karen was one of the first people ever let back into the crime scene on the morning of the murder. She says detectives told her how K-Ridge was secured in the back of the home, and it's this detail that has her convinced she knows who's responsible.
Do you want to set your child up for success? IXL Learning is an online learning program for kids covering math, language arts, science, and social studies. IXL is designed to help them really understand and master topics in a fun way. Powered by advanced algorithms, IXL gives the right help to each kid no matter the age or personality. IXL is used in 95 of the top 100 school districts in the U.S.
There's one site for all the kids in your home, pre-K to 12th grade. Kids can even access IXL on the go through the app or on your phone or tablet. No more trying to figure out how to explain math equations or grammar rules yourself. IXL has built-in explanation videos.
And look, my son is only two and a half right now, but I can already tell by the time he is in school, he is going to appreciate having someone explain why something is the way it is. He doesn't like just to be told. So those explanation videos are going to be super helpful. Make an impact on your child's learning. Get IXL now. And CounterClock listeners can get an exclusive 20% off IXL membership when they sign up today at ixl.com slash clock.
Visit iXL.com slash clock to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price.
This message is sponsored by Greenlight. A new school year is starting soon, and if you're a parent, you want to make this school year an opportunity for your kids to learn important life skills and continue building independence. For that, there's Greenlight. Greenlight is a debit card and money app for families where kids learn how to save, invest, and spend wisely, and parents can keep an eye on kids' new money habits.
There's even Greenlight's Infinity Plan, which includes the same access to financial literacy education that makes Greenlight a valuable resource for millions of parents and kids. Plus, built-in safety to give you peace of mind. My son is only two and a half, but already he knows what a card is and what it does. He actually took it up to a vending machine the other day, swiped it, and, well, let's just say he's going to be a spender when he's older.
And so Greenlight is the perfect thing for him. There's even a chores feature that lets you reward your kids for honoring their responsibilities around the house. So what are you waiting for? Sign up for Greenlight today and get your first month free when you go to greenlight.com slash counterclock. That's greenlight.com slash counterclock to try Greenlight for free. greenlight.com slash counterclock.
When I asked Karen what police told her Kay Ridge had been tied up with, she was very specific. They said it was a child's jump rope. That detail, Karen says, has made her mind up on who was with Denise on the night of her murder. Karen says Eric and the young boy who she'd seen with him next door would have been more likely to have a child's jump rope than Denise. That item was not something she knew her or Denise kept in their cottage. It all points to Denise.
I can't believe they never wanted to listen. The one day just totally bypassed everything I said. Because if somebody slurs throat, that almost looks like a sign of passion. That was intentional. It wasn't like a robbery.
Karen has wondered for years who the woman was who was last seen with Denise at the gas station. And if it was that woman who was also giving Denise problems, the woman dating the next door neighbor, Eric. Why do you think Denise would have been with the girlfriend of the man she was sleeping with? Or maybe she was just following her. The psycho girlfriend was following Denise? Yeah, I mean, because they said she was seen with another woman.
Karen knows she can't be the only one with these questions lingering for two decades. She moved away from the area but was in the party scene for a long time. She remembers people always talked about the crime. And even now, most nights in Kill Devil Hills, people find a bar or restaurant to kill time at.
In a small town, when people drink, they talk. Donnie Johnson knows Denise's name has slipped out of more than one person's mouth who's sitting propped up on a bar stool or sliding into a smoke-filled booth. Oh, I guarantee you somebody in a bar somewhere has talked about it.
I guarantee it. You know, people get loose when they're drinking a lot. I'm sure somebody's talked about it, and I'm sure there's people down there that know because of the lifestyle they live, they're too afraid to come forward.
The Outer Banks that exists now has new generations of locals who were just kids when Denise was murdered. Kids like me. They've grown up and started families. Experiences Denise will never have. She never got to get married. She never got to have kids. She loved children. Hometown chatter in bars isn't the only place people bring up the cold case. They've also been talking about it online. Conversations about Denise Johnson are happening.
Somebody started a page called "Does Anyone Remember?"
This website, Does Anyone Remember?, hosted a chat forum called Topics and it had a thread about Denise that someone started in 2010. That thread still exists today, so I went through it, searching for any information that could be valuable. A user named BeachNative5thGen created the original thread for the post. The person asked if anyone remembered Denise Johnson's murder and wanted to know if anyone had ever been caught.
They wrote they thought Denise was really pretty. Everyone else on the thread chimed in with what they thought about the unsolved case. Donnie Johnson found the website in 2010, and at that time she says she was pretty obsessed with her sister's case and really tried desperately to find out who the people were behind the usernames, but she never had any luck. I've scanned the site three or four times through, and I've read every comment carefully. Most of the comments are users bickering with one another about unrelated things to Denise's case.
But the beach native 5th gen username keeps probing commenters for information. Comments on the post ultimately went silent in 2014. For four years, people were coming and going from the thread, weighing in on the case, talking about Denise's murder and potential suspects. Several users even posted more than once. Here are some of my colleagues to voiceover verbatim what the online usernames wrote. I think everyone wonders about why this was never put to rest.
Maybe because the county doesn't want the bad publicity for such things to happen in a resort area. Don't know. But it was a terrible thing to happen. No one deserves what happened to her. February 7, 2010. I remember hearing another scenario from a few different places involving a jealous girlfriend or some guy DJ was seeing who confronted her that morning, attacked and killed her, then called the boyfriend who set the house on fire. February 9, 2010.
A lot of people were questioned, but a guy she had dated was grilled heavily, but let off. I knew him and knew he did not kill her. We all thought it was a jealous female killer from the beginning. Maybe someone who didn't want Denise seeing the girl's ex or something. Another neighbor on Denise's side of the street once told me he had always had a hunch, but was too freaked out, even five, six years later, to say anything about it.
These users could just be circulating rumors, and they likely are, but I couldn't help but tuck away some of their theories in case I needed to reference them later. Shortly after discovering this blog forum, another member of the Johnson family reached out to me. So far for the podcast, you've only heard from Donnie Johnson, but Donnie isn't the only sibling Denise had. There are actually six Johnson sisters, including Denise. In August, Donnie Johnson convinced her sister, Derisa, to do an interview with me.
Nice to meet you on the phone, finally. I'd like to meet you in person, too. I follow you on Facebook, and I am so thankful and grateful for what you're doing for our family. I want to start out saying that. Yeah. It means a lot to me that somebody cares. She was my only little sister. Now I'm the youngest. She was a great caring girl, loved everybody. She was a great girl. She wasn't the smartest person in the world.
It's a lot. Yeah, it was too much. It took a lot out of me. It took a lot out of our family to lose our little sister.
When Denise was killed, Doresa didn't live on the Outer Banks. She lived further inland in North Carolina, was married, and was raising a family. Distance didn't come between the Johnson siblings, though. In the early 1990s, and when their mother died a few years before Denise, the women were still a pretty tight-knit group. After July 1997, that all changed.
Ever since that happened, all of us were so close. And then we lost part of our six sisters and our six BJs. It was very devastating, but I think it took a whole part of each one of our lives. And we were never just as close as we were then.
Teresa couldn't comprehend who would hurt Denise. To this day, there's just one red flag that pops into her mind, a concerning comment Denise made during a holiday gathering a year before her murder.
Like a guy? Yeah, like a guy.
In Thanksgiving of 1996, Denise was upset about someone in Richmond, Virginia, and then she called you again in January or February of 1997 talking about a similar thing. Exactly.
Was she talking about multiple people, like a man or a woman or just a guy? Within these, anything was never clear. You know what I mean? You'd have to drag it out of her, but she was always looking for some kind of help in my mind. She kept mentioning somebody after her, and that girl was always after her because she was jealous of her.
What did Denise ever tell you about the ex-girlfriend? Yeah.
Again, there was another person bringing up the man who lived next door to Denise. Doresa said she and Denise had last talked about him on the phone in January or February of 1997. The next time I heard from Denise, she was, yeah, murdered. Other than his name, Doresa says Denise never opened up more about Eric. Always happy, but always hiding something.
Unable to get very far with who was in and what was going on in Denise's life leading up to her murder, the Johnson sisters relied on police for information as the investigation began. Here's Donnie Johnson again. I think they've already established that she was woken up like in a startle. And that's really why she didn't have much time to do anything. This is a Mulford scenario. The person who came in was trying to have sex with her while she was asleep, but she
In addition to providing a scenario of how they think the crime occurred, police detectives needed the family's assistance in return. Help identifying key items at the crime scene. Here's Teresa Johnson again.
Did police ask you to identify that lighter? Yes. Why did they ask you that? Because they found that lighter on the scene. That's why. Teresa jumped right out because...
Because Denise's murder involved arson, finding a lighter in the mix of evidence would have been critical. Derisa knew without a doubt it was Denise's and only Denise's. It couldn't have come from the killer, but that doesn't mean it wasn't used by the killer. They were really interested in that lighter for a couple of weeks.
Along with the lighter, there was another item police needed the family to identify, an earring. Doresa Johnson recognized it as Denise's, but Donnie Johnson didn't. It was one earring and that lighter. I can tell you that for sure. The earring, I didn't recognize at all. So that was pretty much, they said, okay, thanks, and they left.
After IDing the items, the sisters say detectives never came back to talk more about how the items fit into their investigation, and they never returned them to the family. Then we asked for that back, you know, the lighter and the earring, you know, and then they said they lost it all in Rome. Donnie Johnson says as the case dragged on and really no leads developed in the first year, Mulford couldn't provide answers about evidence vanishing or what was relevant to the case or not anymore.
The whereabouts of that lighter and the earring are still unknown.
They could be sitting in storage inside boxes of case evidence at Kildivel Hills Police Department, or they're waiting, idle on a shelf at the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, or they're gone. Not knowing what happened to the items upsets Teresa Johnson. I don't feel like the cops did their job at all, no. They were just like in and out and what in the world. And the way they left, they're sitting out there. You know, the day it happened was ridiculous.
Ridiculous. But I guess I was just young. You know, I was back in the 90s. That was appalling.
As days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, no one was voluntarily updating the family with information anymore. Donnie Johnson planted herself in Kill Devil Hills and pressed investigators daily about what was going on with the case, but only got less and less useful information. When I asked more about it, the police would say we don't have enough for the DA to press charges on anybody. You know, I respect the police, but it's been a
Donnie says Jim Mulford eventually revealed to her that he was taking a closer look at the man who was first on scene. Yeah.
As soon as she could, Donnie Johnson told the rest of her family, including Derisa, this new development. But Donnie also revealed something even more astonishing, something about those pieces of evidence.
I've learned three languages in my life: English, Spanish, and French. And I can tell you the most difficult part for me at times was when I was doing the classroom work. And even though I was having conversations with people in those languages, it wasn't the same as being immersed in that language.
But with Rosetta Stone, I get the best of both worlds. Rosetta Stone is the most trusted language learning program, and it's available on desktop or can be used on an app on your phone or tablet. The big thing for me when it comes to learning a language or sprucing up on one I already know is to have that immersive experience, like I said, and really naturally try and pick up the language, first with words, then phrases, and then sentences.
And something that's been really helpful with that is Rosetta Stone's True Accent feature. You get feedback on how well you're pronouncing words. It's like having a personal trainer for your accent. Don't put off learning that language. There's no better time than right now to get started. For a very limited time, CounterClock listeners can get Rosetta Stone's lifetime membership for 50% off. Visit rosettastone.com slash counterclock.
That's 50% off unlimited access to 25 language courses for the rest of your life. Redeem your 50% off at rosettastone.com slash counterclock today. All right, so for a long time, I was completely unaware of like what was good wine and what was bad wine. In fact, I
I usually just didn't even buy it because I was worried I was gonna take too much of a risk. And when I did, I usually let myself down. But now that's completely changed thanks to First Leaf. It's a wine club that's not your average wine club. It's better.
With each shipment, you get a personalized selection of wines from all over the world, handpicked just for you. First Leaf has this great questionnaire on their website that helps me a lot because it asks me questions like, what kinds of foods do I like? Sweet or salty or nutty or oaky?
And all of those things created results that had wines paired perfectly for me. You can tailor your membership to your needs, and you can choose between six or 12 bottles, decide how many reds or whites you want, and select a shipping window that works for your schedule. So get wines to sip and share all summer long with First Leaf. Go to tryfirstleaf.com slash counterclock to sign up, and you'll get your first six hand-picked bottles for just $44.95.
That's T-R-Y-F-I-R-S-T-L-E-A-F dot com slash counterclock. Tryfirstleaf.com slash counterclock.
Donnie says Kill Devil Hill's police detective, Jim Mulford, told her the items of evidence the family had wondered about all along came from the man that they were investigating more closely, the first eyewitness to the house fire. When they showed us these pieces of evidence, we were like, wait a minute, where did they come from? Because they were Denise's and only she would have this. Where did they say this evidence came from? Oh, they just said it was things we've recovered from someone.
There was no reason for him to have this, especially one of them anyway. We were very perplexed about it and to this day still is.
Donnie says Detective Mulford eventually just told her that unique camel lighter was found in the possession of the man who first saw the fire, the Good Samaritan who passed by on his way to pick up Rob Constantinou from work that morning. But remember, this is just Donnie's memory. I'm not saying doubt it, but I'm saying it's important to exercise caution because we can't ask Jim Mulford for himself where the items actually came from.
Kill Devil Hills police have not told this podcast what kind, if any, evidence was retrieved from that man. We know for sure they questioned him and even impounded his truck, but he was never declared an official suspect, and police won't discuss with me in detail how relevant he is to the case. So I decided to find someone who could talk about him and try to understand more of what was going on from his perspective in 1997.
When I went to the Dare County Clerk of Court's office to research any prior criminal offenses he might have... So I called a little bit earlier, and I have a case number here. Yes. Were you the lady I spoke to? I discovered that in addition to a hit-and-run arrest, there was another file under his name. You can look for what piece you want copies of. Okay. Yeah, but just make sure you get it back in order because you can take it out and, you know, lay it.
But the divorce is always busy when we got court. I'll be right back. Sure. Do you mind if I just look over these documents right here? That's okay. I'll leave them in order. I found a divorce proceeding from the early 2000s, and with it, the name of the woman he'd married shortly after the Johnson murder, a woman named Vicki Broadus. Hi, I'm looking for Miss Vicki Broadus. This is she. Vicki doesn't live in North Carolina anymore. She's in Florida now, but she remembers her time in Kill Devil Hills well.
It's related to an unsolved murder in Kill Devil Hills in 1997. I don't know if you're familiar with that or not. I think I am. Okay, gotcha. I'm reaching out to you. Is it the same one? This is Denise Johnson's murder in Kill Devil Hills in 1997. And her firearm was there too, right? Exactly, yeah.
Vicki lived full-time on the Outer Banks in 1997. She remembers Denise's murder because she was a local, but she also remembers it for another unique reason. Shortly after the crime, she began dating the man who was the first eyewitness to the scene. We met in 99, 98 or 99 is when we met. So it happened before I met him.
But I remember him talking about it. He brought it up. When you guys first met, did he come out with that information pretty quickly? Like, hey, I was looked into for a murder? Like, what was that conversation? Pretty quickly. Like, not immediately, but pretty quickly, yeah. Because it's like, you know, things get around, you know? So...
Yeah.
Emotionally, what upset him the most about it? Something like that.
Vicki says after her boyfriend informed her police had interrogated him for the crime and he emphasized that he was innocent, they never talked about it again. When he met me, it was over. It wasn't like it was ongoing. It was over when he met me. Did you ask him? Did you do it? He told me he didn't. I didn't have to ask.
He told me that. And I just know him and his character. He's not going to do that. He's not like that at all. I think what he told me is that they didn't have enough evidence to actually do anything to him is what he said. They had no reason to detain him, to arrest him, to do anything to him. And he was their current suspect.
Yeah.
Vicki married her boyfriend in 1999, but they filed for divorce five years later. In those years that you guys were married, did he ever bring this up again or was that just at the beginning? Yeah.
I'm out here trying to hold his reputation together. I'm not doing that. I'm just telling you what I know as the truth.
The truth, according to Vicki, is that her ex-husband did not kill Denise Johnson. She admits he was questioned by investigators, and she knows he was present at the crime scene, but she will always feel he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is a scheme that he got pinned for it, or tried to get pinned. And luckily, his parents got involved to stop it, because if he didn't do that, if his parents didn't have money...
He would have probably been accused. I mean, I don't know what evidence they would have, but their county is not right. You know what I'm saying? It's Isaiah County and those cops, they've got jacks. Okay. They can't even take down. They can't do that. They're not that adequate. Okay. So all they have is some man standing in front of the burning house who was the first person there because he fishes up early. So, you know, the citizen, you stop, you're going to go, oh my God, because he knows, no one knows what's going on because he's the first one on the road.
Brada says her ex-husband's alibi was that he'd woken up, gotten to his truck, and while driving, stumbled upon the house fire. When he drove down the street, there was someone on a bicycle or walking. I think they were on a bike. But they were going the opposite direction, so he passed...
Yeah, because who on a bicycle would pass by a burning house and not stop? Right. Correct. Exactly.
A person walking or biking away from the burning house at 2014 Norfolk Street was such an odd thing. Vicki says her ex-husband told police what he saw, but nothing came from it. They'd already set their sights squarely on him. From his tone, she went through some stuff because they were very serious. They were seriously looking at him for it. You know what I mean?
I'd like to see Vicki's ex-husband's statement to police, how they followed up on the person on the bike she says he told detectives about. But again, that's information the department won't be releasing from the case file anytime soon. My hope is that eventually I'll be able to ask the man for myself, his side of the story.
Vicki, like the Johnson family, believes the only hope investigators have now of solving Denise's murder is someone with critical knowledge coming forward. There's no way they're going to find a person that did this unless there's help of the citizens around that knows, you know, hears people talking about it. Someone's got to help them out. That thought brought me back to the online blog forum. And that's when I saw it, a single post by an anonymous user.
This theory seemed to suggest maybe the killer wasn't from the Outer Banks. Yet the person still knew Denise and where she lived. Donnie Johnson provided some context. Well, she dated a guy for like 10 years. And they lived together and they were happy and all that. Well, then they broke up.
And then she just kind of, you know, I guess got out with some wrong people or whatever.
Denise being in and out of relationships and living for a period of time in Florida years before her death wasn't really new to the Johnson family. But what if we didn't know the whole story? That was another thing that has always crossed my mind. And of course, a lot of people have talked about it because she lived in Florida for about 10 years, I guess. She lived with a guy for about eight of those years. And they were going to get married and blah, blah, blah. But anyway, they broke up. So she just kind of stayed there.
How much had police actually looked into Denise's past? Kill Devil Hill's police captain, John Towler, in charge of the cold case, seems unsure. What could I find if I dug around? Denise Johnson is the complainant on the report? Yeah.
Okay, and what year was that from? There was so much more to uncover about Denise's life, especially in the weeks leading up to her murder. I do recall the girl telling me at some point in time that she did not like Denise.
Next time on CounterClock. If you're enjoying this series, follow us on social media to get the behind-the-scenes look at the investigation. We're on Twitter at at CounterClockPod and on Instagram, look for the handle CounterClockPodcast.
CounterClock is an AudioChuck original podcast. Ashley Flowers is the executive producer. And all reporting and hosting is done by me, Delia D'Ambra.
The National Sales Event is on at your Toyota dealer, making now the perfect time to get a great deal on a dependable new car like a legendary Camry. Built for performance and available with all-wheel drive, you can count on your new Camry to get anywhere you need to go. Or check out an affordable and reliable Corolla with a trim for every lifestyle. From the hip sedan to the sporty hatchback, there's a Corolla built just for you. Check out more National Sales Event deals when you visit buyatoyota.com.
Toyota, let's go places. Voters know that bad weather, like storms, lightning, and wind, can turn a fun day on the water into a challenge.
But what if you had satellite-delivered weather data giving you the full picture of what's around you, even when you're offshore and out of cell range? With SiriusXM Marine, get up-to-date weather directly on your boat's display. Features include radar, lightning, marine warnings, wind and wave info, and much more. And for offshore anglers, imagine having a guide that tells you where it might be best to cast your line. Fish mapping does just that. It's 8
fishing-focused features, including fishing recommendations, weed line info, plankton info, and sea surface temperature information can help you find fish faster. Plus, you can add SiriusXM Entertainment and listen to ad-free music, plus sports, talk, comedy, news, and more while you're on the water. Visit SiriusXM.com slash marine to learn more.