Let's bring in CNN National Security analyst and former Assistant Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, Juliette Kayyem Juliette, I want to dig in on a few of these elements, the technology, the, the search histories here.
The, the investigators say that Huer searched more than 200 times for updates on this investigation also for what they described as torture porn.
These search histories have been crucial in recent cases, but this one stands out with just the number of searches related to this case.
Yeah.
Yeah, this is, this case is interesting.
First, I wanna commend the prosecutor not simply for opening up the case but for valuing the lives of sex workers we've seen throughout the United States that sometimes some lives are taken more seriously than others.
And this is just an important uh uh closure for those families as well.
And what's interesting here is you had essentially cold cases where technology then caught up to the investigation or the investigation, I should say caught up to technology and they were able to use not just genetic and DNA testing.
Uh but the search, the review of the searches then becomes the key point who else is going to be googling?
What's happening with the investigation 100 times, right?
Who else is going to be?
How can they, how can a prosecutors monitor burner phones except for someone who is nervous that that's what's being done with him.
So, in some ways, he had been the hunted, I mean, he had been the hunter 10 years ago and now was well aware that he was the hunted and that's why the prosecutors closed in.
You mentioned DNA.
There were hairs found near three of the victims.
Back in 2010, they were believed to have been the hairs of Hu's wife, but they were so degraded 13 years ago that they couldn't, uh, render any significant conclusions.
But as you said, the technology progressed and they were able to, to make some links, talk about the, the DNA uh element here and if that is enough to get a conviction, it, it wouldn't be enough.
I mean, and this is what's important.
It's not that the DNA is, is so conclusive that ok, now you're going to have a conviction what the prosecutors have now and what they're disclosing that at least for three of the cases, we have a whole bunch that have not been resolved yet is that the, the conclusiveness of enough of the DNA, right?
That it is within the circle of the family and is tied to the defendant coupled with all sorts of other activity, the activity he's doing in present time because he's nervous about the investigation.
But also remember there is an eyewitness about a pickup truck which they then link to him.
Uh There's, uh there's his, you know, the, the, the, the viewing of porn or hard porn would not in it, of itself bring a conviction.
But if it goes to a motivation about why he's doing it, it will help the prosecution.
So all of the totality, some of it old, some of it new, some of it new.
Only because we have new technology is what closes these cases.
And this is where, you know, investigations that have gone cold, whether they're criminal investigations, national security investigations, any of them then become reopened.
If you have prosecutors and prosecutors offices willing to take them forward, this prosecutor made it sort of his, his cause to give closure to the families and obviously also to the community.
Uh, the, there was a witness who said that, uh, the suspect drove a green pickup truck and we know that according to investigators Huer drove his brother's green, uh, pickup truck, uh, occasionally, um, there was additional, uh, victim Maureen Brainard Barnes, um, that he is, uh, a suspect in that death and disappears but not, um, uh, um, charged in that.
But investigators say, quote, that investigation is expected to be resolved soon.
What do you glean from that framing of his connection and what do they need to do now to potentially charge him with that death.
Right.
Ok.
So they're probably lacking one key piece of evidence, sort of linking him to the, to this particular victim.
But they, they had to go in what was clear just from the chronology that we're reading in the, in the news reports is he was becoming more and more likely either to do something again or to try to escape.
He was well aware that they were at least sort of in with, in his orbit or he was within their orbit.
So they had to close it.
Then these other cases can be reopened.
Remember, there are, there are an additional half a dozen uh victims.
Uh, some woman, there is also a child whose body was found in this area.
All of them are open cases and that's what's key right now is sort of making sure that uh that they have the defendant, they can, they can increase the charges over time.
And, and you know, this is, this is the benefit of, of, of, of science, technology and, and the searches that can be done and commitment as you pointed out the top commitment to this case.