When 11-year-old Teresa Mae McAbee was kidnapped, raped, strangled and drowned in the small Florida city of Mascotte nearly 40 years ago, a surprising suspect emerged: a rookie cop named James Duckett.
The one undisputed fact of the case is that Duckett was on duty on May 11, 1987, when he encountered Teresa at a convenience store. The little girl had walked there to buy a pencil.
Duckett maintains that he told Teresa that she needed to go home, and that's the last time he saw her. Prosecutors argue that Duckett was a monster in disguise who abused the badge and brutally raped and killed Teresa before dumping her body in a lake.
Jurors accepted the state's narrative, convicting Duckett of murder largely based on circumstantial evidence and recommending the death penalty.
Now nearly 40 years later, DNA in the case stands to either save Duckett's life or seal his fate.
