Have you ever woken up from a dream and gotten lost for a few seconds in that place between

asleep and awake?

You're not sure if the dream is reality or if you're still sleeping?

Usually it's pretty easy to shake yourself awake and the line between dreams and reality becomes clear.

But in San Antonio, Texas in 1983, that line seemed a

blur and one man's dream seemed a little too close to reality.

He dreamt of a murder. Actually, he dreamt of a crime scene where a woman was assaulted and

murdered. And the crime scene he dreamed up looked a lot like a real life murder,

where a woman named Rachel Kossab was raped and strangled to death.

For Rachel's daughter Kristen, who was eight at the time, every day was a waking nightmare.

Not only was her mother taken from her, but the murderer was also still out there somewhere,

like a bogeyman waiting in the shadows.

She lived with a trauma for over 20 years, until a resourceful cold case detective and a

very organized DNA analyst helped bring her nightmare to an end.

From A&E, this is Cold Case Files the podcast.

I'm Brooke and this story adapted from a classic episode of Cold Case Files, is told by the luminous Bill Curtis. I knew she was killed, I knew she had died and I knew that someone had choked her.

Kirsten Nuchem is 28 years old.

In 1983, she was 8 when her mom, Rachel Kossum, was murdered.

And that's all I needed to know at age 8.

But as you get older, you do start to wonder and I've always loved you know cold case shows and I just knew one day that you know it would be solved I prayed every day that it would be solved. I prayed every day that it would be solved.

This is my office. This is where I go through my cold cases.

George Sadler is a cold case detective with the San Antonio Police Department.

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