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Joe Brian was a beloved high school principal who lived in Clifton, Texas, which is about 30 miles west of Waco and

In 1985 his wife Mickey who is a teacher at the local elementary school was shot to death in their home

Joe by all accounts was at a principal's conference in Austin, which was about 120 miles away. He was seen

Shortly before the murder and shortly after the murder at this conference, but because the murder took place at night

Joe's only alibi was that he was sleeping at the time

The crime was initially investigated as a robbery and Joe was not a suspect in that but Joe became a suspect about a week later when his brother-in-law, the victim's brother, who had been borrowing Joe's car, told police that he found a blood-speckled flashlight in the trunk of the car.

The key piece of evidence in this case a blood-covered flashlight found in Brian's car four days after Mickey's murder.

The case almost entirely came down to what is called blood stain pattern analysis. It came down to one detectives interpretation of

The blood stains on this flashlight. The flashlight also was found without any context. We still don't know whose blood it was.

We don't know when the blood was deposited. We don't know how it was deposited. But this didn't matter. The person who became sort of the state star witness who was a detective named Robert Thorman, a blood stain pattern analyst

Connected the flashlight to the crime scene by saying that the spatter pattern on the flashlight could only have been caused by a shooting.

And he then tells a very elaborate story about how the killer must have held the flashlight in one hand and the gun that killed Mickey in the other hand.

Again, there was no one who saw Joe and Clifton on the night that this occurred and by all accounts he was 120 miles away.

But this blood stain pattern analyst essentially placed this flashlight that was in Joe's car at the scene of the crime, therefore tying him to the crime.

Joe has always maintained that he was at the hotel where this high school principal's convention was taking place.

And he was able to account for his time up until 9 p.m. that evening when he called Mickey to say good night. And then he watched the country music awards and he was able to say what was on the country music awards.

And he said he went to bed at 11 o'clock. Mickey was killed sometime that evening. We don't know whether it was midnight 3 a.m. 5 a.m. but she did not show up to work the next morning.

Joe was still at the conference that next morning. So the state's argument was that Joe had called Mickey then had driven 120 miles through a very heavy rain storm to Clifton, Texas had murdered his wife with no motive whatsoever.

And he was never able to determine a motive had then disposed of all the evidence except for the bloody flashlight had then returned 120 miles back to Austin and had both left his hotel and reentered the hotel without anyone seeing him do so despite that he was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison.

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