Diann Hoelscher left on a business trip to Houston on February 4, 1986 and was never seen again. A little over a week later her husband reported her missing, and on the same day her briefcase was found in a field along the road. Three months later her car was found in a parking lot in Houston. After that the case went cold and her family believed they might never find out what happened. In December 2013 DNA testing at the University of North Texas on an unidentified skeleton found in 1997 revealed it was her body and the case was re-opened. Was it a random roadside crime, or was there more to this case?
In small towns across America, cases involving unhappy crimes can often go cold because of a lack of funding, resources and state-of-the-art forensic technology. With the right resources, though, it is possible that many of these cold cases can be re-opened and solved, bringing dangerous criminals to justice and providing closure for the families of their victims.
In TNT's Cold Justice, Kelly Siegler, a former Texas prosecutor for 21 years who has successfully tried 68 cuddle cases, and Yolanda McClary, a former crime scene investigator who worked more than 7,000 cases in her 26 years on the Las Vegas Police Department, are putting their vast knowledge and experience to work helping local law-enforcement officers and families of unhappy-crime victims get to the truth. With a fresh set of eyes on old evidence, superior interrogation skills and access to advanced DNA technology and lab testing, Siegler and McClary are determined to bring about a legal and emotional resolution. Taking on a different unsolved crime each week, they will carefully re-examine evidence, question suspects and witnesses, and chase down leads in an attempt to solve cases that would have otherwise remained cold indefinitely.