Since it's a cold snowy night here I decided to dig up some old interviews. This link proves SS knew from the beginning what weapons were used and who did this. Doubtful this was a 1st timer in murder or even someone who's prints weren't on file. Nobody's 1st crime is a double murder and a beheading. he has all forms of evidence he said so he knows the profile of the killer if not the identity.
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/exclusive-sheriff-says-reynolds-plantation-couple-/138256569
I don't think we can positively say with any certainty that someone has to already commit another murder to do multiple murders including decapitations. I looked up 'decapitation murders' right after this happened and found quite a few of them at the time where the victims were found decapitated and/or dismembered.
People who murdered multiple people during their first acts of homicide also have dismembered them. Unfortunately, there are many suspects who do gruesome over-kills and grossly abuse their bodies afterwards.
Do you remember the man who murdered his victims including their little dog, and he dismembered their bodies, and put their remains 40 foot up in a hollowed out tree? He did not know the victims and it was his first homicides. Sorry, I cant think of his name at the moment. It happened a few years back, and when I have more time I will try to find an old link. So it really is impossible to say what murderers will, and will not do the first time they murder.
We have seen home invasions by strangers who had not murdered before although they did have a criminal background yet they have gone in alone or with help and done some of the most heinous over-kills in recent years even resorting to long torture, repeated rapes including small children, and have even set their victims on fire while they were still alive, and before they murdered them.
It happened in my state to a 83 year old woman. They shattered all the bones her hands, they bludgeoned her until she had multiple skull fractures, and then they threw gasoline on her, and lit it while she was alive. She died from her severe wounds and burns to her head and body.
It seems so many murderers nowadays want to do the most gruesome things they can think of doing as if they want to shock society by the depravity they used against innocent human beings. I remember one serial killer decapitated his victim and put his head right on his window sill so he could relive the crime.
He/they may have killed before, and never caught, but I highly doubt it. Most murderers do have a criminal record of some kind even if its not for murder but for other crimes of violence that elevated over time to murder.
Of course there are also plenty of murderers who have no criminal background history whatsoever, and their ultimate first act of violence are homicides of an individual or multiple victims at the same time. Murderers like all facets of life are as individual as the murders they commit. Why they do the heinous things they do to innocent people is known only to them unless they confess giving details and why they did it the certain way they did. That is the reason a DA is not required by law to prove motive to a jury.
Until Sills is able to match the DNA profile he has he does not know who the murderer of the Dermond couple is. Hopefully, he will get that call one day soon saying they have a match ....although many other cold case detectives have had to wait many years or even decades to get the match they needed from the very beginning.
I hope it doesn't take that long, but the reassuring thing about justice is sometimes it does move slowly, but it can come.... even years later. And with murder there are no statute of limitations that run out. I hope for the sake of the family it comes much sooner than later since they aren't spring chickens themselves. It reminds me of so many shows I have seen on ID where family members waited for years or decades for justice to come for their loved one, but they passed away before they could see it come to pass.
I always believed the murderer/s of the Dermonds left evidence of themselves behind. Rarely are murder scenes pristine with no evidence left behind by the murderer. This one wasn't a perfect crime scene either since Sills says they have both types of evidence needed to compare it to the suspect when, and if they find them.
I have often wondered if they put duct tape on Shirley's mouth and/or wrists, and it was still affixed when they found her. Duct tape has solved cases before because the sticky side holds a wealth of DNA/fingerprint/trace evidence. Dr. Baden solved a case decades ago where a woman's body had been thrown into water and wasn't found until 7 months after being murdered by her husband. He found identifiable prints belonging to her husband on the duct tape he used to bind her. Now they would probably be able to extract skin cells as well of the murderer from the duct tape. They have been able to get DNA profiles from bindings too.
What is tragic is this person/s has never had their DNA profile put into any kind of data bank where a comparison can be matched to it. I have read over the years where detectives have said that in some cases all the luck seems to be on the side of the killer/s. And thousands of cases go unsolved. Even when the law enforcement agencies already have the DNA profile evidence of those who have murdered but have no profile so that it can be matched. That has to be so maddening for LE in these kind of cases. I think that is why they are determined to keep looking for the match they so desperately need to solve the cases.
This may never be solved unless the killer/s somehow makes a mistake and their DNA is taken for some other reason unconnected to the Dermond murders.
Another problem is thousands of DNA profiles haven't even been entered into CODIS yet due to the overwhelming backlog with more and more DNA profile samples being sent in all over the country each and every day to be entered.
JMO