25 Best Forensic Files Episodes, Ranked

"Bad Medicine" retells the harrowing story of Dr. Anthony Pignataro. A healthy dose of suspense keeps viewers guessing and has earned this episode of "Forensic Files" a 7/10 rating on IMDb. The case made worldwide news because of the classic motives behind the crime: money and revenge. According to The Orlando Sentinel, Dr. Pignataro was a plastic surgeon who invented the snap-on toupee. However, the invention he's best known for now is a murder plot against his own wife. 

Dr. Pignataro lost his medical license due to the death of a patient, Sarah Smith. Rather than try to rebuild his life, Dr. Pignataro attempted to frame Smith's family by vandalizing his own home and repeatedly poisoning his wife with arsenic. Miraculously, Mrs. Pignataro survived, and investigators determined the exact dates of the poisonings by examining strands of her hair. This excluded any of Sarah Smith's family members as suspects and earned Dr. Pignataro a lengthy prison sentence. However, Dr. Pignataro never truly learned his lesson. According to WKBW News, he legally changed his name and resurfaced in South Florida, trying to practice medicine once again.

Audiences gave this "Forensic Files" episode a 7.4/10 rating on IMDb, and it's easy to see why — the case features multiple suspects and an elaborate attempted coverup. Some killers evade capture by carelessly putting someone else's freedom at risk to maintain their own. Luckily, forensic clues in this case resulted in justice for the victim, airline customer service representative Karen Pannell. After sustaining multiple stab wounds, Karen scrawled the name of her former boyfriend in her own blood on a wall just before dying. Or did she?

An important clue cemented investigators' suspicions that the handwriting was fake: Karen was left-handed, but she had blood on the fingertips of her right hand instead. Investigators excluded her former boyfriend as a suspect but didn't have to look far to find the actual killer: Her most recent boyfriend, Tim Permenter, was a felon 16 times over. Karen ended the relationship after learning about his past, but Tim wasn't going to take "no" for an answer. In retaliation, he murdered Karen and used the bloody handwriting as a ruse to throw law enforcement off his scent.

Cold cases are compelling to many true crime fans, especially those that finally get solved. "Mark for Life," rated 7.6/10 by IMDb reviewers, tells the story of a cold case that dragged on for a staggering 46 years. In the 1950s, Gerald Mason stole a car from a group of teenagers and murdered two police officers while fleeing the scene. The episode thoroughly reviews the limited evidence law enforcement had available at the time and reveals the scientific advancements that eventually brought the case to a close.

Police found small clues over several years, including partial fingerprints, a piece of a handgun, and some eyewitness testimonies. Unfortunately, these clues didn't add up to a likely suspect. Mason's use of a pseudonym further complicated matters, and it seemed like law enforcement would never bring the killer to justice. It wasn't until 2002 that police revived the case and used advanced computer technology to re-analyze the partial prints from the original crime scene. The fingerprint led police to Mason's doorstep, and he received a life sentence for his crimes.

This Season 9 episode covers a crime featured less often than others on "Forensic Files." A dangerous arsonist attacked Southern California in the early '90s, causing dozens of fires in broad daylight. However, clues were few and far between due to the extent of the fires. One of the only initial clues was a tiny scrap of paper wrapped around cigarette butts. Duplicates of this makeshift incendiary device also turned up at other fire sites, and luckily, forensics experts found a fingerprint on one of them.

"Point of Origin" has an IMDb rating of 7.7/10, based on user reviews. One exciting aspect of this episode is the massive twist in the case: An arson investigator who studied the fires believed another arson investigator was behind them. Initially, no one believed his theory. He requested that investigators test the fingerprints of arson investigators against fingerprint evidence from one of the incendiary devices, but the ATF denied this request. It would take seven years and many more fires before police finally investigated the fingerprint records. Amazingly, they found a match: John Leonard Orr, an arson investigator who wrote a novel manuscript about his own crimes. 

In 1991, a mysterious gunman entered a Buddhist temple in Arizona and gunned down everyone inside. Local investigators were overwhelmed by the long list of potential suspects, including members of the KKK and the Bloods street gang. The temple was relatively secluded from nearby Phoenix by design, and the residents were not known to interact with neighboring residents other than allowing local Buddhists to attend religious services. According to ABC 15 News, the attack on nine of the temple's monks was the worst mass murder Arizona had ever experienced. "The Buddhist Monk Murders" ran as an hourlong special due to the complex nature of the case.

IMDb reviewers have given this episode an average rating of 7.7/10. The thoroughness of the storytelling is a major draw, especially because of the multiple twists and turns along the way. Massive pressure from the US and Thai governments led to FBI involvement in the investigation. In addition to the murders themselves, this case involved another unfortunate tragedy: a rush to judgement resulted in four wrongful arrests and unverifiable confessions. According to The Los Angeles Times, the "Tuscon Four" were later released and cleared of any wrongdoing connected to this case. Amazingly, the entire massacre was committed by two teenagers: 17-year-old Johnathan Doody and 16-year-old Alex Garcia. Both received life sentences for their involvement in the crimes.

Wrongful convictions have plagued the American justice system since its inception, but forensic science has come a long way in reducing the instances of these tragic mistakes. For example, in the late 1990s, police accused two different men of murdering their neighbor, nine-year-old Sharra Ferger, but thanks to forensics, the right person went to jail instead. "Sharper Image" covers the story of Sharra's murder, the forensic evidence that cleared her neighbors' names, and the unfortunate truth behind the crime. With an IMDb rating of 7.8/10, "Sharper Image" clearly has true crime fans' approval.

The forensics in this case involved an organization that goes far beyond the earth's surface: one suspect's lawyer reached out to NASA for help with photographic enhancement of a bite mark, which cleared the lawyer's client and pointed investigators to the real killer: Sharra's uncle, Gary Cochran. Cochran and his accomplice, Steven Cannon, were handed life sentences for the crime. However, according to WTSP News, recently discovered DNA evidence has opened the door for Cannon — just 17 at the time of the murder — to appeal his conviction. The story of Sharra Ferger's murder is far from over.

This episode of "Forensic Files" feels like a movie because of the intense drama surrounding the case. "Last Will," which has an IMDb rating of 7.8/10, details a harrowing kidnapping and murder that occurred in 1985 when a South Carolina teen named Shari Smith was abducted. Her kidnapper taunted her parents and law enforcement with cryptic phone calls, ultimately forcing Shari to write her own last will and testament before murdering her. That two-page document arrived at her parents' local post office the next day, when it was already too late to save her.

Even after Shari's family received the letter, the killer continued to taunt them with calls from a local pay phone. Finally, one of the killer's calls gave the investigators information that led to her parents' worst nightmare: the location of Shari's corpse. Clues at the scene suggested that the killer was criminally sophisticated and dangerous, and investigators knew they had to work fast to find clues about their identity. In the meantime, the killer continued to call the grieving parents periodically. Finally, a forensic expert thoroughly examined Shari's letter and found an incredible clue: On the back of Shari's note, there was trace evidence of a partial list of phone numbers. Eventually, tracking those phone numbers led to the killer, Larry Gene Bell. According to AP News, his sentence for the crimes was execution via electric chair.

Some secrets stay buried for decades, and one such secret is at the heart of "A Voice from Beyond." When the Cohen family moved out of their home in Jericho, New York, they found a large barrel in their house's crawlspace. Inside, police discovered the mummified corpse of a pregnant young woman. Investigators estimated that the body had been in the barrel for at least 30 years and had very little forensic evidence to go on. Luckily, a few of the woman's personal effects were in the barrel with the body, including an address book.

Thanks to a forensic document analyzer, investigators salvaged bits of information from the mostly destroyed book, which helped identify people who might have known the mystery woman. An anonymous tip about the barrel also provided a lead on where it came from: a plastics factory from the 1970s. Police tracked down a former plastics executive named Howard Elkins, who refused to provide a DNA sample. Elkins committed suicide soon after the police visited him, and investigators took a blood sample after his death. As it turned out, Elkins was the father of the mystery woman's baby. "Forensic Files" fans gave this episode a 7.8/10 rating on IMDb.

This "Forensic Files" episode digs into the case of a woman named Sue Snow who died under mysterious circumstances. A medical examiner's assistant detected the unmistakable smell of cyanide during Sue's autopsy, and investigators then made a frightening discovery in Sue's kitchen: a bottle of tainted Excedrin. According to The New York Times, Excedrin immediately recalled their products in case of widespread contamination. Sue's husband was briefly a suspect, but police looked in a different direction when another local woman, Stella Nickell, claimed that her husband had also taken Excedrin shortly before his death.

Evidence of an additional victim led law enforcement to believe that a random killer was on the loose, perhaps a copycat of the unsolved Tylenol Murders in Chicago. However, close forensic analysis of the contaminated Excedrin pills revealed chemicals found in aquarium algaecide, a crucial clue to the suspect's identity. One of the investigators working on the case remembered a vital detail: Nickell's home had an aquarium. In the end, Nickell was convicted of the murders of Sue Snow and her husband Bruce. IMDb reviewers gave this complex episode a rating of 7.9/10. The case is so compelling that it's been featured on several other crime shows since this episode aired. 

A woman named Darlie Routier and her two young boys were attacked in their home in Dallas, Texas in 1996. Darlie survived, but both of her sons died from their wounds. From the start, Darlie claimed that an intruder was responsible for the vicious crime, but her story was very suspicious to investigators. Her husband, Darin, exhibited equally bizarre behavior in the aftermath of his children's deaths. As the investigation unfolded, all of the evidence pointed to an unthinkable conclusion: Darlie Routier murdered her sons and staged her own attack. "Invisible Intruder" has an average rating of 7.9/10 from IMDb reviewers.

Though Darlie Routier has been on death row in Texas for 20 years, her fate isn't sealed just yet. Darlie has proclaimed her innocence multiple times since her conviction, and new evidence just might exonerate her. According to the Altoona Mirror, Darlie's legal team is awaiting the results of new DNA tests, and are hopeful that the results will shed light on her possible innocence. For true crime fans that like to stay up-to-date on legal news, this episode of "Forensic Files" is an excellent introduction to a case that is still evolving today.

Losing a parent is one of the worst tragedies a child can experience, and the loss of her mother haunted Lori Romaneck for decades. Dianne Keidel disappeared in 1966, and her murder remained unsolved for 27 years. Investigators noted that Dianne took almost none of her personal effects with her, and those close to Dianne claimed that she would never have left town without her children. In a bizarre twist, the man Dianne met the night she disappeared died from a heart attack the very next day.

In an even more bizarre twist, a house fire nearly claimed the lives of Dianne's children not long after her death. Sadly, Lori's older sister, Suzie, died in the fire trying to protect her. Lori's other sister, Kelly, died as well. It took another two decades for Lori to have the courage to approach law enforcement with a dark family secret: Lori witnessed her father beat her mother to death when she was only five years old. She also claimed that her father buried her mother in their family's backyard and poured concrete over the grave. Investigators found Dianne Keidel's body exactly where Lori said it was buried. "Haunting Vision" has an IMDb rating of 8.1/10.

Some cases become so sensational that they capture national attention. The disappearance of Josh Ford and Geney Crutchley is one such case, and it's the subject of "Dirty Little Secret." This episode is rated 8.2/10 on IMDb, and features some classic themes, including love, mystery, and murder. 

Ford and Crutchley vanished during Memorial Day weekend in Ocean City, Maryland. They were both very dedicated to their respective jobs, so friends and coworkers were suspicious when neither one returned to work after the holiday. The couple was last spotted at a nightclub before vanishing, and they'd left most of their belongings behind in their vacation rental.

Through interviewing potential witnesses, investigators discovered that another couple, Benjamin and Erika Sifrit, might have been responsible for the pair's disappearance. Inside the Sifrits' Jeep, police found Ford and Crutchley's driver's licenses. More of their belongings turned up in the Sifrits' condo, as well as a photo of Ford and Crutchley on their last night alive. To the horror of everyone involved in the case, forensic evidence revealed that the Sifrits had murdered Ford and Crutchley in their condo, dismembering and disposing of their bodies. The Sifrits turned on each other at the trial, and each received lengthy prison sentences.

"The List Murders" is the highest-rated episode of "Forensic Files" on IMDb, with an average rating of 8.6/10. It features an utterly sensational mass-murder case that investigators solved with the help of true-crime TV and a little-known form of forensic art. The episode lays out the finer details of the List family dynamics in 1971, including family photos and pictures of the original home — an introduction that gives viewers an instant connection to the murdered family.

In the List house, police found the bodies of five family members and a written confession from the killer. The only missing family member was the List patriarch, John. Investigators quickly discovered that the unassuming accountant had written the confession letter. Unfortunately, even a nationwide warrant wasn't enough to capture John List. He disappeared, and the case went cold. After 15 years, frustrated detectives turned to a last resort: they had the case featured on "America's Most Wanted." There was one major problem: their last photograph of John List was very outdated. A forensic sculptor created an amazingly accurate age-progressed likeness for the "America's Most Wanted" segment, which generated a flood of viable tips — and led investigators right to List's doorstep.