In October 1998, the FBI launched a DNA database called the Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, which gave detectives the ability to compare DNA samples collected at crime scenes with the DNA profiles of legions of potential suspects. When, in 2000, a $50 million state grant became available to fund DNA testing in certain unsolved murders, Lambkin and Lisa Kahn seized the opportunity to propose a joint LAPD/D.A. task force to tackle the citywide backlog. After considerable political machinations, the LAPD’s new Cold Case Homicide Unit went operational in November 2001.

The cold-case unit initially consisted of seven detectives: three teams of two, with Lambkin at the helm. The “office” the unit was given—a 250-square-foot former janitorial storage space—was so cramped that every time someone wanted to leave, others had to pull in their chairs to make room.

The unit gradually came to grips with the magnitude of its caseload. The coldest homicide on the LAPD’s books was, literally, the first one: the unsolved murder of a man named Simon Christensen in downtown Los Angeles on the night of September 9, 1899. A century later, the unit could not do much about that one. But how far back could they go, given the inevitable loss and decay of physical evidence? “I knew from experience that there was probably nothing left from earlier than 1960,” Lambkin says. The unit’s initial focus would therefore be on unsolved homicides committed from 1960 through 1998.

Using the LAPD’s annual statistics, Lambkin tallied the numbers. During those 39 years, 23,713 murders took place in Los Angeles. Of those cases, 13,300 were cleared by arrest and another 2,668 were recorded as “cleared other.” That left 7,745 cold cases. Page by page, for months, the detectives combed the old homicide summary books. “We were looking for cases that had the best chance for us to potentially work with, given the small numbers [of detectives] we had,” says Rick Jackson, who was part of the original unit. “So we looked for sexually motivated murders, where there was a better chance for DNA. We looked at maybe a burglary murder that was unsolved. Because a burglary murder—someone is going to have broken into the place, spent some time there. In an indoor crime scene, obviously, the longer you are there, the more you do—whether you’re sexually assaulting, burglarizing, moving around ransacking—you increase the chance for good fingerprints.”

Late in 2002, when the cold-case unit finished its initial screening of all unsolved homicides committed in Los Angeles from 1960 through 1998, it judged 1,400 to have good forensic potential for reinvestigation—among them, the 1986 murder of Sherri Rasmussen.

Stephanie Lazarus: I mean, that’s—now that you guys are bringing all this stuff up, I mean, it sound—that sounds familiar. But, again, I mean, you know, what’s—I mean, what’s this got to do with me dating him and, you know, her getting killed? I mean, I—I don’t—you know, I don’t have anything to do with it …

Detective Stearns: Well, like we said, we just, literally, got this the other day … And then so, you know, I mean obviously, it’s, like—

Stephanie Lazarus: Yeah.

Detective Stearns:—we recognize the name, and we, you know—

Stephanie Lazarus: Yeah.

Detective Stearns:—you work next door to us. And so we’re trying to get some background. We’re trying to figure this out.

In February 2003, a year and a half after its formation, the cold-case unit made its first arrest, solving the 1983 murder of a young nurse and mother named Elaine Graham. A suspect, Edmond Marr, had been identified at the time but was never prosecuted; confronted with wiretap evidence and a DNA report that linked him to the murder, Marr eventually pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 16 years to life.