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True Crime

13-yr-old Twin Brothers’ DNA Found On Murdered Woman - Cops Must Figure Out Which Twin Is Lying

Rotten Mango · Stephanie Soo

📅 2026-07-16 ⏱ 54 min

Key takeaways

01Standard forensic DNA tests compare about 20 markers and cannot tell identical twins apart; twins differ by only around eight mutations across three billion base pairs.
02Full-genome sequencing can distinguish twins, but only a handful of labs can do it, it can cost up to seven figures, and its novelty makes it vulnerable in court.
03In the Berlin heist, a court conceded at least one twin took part in the crime yet released both, because prosecutors couldn't prove which one.
04In the Ohio case, DNA under Denise's nails matched both Cart twins, forcing investigators to rely on interviews, timelines, and the boys' injuries instead of the DNA itself.
05The police handling — questioning the 13-year-olds separately while stalling their mother's lawyer requests and taking her phone — is the kind of conduct that invites legal challenges later.

What this episode covers

The episode opens in Berlin, where three masked men dropped through a department store skylight and took $6.5 million in jewelry and watches, leaving behind one glove holding a single bead of sweat. The DNA hit came back to two people: identical twin brothers with matching theft records. Because standard forensic testing scans about 20 DNA markers and identical twins share them all, prosecutors could not prove which twin — or whether both — took part, and a court released the pair within the week. Distinguishing identical twins means sequencing the entire three-billion-letter genome at ultra-high depth to find roughly eight copying 'typos,' a test only a handful of labs can run, at a cost that can reach seven figures, and one defense attorneys can often get thrown out as too novel.

That problem then lands in an Ohio neighborhood, where 64-year-old Denise is found raped and murdered in her own bed by her brother Daryl. The scene is strange: her face covered by a blanket with an angel figurine placed on top, cleaning chemicals and Pepto-Bismol poured over her body, and a blood trail leading out the back door to the rear gate. Neighbors point fingers at a drunk named Dave and at Daryl himself, who is quickly ruled out. Across the street live Becca and her 13-year-old twins, Hunter and Levi Cart — a family two weeks from moving to Long Beach whose Sunday began with a 6 a.m. ER trip because the cat, Marshmallow, had scratched Levi's face badly enough to need five stitches. Cheek swabs from both boys come back a match to DNA found under Denise's nails.

The back half follows the body-cam and interrogation-room footage as police maneuver the family to the station — separating the twins from their mother, who repeatedly demands a lawyer while officers stall, compliment her slippers, and take her phone. Hunter, a true-crime obsessive, talks himself in circles: volunteering that his brother researches sociopathy, then asking the detectives outright whether Levi is a suspect or whether he sounds crazy. Levi calmly narrates an odd night — woken at 2:30 a.m. by the cat on his neck, three hours cleaning up alone in the bathroom, a fall in the shower — before investigators learn he has cerebral palsy, which may bear on whether he was physically capable of the crime at all. Part one ends with that question open.

Why listen: It's a genuine forensic puzzle — the one situation where DNA evidence, the gold standard, points at two people at once — told through raw interrogation footage of the two boys it points at.

Chapters

“From the evidence we have, we can deduce that at least one of the brothers took part in the crime” German court statement · at 2:35 —
“Do you guys think he's a suspect possibly or am I crazy?” Hunter Cart · at 40:08 —

Mentioned in this episode

Hunter CartLevi CartBerlin department store heistJoyful Heart FoundationLong Beach, CaliforniaOhiocerebral palsyRaising Cane'sMiranda rights

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0:00 / 54:54 13-yr-old Twin Brothers’ DNA Found On Murdered Woman - Cops Must Figure Out Which Twin Is Lying