# 2 Cold Cases Solved With Forensic Science: Stephen Edenfield and Donna Ogilvie

An episode of [Lazy Chill True Crime](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1815534472), 3 Aug 2025, 21 min.

Audio: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/APO5549349362.mp3

John me as we discuss the solved true crime cases of Stephen Edenfield and Donna Ogilvie. Chapters: 0:00 Stephen Edenfield 13:28 Donna Ogilvie 👇 Support My Work: 🛍️ Merch: https://lazy-chill-zone-shop.fourthwall.com ❤️ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/lazychillzone 👇 Youtube links: Lazy Chill True Crime Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8dVJtzeHcJgd_Z0bHrJTHQ Lazy Chill History Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LazyChillHistory Lazy Chill Zone Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LazyChillZone 👇Social Media Links: https://www.instagram.com/lazychillzone/ 👇 Podcast links: ⚡True Crime Podcast on Spotify⚡: https://open.spotify.com/show/0klIz08pAr7wR4we0Ia4sk?si=68qZxCeAQkysXzMZrHE0Iw 🍏 True Crime Podcast on Apple 🍎: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lazy-chill-true-crime/id1815534472

## Transcript

[0:00] On the morning of February 1st, 1997, forty one year old Stephen
[0:04] Edenfield was found dead in his Tampa, FL condo.
[0:08] His brother James discovered Stephen lying in bed covered in
[0:12] blood after Stephen failed to show up at their mother's home.
[0:16] As expected, the scene spoke of extreme violence.
[0:21] There were signs of a fierce struggle, blood splattered, and
[0:24] even pieces of a shattered porcelain statue strewn in the
[0:28] hallway. Most eerily, the word greed had
[0:33] been written in Stephen's blood on the bedroom wall.
[0:36] Yet investigators found no sign of forced entry, suggesting
[0:40] Stephen had likely let his killer inside willingly.
[0:44] This gruesome scene set the stage for a perplexing mystery
[0:47] that would haunt detectives in the Edenfield family for
[0:50] decades. The night before the slaying,
[0:55] January 31st, 1997, seemed ordinary by family accounts.
[1:00] Stephen had dinner with his brother and sister that evening.
[1:04] Their mother had just returned home from the hospital and the
[1:07] family lived in the same Tampa Racquet Club condo complex, so
[1:11] they often saw each other. After dinner, Stephen decided to
[1:15] go out around midnight. When he returned home at 12:50,
[1:19] AMA dark colored sedan followed him to the gate of the complex.
[1:24] Steven stopped at the gatehouse since he'd forgotten his remote
[1:27] opener, and asked the security guard on duty to let in both his
[1:31] car and the one behind him. Ominously, he explained that the
[1:36] other driver was with him. The guard lifted the gate for
[1:39] both vehicles, but later admitted he hadn't gotten a good
[1:42] look at the second driver, noting only that the person had
[1:45] dark hair. Within an hour of Stevens
[1:49] return, neighbors in the building heard disturbing
[1:52] noises. Multiple neighbors reported the
[1:54] sounds of an argument and crashing furniture, and even
[1:58] what they thought were cries for help, abruptly followed by
[2:01] silence. Around 2:00 AM, the security
[2:06] guard making his rounds spotted a shadowy figure on an upstairs
[2:09] walkway near Stevens Unit who appeared to be hiding.
[2:13] Before the guard could confront the person, the figure slipped
[2:16] away and the guard then saw the dark sedan driving out of the
[2:20] complex. The security guard doesn't
[2:23] appear to have taken any further investigative steps at that
[2:26] time. By the time James Edenfield
[2:29] entered his brother's condo at about 9:30 the next morning, it
[2:33] was too late. Investigators arriving at the
[2:37] crime scene documented the extremely grim evidence.
[2:41] Steven was found on his back in his bed, covered only by a
[2:44] blanket. He had suffered multiple stab
[2:47] wounds and blunt force trauma to his upper body, indicating A
[2:51] frenzied assault. The blood stains on the
[2:54] headboard and the chilling message Greed scrawled in blood
[2:58] on the wall suggested the perp had taken the time to stage the
[3:01] scene or deliver a message. Yet there was no ransacking of
[3:06] the home beyond the signs of struggle, and the door had been
[3:09] left closed but unlocked when James arrived.
[3:13] Detectives found a bloody white tank top on the bedroom floor
[3:16] and two blood stained socks near the living room couch,
[3:20] presumably items the attacker might have worn or handled.
[3:24] These items were collected as evidence, including traces of
[3:28] unknown DNA, but in 1997 forensic technology was limited
[3:34] and no suspect profile was immediately identified.
[3:39] Early leads were scarce and police questioned residents in
[3:42] the security guard. However, the vague description
[3:46] of a dark haired man and a sedan yielded no immediate suspect.
[3:51] They also looked into Stephen's personal life.
[3:54] Stephen was openly gay, and while he was close with his
[3:58] family, he kept details of his social and dating life private.
[4:02] This made it harder for detectives to pin down whom he
[4:05] might have been with that night. One acquaintance later told
[4:09] investigators that Steven had mentioned dating a man named
[4:12] Carlos around that time, raising hopes of a lead.
[4:18] However, despite pursuing this angle, Carlos was never located
[4:22] or definitively linked to the crime, and it remains unclear if
[4:26] he was actually the mystery visitor or simply a red herring.
[4:31] That said, given the subsequent developments, I strongly believe
[4:35] it's the latter. In the first days of the
[4:37] investigation, authorities also noted that one of Stevens
[4:41] valuable personal possessions had gone missing.
[4:44] This was a custom made solid gold bracelet engraved with his
[4:48] name. This suggested a possible
[4:50] robbery motive, or at least that the perpetrator had taken a
[4:54] souvenir. The bracelet, gifted by Stevens
[4:58] mother and unique in design with double chains and a nameplate,
[5:02] became a critical missing item that detectives quietly kept in
[5:06] mind. Despite these clues, the case
[5:09] quickly went cold. For years, the Edenfield case
[5:14] haunted both Stevens family and the Hillsborough County
[5:17] Sheriff's Office. James Edenfield, who had
[5:21] suffered the trauma of finding his brother's body, was left
[5:24] waiting for justice that seemed increasingly elusive in the late
[5:28] 1990s and early 2000s. Detectives periodically re
[5:33] examined the case file, hoping new information or techniques
[5:37] might crack it, but to no avail. His elderly mother, Barbara,
[5:42] struggled with the loss. She suffered a stroke shortly
[5:45] before the slaying and never fully recovered from the shock.
[5:50] Sadly, she passed away in 2003, having never learned who had
[5:55] taken the life of her beloved son.
[5:58] Over the years, Stevens two sisters also passed away
[6:03] tragically, never seeing the mystery solved.
[6:07] James was the last immediate family member still alive, and
[6:11] he had nearly given up hope. In 2022, armed with federal
[6:17] grant funding and new partnerships, the Cold Case Unit
[6:21] took a major step. They reopened the investigation
[6:24] in earnest. This time they would attempt to
[6:28] harness the power of genetic genealogy to locate the identity
[6:32] of the presumed perpetrator. The Sheriff's Office teamed up
[6:36] with Othrum, a private laboratory specializing in
[6:39] advanced DNA analysis, to apply cutting edge techniques to the
[6:44] crime scene evidence. Othrum scientists performed
[6:48] forensic grade genome sequencing on the degraded DNA from the 25
[6:53] year old evidence, creating a comprehensive genetic profile of
[6:56] the unknown suspect. With this new profile in hand,
[7:01] forensic genealogists conducted database searches looking for
[7:05] relatives of the perp. By 2024, this painstaking DNA
[7:10] work yielded A crucial lead. The unknown DNA profile from
[7:14] Stevens case was matched to DNA from an unsolved 2005 assault in
[7:19] Illinois. In that Illinois case, the
[7:22] victim had provided DNA evidence of her attacker, but the case
[7:26] had gone cold and the assailant's identity remained
[7:29] unknown. Now detectives realize the same
[7:33] person who ended Stephen Edenfield in 1997 had also
[7:37] committed the violent assault in Illinois eight years later.
[7:41] This cross case link was a true breakthrough.
[7:45] It meant the killer was a repeat offender who had left his
[7:47] genetic fingerprint on multiple crime scenes.
[7:51] Importantly, Illinois authorities had once developed a
[7:54] suspect name in the 2005 assault, Brandon Gleha, who was
[8:00] questioned at the time but never convicted.
[8:03] Gleha's name was now on the radar of Florida investigators.
[8:07] They discovered that Gleha, now 47 years old, was living back in
[8:12] Tampa, not far from where the Edenfield slaying had occurred
[8:16] so many years before. With probable cause building,
[8:20] the investigators coordinated with Illinois law enforcement.
[8:24] Conveniently, Brandon Gleeha had an outstanding warrant in
[8:28] Illinois on an unrelated forgery charge, which provided A lawful
[8:32] reason to pick him up. In early February 2025, nearly
[8:38] 28 years after Stevens death, deputies quietly arrested Gleeha
[8:43] in Tampa on the Illinois warrant.
[8:46] During the booking process, they obtained a fresh DNA swab from
[8:50] him. The Florida Department of Law
[8:52] Enforcement lab quickly confirmed what they suspected.
[8:56] Gleeha's DNA matched the unknown samples from Stevens bedroom.
[9:02] Confronted with the DNA proof, Gleeha eventually confessed to
[9:06] his role in Steven Edenfield's killing, though he offered a
[9:10] disturbing and somewhat convoluted story of what
[9:12] happened. And by way of reminder, this is
[9:16] by no means the official story, just one narrative told by a
[9:20] career criminal with a history of disturbing offenses.
[9:24] According to an affidavit later filed by prosecutors, Gleeha
[9:28] claimed that he hadn't acted alone.
[9:32] He told detectives about a man he knew only as Chino.
[9:35] In Gleeha's account, Chino was the one who drove the dark sedan
[9:40] and accompanied him to meet Stephen in the early hours of
[9:43] February 1st, 1997. Gleeha alleged that Chino had
[9:49] essentially set up the encounter and that he had been brought to
[9:52] the condo for the kind of liaison that leaves ample DNA
[9:56] evidence. After Stephen and Gleeha were
[10:00] intimate, Gleeha said he felt violated and angry, suggesting
[10:05] he hadn't fully anticipated the situation.
[10:08] He claimed he heard Stephen and Chino arguing in the bedroom
[10:11] about payment, which hints that the meeting may have been
[10:14] transactional in nature. At that point, Gleeha admitted
[10:19] he lost control. He grabbed A porcelain statuette
[10:23] from the living room and hurled it at the back of Stephen's
[10:26] head. Stephen was knocked down but
[10:29] still alive, and he pushed back at Gleeha, who responded by
[10:33] punching Stephen in anger. What Gleeha described next was
[10:38] the most chilling part of his confession.
[10:40] He claimed that Chino then attacked Stephen with a knife,
[10:43] stabbing him from behind. Gleeha told police that Chino
[10:48] stabbed Stephen repeatedly and also struck him with a blunt
[10:51] object to ensure Stephen was dead so he, quote, couldn't rat
[10:55] them out. All the while, Gleeha said he
[10:58] himself was wiping down surfaces in the apartment to remove their
[11:02] fingerprints. He also admitted to searching
[11:05] for something to steal since, as he put it, they hadn't gotten
[11:09] any money from Stephen. He acknowledged taking Stephen's
[11:13] gold bracelet and perhaps other small items in the hurried
[11:16] aftermath of the events. Importantly, Gleeha denied
[11:20] actually stabbing Stephen. He painted himself as a
[11:23] participant who threw the first blow but blamed the fatal
[11:26] violence on the other man. Detectives listened to Gleeha's
[11:31] account but treated it with skepticism.
[11:34] After all, in nearly 28 years, no evidence of a Chino or any
[11:40] other accomplice had ever surfaced.
[11:42] In the Edenfield case, the security guard's testimony and
[11:46] the DNA results pointed strongly to a single perpetrator.
[11:50] When pressed, Gleeha could not provide full details to identify
[11:54] Chino, and investigators suspect that this accomplice may be a
[11:58] fabrication or an exaggeration aimed at shifting blame.
[12:03] As of 2025, the Sheriff's Office has stated that it's not
[12:07] actively looking for any other suspect in the case.
[12:11] Authorities believe that Brandon Gleeha was the only offender
[12:14] involved in the case and that he was the man who carried out all
[12:18] the acts that night. On February 24th, 2025, nearly
[12:24] 28 years after the slaying, Brandon Gleeha was formally
[12:28] charged with Stevens death. Prosecutors, convinced by the
[12:33] DNA and the confession, moved to hold him without bond as he
[12:37] awaited trial. For James Edenfield, the news
[12:40] was bittersweet. He was 72 years old when
[12:44] detectives arrived at his door to tell him about the arrest.
[12:47] In a later interview, James said he didn't wish the death penalty
[12:51] on Gleeha if he is convicted, rather, he preferred to see the
[12:55] man live out his days in prison as punishment.
[13:00] Brandon Gleeha is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law,
[13:04] and I hope to have an update on his case in the near future.
[13:09] Hey everyone, it's Jimmy here with a quick shout out to all my
[13:13] supporters on Patreon and through YouTube memberships.
[13:16] Also remember to check out my other channels Lazy Chill Zone
[13:20] and Lazy Chill History for unsolved mysteries and
[13:24] historical content respectively. Early on Sunday, March 8th,
[13:32] 1998, the quiet of downtown Toronto was shattered by a
[13:37] gruesome find. At about 7:00 AM, police
[13:41] responded to a 911 call from a concerned resident who had
[13:45] spotted a body in the rear parking lot of 130 Carlton St.
[13:50] There, officers discovered the victim, a young woman suffering
[13:54] obvious signs of trauma. She was rushed to a hospital,
[13:59] but tragically, she couldn't be saved.
[14:02] The woman was soon identified as 24 year old Donna Ogilvy, a
[14:06] recent arrival to the city. It was a shocking and
[14:09] heartbreaking discovery. Donna was not only a young
[14:13] mother but also four months pregnant at the time of her
[14:17] death. Donna Ogilvy had come to Toronto
[14:21] from British Columbia only weeks before her slaying.
[14:25] She split her time between Vancouver, where her family,
[14:29] including a young daughter, lived, and Toronto, where she
[14:32] sought to earn a living. In Toronto, Donna worked as a
[14:37] street level escort, hanging out in the area around Gerrard St.
[14:40] East and Church St. not far from where she was found.
[14:46] From the start, Toronto police recognized that Donna's death
[14:50] was a slaying and began piercing.
[14:52] Together, her final hours and the crime scene itself provided
[14:56] important clues. The details indicated that her
[15:00] last moments involved an intimate liaison that turned
[15:03] deadly. Based on the evidence in Donna's
[15:07] line of work, investigators immediately suspected that she
[15:11] was targeted by a client. Detectives canvassed the area
[15:15] around the parking lot and Donna's usual haunts,
[15:18] interviewing other workers and any potential witnesses who
[15:22] might have seen her that night. In 1998, DNA analysis was a
[15:28] newer tool, but the police managed to recover a male DNA
[15:32] profile from evidence on Donna's body and clothing.
[15:37] This DNA was presumed to belong to the unknown perpetrator and
[15:41] not a previous client. However, when they ran the
[15:45] profile through Canada's national DNA databank, no match
[15:49] was found. The perpetrator's genetic
[15:52] fingerprint didn't correspond to any identified offender.
[15:56] With no immediate hits and no eyewitnesses pointing to a clear
[15:59] suspect, the case began to stall.
[16:02] As weeks turned into months, leads grew scarce and police
[16:06] looked at other crimes for potential connections.
[16:09] Donna's slaying was one of several attacks on women in the
[16:13] trade that had occurred in Toronto in the late 1990s.
[16:17] In fact, between 1996 and 1998, eight women were slain under
[16:24] similar circumstances in the city.
[16:27] This spate of violence raised fears that a predator might be
[16:30] targeting vulnerable women on downtown streets.
[16:34] For a time, detectives considered whether Donna's
[16:36] attacker might be a serial offender responsible for
[16:39] multiple deaths. In the early phase of the
[16:43] investigation, one suspect did briefly come on to the radar.
[16:48] Just three days before Donna was slain, another Toronto woman had
[16:52] been found deceased under similar alarming circumstances.
[16:57] On March 5th, 1998, the body of 22 year old Christine Ricketts
[17:02] was discovered after she was working as a newspaper delivery
[17:05] person in the early morning of that day.
[17:09] Police moved quickly on the Ricketts case and identified a
[17:12] man named Adrian Clive Paul as a suspect within a day of that
[17:17] discovery. Paul, a Toronto resident who was
[17:21] out on parole at the time, was soon accused and later convicted
[17:24] in Christine Rickett's death. Given the timing and Paul's
[17:28] history, investigators wondered if he might also be responsible
[17:32] for Donna Ogilvy's death as well.
[17:35] For a period, they examined possible links between the two
[17:38] cases. However, the evidence did not
[17:41] bear this out, and the DNA recovered from Donna's scene did
[17:46] not match Adrian, Paul or any other known offender, and no
[17:50] other solid connection could be made.
[17:53] Further, the early theory that a single serial killer was praying
[17:57] on escorts also lost traction. As years passed, the pattern of
[18:02] slayings didn't point neatly to one person.
[18:05] With no suspects arrested and no fresh leads, Donna Ogilvy's case
[18:10] eventually went cold. In 2022, investigators turned to
[18:16] forensic genetic genealogy to try to unlock the secret hidden
[18:20] in the DNA from the crime scene. They sent the DNA evidence from
[18:24] Donna's case to Othram for further testing.
[18:27] There, scientists generated A comprehensive genetic profile of
[18:31] the unknown suspect and used it to search genealogical databases
[18:35] for possible relatives. This process effectively built a
[18:40] family tree from the DNA leading detectives to new investigative
[18:44] leads where conventional police work had hit a dead end.
[18:49] The painstaking genetic research paid off, and by late 2024, the
[18:55] cold case team had zeroed in on a particular family and then a
[18:58] specific individual who fit the perpetrator profile.
[19:03] Investigators learned that the suspect was a man living in
[19:06] Newfoundland, far from Toronto, which explained why he had never
[19:10] before come up in the original investigation.
[19:14] His name was Ronald Gordon Ackerman, a 50 year old resident
[19:18] of Gander, NL. Crucially, back in 1998,
[19:25] Ackerman had been a young man living in the Toronto area, not
[19:29] far from where Donna was slain. In the years after the crime,
[19:34] Ackerman had left Toronto, and he spent much of his adult life
[19:38] working in the oil fields of northern Alberta and travelling
[19:42] back and forth to Newfoundland. Given his loose connections to
[19:46] Toronto, he had never been on police radar at any point during
[19:50] the investigation. Armed with their new evidence,
[19:54] Toronto police moved to make an arrest.
[19:57] Detectives coordinated with law enforcement across provinces and
[20:01] learned that Ackerman would be travelling through Toronto's
[20:03] Pearson International Airport on February 6th, 2025.
[20:09] They decided this was the moment to strike.
[20:12] On that day, as Ackerman stepped off a flight from Edmonton for a
[20:16] connection, officers were waiting.
[20:19] He was taken into custody at the airport without incident and in
[20:23] a press conference the next morning.
[20:25] Toronto police announced that Ackerman was charged with Donna
[20:28] Ogilvy's slaying. At present, Ackerman awaits
[20:32] trial on all charges related to Donna Ogilvy's death.
[20:36] As such, he remains innocent until proven guilty in a court
[20:39] of law. The authorities have also
[20:41] indicated that they are currently investigating whether
[20:44] Ackerman has been responsible for any other crimes of a
[20:47] similar nature. Given his vast geographic
[20:50] spread, discovering his further activities, if any, may be quite
[20:54] difficult.

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