Video - Mindy's Fight: A Legacy of Justice

The Evidence She Left Behind: Mindy's Story Valley City, North Dakota, 2006. 22-year-old college senior Mindy Morgenstern had a bright future ahead – until she was found murdered in her apartment, a belt around her neck and a knife in her throat. "She had a light in her eyes," her mother Eunice said. "A smile that would look right through you." When police arrived, they found her body doused in Pine-Sol – the killer's attempt to destroy evidence. But Mindy had fought back. Under her fingernails: DNA that would solve her murder. The investigation led police to Moe Gibbs, a corrections officer who lived in Mindy's building. At first, he denied being in her apartment, then changed his story, claiming he'd only helped her with laundry. What investigators discovered was shocking. Gibbs had changed his name to hide his past – five years in prison for a drive-by shooting. His DNA not only matched evidence from Mindy's apartment but also linked him to an unsolved sexual assault from two years earlier. After his arrest, six female inmates came forward with sexual assault allegations against him. The first trial ended in a hung jury, devastating Mindy's parents. "The DNA seemed pretty simple to me," her father Larry said. Three months later, a second trial finally brought justice: Gibbs was found guilty and sentenced to life without parole. In her final moments, fighting for her life, Mindy Morgenstern collected the evidence that would eventually bring her killer to justice. Nearly two decades later, Moe Gibbs remains in the North Dakota State Penitentiary, his appeals denied, while Mindy's legacy lives on in the hearts of all who knew her.