Dateline: Unforgettable on Oxygen will look into the murders of Sam Herr and Julie Kibuishi by Daniel Wozniak. The episode titled “Plot Twist” will air on the network on Wednesday, December 20, 2023, at 8 p.m. ET.
Daniel Wozniak, a former theater actor, murdered his friend Sam Herr and Herr’s girlfriend Julie Kibuishi in May 2010. Steve Herr, the victim’s father, called 911 on May 22 after finding Kibuishi’s body in his son’s apartment. A few days later, authorities found Herr’s torso in the Liberty Theater at the Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base.
According to People Magazine, prosecutors alleged that Wozniak committed the double murders for money. They believed he needed money for rent as well as his upcoming wedding to his then-fiancée, Rachel Buffett. The killer received a death sentence and is now serving on serving time on death row.
Daniel Wozniak now: Why did he murder Sam Herr & Julie Kibuishi?
Per The U.S. Sun, Daniel Wozniak is now serving time in the Salinas Valley State Prison, a lower-security prison, after transfer from California’s San Quentin State Prison death row. The move was made because Wozniak participated in the Condemned Inmate Transfer Pilot Program. The program reportedly allows death row inmates to participate in rehabilitation and work programs to pay restitution.
CBS News reported that four days after Julie Kibuishi’s body was found at her boyfriend Sam Herr’s apartment, police arrested Wozniak. They charged him with an accessory to murder charge. Authorities had initially set their suspicions on Herr, a 26-year-old Afghanistan War veteran. Moreover, Wozniak claimed he helped him escape before admitting to the veteran’s murder after hours of questioning.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Wozniak’s murder motive was financial as he was struggling to pay rent. Thus, he murdered Herr, who was his neighbor at the time, in an attempt to steal the army veteran’s $62,000 he had saved during his military service.
Wozniak first shot Herr execution style before dismembering his body with an ax and a saw. He then lured the victim’s girlfriend Julie Kibuishi, a college student studying fashion back then, to Herr’s apartment. There, he shot her twice in the head. The killer also confessed to staging the crime scene to frame the boyfriend of Kibuishi’s murder.
Police discovered Wozniak’s backpack, which he had filled with evidence, outside his parents’ house. This evidence included Herr’s clothes, phone, and wallet. Furthermore, during the investigation, detectives found that before the murders, Wozniak made incriminating Google searches such as, “how to hide a body” and “quick ways to kill people.”
CBS‘ report stated that Police discovered Herr’s remains in the Liberty Theater at the Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base. Wozniak had previously performed at the same theater. It took authorities two days to find the victim’s missing body parts. They discovered his head in El Dorado Park.
The outlet reported that over two years later, in November 2012, police arrested Wozniak’s fiancé, Rachel Buffett. They charged her as an accessory after the fact to murder. Buffett, however, maintained her innocence and claimed that she had been “duped by Dan.”
More than five years after Sam Herr and Julie Kibuishi’s double murders, their killer Daniel Wozniak stood trial which resulted in a conviction. He received the death penalty on January 11, 2016.
Oxygen’s Dateline: Unforgettable revisits Sam Herr and Julie Kibuishi’s double murders by Daniel Wozniak this December 20.
