Naman Shrestha
In the episode titled ‘The Disappearing Wife’ of Netflix’s ‘Homicide: Los Angeles,’ the viewers get an in-depth account of the disappearance and murder case of Jana Koklich, who went missing in August 2001. Directing the investigation away from himself from the start, the victim’s husband, Bruce Koklich, managed to stay out of suspicion in the eyes of the detectives. But soon, when all the evidence pointed towards him, his arraignment was inevitable.
Bruce Koklich is the One Who Reported Jana Koklich Missing
Born in the late 1950s, Bruce Koklich married Jana Carpenter, with whom he shared a humble abode in the 2200 block of Lewis Street in Lakewood, California. On the surface, their more than a decade-long marriage appeared to be picture-perfect to others, but Bruce was reportedly womanizing behind his wife’s back. The couple worked as realtors in a real estate office in Boxby Knolls, California. In the early hours of August 18, 2001, Bruce and Jana got involved in a heated argument, as per the neighbors’ claims, after the latter returned from a concert.
The same morning, Jana ended up missing a training session with her trainer, Dean, and a massage appointment at 2 pm. However, when she did not show up to work on August 20, 2001, it raised concerns about her whereabouts and suspicion in the eyes of her loved ones. In order to check on her, Bruce and a coworker, Chris Botoson, drove to the house but could not find any sign of Jana and her car. Later that evening, Brucce reported his wife missing. When the police questioned him about the last time he saw her, he claimed that he saw her alive and well on the morning of August 20, right before heading off to work.
The following morning, when Consuelo Lopez, Bruce and Jana’s housekeeper, came to tidy up, she noticed a different bedsheet and could neither find the previous bedsheet nor the pillows. It was a minor yet pivotal detail in the case, as nobody usually changed the bedsheets except her. The case saw more developments when Jana’s Pathfinder was found off California Street in Signal Hill on August 27, 2001. The trunk contained bloodstain belonging to the missing woman. Meanwhile, Bruce cooperated with the police as they obtained a search warrant for the couple’s house. Upon conducting a luminol examination on September 5, 2001, they found a drop of blood belonging to Jana in the main bedroom.
Evasion of Polygraph Test Led Police to Suspect Bruce Koklich
As for his alibi, Bruce had claimed that he and Jana had decided to spend the weekend together indoors. To steer the investigation in another direction, he even suggested that she might have been the victim of a carjacking. Soon, in order to eliminate Bruce as a potential suspect, the investigators asked him to take a polygraph test. However, when he did not go through with the test, he became a suspect in the eyes of the detectives. When they dug deeper into Bruce’s life, they learned he had been asking random women out before and even after his wife’s disappearance. The prosecutors also claimed that he even reached out to his own 18-year-old niece and made some inappropriate demands from her.
There were also speculations that the victim’s husband had killed her because she had asked for a divorce, and he did not want to split the assets. The fact that he would have lost 51% of the business to her in a divorce also served as a motive for him to kill her. Moreover, Bruce also took out of a $1 million insurance policy on Jana’s life. Given all these pieces of circumstantial evidence against him, the police arrested and charged him with her murder on January 31, 2002. However, he got out on $1,000,000 bail.
Bruce Koklich is Currently Behind Bars Awaiting Parole
On February 18, 2003, Bruce Koklich stood on trial for his murder charges in connection to the death of his wife, Jana Koklich. Just a month later, the judge declared a mistrial as the trial resulted in a hung jury. However, the result of a new trial was not in his favor, as he was found guilty of second-degree murder in October 2003. Several months later, in March 2004, the 45-year-old received a 15-year imprisonment sentence. When the time for his parole arrived, his appeal was denied by the court in 2018, 2020, 2021, and 2023. As of writing, Bruce Koklich is serving his sentence at California Institution for Men at 14901 Central Avenue in Chino, California, awaiting his parole suitability hearing.
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