Colorado Springs Police Lt.Joe Kendacan’t escape the horror he sees on his job as a homicide detective.
“It’s the nature of the work: I have nightmares, I see dead people,” the star ofHomicide Hunter: Lt. Joe Kenda, Investigation Discovery’s long-running true crime docuseries, said in a recent interview onPEOPLE Now.
Ahead of the show’s final season, which premieres tonight at 9 p.m. ET on ID, Kenda says every investigation in his 23-year career is deeply meaningful to him. But one case hit particularly close to home — and for this reason, it comes back to him nearly every night, he tellsPEOPLE Now.
Kenda recounts being called to a trailer park and seeing a uniformed officer who held up three fingers, meaning three people were murdered.
First, Kenda saw an adult woman, then an adult man. Then, on a bed, bleeding profusely with two gunshot wounds was a slain five-year-old boy who wore Mickey Mouse pajamas.
“My son had those pajamas when he was little,” Kenda says. “Now, my son was 19 years old when I saw that crime scene, but I saw him in that bed.”
Kenda adds, “I see him every night.”
Homicide Hunterhas aired on ID since 2011. According to the network, Kenda has solved 356 homicide cases and has a 92 percent solve rate.
All of the cases are equally important to him, he says: “Violent death is violent death. There is none worse or better than another, they’re all the same. And it’s a feeling of euphoria when you take that shadow in the night and you give him a first, middle and last name.”
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The disturbing crimes he investigates stay with him, but he says, “In the end, it’s worth it. It’s the price you pay for the work.”
“I put people in a cage who need to be in one,” he says. “And some of those people would still be killing people if they weren’t in that cage.”
PEOPLE Nowairs live, Monday through Friday, from the Meredith offices in New York City.
The ninth and final season ofHomicide Hunter: Lt. Joe Kendapremiers tonight on Investigation Discovery at 9 p.m. ET.
source: people.com
