Dateline: The Smoking Gun - A complete timeline of the Sheri Rasmussen murder case, revisited

Dateline has covered many chilling stories, but the Sheri Rasmussen case always feels like one that never loses its grip. It is the kind of case that pulls you in because nothing adds up at first, and everything adds up later.

When people ask what this timeline looks like from start to finish, the answer is simple. It starts with a newly married nurse full of hope and ends with a secret hidden inside the LAPD for decades, and Dateline uncovers it all.

This is the full story, revisited from beginning to end, the way Dateline fans love to follow it.

Read below to find out more.

How a bright life crossed paths with a dark fate

When you go back to the beginning of this story, you see why it stayed with so many Dateline viewers. Sheri Rasmussen was only twenty-nine and already on her way to becoming one of the most respected nurses in Southern California. She grew up as the middle daughter, athletic and smart enough to skip two grades.

Sheri Rasmussen, John Ruetten (Sheri's husband) & their family (Image Via: Grunge, YouTube)

Her sister, Connie Rasmussen, once told producers that even in kindergarten, Sheri was so ahead that “the teacher would just use her as an assistant.” She went on to nursing school at just sixteen and later worked her way up to director of nursing at Glendale Adventist Hospital. Her life seemed to be on track.

Her personal life was shining too. She met a young engineer named John Ruetten at a party and immediately clicked with him. They played tennis together, went running together, and built the kind of easy rhythm couples look for.

Connie said they looked genuinely happy, while her other sister, Teresa Lane, remembered how Sheri’s face lit up in the wedding photos. Everything felt steady, like they were building a new world together.

But the timeline turns sharply on February 26, 1985. Sheri stayed home sick that morning, and when John returned that night, he walked into something he could never erase. Sheri was on the floor, brutally beaten and shot.

Author Matthew McGough told the Dateline team that her injuries were “extensive and disturbing,” which is an understatement when you hear what detectives later described. Rob Bub, who eventually worked the cold case, said the blunt force trauma was shocking.

Sheri had been pistol-whipped, hit with a vase, bitten on her arm, and shot multiple times. Some of her fingernails had been yanked off.

According to Dateline, the first LAPD team treated the scene as a burglary. A stack of stereo equipment sat near the door, her purse was missing, and her new BMW was gone.

Lead detective Lyle Mayer told John in the interrogation room that he believed the house “was burglarized today” and said he was pretty sure John had nothing to do with it. John already had an alibi anyway. He said he left the condo before 7:30 that morning, saw Sheri still in bed, and went to work.

When another burglary took place nearby weeks later involving two men, investigators became even more locked into the idea that burglars killed Sheri. Sketches were made, although no arrests ever came from them. Year after year, every time the case resurfaced, detectives reached the same conclusion.

But her family insisted they were wrong. Her father, Nels Rasmussen, tried to tell detectives that this felt personal. He wanted them to check out a nurse who held a grudge and look into John’s ex-girlfriend.

Sheri had told him about that woman. She said the ex would appear at places where she and John were, even showing up inside their home once without permission. But the early investigators never followed up on that.

According to Dateline, the case sat frozen until 2001, when the DNA world gave detectives a second shot. Cold case detective Cliff Shepard discovered that a bite swab had been collected during the original investigation.

He had it tested, and the results shocked him. It came back as an unknown female’s DNA. He later said he was not expecting that at all. Still, even with this clue, the case drifted away again while Shepard was pulled into another major investigation.

It stayed cold again until 2009. That year, Detective Jim Nuttall picked it up for one final review before it was archived. He looked at the stereo stacked by the door and saw something off. If someone wanted to steal it, why leave it behind after Sheri was already dying? He believed whoever came inside went there to kill, not to rob. From that moment, everything changed.

The first signs that the burglary story was falling apart

This period of the timeline is where many Dateline fans say they started yelling at their televisions. The original burglary theory made less and less sense the more the case was examined. When Nuttall read the old files, the blood on the stereo equipment stood out the most.

Sheri was already bleeding when someone stacked the electronics. If theft was the goal, they would have grabbed everything and run. The way Nuttall described it later almost felt like he was thinking out loud. He said it made him wonder why someone would set up the scene that way if they had plenty of time to escape with the items.

Stephanie Lazarus (Image Via: Grunge, YouTube)

According to Dateline, it is that very clue that turned the entire investigation into something brand new. Nuttall and his team decided they needed to focus on a single female suspect instead of burglars.

They made a list of five women connected to Sheri, including family members and a nurse who once had tension with her at work. DNA tests cleared each woman until only one name remained. It was a name no one on the team expected to find. It was Stephanie Lazarus.

Inside the LAPD, Lazarus had built a strong reputation. Bub said her name was known and respected. She helped track art thieves and carried herself like a trusted detective. But long before she put on the badge, she had dated John Ruetten. They met at UCLA, and the relationship continued on and off until John married Sheri.

Sheri had told her father that Lazarus once entered her home uninvited and stood in her living room. Nels Rasmussen described that moment to Dateline correspondent Josh Mankiewicz. He said Sheri looked up from the table and saw the ex-girlfriend standing there silently.

Sheri immediately told her to leave. A coworker of Sheri’s later told police that Lazarus had confronted Sheri at work, too. According to the coworker, Lazarus said that if Sheri’s marriage ever fell apart, she would be waiting in the wings.

John also admitted to detectives years later that right after he got engaged to Sheri, Lazarus called him and sounded devastated. Detectives said John told them he went to comfort her, and they ended up having sex. He confessed this to Sheri, and she forgave him.

When Nuttall spoke to John in 2009, John said he had given Lazarus’ name to the LAPD back in 1986, but nothing ever came of it. The conversation was never recorded in the file. Mayer, the original detective, told Dateline he did not remember the family ever asking him to look into Lazarus. That disagreement has always lingered in conversations about this case.

But once Lazarus became the only remaining woman on the suspect list, investigators had to move gently. She was a police officer who knew every question and every trick. The team followed her to Costco, waited, and grabbed a discarded cup from the trash. That cup turned out to be the turning point of the entire timeline. It was a full DNA match to the bite mark on Sheri.

When the truth fell into place after more than two decades

The moment detectives got the DNA match, the story shifted into a new phase that Dateline viewers remember clearly. Investigators brought Lazarus in for questioning.

Stephanie Lazarus & John Ruetten (Image Via: Grunge, YouTube)

She tried to keep the conversation casual at first, but became tense when they hinted she might be linked to the murder. She told them she had a problem with being called a suspect and then asked for a lawyer. When she left the room, she was arrested.

Her trial took place in 2012. By then, Dateline highlights how twenty-six years had already passed since Sheri died. Prosecutors laid out the case step by step, explaining the DNA on the bite mark, the old jealousy, and the staged burglary.

John testified about the past, including his casual relationship with Lazarus and the moment he slept with her after getting engaged. The jury found Lazarus guilty of first-degree murder, and she received twenty-seven years to life.

Years later, when California created a parole system that gave extra consideration to people who committed crimes under twenty-six, Lazarus became eligible for a hearing in 2023. She was twenty-five when Sheri died.

During that parole process, she changed her story. Sheri’s sister Teresa Marie Lane wasn’t convinced. She told reporters that Lazarus confessed only because she wanted to get out. She said they feared Lazarus still did not show remorse for what happened.

A commissioner later announced that the board found good cause to rescind her parole and would schedule another hearing later. For now, Lazarus remains in prison.

Why the Dateline timeline feels like a warning for future investigators

When you lay out the timeline cleanly, it becomes obvious why Dateline continues to revisit this case and why viewers talk about it so much. It is not just about a single crime.

It is a reminder of how small details can be ignored until years later, when new eyes finally see them. Sheri’s case went from a supposed burglary to a hidden personal attack only because detectives challenged the original story.

The bite mark DNA sat in storage for years until the right person searched for it. The stereo stacked by the door was treated like a burglary clue until someone questioned why blood was already there. Sheri’s warnings about feeling watched were never explored until the new team took the timeline seriously.

Every step of this case shows how a story can flip the moment someone rechecks a detail. Dateline often shows viewers that timelines matter because they reveal patterns you do not see at first glance. Here, each moment, from the early mistakes to the cold case revival, brought the investigation closer to the truth.

When people watch this episode of Dateline and hear the full timeline, they are usually struck by how long it took for justice to catch up. Sheri Rasmussen’s story feels heartbreaking because her life was full of promise, and the truth about her death was buried under assumptions for so long.

But this case also shows how persistence, science, and the courage to revisit old files can change everything. The timeline proves that the truth does not disappear. It waits for the right person to notice it, and that is why this case still stays with so many viewers.

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