DID A KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR HAVE "A MIND FOR MURDER"? -- "48 HOURS MYSTERY," SATURDAY, MAY 14

Professor Thomas Murray of Kansas State University is a very smart man, but is he smart enough to get away with the murder of his ex-wife? Correspondent Richard Schlesinger reports for 48 HOURS MYSTERY: "A Mind for Murder" to be broadcast Saturday, May 14 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Murray, a gentle man by nature, was married to Carmin Ross for 18 years. They had met at The Ohio State University, where he had been her teacher. Ross earned a law degree, but after a few years of working as a lawyer, she became a mediator and then, later, a healer. After 13 years of marriage, the couple had a baby girl, Ciara, much to the chagrin of Murray, who, according to Ross' family, had decided he didn't want children. Then, Ross met Larry Lima through work and divorced Murray [whom she had been growing apart from before the relationship with Lima began]. A custody battle ensued. The former couple shared custody of Ciara but, then, Ross told Murray she wanted Ciara to live with her and that Lima was moving in, too. The November 2003 night following that conversation, Ross was found beaten and stabbed in her home.

Detectives from the Douglas County Sheriff's office in Lawrence, Kan., interrogated Murray for about 10 hours following Ross' murder. Murray denied killing Ross, but investigators also noticed he couldn't stop talking and that he had fresh cuts and bruises on his hands. There was not enough physical evidence to arrest Murray -- no DNA and only one fingerprint matching Murray's was at the murder scene. It took prosecutors in Lawrence 11 months, but they decided to arrest Murray and put him on trial for Ross' murder with only circumstantial evidence.

The assistant district attorney, Angela Wilson, who had never tried a murder, had the trial of her career ahead of her, especially since Murray hired two highly experienced attorneys. Each side presented its case, but when evidence was introduced indicating that Murray's had been researching how to "hire an assassin" and "how to get away with murder," the trial became more complicated. Murray's lawyer claims that Murray's computer research was for a crime scene investigation project. The prosecutor claims that the research helped Murray in the planning and clean-up of Ross' murder. Would the new evidence be enough for the jury to convict Murray of first-degree murder?

48 HOURS MYSTERY: "A Mind for Murder" is produced by Paul Ryan, Ian Paisley and Gayane Keshishyan. Anthony Batson is the senior producer and Susan Zirinsky is the executive producer.