This is a studio both And production. If you'd like to support this show
and get ad free episodes for as little as two dollars a month, go
to patreon dot com slash studio both and. What's a typewritten note during this
investigation that you claim from Jason was from Jason. But it was not from
Jason. It was fictitious and generated by you. You want to know how
I know that? Come on, answer yes or no? Yes or no?
Yes or no? Yes? Yes? You generated a little letter I
had. Animal wise, you can't write that. He didn't write that.
It's not even his terrology, it's yours. This is that UM like a
nightmare. Um, I really had. I had some strong feelings for Chris.
I mean I can't even explain that, or do I even want to?
Um, that house will always be it's painted to me. I mean
I could never live there, right, Um, if it would help with
the expenses, I would just sign it over to UM for whatever, to
I guess for Iron River to finish the rest of the case. Oh well
that's really going, you know, really going out there on a limb and
uh, I appreciate what you're trying to do in a I really appreciate that.
UM to me, UM, I don't understand you know why I can't
find things that you're telling me to find, And it's I've been frying.
I want you to know that. I again, like I said, I've
been out there all day. In fact, I kind of went over our
last conversation. You know where you're giving me. You know this road that
you guys went down that went to the cabins, went to the water,
the big curve. You know you're telling me there's you know, a center
point between the Big Curve and US two. And I'm even trying to get
more cadaver dogs up here. But my problem is, I mean, I've
walked that on foot so many times that I feel my gut tells me that
you know, because I know you're smart enough to know, and I my
gut tells me you know exactly where I need to go. And I just
feel like you're not telling me exactly you know, because I do. I
think that everything else you've told me that checks out, and you're so good
at knowing all the details. I feel like I know she can tell me
this. I know that I'm smart enough to know what she's telling me.
And be able to find what she's telling me. Do you know what I'm
saying? Right? Was hard to People are complicated. If there's a single
through line for this entire podcast, it's that rather than judging people and their
actions through some binary and either or, more often than not, people exist
as both and Israel Keys was both a prolific and calculating serial killer with no
respect for human life and a caring father, boyfriend, and community member.
Kelly Cochrane's story is complicated. Kelly herself is complicated. Keys was so organized,
so meticulous, that even in death, it's a lot easier to navigate
them he left behind. Kelly, on the other hand, runs in chaos.
She lies over and over again, and I believe she does it just
to muddy the water. She's both crazy and calculated, and how she leverages
her perceived craziness. Kelly is both a victim and someone who pretends to be
a victim. Kelly was both abused and an abuser. As the trite but
true saying, goes hurt people hurt people, and Kelly took her childhood hurt
out into the world and caused chaos and pain everywhere she went. There's a
lot to be said about how both Kelly and Jason's relationships have shaped them.
Jason was raised in a pretty typical Midwestern household that had fairly typical expectations of
men play sports, shoot guns, have kids, build a career, support
your family, be a man. But Jason was dealt a pretty bad hand.
He had chronic health problems ranging from sciatica to cancer. He had severe
mental health challenges. His wife was infertile, and Jason at least felt like
he was incapable of working and supporting his family. Not to mention, he
had a domineering wife who worked hard, supported the entire house, and belittled,
abused, and cheated on him. Oh and she was a serial killer
too, who may have been killing people throughout their entire marriage. Jason didn't
live up to the standards or expectations set upon him as a man, and
so he overcompensated. He told friends and family about wanting to kill people or
having killed people, about wanting to poison water supplies, about wanting to murder
entire families. And yet, despite Kelly's crimes and his participation in them,
which no one's denying, there's no evidence Jason actually killed anyone, let alone
poisoned an entire city. It seems as though he was exerting power and control
in a world where he felt he had neither. If Kelly lies to muddy
the waters of her crimes and to manipulate people, Jason lied so that he
could briefly be the man he felt like he was supposed to be, intimidating,
threatening, big, and Kelly, as she always does, exploited that
in two ways. One she could make Jason complicit and participatory in her actual
crimes. Two, she could make Jason look like the killer in the family.
As much as Kelly exploited the ways women are underestimated, she also exploited
the ways in which men are overestimated. Because of Kelly's lies, which are
likely both compulsive and organized chaos, we may never know who exactly she murdered,
but based on her two lists, emerging patterns, and her behavior,
we can start to make sense of when she murdered people, which of her
stories have the most weight, and what exactly her m was. And So
I made a list of mayown well several lists, starting with Kelly's known victims.
On February twentieth of twenty sixteen, I believe if Kelly took her last
life when she smothered Jason to death with a pillow. And on October fourteenth
of twenty fourteen, Kelly lured Chris Regan to her home in Caspian, Michigan,
and where I believe she and she alone shot him in the back of
the head. Jason helped her clean up and dismember and dispose of Regan's body.
And yes, I do believe, based on the repetition of the story
and lack of recovered remains, that the Cochranes likely fed Chris's remains to their
neighbors. The second list is of the two victims I believe were very likely
murdered by Kelly, both with help from Jason. I believe that Kelly and
Jason very likely murdered Jason Ruder. Kelly told investigators she killed a father of
two named Jason in Hasting, Minnesota in twenty fourteen. Jason Ruter, a
father of two, was shot in the back of the head, like Chris
Regan, on June twenty second of twenty fourteen, in Hasting, Minnesota.
Kelly also told investigators that she buried evidence from at least one of her murders
in Ottawa Park. Kelly and Jason camped in Ottawa Park the weekend following Ruter's
murder. I'm even more certain that Kelly and Jason murdered Andrew Fugate at the
Pietech Meat Plant on November fourth of twenty thirteen. Andrew was shot in the
back of the head by the same off brand Ammo used to shoot Chris Regan
in the back of the head. The Cochranes were known to work with local
meat plants, and Pietech Meets was less than five miles from their home.
Just two months after fugates murder and several weeks after the release of video footage
showing two people exiting a white suv and entering Pietech Meets. At the time
of the murder, the Cochrane's abruptly left Indiana for the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
Additionally, there are two missing persons cases that actually match up with a
lot of the stories Kelly has told about her victims and Jason's and full disclosure.
I wasn't able to get the case files on either, so these hypotheses
are based on what's available online and in the media, and an interpretation of
the lies Kelly's told in the times and ways in which She's told these lies.
The first of those two missing people is Jared Hannah. Jared was a
twenty eight year old single father of two when he disappeared on either July second
or third of twenty eleven. At the time of his disappearance, Jared was
living in Jerseyville, Illinois, and the last confirmed sighting of Jared was by
his sister at around noon on July second, at the home they shared in
Jerseyville. About thirty minutes later, his phone pinged at a tower located twenty
miles away in East Alton, Illinois, and then there's no activity on his
phone until nine thirty, Over nine hours after the East Alton ping. At
nine thirty, Jared called the mother of his two daughters, whom he was
supposed to pick up. He told her that he'd run out of gas and
was trying to get to a gas station. That call pinged off a tower
seventy five miles away from East Halton and from where his daughters lived with their
mother and a rural area just north of Centralia, Illinois, and that was
the last confirmed contact with Jared. On July fifth, Jared's car was found
parked and out of gas along Jolife Bridge Road, about three miles north of
Centralia in a rural farming area, and when local law enforcement started looking into
his disappearance, two fairly credible tips came in. One from a motorist who
said he saw a man fitting Jared's description walking along Jolife Bridge Road at around
midnight between July second and third. A second tip came in from a couple
who lived on Jolife Bridge Road. They stated that a man matching Jared's description
knocked on their door at around eight am on July third, asking for a
drink of water and directions to the nearest gas station. According to Jared's sister,
when Jared left their house on the morning of the second, he had
his fishing gear with him and told her he was going to look at a
car that was for sale. His fishing gear was never recovered, and law
enforcement haven't been able to find any information on the car Jared was supposedly going
to see. About two and a half months after his disappearance, Jared's black
Duffel bag was found under a deer stand five miles worth of where his car
was found. Because it was covered in rainwater and mud, no prince could
be lifted. There have been no signs of Jared's since the sighting on the
morning of July third. So why Kelly, you ask? Well, I've
long suspected that Kelly's lists of victims are a mix of outright lies and a
scattering of details, And with the disappearance of Jared Hannah, there's a mix
of circumstantial evidence and details that match some of Kelly's lists. For starters,
Incident three on her list of Jason's victims, and comments she made about an
Illinois murder conflated actually matched the date, location, and details of Jared's disappearance.
Incident number three on Jason's list alleges that on June fifth of two thousand
and eleven, Jason murdered someone in Deep River Park near Hobert. Kelly claims
that Jason took a locket with the initials l L from this victim. Jared
disappeared some time between July second and July fourth of two thousand eleven. I'm
sure you'll recall that Kelly claimed to have killed a truck driver at a motel
six and Mattune, Illinois, several days before her arrest, and while she
could be placed at the Motel six and was seen with a trucker while she
was there, there were no missing truck drivers reported in the area at that
time, nor was there any evidence that any crime had been committed in the
motel. But before financial records indicated Kelly stayed in Mattune, she told investigators
that this murder took place near Effingham, Illinois. Jared's car was found about
fifty miles southwest of Effingham, oh And Jared he was a truck driver.
Kelly also told invest stigators that Minnesota, Jason was a single father to two
young girls. Jason rud was a father to two young boys, but Jared
Hannah was a single father to two young girls. And then there's the piece
of jewelry that went missing with Jared. On the day Jared went missing,
he was reportedly wearing a necklace with a silver cross on it. That necklace
was never found. In Kelly's list of trophies, she includes a necklace with
a silver cross. Most notably, though, is the location. In twenty
eleven, Kelly was enrolled in her forensics course at Purdue University Calumet, and
she was taking multiple trips to the Tennessee Body Farm, the inspiration behind her
butterfly obsession. It's about an eight hour drive from Maryville to the Body Farm,
so according to Kelly and Jason cousin, she frequently drove there through Wingo,
Kentucky, where she'd stay the night, and route Interstate fifty seven takes
you directly from Merylville to Wingo. Jared's car was found just five miles off
Interstate fifty seven. The second disappearance that coincides with many of Kelly's statements is
that of Stephen Kraft, whose name you may recognize as one of Israel Key's
name is forty four. As you might recall, Kelly told investigators about what
was allegedly her first murder sometimes second murder, the murder of Dylan Austen,
according to Kelly, which should probably have been the title for this entire season.
She met Dylan Austen, a twenty three year old man from Rensselaire,
Indiana, through her friend Tim Kelly. The two were casually dating when she
alleges she murdered him at her parents' house in Hobert during an argument about sex.
In later interviews, she would change her story to say that the murder
had to do with meth, and in that confession, she claimed to have
killed Dylan in a friend's car near Lake Station, Indiana. What was consistent
in both of her stories about Dylan Austen was that her eleven year old cousin
participated in the murder, a cousin who would die by suicide two years following
the alleged events, and that Dylan's body was dumped along a small creek at
Silver Beach in Saint Joseph, Michigan. And you'll remember from episode thirteen that
Silver Beach has no small creek in or near it. Additionally, Ogden looked
into this and confined no one matching Dylan's name or description. He even spoke
to Tim Kay, who wouldn't remember anyone by that name, nor any one
by Kelly's name. According to Kelly, this murder took place when she was
around sixteen or seventeen. Stephen Craft was twelve when he disappeared while playing in
his neighborhood less than five miles from Silver Beach on February fifteenth, two thousand
and one. At some time between seven and eight pm. Kelly would have
been eighteen at the time when Stephen went missing. He was with his family's
two dogs. One of those dogs returned home alone the night of the disappearance,
and it led Stephen's parents to a nearby pond. The second dog,
a puppy, was located the next day at Blue Creek, a small creek
just a mile and a half north of Stephen's house. The pond was searched
extensively. There's no media reports indicating that Blue Creek, however, was ever
searched. So Stephen's location and date of disappearance line up almost exactly with Kelly's
story about Dylan Austen. It's just the details of the victim that are different.
And as Kelly told Ogden, everything I've told you is true, just
not the details. Additionally, between the limited available records and interviews with Kelly
and her mother, Kelly was essentially under full time supervision at New Beginnings,
the facility for Troubled Girls, from shortly following her sixteenth birthday until just before
her eighteenth birthday in June of two thousand, meaning if she is to be
even partially believed, her alleged murder of Dylan Austen could have only occurred in
nineteen ninety eight or following her release from New Beginning. Stephen Craft disappeared seven
months after Kelly's release, and if Kelly did in fact coerce her young cousin
into participating in such a murder, he would have been the exact same age
as Stephen. And if the alleged dil In Austin murder is actually the murder
of Stephen Kraft, Kelly's cousin would have died by suicide just several months after
Stephen disappeared. My final list is one of time frames, specifically windows surrounding
stays Jason and or Kelly had with mental health facilities. As we've discussed throughout
the season, Kelly had a pattern of either admitting herself or convincing Jason to
admit himself to psychiatric facilities, either before or after, or sometimes both before
and after their commissions of murders, and Kelly has two that can't be closely
linked to any of her known or likely homicides, one in April of two
thousand and seven and one in March of two thousand and eight. And there
disappearances and unsolved homicides that could match Kelly's m O and murder map for each
of those visits, and it should also be noted that the camping trip Colton
took with the Cochranes where he was likely drugged, occurred in either the spring
of two thousand and seven or two thousand and eight, which also coincides with
these psychiatric stays. Of those two checkens, the March two thousand and eight
one is of most interest to me because there are two unsolved cases that occurred
surrounding that visit that strongly resemble both Kelly's m O and some of her claims.
The first of which is the disappearance of Rachel Conger, who was very
likely the victim of a murder suicide. She and her estranged and abusive husband,
Paul, disappeared on the same day. Several days later, Paul was
found in the woods near Rachel's home, dead by what appeared to be a
self inflicted gunshot. The only reasons this case stuck out to me were that
the couple lived and disappeared from Como, Tennessee, which is less than thirty
miles from Fulton, Kentucky, where Kelly claims Jason killed his first victim sort
of. You may recall that she said it was Fulton, Tennessee, but
named a motel that's actually located in Fulton, Kentucky, which is on the
Tennessee border. You'll also recall that Kelly said she had victims in Tennessee.
Rachel also had one tattoo that said Lennia Lane, which sounds a lot like
the lockett that Jason supposedly took from a victim with the initials l L engraved
in it. More coincidental, however, is that Rachel had multiple butterfly tattoos.
There are some other eerie coincidences which actually make me wonder if this was
perhaps a case that Kelly committed to memory. For more information on the disappearance
of Rachel, I highly recommend checking out The Vanished Podcasts episode two sixteen.
The second and more relevant case is the disappearance of Michael Anthony Womack, a
twenty five year old black man who disappeared from Alton, Illinois, on March
thirty first of two thousand and eight, just a week and a half after
Kelly was released from the psychiatric facility. Little is known about the events precipitating
Michael's disappearance. He was the last seen at one thirty pm on the day
he went missing. His last outgoing call on his cell phone pinned six miles
north of his home in Godfrey, Illinois. The police haven't released the time
nor the details of that phone call. Two weeks following his disappearance, Michael's
car was discovered abandoned in a rural industrial area of Kahokia, Illinois. Michael's
friends and family can think of no reason he'd be in that town, which
just thirty five miles south of Alton. There was no evidence of foul play
found in or around his vehicle, except that it appeared to have been wiped
completely clean. There wasn't any DNA nor any fingerprints anywhere in his truck.
Michael was engaged with five children and one on the way, and by all
accounts, he lived a normal and happy life. He was looking forward to
the birth of his first son, a Berth, which occurred less than two
weeks after Michael went missing. Strangely, Michael lived just blocks from the air
Ria. Jared Hannah's phone pinned in Alton on the day of his disappearance.
As for relation to Kelly beyond his disappearance, coinciding with a psychiatric stay.
Kelly's list of victims included a Nathan Holder, who she allegedly killed in twenty
fifteen. Nathan Holder was from and supposedly murdered in Belleville, Illinois. Belleville,
Illinois is approximately seven miles from where Michael's car was abandoned. Kelly claimed
to have taken Holder's baseball cap and wallet as trophies. Michael was wearing a
brown baseball cap on the day of his disappearance. Neither it nor his wallet
were ever recovered. It should be noted that, while Kelly claims that the
Cochranes destroyed every car that was ever involved in any of their crimes, Chris
Reagan's car was found abandoned at a park and ride in a rural area about
six miles from their home. Regan's car had also been wiped. In addition
to these disappearances, I cannot rule out the disappearance of John lenn Taylor,
which was detailed in episode thirteen and also strongly matched various stories from Kelly.
Shortly after Kelly's sentencing, Jeremy Ogden went back to being a street cop.
No one pursued this case or its many leads more doggedly than Jeremy Ogden and
Laura Frizzo, and both were relieved of their duties during or immediately following the
case, and since local law enforcement doesn't appear to have done anything to continue
looking into Kelly's crimes or other potential victims, despite a broad consensus that Kelly
is most definitely responsible for additional murders. However, while Laura and Jeremy have
both moved on in their careers, they continue to visit Kelly and continue to
push for her to provide more information regarding her crimes. They've made little progress,
but persist, and Kelly continues to send them letters, original artwork,
and requests for more visits. Kelly never did respond to my letter, but
three days ago I sent her a follow up. It was short and simple
and to the point, Kelly, I'd love to hear from you. Let's
discuss Andrew Fugate, Jason Ruter, Jared Hannah, and Stephen Kraft. And
while Kelly may not be writing to me, she is a prolific letter writer
these days. She's even sent some original artwork and letters to one listener of
this podcast, and she has two ongoing sexually explicit jail male relationships, one
with a man who seems to have known Kelly before her arrest, and another
with an inmate at a different Michigan facility. Those letters are available on Patreon,
and I would include snippets were they not so deeply and uncomfortably graphic.
But amid all the sexual talk, Kelly always finds time to ask each of
her suitors for money. Since this season of the show began, I received
hundreds of files from various law enforcement agencies, including Iron County, and one
of those files had nothing whatsoever to do with Kelly Cochrane or any of her
victims, so I was surprised it was included. It was a file on
Laura Frizzo. I've gone back and forth on whether to mention this file because
it doesn't provide any additional insight into Kelly Cochrane or the investigation into her.
However, it does provide insight into the relationship between Iron River City Manager David
Thayre and Laura Frizzo, and in an effort to provide fair and balanced reporting,
I'll summarize it. It's a forty seven page collection of correctional records and
statements from people in Iron River alleging various incidents involving Laura, from drinking and
driving to bullying, to assault, bathroom brawls, and domestic violence. And
while I'm sure this file was included in my FOYA response with some intention,
it does provide further insight into the contention between Frizzo and David and her eventual
firing. Speaking of which, several months ago, David Thayer finally stepped down
as Iron River City manager. And this file doesn't negate Thayer's well documented problematic
history nor the excellent work Laura did on the Cochran case. It's a both
and situation. Laura both had a problematic past and became an excellent investigator.
Thayer was both sexist and abused his powers, and had a chief of police
who was challenging and challenged his problematic ways of working. I like Laura.
She's smart, she's tenacious, she's strong, cares. Those are the qualities
I want to see in law enforcement. Those are the qualities that got Kelly
arrested. The qualities exhibited in the file are not qualities I want to see
in my law enforcement. No one is singular, no one is all good
or all bad, it's all both, and people are complicated and sexism is
pervasive. It shaped Laura and Kelly in so many ways. Laura had to
constantly fight against it and Kelly Kelly exploited it. Nothing m