Speaker 1: Oh, I've been separated from my group.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's been a couple of hours now I think.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure.
Speaker 2: I was trying to find my way out and I can't.
Speaker 2: But I'm gonna stay here. I don't think that I
Speaker 2: went too far I am. I'm not sure that I
Speaker 2: don't know the name of the cave.
Speaker 3: The last the.
Speaker 2: Last entry point was somewhere near to them, Quantanamo in Mexico.
Speaker 2: If someone can notify the police or the authorities, or
Speaker 2: someone can help, I'm gonna stay here. I have water
Speaker 2: and some food. I'm gonna stay here.
Speaker 1: Hello, friends, Steve Stockton here with you now. For some
Speaker 1: a walk in the wilderness can be the perfect getaway
Speaker 1: from everyday life and a chance to reconnect with mother Nature.
Speaker 1: For others, great outdoors can be a dangerous place and
Speaker 1: unfortunately as a place where many people meet their end
Speaker 1: or just mysteriously vanish. Here are cases for you to consider.
Speaker 1: Randy Rascoe. On November nineteenth, twenty fifteen, park rangers at
Speaker 1: the Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky noticed that a
Speaker 1: car had been sitting in the car park for around
Speaker 1: two weeks. This immediately set off warning bells, and after
Speaker 1: doing some digging for information, they discovered that the car
Speaker 1: belonged to forty year old Randy Rascoe. As the car
Speaker 1: had been there for quite some time, the park rangers
Speaker 1: set about searching for Randy right away, but when he
Speaker 1: couldn't be found in or near the parking area, they
Speaker 1: opened an investigation and widened their search. Park rangers and
Speaker 1: investigators contacted Randy's family to see if they had spoken
Speaker 1: to him, but chillingly, they had been out of contact
Speaker 1: for a few months. According to his sister Sherry, up
Speaker 1: until May twenty fifteen, everything was normal on a regular basis.
Speaker 1: He was doing his normal things, hunting, fishing, and kept
Speaker 1: in contact with her brother, who lived close to his
Speaker 1: Bowling Green apartment. Then one day, out of the blue,
Speaker 1: he packed up his belongings, quit his job, and had
Speaker 1: his mail forward it to another address, and just left.
Speaker 1: Cherry said they filed a missing person's report after they
Speaker 1: found out he had just fled, and were worried as
Speaker 1: he had recently gotten divorced. For a month, the Rascoe
Speaker 1: family waited for any news, and in June he was
Speaker 1: found safe and sound in Washington State. Randy made it
Speaker 1: clear that he didn't want to speak to his family
Speaker 1: at that time and wanted to be alone. As painful
Speaker 1: as it was, his family respected his boundaries and assured
Speaker 1: him they would welcome him back with open arms whenever
Speaker 1: he was ready. For the next few months, it's believed
Speaker 1: that Randy traveled all around the US, all while maintaining
Speaker 1: his privacy and secrecy. His family didn't know that anything
Speaker 1: was wrong until the Mammoth Cave National Park rangers contacted
Speaker 1: them to let them know that his car had been
Speaker 1: found abandoned. With this second disappearance, his family hoped that
Speaker 1: there would be a positive resolution, but sadly, Randy Rascoe
Speaker 1: is still missing. Search crews, volunteers, and even the Civil
Speaker 1: Air Patrol all joined the end of the search for Randy,
Speaker 1: scaringly over fifty three thousand acres of land of the park.
Speaker 1: Despite their best efforts and multiple searches, no sign of
Speaker 1: Randy has ever been found, and his car is the
Speaker 1: only clue we have in terms of his mysterious disappearance.
Speaker 1: Randy Rascoe is described as a white male six foot
Speaker 1: two inches taught, with black hair, hazel eyes, and a slim,
Speaker 1: athletic build. Anyone with any information is as to please
Speaker 1: contact the Mammoth Cave National Park at two seven zero
Speaker 1: seven five eight two.
Speaker 3: One eight zero.
Speaker 1: Catherine van Alst, eight year old Van Alst, disappeared from
Speaker 1: Devil's Den State Park, near Arkansas's Ozark National Forest when
Speaker 1: she and her family were camping. Catherine apparently was playing
Speaker 1: with her brothers when she wandered off and got lost.
Speaker 1: What makes Catherine's disappearance remarkable is she was found six
Speaker 1: days later. When found, she was wandering the woods and
Speaker 1: was eerily calm. University of Arkansas student Border Chadwick was
Speaker 1: part of the search party that found Catherine. He told
Speaker 1: the Pittsburgh Press that when he found her, she walked
Speaker 1: starically out of a cave and just said, here I am.
Speaker 1: Many other hikers have gotten lost in that part of
Speaker 1: the Ozarks and haven't been as lucky as Catherine. A
Speaker 1: grown woman was lost there for seventeen days and died
Speaker 1: just fifty yards from the road. How did Catherine survive
Speaker 1: in the woods for six days? Did someone take her
Speaker 1: only to return her six days later? Or as explanation
Speaker 1: of this story that we simply can't comprehend. Either way,
Speaker 1: someone or something might just be lurking in Devil's Den
Speaker 1: Kenny Veach. Forty seven year old Kenny Veach mysteriously disappeared
Speaker 1: in the Mohave Desert in Nevada on November fourteenth, twenty fourteen.
Speaker 1: Kenny was hiking near Area fifty one and was looking
Speaker 1: for cave systems and mine shafts. Kenny has uploaded several
Speaker 1: videos to his YouTube channel under the username snake Bitt McGee,
Speaker 1: where he describes entering a cave with an M shaped opening.
Speaker 1: He wrote in one comment that ain't nothing. I'm a
Speaker 1: long distance hiker. One time, during one of my hikes
Speaker 1: out by Nellis Air Force Base, I found a hidden cave.
Speaker 1: The entrance to the cave was shaped like a perfect
Speaker 1: capital M. I always enter every cave I find, but
Speaker 1: as I began to enter this particular cave, my whole
Speaker 1: body began to vibrate. Suddenly, I became very scared and
Speaker 1: I tailed out of there. That was one of the
Speaker 1: strangest things that ever happened to me. Now, these videos
Speaker 1: gained popularity following his mysterious disappearance, and in these videos
Speaker 1: he does indeed talk about how his whole body vibrated
Speaker 1: and he felt scared upon entering this mysterious m cave
Speaker 1: armed with a gun and a camera. This time, Kenny
Speaker 1: headed back out to the m cave on November tenth,
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, hoping to get a better look inside. However,
Speaker 1: Kenny never returned home. Although he was a very experienced
Speaker 1: hiker and outdoorsman, Kenny rarely took a map or GPS
Speaker 1: device with him on his hikes. According to his family,
Speaker 1: on the day of his disappearance, he told him that
Speaker 1: he would only be gone for a short overnight trip,
Speaker 1: but then when he didn't return home, they immediately called
Speaker 1: the police. Police volunteers, and search and rescue teams all
Speaker 1: scattered the area where Kenny was last known to have been.
Speaker 1: On November twenty second, twenty fourteen, volunteers found Kenny's phone.
Speaker 1: According to those volunteers, the trail went cold soon after
Speaker 1: they located his phone, and there have been no signs
Speaker 1: of Kenny ever since. At the time of this episode,
Speaker 1: the mysterious disappearance of Kinny Beach is very much alive
Speaker 1: in true crime and paranormal circles, but it appears that
Speaker 1: we are still no closer to uncovering the truth Devil's
Speaker 1: Whole and the tragic disappearance of two teens in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty five. Now, there's just something about a place with
Speaker 1: the name devil in its title that pigus the curiosity
Speaker 1: of some people. There are countless locations all over the
Speaker 1: world which have this particular.
Speaker 3: Word in their name.
Speaker 1: Not only devil, either, there are many other words that
Speaker 1: symbolize or mean devil or evil, or some other form
Speaker 1: of something not very good or beautiful, given somewhaite ironically
Speaker 1: to some of the world's most breathtaking and wondrous places.
Speaker 1: Sometimes the location will have got its name innocently enough,
Speaker 1: such as because the geology of the place simply looks
Speaker 1: foreboding and sinister, especially under the cover of night. Much
Speaker 1: of the time, these particular places are said to be cursed, enchanted,
Speaker 1: or downright evil, and the spooky and scary landscape only
Speaker 1: lends credence to these rumors and legends. So much of
Speaker 1: the time, though, these places with this particular word in
Speaker 1: the title are associated with not just devils, demon spirits,
Speaker 1: and other other worldly phenomena, but with real tragedies, disappearances, deaths,
Speaker 1: maybe bizarre sounds and strange lights in the sky. Today, though,
Speaker 1: we're going to focus on one place in particular, we're
Speaker 1: a mysterious tragedy struck Devil's Hole, which is located in
Speaker 1: the aptly named Death Valley National Park in California, United States.
Speaker 1: This portion of the Mohave Desert contained in Death Valley
Speaker 1: National Park is the driest and hottest place in the
Speaker 1: United States. Near bad water in the Long Trench of
Speaker 1: the desert, between the Panamint Range on the west and
Speaker 1: the Black Mountains on the east, is the lowest dry
Speaker 1: land in the Western Hemisphere, an amazing two hundred and
Speaker 1: eighty two feet below sea level. A veritable showcase of
Speaker 1: desert extremes, Death Valley National Park includes one of the
Speaker 1: largest salt pans on Earth, dramatically faulted landscapes, young volcanic craters,
Speaker 1: and massive dune fields. Today, we're going all the way
Speaker 1: back to the year nineteen sixty five. Death Valley was
Speaker 1: very different from the Los Angeles of the time, where
Speaker 1: there were uprisings happening all over the place and all
Speaker 1: of it being shown live on the evening news. Death Valley, California,
Speaker 1: was in one of the least populated parts of the
Speaker 1: state at the time, and a whole different world from
Speaker 1: the more largely inhabited cities which surrounded it. On June twentieth,
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty five, four high school buddies set out to
Speaker 1: remote desert location about nine isles northwest of Las Vegas.
Speaker 1: Their intent was to joydive into a deep geothermal abyss
Speaker 1: called Devil's Hole. Sadly, two of the young men would
Speaker 1: never re emerge from this mysterious fossil water portal. Arriving
Speaker 1: at their destination, the foursome hiked up a hot barren
Speaker 1: hillsite which overlooked a large scale ranching operation that would
Speaker 1: nearly erase a much smaller and nearly ancient complex called
Speaker 1: ash Meadows within a few short years. A well trampled
Speaker 1: trail led to the entrance of a limestone chasm that
Speaker 1: had allegedly opened a whopping sixty thousand years ago after
Speaker 1: possibly some seismic event caused the roof of the cave
Speaker 1: to collapse in on itself. The foursome of boys, which
Speaker 1: was made up of Paul gian Conteri, a nineteen year
Speaker 1: old cafeteria worker at the nearby Nevada Test site, his
Speaker 1: new brother in law, twenty year old David Rose, who
Speaker 1: was a Las Vegas Casino parking attendant for with their
Speaker 1: other friend, nineteen year old Bill Alter and his younger
Speaker 1: brother Jack, Boys scrambled under a fenced enclosure posted with
Speaker 1: warning signs, and thinking they were immune to any trouble
Speaker 1: these warning signs might be posted about, they proceeded to
Speaker 1: descend the thirty or so feet down to a ledge
Speaker 1: where the faint but flitting movement of tiny blue gray
Speaker 1: pupfish could be observed swimming in the eight by sixty
Speaker 1: foot pool, That is, if any of the four young
Speaker 1: men had bothered to look just a bit closer at
Speaker 1: what they were about to jump into. After suiting up
Speaker 1: with scuba tanks, masks, and dive lights, Paul, David, and
Speaker 1: Bill dove into the claustrophobic waters. The temperature was nearly
Speaker 1: indistinguishable from that of their skin. Upon entering the pool,
Speaker 1: the boys most likely disturbed the delicate algae s falling mats,
Speaker 1: where the entire population of the exceedingly rare Cyprinodon diabolus
Speaker 1: continues to prosper and breed exclusively. Jack was the only
Speaker 1: one who hadn't jumped in, as he was delegated the
Speaker 1: one who would remain stationed on the ledge in case
Speaker 1: anything went wrong. Some time after midnight, Paul failed to resurface,
Speaker 1: so David and Bill quickly redove into the waters in
Speaker 1: a vain attempt to locate their missing friend. Bill Alter
Speaker 1: frantically followed David Rose down to approximately one hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy feet until David too disappeared into the darkness. The
Speaker 1: bodies of the brothers in law were never recovered. Many
Speaker 1: people believed back then and still do believe that these
Speaker 1: young men were inspired to go diving at night, despite
Speaker 1: the dangers in the specific place, because of a newspaper
Speaker 1: article from the year before which detailed a speleological research
Speaker 1: expedition of a massive underground lake below Death Valley led
Speaker 1: by California based professional diver Jim House, who would ironically
Speaker 1: dive numerous times around the clock with military personnel and
Speaker 1: other volunteer divers in their attempt to locate the missing
Speaker 1: men for thirty cent whole hours until the search was
Speaker 1: eventually called off. The only traces left of the two
Speaker 1: brother in laws a mask and a snorkel. There was
Speaker 1: also a flashlight tied to alledge some hundred feet below.
Speaker 1: It seemed to signal and effectively the way out of
Speaker 1: the otherworldly underwater cave system. Articles detailing the unsuccessful rescue
Speaker 1: effort were published nationwide in the Sarasota Journal date of
Speaker 1: June twenty second, eighteen sixty five. Outstated that he had
Speaker 1: previously dived in Devil's Hole around three hundred times over
Speaker 1: twenty eight trips, further commenting, it's beautiful in there. It
Speaker 1: goes straight down one hundred and sixty feet like a pipe,
Speaker 1: then opens into a room that is about three hundred
Speaker 1: feet long and maybe forty feet wide. The bottom of
Speaker 1: the room is about two hundred and sixty feet down.
Speaker 1: Then it narrows into another tube. I dived to three
Speaker 1: hundred and fifteen feet. Maybe that's a record, I don't know.
Speaker 1: But at the end into the tube, it opens again
Speaker 1: into something else. We don't know what the next room is,
Speaker 1: or if it's a room at all. It's like infinity.
Speaker 1: There are some very terrifying legends from the native tribes
Speaker 1: of the area about this particular place called Devil's Hole.
Speaker 1: The Timbasha told tales of water babies who would surface
Speaker 1: and swallow a swimmer or diver hole should they stay
Speaker 1: in the pool for too long other legends suggested that
Speaker 1: so a Pizi, a legendary malevolent giant who dwelled at
Speaker 1: mountain springs and caves, would snatch and devour unwary victims.
Speaker 1: Miss was standing. Barbara Durham, an elder of the timbisious Shoshoni,
Speaker 1: who shared these stories at a two thousand and two workshop,
Speaker 1: admitted that she and her friends enjoyed how the pupfish
Speaker 1: tickled their toes when they played in the spring. Keep
Speaker 1: in mind here that the Devil's Hole pupfish, as they're
Speaker 1: specifically named, are considered by experts to be the rarest
Speaker 1: fish found anywhere on the planet. They were even the
Speaker 1: first ever species to be classified as endangered. The fish
Speaker 1: are not important to the story at all, really, but
Speaker 1: it seemed worth mentioning in order to reinforce how very
Speaker 1: special and perhaps a bit magical this place actually is.
Speaker 1: As far as the two young men who disappeared without
Speaker 1: a trace back in this mystical and extremely dangerous underwater
Speaker 1: cave system decades ago, well, they've never been found, and
Speaker 1: neither have any clues relating to what could it possibly
Speaker 1: happen to them. As for one more bit of interesting fact,
Speaker 1: that could lend a bit of Creden says something a
Speaker 1: bit more sinister being afoot, as the local tribes absolutely
Speaker 1: believe that this otherwise serene and tranquil looking water source.
Speaker 1: It's said that Charles Manson himself spent several days at
Speaker 1: Devil's Hole trying to figure out a way to make
Speaker 1: it safely down into the chasm, with some saying he
Speaker 1: was convinced he would never have to come back up.
Speaker 1: He had an obsession with the place that was convinced
Speaker 1: that there was an underwater portal to an alternate dimension,
Speaker 1: or more specifically, a portal to the underworld, where he
Speaker 1: felt he and his family would be able to safely
Speaker 1: wait out the coming apocalypse. He so famously predicted what
Speaker 1: happened that never actually did. Charles Manson's problem lie in
Speaker 1: figuring out a way to drain the whole, and it
Speaker 1: seemed like he may have been given this idea by
Speaker 1: an alleged Indian legend that resurfaced during the nineteen twenties,
Speaker 1: contending that a subterranean sect of leather clad humanoids lived
Speaker 1: down within an early yellow green lid of boat somewhere
Speaker 1: in the Mohave Desert could this possibly be true, just
Speaker 1: as with the case of these poor young men just
Speaker 1: doing what young men do and looking for a night
Speaker 1: or perhaps irresponsible but never thought to be deadly fun,
Speaker 1: we may never actually know. Hello, friends, there's something so interesting,
Speaker 1: albeit a bet macobb about our fascination these days with
Speaker 1: death and murder. We see it all over television and
Speaker 1: the internet. And who in this community hasn't sat for
Speaker 1: hours and watched shows about serial killers I've never been caught,
Speaker 1: and movies made about unsolved disappearances and whatnot. Seems like
Speaker 1: a bad train wreck where we know we shouldn't look,
Speaker 1: but we can't help but do it anyway. On this channel,
Speaker 1: we try to respectfully cover as many of those strange
Speaker 1: and mysterious missing person cases and murders as we can,
Speaker 1: and we try to do it in depth. Sometimes though
Speaker 1: there just isn't enough information for us to go fully
Speaker 1: in depth or as deep into the cases we would
Speaker 1: like to, But we still feel these people and their
Speaker 1: situations and stories should be talked about and discussed as
Speaker 1: well lest they be forgotten. Sometimes it's not a person
Speaker 1: at all, but an entity which has some strangers our
Speaker 1: mystery lurking around it, where we just.
Speaker 3: Can't let go and need to know more.
Speaker 1: Here's a collection of some of the most mysterious deaths
Speaker 1: or unsolved disappearances that we could find.
Speaker 3: Could you or.
Speaker 1: Someone you know hold the clue to unlock these mysteries?
Speaker 1: Number one The Mary Celeste. On December fifth, eighteen seventy two,
Speaker 1: the American merchant ship named the Mary Celeste was found
Speaker 1: to drift approximately four hundred miles away from the Zorus
Speaker 1: Islands of Portugal, located in the eastern part of the
Speaker 1: Atlantic Ocean. The Canadian vessel came across the drifting ship,
Speaker 1: which was still at partial sale, and stopped the ship
Speaker 1: in order to.
Speaker 3: Investigate what the issue was.
Speaker 1: The Marry Celeste was found to be carrying a full
Speaker 1: cargo load of cask of industrial alcohol and enough food
Speaker 1: and water to last several.
Speaker 3: People a few months.
Speaker 1: While the crew's belongings were all found on and around
Speaker 1: their bunks and only one of the lifeboats was found
Speaker 1: to be missing, the ship was completely and totally devoided people.
Speaker 1: The ship had left New York and was headed to
Speaker 1: Italy with ten people aboard. There were seven members of
Speaker 1: the crew, the ship's captain, his wife, and their daughter,
Speaker 1: who was only two years old at the time. No
Speaker 1: sight or a sign of any of them was ever found.
Speaker 1: There have been theories and rumors circulating about this case
Speaker 1: since the ship was located, but never anything factual to
Speaker 1: go by. Even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a story
Speaker 1: about a ship called Mary Celeste where everyone on board
Speaker 1: had been murdered by deranged serial killer. Unfortunately, this spectationous
Speaker 1: account by a well known author was sometimes taken to
Speaker 1: be what actually happened. The truth of the matter is,
Speaker 1: though no one knows what fate really befell the passengers
Speaker 1: on this ship. Many researchers speculate those board fled for
Speaker 1: fear of the alcohol fumes leaking from the cask causing
Speaker 1: a possible explosion. Still, others say they must have fallen
Speaker 1: victim to Moroccan pirates who were some unknown and nonsensical reason,
Speaker 1: carried off the people but none of the cargo before
Speaker 1: whatever fate befell these four ten souls suppor of that
Speaker 1: ship that fathful December day. The Mary Celeste was associated
Speaker 1: with much death and hardship, and has been subject to
Speaker 1: rumor of bad luck and even a curse. While we
Speaker 1: may never know the truth. It's said today that perhaps
Speaker 1: the crew with a captain who was a devout Christian
Speaker 1: and never drank alcohol, clearly and loudly stated he would
Speaker 1: never abandon his ship unless it were to be for
Speaker 1: saving lives, were all abducted by some sort of extraterrestrials.
Speaker 1: It's just a good theory as any others at this point.
Speaker 1: What do you think?
Speaker 3: Number two?
Speaker 1: Rodney Marx. On May twelve, two thousand, an Australian astrophysicist
Speaker 1: named Rodney Marx was stuck in the middle of a
Speaker 1: very dark and extremely frigid Antarctic winter. He was stationed
Speaker 1: at the Mundsen Scott Station, which was at the time
Speaker 1: an American scientific research base located near the South Pole.
Speaker 1: There were only forty nine other people there with Rodney,
Speaker 1: and they were all basically trapped there at that location
Speaker 1: until the spring.
Speaker 3: There are no winter.
Speaker 1: Flights too or from the South Pole because they're extremely
Speaker 1: dangerous and far too risky. These people were working and
Speaker 1: for the most part is said have all gotten along
Speaker 1: with one another fairly well. Rodney Marx died on that
Speaker 1: twelfth of May, and what happened to him and who
Speaker 1: was involved remains a mystery. Because his body had to
Speaker 1: be frozen and kept at the base until spring, when
Speaker 1: flights started again. The only thing anyone knew was that
Speaker 1: he had died of some type of mysterious illness. Once
Speaker 1: his body was flown back to New Zealand had thought out,
Speaker 1: it was discovered he had been murdered poisoned by methanol,
Speaker 1: and all the other forty nine people there with him
Speaker 1: were suspects Rodney had most likely consumed the toxic substance
Speaker 1: without even knowing it. The authorities eventually ruled out that
Speaker 1: he had taken his own life, and also thought it
Speaker 1: highly unlikely he had drunk the substance accidentally. All the
Speaker 1: others there with him for the winter were interviewed, but
Speaker 1: of course nothing ever came from any of it, and
Speaker 1: eventually foul play was ruled out of the factor in
Speaker 1: his untimely demise. The case is sometimes called the first
Speaker 1: murder committed at the South Pole, and the events that
Speaker 1: surrounded his poisoning are said to have never been determined.
Speaker 1: So what happened to Rodney? How does someone die from
Speaker 1: methanol poisoning without being murdered, without it having been an accident,
Speaker 1: and without them having done it their self to take
Speaker 1: their own life. This is one we also may never
Speaker 1: find the answers to What's your opinion? Number three The
Speaker 1: Impossible Murder. In nineteen thirty one, in Liverpool there lived
Speaker 1: a lovely husband and wife named Julia and William Wallace.
Speaker 1: The couple seem normal enough until one day in January
Speaker 1: that same year, when something happened that is so bizarre, mysterious,
Speaker 1: and which is still unsolved to this day that has
Speaker 1: since come to be known as the Impossible Murder. William
Speaker 1: Wallace was an insurance salesman who'd received a message one
Speaker 1: eating from someone asking him to meet him at an
Speaker 1: address on Love Gardens East so they could discuss policies.
Speaker 1: William was hesitant and normally wouldn't have even entertained doing
Speaker 1: business in such a way, but there was a depression
Speaker 1: at the time and he figured he would take what
Speaker 1: he could get as far as sales. On January twenty first,
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty one, William left his home and headed to
Speaker 1: his appointment with a mysterious man who had requested his presence,
Speaker 1: Assuming that it was a lead on a sale, William
Speaker 1: tried to find the address, but after a while of
Speaker 1: searching and some other strange circumstances found the address he
Speaker 1: had been called to simply didn't exist, and he had
Speaker 1: it home frustrated and had bit confused. William claimed that
Speaker 1: upon returning home, he found his wife murdered, plunging to
Speaker 1: death in.
Speaker 3: The living room.
Speaker 1: William was eventually convicted of his wife's murder, but then
Speaker 1: it was overturned on appeal. There trust wasn't enough evidence. Actually,
Speaker 1: there wasn't any evidence, not really, and the cases continued
Speaker 1: to fascinate both armchair detectives researchers and web slutes alike.
Speaker 1: Historical researchers have since speculated that the murder was committed
Speaker 1: by a co worker of Wallace's, which he had fired
Speaker 1: and accused him investment from the company. In twenty thirteen,
Speaker 1: a British crime writer named P. D. James said she
Speaker 1: believes that Wallace did in fact kill his wife Julia,
Speaker 1: and just happened to be helped along by a coincidental
Speaker 1: prank call to men Love Gardens East that very same night.
Speaker 3: So what do you think?
Speaker 1: This is just a quick synopsis of this one, and
Speaker 1: there's so many mysterious twists and bizarre turns in between.
Speaker 1: It's enough to make your head spin. There are literally
Speaker 1: entire books written about this one case, number four Toman Should,
Speaker 1: Australia's most mysterious death, is known as the toman Should case.
Speaker 1: This title comes from a Persian word that was printed
Speaker 1: on a small scrap of paper found in the dead
Speaker 1: man's pocket. The man was found dead on the beach
Speaker 1: south of Adelaide in December of nineteen forty eight. The
Speaker 1: only things found on the body were a train ticket,
Speaker 1: a few cigarettes, a comb, and that tiny scrap of
Speaker 1: paper with the Persian word. There was no identification either.
Speaker 1: Taman should translates to the end from Persian to English,
Speaker 1: which really was the clue in and of itself. However,
Speaker 1: this piece of paper was found to be from a
Speaker 1: very rare edition of a book of poetry called the
Speaker 1: Rubaiyat of Omar Khayam, and the last two words from
Speaker 1: that book are the words taman should. Even more mysterious, wouldn't.
Speaker 1: The pathologist who performed the autopsy said that he suspected
Speaker 1: that the unnamed man had died from poisoning somehow, and
Speaker 1: this too, how it came about as shrouded a mystery
Speaker 1: as well. The police appealed to the public and located
Speaker 1: what seemed to be the book. The scrap of paper
Speaker 1: came from which was found on the man. Inside the book,
Speaker 1: which they came across by some unknown and unnamed means,
Speaker 1: also contained a phone number. This number led them to
Speaker 1: an Australian woman who claims she didn't know and had
Speaker 1: never meant the deceased man found on the beach, and
Speaker 1: further claim that while she had once owned a copy
Speaker 1: of the book, she had lent it to someone. Again,
Speaker 1: no specific person was named to lead to who it
Speaker 1: was she allegedly led the book to. There was also
Speaker 1: some handwritten code throughout the book, which seemed to be
Speaker 1: a series of letters, but the code was never cracked
Speaker 1: and it's still unknown what it all said and meant.
Speaker 1: In two thousand and nine, an author by the name
Speaker 1: of Derek Abbott, who was also a professor at the
Speaker 1: School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering in Adelaide, came forth
Speaker 1: with a theory of his own and proposed the coded
Speaker 1: letters were traces of a manual encryption or decryption of
Speaker 1: a message using a one time pad. This is said
Speaker 1: to be an espionage technique that can be based on
Speaker 1: texts from a specific book. In this case, most likely
Speaker 1: it was from the same rare edition of the original
Speaker 1: book in question. Some people believe this gives way to
Speaker 1: the theory that there was some sort of spir ring
Speaker 1: operating in Australia at the time, and that the taman
Speaker 1: Should case had something to do with that. This is
Speaker 1: another case where there are just no answers at all,
Speaker 1: and the full story is one like you'll never find
Speaker 1: again or heard before. Who was this mysterious man, What
Speaker 1: connection did he have, if any, to the equally mysterious woman.
Speaker 1: Was he murdered or did he take his own life?
Speaker 1: What in the world did all this have to do
Speaker 1: with that rare edition of the book of Poetry. Sometimes
Speaker 1: cases come along where there just are no definitive answers.
Speaker 1: Usually we can live with that because when we follow
Speaker 1: the facts and evidence, it leads to some sort of
Speaker 1: reasonable conclusion. Then there are cases like the ones above,
Speaker 1: where there are not only any rational answers or any
Speaker 1: factual evidence, there are also no reasonable conclusions that could
Speaker 1: be drawn, and we are all left frustrated and scratching
Speaker 1: our heads until we move on to the next one.
Speaker 4: He slat Out told us moms, she's dead. She needs
Speaker 4: our house. And that's when I got the goosebumps, and
Speaker 4: I was like, oh my gosh. He was just in
Speaker 4: our car and he was pointing out to a certain
Speaker 4: spot in the meadow.
Speaker 5: While Victoria Gorba and her family stopped for lunch, her
Speaker 5: son Kayden began talking to someone.
Speaker 4: And my husband and I kind of looked at each
Speaker 4: other like what, and he goes, yeah, there's a lady
Speaker 4: over in the meadow in a black shirt, and I
Speaker 4: got goosebucks. He says, she needs our help. But she's
Speaker 4: dead and she's laying face down with her legs up
Speaker 4: and she can't talk to me. But she's over there.
Speaker 4: We need to go help her.
Speaker 5: Jake and Victoria checked out the meadow but saw nothing.
Speaker 4: He kept saying, trust me, trust me, mom, and I
Speaker 4: was like, I trust you, Bud. You know, I believe
Speaker 4: you one hundred percent.
Speaker 5: Spooked, the couple decided to end the trip early and
Speaker 5: head home.
Speaker 4: And we put it on Facebook seeing if anybody knew
Speaker 4: anything about the area, and come to find out that
Speaker 4: there was a lady missing with the description that he
Speaker 4: described to us was in a five mile radius of
Speaker 4: where we were.
Speaker 5: Sandra Hughes had gone missing in July of twenty twenty.
Speaker 5: Cayden had described her in detail and recognized her in
Speaker 5: three of four photos.
Speaker 4: He was very adamant that we needed to help her,
Speaker 4: and he describes down to blue hair. He said, she
Speaker 4: has a black shirt, blue jeans, and blue hair.
Speaker 2: Mom.
Speaker 4: That's the exact description of her when she went missing.
Speaker 1: Hello, friends, We recently learned of what may be one
Speaker 1: of the strangest updates to a missing person case that
Speaker 1: we've ever brought forth. Now, sometimes in these missing person
Speaker 1: cases that we cover, there will be a little bit
Speaker 1: of a paranormal or supernatural element. It's usually something small
Speaker 1: and not very significant to the overall case, but sometimes
Speaker 1: it seems that the unknown can play a larger part
Speaker 1: in these cases, stories of UFOs, the Fae, Bigfoot, or
Speaker 1: rather Cryptid's portal, translucent entities, et cetera. But is it
Speaker 1: possible that the ghost of a missing woman may be
Speaker 1: trying to help solve her disappearance, or at least help
Speaker 1: locate her remains. We ask that you keep an open
Speaker 1: mind and consider it the following case. Back in episode
Speaker 1: number seven of our ten Unsolved National Park Disappearances series,
Speaker 1: we brought you the story of Sandra Hughes to recap.
Speaker 1: Fifty four year old Sandra Johnson Hughes of California was
Speaker 1: last heard from on June twenty six, twenty twenty. Sandra
Speaker 1: had embarked on a solo camping trip in the Sierra
Speaker 1: south of Yosemite to escape from the current pandemic. Sandra
Speaker 1: had recently moved from Maui, Hawaii, to California in June
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty. She had trained to be a park
Speaker 1: ranger in college and was experiencing the outdoors. On July
Speaker 1: fifth of that year, the Madera County Sheriff's Office asked
Speaker 1: for the public's help in locating Sandra after they found
Speaker 1: her campsite near the Johnson's Meadow section of the forest
Speaker 1: in disarray. On that same day, the authorities located Hughes
Speaker 1: Silver Sob and Shequido Creek to the north of the
Speaker 1: camp site. They said it appeared to have crashed into
Speaker 1: a tree at a speed of less than twenty miles
Speaker 1: per hour before it rolling into the ravine. Hikers reported
Speaker 1: Saint Sandra on July fourth, twenty twenty, and said she
Speaker 1: was barefoot and had a bruise on her face. They
Speaker 1: offered to help her, but she declined. Medical assistance officers
Speaker 1: and volunteer search and rescue teams from more than half
Speaker 1: a dozen other sheriff's departments, together with dog teams, the
Speaker 1: California Highway Patrol and the Governor's Office of Emergency Services,
Speaker 1: combed the forest on foot, while helicopters from California Air
Speaker 1: National Guard did an aerial search. The search focused around
Speaker 1: the area where her car was found, but there was
Speaker 1: no sign of Sandra. Then, on August ninth, twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: hunters saw a woman leaning against a tree along Road
Speaker 1: five S zero one near Biesore Road. She did not
Speaker 1: wave them down, attempt contact, or appear to be in
Speaker 1: any distress. Upon returning, they recognized her from a missing
Speaker 1: persons fire and contacted park rangers. The hunter said that
Speaker 1: she appears to be visibly thinner than her last known
Speaker 1: photos at the time of her disappearance. Sandra was a
Speaker 1: fifty four year old white female with blue shoulder lenked hair.
Speaker 1: Her natural color is brown. She has brown eyes, is
Speaker 1: approximately five foot three inches tall, and weighs about one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty pounds. The search for Sandra was ongoing
Speaker 1: but limited. Now flashed forward to almost exactly one year later.
Speaker 1: This strange update to the case comes from the Madair
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's Office in Madeir, California. It seems that a
Speaker 1: family from nearby Course Gold, California, experienced a bizarre broad
Speaker 1: daylight ghost sighting in the Madeir County Mountains on Wednesday,
Speaker 1: July twenty first, twenty twenty one. The event was so
Speaker 1: strange and disturbing that the Madair County Sheriff's Office felt
Speaker 1: the need to further investigate. It seems that a man
Speaker 1: named Jake Gorba, his wife Victoria, and their three children
Speaker 1: decided to take their four wheeler up to the shut
Speaker 1: Eye Peak on that faithful Wednesday. While on this family outing,
Speaker 1: they stopped to have something to eat beside the trail,
Speaker 1: and that's when things started to get strange. The couple's
Speaker 1: three year old son, Caden, suddenly began animatedly talking to
Speaker 1: someone nearby. He was just in our four wheeler and
Speaker 1: he was pointing out to a certain spot in the meadow,
Speaker 1: said his mom Victoria. The normally reserved and somewhat quiet
Speaker 1: Caden excitedly told his parents that they're in the meadow
Speaker 1: by where the family was having lunch was a woman
Speaker 1: lying face down with her legs straight up in the air. Furthermore,
Speaker 1: Caden stated that the woman was unable to speak or
Speaker 1: move and needed help. He began pleading with his parents
Speaker 1: to help this poor woman. He flat out told us, Mom,
Speaker 1: she's already dead, but she needs our help. And that's
Speaker 1: when I got the goose bumps. I was like, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, Victoria said. He goes, yeah, there's a lady
Speaker 1: over in the meadow in a black shirt, blue jeans,
Speaker 1: and blue hair, and I got goose bumps, said Victoria.
Speaker 1: He says, she needs our help, but she's dead and
Speaker 1: she's lying face down with her legs up. She can't
Speaker 1: talk to me, but she's over there. We need to
Speaker 1: go help her. So in order to calm young Caden down,
Speaker 1: Jake and Victoria walked over and checked out the metal
Speaker 1: but saw absolutely nothing. Caden continued to insist. He kept saying,
Speaker 1: trust me, trust me, Mom, And I was like, I
Speaker 1: trust you, I trust you. I believe you one hundred percent,
Speaker 1: said Victoria. Whatever young Caden was experiencing so unnerved and
Speaker 1: spoke the rest of the family that the other members
Speaker 1: of the family all unanimously agreed it's time to put
Speaker 1: an early end to their day of adventure and make
Speaker 1: the thirty five mile drive back home to Course Calf.
Speaker 1: After arriving home, the event still fresh in her mind,
Speaker 1: Victoria decided to post about the weird encounter on her
Speaker 1: Facebook profile. We put it on Facebook to see if
Speaker 1: anybody knew anything about this area, and come to find out,
Speaker 1: there was a lady missing with a description that he
Speaker 1: described to us within a five mile radius of where
Speaker 1: we were, said Victoria. Now, viewers of this channel No
Speaker 1: from our previous episode number seven, Sandra Hughes had gone
Speaker 1: missing in that area in June of twenty twenty. The
Speaker 1: encounter became even more chilling when, according to Victoria, three
Speaker 1: year old Kaden's highly detailed description of the woman he
Speaker 1: had seen in the meadow was identical to the description
Speaker 1: of Sandra Hughes as given by the local authorities. He
Speaker 1: was very adamant that we needed to help her, and
Speaker 1: he described her down to blue hair. He said, she
Speaker 1: has a black shirt, blue jeans, and blue hair.
Speaker 3: Mom.
Speaker 1: That's the exact description of her when she went missing,
Speaker 1: said Victoria. Then Victoria and searched online for Sandra Hughes
Speaker 1: and found some photographs that have been released as a
Speaker 1: part of the search effort the year prior. Because I
Speaker 1: said she got goosebumps when Cayden readily recognized three of
Speaker 1: the photos of Sandra, identifying her as the woman he
Speaker 1: had seen in the field. As fate would have it,
Speaker 1: Madera County Sheriff Corporal Chris Williams just happened to see
Speaker 1: the Facebook post and found it intriguing, to say the least,
Speaker 1: so much so that he contacted Cayden's family to further
Speaker 1: investigate the chilling account. Victoria said the corporal in charge
Speaker 1: of her case actually reached out to us on Facebook
Speaker 1: and was like, Hey, we want more information and we
Speaker 1: want to bring you guys back up there and see
Speaker 1: if you could point us in the right direction. Corporal
Speaker 1: Williams has been investigating the disappears of Sandra Hughes since
Speaker 1: the beginning of the investigation. On the following Thursday, two
Speaker 1: Madera County Sheriff's deputies ventured back up to the meadow
Speaker 1: to investigate, with Jake and Caden coming along to point
Speaker 1: them in the right direction. Unfortunately, and the deputies found
Speaker 1: nothing new by way of evidence, although the case remains open.
Speaker 1: If she was possibly a ghost looking for some help,
Speaker 1: I hope that he could have at least helped and
Speaker 1: maybe helped the family find her, because it's been a
Speaker 1: long time apparently since she's been gone.
Speaker 3: Victoria said.
Speaker 1: The four wheeler that Cayden and his family used while
Speaker 1: traveling in the mountains has now been nicknamed the Ghost
Speaker 1: Runner and incidentally, is also for sale. It's not believed
Speaker 1: that the spooking encounter is the reason they put the
Speaker 1: vehicle up for sale, as the family says they will
Speaker 1: continue to go adventuring in the Madeira Mountains, but do
Speaker 1: admit there are a few spots now which they aren't
Speaker 1: anxious to visit again anytime soon, if at all. Local
Speaker 1: news reporters in the area reached out to the Madera
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's Office, who did confirm that they received the
Speaker 1: report of a possible sighting of some sort and they
Speaker 1: did go out to the location to search for any
Speaker 1: additional leads or information.
Speaker 3: For now, the.
Speaker 1: Case remains open and hopes that this latest update regarding
Speaker 1: the spooking encounter may produce some new leads. Now as
Speaker 1: strange as this new development is, it's not the first
Speaker 1: time that possibly a ghost helped solve the missing person's case.
Speaker 1: Back on February twenty first, nineteen ninety seven, the TV
Speaker 1: show Unsolved Mysteries aired to segment regarding a missing person's
Speaker 1: case from almost three years prior. This report told the
Speaker 1: story of twenty three year old Christine Scuubage and her
Speaker 1: three year old son Nick. They were driving along Highway
Speaker 1: fifty in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range in California when
Speaker 1: they vanished without a trace on June sixth, nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 1: Christine was a single mother and it recently completed parallegal training.
Speaker 1: She had plans of going to work for a prestigious
Speaker 1: law firm, and she helped to make enough money so
Speaker 1: that she and her child's father could be married. Christine
Speaker 1: left her stepparents home near Sacramento on June fifth, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety four, on her way to Carson City, Nevada. After
Speaker 1: failing to make contact with her family after three days,
Speaker 1: her step father, Dave Stossenbach, reported her and her son
Speaker 1: missing on June eighth. The police took the missing person's report,
Speaker 1: but there were no initial leads in the case.
Speaker 3: Five days after.
Speaker 1: Christine and Nick disappeared, however, a woman named Debraah Hoyt
Speaker 1: and her husband were driving along the Highway fifty.
Speaker 3: Around three am.
Speaker 1: The pair were on along overnight drive and had been
Speaker 1: joking and singing in order to keep each other away.
Speaker 1: Suddenly never saw what appeared to be a completely naked
Speaker 1: woman lying on the side of the road. The naked
Speaker 1: woman's face was turned toward the road and she was
Speaker 1: laying on her side with her knees slightly bent. She
Speaker 1: had one arm placed beneath her head and the other
Speaker 1: arm held over her head. The Holtz were shocked beyond belief.
Speaker 1: They thought it must have been some sort of sick
Speaker 1: practical joke, or perhaps he would employ the carjack them
Speaker 1: had they stopped. Deborah floored the accelerator instead and sped
Speaker 1: down Highway fifty, not stopping until she arrived at the
Speaker 1: nearest phone booth, where she proceeded to call the foe.
Speaker 3: In just minutes.
Speaker 1: Two Sharf's cards with the scene were deborn seeing the
Speaker 1: naked woman's body. However, unable to pinpoint the exact location,
Speaker 1: the deputies reported that they saw and found nothing. The
Speaker 1: next morning, though, speculations began that the sighting had something
Speaker 1: to do with the disappearance of Christine and Nick, who
Speaker 1: were the most recently missing people from that area. Due
Speaker 1: to the insistence from the family, deputy Rich Strasser decided
Speaker 1: to go back and have a closer look. Strasser figured
Speaker 1: that it might be easier to spot anything out of
Speaker 1: the ordinary in the daylight. Deborah had indicated that a
Speaker 1: particularly dangerous stretch of Highway fifty, known as Bullion Bend,
Speaker 1: was where the incident took place. As Strasser patrolled the area,
Speaker 1: he spotted a new looking child's tennis shoe on the
Speaker 1: side of the road. Immediately next to that spot and
Speaker 1: the shoulder of the road was a steep embankment. Strasser
Speaker 1: pulled over his cruiser to search the area more thoroughly,
Speaker 1: and sure enough, at the bottom of the embankment he
Speaker 1: spotted the twisted remains of Christine's car. He checked Christine
Speaker 1: and observed that she was dead and unfortunately had been
Speaker 1: that way for quite some time. The deputy then went
Speaker 1: around to the other side to check Nick, who was
Speaker 1: curled up in a fetal position in the passenger seat.
Speaker 1: Strasser assumed the worst and was sure that Nick was
Speaker 1: also dead. However, when he touched the little boy's neck
Speaker 1: to find a pulse, it appeared that Nick took a breath.
Speaker 1: Strasser immediately radioed for an ambulance. Little Nick had been
Speaker 1: alone in the car for five days, yet he was
Speaker 1: somehow still clinging to life. Officials believed that sometime around
Speaker 1: two am on June sixth, Christine must have fallen asleep
Speaker 1: at the wheel. The car veered off the road and
Speaker 1: plunged to the bottom of the ditch, striking a tree.
Speaker 1: Due to the embankment being so steep, other drivers drove
Speaker 1: right past the accident seen for days, unaware that it
Speaker 1: was just over the side of the road. It was
Speaker 1: later determined that Christine had been killed instantly on impact
Speaker 1: with a tree. Through your old Nick was all alone,
Speaker 1: with no way out and no one to talk to.
Speaker 1: Christine's mother says that she believes that little Nick spent
Speaker 1: the time talking to his mother, unaware that she was dead.
Speaker 1: Against all odds, he survived five days of intense heat
Speaker 1: and four nights of cold, trapped within the twisted remains
Speaker 1: of the car. Doctors who examined nickt stated that he
Speaker 1: was in such bad shape that he would have most
Speaker 1: likely die within a couple of hours had he not
Speaker 1: been found when he was. The strange encounter that saved
Speaker 1: Nick's life seems to defy any rational explanation. If deb
Speaker 1: had not seen the naked woman lying on the side
Speaker 1: of the road, Nick would have not survived. Now, it's
Speaker 1: absolutely impossible for Christine to have been the naked woman.
Speaker 1: She was still fully clothed and wearing her seat bolt
Speaker 1: when found, and the medical examiner stated that she was
Speaker 1: most likely killed on impact. Debah Hoyt is one hundred
Speaker 1: percent certain that she saw a naked woman on the
Speaker 1: side of the road. Both she and Christine's family believe
Speaker 1: it was Christine's spirit who saved Nick that day. The
Speaker 1: spirit had apparently appeared in the nude in order to
Speaker 1: draw attention. Nick years later, as an adult, was interviewed
Speaker 1: on a television show Paranormal Witness. He remembers seeing a
Speaker 1: bright light surrounding the car following the accident. To this day,
Speaker 1: he believes that his mother was watching over him following
Speaker 1: the accident.
Speaker 3: And helped him to be rescued.
Speaker 1: The show also revealed that Christine's aunt had several dreams
Speaker 1: or premonitions about the accident. Before Christine and Nick were
Speaker 1: even reported missing, she dreamed of seeing them lying in
Speaker 1: their car in a ditch. She also saw the number
Speaker 1: sixteen in the dream, which turned out to be the
Speaker 1: number for the mile marker nearest the accident's site.
Speaker 3: Well, there you have it.
Speaker 1: What do you think about the apparition that little Kayden observed,
Speaker 1: which she identified as Sandra Hughes, even down to the
Speaker 1: color of her hair, which was dyed blue when she
Speaker 1: went missing. Is it possible that Sandra's spirit is attempting
Speaker 1: to communicate with a living in a desire that remains
Speaker 1: be found and her friend and loved ones have closure.
Speaker 1: It certainly appears that way. And what about the two
Speaker 1: other times she was spotted by high christ Was that
Speaker 1: actually her or was that an apparition?
Speaker 3: I mean?
Speaker 6: Anyway, fall man, we.
Speaker 7: Lost my two year old grandson. That's walk be the
Speaker 7: ones my dad. We can't find him. Three year old
Speaker 7: glands him. Hey there window here, Paul says, are you
Speaker 7: there your own? Yeah, he's free. Okay. The girls come
Speaker 7: to the house and left him there and he's walked
Speaker 7: both somewhere and we can't find him. And even then
Speaker 7: I know you're not there in the house now, all
Speaker 7: that dials hill okay, and how long do you know
Speaker 7: he brought in there's voice a minute because we've been
Speaker 7: looking at it all in the woods for him.
Speaker 6: And then behind your house, directly.
Speaker 7: Behind your house, yeah, well on the side. Yeah, and
Speaker 7: then a white flack he was, you know, and he
Speaker 7: was wearing probably a black little coat, a black coat. Yeah.
Speaker 6: Okay, you do this, you do this.
Speaker 7: Where we go? Yeah, he has there? Yeah, thanks us.
Speaker 6: Okay, he said about forty five minutes ago. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 6: all right. Is it a big area of wood behind
Speaker 6: your house? Yeah, it's pretty big. I think he's been
Speaker 6: out there looking for him. Yeah, yeah, okay, all right,
Speaker 6: we got it there, but he had to see you. Okay.
Speaker 6: And you said forty five minutes directly behind your house
Speaker 6: or a side yeah okay, you see said we have
Speaker 6: some said it that way. Okay, okay, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3: Hello, friends, Steve's talking here with you. In this video.
Speaker 1: We're going to discuss children who claim to have been
Speaker 1: saved by bears in the while. Join me, let's walk
Speaker 1: and see. But before we begin, at least take a
Speaker 1: moment make sure you're subscribed notification bell is on and
Speaker 1: also you click join come a member of the channel
Speaker 1: as exclusive members only perks. Now throughout this channel and
Speaker 1: across this community, we've seen many strange things that have
Speaker 1: gone on in the woods all across the world. There
Speaker 1: are times, though, when things happen that just can't be
Speaker 1: explained rationally or reasonably, despite seeming to be backed up
Speaker 1: by documentation and in some cases even factual evidence. We've
Speaker 1: discussed everything from ferries in the woods and people who
Speaker 1: have gone missing under strange and unusual circumstances, sometimes in
Speaker 1: front of witnesses. But every once in a while we
Speaker 1: come across something so incredibly strange that it's hard to
Speaker 1: imagine and actually have happened at all. However, today we're
Speaker 1: going to discuss something unimaginably strange that it is said
Speaker 1: to have happened not only once, but twice. And while
Speaker 1: there are some facts and witness statements to make one
Speaker 1: think these things are really happening out there, it's still,
Speaker 1: of course up to you to decide what you want
Speaker 1: to believe at the end of the day. One day,
Speaker 1: way back in June of seventeen eighty three, a four
Speaker 1: year old girl from Warren, New Hampshire named Sarah Witcher,
Speaker 1: wanted to go with her parents to visit her uncle.
Speaker 1: Her uncle lived on a tall hill right behind their house,
Speaker 1: and for whatever reason, Sarah's parents didn't want her to
Speaker 1: go with them, no matter how much Sarah begged and
Speaker 1: pleaded with them, though, they refused to allow her to
Speaker 1: go and assured her they would only be gone a
Speaker 1: short time and she would be perfectly fine in the
Speaker 1: care of her older siblings until their return. However, it
Speaker 1: turns out that they were wrong, and due to some
Speaker 1: kind of miscommunication. When her parents returned, the older siblings,
Speaker 1: who were supposed to be watching little Sarah, ask why
Speaker 1: she hadn't turned with them. What came next was something
Speaker 1: that would be imprinted in New Hampshire history for centuries,
Speaker 1: but also the mystery of what happened to Sarah that
Speaker 1: day so long ago would live on forever in the
Speaker 1: minds of those of us who study strange things in
Speaker 1: the woods. So let's take a look at what allegedly
Speaker 1: happened on a sunny day in June many many years ago,
Speaker 1: when Sarah's siblings asked where she was and why she
Speaker 1: hadn't returned with the parents. Obviously, Sarah's mother and father
Speaker 1: were immediately panic. They sorted through the details with their siblings,
Speaker 1: and it didn't take long for everyone to realize that
Speaker 1: no one was watching Sarah and that she had wandered
Speaker 1: off somewhere. An immediate search party, including the family and
Speaker 1: their friends and neighbors in the community, quickly turned into
Speaker 1: something much larger when dozens of people from all over
Speaker 1: the surrounding areas descended upon Warren to help search for
Speaker 1: the lost four year old. On the second day of
Speaker 1: the search reported back to the Witchers with some frightening news.
Speaker 1: Tracts believed to belong to Sarah were found deep in
Speaker 1: the wilderness behind the home, but falling directly behind hers
Speaker 1: were the tracks of a large bear. This was terrible news,
Speaker 1: and the family came to the conclusion in their heads
Speaker 1: that it was more than likely their precious little girl
Speaker 1: was deceased. Everyone involved was disheartened, but it didn't slow
Speaker 1: down the search one bit, as now they were determined
Speaker 1: to at least recover Sarah's remains. It was decided among
Speaker 1: the community of searchers that if Sarah were to be
Speaker 1: found alive, after all, whover found her would fire three
Speaker 1: shots from their rifle into the air. The situation was
Speaker 1: a grim one, but Sarah's parents and siblings couldn't help
Speaker 1: but keep at least some hope that Sarah would be
Speaker 1: found alive and well, despite how minuscule the odds of
Speaker 1: that happening were. Searchers continued in their efforts for days
Speaker 1: on end, refusing to leave Sarah to the elements and
Speaker 1: wildlife of the dense forest. On the fourth day of
Speaker 1: the search, an expert wilderness woodsman from nearby Portsmouth, New
Speaker 1: Hampshire arrived and joined the now exhausted search parties who
Speaker 1: were still out looking for Sarah. Only a few hours
Speaker 1: later that the townspeople heard the signal three shots fired
Speaker 1: into the air. Sarah had not only been found, but
Speaker 1: was apparently alive and well. But what had happened to
Speaker 1: her and one of the bear tracks discovered following so
Speaker 1: closely behind her most of the way. The expert woodsman
Speaker 1: from Plymouth, who was still a stranger to the community
Speaker 1: and Sarah's family, was now also a hero, and he
Speaker 1: happily returned Sarah directly to her mother's arms, as the
Speaker 1: rest of the community looked on with tears of joy.
Speaker 1: In their eyes and pairs of thanks on their lips.
Speaker 1: Everyone was eager to know what had happened to the
Speaker 1: little girl, and she was more than happy to oblige
Speaker 1: them with her miraculous and now legendary tale. Sarah began
Speaker 1: by explaining that when her parents wouldn't allow her to
Speaker 1: go with them to visit her uncle, she became bored
Speaker 1: and decided to wander around picking wildflowers. Somehow, while walking along,
Speaker 1: her feet had been cut and began to bleed. Suddenly,
Speaker 1: as Sarah tried to figure out what to do, as
Speaker 1: now her feet were injured and hurting and she still
Speaker 1: needed to get back home, a bit emerged from the woods.
Speaker 1: The little girl was immediately scared, but soon realized that
Speaker 1: bear seemed more curious than menacing, and so she stood
Speaker 1: there and did nothing as the animal approached her. According
Speaker 1: to Sarah, the bear walked right up to her, licked
Speaker 1: her in essence giving her a kiss, and then laid
Speaker 1: down right there at her feet. Sarah somehow immediately took
Speaker 1: this to mean she was to lay down and use
Speaker 1: the bear as a warm and comfortable bed for the night.
Speaker 1: The only other thing Sarah said to have revealed was
Speaker 1: that the bear simply stayed with her, either in that
Speaker 1: one spot or in the forest in general, and didn't
Speaker 1: leave her side until rescuers finally approached to bring her
Speaker 1: back out of the woods and reunite her with her family.
Speaker 1: Sarah went on to live a normal life Mary and
Speaker 1: have children of her own. It said she entertained others
Speaker 1: with her curious tale for many years after, and, as
Speaker 1: with any legend, be it fashion or completely made up,
Speaker 1: the miraculous story took on many extra parts throughout the centuries.
Speaker 1: Some very common additions are that the stranger who found
Speaker 1: Sarah had been followed a vision of some kind, and
Speaker 1: yet in other retellings of the story, the prayers from
Speaker 1: the townspeople and Sarah's family were so fervent in earnest
Speaker 1: that that's what actually brought Sarah back and let her
Speaker 1: being found safe and sound. It's even sometimes said that
Speaker 1: Sarah told her parents quote the great black dog had
Speaker 1: kept her safe and warm at night end quote. Of course,
Speaker 1: these things can't possibly be proven, but aren't known to
Speaker 1: be a part of Sarah's original retelling of the story.
Speaker 1: A man named William Little went out and researched the
Speaker 1: story and using only accounts that were allegedly eyewitnesses to
Speaker 1: the event, wrote the book History of Warren, a hamlet
Speaker 1: located along the White Hills of New Hampshire. This is
Speaker 1: one of, if not the only, book that's said to
Speaker 1: tell the true story in the words of those who
Speaker 1: were there that day. In its entirety, well, there's not
Speaker 1: much to this story. It's still pretty miraculous and some
Speaker 1: would say unbelievable. Knowing what we know, and considering everything
Speaker 1: we've learned about the missing in the woods and things
Speaker 1: many have alleged to have experienced while out there, this
Speaker 1: could very well have happened. After all, Sarah is not
Speaker 1: the only child to allege a bear or otherwild animal
Speaker 1: help protect them and keep them safe while they were
Speaker 1: scared and lost in the wilderness for days on end.
Speaker 1: House would these small children have survived, and why or
Speaker 1: how would they even come up with such strange tales
Speaker 1: if they weren't at least partially true to begin with.
Speaker 1: Maybe Sarah's story is a bit too old for some
Speaker 1: to believe it is anything more than a local myth
Speaker 1: or urban legend. If that's the case, however, it's completely
Speaker 1: understandable because these things do have a way of taking
Speaker 1: on a life of their own after some time. It
Speaker 1: seems to still be happening to this day. We've discussed
Speaker 1: some more recent cases, like two year old I had
Speaker 1: to make Curtis, who in nineteen fifty five went missing
Speaker 1: in Montana's coot and Eye for Us. She was lost
Speaker 1: for two whole days, and the entire time the weather
Speaker 1: had been pouring rain, but she was found safe and sound,
Speaker 1: no worse for the wear. She adamantly insisted that it
Speaker 1: was a big bear that he kept her safe and
Speaker 1: that cared so well for her during the entire time
Speaker 1: she'd been gone. In even more recent years, in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: a three year old named Casey Hathaway went missing in
Speaker 1: the wilderness near his grandmother's home in North Carolina, and
Speaker 1: told a very similar story when he was rescued. Here's
Speaker 1: his story, which some say is similar to the others
Speaker 1: in that it is very nonspecific as to what he
Speaker 1: and his companion did for days in the woods together,
Speaker 1: and only get his mentions to the fact that an animal,
Speaker 1: in this case also a bear, miraculously went against its
Speaker 1: very nature in order to protect and perhaps save a
Speaker 1: human child on January twenty third, twenty nineteen, Little Casey
Speaker 1: hathaway and was playing with a couple of his older
Speaker 1: cousins and his great grandmother's backyard, but when the others
Speaker 1: came inside, Casey wasn't with them. His family searched for
Speaker 1: him for approximately forty five minutes, hoping to find him
Speaker 1: on their own, but when they had no luck, they
Speaker 1: called the Craven County Sheriff's Department on the phone with
Speaker 1: a nine to one one dispatcher. His grandmother reported, he
Speaker 1: was walking in the woods back there and we can't
Speaker 1: find him. The other ones come through the house but
Speaker 1: left him there, and he walked off somewhere and we
Speaker 1: can't find him. The next two nights were filled with
Speaker 1: freezing cold temperatures, pouring rain, and having winds, with the
Speaker 1: search and rescue teams and volunteers, along with.
Speaker 3: Casey's family never gave up.
Speaker 1: Both the FBI, US Marine Corps, dozens of volunteers, plus
Speaker 1: search and rescue teams from across the state came together
Speaker 1: to help find the missing toddler. Three days after he
Speaker 1: had last been seen in the backyard, the neighbor of
Speaker 1: his grandmother was out walking her dog and heard a
Speaker 1: loud cry coming from some nearby bushes, approximately forty yards
Speaker 1: from the road. When the neighbor went over to investigate,
Speaker 1: she found little Casey Hathaway alive and seemingly well, except
Speaker 1: that he was crying and tangled up in some thorn bushes.
Speaker 1: The authorities and Casey's family were immediately notified and he
Speaker 1: was rushed to the hospital, where he was described as
Speaker 1: being in surprisingly good condition. So Casey didn't have much
Speaker 1: to say about what he had done and where he
Speaker 1: had been. According to David McFadden of the Craven County
Speaker 1: Sheriff's Office, who told CNN and other news outlets who
Speaker 1: were seeking information, quote, he made a comment about having
Speaker 1: a friend while he was in the wood. His friend
Speaker 1: was a bear. In the emergency room, he started talking
Speaker 1: about what happened in the woods, and he said he
Speaker 1: had a friend that was a bear with him while
Speaker 1: he was in the woods.
Speaker 3: End quote.
Speaker 1: While Major and McFadden admitted there were bears in the
Speaker 1: woods in the county, he said there was no way
Speaker 1: to prove one way or the other that one had
Speaker 1: been with Casey during the time he was missing. He
Speaker 1: went on to say that all that battered was that
Speaker 1: there was something there to comfort the little boy throughout
Speaker 1: the ordeal. Major McFadden was also quoted as saying, we
Speaker 1: are very pleased he had that type of comfort. There
Speaker 1: were very brutal conditions out there. The first night had
Speaker 1: dropped down to twenty degrees. The second night we had
Speaker 1: two inches of rain. Casey requested and is said to
Speaker 1: have absolutely devoured some of his favorite foods while at
Speaker 1: the hospital, including Cheetos and chicken McNuggets. Aside from a
Speaker 1: few bruises, cuts and scrapes, Casey was in good condiction
Speaker 1: and was happy to be reunited with his family. While
Speaker 1: we may never really know what happened to any of
Speaker 1: these children and at least a handful of others that
Speaker 1: have claimed to have been protected and cared for by
Speaker 1: some unusual wildlife out in the woods, it definitely makes
Speaker 1: for much more than just an interesting story.
Speaker 3: In this community.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's hard to take things that face value, but
Speaker 1: there are some who believe cases like these and others,
Speaker 1: especially when it comes to small children who have no
Speaker 1: reason or incentive to lie about such things, that we
Speaker 1: need to read between the lines. Could it be that
Speaker 1: actually bears came out of the woods and went against
Speaker 1: their very nature in order to protect and rescue at
Speaker 1: times even to care for these little and otherwise helpless
Speaker 1: human children for days on end. Could it be there's
Speaker 1: something else at play here, and if so, what is it,
Speaker 1: What could it possibly be and what interest does it
Speaker 1: have in human children? Some people believe that perhaps whatever
Speaker 1: the entities are, they simply appear to small children in
Speaker 1: the form of a bear, due to the fact that
Speaker 1: there's so many bear in popular children's story books and
Speaker 1: fairy tales. This is all, of course speculation, and we
Speaker 1: most likely will never know the real answers, but it
Speaker 1: is certainly something for us to consider.
Speaker 3: And think about.
Speaker 1: One more interesting thing to be added about Sarah Witcher
Speaker 1: and her incredible tale of rescue survival in the woods.
Speaker 1: The New Hampshire Historical Society has recently added, mainly due
Speaker 1: to requests made by First and Second Greatest at Dublin
Speaker 1: Christian Academy. There are two hundred and seventy fifth historical
Speaker 1: highway marker in honor of the little girl who was
Speaker 1: said to be saved by a bear all those years ago.
Speaker 1: The markers, in accordance with the tale as told by
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Yates and reads in part quote, the local man
Speaker 1: joined the search after dreaming three times that Sarah would
Speaker 1: be found under a pine limb near Barrybrook, guarded by
Speaker 1: a bear. His dream proved to be true. Sarah was
Speaker 1: found as he stated, and she told rescuers that a
Speaker 1: great black dog had kept her each night.
Speaker 3: End quote.
Speaker 1: Yet more elements added to the long and ever evolving
Speaker 1: story of three year old Sarah Witcher and her bear.
Speaker 1: Hello friends, Steve Stalkton here with you. Welcome to a
Speaker 1: brand new episode twenty twenty four. In this video, we'll
Speaker 1: take a look at hitchhikers who went missing. Join me,
Speaker 1: let's walk and see.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 1: They say the road less traveled holds the greatest mysteries,
Speaker 1: and out there on the roughly four point two million
Speaker 1: miles of roads and highways throughout the USA, that couldn't
Speaker 1: be more true. Every night, as the world sleeps, the
Speaker 1: highway becomes a stage for vanishing acts. It's as if
Speaker 1: the darkness itself has an appetite, devouring hitchhikers without a trace.
Speaker 1: Let's discuss some cases in which the following individuals were
Speaker 1: offered a ride to their destination, never to be seen again.
Speaker 3: Vocal up.
Speaker 1: This is going to be a strange one. First up,
Speaker 1: we have Mitch Weiser and Bonnie Bickwit. Mitchell Weisser, age sixteen,
Speaker 1: also known as Mitch, and his fourteen year old girlfriend,
Speaker 1: Benita Mara Bickwitt, also known as Bonnie, reported missing after
Speaker 1: being seen hitchhiking along a highway in Narrowsburg, New York.
Speaker 1: They were heading northwest towards a town called Watkins Glen,
Speaker 1: one hundred and seven miles away. The date was Friday,
Speaker 1: July twenty seventh, nineteen seventy three, and the couple were
Speaker 1: desperately attempting to hitchhike their way to the Watkins Glenn
Speaker 1: Summer Jam Concert. The concert was a huge affair, posting
Speaker 1: performances by The Almond Brothers, The Grateful Dead, The Band,
Speaker 1: and many other popular artists of the time. Approximately six
Speaker 1: hundred thousand individuals were in attendance of the concert, earning
Speaker 1: it a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records.
Speaker 1: Out of the massive crowd that numbered well over half
Speaker 1: a million, only two individuals managed without a trace, Bonnie
Speaker 1: Bickwit and Mitch Weisser. No one has seen or heard
Speaker 1: from them since they attended and participated in the event.
Speaker 1: Mitch was a resident of the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: New York, and had initially intended to go to the
Speaker 1: concert with his friend Larry Marion. However, due to Larry's
Speaker 1: mother's restrictions, Mitch asked Bonnie to join him instead.
Speaker 3: Bonnie and Mitch had.
Speaker 1: Been together for about a year when he decided to
Speaker 1: take time off from his summer internship at a photography
Speaker 1: studio in Coney Island to attend the event. He was
Speaker 1: determined not to miss it. He was overjoyed when Bonnie,
Speaker 1: who had been a parents' helper at Camp Wilmot during
Speaker 1: the summer in the Catskill Mountains, decided to join him.
Speaker 1: She had attended the camp as a child and cherished
Speaker 1: her time there. However, when her boss would approve her
Speaker 1: time off to go to the concert with Mitch, she
Speaker 1: quit on the spot and told him she would be
Speaker 1: back after the concert to collect her personal belongings and
Speaker 1: final paycheck. With worried expressions, Mitch's mother, Shirley and his
Speaker 1: sister Susan pleaded with him to reconsider attending the concert.
Speaker 1: Both of them strongly believed it was a poor decision,
Speaker 1: yet he refused to change his mind and was determined
Speaker 1: to go. Charley stepped in and offered him some money
Speaker 1: to cover his travel expenses there and back. At that moment,
Speaker 1: Mitch was already making his way out the door. It's
Speaker 1: unclear if he didn't hear or if he was purposely ignored. Heer,
Speaker 1: but with only twenty five dollars in his pocket, he
Speaker 1: left without a second glance and never returned. He would
Speaker 1: never step foot inside his home again. Mitch rode a
Speaker 1: bus to Nearrisburg and then hopped on another one to
Speaker 1: Camp Well Met, where he arrived around midnight on Thursday.
Speaker 1: By this point, he was almost completely broke. He made
Speaker 1: sure to call his mother and sister to let them
Speaker 1: know it he arrived safely, but also that he had
Speaker 1: very little money left. His mother and sister were understandably
Speaker 1: worried and tried once again to convince him not to go,
Speaker 1: but Mitch assured him that he would be fined and
Speaker 1: promised to see them when he returned home. On Sunday
Speaker 1: was a hitchhike one hundred and fifty miles northwest, but
Speaker 1: he could attend the outdoor concert with Bonnie. After spending
Speaker 1: the night at their campsite. They had breakfast on Friday
Speaker 1: morning before embarking on what they thought would be an
Speaker 1: exciting adventure. A caneman in a pickup truck offered them
Speaker 1: a ride back to Narrisburg, and they gratefully accepted before
Speaker 1: making their way to Highway ninety seven. Using a homemade
Speaker 1: cardboard sign, they hitchhiked and asked for a ride to
Speaker 1: the concert. When the truck driver glanced back one last time,
Speaker 1: little did he know that it would be the final
Speaker 1: confirmed sighting of the two teenagers. As Sunday night passed
Speaker 1: without a call or appearance from Mitch as he promised,
Speaker 1: his family grew increasingly concerned of the next day. They
Speaker 1: were filled with worry and dialed camp Well met to
Speaker 1: speak with Bonnie. With their dismay, they discovered that Bonnie
Speaker 1: also did not return on Sunday and no one had
Speaker 1: heard from her either. Susan and Sidney Wiser, Mitch's sister,
Speaker 1: and father, drove all the way to Watkins Glen the
Speaker 1: search for the two teenagers, while Mitch's mother surely waited
Speaker 1: anxiously at home. Meanwhile, Donnie's parents, Theodore and Ray, were
Speaker 1: unaware of their daughter's disappearance, since they were vacationing in
Speaker 1: Cape god Upon hearing the devastating news, they rushed to
Speaker 1: Camp well Met. Without hesitation, they reported their daughter's missing,
Speaker 1: hoping for assistance and finding her. However, their hopes were
Speaker 1: quickly dashed as the police brushed off their concerns and
Speaker 1: chalked it up to another pair of teenagers who'd run
Speaker 1: away after attending a concert. Just three days before her disappearance,
Speaker 1: Donnie had sent a letter to her parents. In it,
Speaker 1: she expressed her happiness at Camp well Met and how
Speaker 1: much she valued the freedom she had there. She also
Speaker 1: mentioned that when she returned home, she hoped her parents
Speaker 1: would give her more space to grow and travel. This
Speaker 1: last part gave them hope that perhaps she had gone
Speaker 1: on a trip and would contact them soon. After the
Speaker 1: authorities refused to help with any investigation into their missing children,
Speaker 1: both Bonnie and Mitch's parents decided to let them explore
Speaker 1: their freedom for a while. They waited patiently for school
Speaker 1: to start again, hoping their kids were just traveling on
Speaker 1: their own. However, when neither of them showed up for
Speaker 1: the first day of school, all the parents feared the worst.
Speaker 1: Described as a sweet boy with shouldered, linked hair pulled
Speaker 1: back into ponytail, tortoise show glasses, and hazel eyes. Mitch
Speaker 1: was known for his love of baseball, his girlfriend, Bonnie, photography,
Speaker 1: and The Grateful Dead. Even named his dog Casey Jones
Speaker 1: after one of the band's classic songs. His friends admired
Speaker 1: him for being courageous and rebellious. According to his sister Susan,
Speaker 1: he was a talented and gifted individual. She kept a
Speaker 1: box filled with her brother's belongings as a memento for
Speaker 1: the brother she loved dearly but.
Speaker 3: Lost too soon.
Speaker 1: Among the items in the box are his old tortoise
Speaker 1: show glasses, his poetry ticket stubs from the nineteen sixty
Speaker 1: nine Mets World Series, trading card from the nineteen sixty
Speaker 1: four and sixty five New York World's Fair, and a
Speaker 1: large birthday card made by Mitch's friends on his fifteenth birthday.
Speaker 1: At just four feet and eleven inches, Bonnie was a
Speaker 1: petite young girl, weighing around ninety pounds. She had a
Speaker 1: face full of freckles and long brown hair. Her close
Speaker 1: friends often referred to her as a free spirited individual
Speaker 1: with a sweet disposition, sharp intellect, strong determination, and fearlessness.
Speaker 1: Music was one of her passions, and she particularly adored
Speaker 1: the Almond Brothers band. Bonnie was a student in gifted classes,
Speaker 1: and instead of going to traditional high school, she chose
Speaker 1: to attend the experimental John.
Speaker 3: Dewey High School.
Speaker 1: That's where Mitch and Bonnie first crossed paths and bonded
Speaker 1: over their shared academic successes. With impressive GPAs and ambitious
Speaker 1: plans for the future, it seemed unlikely that they would
Speaker 1: simply vanish without a trace. To make matters more suspicious,
Speaker 1: they had secretly exchanged wedding, leading the police to believe
Speaker 1: that they may have deliberately disappeared together. Even after six
Speaker 1: weeks of no contact, the police remained doubtful and dismissed
Speaker 1: the disappearance of the simple teenager runaways. Frustrated by their
Speaker 1: lack of action, the parents of both missing teenagers took
Speaker 1: matters into their own hands and launched independent investigations, regardlessly
Speaker 1: working to bring attention to the case. In nineteen seventy three,
Speaker 1: despite the passionate police for these two disressed families, investigators
Speaker 1: from three different counties in New York chose to ignore
Speaker 1: their crist for help and refused to launch an official investigation.
Speaker 1: Despite assurances from the NYPD that they would inform other
Speaker 1: agencies nationwide about the missing teens, they failed to do so.
Speaker 1: As a result, the Slovan County Sheriff's Office also neglected
Speaker 1: to help investigation on the case. On the twenty fifth
Speaker 1: anniversary of the disappearance of the teenagers, Bonnie's sister, Sheryl Kagan,
Speaker 1: decided to launch an investigation to find uncovered the truth
Speaker 1: behind her sister and Mitch's fate. Her dis May, she
Speaker 1: discovered that the original case files, notes from investigators, dental records,
Speaker 1: and a list of potential witnesses had all been lost
Speaker 1: by both the Sylvan County Sheriff's Office and the NYPD's
Speaker 1: Missing Persons Squad. As a result, crucial information was not
Speaker 1: entered into the FBI's National Crime Information Center. A former
Speaker 1: detective from Sullivan County named Anthony Suarez confessed that he
Speaker 1: had been assigned to the case in nineteen ninety four,
Speaker 1: but never attempted to contact the original investigator or make
Speaker 1: any effort to solve the mystery of Bonnie and Mitch's disappearance.
Speaker 1: Anthony Suarez passed away in May of twenty twenty. Now,
Speaker 1: in the year two thousand, a man came forward with
Speaker 1: a remarkable tale. Unfortunately, it was never confirmed and the
Speaker 1: man has since passed away. In summary, he claimed to
Speaker 1: have hitchhiked with Bonnie and Mitch, who were desperately trying
Speaker 1: to get home from a concert that couldn't reach. They
Speaker 1: were supposedly picked up by an orangeb W bus, but
Speaker 1: the driver pulled over when things got too intense. The
Speaker 1: group stopped at the Susquehanna River for a swim, but unfortunately,
Speaker 1: both Mitch and Bonny were swept away by the strong current.
Speaker 1: The driver left, but promised to contact the police, so
Speaker 1: the other hitchhikers saw no need to do so himself. Eventually,
Speaker 1: he did meet with investigators at his own expense, and
Speaker 1: now the police believe his story is the most likely
Speaker 1: explanation for what happened to the missing teens. Nevertheless, the
Speaker 1: families remained doubtful and are waiting to hear from the
Speaker 1: driver or any other potential witnesses. However, despite their efforts,
Speaker 1: no one has stepped forward with any information about the incident.
Speaker 1: This case remains unsolved. Next up, we have the case
Speaker 1: of Jojo Delard On November ninth, nineteen ninety five, twenty
Speaker 1: one year old Jojo Delard left her home in Callen County,
Speaker 1: Kilkenny to take a bus to Dublin, where she was
Speaker 1: supposed to meet up with friends. After spending the afternoon
Speaker 1: at Brooksville's Pub on Grafton Street, she planned to take
Speaker 1: the bus back home around ten pm. However, she missed
Speaker 1: the last bus of the night and had to board
Speaker 1: a different one that would take her somewhat close to
Speaker 1: her find her destination in nas County kill Dare. With
Speaker 1: no other plans for the evening, she hopped off that
Speaker 1: bus and began hitchhiking. This was a common occurrence at
Speaker 1: the time. After hitch hiking her first ride to Moon,
Speaker 1: Jojo called a friend from a fai phunt. She promised
Speaker 1: to be home soon as someone had just pulled over
Speaker 1: and offered her a ride while she was making the call.
Speaker 1: As soon as she hung up, she presumably got into
Speaker 1: the car and was never seen or heard from again.
Speaker 1: Even though her family continuously asked for updates and assistance,
Speaker 1: the police initially refused to provide any help. They believed
Speaker 1: Jojo voluntarily disappeared and would reappear on her own. Eventually,
Speaker 1: during the evening when Jojo Delard disappeared, a truck driver
Speaker 1: claimed he saw a young woman running naked through Moon.
Speaker 1: The driver and his boss were traveling through the area
Speaker 1: at the time and spotted the visibly distressed woman, but
Speaker 1: they did not stop to offer assistance. They did, however,
Speaker 1: call the police and were promised that someone would immediately
Speaker 1: go to the location and investigate. The driver claimed that
Speaker 1: he later learned the woman was not Jojo, and authorities
Speaker 1: confirmed that it was actually from one else.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 1: The murder of Jojo was only recently declared by authorities,
Speaker 1: and now the police are searching for any traces of
Speaker 1: her mains. The case was reopened a few years ago
Speaker 1: and the Police Service of Ireland issued a statement to
Speaker 1: the public. In JoJo's family they now believed she was
Speaker 1: a victim of homicide and that her cause of death
Speaker 1: was most likely due to violent means. This case is
Speaker 1: filled with an extraordinary amount of information, largely to the
Speaker 1: relentless effort of JoJo's family, particularly her devoted sister. They've
Speaker 1: taken upon themselves to investigate the case. Feeling let down
Speaker 1: by the authorities from the get go, hiring investigators and
Speaker 1: following leeds has become their own responsibility. Despite all their efforts,
Speaker 1: the truth behind Jojo Delarde's disappearance remains elusive and sadly,
Speaker 1: she is not the only young woman to go missing
Speaker 1: in that area. Next, we have Jamie Herdman at only
Speaker 1: twenty six years old. Jamie Herdman was a skills chef
Speaker 1: from Facatone, New Zealand. He had failed to work at
Speaker 1: a furniture removal company in Broome, Western Australia when he disappeared.
Speaker 1: During his free time, Jamie poured his passion into renovating
Speaker 1: a Nissan utility van that he dreamed of taking for
Speaker 1: a cross country trip across Australia. After completing his project
Speaker 1: and waiting for the perfect moment, Jamie finally set off
Speaker 1: on his long awaited road trip. Jamie's family reported missing
Speaker 1: on December five, two thousand and six, when they couldn't
Speaker 1: reach him during his trip. An investigation was launched and
Speaker 1: authorities discovered that Jamie was last seen hitchhiking at Dally Waters,
Speaker 1: approximately three hundred and seventeen miles from Darwin, where his
Speaker 1: family believed he was headed. His van, which had a
Speaker 1: history of overheating was quickly located abandoned near a roadhouse
Speaker 1: on Stuart Highway. Inside the unlocked van, authorities found Jamie's clothes, phone,
Speaker 1: credit cards, toothbrush, and some cash. However, his keys were missing.
Speaker 1: In November of two thousand and six, Jamie made the
Speaker 1: unusual decision to travel through the center of Australia on
Speaker 1: his way to Dally Waters. His brother Karl, described this
Speaker 1: as bizarre. Jamie was an avid fisherman, leading his family
Speaker 1: to believe that he would have more likely chosen route
Speaker 1: along the coast. However, Carl reported that Jamie had left
Speaker 1: Broom suddenly and without informing anyone, not friends, family, or
Speaker 1: even his employer. The family suspected that Jamie may received
Speaker 1: a warning from a friend about someone who was after
Speaker 1: him or planning to harm him in some way. Everyone
Speaker 1: held on to the hope that Jamie was simply unaware
Speaker 1: of the search efforts to find him, and that he
Speaker 1: was out there somewhere continue his journey and still safe.
Speaker 1: There was also the possibility that he had become stranded
Speaker 1: in a remote Aboriginal community, cut off from the rest
Speaker 1: of civilization due to severe flooding, but as more time
Speaker 1: passed without any word from Jamie, it became increasingly unlikely
Speaker 1: that he would be found alive. Despite extensive search efforts
Speaker 1: on land and in the air, no trace of Jamie
Speaker 1: or any clothes I saw his whereabouts have ever been discovered.
Speaker 1: He remains missing to this day, along with many others
Speaker 1: who have traveled through the isolated Australian outback and never
Speaker 1: returned home. And finally, Joshua Jones. Joshua Jones, a twenty
Speaker 1: nine year old man from Hurst Rise in matt Locke, Derbyshire, England,
Speaker 1: left his home on December twelfth, twenty twenty at approximately
Speaker 1: eleven thirty. He told his wife Talia that he was
Speaker 1: going to the pharmacy and would be back soon. Before leaving,
Speaker 1: he kissed his two year old son and wife goodbye,
Speaker 1: but never return. At around noon, CCTV footage captured Joshua
Speaker 1: at a department store and then later at a nearby
Speaker 1: Sainsbury grocery store. Witnesses supported seeing him hitchhiking on the
Speaker 1: A six thirty two towards Chesterfield at around four pm.
Speaker 1: Prior to his disappearance, Joshua had texted his wife saying
Speaker 1: I love you to the moon and back. This mysterious
Speaker 1: vanishing led to both reports to the police about potential
Speaker 1: sightings of Joshua. However, no one has been able to
Speaker 1: locate him since. When he disappeared, he'd been wearing a
Speaker 1: gray super dry jacket and blue jeans. The sleeves of
Speaker 1: the coat were light colored and the inside was green.
Speaker 1: Other identifying features include a Japanese inspired tattoo on his
Speaker 1: right arm featuring a dragon, a koi f and a crane.
Speaker 1: On his left wrist, there was a tattoo in Tallia's
Speaker 1: handwriting that read to the Moon and Back with a
Speaker 1: red rocket and runes surrounding a moon inside. Despite the
Speaker 1: efforts of authorities, including drone searches, mountain rescue teams, and
Speaker 1: a helicopter, Joshua Jones could not be found, nor any
Speaker 1: information about his disappearance. There are no leeds or evidence
Speaker 1: in this case. His wife claimed that she wasn't surprised
Speaker 1: that he couldn't be seen on CCTV footage because there
Speaker 1: were only cameras in Central Matlock. Dahlia also mentioned that
Speaker 1: her and Joshua had often talked about leaving society behind him,
Speaker 1: building a treehouse to live in during the pandemic and lockdowns.
Speaker 1: Joshua struggled with feeling trapped and anxious. He refused to
Speaker 1: seek medical help, believing time would heal his wounds. Eliat
Speaker 1: remains hopeful that her husband is still alive and possibly
Speaker 1: living in the wilderness, as he was skilled in survival
Speaker 1: and loved the outdoors. Now, there is no record explaining
Speaker 1: the reason that he would have had to possibly leave
Speaker 1: his wife and sun behind intentionally. However, the day before
Speaker 1: he vanished, his card broken down, and both he and
Speaker 1: Italian were concerned about the expenses of getting it fixed
Speaker 1: and how that would affect plans to purchase Christmas gifts.
Speaker 1: On top of that, rent was due and they had
Speaker 1: yet to shop for their holiday meal. Tellia speculates that
Speaker 1: the stress of their life together may have pushed him
Speaker 1: to flee. Unfortunately, there is no further information on this case,
Speaker 1: and Joshua Jones remains missing. The strange disappearance of Eric Sears.
Speaker 1: On July fourteenth, two thousand and four, friends and recent
Speaker 1: graduates of Carlsbad High School in California, seventeen year olds
Speaker 1: Eric Sears and Ben Fogelstrom, decided to go on a
Speaker 1: camping trip together in Joshua Tree National Park. The two
Speaker 1: of them showed up to their campsite in jumbo rocks
Speaker 1: and we're just having a good time. They were turned
Speaker 1: away from the Sanya Sinto due to wildfires. Around noon
Speaker 1: is when investigators believe the two boys became separated. Teams
Speaker 1: of searchers were told that Eric became dehydrated and Ben
Speaker 1: went to go and find some water. Erk stayed behind
Speaker 1: and curled up underneath a picnic bench to try and
Speaker 1: rest in the shade until Ben returned. When Ben came back,
Speaker 1: he couldn't find Eric anywhere and became panicked. Some other
Speaker 1: campers came across him hiw is still unclear, and brought
Speaker 1: him into the park office to report the disappearance of
Speaker 1: Eric at around four to forty the next afternoon.
Speaker 3: The search of a.
Speaker 1: Twenty square mile area of the park began at six
Speaker 1: pm that evening. There's an intensive search and rescue operation.
Speaker 1: Parks SAAR teams scattered the area with help from various
Speaker 1: law enforcement teams, and as of Sunday, there were one
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy searchers in total, but by Monday the
Speaker 1: number of searchers had dropped to forty because the volunteers
Speaker 1: had to return to work.
Speaker 3: The search included tracking.
Speaker 1: Dogs, horses, a helicopter, fixed wing planes, and climbers who
Speaker 1: looked in rock crevices where he could have fallen. Robert Fonda,
Speaker 1: one of the parks lead trackers, said the search was
Speaker 1: difficult because it had taken place in one hundred plus
Speaker 1: degree heat every day, because the terrain varied from really
Speaker 1: flat to boulder outcroppings where the footing is perilous. He stated,
Speaker 1: we've been working a lot in the back areas and
Speaker 1: making sure that some teams didn't miss anything. You can't
Speaker 1: speculate about what may have happened, You just have to search.
Speaker 1: Searchers did find some of Eric's shoe prints, and the
Speaker 1: dogs were able to pick up his scent, but none
Speaker 1: of it enabled them to determine where he was going.
Speaker 1: Eric was described as in top physical condition. He ran
Speaker 1: cross country for four years in high school and even
Speaker 1: traveled to Australia two years earlier with other state runners.
Speaker 1: As an adult, he also participated in a twenty four
Speaker 1: hour relay race between Carlsbad and El Camino High Schools
Speaker 1: at Carlsbad July tenth and eleventh to promote the sport
Speaker 1: and help raise money. Unfortunately, all would not end well.
Speaker 1: Eric's body was found on July twenty third. Because of
Speaker 1: death couldn't be determined by autopsy because that time it
Speaker 1: was too badly decomposed. There was no obvious trauma found
Speaker 1: anywhere on the body. This is when the investigators turned
Speaker 1: to the only person who was with him that night
Speaker 1: for answers. The rest of the story was told by
Speaker 1: Ben to the authorities. It's strange, to say the least.
Speaker 1: Here's what Ben said had happened leading up to the disappearance.
Speaker 1: Though he admitted to authorities during this statement, but he
Speaker 1: was having trouble distinguishing what actually happened from hallucinations he
Speaker 1: was certain he was having due to his and Eric's
Speaker 1: partaking in a wildly grown, illicit but not illegal in
Speaker 1: the state of California substance the night before. His report
Speaker 1: was oftentimes conflicting and all over the place. He told
Speaker 1: authorities both he and Eric had drank a tea made
Speaker 1: from a certain weed. He claimed he remembered speaking to
Speaker 1: a bush an Indian, and possibly to Eric. He said
Speaker 1: he was pretty sure his friend was deceased because he
Speaker 1: thought he remembered disposing of his body. He also couldn't
Speaker 1: tell authorities exactly see how Eric had gone missing or
Speaker 1: ended up deceased, depending on which story Ben was recounting
Speaker 1: at the time. However, two chemicals toxins found in this
Speaker 1: plant were found in Eric's brain tissue. One way or another,
Speaker 1: the use of this plant by Ben and Eric was
Speaker 1: a major contributing factor in Eric's death. The plant known
Speaker 1: as gemsen weed, local weed, stink weed, mad apple, thorn
Speaker 1: apple are among the street names for the foul smelling Datura.
Speaker 1: Stramonium plant is one of a group of plants known
Speaker 1: as belladonnas notarius. Tremonium is a common weed found along
Speaker 1: roadsides in cornfields, pastures, and waste areas. It's been reported
Speaker 1: to grow widely in all but two states, by only
Speaker 1: in Alaska. Although it's not popular on the street, it
Speaker 1: is usually used by teenagers curious about the plants hallucinogenic
Speaker 1: and euphoric effects. Although something adolescents might use with their peers,
Speaker 1: all parts of the plant are toxic and usage can
Speaker 1: result in serious illness or death. It can take up
Speaker 1: to hours for someone to feel the plant's effects, so
Speaker 1: people often consume excessive amounts, believing it's not working since
Speaker 1: it's growing wild. The ponency is impossible to predict. The
Speaker 1: toxicity even varies by year, between plants, parts of the plant,
Speaker 1: and even among different leaves on the same plant. Even
Speaker 1: just a small amount of it ingested can cause nausea, headache,
Speaker 1: severe agitation, hallucinations, behavioral changes, and or delirium. Annually, poison
Speaker 1: control centers deal with approximately one thousand cases of poisoning
Speaker 1: by these plants. Usage increases between May and September, when
Speaker 1: the plants are mature and plentiful. The overwhelming majority of
Speaker 1: users report that their experience was very unpleasant, physically dangerous,
Speaker 1: and sometimes terrifying. Few people ever use it twice. Even
Speaker 1: a one time usage can have tragic effects, such as
Speaker 1: in this case. With all that being said, one may
Speaker 1: ask what is the lure to experiment with the plant
Speaker 1: which seems have no pleasant effects whatsoever. The effects have
Speaker 1: been described as being in a living dream and can
Speaker 1: last for days. It has extremely powerful psychoactive effects, including hallucinations, delusions, disorientation, confusion,
Speaker 1: and panic. Doesn't sound like my idea of fun. Users
Speaker 1: have no concept that anything they are talking to seeing
Speaker 1: or running from isn't actually there. That's how intense these
Speaker 1: hallucinations can be, where it's impossible to distinguish them from reality.
Speaker 1: Oddly enough, some of the hallucinations are reported to have
Speaker 1: recurrent themes, such as insects, cigarettes, people, or objects appearing
Speaker 1: and disappearing, including demons and monsters. Smoking a phantom cigarette
Speaker 1: is one of the most common hallucinations, even if the
Speaker 1: individual has never smoked before. Talking to inanimate objects, plants,
Speaker 1: and friends who are not present is also frequently reported.
Speaker 1: Individuals lose their ability to identify their friends and may
Speaker 1: not even recognize their own reflection in a mists. Individual
Speaker 1: may also try to interact with these hallucinations. Most users
Speaker 1: don't even realize that they're hallucinating until its effects were off.
Speaker 1: Amnesia is also frequently reported, with users having no memory
Speaker 1: of what they were doing for several hours, or they
Speaker 1: may unconsciously replace fact with fantasy. They can fall in
Speaker 1: and out of conscience, slip into delirium. It's believed that
Speaker 1: this is what happened with There can be in while
Speaker 1: they were out being typical teenagers that night in Joshua
Speaker 1: Tree did they get in over their heads and one
Speaker 1: thing lead to another. Did Eric dive an overdose? I'm
Speaker 1: taking too much thinking the initial doses weren't effective or
Speaker 1: not working for him? Or was it something else all together? Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: gyms and weeds related deaths are often a result of
Speaker 1: impair judgment that leads to risk taking activities such as
Speaker 1: believing you can fly and jumping off a cliff, or
Speaker 1: chasing a mermaid in a lake even though you can't swim.
Speaker 1: Are the above listed or nowhere near all the dangerous
Speaker 1: effects this particular belladonna could have on the human brain
Speaker 1: and psyche. So what happened to Eric Serius that faithful
Speaker 1: night in two thousand and four when he had his
Speaker 1: whole life ahead of him and was just looking to
Speaker 1: have some fun with his friend in a beautiful place
Speaker 1: the celebration of the Huge Life milestone and graduating high school.
Speaker 1: Eric was described by his peers as popular and friendly, and,
Speaker 1: as mentioned before, was a member of the cross country team.
Speaker 1: He had been accepted in the engineering program at San
Speaker 1: Diego State University that was to begin classes that fall.
Speaker 1: His death affected the whole community, According to an affidavit
Speaker 1: file and super record in Indio. He provided several stories
Speaker 1: of hallucinating during the night, with he being Ben Fogustrom.
Speaker 1: The community was heartbroken with the discovery of Eric's body
Speaker 1: and with the seeming senselessness of it. On top of
Speaker 1: it all, on the porch of the series' home, signs
Speaker 1: with messages of hope, flowers and red and white and
Speaker 1: blue candles formed what was to be a welcome for
Speaker 1: the family when they returned. Parents Tom and Wendy Sears
Speaker 1: have remained at the desert campground since shortly after their
Speaker 1: son was reported missing. Officials said the Seers family was
Speaker 1: in seclusion Friday night in nearby twenty nine Palms, and
Speaker 1: that their daughter, Stephanie, aged nineteen, was en route to
Speaker 1: join them. Many were expected to return later in the
Speaker 1: evening to share prayers and light candles against the darkness
Speaker 1: at the Seers home, something they have done not after
Speaker 1: night this week. Neighbors and friends said the mutual support
Speaker 1: provided by the small, close community has at times been
Speaker 1: the only thing that carried them through more than a
Speaker 1: week of waiting. Groups of neighbors who traveled daily to
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree to help support the family. There was a
Speaker 1: search warrant issued for Ben's home in hopes of uncovering
Speaker 1: more information. According to this affidavit, investigators did give him
Speaker 1: a lie detect your test, but we know that these
Speaker 1: are faulty and not admissible in most courts. This was
Speaker 1: while searchers were so looking for Eric in the Jostuh
Speaker 1: Tree Park. According to the affidavit, Ben Tearrifory admitted during
Speaker 1: an interview with detectives that he found Eric dead inside
Speaker 1: his tent. He said that happened the day he reported
Speaker 1: his friend as missing. This is also where he admitted
Speaker 1: to disposing of Eric's body by putting an inside an
Speaker 1: outhouse toilet at their campsite, but according to the affidavit,
Speaker 1: that's when he wanted to stop talking to investigators and
Speaker 1: then change the story altogether. Investigators say he later denied
Speaker 1: dumping Eric's body in an outhouse and said that's not
Speaker 1: where I put him. Investigators did indeed check several park toilets,
Speaker 1: but searchers eventually found Eric's body lying in the middle
Speaker 1: of the desert, about three miles from the Jumbo Rocks campground.
Speaker 1: Sheriff's investigators tried hard to corroborate what Ben told them
Speaker 1: about what happened while they were at the campsite before, during,
Speaker 1: and after they had consumed the plan. Whatever information was
Speaker 1: given to us in the affidavit, investigators are looking into
Speaker 1: it and looking at every scenario in the affidavit, they said.
Speaker 1: But despite statements ben apparently made in this Affidavid, the
Speaker 1: Sheriff's department said he was not a suspect in the death.
Speaker 1: They did say that he is still a focus of
Speaker 1: their investigation as they tried to figure out exactly how
Speaker 1: the seventeen year old ended up dead in the desert
Speaker 1: at Joshua Tree. No one was ever charged of anything
Speaker 1: in relation to the death of Eric Sears, and so
Speaker 1: much of what happened remains a mystery. To make matters
Speaker 1: worse and even more sad, two San Bernardino County Sheriffs
Speaker 1: Search and Rescue volunteers on their way to help search
Speaker 1: for Eric, A thirty five year old man named Joseph
Speaker 1: Tidwell from Wonder Valley who was allegedly under the influence
Speaker 1: of several narcotic substances, lost consciousness due to his intoxication,
Speaker 1: causing his truck to drift across the roadway directly into
Speaker 1: the path of the Sheriff's man, Scott Johnson, thirty of Redlands,
Speaker 1: died at the scene. Philip Calvert, fifty eight, of Mentone,
Speaker 1: was transported to Desert Regional Medical Center with major injuries
Speaker 1: and sadly died early the next morning. Although this harmful
Speaker 1: plant isn't scheduled under the Controlled Substances Act, three states, Connecticut,
Speaker 1: New Jersey, and Tennessee at this time have passed legislation
Speaker 1: to control it. In addition, the FDA has asserted that
Speaker 1: the beladonna alkaloids in this plant are neither safe nor
Speaker 1: effective in over the counter or other cough and cold inhalos,
Speaker 1: So be careful what you put into your body. Hello, friends,
Speaker 1: In this video, going to take a look at Devil's
Speaker 1: Hole and the tragic disappearance of two teens in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty five. Now, there's just something about a place with
Speaker 1: the name devil in its title that pigs the curiosity
Speaker 1: of some people. There are countless locations all over the
Speaker 1: world which have this particular word in their name. Not
Speaker 1: only devil, either, there are many other words that symbolize
Speaker 1: or mean devil or evil, or some other form of
Speaker 1: something not very good or beautiful, given somewhat ironically to
Speaker 1: some of the world's most breathtaking and wondrous places. Sometimes
Speaker 1: the location will have got its name innocantly enough, such
Speaker 1: as because the geology of the place simply looks foreboding
Speaker 1: and sinister, especially under the cover of night. Much of
Speaker 1: the time, these particular places are said to be cursed, enchanted,
Speaker 1: or downright evil, and the spooky and scary landscape only
Speaker 1: lends credence to these rumors and legends. So much of
Speaker 1: the time, though, these places with this particular word in
Speaker 1: the title are associated with not just devils, demon spirits,
Speaker 1: and other other worldly phenomena, but with real tragedies, disappearances, deaths,
Speaker 1: maybe bizarre sounds and strange lights in the sky. Today, though,
Speaker 1: we're going to focus on one place in particular. We're
Speaker 1: a mysterious tragedy struck Devil's Whole, which is located in
Speaker 1: the aptly named Death Valley National Park in California, United States.
Speaker 1: This portion of the Mojave Desert contained in Death Valley
Speaker 1: National Park is the driest and hottest place in the
Speaker 1: United States. Near bad Water in the long trench of
Speaker 1: the desert between the Panamint Range on the west and
Speaker 1: the Black Mountains on the east, is the lowest dry
Speaker 1: land in the Western Hemisphere, an amazing two hundred and eighty.
Speaker 3: Two feet below sea level.
Speaker 1: A veritable showcase of desert extremes, Death Valley National Park
Speaker 1: includes one of the largest salt pans on Earth, dramatically
Speaker 1: faulted landscapes, young volcanic craters, and massive dune fields. Today,
Speaker 1: we're going all the way back to the year nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty five. Death Valley was very different from the Los
Speaker 1: Angeles of the time, where there were uprisings happening all
Speaker 1: over the place and all of it being shown live
Speaker 1: on the evening news. Valley, California, was in one of
Speaker 1: the least populated parts of the state at the time,
Speaker 1: and a whole different world from the more largely inhabited
Speaker 1: cities which surrounded it. On June twentieth, nineteen sixty five,
Speaker 1: four high school buddies set out to remote desert location
Speaker 1: about ninety miles northwest of Las Vegas. Their intent was
Speaker 1: to joydive into a deep geothermal abyss called Devil's Hole. Sadly,
Speaker 1: two the young men would never re emerge from this
Speaker 1: mysterious fossil water portal. Arriving at their destination, the foursome
Speaker 1: high cup of hot Barren hillsite, which overlooked a large
Speaker 1: scale ranching operation that would nearly erase a much smaller
Speaker 1: and nearly ancient complex called ash Meadows. Within a few
Speaker 1: short years, A well trampled trail led to the entrance
Speaker 1: of a limestone chasm that had allegedly opened a whopping
Speaker 1: sixty thousand years ago after possibly some seismic and caused
Speaker 1: the roof of the cave to collapse in on itself.
Speaker 1: The Foursome of Boys, which was made up of Paul
Speaker 1: gian Contery, a nineteen year old cafeteria worker at the
Speaker 1: nearby Nevada Test Site, his new brother in law, twenty
Speaker 1: year old David Rose, who was a Las Vegas casino
Speaker 1: parking attendant, or with their other friend, nineteen year old
Speaker 1: Bill Alter, and his younger brother Jack, Boys scrambled under
Speaker 1: a fenced enclosure posted with warning signs, and thinking they
Speaker 1: were immune to any trouble these warning signs might be
Speaker 1: posted about, they proceeded to descend the thirty or so
Speaker 1: feet down to a ledge where the faint but flitting
Speaker 1: movement of tiny blue gray pupfish could be observed swimming.
Speaker 3: In the eight by sixty foot pool, that is, if.
Speaker 1: Any of the four young men had bothered to look
Speaker 1: just a bit closer at what they were about to
Speaker 1: jump into. After suiting up with scuba tanks, masks, and
Speaker 1: dive lights, Paul, David, and Bill dove into the claustrophobic waters.
Speaker 1: The temperature was nearly indistinguishable from that of their skin.
Speaker 1: Upon entering the pool, The boys most likely disturbed the
Speaker 1: delicate algae's falling mats, where the entire population of the
Speaker 1: exceedingly rare Cyprinodon diabolus continues to prosper and breed exclusively.
Speaker 1: Jack was the only one who hadn't jumped in, as
Speaker 1: he was delegated the one who would remain stationed on
Speaker 1: the ledge in case anything went wrong. Some time after midnight,
Speaker 1: Paul failed to resurface, so David and Bill quickly redove
Speaker 1: into the waters in a vain attempt to locate their
Speaker 1: missing friend. Bill Alter frantically followed David Rose down to
Speaker 1: approximately one hundred and seventy feet until David too disappeared
Speaker 1: into the darkness. The bodies of the brothers in law
Speaker 1: were never recovered. Many people believed back then and still
Speaker 1: do believe that these young men were inspired to go
Speaker 1: diving at night, despite the dangers in the specific place,
Speaker 1: because of a newspaper article from the year before, which
Speaker 1: detailed spe leological research expedition of a massive underground lake
Speaker 1: below Death Valley led by California based professional diver Jim Houns,
Speaker 1: who would ironically dive numerous times around the clock with
Speaker 1: military personnel and other volunteer divers in their attempt to
Speaker 1: locate the missing men for thirty six whole hours until
Speaker 1: the search was eventually called off. The only traces left
Speaker 1: of the two brother in laws a mask and a snorkel.
Speaker 1: There was also a flashlight tied to allege some hundred
Speaker 1: feet below. It seemed to signal and effectively the way
Speaker 1: out of the otherworldly underwater cave system. Articles detailing the
Speaker 1: unsuccessful rescue effort were published nationwide in the Sarasota Journal
Speaker 1: date of June twenty second, eighteen sixty five. Out stated
Speaker 1: that he had previously dived in Devil's Hole around three
Speaker 1: hundred times over twenty eight trips, further commenting it's beautiful
Speaker 1: in there. It goes straight down one hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: feet like a pipe, then opens into a room that
Speaker 1: is about three hundred feet long and maybe forty feet wide.
Speaker 1: The bottom of the room is about two hundred and
Speaker 1: sixty feet down. Then it narrows into another tube. I
Speaker 1: dive to three hundred and fifteen feet Maybe that's a record,
Speaker 1: I don't know. But at the end of the tube
Speaker 1: it opens again into something else. We don't know what
Speaker 1: the next room is, or if it's a room at all.
Speaker 1: It's like infinity. There are some very terrifying legends from
Speaker 1: the native tribes of the area about this particular place
Speaker 1: called Devil's Hole. The Timbasha told tales of water babies
Speaker 1: who'd surface and swallow a swimmer or dive or hole
Speaker 1: should they stay in the pool for too long. Other
Speaker 1: legends suggested that so a Pizi, a legendary malevolent giant
Speaker 1: who dwelled at mountain springs and caves, would snatch into
Speaker 1: our unwary victims. Myths was standing. Barbara Durham, an elder
Speaker 1: of the Tumbious who shared these stories at a two
Speaker 1: thousand and two workshop, admitted that she and her friends
Speaker 1: enjoyed how the pupfish tickled their toes when they played
Speaker 1: in the spring. Keep in mind here that the Devil's Whole. Pupfish,
Speaker 1: as they're specifically named, are considered by experts to be
Speaker 1: the rarest fish found anywhere on the planet. They were
Speaker 1: even the first ever species to be classified as endangered.
Speaker 1: The fish are not important to the story at all, really,
Speaker 1: but it seemed worth mentioning in order to reinforce how
Speaker 1: very special and perhaps a bit magical this place actually is.
Speaker 1: As far as the two young men who disappeared without
Speaker 1: a trace back in this mystical and extremely dangerous underwater
Speaker 1: cave system decades ago, well, they've never been found, and
Speaker 1: neither have any clues relating to what could it possibly
Speaker 1: happen to them. As for one more bit of interesting
Speaker 1: fact that could lend a bit of credence as something
Speaker 1: a bit more sinister being afoot, as the local tribes
Speaker 1: absolutely believe that this other serene and tranquil looking water source.
Speaker 1: It said that Charles Manson himself spent several days at
Speaker 1: Devil's Hole trying to figure out a way to make
Speaker 1: it safely down into the chasm, with some saying he
Speaker 1: was convinced.
Speaker 3: He would never have to come back up.
Speaker 1: Allegedly, he had an obsession with the place and was
Speaker 1: convinced that there was an underwater portal to an alternate dimension,
Speaker 1: or more specifically, a portal to the underworld, where he
Speaker 1: felt he and his family would be able to safely
Speaker 1: wait out the coming apocalypse. He so famously predicted what
Speaker 1: happened that never actually did. Charles Manson's problem lie in
Speaker 1: figuring out a way to drain the hole, and it
Speaker 1: seemed like he may have been given this idea by
Speaker 1: an alleged Indian legend that resurfaced during the nineteen twenties,
Speaker 1: contending that a subterranean sect of leather clad humanoids lived
Speaker 1: down within an early yellow green lid a boat somewhere
Speaker 1: in the Mohave Desert.
Speaker 5: Says Bill, planned on leaving the park before dark, and
Speaker 5: when she still hadn't heard from him by Friday morning,
Speaker 5: she called rangers, who launched a search effort that's.
Speaker 8: Grown an incredible story of survival. The hiker survived five
Speaker 8: days alone out in Joshua Tree.
Speaker 1: It all started on the last week of December in
Speaker 1: twenty twelve. My mother and I were relaxing after work
Speaker 1: watching TV when out of the corner of my eye,
Speaker 1: I noticed movement in our hallway. When I turned to look,
Speaker 1: I noticed two shadowy like figures that appeared on our
Speaker 1: hallway wall. In disbelief of what I was saying, I
Speaker 1: turned my head over towards my mother, and right as
Speaker 1: I did, she made eye contact with me and simply said,
Speaker 1: you see them, don't you?
Speaker 3: I said yes.
Speaker 1: She told me not to acknowledge them, because they are
Speaker 1: entities that consens fear. But in disbelief, I looked back
Speaker 1: over the hallway wall and they were gone. A few
Speaker 1: days had gone by, and my mother told me she
Speaker 1: felt a sense of dread and said someone in our
Speaker 1: family is going to pass away before the end of
Speaker 1: the year. Well, on New Year's Eve twenty twelve, my
Speaker 1: mother and I celebrated at home. We watched the movie
Speaker 1: Tron and had a pizza delivered to ring in the
Speaker 1: new year. I've always been a real mama's boy, so
Speaker 1: this was an ideal way for me to spend my
Speaker 1: New Year's Eve. Around eleven pm that night, we saw
Speaker 1: the two figures again. This time we both experienced an
Speaker 1: overwhelming quietness and sense of urgency and dread. We both
Speaker 1: did our best ignored and eventually the shadowy figures, And
Speaker 1: since this went away, we discussed the experience, and again
Speaker 1: my mother told me to never acknowledge them, and before
Speaker 1: I could press her for more details, my mother started
Speaker 1: telling me how much I meant to her and that
Speaker 1: I would go on to do great things.
Speaker 3: In my life. She loved me, et cetera.
Speaker 1: She then got up and walked towards the kitchen, turned
Speaker 1: around and said I love you, then fell to the ground.
Speaker 1: I had previous EMT training and am certified in CPR,
Speaker 1: so I dialed nine to one one and explained to
Speaker 1: them my mother is in cardiac arrest and I needed
Speaker 1: medical assistance asap. I was doing CPR on my mother
Speaker 1: for nearly twenty minutes, and for anyone who's ever done CPR,
Speaker 1: it's not easy. The MTS arrived at eleven thirty eight
Speaker 1: pm and my mother was taken to the emergency room.
Speaker 1: By this time, our neighbor and friend, Bonnie, had rushed
Speaker 1: over to my house and drove me to the hospital.
Speaker 1: When I checked in at the front desk, I was
Speaker 1: taken to a small private room and the physician told
Speaker 1: me that my mother had passed away. The autopsy showed
Speaker 1: my mother suffered from a fatal heart attack and her
Speaker 1: time of death was eleven fifty nine pm on December
Speaker 1: thirty first, twenty twelve, when I was taken in to
Speaker 1: see her one last time. Her lips were blue. She
Speaker 1: was cool to the touch, but she was still my mom,
Speaker 1: so I just hugged her and couldn't let go for
Speaker 1: nearly thirty minutes. Thankfully, my neighbor Bonnie was there and
Speaker 1: gave me plenty of support and encouragement to leave eve
Speaker 1: as my mother would want me to stay strong. Fast
Speaker 1: forward about six months after my mother died, I'd quit
Speaker 1: my job and had become a recluse. I would only
Speaker 1: leave my house to purchase groceries. I quickly realized how
Speaker 1: severely depressed I was and decided it was time to
Speaker 1: get away. I ended up traveling to Joshua Tree National
Speaker 1: Park and decided it would be my getaway to find
Speaker 1: some peace and closure. I notified my neighbor Bonny not
Speaker 1: to worry that I'm just going on a day's hike
Speaker 1: and would be back by midnight. When I arrived at
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree, I parked my jeep and entered the Lost
Speaker 1: Palms Oasis Trail. After a few hours of walking and hiking,
Speaker 1: I stopped to take a break and eat. As I
Speaker 1: finished up and looked around, nothing looked familiar, and I,
Speaker 1: in fact was not on any trail. I was not
Speaker 1: too worried and felt confident I would find my way back.
Speaker 1: But as I made my way through the desert landscape
Speaker 1: that I did not recall ever passing, I started feeling
Speaker 1: like I was being watched. I started to panic. Then
Speaker 1: I started hearing strange growling noises, but could not determine
Speaker 1: from what direction they were coming from. It almost seemed
Speaker 1: like they were all around me. So I stood in
Speaker 1: one spot and made a three hundred and sixty degree rotation.
Speaker 1: As I came to stop, I saw something transparent, no
Speaker 1: defining shape, just to blur directly in front of me
Speaker 1: that was coming closer and closer to where I was standing.
Speaker 1: I quickly turned around and started walking faster and faster
Speaker 1: in the opposite direction, and then experienced the same overwhelming
Speaker 1: quietness and sense of urgency and dread I had experienced
Speaker 1: with my mother just six months prior. Then, all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, almost like a snap of a finger, daytime
Speaker 1: turned into night. I wasn't sure what was going on,
Speaker 1: but knew something wasn't right. After walking around in the dark.
Speaker 1: I found myself by a large rock about as big
Speaker 1: as a large suv and felt safest there. I put
Speaker 1: my back against the rock. This way, I felt no
Speaker 1: otherhing would sneak up behind me. I used the knight
Speaker 1: to hydrate and eat some snacks I brought. I remember
Speaker 1: trying to make sense out of what I was experiencing,
Speaker 1: but knew that my mother and I had already experienced
Speaker 1: something within our own home. But at least when I
Speaker 1: was home, I felt safe here, I was vulnerable and alone.
Speaker 1: As I tried to rest that night, I started seeing
Speaker 1: a number of shadowy entities walking around in the desert,
Speaker 1: almost as if they were wandering around aimlessly. It freaked
Speaker 1: me out, and the more I acknowledged them, the closer
Speaker 1: they got to me. At one time during the night,
Speaker 1: I remember feeling something breathing down my neck. Remember my
Speaker 1: back was against a huge rock. I just closed my
Speaker 1: eyes and did my best to keep them shut. The
Speaker 1: last thing I remember about that night was opening my
Speaker 1: eyes and seeing three shadowy figures, one at each side
Speaker 1: and one directly in front of me. Then once again,
Speaker 1: in a snap, it was morning. I would experience the
Speaker 1: same weirdness for two more days until the last day.
Speaker 1: On the last day of me roaming around Joshua Tree,
Speaker 1: I hadn't had any food or water since the initial
Speaker 1: first night. I was scared and dehydrated. I came upon
Speaker 1: another large rock and remembered in my MT training that
Speaker 1: digging a hole near a rock in the desert will
Speaker 1: keep you cool and less likely to get severe sunburn.
Speaker 1: I did just that and thought to myself, I'm literally
Speaker 1: digging my own grave. By the time I laid down
Speaker 1: in the two foot arch hole I had made and
Speaker 1: covered my chest and legs up of dirt, I blacked out.
Speaker 1: I don't remember anything for the rest of that day
Speaker 1: or night. The next morning, I was woken by an
Speaker 1: off duty search and rescue employee who was literally making
Speaker 1: me choke on water. I remember him saying, there are
Speaker 1: a whole lot of people out looking for you, buddy.
Speaker 1: I was picked up by helicopter and taken a regional
Speaker 1: medical center in Palm Springs, California. In the days during
Speaker 1: my recovery, I saw two detectives, a number of psychiatrists,
Speaker 1: and my neighbor Bonnie, who was there at the hospital
Speaker 1: by my side one hundred percent away. The detectives wanted
Speaker 1: to close the missing person's report. My neighbor Bonnie made
Speaker 1: the second day I was missing, but they asked me
Speaker 1: strange questions like was I using a.
Speaker 3: Flare gun in the area?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 1: And why had I purchased a large amount of camping
Speaker 1: gear and survival materials prior to my hike. I'm going
Speaker 1: for a hike. Strange questions to ask someone, or maybe
Speaker 1: it's just me. The physician stated he thought I was
Speaker 1: planning to myself due to the loss of my mother,
Speaker 1: but honestly, that never crossed my mind. The psychiatrist told
Speaker 1: me I didn't experience anything but hallucinations due to the
Speaker 1: lack of food and water and effects of dehydration. My
Speaker 1: neighbor Bonnie overheard my story and later confided in me
Speaker 1: that she too experienced similar shadowy figures when she hiked
Speaker 1: in Joshua Tree. When I arrived back home, she used
Speaker 1: sage and other New Age methods to rid my house
Speaker 1: of whatever darkness was there. However, it continued all the
Speaker 1: way up until I moved to Tennessee in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 1: The most aggressive was the transparent entities that were in
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree. I felt like everything was about to end
Speaker 1: when I encountered them. I've always wondered if my mother
Speaker 1: experienced more than what happened that night. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what the hell happened those few days in Joshua Tree
Speaker 1: National Park, but from what I can remember, during the
Speaker 1: moments when daytime would turn into night and snap, I
Speaker 1: felt like I was falling down or being suspended in
Speaker 1: mid air before completely realizing what was going on. I
Speaker 1: also remember a strong urge to go to Joshua Tree.
Speaker 1: I would think about going all the time, and when
Speaker 1: I finally went, almost felt like I was being called
Speaker 1: there by something my sister often talks about my first
Speaker 1: week living in Tennessee. She said that she felt like
Speaker 1: a demon was attached to me. One night as I
Speaker 1: slept on her couch. I woke up with her putting
Speaker 1: holy water on my head and saying a prayer over me.
Speaker 1: But I don't believe in all that I used to.
Speaker 1: But nowadays I have an easier time believing in alien
Speaker 1: abduction and portals rather than being followed around by demon.
Speaker 1: But then again, who knows?
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 1: Finally, I can tell you, with one d percent honesty,
Speaker 1: I experienced all the above. I can't explain what it
Speaker 1: or what they were, but I can tell you I
Speaker 1: feel like my life was spared for some strange reason.
Speaker 1: Perhaps I didn't meet the requirements for whatever it is
Speaker 1: they need. Looking back now, I would never have gone
Speaker 1: hiking alone. But again, I remember this irresistible urge to
Speaker 1: go to Joshua Tree and would frequently feel like I
Speaker 1: was being called.
Speaker 8: There hiking transitting on one of her most popular mountain peaks.
Speaker 9: A woman from out of state dying after trying to
Speaker 9: hike Camelback Mountain. Fire official say she became overheated on
Speaker 9: the Echo Canyon trail, but instead of waiting for rescue crews,
Speaker 9: she went to find help herself. Then a deadly discovery.
Speaker 9: Her body later found near the mountain, right outside a home.
Speaker 8: A woman found dead near Camelback Mountain was thanking with
Speaker 8: a Phoenix cop, and tonight we know the woman's name
Speaker 8: is Angela Tremonte, a thirty one year old visiting from Boston.
Speaker 8: She was found dead Friday after separating from that cop
Speaker 8: to turn back down the mountain in the summer heat.
Speaker 10: And she thought, because he was a police officer, she
Speaker 10: was sick and she wasn't. And I sent him the
Speaker 10: address where it was. It took them three hours to
Speaker 10: find her. And when I talked to Dario that night
Speaker 10: and asked him, when was the last time you saw
Speaker 10: my daughter, she said six hours ago? So not you
Speaker 10: why the police may not be investigating this, but I
Speaker 10: won't stop. I will not stop. There is something missing
Speaker 10: that I, as a mother, did not put my finger on.
Speaker 1: Hello friends, today we're going to bring in a strange
Speaker 1: story about a first date hike that resulted in a
Speaker 1: young woman's death. Thirty one year old Angela Tremonte was
Speaker 1: visiting Phoenie, Arizona for the first time when she and
Speaker 1: a local police officer named Dario Dizdar decided to go
Speaker 1: on a hike for their first date. The couple went
Speaker 1: to Echo Canyon Trail near Scottsdale, Arizona. Echo Canyon Trail
Speaker 1: is a two point five mile heavily trafficked out and
Speaker 1: back trail that offers scenic views and beautiful landscapes. The
Speaker 1: trail is rated as difficult, but Angela and Dario weren't concerned,
Speaker 1: as it was later reported that Dario was extremely familiar
Speaker 1: with the mountain and hiked that exact trail often. According
Speaker 1: to reports, they started hiking together around ten am with
Speaker 1: no water, but split up. Dario, an off duty police officer,
Speaker 1: stated that he was a local and did this hike
Speaker 1: all the time, and that she was going to go
Speaker 1: as far as she could and turn around, according to
Speaker 1: an incident report followed by an unnamed park ranger. Now,
Speaker 1: according to what Dario told the authorities, he and Angela
Speaker 1: were going for a day hike together for their first
Speaker 1: date on July thirtieth. He reported that she became overheated
Speaker 1: when they were about halfway up the trail and told
Speaker 1: them she was wanted to head back down to the car.
Speaker 3: Dario wanted had.
Speaker 1: To finish the hike, assuming he would just meet her
Speaker 1: back at the vehicle when he was done. Angela wanted
Speaker 1: him to take pictures of the view from the top
Speaker 1: of the mountain so she could share them on her
Speaker 1: social media camps. He finished his hike, but when he
Speaker 1: got back down to the car, Angela wasn't there and
Speaker 1: wasn't anywhere in sight. Her belongings were still in the car, however,
Speaker 1: and this is when Dario's police officer instincts kicked in
Speaker 1: and he decided to report it to the authorities that
Speaker 1: his date was missing. Mark Ranger spoke with him on
Speaker 1: the mountain and the search commenced. Immediately, search teams arrived
Speaker 1: and began looking around common areas on the mountain where
Speaker 1: people can get off the trail and get lost. More
Speaker 1: than thirty fire personnel and a police helicopter scoured the
Speaker 1: region looking for the missing woman. Initially, authorities were suspicious
Speaker 1: of Dario because they thought his initial statement was changing
Speaker 1: the more he retold what.
Speaker 3: Happened that day.
Speaker 1: However, it was later realized that he had been misquoted
Speaker 1: by local news media and therefore misunderstood. A Phoenix police
Speaker 1: spokesperson stated that the police department was not informed as
Speaker 1: to what the park rangers and officials had already asked
Speaker 1: Dario about the incident. Angela Tremonte was originally from the
Speaker 1: Boston area and was visiting Phoenix for the first time,
Speaker 1: specifically to meet and go on a date with Daria.
Speaker 1: They had met and been chatting online, mainly by Instagram.
Speaker 1: It was less than twenty four hours from her arrival
Speaker 1: that Angela went missing and was then found deceased. Around
Speaker 1: four Bruce found Tremonte unconscious near home along the side
Speaker 1: of the mountain. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
Speaker 1: Police say no traumatic injuries were observed during the initial
Speaker 1: investigation or during the autopsy. Police say Tremante had her
Speaker 1: cell phone with her when she was found. Fire officials
Speaker 1: involved in the search stated they believe she was trying
Speaker 1: to signal to someone in the homes there near the
Speaker 1: mountain to get some help. She must have known she
Speaker 1: was in trouble, but most likely had no cell service
Speaker 1: to call anyone for help or self. At this time,
Speaker 1: there is no evidence to indicate foul play is suspected
Speaker 1: in connection with her tragic death. Police say Dario Disdar
Speaker 1: has been granted personal time off and has been offered
Speaker 1: resources to deal.
Speaker 3: With this tragedy.
Speaker 1: According to the Maricopa County Medical Examiner's website, Angela died
Speaker 1: of environmental heat exposure. Her death was ruled accidental by
Speaker 1: local and park authorities. Angela Tremante's friends set up a
Speaker 1: gofund me account to bring her body back to the
Speaker 1: Boston area. Angela's mother, however, isn't satisfied with the medical
Speaker 1: Examiner's findings. She's looking for answers after her daughter's cause
Speaker 1: of death was ruled to be from accidental heat exposure.
Speaker 1: I'm frustrated, said Nancy Tremonte, Angela's mother. My daughter was
Speaker 1: an Instagram person. She posted everything, thousands of photos per day,
Speaker 1: and she was always in the picture. And there's not
Speaker 1: one picture of her going up the mountain or even
Speaker 1: in Arizona. She said, none of it makes sense. But
Speaker 1: as we said, Americopa County Medical Examiner's office did recently
Speaker 1: list Tremante's death as accidental and as a result of
Speaker 1: heat exposure. Phoenix police had previously stated investigators didn't find
Speaker 1: anything suspicious about Tremonte's death. However, Tremante's family and friends
Speaker 1: have had suspicions about the circumstances surrounding her death all along,
Speaker 1: especially since the off Deedy police officer claimed he and
Speaker 1: Tremante didn't bring any water with him on a hike
Speaker 1: in the middle of the summer. Angela's cousin doesn't believe it.
Speaker 1: It's difficult because we are all mourning her, but we
Speaker 1: can't fall back and be sad about the situation. We
Speaker 1: all have to fight, said Gabrielle Pletuccio, Angela's cousin. Angela
Speaker 1: was found deceased in a backyard off the trail. Investigators
Speaker 1: believe she's in a desperate search for water. Speaking about
Speaker 1: travel to Arizona to meet the officer, she was excited
Speaker 1: but nervous, said her cousin. She also made it a
Speaker 1: point to drink a whole gallon of water every day,
Speaker 1: so it's very hard to believe that she would go
Speaker 1: on a hike in Arizona where it was one hundred
Speaker 1: and four degrees and not take any water. Autopsy reports
Speaker 1: recently released by the County Medical Examiner's office showed no
Speaker 1: major regularities that were uncovered that would indicate Tremante's death
Speaker 1: could be tied to something other than heat exhaustion. A
Speaker 1: toxicology report did show that Tremante had traces of amphetamine
Speaker 1: in her system, although her family told twelve News she
Speaker 1: had a prescription for adderall, which can produce high levels
Speaker 1: of amphetamine in the blood. Ramonte had three hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty nanograms per mile leader of amphetamine in her system
Speaker 1: at the time for death. According to the report, adults
Speaker 1: who fatally overdose on amphetamine have on average nine thousand
Speaker 1: nanograms per mole leader in their system. Autopsy report additionally
Speaker 1: turned up irregular linear dried red abrasions on Tremonte's body
Speaker 1: that ranged in size between four and ten centimeters. An
Speaker 1: examination of her head neck revealed no detectable abnormalities, according
Speaker 1: to the report. The report also stated that Tremonte's bone, framework,
Speaker 1: and soft tissues also appeared normal. Phoenix Police had previously
Speaker 1: said investigators didn't find anything suspicious about Tremonte's death. They
Speaker 1: further indicated no disciplinary measures will be taken against Dario
Speaker 1: because no prime has been found. Hello, friends, Today we're
Speaker 1: going to take a look at legends, disappearances, and stories
Speaker 1: of survival in Joshua Treat National Park, California. Joshua Treat
Speaker 1: National Park is home to a vast and protected land
Speaker 1: located in southern California. The area was first designated as
Speaker 1: a National monument in nineteen thirty six a President Franklin
Speaker 1: Delano Roosevelt, and was later given national park status in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety four when the United States Congress passed the
Speaker 1: California Desert Protection Act. The park spans more than seven
Speaker 1: hundred and ninety thousand acres, and over half is reserved
Speaker 1: as wilderness. The park is well known for the tree
Speaker 1: that inspired its name, the Joshua Tree. Scientifically, it's known
Speaker 1: as the Yuckup brevifolio and as a member of the
Speaker 1: agave family. Joshua trees grow in a wide variety of formations,
Speaker 1: from then a sparsely place to thick and crowded forests.
Speaker 1: According to the National Park Service, of the mid nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: Mormon immigrants had made their way across the Colorado River
Speaker 1: and into the area that is now the National park.
Speaker 1: Legend has it that these pioneers named the tree after
Speaker 1: the biblical figure Joshua. Seeing the limbs of the tree
Speaker 1: has outstretched its supplication, guiding the travelers westward. Joshua Tree
Speaker 1: National Park is a meeting ground between the low lying
Speaker 1: western reach of the Sonor and De Lizzard and the
Speaker 1: more vegetated Hi Bahabi Desert. The merging deserts give the
Speaker 1: park a unique landscape with an abrupt transition between the
Speaker 1: Sonoran and Mahabi ecosystems. Joshua Tree offers visitors a variety
Speaker 1: of outdoor activities, including the typical hiking, biking, camping, and
Speaker 1: horseback riding. There are large boulders throughout the park that
Speaker 1: make it a well known rock climbing destination, and the
Speaker 1: night skies provide crystal clear stargazing. The natural beauty of
Speaker 1: the park is a key factor in its popularity. But
Speaker 1: despite all the beauty found in Joshua Tree, inexplicable things
Speaker 1: have been known to happen here, some of which are
Speaker 1: truly horrifying. Let's look at local legends, disappearances as survival
Speaker 1: stories from Joshua Tree National Park. First up, Desert Dungeon.
Speaker 1: In the depths of Joshua Tree National Park, there's a
Speaker 1: strange cave, which is actually an enclosure constructed around a
Speaker 1: large boulder and sealed with an iron door. There long
Speaker 1: enduring legends attached to this cave. Some people think perhaps
Speaker 1: it was where local farm restored dynamite. Others theorized it
Speaker 1: was where rustlers or gold thieves kept their loot. The
Speaker 1: energy it radiates, however, is much more sinister, darker, more disturbing.
Speaker 1: Legends exist, probably rooted in truth about the cave being
Speaker 1: used to hold people captive. One story with many versions,
Speaker 1: maintains that a local family and born a horribly disfigured
Speaker 1: and mentally impaired son who was huge and monstrous. The
Speaker 1: family hid him away from society, locking him up in
Speaker 1: this rocket iron desert dungeon. The father would bring him food,
Speaker 1: but the poor soul spent his days and nights of prisoner.
Speaker 1: Growing tired of this miserable existence, the disfigured man broke
Speaker 1: out of his prison and fled, leaving the iron door
Speaker 1: ajar for his father to find. Upon his return. Searching
Speaker 1: far and wide, the father couldn't find his son. Reports
Speaker 1: and rumors began to surface about random brutal attacks on
Speaker 1: travelers who sustained injuries like they were surrogants being punished
Speaker 1: for someone else's horrible misgivings. The legend holds that the
Speaker 1: tortured man was never caught, and he, or whatever's left
Speaker 1: of him, could still be out there today roaming Joshua Tree,
Speaker 1: looking for unsuspecting travelers to make them atone for his
Speaker 1: father's sins. Next up, we have the Yuckaman. The first
Speaker 1: reported sighting of the Yucker Man happened in nineteen seventy one,
Speaker 1: provided by a source not normally keen on believing in
Speaker 1: the other worldly. A United States marine was on guard
Speaker 1: duty at the base in Joshua Tree's twenty nine Palms.
Speaker 1: Well into his overnight shift. The marine was keeping posts
Speaker 1: duty required when a huge and seemingly human man came
Speaker 1: out of darkness toward him. As the burly being drew closer,
Speaker 1: the marine caught sight of the man's successive hair growth
Speaker 1: as abnormally long arms, which hung well below the knees.
Speaker 1: The marine lifted his rifle and gave an order to halt,
Speaker 1: but then the strange man lunged forward and snatched the
Speaker 1: rifle away, surprising the marine and knocking him off stands.
Speaker 1: He was startled, but caught himself and watched as the
Speaker 1: wild man bent the metal rifle barrel in half with
Speaker 1: his bare hands. The broad shouldered beast of a man
Speaker 1: gave a grunt and then knocked the marine unconscious, perhaps
Speaker 1: with the butt of his own weapon. When he came to,
Speaker 1: the giant man was gone, but his disfigured gun lay
Speaker 1: next to him. Even so the marine couldn't move. The
Speaker 1: blow he sustained had caused a lot of damage. He
Speaker 1: lay there half conscious until the next morning, when he
Speaker 1: was found by the relief guard. Reportedly, both the CIA
Speaker 1: and the FBI were brought in to investigate, as this
Speaker 1: wasn't the only incident to be reported. There were at
Speaker 1: least two other sightings that same night. Wonderport described the
Speaker 1: man as being nearly two feet tall, but with a smaller,
Speaker 1: unknown figure by its side. Several people also reported that
Speaker 1: their dogs had barked and acted strangely that evening. In
Speaker 1: the same year, there were reports from employees at Joshua
Speaker 1: Tree stating they had also seen the large hairy figure.
Speaker 1: In nineteen seventy nine, a couple on a trip to
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree said they were forced to slam on the
Speaker 1: brakes in their car one night when what they described
Speaker 1: as a large hairy man stood in the middle of
Speaker 1: the road near their condominium in Desert Hot Springs. They
Speaker 1: recalled that he just stepped from behind a yucca bush
Speaker 1: and stood in front of the car, refused to move.
Speaker 1: The couple claimed the creature's hairy chest was the size
Speaker 1: of a refrigerator and its arms were abnormally long. Sounds familiar.
Speaker 1: It had lengthy tan hair that swished back and forth
Speaker 1: as it walked away and disappeared into the night, but
Speaker 1: only after frightening them. Senseless evidence was left behind it.
Speaker 1: Yet more Yukaman's sightings in nineteen seventy nine in him It, California.
Speaker 1: This beast seen on two separate occasions. This being left
Speaker 1: behind seventeen footprints that were said to be a foot
Speaker 1: and a half long, spanning six feet apart. Two prominent
Speaker 1: bigfoot researchers worked the area looking for further information, but
Speaker 1: nothing more has surfaced.
Speaker 3: Skin Walkers.
Speaker 1: Toys of skinned walkers inhabiting the Joshua Tree area date
Speaker 1: back many centuries. The Native American Navajo tribe first experienced
Speaker 1: these beings several hundred years ago, calling them ey Nagloshi,
Speaker 1: meaning he who walks.
Speaker 3: On all fours.
Speaker 1: The legend of the skin walkers hold forth that they
Speaker 1: are actually human shape shifters that were once shamans of
Speaker 1: the Navajo tribe. The shamans, who used their gifts for
Speaker 1: evil like herding or cursing people, were turned into skin walkers,
Speaker 1: able to take the form of various animals like fox,
Speaker 1: birds of coyotes. The Navajo people tried to keep their
Speaker 1: existence from becoming known to the outside world, but over
Speaker 1: a century ago, weird and often terrifying things began happening
Speaker 1: to outsiders in Joshua Tree, so terrifying, in fact, that
Speaker 1: some Navajo people refuse to this date to speak of
Speaker 1: the skinwalkers for fear of drawing them to them. Campers, visitors,
Speaker 1: and other travelers are reported being attacked and often taunted
Speaker 1: by these beings. Some campers have claimed that when a
Speaker 1: skin walker is near, it's like they're being drawn toward
Speaker 1: whatever the creature is mimicking. Skinwalker attacks are sometimes even deadly,
Speaker 1: with evil beings sinking their teeth into human flesh and
Speaker 1: ripping people apart. Those who live to tell the tale
Speaker 1: of a skinwalker attack are never the same, and they
Speaker 1: always carry scars, both of the physical and psychological varieties. Next,
Speaker 1: let's look at some strange disappearances from Joshua Tree National Park.
Speaker 1: Paul Miller, fifty one years old, disappeared on July thirteenth,
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, in Joshua Tree National Park. He was on
Speaker 1: vacation with his wife, Stephanie at the time of his disappearance.
Speaker 1: They were traveling in celebration of their twenty sixth wedding anniversary.
Speaker 1: Backwoods camping, hiking, and kayaking were typical pastimes for the couple.
Speaker 1: They were in great shape and loved the outdoors. Paul
Speaker 1: last spoke with his wife when he told her that
Speaker 1: he was going out from one last hike in the park.
Speaker 1: He planned on hiking the popular forty nine Palms Oasis
Speaker 1: Trail before they were to begin their journey back to Ontario, Canada.
Speaker 1: He left their hotel room around nine am that morning
Speaker 1: and drove to the trailhead. When Paul didn't return by
Speaker 1: the hotel checkout time, Stephanie became worried. Around noon, she
Speaker 1: contacted park officials and a search and rescue mission was launched.
Speaker 1: Paul's rental car was found where he parked at the trailhead,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't with it. Rangers hiked the trail looking
Speaker 1: for him, but to no avail. Paul also didn't have
Speaker 1: a cell phone on him, but this was not out
Speaker 1: of the ordinary. The search for paulk continued for five
Speaker 1: days with not so much as a trace of evidence
Speaker 1: servicing aside from his rental car. The search included over
Speaker 1: six hundred volunteers, multiple agencies, k nines, high tech equipment,
Speaker 1: and lots of hope, but nothing was found. Park superintendent
Speaker 1: David Smith said, we have a witness who saw Paul
Speaker 1: at the trailhead that morning, but that's all. Another visitor
Speaker 1: from England that was at the park that morning reported
Speaker 1: seeing Paul at around nine am walking quickly and with purpose.
Speaker 1: About halfway down the trail. No other sightings were reported. However,
Speaker 1: on December twenty first, twenty nineteen, in PS authorities and
Speaker 1: San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department reported that human remains had
Speaker 1: been found in a remote and rocky part of Joshua Tree.
Speaker 1: Official state of the discovery came about through photographs taken
Speaker 1: by a drone fly over the area in November. On
Speaker 1: December twenty, park ranger's height to the area where they
Speaker 1: found human skeletal remains. In personal longings, there was no
Speaker 1: identification with the remains, which appeared to have been there
Speaker 1: for quite some time. Upon the discovery of these remains,
Speaker 1: the Miller family prepared themselves for the likelihood that those
Speaker 1: belonged to Paul. It's been a tough journey, waiting, waiting, waiting.
Speaker 1: Then you hear he's been found, It doesn't make it
Speaker 1: any easier. Stephanie Miller said in a phone interview. Speculation
Speaker 1: is that whatever happened that caused his death happened quickly,
Speaker 1: she said, possibly a heart attack or heat stroke. He
Speaker 1: was found in a shaded area and still had water
Speaker 1: and food. It appeared he had made the heike to
Speaker 1: forty nine Palms Oasis, but was coming back from trail
Speaker 1: the wrong way. Early in the search for Paul, teams
Speaker 1: had gotten close enough to where the remains were found
Speaker 1: that he would have heard and responded when they called
Speaker 1: out his name, She said, adding there is comfort knowing
Speaker 1: he didn't suffer long. I hated to think he was suffering,
Speaker 1: and we couldn't find him. As of January nineteenth, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two time of recording, Paul Miller's case has no
Speaker 1: further updates. Another disappearance in Joshua Tree was that of
Speaker 1: William Michael Euasco. Sixty five year old William Michael Ouasco,
Speaker 1: known as Bill, disappeared on June twenty fourth, twenty ten,
Speaker 1: from Joshua Tree National Park while on a day Hi.
Speaker 1: Bill lived in Marietta, Georgia, along with his freance Mary Winston.
Speaker 1: Bill was a strong hiker with experience in the wilderness,
Speaker 1: and he had loved Joshua Tree for a long time
Speaker 1: and visited the park almost yearly. He was an Army
Speaker 1: veteran who had served in Vietnam and he loved to
Speaker 1: be outdoors. It was on a Wednesday, June twenty third,
Speaker 1: twenty ten, When Bill arrived at Lax from Georgia, he
Speaker 1: rented a white Chrystler Seabring and drove to Rancho Mirage, California.
Speaker 1: Bill was staying at a friend's vacant condo on this
Speaker 1: particular trip. On Thursday, the twenty fourth of June, he
Speaker 1: headed for Joshua Tree, making a couple of calls along
Speaker 1: the way. Bill told his beon s Mary that he
Speaker 1: planned on leaving the park by five pm and was
Speaker 1: going to have dinner that evening at the Pioneer Town
Speaker 1: restaurant Pappy in Harriet's. Mary believed that Bill was planning
Speaker 1: the hike too a place called Carry's Castle, which was
Speaker 1: the first item on the planet a tenerary he'd left
Speaker 1: with her. That would have been an ambitious hike for
Speaker 1: the time of year, though due to the high temperatures
Speaker 1: in the lower portion of Joshua Tree. Mary was uncomfortable
Speaker 1: with the destination choice due to its remoteness and had
Speaker 1: asked him to reconsider. Bill just laughed it off and
Speaker 1: gave no indication he was changing his mind. When Bill
Speaker 1: failed to call Mary that evening, she grew concerned and
Speaker 1: began making calls early the next day. Friday, June twenty five,
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree officials had been notified of the incident and
Speaker 1: were given a description of Bill's vehicle along with his itinerary.
Speaker 1: By mid morning, rangers to check the trailhead for Carry's Castle,
Speaker 1: but found no vehicles. They began checking other areas of
Speaker 1: the park, but it wasn't until four fifty six pm
Speaker 1: on Saturday, June twenty sixth at the California Highway Patrol
Speaker 1: copter spotted Bill's vehicle park at the Juniper Flats trailhead,
Speaker 1: which is a regular starting point for visitors wanting to
Speaker 1: hike to the top of Quail Mountain, a destination also
Speaker 1: listed on Bill's itinerary. Ranger stayed with Bill's car overnight
Speaker 1: just in case he came back, but he never showed.
Speaker 1: There was one known visitor to Jennifer Flats trailhead on
Speaker 1: the day Bill disappeared, a hiker named Greg Mendoza. At
Speaker 1: the time of his arrival around ten twenty am, there
Speaker 1: was no one else at the trailhead, but upon his
Speaker 1: return between five point thirty and six pm, he saw
Speaker 1: Bill's car. He also saw a single line of fresh
Speaker 1: boot tracks going up the old Jennifer Flats Road. This
Speaker 1: means that Bill's car had arrived at the parking lot
Speaker 1: no earlier than ten twenty am, leaving at minimum a
Speaker 1: near two and a half hour gap from his last
Speaker 1: phone call. It should have only taken Bill about half
Speaker 1: that time to reach Juniper Flats trailhead, so it's unknown
Speaker 1: where Bill was for the extra hour or so. By
Speaker 1: this point, an official search and rescue operation began, focusing
Speaker 1: mainly on Quail Mountain, but also involving other areas that
Speaker 1: he could have accessed from the Jenniper Flat's trailhead. The
Speaker 1: official search continued until July fifth, twenty ten, eleven days
Speaker 1: after Bill's disappearance, and involved hundreds of search and rescue
Speaker 1: personnel Included in these search and rescue teams from all
Speaker 1: over southern California, where canine units, horseback riders, civilian volunteers, helicopters,
Speaker 1: and a fixed wing aircraft. In total, about seven hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy miles of GPS tracks from ground searchers were logged.
Speaker 1: Only a red bandana believed to belong to Bill, was
Speaker 1: found on the ridge near Quayll Mountain. Throughout all these efforts,
Speaker 1: the unofficial search continued on despite the lack of evidence,
Speaker 1: even with many people being involved after the official search ended.
Speaker 1: As of this recording in January of twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: bill Owasco remains missing and there have been no further updates.
Speaker 1: Lauren Choe Lauren Ell Choe disappeared on June twenty eighth,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, from the area between Marongo and Yucca
Speaker 1: Valleys in California. Lauren grew up in Hunterdon County, New Jersey,
Speaker 1: and with mother nicknamed Elle. She studied music education at
Speaker 1: Westminster Choir College and became a high school music teacher. However,
Speaker 1: Elle quit her teaching job in the winter of twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: She then joined her friend Cody Orrel on a road
Speaker 1: trip cross country. She joined this trip with the intention
Speaker 1: of running a food truck once they arrived at their
Speaker 1: final destination, Bombay Beach, California. By June twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: Elle was working as the private chef for an Airbnb
Speaker 1: property called The Whole, owned by Tao Ruspoli. The property
Speaker 1: is located between Yucca and Morongo Valleys outside of Joshua
Speaker 1: Tree National Park. On June twenty eighth, twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: Elle took off on her own after he had argument
Speaker 1: ensued between she and her friend, Cody. The housekeeper at
Speaker 1: the Airbnb property claimed that both Ell and Cody had
Speaker 1: been drinking since early in the day and l had
Speaker 1: become aggravated when Cody refused to let her drive away,
Speaker 1: so she took off on foot, leaving her phone and
Speaker 1: taking no food or water. This was around three in
Speaker 1: the afternoon. Cody called the Sheriff's office around five thirteen
Speaker 1: PM when his initial search rail which included some of
Speaker 1: their other friends, came up empty. They didn't find so
Speaker 1: much as a single footprint. Elle was last seen wearing
Speaker 1: a yellow T shirt and blue jeans shorts when she
Speaker 1: walked away from where she was staying. Cody thought she
Speaker 1: might have gotten into a vehicle with someone, considering there
Speaker 1: were no tracks and Elle was supposedly planning on meeting
Speaker 1: an unknown individual later in the day anyway, although this
Speaker 1: theory was never confirmed. Law enforcement officials, as well as
Speaker 1: search and rescue teams come to the area on foot,
Speaker 1: and included K nine rescue teams and a fixed wing
Speaker 1: aircraft which was used conduct aeri of searches. The Morongo
Speaker 1: Basin Sheriff Station told reporters that their helicopter, along with
Speaker 1: members of the Search and Rescue unit, had been searching
Speaker 1: for L since her disappearance. However, they believe that L
Speaker 1: was voluntarily missing due to no evidence of foul play.
Speaker 1: The Specialized Investigation Divisions of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's
Speaker 1: Department began assisting in the search rail in September of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one. However, this was a good three months
Speaker 1: after her disappearance. Despite these efforts, no evidence of her
Speaker 1: whereabouts came to light. Cody and some of L's other
Speaker 1: friends tried bringing awareness to her disappearance by using social
Speaker 1: media platforms. They also posted flyers all around the Bombay
Speaker 1: Beach area, but nothing came of it. No one came
Speaker 1: forward claiming to have seen L. The search continued until
Speaker 1: October ninth, twenty twenty one, when investigators found human remains
Speaker 1: in the rugged terrain of Yaco Valley. On October twenty
Speaker 1: eighth of twenty twenty one, it was confirmed that the
Speaker 1: remains found did indeed belong to L. Because in manter
Speaker 1: of for passing have not been released as of this recording.
Speaker 1: In January of twenty twenty two, large show's case has
Speaker 1: no further updates. Next it brings us to the disappearance
Speaker 1: of Patrick Lynn Wells. Thirty eight year old Patrick Wells
Speaker 1: disappeared on June five, twenty twenty one, from Joshua Tree
Speaker 1: National Park. Park spokesperson Jenny Albrink stated that Patrick was
Speaker 1: last seen on June fifth, when he left to drive
Speaker 1: to his dad's house. Patrick was from twenty nine Palms
Speaker 1: and he was heading your Riverside. He never made it
Speaker 1: to his destination and was officially reported missing on June ten.
Speaker 1: He's described as a Caucasian male five feet ten inches tall,
Speaker 1: playing about one hundred and ninety seven pounds. He has
Speaker 1: brown hair and brown eyes, as well as a dragon
Speaker 1: and a United States Marine Corps.
Speaker 3: Insignia tattoo on his arms.
Speaker 1: Is believed he was wearing a white T shirt, blue jeans,
Speaker 1: and either tennis shoes or black work boots at the
Speaker 1: time of his disappearance. Park officials found Patrick's truck in
Speaker 1: the Indian Cove parking lot of the Rattlesnake Canyon area
Speaker 1: on the day was reported missing. Joshua Tree National Park
Speaker 1: began investigating and organized a search. The efforts continued until
Speaker 1: The search was hauled at June twelfth, twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: on discovery of human remains in a hiking area of
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree. Soon after, the coroner confirmed the remains belonged
Speaker 1: to Patrick, though no cause of his passing was listed.
Speaker 1: As of January nineteenth, twenty twenty one, the date of
Speaker 1: this recording, there have been no further updates on the
Speaker 1: Patrick Wells case. Next, we have Erica Ashley Lloyd. Thirty
Speaker 1: seven year old Erica Lloyd was last seen on June fourteenth,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, at her home in Walnut Creek, San Bernardino County, California.
Speaker 1: She told her family she was going on a camping
Speaker 1: trip to Joshua Tree National Park. Erica's mob ruth since
Speaker 1: she he was just trying to make ends meet like
Speaker 1: so many others during the pandemic. Erica owned a salon
Speaker 1: called Bloom in Alamo, California, but when the mandatory closures
Speaker 1: and other restrictions came about due to the pandemic, Erica's
Speaker 1: salon closed down and didn't reopen.
Speaker 3: The trip to.
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree was to be a chance for her to
Speaker 1: get away from all the negativity for a little while.
Speaker 1: Erica's described as five foot three inches tall, one hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty five pounds, and house brown hair and blue eyes.
Speaker 1: According to Erica's roommate, she said she was planning to
Speaker 1: meet other people at Joshua Tree. However, the identities of
Speaker 1: those people she was supposedly planning to meet are still
Speaker 1: a mystery, and it's unclear if she did indeed meet.
Speaker 3: Up with anyone. After leaving home.
Speaker 1: On June fourteen, when Erica didn't return and couldn't be reached,
Speaker 1: her family reported her missing. On June seventeen, authorities found
Speaker 1: Erica's car, a black two thousand and six, on to
Speaker 1: a cord, abandoned on Shelton Road north of State Route
Speaker 1: sixty two, just east of the Nine Palms area. Both
Speaker 1: the front and rear windshiels were broken, and the car
Speaker 1: appeared to be involved in a sandburm accident which mangled
Speaker 1: the k frame of the car and deployed the airbag.
Speaker 1: Even so, California Highway Patrol Officer Casey Simmons said investigators
Speaker 1: found no evidence on the roadway consistent with the traffic accident.
Speaker 1: Some of Erica's items were found in the car, but
Speaker 1: there was no sign of her whereabouts. The police stated
Speaker 1: there was no indication of foul play up until the
Speaker 1: car was found. According to Erica's sister in law, Jenna,
Speaker 1: Erica was very stressed about the pandemic and the quarantine,
Speaker 1: and she was going camping for a few days to
Speaker 1: sort of unplug, despite the fact that she was not
Speaker 1: an experienced camper. The most accurate information about Erica's disappearance
Speaker 1: can be found on the Bring Erica Home Facebook page.
Speaker 1: The following is an excerpt from a comment written by
Speaker 1: Erica's mom on that page. There have been many stories
Speaker 1: of Erica from various podcasts and in the form world,
Speaker 1: which are filled with a lot of opinions, theories, and conjectures.
Speaker 1: The information that they provide almost never comes from the
Speaker 1: police investigators handling Erica's case to verify or corroborate their info.
Speaker 1: We know that Erica was not in a good state
Speaker 1: of mind and decided to take this trip to Joshua
Speaker 1: Tree Park to clear her head. There's been no indication
Speaker 1: of foul play up to winter car was found on
Speaker 1: Shelton Road, broken down, despite what others may say or think.
Speaker 1: We received six sightings of apparently homeless or transient women
Speaker 1: fitting Erica's description in the High Desert area, but none
Speaker 1: of them turned out to be her. Some of what
Speaker 1: was done to find Erica. There were search teams from
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's department that continued to search further and further
Speaker 1: out from the location of her car. Doug Billings, an
Speaker 1: expert at mapping a cave diver, has extensive knowledge of
Speaker 1: minds in the area. He's done numerous searches with the
Speaker 1: help of his friends. Family members, and other groups have
Speaker 1: aided in the searching. Banners and a billboard were placed
Speaker 1: in strategic locations in the Wonder Valley area asking if
Speaker 1: anyone helped Erica.
Speaker 3: On June sixteenth.
Speaker 1: Erica's aunts have sent out hundreds of flyers to homeless shelters, hospitals,
Speaker 1: and food banks areas such as Twenty nine Palms, Joshua Tree,
Speaker 1: Yucca Valley, Palm Springs, Desert Springs, Indio, Coachella Riverside, Morongo Basin, Ontario,
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, San Diego, Venice Beach, and Moore. Erica's mom
Speaker 1: further states We're continuing to look at offbeat communes like
Speaker 1: Slab City and Amboy. Both police investigators from San Bernino
Speaker 1: Sheriff's Department and Walnut Creek Police Department are still actively
Speaker 1: investigating the case. The case remained active after Erica's disappearance
Speaker 1: with no real leads until January of twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: In February of twenty twenty one, Ericin's brother posted to
Speaker 1: the Facebook page saying, as the brother of Erica Lloyd,
Speaker 1: I would like to address the public on behalf of
Speaker 1: our family. On January thirty first, twenty twenty one, human
Speaker 1: remains were discovered by hikers in the vicinity of Danby
Speaker 1: Road and Amboy Road in Wonder Valley, California. It is
Speaker 1: with a heavy heart announce that these remains have been
Speaker 1: identified by Sam Bernardino County Sheriff's Department as my sister Erica.
Speaker 1: There is no easy way for me to tell you
Speaker 1: all this, and there's no easy way for any of
Speaker 1: us to receive it. My wish is that we can
Speaker 1: all lean in a little closer, hold each other up,
Speaker 1: and remind each other more often that we're here for
Speaker 1: one another with open arms and endless love. It's what
Speaker 1: she would have wanted. It's the spirit of who she was.
Speaker 1: On May twelfth, twenty twenty one, Erica's family shared another
Speaker 1: post on the Bring Erica Home Facebook page, quoting here,
Speaker 1: the family of Erica Lloyd would like to give an update.
Speaker 1: The sam Bernardino County s Sheriff's Department Special Investigative Unit
Speaker 1: has notified us they are no longer handling Erica's case.
Speaker 1: After reviewing the extensive investigation done on Erica's disappearance, they
Speaker 1: have not found any indication of foul play. Thus, Erica's
Speaker 1: case will be turned back over to the Morongo Basin
Speaker 1: Station investigators for any remaining follow up and information. From
Speaker 1: everything the investigators learned and everything we found out from
Speaker 1: our first trip to California in June to our last
Speaker 1: trip in February, all indications appeared Erica suffered a sudden
Speaker 1: mental breakdown starting about a week before she disappeared into
Speaker 1: the desert. During that last week, Erica had communicated with
Speaker 1: various family members, friends, co workers, and some clients. The
Speaker 1: common thread from all of them referring to Erica was
Speaker 1: something was off and out of place, but they couldnot
Speaker 1: put their finger on it. One co worker was so
Speaker 1: concerned about Erica on June tenth, six days before she
Speaker 1: went missing, that she dropped by Erica's apartment to check
Speaker 1: up on her and spent a couple of hours talking
Speaker 1: to her. It was the following day when Erica took
Speaker 1: off on her road trip. It has been hard to
Speaker 1: understand how Erica, who was a free spirit, hardworking and
Speaker 1: an independent loving mom, could suffer a sudden mental psychotic breakdown.
Speaker 1: Psychosis means losing touch with the reality, is often associated
Speaker 1: with various serious mental illnesses. Distress becomes too overwhelming. Anyone
Speaker 1: may experience these symptoms, triggering a breakdown. Erica was dealing
Speaker 1: with the lockdown, learning to take care of her son
Speaker 1: in the new stay and Place world a, forced to
Speaker 1: shut down of her thriving Bloom Hair studio in Almo, California,
Speaker 1: losing personal contact with the clients whose weddings and proms
Speaker 1: were canceled, and trying to make some sense to understand
Speaker 1: where our society was going. This was overwhelming to her
Speaker 1: and pushed her over the edge and into a break.
Speaker 1: Erica was no longer in control and the voices she
Speaker 1: heard had taken over her thoughts. As a family, we
Speaker 1: are heartbroken over losing our Erica. It is difficult to
Speaker 1: understand what struggles her mind was going through the last
Speaker 1: week of her life. We know there were possibly missed
Speaker 1: opportunities to stop and help Erica before she slipped away
Speaker 1: and wandered out into the desert. At this point, it's
Speaker 1: unknown if any person or persons could have made a
Speaker 1: difference in stopping or helping her. We accept what happened
Speaker 1: to Erica and know she was in the storm of
Speaker 1: her life. Joshua Treet National Park has a mystical appeal
Speaker 1: and is said to be located on a powerful energy vortex,
Speaker 1: and Erica was drawn to this place. Unfortunately, as beautiful
Speaker 1: as the desert is, the heat is brutal and harsh
Speaker 1: during the day and cold at night. We know that
Speaker 1: prior and during this time, Erica was seeking the Lord,
Speaker 1: looking for peace and happiness in her life. While working
Speaker 1: with the investigators and searchers early on, we knew there
Speaker 1: were three main possibilities of what could have happened to Erica.
Speaker 1: All were closely looked at, but sadly, on June sixteenth,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, Erica was running. It was hot, she was scared, dehydrated,
Speaker 1: and not in touch with the reality. She wandered into
Speaker 1: the desert and succumbed to the elements. We know Erica
Speaker 1: is at peace now because of Erica's faith in God.
Speaker 1: He has a bigger plan for her, which gives us comfort.
Speaker 1: This is our hope. The Lord Jesus Christ brought Erica home.
Speaker 1: End to Any updates that the family wished to share
Speaker 1: in the future will be posted on the Facebook page
Speaker 1: titled bring Erica Home.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 1: On a lighter note, not everybody that goes missing in
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree perishes. Here are some amazing true stories of survival.
Speaker 1: Claire Nelson thirty six year old Claire Nelson nearly died
Speaker 1: alone in the desert in May of twenty eighteen. Claire,
Speaker 1: originally from New Zealand, was visiting friends who lived near
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree National Park, where she was to house sit
Speaker 1: for them while they left vacation. During her stay, Claire
Speaker 1: planned on adventuring through the desert and connecting with nature.
Speaker 1: Clara was experiencing the outdoors, and she was a fiercely
Speaker 1: independent person, so much so that she had been pushing
Speaker 1: people away for some time. But she loved exploring and
Speaker 1: also sharing her travel experiences online. She was a freelance
Speaker 1: travel writer at the time of the Joshua Tree visit
Speaker 1: that changed her life forever. After her friends left for
Speaker 1: their journey to Scotland, Claire was on to her own adventures.
Speaker 1: She left for a day hike to Joshua Tree, plaiting
Speaker 1: to explore the Lost Bombs Oasis trail. However, Claire hadn't
Speaker 1: told anybody specifically where she was going, only that she
Speaker 1: planned on exploring inside Joshua Tree. It started out as
Speaker 1: a day like any other. Claire packed the day bag
Speaker 1: with a spare T shirt, several liters of water, and
Speaker 1: a meager lunch a hard boiled egg, a bagel, and
Speaker 1: a chocolate bar. Fussel carried other items that were usually
Speaker 1: not essential for just a few hours outdoors but later
Speaker 1: proved life saving, a plastic bag, a bandanna, a park
Speaker 1: map and sunscreen. With her daypacking place, Claire drove to
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree and parked. It was hot, but Claire was
Speaker 1: confident and enjoying herself in the beauty of the desert.
Speaker 1: She was waised into her heike when she unknowingly wandered
Speaker 1: off the designated trail and began following a dry river bed,
Speaker 1: and there was a boulder she had to climb on
Speaker 1: the path.
Speaker 3: She was traveling.
Speaker 1: She climbed up, then began testing her footing. Everything seemed
Speaker 1: okay until her foot started slipping and she became unsteady.
Speaker 1: She lost her balance completely and went crashing over twenty
Speaker 1: six feet down into a clearing not much bigger than
Speaker 1: she was, shattering her pelvis in the process. The fall
Speaker 1: knocked the breath out of her, and the pain was
Speaker 1: excruciating and unrelenting. Claire recalled, I'd landed amongst these large boulders,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't move. I couldn't sit up, I couldn't
Speaker 1: stand up. It was indescribably painful. Unable to move, Claire
Speaker 1: immediately tried using her cell phone to call for help,
Speaker 1: but she had no service. The predicament she was in
Speaker 1: was life threatening. Indeed, she was all alone in the
Speaker 1: desert with a shattered pelvis, barely enough water for a
Speaker 1: day and a half, and contending with the California desert heat,
Speaker 1: as well as unusually high numbers of coyote, rattlesnakes.
Speaker 3: And other dangers.
Speaker 1: I felt more vulnerable than I could ever have imagined
Speaker 1: being in my life, Claire said of the ordeal. She
Speaker 1: immediately began recording videos of herself messages to friends and family,
Speaker 1: as well as documentation of her situation. Claire occasionally tried
Speaker 1: to move, especially to find shade, but when she tried,
Speaker 1: there was a crunching, clicking sound coming from her pelvic region,
Speaker 1: along with searing, my numbing pain. She couldn't budge to
Speaker 1: admit it, but this hike was not the first time
Speaker 1: she'd left for an adventure without telling someone of her plans.
Speaker 3: I know better, I know the rules.
Speaker 1: Always tell someone where you're going, said Claire, who wrote
Speaker 1: about her experience in her book Things I Learned From Falling.
Speaker 1: The Reality of her situation set in and Claire really
Speaker 1: didn't want to spend the night alone on the desert floor,
Speaker 1: but she had no other option. Nobody knew to check
Speaker 1: in with her or to expect her back at a
Speaker 1: certain time. The fact that she might die out there
Speaker 1: alone was not lost on Claire. She kept recording videos,
Speaker 1: then turning her phone and digital camera off to conserve
Speaker 1: the battery life. She made herself eat the hard boiled
Speaker 1: eggs since it would go bad anyway, and she knew
Speaker 1: she needed the protein if she was going to survive
Speaker 1: this tragedy. Her determination and will live kicked in however,
Speaker 1: and Claire prepared herself for the nighttime. After nightfall, there
Speaker 1: were bats flying around, and Claire hoped they weren't the
Speaker 1: kind that liked to bite people. Imagination went wild, and
Speaker 1: she was sure at times that she was seeing snakes
Speaker 1: coming out of the rocks, though in reality snakes rarely
Speaker 1: come out at night. Thankfully, she survived until morning one
Speaker 1: night in the desert alone and injured. Down only two
Speaker 1: more to go, Claire tried her best to protect herself
Speaker 1: from the elements. She used a stick to rub sunscreen
Speaker 1: on her legs. Sun is unforgiving during the desert summers
Speaker 1: and can quickly do significant damage to her skin as
Speaker 1: well as dehydrate it's even faster. She rationed what was
Speaker 1: left for her food and water as long as she could,
Speaker 1: but neither it lasted very long. The lack of water
Speaker 1: grew unbearable. Dehydration is a god awful business, Claire wrote
Speaker 1: in her book. It starts in the mouth. The initial
Speaker 1: pang of craving quite subtle and easy to ignore, but
Speaker 1: the signals get more insistent over time. Your tongue becomes
Speaker 1: increasingly dry and scratchy, thickening like a woolen mitten sticking again,
Speaker 1: the size of your mouth like velcrow. From there, you
Speaker 1: feel it in your head. A slowly increasing pressure throbs
Speaker 1: inside your skull, as if her brain is shrinking in
Speaker 1: on itself, withering like a piece of dried fruit. She
Speaker 1: fantasized about diet coke and other cold refreshments, even willing
Speaker 1: them to be real. Claire had no choice. Once her
Speaker 1: water ran out, She even urinated in a bottle and
Speaker 1: drank it for hydration.
Speaker 3: While unpleasant, at least it helped keep her alive.
Speaker 1: She used the park map, the bandana, and the plastic
Speaker 1: bag which she attached to a stick to cover herself
Speaker 1: and block out the sun. Claire continued applying sunscreen, recycling
Speaker 1: her urine, and making videos, but there was nothing else
Speaker 1: she could do. She was trapped in the middle of
Speaker 1: the desert, with no way of knowing whether anyone was
Speaker 1: searching for She battled the scorching heat on the second
Speaker 1: day and dreaded nightfall. She didn't want spent another night
Speaker 1: alone in the desert. Naturally, she hadn't slept, and delirium
Speaker 1: was setting in. She made it through the night with
Speaker 1: sheer willpower and determination. Of the third day, Claire's mind
Speaker 1: was really playing tricks on her sought. Sheard helicopters and ambulances,
Speaker 1: but it was all in her head. She could see
Speaker 1: birds of prey circling overhead, waiting for her to die
Speaker 1: so they could grab an easy meal. However, after a
Speaker 1: couple of days of social media silence, the friends Claire
Speaker 1: was house sitting for grew concern. It wasn't like her
Speaker 1: not to post, especially when she was somewhere beautiful like
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree. They contacted friends from the area and had
Speaker 1: them go to the house to check for Claire. When
Speaker 1: they didn't see her car or find her at the home,
Speaker 1: Claire was reported missing. Joshua Treat National Park officials found
Speaker 1: her car, and there were at least two days of
Speaker 1: chalk marks, which were used to tell whether or not
Speaker 1: a vehicle has been moved. It was clear that Claire
Speaker 1: had left the car and not come back for quite
Speaker 1: some time. The search and rescue mission was launched. The
Speaker 1: searchers were starting where her car was found and working outwards.
Speaker 1: They made several rounds in a helicopter near where Claire
Speaker 1: had fallen, but they didn't find her at first. After all,
Speaker 1: she was trapped between large boulders where it was difficult
Speaker 1: to see. They called out over the helicopter's PA system,
Speaker 1: we are looking for a missing hiker. If you can
Speaker 1: hear us, please make movement. The search crew didn't know it,
Speaker 1: but Claire was screaming for help as she heard the
Speaker 1: helicopter and.
Speaker 3: It was real this time.
Speaker 1: She tied the plastic bag on the end of her
Speaker 1: stick with her hair tie and began waving it frantically.
Speaker 1: It wasn't until their last and final sweep of the
Speaker 1: area that they saw tiny and obscure a plastic grocery
Speaker 1: bag waving back and forth. They called out that they
Speaker 1: could see her and told her that help was on
Speaker 1: the way. Due to the terrain, the helicopter could land
Speaker 1: in the area, so rescuers had to hike into where
Speaker 1: she was at the same Claire knew at that point
Speaker 1: that she was going to be okay. After three nights
Speaker 1: and four days alone in the desert, Claire was rushed
Speaker 1: to a hospital where she received emergency surgery. Thankfully, she
Speaker 1: made it through okay and spent the next several months recuperating.
Speaker 1: She had to do extensive rehabilitation and spend some time
Speaker 1: in a wheelchair before she was able to learn to
Speaker 1: walk again. During her time in that awful situation, Claire
Speaker 1: realized that she had been pushing people away, and although
Speaker 1: she was connecting with others in social media, there was
Speaker 1: a lack of true human connection in her life. She
Speaker 1: made the decision that if she lived through this ordeal,
Speaker 1: she was going to do better for herself and for others.
Speaker 1: Claire Triumphully returned to Joshua Tree a year later with
Speaker 1: friends and finally finished the hike she had started that
Speaker 1: almost ended her life. Today, Claire's thankful to be alive,
Speaker 1: and she vowed to never forget what happened to her
Speaker 1: and to use it as motivation. Her book, Things I
Speaker 1: Learned from Falling can be found on Amazon. Next up
Speaker 1: in her survivor's Holly Jocum, Thirty two year old Holly
Speaker 1: Jocum was planning a camping trip on December twenty seventh,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, to Big Bear Campground in California. She packed
Speaker 1: her things and loaded her two dogs into RV as
Speaker 1: she drove to Big Bear. She was excited for the trip,
Speaker 1: but unfortunately when she arrived, she found the camp site
Speaker 1: was closed. Around four forty five PM that day, she
Speaker 1: contacted family and told them about a change of plans.
Speaker 1: She was going to drive an hour and fifteen minutes
Speaker 1: away and camp in the desert at Joshua Tree instead,
Speaker 1: and said she'd call when she arrived. But by seven
Speaker 1: point thirty that evening, Holly's phone was off or otherwise unreachable,
Speaker 1: and her family hadn't heard from her. They were rightfully concerned.
Speaker 1: In contact to the authorities, they filed a missing person
Speaker 1: and began reaching out on social media for help locating Holly.
Speaker 1: Her sister Laurie made a post asking for anyone who
Speaker 1: might have seen Holly to please come forward. Holly had
Speaker 1: randomly selected the camp site and Joshua Treat from her phone.
Speaker 1: Although she was an experienced camper, the site she chose
Speaker 1: was unfamiliar to her. On the way to the site,
Speaker 1: the terrain had become difficult, and she decided to camp
Speaker 1: out in a secluded area until the next day. The
Speaker 1: night came and went, and the next morning Holly woke
Speaker 1: to find two feet of snow had fallen through the night.
Speaker 1: Holly wrote about the ordeal. By Tuesday, there was nearly
Speaker 1: two feet of very fine fresh powder and I was stuck.
Speaker 1: There was also no cell service where she had parked,
Speaker 1: so she and her two dogs were truly out there alone.
Speaker 1: For three days, Holly and the dogs camped out waiting
Speaker 1: for the snow to melt, but that never happened. Holly
Speaker 1: decided she had to do something. Friday morning, she planned
Speaker 1: on hiking back down the mountain, at least until she
Speaker 1: had cell service. The snow was too deep for dogs,
Speaker 1: so she loaded them into two separate backpacks and began
Speaker 1: the six mile hike back down. Eventually, she reached a
Speaker 1: place that had phone service, and she called in her
Speaker 1: location to her mom and the authorities. Search teams have
Speaker 1: been looking for and news of her safety was caused
Speaker 1: for celebration. Holly met the sheriff at the bottom of
Speaker 1: the mountain, who drove her to Cabazon, where she met
Speaker 1: with her mother. Thankfully, neither Holly nor her dogs were
Speaker 1: harmed during their time stuck on the mountain, and they
Speaker 1: had a happy ending, unlike so many others.
Speaker 3: Who go missing.
Speaker 1: Holly wrote, I'm so thankful for everyone who was involved
Speaker 1: in searching for me, for everyone who shared the missing
Speaker 1: person's post, and mostly for my family who tried with
Speaker 1: every ounce they had to bring me back. The experiences
Speaker 1: sure to remind Holly as well as the rest of us,
Speaker 1: of the dangers of the wilderness and just how quickly
Speaker 1: things can change when you're at the mercy of Mother Nature.
Speaker 1: At our last tailor of survival. Robert Ringo, sixty seven
Speaker 1: year old Robert Ringo was on a day hike one
Speaker 1: Thursday in June of twenty twenty near Quayle Mountain in
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree National Park when tragedy struck. Robert had gotten
Speaker 1: ready that morning with nothing out of the ordinary. He
Speaker 1: drove to Joshua Tree and once parked, shared his location
Speaker 1: with his son, something he always did. He brought along
Speaker 1: two liters of water for the hike, but not much
Speaker 1: more in the way of supplies. The temperatures from the
Speaker 1: high nineties the desert heat was sweltering. Robert is an
Speaker 1: avid hiker and used to these conditions, so he wasn't worried,
Speaker 1: especially since he was only planning a short hike. He
Speaker 1: felt good starting out on his walk put aways into
Speaker 1: the hike while admiring the views and enjoying the outdoors,
Speaker 1: Robert somehow lost his footing and fell to the ground,
Speaker 1: breaking his left Femur. The area he was in had
Speaker 1: no cell service, so he was stranded. After his fall,
Speaker 1: I started trying to at least turn over, and when
Speaker 1: I did, he said, it was just unbelievable pain. Robert
Speaker 1: began recording himself since he had no way of signaling
Speaker 1: for help. His cries for help can be heard in
Speaker 1: the videos shared.
Speaker 3: With news media.
Speaker 1: Robert knew his two leaders of water wouldn't last for long.
Speaker 1: He tried to at least get himself onto his back
Speaker 1: and finally managed after some time lying there. He knew
Speaker 1: he had to eat something to keep his energy up.
Speaker 1: I somehow scooted it up this place, ate some juniper
Speaker 1: berries and saw what I thought might be flowers, but
Speaker 1: they were all dry, so I wasn't going to eat them,
Speaker 1: he said. He continued recording videos and trying to conserve water.
Speaker 1: This is the first time I've experienced no saliva, he
Speaker 1: said in one of the videos he took. He knew
Speaker 1: if he could just hold on long enough, someone would
Speaker 1: be looking for him. He mentions having a confidence and
Speaker 1: a faith that he was going to survive. The Next day, Friday,
Speaker 1: Robert's son Ryan alerted officials of his father's missing status.
Speaker 1: He saw on his phone that his dad's last known
Speaker 1: location was Joshua Tree. The search and rescue efforts began
Speaker 1: searching in earnest for Robert. Knowing the summer heat is
Speaker 1: dangerous to be in with only limited water supply, time
Speaker 1: was of the essence. Rescue teams searched for hours, but
Speaker 1: to no avail. It wasn't until Saturday morning, nearly two
Speaker 1: days after Robert had taken his fall, that he finally
Speaker 1: heard a rescue copter. The Joshua treat Search and Rescue
Speaker 1: team retrieved Robert and brought him to the Desert Regional
Speaker 1: Medical Center. Robert had emergency surgery on his leg and
Speaker 1: later made a full recovery. In closing things, like we've
Speaker 1: covered in this video, they continue to happen daily, with
Speaker 1: their national parks being hotspots for all manner strange occurrences,
Speaker 1: some of them natural, some of them bordering on the
Speaker 1: supernatural and beyond. While there could be any number of
Speaker 1: things or a combination of things to blame for these cases,
Speaker 1: one thing is certain. We can never be sure something
Speaker 1: won't happen to us. It's recommended that everyone who plans
Speaker 1: on being with international parks or out of the wilderness.
Speaker 1: In general, carry a personal locator beacon at all times.
Speaker 1: The speaking transmits a the stress signal with its location
Speaker 1: when activated. So what do you think is happening in
Speaker 1: Joshua Tree? Let us know in the comments section, and
Speaker 1: if we've earned your subscription, we appreciate it. Please hit
Speaker 1: the red button and turn on post notifications so you
Speaker 1: don't miss out on any new content or case updates.
Speaker 1: I look forward to your comments, but ask that you
Speaker 1: please keep them friendly and respectful. Until next time. Take
Speaker 1: care of yourselves and each other, and I'll see you
Speaker 1: just a little farther on down the trail. I'm Steve Stockton,
Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you next time.