Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, pack your bags because we are heading to Iceland.
And when I say we, I don't just mean me
and you, because Tooks and Shana from the research team
are joining us on this magical Trova trip, and so
is the one and only Sydney Copp who helped identify
Christopher Roof. For as long as I can remember, Iceland
has been number one on my travel list and it
still somehow eluded me for all these years. So I'm
inviting you to come experience Iceland with me for the
very first time. We'll visit secret geothermal lagoons, waterfalls, geysers,
the Continental Rift, and black sand beaches littered with icebergs.
We'll take a private boat tour, see the glaciers, see
puffins and hang out and rekivic. It will be I'm
sure a life changing six days. Tickets are on sale now,
but act fast because as of today, there are only
four spots left, so reserve your spot asap. Check out
the link in the show notes or on Instagram. I
cannot wait to see you in Iceland.
Speaker 2: This is a.
Speaker 1: Studio both and production. As we've negotiated israel Keys's ability
for love, it's been impossible to overlook the immense pain
he brought to the world. I mean, it's the reason
we're all here. Can one be capable of love and
love to inflict pain on others? It seems to me
that Keys had an almost adversarial relationship with the idea
of love, almost as though he wanted to hurt the
love that he never received. He read and possibly even
quoted articles covering his crimes and their impacts on missing
people's loved ones. He often specifically targeted couples. He talked
about the emotional pain those couples would endure. So our
investigation into Keys has been one of his crimes, but
also one of who he was and what drove him,
what compelled him, and what did his innermost workings make
possible and or impossible. Our investigation into him is limitless.
It's taken us down bizarre rabbit holes into unexpected places.
Ours spent researching Farmville calls to small town librarians in
search of out of print publications, essentially living in newspaper archives,
braving the elements to walk in Keys's footsteps, hoping to
connect some pieces of the puzzle or rule something out.
And these pursuits are always driven by one goal to
identify Keys's crimes and victims. Some more people can get
their names back and loved ones can finally receive answers.
And the more we know about Keys, not just his crimes,
but who he was, the more possible this becomes. Because
Keys admitted to taking both men and women of varying ages,
his victimology is broad, making it that much more difficult
to identify potential victims. But one detail that comes up
over and over again that has helped focus our research
are his references to killing couples. Investigating potential pairs allows
us to narrow the field, to rule some cases out
and flag others for deeper investigation. In this episode will
dive into updates on couples we've discussed in previous seasons,
as well as cases we're asked about frequently, plus and
more importantly, unsolved cases that have been on our radar,
along with crimes not yet discussed on the show. This
is True Crime Bullshit. The serialized investigation into Israel Keys
Season seven, Episode four, Couples.
Speaker 2: Is there a struggle and you get them and they died?
Or what did you need to killing that way? Trying
and kill him?
Speaker 3: I just.
Speaker 2: So you can out of action. I read that in
one of those letters with the male female, well a
couple in Washington State? Would you had female a couple?
I read that in are those the same couple from
that you took to the boat and come to the
light before their others and they went in that whole
not from Yeah, yeah, you're arried. Yeah, that was a while.
Speaker 4: That was a long time, right after the got right
after the military, right after the military, after you got
out of the military.
Speaker 2: What was before I got the boat?
Speaker 4: And you told this one time that you know, it
wasn't long when you got out of the military that.
Speaker 2: You killed somebody.
Speaker 4: And it was that sort of feeling that you needed
to do something.
Speaker 2: You know, it was hard to resist. Do you have
any base of boarding time?
Speaker 1: Based on evidence and interviews with Keys, we know that
you murdered at least two different couples, the burs and
the male female couple in Washington State. Now there is
some uncertainty about whether the Washington State victims in total
he discussed include two couples, a couple and then two
separate individuals, or a combination of both. Keys is very
careful with semantics when discussing these crimes so careful that
even we have to determine what exactly Keys defines as
a couple. Additionally, Keys admitted to at least two other
occasions where he was actively seeking out a couple to take,
and at least one couple in addition to the couriers
appears on the name is forty five. As we've discussed,
Keys targeted couples not just to physically torture them, but
also to emotionally torture them. This falls in line with
research into sexually violent offenders. Killing a pair ups the
ante on the suffering fear, harm and humiliation, which is
what sexual sadists like Keyes experience pleasure from. Dennis Raider
and Ted Bundy, two serial killers Keys talked about, often
also killed more than one victim at a time, with
Bundy telling author Stephen G. Mashad and later FBI special
agent Bill Hagmire that the two women he abducted on
the same day from Lake Samamish State Park, janisaw and
Denise Nasland, were alive together. He said he forced one
woman to watch as he murdered the other, highlighting his
thrill of domination. In the severe psychological torture he inflicted
on his victims. This is something Edmund Kemper did as
well on at least two separate occasions, with Mary Anne
Pesh and Anita Lukessa and Rosalind Thorpe and Alice Low.
This topic is explored at length in FBI profiler Roy
Hazelwood's true crime book Dark Dreams, a book that we
know israel read and one that contains a number of
shocking parallels to Keys, which will explore more in future episodes.
Among violent sexual offenders, often the only logic to their
crimes is internal, Hazelwood wrote, The criminal alone knows why
he commits his deviant acts. Although we can find patterns
and common elements among them, no two offenders ever commit
exactly the same sexual crime, and the world of dark minds,
the darkness truly is infinite, Hazelwood adds later. Many offenders
are aroused by a victim's suffering sadists, while others are
excited by their own pain masochists. Then there are sato
masochists who may be aroused in either way, simultaneously or
in separate incidents. Perhaps the most obvious and most frightening
explanation of all that is that some offenders commit sexual
crimes simply because they want to, they like it, and
they have no regard for what the rest of society thinks.
Israel Keys admitted to abducting, torturing, and murdering Bill in
The Rain Courier, and their images were found on his
computer as part of the Name Is forty five. As
we've covered before, Keyes told detective Monique Dahl that he
considered taking both Samantha Koenig and her boyfriend Dwayne. In
a December twenty twelve article from The Spokesman Review titled
killer targeted victim's boyfriend, Dahl said, what we found when
we interviewed mister Keyes was that he knew that the
coffee Kiosk closed at eight p m. And he knew
that because Samantha didn't have a vehicle there, somebody was
going to come and pick her up. He was waiting
for her ride to come there because he intended to
take that person as well. But who were the pairs
killed by Keys? Were they spouses, family friends, strangers to
one another? Did they come on to his radar and
adv dants or did he stumble upon them. As time passes,
it sometimes feels like we're slipping further away from answering
these questions, further from the possibility of identifying any additional
Key's victims. Memories fade, investigators retire, witnesses pass evidence is lost,
but there's still hope. DNA technology continues to advance, new
witnesses emerge. Cold cases are solved all the time. Take,
for instance, to two thousand and four murders of Lindsay
Cutshaw and Jason Allen. The couple were found shot to
death on a California beach, and for a time many
speculated that Keys could have been responsible. It wasn't until
twenty seventeen, when Lindsay and Jason's actual killer murdered his
own brother, that there was significant movement in the case.
There's also the April two thousand disappearance of Tennessee teenagers
Aaron Foster and Jeremy Bechtel. Their case often popped up
while searching for unsolved disappearances of pairs and cold cases
in Tennessee, where we have several names forty five cases.
In twenty twenty one, a YouTuber and volunteer civilian cold
case investigator named Jeremy Sides discovered Foster's submerged vehicle and
the Calfkiller River. Bechtel's and Foster's remains were located inside,
and their deads were ruled accidental. And so while it
often feels like time is an enemy in the keys case,
that also brings clarity, which is exactly what happened recently
in regards to a Callville double murder we've been tracking
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the ordinary. In the summer of nineteen ninety seven, Israel
Keys was nineteen years old and living in Mappin, Oregon. However,
according to multiple accounts, he was still frequenting the home
he grew up in on Rocky Creek Road in Calville, Washington.
This Calville farm was abandoned at the time, as the
Keys family prepared to sell it that September while living
in Dufur, Oregon. But again, there are multiple accounts of
Keys traveling nearly four hundred miles to the abandoned property
on Aladdin Mountain during his time in Mappin. On June
twenty seventh of nineteen ninety seven, just twenty miles from
the Rocky Creek Road compound, police responded to an arson
at the Panorama Mobile Home Park at five twenty three
or in Rice Road in Calville. Inside, first responders discovered
the remains of twenty nine year old Marlene Emerson. Her
twelve year old daughter, Cassie was missing and presumed abducted.
Marlene's autopsy concluded that her cause of death was homicide.
Exactly one month would pass before Cassie's body was discovered
in Old Wooden area above orn Rice Road on July
twenty seventh of nineteen ninety seven, and her autopsy concluded
that she died from homicidal violence. The double homicide in
Arson had long been on our radar. Not only was
Keys in close proximity to this unsolved case, but he
also discussed committing Arson to conceal his crimes, including specifically
referencing burning a trailer.
Speaker 2: How old were you when your first burns humped down? Well,
that's what you're counting it. I know.
Speaker 4: The first thing I burned down was a trailer, So
I was about the same, maybe like fourteen fifteen.
Speaker 2: I mean, I you know, pyromania. After years, it was.
Speaker 4: Something you weren't supposed to burn down, like besides of
my eyebrows.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know, I know, I was. I started
a forest fire once.
Speaker 1: Over the years and behind the scenes, we've returned to
the Emerson case over and over again, asking ourselves, could
this have been Keyes's first murder? Is this where his
affinity for pairs began? A repeated Foyer requests were denied,
and there wasn't much new information to cover, That is
until early twenty twenty three, when Jordan from the research
team communicated with the lead detectives on the case and
they told him something surprising. They said that they could
state with certainty that Israel Keys was not involved in
the Emerson's debts. Of course, with Keys growing up in Callville,
the detectives were very aware of his case. They informed
Jordan that they had spoken with the FBI about other
cases within their jurisdiction to possibly link to Israel, and
were currently working to arrange a conversation about those other cases. Meanwhile,
we waited a year, then another, and then we learned
why investigators were so certain Keys had no involvement in
the Emerson case. In December of twenty twenty four, twenty
seven years after the double homicide, police announced that they
had charged a suspect with first degree murder for Cassie
and Marlene's deads Charles Lloyd Tatum. Tatum is no stranger
to violence. In the nineteen seventies, he killed a man
who he claimed was trying to break into his truck,
and he served just a decade for that crime. By
nineteen ninety seven, he was in his late forties and
living in Callville. In early interviews with police, Tatum said
he was completely intoxicated at the time and did not
remember where he was or what he did the night
of Marlene Emerson's murder. But Tatum's associates shared a different story,
noting that Tatum admitted to abducting an assaulting Cassie. It
took nearly thirty years before investigators garnered enough evidence to
charge Tatum, who is now in his seventies. That evidence
included Dud's eyewitness accounts and new DNA tests. Investigators even
confirmed that blood found in the vehicle Tatum was allegedly
driving at the time belonged to Cassie. His trial is
slated to begin in December of twenty twenty five. With
this development, Cassie's and Marlene's loved ones finally have some answers,
and we can answer one of countless questions we have
about keys. The Emersons were not israel Keys as victims.
Other pairs or couples we've covered at length on the
show include Cammie Vollendroff and Eugene Hyatt, along with Danielle
Imbau and Richard Patrone. The missing Philadelphia couple whose images
were found on Keys's computer. At this time, there is
nothing new to report regarding Cammi and Jean's disappearance, which
police originally attributed to a rogue wave. Since covering their case, however,
we've come to know Cammy's cousin, Shelley and her family
is still searching for an answers, and should we learn
of any new updates, we'll certainly share them. As for
Danielle and Richard, their standalone name is forty five episode
which delves deeper into their two thousand and five disappearance,
will be released later this season. Then there's an unsolved
double homicide that we get asked about a lot, and
for good reason.
Speaker 2: You said the accuracy for a distance with this one,
you could actually get this one to be accurate for
a long distance. Yeah, yeah, how do you know that?
I mean, how could you test that?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 4: I shot it, I mean I should I probably. I
took it up in their woods out and shee gash
and I had it. I had a whole target system
set up there.
Speaker 2: I had. I got to give away my grand plan here,
but I had.
Speaker 4: A moving target system to where I could trip the
target and it would start rolling downhill on a polly.
Speaker 2: And it was just a piece of print or paper.
Speaker 4: But then I would put a black mark like spray
paint a black.
Speaker 2: Mark about that big brain a point and that's what
that's what I was shooting at. Was it at about
fifty yards? You know?
Speaker 4: That was uh, that was the plan I had.
Speaker 2: I didn't actually ended up ended up doing it that way.
Speaker 4: Then that's one of the ways. I one of the
ideas I had or for carjacking, someone shoot out their
tire while they were pulling up to a stop sign
or something, but didn't find any good roads or places
to do it.
Speaker 2: So plus I didn't as as that sky. Kind of
had it in the back of my mind, but you know,
I didn't turn it. It's pretty easy.
Speaker 6: People are pretty especial, so you get out in the backwoods,
people are pretty naive and don't really expect it to have,
you know, so you don't really have to do anything
as crazy as she got their tires.
Speaker 2: But though that was one of the ideas I've i'd
had partly because if.
Speaker 4: You're on a road with the right amount of traffic,
you can uh some set up in the right spot right,
sit there with binoculars and kind of stick out who's
in the car.
Speaker 2: I don't like shocking kind of thing on targets right.
Speaker 4: Anyway, wouldn't have draw attention and the shooting at the
tires thing.
Speaker 2: I mean, they might not know who shot 'em out,
but what's the car. Well, let's.
Speaker 4: Y in the evening and there's not a lot of
people around us on a backwoods road that gets a
car every five or ten minutes.
Speaker 2: You shoot out.
Speaker 4: Someone's tired. Someone's tired. She's by herself, and she doesn't
have much choice but to stop. If you shoot it
out with the twenty two and the side wall, it's
she's gonna have to stop, probably within half a mile
of where you shoot it out.
Speaker 2: So that was yeah, but yeah, I don't know. I guess.
Speaker 4: That was part of the plan I had for for
why I wanted There were other reasons why I.
Speaker 2: Wanted to silence her. That was still accurate too.
Speaker 4: I had actually had an ambush set up here in Anchorage,
and uh and that one got that one got really close,
I because.
Speaker 2: But then uh APD showed up. They they came out
to tell the people that, uh, the park was closed.
Speaker 4: It was about ten or eleven o'clock at night, and uh,
there's a young couple out there in their car and uh,
I had the parking lot that the.
Speaker 2: Park sticked out. APD showed up and that yeah, coulda
got ugly, but fortunately for.
Speaker 4: The cop guy, he uh his backup showed up. And
I mean APD is really good, like they're they're really good,
Like I'll buy the book and stuff. And that's about
the time that I decided to get a scanner, cause
I almost got myself into a lot of trouble on.
Speaker 2: That one cause I had no way. I didn't know.
I didn't think that they would he would call him
back up just for some kids sitting.
Speaker 4: Out in the park, and uh almost pulled the trigger
even with him there, and that would have been I
would have got really ugly really fast. But yeah, anyway, well,
as soon as his backup showed up at the side
of to day, so did they better call it a night?
And I got back on my bike and took off it.
And that was was that Elderberry Park or where was that?
Speaker 2: That was the one out out past the earthquake.
Speaker 4: I rode along the coastal trail there there's uh the
last park on the line out on.
Speaker 2: The other other side of the airport there. I guess
it's still ment Uh Northern lights. You just follow Northern
Lights out as far as it goes. And there's a
park out there on the right side of the lost
water side of it, on the water side of ye. Huh,
it's one coastal trailer runs right by it. Where'd that
parking lot at? Yeah, there's there's a parking lot.
Speaker 4: And I mean all the parks out there are parking lots.
There's a there's a earthquake park, and that one I
had staked out of time or two, but it was, uh,
there's always a lot of cars driving by that one,
and so I went further out. There's uh, there's two
more parks after that one, and uh, I was mostly
at the other two, the ones further out.
Speaker 2: And it was that was right before I flew back east.
And I don't know why I was.
Speaker 3: I was just uh.
Speaker 4: Itching for trouble, I guess because I knew I was
going back east, and I just uh yeah, And then
there was that one close call and then I I
it was kind of a spur of the moment thing
because it just so happened that Uh, like Kimberly was
out of town and my kid was gone for then
I should staying with her aunt for a couple of days.
Speaker 2: I just got the gun finished. It was just.
Speaker 4: Out looking for trouble and decided I was gonna try,
try and do it, Try.
Speaker 2: And do something here.
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lying in wait, hunting and unsuspecting couple and shooting them
from a distance. It's hard to listen to that clip
and not think of an unsolved double shooting in Washington State.
And just days after Israel's suicide in December twenty twelve,
the media asked those victims family what they thought about
Keys's potential involvement. I mean there were a couple of things. Obviously,
he went to campgrounds, and he liked to go to
trailheads and look for people potential victims, David Stauden said
in an interview with Fox thirteen. David's daughter, Susannah Stodden
and his wife Mary Cooper were murdered on July eleventh,
two thousand and six, on a hiking trail in Mount
Baker Snowwalmie National Forest. In the interview with Fox thirteen,
David added that learning about Keys gave him hope that
the murders would be solved, but also led to disappointment.
I think eventually it will be solved, Stauden told Fox thirteen.
I kind of hope there's a trial, then more of
the wise would be answered. In the same article, the
Snowhomish County Sheriff's office said they didn't believe Keys was
involved in any murders in their county, including those of
Cooper and Stadden. Were not sure why they believe this,
and in fact have two potential victims who disappeared from
Snowhomish County. I've covered the mother daughter duo shooting several
times over the years and have even discussed it on
other podcasts. There are a lot of peculiarities in this
case related to Keys, A back and forth that oscillates
between the timeline is too tight for him to have
been involved, and maybe because the timeline is too tight
for him to have been involved simultaneously would rule Keys
out and rule him in based on what we know
about his m O and our records from the FBI,
there are numerous financial transactions for Keys in Port Angelus,
Washington on the day of this double murder. Keys's cell
phone data also indicates that he received fifteen phone calls
on the day of the trail side murders, and these
calls place Israel or his phone at least in the
Nia Bay Port Angelis area. Curiously, however, there is a
three hour window from one forty eight pm to four
forty one pm where Keyes's phone went dark. Now, the
Pinnacle Lake trailhead, near where Cooper and Stauden's bodies were found,
is just under a four hour drive from Port Angelus,
but we also need to take into account the time
someone would need to hike up the trail, commit the murders,
and then flee the area. According to the FBI files,
Keys is only unaccounted for for a few hours, making
his involvement extremely unlikely. But back in the maybe column
is the fact that Keyes often committed crimes around tight timelines,
like murdering Samantha just hours before leaving for a family cruise.
And does the FBI know with certainty that Keyes himself
made those Port Angelus transactions on July eleventh? Could they
have been made a day or so prior, with a
delay in reporting by financial institutions. Could he have given
his card to someone else to use whenever the FBI
rules Keys out based on financial transactions. These are the
questions we have to ask regarding the cell data. Did
Keys lend us phone to someone that day to establish
an alibi? There are a lot of what ifs. There's
also an unknown Hurtz rental car charge on July tenth,
two thousand and six, the day before the murders. This
is something we've seen with other cases, notably Gary Sewan Bryant,
whose bizarre disappearance will dive deeper into later this season.
Another factor that's made me lean away from Keys's involvement
in the Koperstadt In case in the past is the
lack of an obvious sexual motive. But, as Hazelwood explores
in Dark Dreams, a sexual sadists preferences and behaviors are atypical,
which means in some scenarios, aspects of a crime that
might not appear sexual in nature very well could have
aroused the perpetrator. Like countless cases we've covered on the show,
behind the scenes were always keeping our ears and eyes open.
Is there an update that warrants further investigation into Keys, or,
as with the Emersons, is there a development that finally
rules him out. Tooks from the research team has been
keeping tabs on the Cooperstatten case for years, and she
recently discovered two intriguing details relevant to Keys. A twenty
twenty four update on the case, featuring an interview with
David Stadden mentioned that both women were found partially undressed. Now,
while we'd heard accounts for years that the women were posed,
this was the first we'd learned of any undressing. This
detail seems more likely to indicate a sexual component to
the crime, though of course it could be a ploy
meant to give the appearance of a sexual element when
there was not one. Then this year, further media updates
revealed that investigators had recovered a partial mail DNA profile
from fingernail clippings taken during Susannah Stodden's autopsy. This sample
wasn't discovered until twenty twenty as DNA testing capabilities have
continued to advance over time. Susannah's father, David, and her
boyfriend at the time of her death were eliminated as matches,
so The next obvious question is did investigators run Keys's
DNA against this sample. They did, but Keys wasn't a match.
We've reached out to the lead detective to clarify some
follow up questions and are waiting to hear back, but
it seems for now we can rule Keys out. By
tracking cases, we continue to glean important information from new
developments and details. In this instance, we have confirmation that
within the last few years, investigators are comparing Keys's DNA
to evidence and unsolved cases, and this is something we've
all hoped for. Exactly one year, in ten days before
Mary Cooper and Susannah Stadden's murders, a chillingly similar crime
occurred about four hundred miles south in the Willamette National Forest,
and this double homicide is also still unsolved, and it's
another case we've been researching behind the scenes for years now.
Well liked educators Jeannette Bowman fifty six and Stephen Hougen
fifty four met while working in a Montana school. They
began dating in two thousand. Jeanette had two sons from
a previous marriage and Stephen had two daughters. They loved adventure,
the outdoors, and traveling. Eventually, the couple would leave Montana
for Washington State in around two thousand three. There, Stephen
subbed for the Ocean Beach School District in Long Beach,
while Jeanette taught business courses at Ilwaco High School. When
Stephen landed a job two hundred fifty miles away as
a guidance counselor and track coach at Westridge Middle School
in Oakridge, Oregon, Jeannette also made plans to relocate there.
Just weeks before they were murdered, Jeanette moved south to
join Stephen. That fall, she was set to begin a
new position at Lane Community College and Eugene. The educators
were enjoying their summer off, spending as much time outside
as possible, including fishing and golfing. They told family they
were going on a three day fly fishing and camping trip,
with Jeannette emailing a former colleague on June twenty eighth,
according to the Hindook Observer, to say, we got me
moved and settled in, so now we have some time
for fun this summer, going camping tomorrow. Hope your summer
is going great and you are able to relax a
little bit too. Jeannette. Police believe that on either Wednesday,
June twenty ninth or Thursday, June thirtieth, then days of
sending that email, that Stephen, Jeannette, and their chow golden
retriever mixed Caesar, traveled about twenty five miles south from
their home to Staley Creek. There, they planned to set
up camp in a remote area within the expansive forest.
On Friday, July first, two thousand five, as people descended
on the area to enjoy the Fourth of July weekend,
a camper hiking through the sand Prairie campground made a
grim discovery the bodies of Jeannette, Stephen, and Caesar. When
the Lane County Sheriff's Office responded, Detective Sergeant Carl Wilkerson
described the crime scene to the media as something you
would envision out of a horror movie. Police were quick
to rule out murder suicide and confirmed that the shooting
was not exiit dental. The couple's autopsies indicated that both
had died from multiple gunshot wounds, according to the historian.
Authorities also conducted a net cropsy on Caesar, who was
described as a big teddy bear. Police were hoping to
determine if the dog had bitten his assailant. No further
details had been publicly released regarding those results at this point. However,
it's worth noting that this is around the same time
when Kimberly noticed an injury resembling a bite on Keyes's hand,
which she would eventually prescribe antibiotics for. Investigators combed the
forest for ten days by land, water, and air in
search of clues. They found zero fingerprints, no connected tire tracks,
and zero useful footprints. Oddly, they also did not find
Jeannette and Stephen's campsite, and this was strange considering the
couple had planned a camp for three days. Similar to
the Cooper Stadding case, there were no obvious signs of
sexual assault, Jeanette and Stephen were found fully clothed, and
there was no evidence of a struggle. Authorities investigated the
surrounding forest for illegal operations, such as a meth lab
or cannabis farm, thinking perhaps the couple was killed after
they stumbled upon criminal activity, but this angle also yielded
zero results. This was an overkill situation. Sheriff's sergeant spent
Slater told the National Register. These people were executed. We
think they were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
They didn't stumble on to somebody. It's more likely that
somebody stumbled onto them. Police interviewed each and every person
camping in the forest for the holiday that weekend, and
despite determining that the couple were killed with both a
high powered hunting style rifle and a low powered firearm,
not a single camper of the hundreds interviewed reported hearing
even a single gunshot. The ballistics evidence also suggested something peculiar. Jeanette, Stephen,
and Caesar were shot from a distance, and then again
from a closer range of approximately five to seven feet.
Sergeant Slater has said that there was either one shooter
who shot very quickly, or two shooters. Police have not
revealed the exact details on the weapons used. In two
thousand five, investigators struggled to determine a motive for the murders.
Stephen and Jeannette had no enemies or significant secrets, and
according to all accounts, they were beloved educators, parents, and friends.
They were enjoying their budding romance and adventurous lifestyle. Their colleagues, students,
and family members all spoke fondly of the pair. Dan Bowman,
Jeanette's oldi son, mentioned in an interview with TV news
station KATU ABC two that his mother was also a
doting grandmother. Kelly Hogan, Stephen's daughter, told Katu, this could
have happened to anybody. My dad and Jeanette just happened
to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
It's frightening. A search of Stephen's nineteen ninety four GMC Jimmy,
located about fifty feet from the couple's bodies, deepened the mystery.
The vehicle was unlocked, and inside police found Hogan's wallet,
camping equipment, and two cans of opened yet full soda.
And reported missing from the vehicle were custom fishing rods,
a brown leather shoulder holster, a Smith and Wesson forty
one magnum revolver, and the Jimmy's front and back license plates,
which were Oregon plates c L four seven seven sixty
three bearing the Crater Lake design detect hi of Sergeant
Wilkerson has speculated that the perpetrator was a stranger. This
is somebody who probably killed people not known to them
and did it for killing's sake. He told Katu. The
FBI eventually got involved and informed local investigators that they
believed the stolen items were trophies. They also floated the
possibility that a super hunter was responsible. According to interviews
with Katu, a super hunter is someone who moves into
a national forest and then calls it their own. The
FBI has said they are territorial and can kill do
sometimes take a few items of the deceased as a token.
A two thousand and six episode of Sensing Murder titled
Hunted in the Forest includes details from the lead detectives
not reported elsewhere. In it, Sergeant Slater revealed that the
bodies were piled and appeared to have been placed together.
I haven't seen bodies splayed in any of the homicides
i've been to. I think that the arranging of the
bodies has a meaning, and I don't know if that's
for us or for them. This detail stands out. Jeanette,
Stephen and Caesar were moved after the murders and posed,
as were Cooper and Stauden, and after Mary and Susannah's
murders in two thousand and six, authorities did investigate if
the two double homicides were connected, but they could find
no definitive link. In December twenty twelve, when news of
Keys of suicide and known crimes made headlines, the media
started asking more questions, just as they did in the
Cooper Stauden murders. Could Israel Keys be responsible for this baffling,
chilling Oregon cold case? But it wasn't just the media
considering Keys as a potential suspect. In a December eight,
twenty twelve article from Oregon Live titled Oregon double killing
from two thousand and five, examine meant for links to
serial killer Israel Keys, detective Sergeant Cliff Harold, who is
now retired, had this to say about Keys's potential connection
to the Bauman Hogan murders. It fits in that time frame.
It's one of the more recent cold cases that we have.
It's a double homicide. We'd love to have it solved.
Harold said that his agency planned to talk to the
lead FBI agents in the Keys investigation to compare notes.
We'll see if there's anything that they've learned in their
investigation that will link it to our open case. Harold said,
I don't know when we'll be able to have that
detailed conversation, but the Key's lead quickly fizzled out, with
no new details ever publicly revealed, But a twenty twenty
four interview with Stephen's daughter Kelly on the Culpable Case
Review podcast provided further clarity. According to Kelly, investigators ruled
Keys out by narrowing down the timeline of her father
and Jeannette's murders. They then compared these details to, in
Kelly's words, alibi. There was a part of me that
wanted to believe he did it, to have this big
question answered, But of course there's always that side that
is skeptical. Kelly told KTU in an interview. I've accepted
that we may never know. Now it's unclear to me
where that information came from. Our timeline has no information
placing Keys anywhere in the days surrounding the murders of
Bowman and Agen, So if the FBI did in fact
rule him out, we don't know what data they were
using to do so, and how accurate or flawed that
data may be. On our timeline. Keys is last known
whereabouts prior to the murders were June seventeenth, when he
was boating, presumably alone, at an unspecified lake, and he
can't be placed anywhere again until July thirtieth, when he
and some friends took the boat out to Lake Ozette.
But it's worth noting that Tony Luzio and Christina Hamilton
from the Name Is forty five disappeared on the fourth
and fifth that year, respectively, and that Gregory Siemens Brown,
the case we've discussed several times over the years and
will deep dive later this season, disappeared from a trailhead
in Washington State on July fifth that year. Like the Couriers,
Jeannette and Stephen were a couple in their fifties seemingly
killed at random in the middle of a summer night,
and though they were murdered in Oregon, the pair had
ties to Washington in close proximity to Keys. Hogan's substitute
taught in Long Beach, Washington, which is an area that
the FBI asked if Keys would have had a reason
to visit in January two thousand four, at the same
time that the couple were living there. It's a city
known for its beach and boardwalk and located about five
hours south of Na Bay. It's also two hours south
of Ocean Shores, another coastal town Keys visited with Tammy
in two thousand and one, just two months before the
disappearances of Cami and Jane. Additionally, when looking at the
geography of the case, Keyes had family in Gresham, Oregon
at the time of Bowmen and Hogan's murders, with it
confirmed a visit to his sister there in December of
two thousand and five. Gresham is just under two hundred
miles from Staley Creek. Keyes, as we know, had ties
to Moppin, Oregon, which is just over two hundred miles
from Staley Creek. If Keyes did commit this crime, is
it possible the pair had crossed paths with them prior,
like we believe happened with Bill and Lorraine, had they
become targets prior to their murders. Eerily, there is a
Crescent Lake within the Dushut's National Forest, about fifty miles
from the Bowmen Hogan murders. Like Lake Crescent and Washington State,
where Keys confess to having dumped at least one victim,
Oregon's Crescent Lake also allows boating, fishing, and camping. This
is just another one of those curious details we've uncovered
in our research, like the street named Keys Place, not
far from where Cami and Gene vanished. Perhaps just a
strange coincidence, perhaps something of significance or an easy detail
for Keys to remember. As far as financial records go,
in the summer of two thousand and five, Keys made
a one thousand dollars credit card payment on June twenty
fourth and a fifteen hundred dollars payment on July eighth,
a week after Jeanette and Stephen's bodies were discovered. As
we've explored at length, large credit card payments are a
pattern that both we and the FBI have looked into
when trying to connect Keys to unsolved crimes, including bank
robberies and arsons. This double homicide has baffled the police
and the public for two decades. Law enforcement has seemingly
investigated every possible angle, including allowing psychics to review the
case for reality TV. Yet there are still few answers.
But as we've seen with Cooper Stawden and even more
so with the Emersons, as time moves on, new details
often emerge or become public. In an April twenty twenty
five article from the Highway fifty eight Herald highlighting the
twentieth anniversary of Hogan and Bowman's murders and exploring Keys's
potential link to them. We learned an important detail Tara Zeitner,
who notes that she listens to true crime bullshit Hey.
Tara writes in the article that she spoke with cold
case investigators in twenty twenty three and again in twenty
twenty five. According to what Detective Charles Tilby told Tara,
no one has been definitively ruled out yet, and that
includes Keys. Investigators are hopeful that advances in DNA technology
will allow them to test evidence from the crime scene
and develop new leads or a suspect, as in so
many cases we've come to know during our research into
Israel Keys. We'll continue to investigate this one, following up
until there are answers one way or another. Studio both
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the show notes. A research into couples has included other
cases worth noting here. Canadian couple Jonathan Jetta and Rachel Bagnell,
who vanished while hiking near Valentine Lake, British Columbia on
September fourth of twenty ten. According to our timeline, Keys
was doing construction work and anchorage throughout the month of
September that year, and while it seems the most likely
scenario in this situation was a tragic hiking accident, there's
limited information available to say for sure. There's also Melody
and Norman Kassan, an Alaskan couple I covered in season two,
episode six. The Cassans lived a subsistence lifestyle in a
remote part of Alaska called Cordova. They were last seen
on March six of two thousand and eight, but weren't
reported missing until March twenty third, when relatives failed to
reach Norman on his birthday. The couple had gone boating
on their skiff, which is a small, flat bottomed boat
that can be powered by oars or a small sail,
on April third. Their skiff was located on a mud
flat in the Prince William Sound, which separates Cordova from
the Keen Eye Peninsula to the east and the Anchorage
area to the northeast. Now, Cordova is not accessible by
car from Anchorage, but is only a forty five minute
flight away. The Cassans are presumed to have drowned, yet
their bodies were never located. As you might recall, Keys
was living in Anchorage at the time, and this was
a few weeks before his dog sitter said that he
was out of town. Again, there's such limited information here
and the most likely scenario appears to be a boating accident,
and of course a flight to such a remote area
would be incredibly high risk for Keys. But will continue
to track this case to determine if there are any
new leads, and then finally the Ellensburg couple. This is
a case Agent ted Halla mentioned to us. We scoured
our sources to see if there was a missing couple
or unsolved double homicide near Ellensburg, Washington, and came up
with nothing. After further discussion, we learned that Agent Halla
meant he believes the murdered pair were buried near Ellensburg,
and that's why he refers to them as the Ellensburg couple.
For the longest time, we couldn't find any cases that
could even remotely line up with Keys's description of this couple,
let alone in the window the FBI believes this double
murder occurred. But we foiled every case that lined up
with that window, and we foyled every case of missing
couples in the Washington area in this time period, and
still nothing. We met with somewhere in the Pines and
began exchanging notes on cases we've looked into and theories
we've had, and we started thinking about Keys and semantics,
and Keys and his favorite literature, and Keys and his
predecessors that he claimed to not care nor know much about,
despite what later interviews would reveal, and all of these
conversations and reevaluations brought us to a familiar and curious place,
a farmhouse in Hunter's Washington.
Speaker 5: King of your play ground, King of this great time,
when your time is Upman, I found you on.
Speaker 7: Your way there.
Speaker 1: Well, how does it feel to lie when you're home
and life and.
Speaker 3: You find yourself feeling anything? Well, maybe you feel here then,
because I.
Speaker 5: Know you comfy here.
Speaker 7: The don ad, because I know you comfy because you're
confish heart.
Speaker 1: This episode was written, researched, and produced by Michelle Tucker,
with editing and post production by Josh Hallmark an additional
research by shaneo. Olenski and Jordan Taylor. Research resources included
Dark Dreams by Roy Hazelwood and Stephen G. Mashad, The
Spokesman Review, Justice Dot Gov, King five News, kat U News,
Oregon Live, The Chinook Observer, The Daily Historian, The culpabol Podcast,
and The Charlie Project. This episode is made possible by
the following Patreon producers, Amy Basel, Kendall, c Heather Horton, Wheedon,
Sherry Dee Kirsten Hoffmandale Axton, Stephanie Taylor, Lydio Rodarte, Quayle
Drew Vipond, Emilia Hancock, Christina Sisson, Nicole and Dennis Henry,
Gillian Natalelna Holiday, Rural, Juror, Tuesday Woodworth, zach Ignotowitz, Warren,
Kathleen Studor and at L Ksey Jensen, Richardson, sc Benjamin Chopafon, Trista, Nicole, Ashfish,
Becky C. Pink Gen J, Cory Deeley, Robin Carroll, Jordan, M,
Kate Lucier, John Comery, Kathy Nation, Carrie, Jordan T, Bethany,
Lauren Ferry, Emily Payne, Tory Meyer, Sabrina Abbott, Megan Inman,
Meghan Dagel, Ashley could Uplin, Michael Randall, du Wayne C
Jen and Justin Runyon. Thank you to True Crime Bullshit's
newest Patreon supporters, Susanne C. Kalina D, Carl D three E,
S T, Stephanie S, Kaylee S, Rebecca S. Shelby D
Paige B, Tara H, Courtney B Chrisa F, Susan N
JSH Chrissy Corey F, Georgina V, Josh H not Me,
Jessica J. Kristen, P. Craig H, Sarah M, k c H, Jason, Eli,
Troy R. Brock h Dan d Jka and Brina s.
To support the investigation, go to Patreon, dot com, slash
Studio both and. This episode included music by Radical Face,
Nine Moons, Aquertos A Tai, Argamon, Nocturne, and Sergei Cheramissinov,
with featured music by Peter and Carrie.
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Speaker 3: When you're cold.
Speaker 5: You cannot.
Speaker 2: Budgets to say.
Speaker 7: Maybe hear the sound of lading because I know you're confiding.
Speaker 3: Hear the sound of la.
Speaker 5: Because I know you county.
Speaker 3: He can spake signs, flies, cast fake, fake smiles, see
a customize.
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Where you're gonna go, Where are you gonna go, Where
you're gonna go when the winner post child? Where are
you gonna go, Where you're gonna go, Where you're gonna
go when the money is dry.
Speaker 3: Where you're gonna go, Where you're gonna go, Where you're
gonna go when the money is trying? Think see son
sec les stuff speak, thinking about thank you, say so
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