Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Path Went Chile for our conclusion
Speaker 1: of our three part series about the disappearance of Stephen Kosher, Robin,
Speaker 1: do you want to catch everyone up? And what we
Speaker 1: talked about in our previous episode, well.
Speaker 2: In our last two episodes we talked about the known
Speaker 2: facts of the case that have been shared for over
Speaker 2: a decade. Stephen Kosher was thirty years old, came from
Speaker 2: a tight knit Mormon family in Salt Lake City, Utah,
Speaker 2: and he reached the age of thirty and surprisingly was
Speaker 2: not married yet and did not have children, even though
Speaker 2: all of his siblings did. But he still seemed to
Speaker 2: be very close to his family. He was not a
Speaker 2: strange for them or anything, but he was going through
Speaker 2: a number of personal struggles because he had relocated to
Speaker 2: the town of Saint George, Utah, which was three hundred
Speaker 2: miles away. But the Great Recession of two thousand and
Speaker 2: eight hit and he left himself very underemployed, couldn't hold
Speaker 2: down a full time job, he was broken behind in
Speaker 2: his rent, and he seemed unwilling to accept any assistance
Speaker 2: from his family. And then in December of two thousand
Speaker 2: and nine, Stephen would go missing under very strange circumstances.
Speaker 2: In the days prior to his disappearance, he made two
Speaker 2: unexplained road trips through various locations throughout Utah and Nevada,
Speaker 2: where one day he drove around eleven hundred miles, but
Speaker 2: nobody really knows why, particularly since traveling that distance and
Speaker 2: spending money on gas is not something you would or
Speaker 2: nearly do when you're struggling financially. And then, finally, on
Speaker 2: December the thirteenth, he decided to make an unexplained trip
Speaker 2: to Henderson, Nevada, just outside Las Vegas. He went to
Speaker 2: an affluent neighborhood where all the residents were seniors over
Speaker 2: the age of fifty five, and one of the neighbors
Speaker 2: had a camera outside his residence which showed Stephen parking
Speaker 2: his car, climbing out while caring what appeared to be
Speaker 2: a folder in his hand, and after he walked out
Speaker 2: a frame in the camera. He vanished without a trace.
Speaker 2: They picked up some pings on his cell phone in
Speaker 2: the days after his disappearance, and somebody even checked his voicemail,
Speaker 2: but we don't exactly know who did it, and Stephen
Speaker 2: has sadly not been seen since. There's been a lot
Speaker 2: of speculation that maybe because he was falling on hard times,
Speaker 2: that maybe his disappearance was a suicide, or he walked
Speaker 2: out into the Nevada desert and died of exposure. But
Speaker 2: on this episode, we're finally going to talk about a
Speaker 2: theory which suggests that Stephen may have been the victim
Speaker 2: of foul play and did not leave that neighborhood in
Speaker 2: Henderson alive. Well, now we're finally going to discuss the
Speaker 2: new information about this case which has been unearthed in
Speaker 2: recent years, and will start off by discussing Stephen's landlord,
Speaker 2: Brett Bishop. Even though Stephen was renting a house in
Speaker 2: Saint George, Brett Bishop and his wife Tina lived in Aura, Utah,
Speaker 2: which is located about two hundred and sixty five miles northwest.
Speaker 2: Brett is actually quite a sketchy character, as he had
Speaker 2: an extensive arrest record, and in August of two thousand
Speaker 2: and nine, the authorities performed a raid of his residence
Speaker 2: in Orum, where they turned up a cache of guns,
Speaker 2: some marijuana, a number of prescription pills and prescription bottles
Speaker 2: with other people's names on them, and a Porsche which
Speaker 2: had been stolen from a dealership in Arizona. Years earlier,
Speaker 2: Brett had previously been employed by a closed door pharmacy business,
Speaker 2: which would deliver prescription medications to exclusive clients such as
Speaker 2: rest homes and troubled youth centers. The reason the pharmacy
Speaker 2: let Brett go was because they received an anonymous email
Speaker 2: alleging that he might have been ripping them off in
Speaker 2: order to sell these pills on the side. I mentioned
Speaker 2: in our first episode that a YouTuber named Aaron Stoner
Speaker 2: ironic name given what we're talking about right now, has
Speaker 2: produced a thorough multi episode series about this case, and
Speaker 2: one of the episodes focused on online posts that Tina
Speaker 2: Bishop has made at sites like the web Slues Forum
Speaker 2: in the year's following Stephen's disappearance. During her posts, Tina
Speaker 2: has cast a lot of suspicion on Jordan's circle, Steven's
Speaker 2: former roommate at the house in Saint George. We mentioned
Speaker 2: in our first episode that Stephen and Jordan had polar
Speaker 2: opposite personalities, as Stephen was a straight laced religious person
Speaker 2: who was very devoted to his faith, while Jordan seemed
Speaker 2: to be more of a partier who had a prior
Speaker 2: drug possession. Conviction on his record. In spite of this,
Speaker 2: it sounds like the two roommates got along well enough
Speaker 2: and did not have any serious conflict, even though I'm
Speaker 2: not sure if Tina ever met Jordan. It almost seems
Speaker 2: like she's trying to betray him as this major drug
Speaker 2: dealer who could have gotten Stephen involved in something illegal.
Speaker 2: But the problem is that Jordan moved out of the
Speaker 2: house a month before Stephen went missing, and there's nothing
Speaker 2: to indicate that the two former roommates were still keeping
Speaker 2: in touch. Jordan even agreed to do a phone interview
Speaker 2: on one of Aaron Stoner's YouTube episodes, and he honestly
Speaker 2: sounds like he has nothing to hide. Jordan was very
Speaker 2: cooperative when he was interviewed by law enforcement during the
Speaker 2: original in investigation, and it does not sound like they
Speaker 2: ever considered him to be a possible suspect.
Speaker 3: And if he was some major drug dealer, there definitely
Speaker 3: would have been bigger implications and complications here. It sounds
Speaker 3: like a person who's a kid who's a little lost
Speaker 3: and doing whatever feels good at the time. And what's
Speaker 3: interesting and what I think is quite charming, is that
Speaker 3: Stephen lived alongside this kid, and he had his own life.
Speaker 3: Jordan had his own life, and the two boys seem
Speaker 3: to kind of coexist seamlessly. One of the cool things
Speaker 3: is that, I guarantee you one of Steven's ideas was
Speaker 3: that I can model my faith and share my faith
Speaker 3: with a roommate who doesn't have the same lifestyle, and
Speaker 3: who knows, maybe I actually influenced him in a good way.
Speaker 3: So I can see that being a very you know,
Speaker 3: I don't know, healthy might be the wrong word, but
Speaker 3: kind of charming dynamic that you have these two roommates
Speaker 3: at polar opposite ends. And was Jordan really that far
Speaker 3: out polar opposite ends or is it a young kid
Speaker 3: who uses drugs and is a party right, I don't
Speaker 3: think he was a major drug dealer, or you would
Speaker 3: have seen the police look a lot deeper into that.
Speaker 3: And it sounds more like the wife is trying to
Speaker 3: throw the scent off of she and her husband.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. The whole scenario sounds like a wacky sitcom
Speaker 2: where you have a devout Mormon and a stoner being roommates,
Speaker 2: but in spite of their differences, they get along very well.
Speaker 2: And that's exactly what it sounded like that even though
Speaker 2: they probably would not be close friends if they were
Speaker 2: not living in the same house together, it does not
Speaker 2: sound like they add any conflicts. And even though Jordan
Speaker 2: liked smoke his marijuana every now and then, he was
Speaker 2: not someone who dealt drugs. And I do agree that
Speaker 2: it sounds like Tina Bishop is using a lot of
Speaker 2: projection considering that Jordan all he had in his record
Speaker 2: was a drug possession charge, whereas her husband, Brett, he
Speaker 2: got busted turning up a cash of guns and a
Speaker 2: stolen car and a whole bunch of different drugs in
Speaker 2: his house. So it's like she shouldn't be the one
Speaker 2: casting stones.
Speaker 1: So as Ashley just said, Ed Robin just reiterated, it's
Speaker 1: been theorized that Tina and may have been pointing the
Speaker 1: finger at Jordan in order to deflect suspicion away from
Speaker 1: her husband Brett. One interesting detail Jordan's chered during his
Speaker 1: interview is that whenever Brett visited the residence in Saint George,
Speaker 1: he was always carrying a toiletry bag which made noises
Speaker 1: whenever it moved, to indicate that it likely contained pill bottles.
Speaker 1: Now here's where things get weird. At the time he
Speaker 1: went missing, Stephen was three months and fifteen hundred dollars
Speaker 1: behind in his rent, but when Brett was interviewed by
Speaker 1: police following his disappearance, he said that he had no
Speaker 1: plans to evict Stephen from the house since he was
Speaker 1: confident that the money would eventually be paid. During her
Speaker 1: online post, Tina stated that a few days before Stephen
Speaker 1: went missing, Brett spoke to him and they quote worked
Speaker 1: something out which would ensure that the rent would be
Speaker 1: all paid up by January. But the problem is that
Speaker 1: Stephen's phone records were checked and while it shows that
Speaker 1: Brett texted him a few times on December seventh and eighth,
Speaker 1: there's no record of any communication between them until December thirteenth,
Speaker 1: as Brett called Stephen's phone at four thirty six pm
Speaker 1: that afternoon. This was four and a half hours after
Speaker 1: Stephen was last seen in sun City, Anthem, and would
Speaker 1: explain why his phone pinged off a tower located ten
Speaker 1: miles away. Let's also not forget that Brett made a
Speaker 1: phone call to Ralph Klosher on December ninth to inform
Speaker 1: him about the rent situation, as Stephen had listed him
Speaker 1: as a contact in the rental agreement. Brett told Ralph
Speaker 1: that he was calling him because he was unable to
Speaker 1: reach Stephen. But it still strikes me as odd that
Speaker 1: he would phone the father of a thirty year old
Speaker 1: man about the situation, as this feels similar to a
Speaker 1: teacher calling the parents of his student who's having trouble
Speaker 1: in school. If Stephen and Brett had already quote worked
Speaker 1: something out, why would he feel the need to call
Speaker 1: Ralph to begin with. So according to Rolf, Stephen acted
Speaker 1: pretty hostile when he called him to inquire about the situation,
Speaker 1: So it sounds like Stephen was none too please that
Speaker 1: Brett got in touch with his father.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and also think about this. If he's actually communicating
Speaker 3: with him December seventh and eighth, and I'm assuming he
Speaker 3: gets a response from Stephen, why does he feel this
Speaker 3: need to have a concern one day later and call
Speaker 3: the dad. You had been in communication with him, right,
Speaker 3: he had been texting him?
Speaker 2: Uh? Yeah, like on the seventh and the eighth. And
Speaker 2: when you look at the whole thing about how Brett
Speaker 2: and Steven had supposedly worked something out, you would have
Speaker 2: to assume that they work something out on the seventh
Speaker 2: or the eighth, because the next time that Brett called
Speaker 2: Stephen was on the thirteenth, after Steven went missing. So
Speaker 2: it just seems weird that if they had quote unquote
Speaker 2: work something out, that Brett would suddenly decide to call
Speaker 2: Stephen's father unsolicited on his phone to inform him about
Speaker 2: his problems with their late rent. And what day does
Speaker 2: he actually go missing the thirteenth? The thirteenth.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this doesn't make any sense. Either he didn't
Speaker 3: say they were going to work something out, or there
Speaker 3: was some kind of deal made and Stephen wasn't following.
Speaker 2: Through with it.
Speaker 3: But I just have to step back and think, Okay,
Speaker 3: I owe my landlord. I have never I've been like,
Speaker 3: I've had a person who's kind to me. But if
Speaker 3: it came down to I did or did not pay
Speaker 3: you that check, you don't care about me. You care
Speaker 3: about your money. And so I find it interesting that
Speaker 3: this guy's kind of flippant about his rent and that
Speaker 3: I will just figure it out later. I never met
Speaker 3: a landlord like that, and then to have him so
Speaker 3: concerned about this money that he has to reach out
Speaker 3: to the data day after talking to Steven. It seems
Speaker 3: like he has some kind of erratic issue going on,
Speaker 3: not Steven.
Speaker 1: Well, it's pretty incongruous. His actions and his words aren't
Speaker 1: matching up.
Speaker 2: I mean, I can understand it if Brett and Steve
Speaker 2: Ben had already been close friends and they known each
Speaker 2: other for a long time, and he's thinking, oh, it's okay, bro,
Speaker 2: you can pay me whenever you want. I trust you.
Speaker 2: But like we mentioned, Brett lived one hundred miles away.
Speaker 2: These were not close friends, so it seems weird that
Speaker 2: he would be willing to cut Steven, a guy he'd
Speaker 2: know all that well, all this slack.
Speaker 1: It's just so weird that he said, oh, yeah, like
Speaker 1: we had something worked out, but then you felt the
Speaker 1: need to call his father, So it feels like you
Speaker 1: really didn't have something worked out, or why would you
Speaker 1: feel the need to call the father of a thirty
Speaker 1: year old match exactly.
Speaker 2: But here's the interesting part. During his lengthy road trip
Speaker 2: on December tenth, Stephen stopped to get gas in Springville, Utah,
Speaker 2: at five twenty five pm Mountain time, which would have
Speaker 2: been on his route between Salt Lake City and Saint George. Well,
Speaker 2: we previously revealed that Brett and Tina Bishop lived in
Speaker 2: Orum and it just happens to be located fourteen miles
Speaker 2: outside Springville. So could Steven have paid a visit to
Speaker 2: the bishops that day? And this is where they quote
Speaker 2: unquote worked something out. If Brett was involved in drug trafficking,
Speaker 2: could he of course Stephen into making some deliveries for
Speaker 2: him in exchange for wiping out the debt of Stephen's
Speaker 2: back rent. Give it Stephen's high moral character, I don't
Speaker 2: want to accuse him of getting involved in something illegal
Speaker 2: without evidence, But it's also possible that Brett asked Stephen
Speaker 2: to do some favors for him without revealing the full
Speaker 2: extent of what it was. We mentioned earlier that it
Speaker 2: made no sense for Stephen to drive northeast through Utah
Speaker 2: towards Salt Lake City before he went to visit the
Speaker 2: Nefts and Ruby Valley, since it would have been a
Speaker 2: much quicker route for him to drive northwest through Nevada. However,
Speaker 2: if Stephen needed to pay a visit to the bishops
Speaker 2: in Orum, that would explain his detour, and for all
Speaker 2: we know, they could have given him some cash to
Speaker 2: help cover his expenses, such as his stops to pay
Speaker 2: for gas. This may also account for Stephen's road trip
Speaker 2: through Nevada on December the twelfth, where he passed through
Speaker 2: over Tin and Mesquite, as he may have been asked
Speaker 2: to make deliveries there. If Brett wrote Stephen into doing
Speaker 2: something for him, I have to wonder if his call
Speaker 2: to Rolf was a psychological ploy of some sort, because
Speaker 2: now that Stephen knew his parents were aware of his
Speaker 2: serious financial problems, he might have felt desperate enough to
Speaker 2: help Brett out in order to make his unpaid rent
Speaker 2: issues go away.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very possible. It's possible that he's saying, Okay,
Speaker 3: I don't want to take help from my parents. Brett
Speaker 3: has this favor I can do for him, or says
Speaker 3: that if I'll just, you know, quickly do these things
Speaker 3: for him, he'll give me the cash or he'll cover
Speaker 3: my rent for me. I could see him getting tied
Speaker 3: up in something, especially when you talk about Jordan's a
Speaker 3: drug user. So what does he have to risk or
Speaker 3: why would he make up that this other guy comes
Speaker 3: into his house and has pills and things like that
Speaker 3: that make him a little suspicious or make his ears perk, thinking, Hey,
Speaker 3: this guy might be doing something drug related. That information
Speaker 3: comes from a kid who could have gotten himself in
Speaker 3: trouble by talking to the police, and instead he still
Speaker 3: disclosed those kinds of details. And so I'm quite suspicious
Speaker 3: of Brett right this second.
Speaker 1: And don't you guys think it's a little bit odd
Speaker 1: to point out the fact that there's a toiletry bag
Speaker 1: and it made it sound like there's pills. I take
Speaker 1: a bazillion supplements and those make this exact same sound
Speaker 1: as prescription drugs. I don't take a single prescription drug.
Speaker 3: Well. Also, though, you got to think, why would you
Speaker 3: need to carry those into the house while you're meeting
Speaker 3: with two of your tenants, even if you're on the
Speaker 3: road traveling. Why does your twiletry bag need to be
Speaker 3: in your hand unless you're considering making an offer to
Speaker 3: them to buy the drugs from you, or you're dropping
Speaker 3: some off or something. Why would you have your supplements
Speaker 3: in your hand? Illegal pills, prescription pills? Why would those
Speaker 3: be on your persons while you're meeting with two of
Speaker 3: your tenants.
Speaker 2: And it's all the more significant since we just revealed
Speaker 2: that Brett used to be involved in a closed door
Speaker 2: pharmacy business, which involved making deliveries of pills, so that
Speaker 2: could be another reason why he's bringing them into his
Speaker 2: rental house. Like maybe he's delivering these pills to someone
Speaker 2: else who lives in the area and it's just something
Speaker 2: he carries around all the time.
Speaker 1: So you think he just doesn't want to leave it
Speaker 1: in his car because it just seems like such an
Speaker 1: odd thing to bring into your rental property unless you
Speaker 1: have tenants who are buying those pills from you.
Speaker 3: That's what I'm thinking, was he offer the boys' pills?
Speaker 2: I mean, we haven't heard any confirmation from Jordan that
Speaker 2: specifically sold him any pills. He just talked about hearing
Speaker 2: like the sound of him the pills jaggling around when
Speaker 2: he was carrying them. But it makes me wonder though,
Speaker 2: maybe if Jordan, even if he had nothing to do
Speaker 2: with Stephen's disappearance, if he bought drugs from Brett, that
Speaker 2: might be one of those things he's reluctant to talk
Speaker 2: about openly.
Speaker 1: And that could be exactly why he's inferring that Jordan
Speaker 1: has some kind of pills or he's got something illegal,
Speaker 1: because he doesn't want to outright say, yeah, I bought
Speaker 1: them from him, So he's just going to infer the
Speaker 1: Jordan has them now. Tina says that on December thirteenth,
Speaker 1: she and Brett traveled to the house in Saint George
Speaker 1: and discovered Stephen wasn't there, who had noticed his personal
Speaker 1: possessions were still inside the residence, But in separate online
Speaker 1: posts made years apart, she told two completely different stories.
Speaker 1: At first, Tina wrote that she and Brett took a
Speaker 1: routine trip to Saint George and decided to stay at
Speaker 1: the house in order to money for a hotel since
Speaker 1: there was an unused bedroom which was always kept locked
Speaker 1: when they weren't there. However, in her second post, Tina
Speaker 1: claimed that Brett was worried that Stephen might have decided
Speaker 1: to skip out without paying his rent, so they traveled
Speaker 1: to the house, but since Stephen's personal belongings were still there,
Speaker 1: this quelled their concern that he had taken off. But
Speaker 1: once again, phone records show that Brett made no attempt
Speaker 1: to call or text Stephen's cell phone between eight twenty
Speaker 1: three am on December eighth and four thirty six pm
Speaker 1: on December thirteen. If you were so concerned that Stephen
Speaker 1: was going to take off without paying his rent. Why
Speaker 1: wouldn't you try calling him rather than drive three and
Speaker 1: a half hours from Oran to Saint George. And when
Speaker 1: Brett was interviewed by police, he said he was confident
Speaker 1: that Stephen would pay him everything he owed rather than
Speaker 1: taking off. It just strikes me as an odd coincidence
Speaker 1: that Brett and Tina would decide to make this impromptu
Speaker 1: trip to Stephen's house on the same afternoon he went missing.
Speaker 1: In addition, the last Brett called Stephen Celthoam was on
Speaker 1: December fourteenth at six oh four am, which is right
Speaker 1: around the same time the phone was used to check
Speaker 1: his voicemail, which seems like another odd coincidence. All that
Speaker 1: being said, these suspicions about the Bishop are based entirely
Speaker 1: on Tiffany's online posts. At no point have law enforcement
Speaker 1: ever named Brett as a suspect or person of interest.
Speaker 1: These suspicions about the Bishop are based entirely on Tina's
Speaker 1: online posts, and at no point have law enforcement ever
Speaker 1: named Brett as a suspect or person of interest.
Speaker 3: He again, though his words aren't matching his actions. You
Speaker 3: are concerned that he's not going to pay you. You
Speaker 3: had to travel to the house or the apartment to
Speaker 3: look and see if he was there, and when his
Speaker 3: belongings are there, then you're not so worried. You don't
Speaker 3: just think he could have taken off and left his belongings.
Speaker 3: And you were concerned when you called his dad and
Speaker 3: said he wasn't going to pay. So it's really interesting
Speaker 3: because you have these messages to so many different people
Speaker 3: that don't line up. Hey, I talked to him. We
Speaker 3: work something out. Hey, Dad, I'm concerned Stephen is not
Speaker 3: going to pay his rent. Oh, don't worry, police, I
Speaker 3: have no worries that he wasn't going to pay his rent.
Speaker 4: Oh.
Speaker 3: Hey, by the way, we actually traveled and went there
Speaker 3: to make sure that he was still residing in this dwelling.
Speaker 3: But don't worry. We aren't worried about him paying his rent.
Speaker 3: None of that lines.
Speaker 2: Up, and we're not going to try to call him
Speaker 2: either to like see where he is, even though we're
Speaker 2: worried that he's going to take off without paying any rent.
Speaker 2: But let's operate under the assumption that Brett asked Stephen
Speaker 2: to drive to Henderson and make a delivery in the
Speaker 2: sun City Anthem neighborhood. If that is what happened. It
Speaker 2: would not surprise me if Brett provided Steven with a
Speaker 2: burner phone, which would explain how the two men communicated
Speaker 2: with each other without a bunch of calls and texts
Speaker 2: showing up on Steven's cell phone. For what I can tell,
Speaker 2: parking on the side of the street in that neighborhood
Speaker 2: was not permitted for outside residence, so I can see
Speaker 2: Stephen being given instructions to park in the cul de
Speaker 2: sac at the end of the road in order to
Speaker 2: avoid attracting attention. When he walked past the security camera,
Speaker 2: Stephen appeared to be carrying something like a file folder
Speaker 2: or portfolio, so this very well could have been an
Speaker 2: item that he was attempting to deliver. We just shared
Speaker 2: a story from Jordan's Zirkle about how Bread liked to
Speaker 2: carry around a toilet tree bag which likely contained bottles
Speaker 2: of pills. And since Brett had previously worked for a
Speaker 2: closed door pharmacy and had a lot of prescription medication
Speaker 2: at his residence when police raided it, I think it's
Speaker 2: reasonable to assume that Brett may have been stealing pills
Speaker 2: and selling them on the side. I know that police
Speaker 2: had a sniffer dog go over Stephen's car and have
Speaker 2: found no sign that any drugs had ever been inside
Speaker 2: the vehicle. But even though sniffer dogs are trained to
Speaker 2: detect hard drugs like cocaine and heroin, would they really
Speaker 2: give off much of a reaction if a small bag
Speaker 2: of prescription medication had been there. It's possible that since
Speaker 2: Brett had worked for a pharmacy, Stephen may have believed
Speaker 2: that the deliveries he was making were legit and had
Speaker 2: no idea he was doing anything legal. Of course, Sun City,
Speaker 2: Anthem would not seem like the most likely location to
Speaker 2: make a dangerous drug drop, as it's an affluent retirement
Speaker 2: community where you have to be a minimum age of
Speaker 2: fifty five in order to live there. I know that
Speaker 2: Brett's closed door pharmacy delivered medication to rest homes, but
Speaker 2: how did things escalate to the point that Stephen made
Speaker 2: a delivery in Sun City Anthem which put his life
Speaker 2: at risk.
Speaker 3: Ooh, this is a much more probable story than what
Speaker 3: we've been hearing. You have a man who presents himself
Speaker 3: as someone who works for a pharmaceutical company, and so
Speaker 3: if he is a pharmaceutical rep or he's working for
Speaker 3: a pharmacy and delivering quote prescriptions. If he did say, Hey,
Speaker 3: Brett or hey Stephen, if you could make this run
Speaker 3: for me, I'll knock five hundred bucks off your rent.
Speaker 3: Hey buddy, you know, hey, my company needs me to
Speaker 3: make these runs, but my wife and I have plans.
Speaker 3: You think you could do these couple drop offs for me?
Speaker 3: He might truly believe, like you said earlier in the podcast,
Speaker 3: that he is doing something noble or legal and he's
Speaker 3: just helping a friend. Maybe he doesn't know that Brett
Speaker 3: had gotten in trouble for for his you know, maybe
Speaker 3: stealing medication and things like that. Now you ask can
Speaker 3: drug dogs smell prescription pills? They can, they'd have to
Speaker 3: be particularly trained, and not just be a dog trained
Speaker 3: for those heavier drugs, but opioids and opiates those are
Speaker 3: things that a drug dog can be trained to smell. Again,
Speaker 3: there's a ton of factors that go into that. You know,
Speaker 3: were they what were they housed in, and how many
Speaker 3: were there and that kind of things. But I mean,
Speaker 3: it's it's possible that the drug dogs that they put
Speaker 3: on that car were trained on a host of different
Speaker 3: types of medications and drugs, Well.
Speaker 2: How much would the quantity have to be, Like, if
Speaker 2: there was just like a bottle or two, would that
Speaker 2: be large enough for the dogs to detect its scent
Speaker 2: after the pills were already removed. Do you have much
Speaker 2: idea about that.
Speaker 3: I don't know about that, And I know too, you
Speaker 3: got to think about what they were, what they were
Speaker 3: contained in, and so someone who's into diligent obviously could
Speaker 3: come up with things that would minimize smell. Even dispensary
Speaker 3: bags and things like that have the ability to kind
Speaker 3: of minimize the kind of transfer smells, but they're not
Speaker 3: full proof, right, There's still smells that are detectable, So
Speaker 3: I don't know. I think obviously the larger the dosage,
Speaker 3: the easier they'd be to smell, And depending on what
Speaker 3: they were housed in, would also make a big difference
Speaker 3: as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like if they're vacupatd plastic, right, it's a lot harder.
Speaker 1: But I also think that sniffer dogs, if they're trained,
Speaker 1: if there's even just one or two bottles, they should
Speaker 1: be able to detect that. But it does there's a
Speaker 1: lot of variable to go into that, like the dog
Speaker 1: and the handler and what type of training that they had.
Speaker 3: How long since the drugs had been there.
Speaker 1: They don't know how much stronger dogs noses are than humans,
Speaker 1: but they know they're at least five thousand times better
Speaker 1: and possibly millions of times better than ours. So I'm
Speaker 1: sure that even if there was one pill, if you
Speaker 1: have a dog that's trained properly, they could smell it.
Speaker 1: It turned out that back in two thousand and nine,
Speaker 1: there was one slightly younger resident living in Sun City,
Speaker 1: Anthem who was crashing at his parents' property. Going back
Speaker 1: to the Aaron Stoner YouTube series, he was able to
Speaker 1: get a hold of the original police reports for this
Speaker 1: case and posted them on his channel, and they provided
Speaker 1: some insight into the early stages of the investigation. The
Speaker 1: police did a door to door canvas of all the
Speaker 1: residents of Sun City, Anthem, and one of these residents
Speaker 1: said that someone appeared to be moving out of the
Speaker 1: house on the Evening Light Street on the same afternoon
Speaker 1: Stephen went missing. If that wasn't enough, Stephen just happened
Speaker 1: to be heading in that direction when he was last
Speaker 1: seen well. An elderly couple named Severio and Maria DiMaggio
Speaker 1: had been living in the house but moved to another
Speaker 1: residence in Henderson in November of two thousand and nine.
Speaker 1: That would explain why the house on Evening Light Street
Speaker 1: seemed to be empty and devoid of furniture whenever the
Speaker 1: police attempted to check it out, but it does an
Speaker 1: account for why someone would have been moving out there.
Speaker 1: On December thirteenth, however, Severio and Maria's son, Mark Demaggio,
Speaker 1: who was forty one years old at the time, had
Speaker 1: been living in a separate guest house on the property,
Speaker 1: and as far as anyone knew, he was still residing
Speaker 1: there in December. The police paid multiple visits to the
Speaker 1: residents and left their business cards, but no one was
Speaker 1: ever home, and they did not actually track down Mark
Speaker 1: Demaggio and interview him until February twenty ten. You might
Speaker 1: recall that we made reference to this back in our
Speaker 1: first episode, and yes, Demaggio was the individual we mentioned
Speaker 1: who appeared to be nervous when he was questioned about
Speaker 1: the case and claimed not to recognize Stephen in any
Speaker 1: of the photos the police showed him. Demaggio did acknowledge
Speaker 1: that he moved out of the residence in sun City,
Speaker 1: Anthem on December thirteenth, but for whatever reason, he became
Speaker 1: very evasive when asked where he was currently living and
Speaker 1: made remarks about how he didn't like to give out
Speaker 1: his address because he had no friends in town end quote,
Speaker 1: did not trust anyone due to the drug lifestyle that
Speaker 1: people tend to have end quote. All he did was
Speaker 1: provide a PO box number in the town of Perump,
Speaker 1: located over sixty miles west, and investigators later learned that
Speaker 1: DiMaggio owned four properties out there, two of which were
Speaker 1: vacant lots. Not surprisingly, this has led to speculation from
Speaker 1: online salutes that Stevens remains might be buried on one
Speaker 1: of those properties.
Speaker 3: Do you guys think that he had mental health issues
Speaker 3: going on that made him seem evasive and nervous and jumpy.
Speaker 3: I mean, he's living in a guest house behind his parents,
Speaker 3: but supposedly does have his own properties and owns other properties.
Speaker 3: He sounds like he could be someone of suspicion and
Speaker 3: or he could be someone who seems a little bit
Speaker 3: unstable as well.
Speaker 2: Well, we're going to talk about this later on, but
Speaker 2: he has always said that he had a serious injury
Speaker 2: in like a car accident, like at some point and
Speaker 2: was on a lot of medication at that times, which
Speaker 2: he is tried to use as a justification for why
Speaker 2: he was acting so evasive when he was speaking to police.
Speaker 2: But there's been a lot of uncorroborated gossip about Mark
Speaker 2: demagu online, and it sounds like he is kind of
Speaker 2: a troubled individual who has probably had drug issues at
Speaker 2: various points in his life, though I'm not entirely sure
Speaker 2: what kind of situation he was in back in late
Speaker 2: two thousand and nine early twenty ten. Another odd detail
Speaker 2: is that in the months following Steven's disappearance, the police
Speaker 2: got a number of tips from a woman calling herself Angela,
Speaker 2: who said there was a guy hanging around Las Vegas
Speaker 2: Boulevard who resembled Stephen Kosher and was claiming that he
Speaker 2: was the missing man whose face was being plastered on
Speaker 2: milk carts at that time. Investigators looked into this lead,
Speaker 2: but they never found this man or confirmed that he
Speaker 2: actually existed. And if that wasn't strange enough, one of
Speaker 2: the original police reports also mentions a tip from an
Speaker 2: Angela Demagio, even though there was no one from the
Speaker 2: Demagio family named Angela. This particular tip advised the police
Speaker 2: to search a particular area of the desert, but nothing
Speaker 2: was found. I don't believe they ever uncovered Angela's true identity,
Speaker 2: but it's been suspected that she may have attempted to
Speaker 2: mislead the investigation and send the police on a wild
Speaker 2: goose chase in order to give off the false impression
Speaker 2: that Stephen was still alive somewhere. It's also worth mentioning
Speaker 2: that Demago agreed to speak with the producers of the
Speaker 2: aforementioned Eyes on Justice podcast, and he told them that
Speaker 2: sometime before Stephen went missing, he had suffered a serious
Speaker 2: back injury in a car accident and was taking a
Speaker 2: lot of pain pills, so for this reason, he couldn't
Speaker 2: remember much about what happened during that time period. Well,
Speaker 2: if true, a person in that condition sounds like someone
Speaker 2: who might have been inclined to buy prescription medication on
Speaker 2: the black market, but Demaggio denied ever knowing Stephen Kosher
Speaker 2: or Brett Bishop.
Speaker 3: Super interesting. Yeah, it would make sense that he might
Speaker 3: be one of the people that they'd be dropping off
Speaker 3: pain pills to. But this Angela Demaggio, is that supposedly
Speaker 3: or was she presenting as if she was part of
Speaker 3: the elderly family, and is she presenting as if she's
Speaker 3: the daughter or niece or something of the elderly couple
Speaker 3: in Mark Demaggio as well.
Speaker 2: That part is confusing because this information about Angela Demaggio
Speaker 2: is only from the police reports that the private investigators
Speaker 2: hired by the Kosher family managed to obtain. But the
Speaker 2: Henderson police have never publicly commented on this lead, so
Speaker 2: they have not revealed where they got the name Angela Demaggio.
Speaker 2: But all the private investigators have confirmed is that there
Speaker 2: is no one from the immediate family named Angela, that
Speaker 2: Mark does not have a sister named Angela, that he
Speaker 2: doesn't have a niece or anything like that. So we
Speaker 2: don't know like if maybe he had a girlfriend or
Speaker 2: someone who was phoning in all these false tips about
Speaker 2: Stephen possibly being alive and wandering around Las Vegas Boulevard
Speaker 2: because she was trying to protect Mark and give off
Speaker 2: the false impression that Stephen was still alive somewhere.
Speaker 1: We should reiterate that law enforcement has never publicly commented
Speaker 1: on Demaggio or named him as a suspect or person
Speaker 1: of interest, and no conclusive link has ever been established
Speaker 1: to prove that Demashio and Bishop even knew each other,
Speaker 1: and if Demaggio really had a debilitating back injury at
Speaker 1: that time and was constantly hopped up on paign meds,
Speaker 1: I question if he would have had the wherewithal to
Speaker 1: commit a murder and effectively dispose of Stephen's body without
Speaker 1: leaving any evidence behind. But we have to harke him
Speaker 1: back to this segment produced by eight News Now in
Speaker 1: November of twenty twenty two, which we referenced in Part
Speaker 1: one of our series. As you might recall, it features
Speaker 1: interviews with the Eyes On Private Investigations team, who seemed
Speaker 1: pretty certain that Stephen was the victim of foul play
Speaker 1: and something happened to him shortly after he walked past
Speaker 1: the security camera. It sounds like it's been established that
Speaker 1: Stephen went to the house and briefly spoke to one
Speaker 1: of the neighborhood's residents about money before he realized that
Speaker 1: he was at the wrong address. So the primary theory
Speaker 1: is that when Stephen finally went to the right address,
Speaker 1: he joked about how he'd gone to the wrong place
Speaker 1: and spoken to the wrong person, and for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: this seemed to sign his debt warrant, possibly because the
Speaker 1: perpetrator was paranoid that Stephen had revealed too much. This
Speaker 1: person may have concluded that Stephen was a liability and
Speaker 1: they had to make him disappear in order to ensure
Speaker 1: that there was no connections between them. There are photographs
Speaker 1: of extensive damage to walls and doors inside the Demagio residence,
Speaker 1: and this might indicate that Stephen was the victim of
Speaker 1: a violent struggle in there. But even though the Eyes
Speaker 1: On Private Investigations team have always been quite open about
Speaker 1: expressing their personal opinion about what they believe happened to Stephen,
Speaker 1: the Henderson Police Department have never commented on the situation,
Speaker 1: and in the aforementioned segment by eight News Now, they
Speaker 1: simply stated that there was no new updates to provide.
Speaker 1: So are they remaining silent in order to protect the
Speaker 1: integrity of the investigation or do they just not put
Speaker 1: much credence into the private investigator's theory.
Speaker 3: Well, one of the things I wonder is that there's
Speaker 3: evidence that's been shared in the file about this Angela
Speaker 3: DiMaggio where the parents ever questioned about why there might
Speaker 3: have been damage to the house, or like what if
Speaker 3: Mark had outburst and was violent anyway, or what if
Speaker 3: there had been a break in in the house at
Speaker 3: some other point and someone had vandalized the home. Is
Speaker 3: there information from the parents of the condition of that house.
Speaker 3: Is there anything where the police say that they even
Speaker 3: explored the house for DNA or kind of evidence in
Speaker 3: the violent struggle that seems to be presented there.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, just don't have that information just because the police
Speaker 2: are acting so secretive. I know it's been established that
Speaker 2: Mark's parents were no longer living at the residence. They
Speaker 2: had moved into a new place a couple of weeks
Speaker 2: before Stephen went missing, and it sounds like Mark was
Speaker 2: the sole resident living in the guest house. So it's
Speaker 2: unclear how if law enforcement went to the trouble of
Speaker 2: interviewing the parents, because it took them a couple months
Speaker 2: just to even track down Mark and interview him, And
Speaker 2: even if he raised red legs with his behavior, it
Speaker 2: does not sound like they have ever really named them
Speaker 2: as a suspector person of interest, And it's unclear to
Speaker 2: me if they actually performed a full forensic search of
Speaker 2: that house to see if there was any evidence of
Speaker 2: foul play or that Steven had been there. It's possible
Speaker 2: they have already done that stuff, but in order to
Speaker 2: protect the integrity of the investigation, they're just staying silent
Speaker 2: about it. So this begs the question, did Brett Beship
Speaker 2: convince Stephen to travel to Henderson to make some sort
Speaker 2: of delivery to Mark Demaggio which led to him being killed. Well,
Speaker 2: it's an intriguing theory, but I have to hammer on
Speaker 2: the point that law enforcement has never publicly commented on
Speaker 2: Bishop or Demaggio, and no link has ever been established
Speaker 2: between the two men. And even if you believe this theory,
Speaker 2: there are still a ton of unanswered questions. If the
Speaker 2: purpose of Stephen's road trip on December the tenth was
Speaker 2: to visit the bishops in Orum, why did he travel
Speaker 2: hundreds of more miles to visit the Nefts in Ruby Valley?
Speaker 2: Why did he tell the Nefts he was planning to
Speaker 2: visit people in Sacramento. If Stephen had something important planned
Speaker 2: in Henderson, why did he tell Greg Webb that he
Speaker 2: was willing to drive back to Saint George to perform
Speaker 2: the morning service. If he was making a delivery to
Speaker 2: someone in Henderson, how did they communicate with each other.
Speaker 2: If Stephen was killed on the same day he went missing,
Speaker 2: why was someone checking his voicemail two days later? I
Speaker 2: get the sense that a number of people associated with
Speaker 2: this case now have a pretty good idea of what
Speaker 2: happened to Stephen, but without a body or any hard
Speaker 2: evidence that a crime even took place, law enforcement is
Speaker 2: powerless to file any charges or make any arrests.
Speaker 3: And it's really hard because there's multiple players here. If
Speaker 3: this is really what happened, if Brett set him up
Speaker 3: to go deliver these pills and Mark killed him, you
Speaker 3: have multiple people who are involved here. You have Brett,
Speaker 3: who needs to be deeply investigated, you have Mark, and
Speaker 3: then again, like you said, where is the evidence of
Speaker 3: communication between the two. So you can have a theory
Speaker 3: and an idea that's pretty airtight, but without any kind
Speaker 3: of supporting evidence and without any ability to prove that theory,
Speaker 3: the police could be at a standstill.
Speaker 1: So if Stephen was murdered because he was roped into
Speaker 1: doing something illegal, either knowingly or unknowingly, then you have
Speaker 1: to feel immense sympathy for him because it sounds like
Speaker 1: he was a good man from a fine family who
Speaker 1: found himself in a desperate financial situation because of a
Speaker 1: lot of different factors, and he seemed to have so
Speaker 1: much pride that he felt that he should get out
Speaker 1: of it on his own. It's possible that there are
Speaker 1: people out there who might have important information about what
Speaker 1: happened to Stephen, and the big break in this case,
Speaker 1: and the big break this case means is for the
Speaker 1: right person to come forward.
Speaker 2: So if you happen to have any information about the
Speaker 2: unsolved disappearance of Stephen Kosher, you can contact the Saint
Speaker 2: George Police Department, the Las Vegas met for Politan Police Department,
Speaker 2: or the Henderson Police Department, as they have all worked
Speaker 2: on this investigation. Jules Ashley, any final thoughts in this case?
Speaker 3: This one is one where I actually think there's a
Speaker 3: potential for it to be solved and for someone to
Speaker 3: be held accountable. You do have multiple players in this scenario,
Speaker 3: though we've presented recently where you have maybe Brett set
Speaker 3: him up for something. Perhaps Mark is the one who
Speaker 3: intercepts him and injures him or kills him. And so
Speaker 3: it's this idea that as time goes on and they
Speaker 3: feel more and more confident that they got away with it,
Speaker 3: as relationships change, as people's lifestyles changed, there's an ability
Speaker 3: that maybe someone says something, maybe someone no longer has
Speaker 3: loyalties to protect the people involved, and maybe it's not
Speaker 3: Breton Mark, but same situation that over time, because this
Speaker 3: is a more recent case, there's potential that circumstances may
Speaker 3: change in a way that people feel the freedom to
Speaker 3: now come forward and not be scared of the retribution
Speaker 3: that would come. I'm praying so deeply for that, because
Speaker 3: you already have a beautiful family who's been ripped apart
Speaker 3: by the disappearance of their son and brother, and then
Speaker 3: you have a you know, the father passed away, but
Speaker 3: you have this beautiful element of faith and struggle that
Speaker 3: so many of us can relate to. He was a
Speaker 3: young man with his whole life in front of him.
Speaker 3: It wasn't going easy. He was in the recession and
Speaker 3: in this kind of financial crash that so many of
Speaker 3: us suffered with, and he just wanted goodness for his life.
Speaker 3: And so whether he knew or didn't know what he
Speaker 3: was getting involved in, it breaks my heart that something
Speaker 3: that seemed so innocent to him or short term for him,
Speaker 3: could have ended up costing him his life. I'm praying
Speaker 3: that someone has the ability to come forward because it
Speaker 3: would be incredible to see someone held accountable for this crime.
Speaker 1: This case is so sad. I think it's just so
Speaker 1: many people who loved Steven. There's all of the people
Speaker 1: at the LDS church, there's all of his family members,
Speaker 1: and they're left with so many questions wondering what happened
Speaker 1: to their son. Did he meet with foul play? Like
Speaker 1: the private investigator's thought, was it something where Stephen wandered off,
Speaker 1: which I don't believe. I think the fact that you know,
Speaker 1: as she had brought up that he had bought these
Speaker 1: gifts for his nephew that had been born and isn't newborn,
Speaker 1: and although it wasn't expensive gifts, it showed the intention
Speaker 1: that he wanted to be there at Christmas with his family.
Speaker 1: And I do think that was and intention that he
Speaker 1: was going to try to follow through with. And it
Speaker 1: does sound like he may have got embroiled in something
Speaker 1: potentially illegal, and that running into DiMaggio might have been
Speaker 1: the worst thing that could have ever happened to him,
Speaker 1: because it sounds like if Demaggio was indeed on pain pills,
Speaker 1: the way he spoke to police about not wanting to
Speaker 1: give out his address because of the drug lifestyle that
Speaker 1: most people lead, which seems like a really odd thing
Speaker 1: to say if you're assuming that everybody is living this
Speaker 1: drug lifestyle, and or the police, I'm not sure, but
Speaker 1: either way, this man had multiple properties. He seemed like
Speaker 1: he was potentially on drugs, and if Steven did indeed
Speaker 1: knock on a neighbor's door and then went and told
Speaker 1: DiMaggio that he did that, it seems like he could
Speaker 1: have been paranoid and may have taken an extreme step.
Speaker 1: And that's why we've never found out what happened to Steven,
Speaker 1: because he had access to multiple different properties, and the
Speaker 1: police obviously don't have enough information in order to get
Speaker 1: a search warrant, and like, even if they did, which
Speaker 1: property would you start with if he owns four Yeah.
Speaker 2: I got introduced to this case when I saw it
Speaker 2: on Disappeared several years ago, and obviously it's one of
Speaker 2: the saddest episodes they produced because it contained an interview
Speaker 2: with Steven's father, Rolf, who passed way just a few
Speaker 2: weeks after his interview was filmed without him getting to
Speaker 2: have any answers about what happened to his son, And
Speaker 2: for the longest time, I was pretty baffle what happened here.
Speaker 2: I cannot think of any snare that made sense. Even
Speaker 2: though I didn't really believe it was a suicide or
Speaker 2: an intentional walkaway, I wasn't willing to completely discount it
Speaker 2: because it amazed me that the investigation had not turned
Speaker 2: up any evidence that shed any light on why Stephen
Speaker 2: would have driven to such a faraway location and why
Speaker 2: he was spending those two days just making these lengthy
Speaker 2: road trips through Utah and Nevada. So it was a
Speaker 2: major head scratcher, and I remember when I covered this
Speaker 2: on the Trail went Cold. At the end of twenty
Speaker 2: twenty two, I started researching it and figured I was
Speaker 2: just going to cover the same ground which has been
Speaker 2: shared for the past decade about this case. But then
Speaker 2: I saw Aaron Stoner's YouTube channel. I saw a lot
Speaker 2: of this information shared on the Crime Weekly YouTube series,
Speaker 2: and I heard all this new information about Brett Bishop
Speaker 2: and Mark Demaggio, and a light bulb went off over
Speaker 2: my head, thinking, wow, wow, this scenario actually makes a
Speaker 2: lot of sense. It would account for why Stephen made
Speaker 2: these long road trips, possibly to visit Brett and his
Speaker 2: wife in orum would also explain why Brett was acting
Speaker 2: so suspiciously and why Stephen would be desperate enough to
Speaker 2: make possible deliveries of drugs just because he was many
Speaker 2: months behind in his rent. And it's possible that Brett
Speaker 2: was going to give him a break on this if
Speaker 2: he did this favor. But unfortunately, it sounds like Stephen
Speaker 2: cross passed with the wrong guy. And if this theory
Speaker 2: is true, that Stephen just went to the wrong house
Speaker 2: my mistake and then joked about it with Devaggio and
Speaker 2: he was so paranoid that he killed Stephen over it.
Speaker 2: It is such a senseless strategy. But once again I
Speaker 2: should reiterate that law enforcement has not commented on this angle,
Speaker 2: so it may not be one hundred percent true, But
Speaker 2: I happen to think that there sounds like there is
Speaker 2: some validity to it and that Stephen sadly probably was
Speaker 2: the victim of foul play, and that there are some
Speaker 2: people out there who knew the truth about what happened,
Speaker 2: but the beliefs just lacked the evidence to make an arrest.
Speaker 2: So that this information is being made public, hopefully one
Speaker 2: of these days, they can find now one piece of
Speaker 2: evidence that breaks this case wide open and Steven's family
Speaker 2: can finally get answers.
Speaker 1: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
Speaker 1: about the Trail Went Cold Patreon?
Speaker 2: Yes, The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
Speaker 2: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
Speaker 2: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
Speaker 2: and sign thank you cards to anyone who signs up
Speaker 2: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
Speaker 2: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
Speaker 2: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
Speaker 2: the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to Patreon,
Speaker 2: and if you join our highest tier tier three, the
Speaker 2: ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer is
Speaker 2: a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsawved Mysteries,
Speaker 2: where you can download an audio file and then boot
Speaker 2: up the original Unsoalved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
Speaker 2: YouTube and play it with my audio commentary play in
Speaker 2: the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids about
Speaker 2: the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very
Speaker 2: first episode that I did a commentary track over was
Speaker 2: the episode featuring this case. So if you want to
Speaker 2: download a commentary track in which I make more smart
Speaker 2: ass remarks about Jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join
Speaker 2: Tier three.
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Speaker 1: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Colors Comedy