Keddie Cabin 28 Murders

Hey, glad you could make it. Before you head into the bar for today's true crime story, just a warning that TCB might contain disturbing content, so it's not for kids. Enjoy the episode. Welcome to True Crime Brewery. I'm Jill. And I'm Dick.

In the quiet mountain town of Keddie, California, a brutal crime shattered the peace of a spring night back in 1981. Four lives were taken in a cabin that was tucked deep in the woods. Three victims were found in a scene of unimaginable violence, and one victim went missing for years. So despite decades of investigation, the case remains unsolved, draped in mystery and fear. Who committed the murders? Why were key pieces of evidence ignored? And why did this small-town tragedy become one of the most haunting cold cases in American history?

Join us for Keddie Cabin 28 Murders. The murders of Susan Sharp, John Sharp, Tina Sharp, and Dana Wingate had all the things that make up a horror movie. But this is real life, and real people were devastated by these murders. All that's left of Cabin 28 is the land, and that's where the dark secrets linger while justice still remains just out of reach. So what are we having for a beer? We're having an imperial stout. It's called The Nothing, brewed by Smog City Brewing Company in Torrance, California. It's a pitch black colored beer, tiny tan head, really strong chocolate aroma, and some booze.

Taste, big time chocolate taste. It's almost like eating a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. A little bit of coffee, a bit of charcoal, and some bourbon. Okay, I'm not sure about the cake thing, if it's got bourbon and charcoal. But the chocolate's overwhelming? No. No, I thought it was very good and nice balance between the sweetness of the chocolate and the bitterness of the bourbon. Okay. It worked really well, but it is 10% alcohol by volume. So we're passing this around to a bunch of people. Okay. Well, just an apology in case we don't sound great. We both are getting over a cold, but I think we're at the tail end of it and should be okay. Well, I think I have a very sexy voice now. Well, of course. Yes. Okay. Let's open some beer. How about that? Okay. I'm good with that. Okay.

So in the spring of 1981, Glenna Susan Sharp, a 35-year-old mom of five children who went by Sue, lived with her children in Cabin 28 in the small community of Keddie, California. They'd moved there back in November of 1980 after they moved from Connecticut to be closer to her brother after divorce from Sue's husband. The Keddie cabins were listed as resort cabins, but this was really in name only at this point. By the time Sue and her children moved in, these were already run-down cabins in need of repair, and they were being rented out as low-income housing. Sue held part-time jobs in the nearby town of Quincy, but she still had to depend heavily on the welfare system to get by. So although the family was living in poverty, Sue did her best to provide for her children. She was described as a selfless mother who made sure that her children had food to eat and warm clothes for the winter, even if she had to go without. The Sharp family was a modest and close-knit unit in search of a peaceful life. Sue had relocated there after separating from her husband, James Sharp. As a dedicated and caring mother, she was focused on providing a stable and nurturing environment for her children. And this is despite all the challenges of single parenthood.

so sue was known for her quiet strength and determination she would remain optimistic in the face of circumstances that others of us might find impossible Friends and neighbors described her as a kind woman who was deeply devoted to her children. She'd moved to Keddie with the hope of starting fresh. Sue's decision to move there was partly influenced by its picturesque setting and the sense of community that the small town offered. So Sue was born back in March of 1945 in Springfield, Massachusetts. She married James Sharp in the 60s, and together they had five children. The marriage was troubled from early on, though. James Sharp, a Vietnam veteran, struggled with alcoholism and became increasingly abusive throughout their marriage.

In July of 79, Sue finally made the difficult decision to leave him, so she packed up her five children and she moved across the country to Northern California. And there she had support because she would be closer to her brother Don. So at first, the family rented a small trailer in Quincy. The Sharp children attended school there, where teachers reportedly believed there wasn't much support at home. And this was probably due to Sue working a part-time job and taking typing classes at the Feather River College through the California Education Training Act. Plus, she's got five kids to take care of. Yeah, and you get paid a little bit of money for going through that training. So when Sue moved her family into Cabin 28, Keddie had definitely seen better days. The collection of aging cabins surrounding a central lodge was home to many low-income families who were seeking affordable housing in the mountains.

Despite the rundown conditions, Sue worked hard trying to create a stable home for her and her children. So Sue's children, John, 15, Sheila, 14, Tina, 12, Rick, 10, and Greg, 5, adapted to their new life well. Johnny, the oldest, was described by those who knew him as friendly, outgoing, and he was a teenager who made friends easily. As the eldest son, he kind of saw himself as the protector of the family. And although he was kind of a small guy, he could be a fighter. He was scrappy. Sheila was quieter, but she was thoughtful and very well-liked. 12-year-old Tina was known for her sweetness and her vibrant personality, and they were all good-looking kids. Although Tina struggled academically, her teacher saw her as a really good kid.

They just thought she brought a light to the class that wasn't there before she was. Now the two youngest boys, Rick and Greg, were ten and five years old, and they added boundless energy to the household. Despite Sue's efforts to care for her children, some neighbors were still pretty judgmental of her. They gossiped that she wasn't the most attentive mother and that male visitors were frequently seen coming and going from her cabin. A small household with five children meant there was constant activity there. The Sharps had become friendly with the Smart family, who lived around the corner.

In the welcoming spirit of the mountain resort town, sleepovers were a regular occurrence for the kids. Sheila and Tina often stayed over with their friend Alyssa Siebel, who lived in a neighboring cabin, while Johnny had grown close to 17-year-old Dana Wingate, a local teenager who frequently spent the night at Cabin 28. Cabin 28 was a very modest home. While life wasn't easy there, the Sharp family made the best of their circumstances. By that spring, they felt like they were part of the community. They were well-liked and had friends in the area. So in the days leading up to the tragic events in April 1981, nothing really seemed amiss in the lives of the Sharp family.

They were now going about their routines, having no idea of the horrors that actually awaited them. In the early spring of 1981, Sue told her brother Donald and his wife Nancy that she had grown increasingly concerned about her teen son's use of alcohol and marijuana and his tendency to engage in other risky behavior. Johnny was involved in two incidents, one 10 months prior to his death and another about four months before his death, in which he allegedly stole an ounce of marijuana from a small-time Quincy drug dealer. He was caught by the dealer, and they worked out an informal agreement between Johnny and the dealer where Johnny cut firewood. for the man to pay off his debt. That's a kind drug dealer that will let you work out a deal. I'd want to be aware of that, given the carnage that takes place in their home. That's true, yeah. One witness claimed that when he agreed to take John and his friend Dana Wingate to East Quincy one day, they robbed a house of some drugs, two bags of marijuana, and sheets of what Johnny and Dana said was acid. Johnny was prone to fighting, and he got a black eye during a fistfight a week before the murders. Johnny spent many weekends away from home, staying at the homes of friends in Quincy.

Dana Wingate, who had been placed into a group home, liked drinking beer and smoking pot, but he tried to refrain from both because he was diabetic and insulin dependent. So yeah, probably smoking and drinking and all that is not a good way to treat your diabetes. Well, alcohol is sugar. It will hurt. In fact, according to law enforcement, Dana's last injection of insulin before his murder occurred between 6.30 p.m. and 7.30 p.m. It's about six hours before his death. Dana lived in a foster home in the Quincy area, placed there by the Plumas County Probation Department in October of 1979. He was placed on probation.

because he had tortured a cat in Quincy by injecting the animal with insulin while a friend burned the cat alive. Well, that's horrendous. That is really horrendous. In another incident, which I find much better, I guess, Dana smashed a series of lights at the airport in Quincy. Now, he was only 17, but Dana had become a ladies' man with the girls at Quincy High School, and he was regularly having sex with a 27-year-old woman, too. So he just basically had a rough life and was a rough kid. These two teenagers' misadventures, witnesses have speculated, could have resulted in their deaths, because one witness claimed Johnny and Dana were killed by a drug dealer because they had stolen those 10 sheets of acid.

Another witness claimed the murders occurred because of a botched drug deal. And yet another witness claimed that Dana confided to him mere hours before his death that some people were after him. But when it came to April 11th of that year, by all accounts, Johnny and Dana were not looking for trouble and they had not been using drugs. Toxicology studies would show that there were no signs of drugs or alcohol use by either boy near the times of their deaths. So it could be that stories about their drug and alcohol use were just exaggerated.

There are a lot of stories, and many of them were conflicting, about Johnny and Dana's whereabouts on the day of April 11th. I don't know that these stories are necessarily exaggerated. I think they're probably true. They could be. But for some reason that day, they didn't do any drugs, at least not within the time frame where it would show up in their bodies. Well, yeah. But we haven't been told that they were heavy drug users. No, no. No, we haven't heard that at all. I don't think Johnny was. I'm not sure about Dana. Yeah, they hung out together a lot. They did, yep. So let's go over the day of April 11th, which is the day before these people are found murdered.

So 9.30am on April 11th, Sue drove herself, Sheila, Ricky, Greg, and Justin to Quincy. Justin was the neighbor boy, Justin Smart. Sue left Ricky and Justin at Little League practice and then drove to Richard Meeks' home in East Quincy. Sheila walked to her friend Alice Thompson's home in East Quincy as well. At about 10.15, Sue called Sheila at Alice's house. Sue, Sheila, and Greg then drove home. On the way, they picked up Johnny and Dana. They just saw them. They were out hitchhiking in Gansner Park, which is located on the northwest end of Quincy. So at 11 a.m., Richard Meeks, who was the father of Sheila's baby, now Sheila, 14, had had a baby that she put up for adoption, and Richard was the father.

But he hung out with Johnny at Holiday Market in East Quincy, and one of Dana's foster parents drove up and let Dana out of the car, and then the three boys went to visit a friend. At around noon, Sue, Sheila, Greg, Johnny, and Dana all arrived back in Keddie. Tina had stayed home, and she was there when they got back. Not long after they returned to Keddie, Dana and Johnny decided to return to Quincy, and they hitched a ride into town about 1.30. The two boys ended up hanging out at a friend's home in a trailer park in Quincy. And after hanging out there for a while, Johnny and Dana decided to head over to Dana's foster home, and then back to Keddie.

So they returned to Cabin 28 later that evening, sometime around 9 p.m., although we're really not completely sure. Justin Smart visited the Sharp house, and he and Ricky rode their bikes until about 6 p.m. before they returned to cabin 28. Sue, Ricky, Greg, and Justin all had burritos for dinner. Ricky, Greg, and Justin ate in the kitchen, but Sue ate while sitting on the sofa in the living room. Then Sheila went over to the Seaboltz cabin to hang out with her friend Alyssa. So the family's plans for that evening were not unusual. Rick and Greg's friend Justin was staying over, while Sheila planned to sleep over at the Seaboltz family's cabin next door with her friend Alyssa Seaboltz. Tina joined them to watch TV, but returned home around 9.30, but Sheila stayed at the Seaboltz.

So by then, Sue, Johnny, Dana, Tina, Greg, and Justin were all gathered together in cabin 28. Ricky and Justin came into the Sharp cabin and started to watch Love Boat with Sue and Greg around 9. Tina walked home from the Seabolts around the same time and got ready for bed in cabin 28. At 9.30, the Sharp's telephone rang. Sue answered the phone and she was overheard asking, who is this? But no one knew who called her.

Marilyn and Martin Smart, who are Justin's parents, and John Bubaday walked to the tavern, passing the Sharps cabin on the way. So Martin said the cabin appeared darker than usual. Ricky and Justin went to bed after watching Love Boat. They talked for about ten minutes, and then Ricky fell asleep. He would say he didn't wake up at all during the night. There would be a witness who saw a man leaving the tavern and described him as unclean, about five foot six, and less than 150 pounds, with dark brown hair, stubble on his face, wearing a floppy faded denim hat, faded blue jeans, and a blue jean jacket.

at eleven p m martin smart observed the two men who he called bearded hippies leaving the tavern and getting into an older truck so at eleven thirty p m a witness said the light in the front yard of the sharps cabin was off and it was normally on so april twelfth slightly after midnight a witness left the tavern and saw a dark-colored square-shaped van parked across the bridge that connects the highway to ketty johnny and dana arrived at the sharps cabin by then according to justice so at twelve thirty a m martin smart claims that he became angry at the tavern because the music was changed from country to rock music even though people would say he actually preferred rock music. So Martin, his wife Marilyn, and Bubaday left and walked home past the Sharp cabin. So what happened in Cabin 28 that night has been the subject of speculation for over 40 years. Based on the evidence recovered from the crime scene and the witness statements throughout the years, investigators believe that it was sometime after 9 p.m. on April 11th when at least two assailants entered Cabin 28. So the lack of any signs of forced entry suggests that either the victims knew their attackers or that they had somehow convinced someone to let them in.

But what followed was a prolonged, violent and bloody home invasion, assault and murder. sue johnny and dana were bound with electrical wire and medical tape before being brutally beaten with multiple weapons two bloodied knives and a hammer were found at the crime scene one of the knives a steak knife was bent at approximately thirty degrees so anyone who saw this scene would say that the level of violence was shocking sue sharp was found nude from the waist down she was gagged with a blue bandanna with her arms and legs secured with tape she'd been stabbed in the chest multiple times her throat was slashed horizontally through her larynx and there was an imprint on the side of her head matching the butt of a daisy bb pellet rifle her son her oldest son johnny sharp his throat was slashed and he had suffered severe blunt force trauma to his head from what seemed to be hammer strikes dana wingate had multiple head injuries and had been manually strangled to death in addition to suffering blunt force trauma similar to johnny's autopsies later determined that sue and johnny died from their knife wounds and the blunt force trauma but dana died from asphyxiation due to strangulation during this attack twelve-year-old tina was abducted from the cabin

whether she was removed before during or after the murders of her other family members is not known but the youngest sharps greg and rick and their friend twelve-year-old justin smart who were sleeping in a bedroom were left unharmed the cabin's telephone had been taken off the hook and the cord was cut from the outlet the curtains were all drawn and some of tina's belongings including her jacket her shoes as well as a tool box johnny had made at school were missing from the house So really just a horrible crime. Yeah, a lot of blood, a lot of disarray. Yes, it was very violent. And investigators really think it had to be more than one person. Yeah, I think it would have to be. Yeah, it would be really hard for one person to do that. Although there have been suggestions that maybe one of the victims helped, especially Dana. Dana may have been forced to help bind people. So it is possible it was one person, but more than likely it was two or even more people.

So the next day was Sunday, April 12. Sheila Sharp walked 60 feet from her neighboring friend's cabin to her own. Sheila had stayed the night with Alyssa, and she headed home around 8 a.m. As the 14-year-old opened the front door to her family's cabin, she saw the living room prior to entering, and something just appeared very wrong. But it took her a second or two to register in her mind what she was seeing. She was seeing the mutilated bodies of her brother John and John's friend Dana.

a blanket covered her mom sue's body so later in a memoir that sheila wrote she described what she saw that morning she wrote i stood in complete shock and i didn't move into the house more than a step beyond the threshold I heard screaming, but I couldn't locate the source. Suddenly, my friend's older brother seized me by the arm and dragged me back to their home next door. Apparently, I had been the one screaming, and my friend's mother had dispatched her oldest son to investigate the ruckus. When Sheila returned to the Seaboltz cabin, she was crying out, come quick, there are three bodies over there, blood all over, and a knife, and their hands are tied. So it was the Seaboltz who contacted a neighbor who called the sheriff's office, and this was right after she'd gotten there. It was about ten after eight. Sheila, along with James Seabolt Jr. and his mother, Zanita Seabolt, went back to the Sharps cabin.

They rescued her brothers, Greg and Rick, and their friend Justin Smart, who'd spent the night. Now, not wanting them to see the massacre in the living room, Sheila helped the boys to exit through her brother's bedroom window instead of leaving through the front door. That's a good idea. Yeah, and it's pretty remarkable that they weren't harmed. and that they didn't wake up. Now it'll be questionable about whether Justin woke up or not, but the other two boys honestly did not seem to hear anything. By 8.30 in the morning, the first law enforcement officers arrived on the scene. Blood spatter covered the walls and floor. Furniture was overturned, and personal belongings were scattered throughout the room. The body closest to the front door was 15-year-old Johnny Sharp.

Johnny's friend, 17-year-old Dana Wingate, was next to him. Sue Sharp had been beaten, stabbed, and was lying nearby, covered with a blanket. Killers had sliced her chest, scalp, throat, and face. Her skull and right eye socket were fractured. Her teeth were broken. All three were tied up with medical tape and electrical cords, and Sheila could not find her 12-year-old sister, Tina, inside or outside the house. So this is incredibly violent. I just don't understand the violence here.

Her teeth were broken. Her skull was fractured. This was really, really a horrible crime. And it almost seems like Sue was the target because she got the worst of it. She was the worst beat up. Yes. Which wouldn't be surprising if there was some man that felt slighted by her or something. Of course, they would suspect ex-boyfriends, ex-husband, all that. Well, then we'll get back to what you mentioned earlier, that Sue's acquaintances or friends or whatever said that she didn't keep a good house and there were men coming and going all the time. Right. But other people would deny that to be true. So we're not sure about that.

So if you're a fan of True Crime Brewery, and you're here, so hopefully you are, maybe you just can't get enough of our storytelling and our analysis of true crime cases. So you can satisfy that by subscribing to our premium show by going to tiegrabber.com slash subscribe. Once you're a subscriber, you can enjoy every episode with no ads, so you can stay immersed in the details of a crime without any interruptions. And this will also give you access to exclusive bonus episodes where we dive into the most fascinating and disturbing cases. And this is content you won't hear anywhere else. It's not public content, so sometimes we share a little more personal stuff, right? That's right. On that premium channel.

So your support not only helps keep the beer cold and the stories flowing, but it allows us to continue delivering the content that you love. So whether you're into TCB for the psychology, the mystery, or maybe just the craft beer pairings, subscribing is an effective way for you to show your appreciation and get yourself even more of True Crime Brewery. So why wait? You can head over to tiegrabber.com slash subscribe and join the Tie Grabber community today. So shortly after the bodies were discovered, the Plumas County Sheriff's Department contacted Don Stoy. This was the agency's investigation supervising sergeant. The dispatcher told Stoy about multiple homicides, possibly as many as four, in Keddie. And this was shocking. This wasn't the kind of thing that happens out in the country. Stoy drove from his Indian Valley home to Keddie, which was about a 20-mile drive.

and when he arrived at the scene it was around nine thirty a m this was about an hour and a half after sheila had discovered her family's bodies stoy met up with assistant sheriff ken shanks then stoy and shanks walked inside the cabin to assess the scene stoy immediately saw what he later would describe as two bodies on the living room floor and a hump under a yellow blanket in front of the couch he also saw the bent steak knife near johnny stoy said both johnny and dana were bloody especially on their necks and heads johnny was face up dana was face down with his head laying on his right arm and partially on a pillow Both boys' feet were tied with an electrical cord and linked together with the cord. Sue Sharp's legs and feet were tied with an electrical cord, too, and she had been covered with that yellow blanket. Like the boys, Sue's head and neck were covered in blood. Stoy said all three bodies were cold and stiff, and it was obvious that they were dead. No sane person could have performed these acts. Stoy observed that, in addition to the bent steak knife, a butcher's knife and a claw hammer were on the scene, and they were found on a table at the entryway into the kitchen. So blood was on the knife and the hammer. Knife marks had damaged the walls, so there was a big struggle here.

The phone was off the hook, and except for a light inside the bathroom, the cabin was dark. Seized as evidence was a fingerprint that was found on a post at the bottom of the rear outside stairs. There was additional evidence seized as well. They totally dismantled the walls. Everything was examined and photographed. Following the search inside the house, including an April 16th walkthrough that was done with Sheila Sharp, the sheriff's office made sure the crime scene was kept clean. Deputies were posted at the crime scene around the clock to prevent anyone from contaminating it. So Stoy said the back door was doubly secured with locks. Then they sealed it off with nails. And the search continued both inside and outside the cabin for the following six days. But they said the scene was well contained and locked up.

Evidence items weren't sent to the Department of Justice for DNA testing until 2004. Now, use of DNA for criminal investigations wasn't developed until 1985. So that would be four years after the crimes. And it was not used to secure a criminal conviction until 1988. But we really didn't even hear much about that until the 90s. It was still quite rare. Quite rare. Yeah. And expensive. And time consuming. Absolutely. So Sue's brother, Donald Davis, showed up at the crime scene at about 845. He was in front of the cabin after being called by Sheila.

and he connected with law enforcement law enforcement described donald as being terribly upset and tearful when he arrived that morning of course it took him some time to process and then he was able to identify the victims as his sister her son and her son's friend donald said sue was in the process of divorcing her estranged husband he also said that sheila had recently become pregnant that's the fourteen-year-old daughter who discovered the bodies and she had delivered a child in the recent months in oregon and had given that baby up for adoption so they would definitely look into the father who was richard meeks the california department of justice the doj was called in by the sheriff's office to assist with the investigation and because it appeared that tina sharp had been kidnapped the fbi also assisted them so a search party which focused heavily on finding tina included four dog teams but tina was just nowhere to be found and of course she was feared dead so an interesting piece of evidence was an account of the events by twelve-year-old justin smart the only confirmed known witness to the killings and a stepson to one of the suspects justin possibly was law enforcement's best hope to focus the investigation he was interviewed under hypnosis which was pretty unusual

and he described the events leading up to the murders and tina's disappearance during the session justin said he and sue's two other sons went to bed for the night around ten after a b c nine p m show the love boat he claimed he fell asleep shortly after going to bed now five or ten minutes past before he nodded off was his estimate During this hypnosis session, Justin was asked whether he was awakened during the night, maybe by a thumping noise, and whether he recalled the events of the night. So this was done by a policeman with very little training, and it seemed kind of suggestive because it was the policeman who brought up the thumping noise. So there was a lot of things being suggested in that. Under this hypnosis, Justin described the day he'd had. He said that later in the day, Sheila and Tina were next door at the Seabolts. Tina came home around 7.30 p.m., according to him, to wash the dishes and then went back over there. Sheila was staying the whole night there, but Tina had to go back home.

Justin said that Tina returned to the cabin around 9.30 and went to bed. Justin, Ricky, and Sue Sharp had been watching The Love Boat on TV before going to bed around 10 p.m. So that seems to be the theme as he described an alleged dream in which two men were involved in a fight with John Sharp and Dana Wingate and they got thrown overboard. So he had this dream he was on a boat, but the things he said happened, a lot of it matched up with the crime inside the cabin. So in one dream, one of the men had a pocket knife in his right hand and cut Sue Sharp in the chest. And Sue had been cut in the chest. He also said that the same man had a hammer in his other hand.

So they hypnotized him again on May 19th, 1981, this time by a psychologist at the Children's Hospital in Los Angeles. So Justin spoke about Tina Sharp. He said Tina woke up and appeared in the living room to see what was going on. She was carrying a blanket. And according to what Justin said, under this hypnosis, a man grabbed Tina and carried her through the kitchen and down the back stairs. The man then returned, removed a hunting knife that someone had stuck in one of the walls, picked up the blanket and left again. So what do you make of that? What do you make of his dream slash memory that he came up with when he was hypnotized?

Well, as you said, this man wasn't trained. The first man, yeah. And the second one probably was better trained. It's interesting. And you wonder, is this something that comes out under hypnosis? Do you really see it? I don't know if hypnosis is really looked at as science. Is it? I mean, really, isn't it a lot of it is just suggestibility? It's kind of quasi-science. Okay. All right. But I don't think that law enforcement uses hypnosis much anymore. They used to back in the 70s and 80s a little bit more. And I don't think you can use hypnosis as evidence in court, can you? Oh, probably not.

No. Although that's a whole other thing with repressed memories and all that, which for a time that was allowed in court. Yeah. But I'm just curious about how he had that dream of being on a boat and seeing two men fighting with Johnny Sharp and Dana Wingate. Could he have kind of been in a dream state and confused what really happened with whatever his dreams were after watching The Love Boat? Or another thing is, was he trying to hide what he'd seen because he didn't want to be a witness? Maybe he didn't want to say who did it, even if he knew. So there could be a lot of aspects to that, I believe. There could be. I mean, from the little bit we know.

It's really hard to see or say what exactly that was coming from. Was it coming from reality? Was he trying to please the psychologist? You know, kids will do that. They can kind of sense what they want. Yeah, they can pick up what the therapist is looking for. Right, exactly.

So that could be it too. Now they would say that the stabbing in Sue's chest and the man having a hammer were things that actually happened, but we really don't have any way of knowing if he'd been told that beforehand. Right. Right. He may have overheard that. Well, it certainly didn't help solve the case. Didn't seem to know, but it does suggest a few things that we'll get into. Now there were some neighbors near cabin 28 who reported hearing some muffled screams that woke them up between 1 and 2 AM, but unfortunately they didn't know where it was coming from and they went back to sleep. How many times have we heard that where someone here screaming and they go back to sleep? Yeah, I know. It's remarkable.

That wouldn't happen in our house. No. Well, the dogs would never stop barking for one thing. But I'd be on the phone in an instant. Yeah, we'd want to find out what was going on. Sure. So Justin Smart was present in cabin 28 with Greg and Ricky on the night of the killings. And he was sleeping in a separate bedroom with the Sharp Boys. And they were all left physically unharmed.

The three boys said that they had slept through everything, but that's difficult to believe, too, because there had to be quite a ruckus. There must have been a lot of noise. Yeah. There's been longstanding speculation that Justin Smart may have witnessed part of the murders, either consciously or subconsciously. According to some reports, Justin later described what he called a dream about the murders, and it did have these details that were eerily accurate. And they may not have been publicly known, but he could have overheard them from Sheila or the Seabolts or someone who'd seen the scene. Right.

His mother allegedly claimed that Justin had blood on his shoes when he came home too, suggesting he may have been closer to the crime scene than was believed. But I don't know why his shoes weren't taken into the police then. You would think. But we're going to find out that the police really did not handle this the best either. That's something we'll be going pretty deeply into. It's a big part of why this case is unsolved, according to most people. That's right. So some investigators and researchers do believe that Justin may have repressed the memory, or like I said, maybe he confused it with a dream due to the trauma or the fear.

But no definitive evidence confirms that Justin consciously witnessed the murders. His statements remain controversial, and they're really an ambiguous part of the investigation. But Justin did say that he saw two men who both wore glasses. One of them was tall and blonde, with a mustache, and the other had shorter dark hair and was clean shaven. So police did have a sketch made of these two men that were described in his hypnosis session. And the sketch of the dark-haired man did look very similar to Justin's stepdad, Martin Smart, who would be a suspect. So there was also speculation that maybe Justin was afraid of Martin.

So he put what he had witnessed into a dream scenario kind of to protect himself, which I think that's possible. I could see a child doing that. So why don't you tell us a little bit about the autopsies that were done the next day, right? They're done April 13th by Dr. Pierce A. Rooney. Rooney was a pioneering pathologist who was the first board-certified forensic pathologist in Sacramento, taking the position more than a decade prior to the Keddie homicides. Rooney was widely consulted as an expert for his experience performing thousands of autopsies during 20 years at the Sacramento County Coroner's Office. Rooney conducted research into causes of sudden infant death syndrome.

and worked on cases involving serial killer Juan Corona and husband and wife serial killers Gerald and Charlene Gallego. I've never heard of either of those, though. No, I'll have to look them up. Yeah, for sure. So in the Keddie case, Rooney said the perpetrators tortured Dana and the Sharps. So how did they do that? Well, Dana's killer strangled the teenager from the front with two hands and then eventually pounded his head with a hammer and sliced it with a knife. God, brutal. So the cause of death was noted by Rooney as cranial cerebral trauma and strangulation. The beating to Dana's head and brain produced marked trauma, resulting in major blood loss.

the strangling caused a large-sized area of hemorrhage in the musculature over the thyroid cartilage gashes were all over dana's face and skull and his teeth were broken So everybody's getting blood force trauma to their head and face. Just the idea of teeth being broken sounds just so horrible to me. I just think you'd have to be so violent to do that, and it would be so painful. Wouldn't it? Yeah. So if you're doing this to get information from a person, chances are they'll talk. Yeah. Well, we don't have any indication that that was the case, although I guess if it was drug-related, that's possible. Yeah. So Johnny Sharp, though the cause of death was different, was similarly overpowered. And like Dana, Johnny had no clear signs of any defensive wounds.

His killers battered his skull and brain and stabbed his chest. His head sustained multiple depressed fractures with lacerations and contusions of the brain, with just massive brain swelling. The beating also fractured Johnny's right eye socket. However, Johnny died when his right carotid artery, jugular vein, and larynx were sliced open, and that would do the trick. That sure would. Exsanguinity pretty quickly.

So of the three found dead in the cabin, Sue Sharp was the only victim who had possible defensive wounds, with cuts on her arms and blood on her hands. Though she was not sexually assaulted, Sue suffered more than Dana and Johnny, if that's possible. Sue's killer gagged, stabbed, cut, beat her, and bloodied her face. Sue sustained multiple stab wounds of the anterior chest, with involvement of her ascending aorta, pericardial sac, and her left lung. So Sue had at least four stab wounds to the chest and another to the neck. Her head and face showed numerous points of blunt force trauma, including broken bones, bruises, and cuts.

one of the perpetrators also stabbed sue in the stomach so this woman really suffered and so much trauma did raise the idea that sue was the primary victim this was a theory that investigators had considered from the very beginning plus you would think an adult would be more likely to be the target than a child although there's also the thought that maybe kidnapping tina was the whole idea behind this But meanwhile, one of the underlying issues that came from the three autopsies was evidence that one, if not all of the bodies, were moved post-mortem to stage the crime scene. So that is interesting. Very interesting. Why? I can't imagine why. If you're leaving that huge of a mess and a struggle, why would you bother staging it? It's interesting. It's very interesting. But the staging, it did kind of mess things up. So maybe the killer was smart enough to know it would cause a problem for the investigation.

It made it hard for them to determine the sequence of the events in this mass murder. I guess you could say that the two boys were killed first because the mother, Sue, had numerous injuries. You could. And possible defensive injuries. So maybe the boys were first and then they're attacking Sue. Which is really hard because that means she saw her own child be murdered in front of her, which most mothers would rather be killed than have to watch that. There's also the idea that maybe, like I think I mentioned that a little bit ago, how Dana could have helped. If these were drug dealers, they could have forced Dana to help bind the other people. So that's a possibility too.

And his reward was to get killed. Yeah, but maybe he wouldn't know that at the time. No, I'm sure he didn't. I mean, people can be forced into doing, helping people with crimes if they think that's the only way to save themselves. That's just human nature.

So Plumas County authorities did turn to the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit, the BSU. That's the branch known for criminal profiling. The name the public associates with criminal profiling the most is Special Agent John Douglas. That was the Mindhunter guy, right? That's the Mindhunter. So although by the early 1980s, Douglas and the BSU were overwhelmed with requests for their expertise, Douglas and his team helped out Plumas County. The request was made through the California Department of Justice. So the report to the BSU provided information about the victims, and that includes Sue Sharp, was not a known drug user, nor was she known to drink alcohol very much.

No drugs or alcohol were found in the house at the time of her death, so not even a bottle of wine in the house. She was not known to frequent bars in the area either. And the report also describes Sue as not a fancy dresser and a loner. So basically, that means she wasn't getting all gussied up, as my grandma would say, and going out to the bars to pick up men. No, she was not. She was not doing that. She was known to have dated at least two men in the year prior to her murder. One of these men was about a decade older than her, and the other was about her age. According to law enforcement reports, Joe Bays and Daryl Josephson were among her known boyfriends.

But neither of these men were near Quincy at the time of the homicides, so they were never even considered suspects. Now, Sue was described as impoverished. They were living like, you know, on a thread. Her only source of income came from her enrollment as a vocational student at the Feather River College under that Comprehensive Employment and Training Act. In addition, the U.S. Navy did withhold $250 each month from the wages of James Sharp, the father of Sue's five children, for child support. But still, she was really scraping by. It was noted that her house was very sparsely furnished and...

Most that was there was of little or no value, and most had been left behind by the previous tenant. When her and her kids went there, they really had the clothes on their back and, you know, a few boxes, not a lot of stuff. Not much. No, there was no moving truck. But the Sharps were really typical of many residents at the Keddie Resort. They were all living in poverty or on the verge of poverty, and it was low-income housing. Douglas devoted parts of his profile to Sue Sharp as well as Tina Sharp and their possible related roles in the case. But the profile also examined the role of Dana Wingate, who Douglas saw as a probable criminal in the making.

Well, from what you've talked about earlier, I'd say that's for sure. Yeah, this kid was in foster homes, was selling drugs, was hanging out with the wrong kind of people. And it had to be really hard to manage diabetes in the lifestyle he had. For sure. Yeah. The implication was that Wingate may have associated with, or at least knew, that killers. Yes. Dana Wingate appeared to fit a prior pattern of behavior that could very definitely lead him down a self-destructive path. His previous antisocial criminal acts made it possible that he'd associated with other criminals. Oh, I think it's more than possible. I would feel pretty positive that he had.

But not all of the killings appeared to be planned, according to Douglas. The crime scene showed that the offender responsible for the murders exhibited great control if he'd acted alone. The crime scene also reflected that he may not have planned on killing all of the victims, because with the exception of a pellet rifle that was recovered at the crime scene, all of the weapons had come from the residents of the victims, like the steak knife and the hammer. So this indicated that killing the victims was possibly an afterthought. But Douglas really did not believe that the killings were committed by one person. For one subject to gain and maintain control of the victims, he would have had to have some assistance. So it looked like victim Dana Wingate was not killed in the same way as the other two victims.

He was made comfortable by receiving a cushion from the couch to rest his head on prior to being executed. So does that mean he didn't think he was being executed? Or they actually said, here's a pillow before we shoot you? I mean, who would really care about being comfortable when you're going to be killed? Right. But like I mentioned earlier, Dana Wingate may have been used to assist. You know, when you started discussing this, it sounded like someone in the crowd was targeted. Right, right. Whether it was the mother or Wingate kid. Or Tina being kidnapped if someone had their eye on Tina. Right. But as somebody said a long time ago, if you're intending to kill someone.

You bring your own weapons. You don't look for weapons in the household. Exactly. The person you're going to kill. Right. Yeah. Because most of the weapons were at the cabin. So I just, again, if I'm entering a house to kill someone or someone, I'll bring my own tools. You would think so. Well, it's interesting because they did talk to friends and associates of Dana, and they said that Dana's the type of guy who would succumb if threatened and would go along rather than fight back against an assailant. So that was a distinct possibility. Yeah.

Douglas said that Sue Sharp's murder possibly holds the central clue, and that is that blood was on the feet of Sue Sharp, which suggests that she was alive when she walked into a pool of blood, which would go along with the idea that the boys were killed first. The profiler did not know whose blood was on her feet, which would have been good to know, right? It would be a help. According to investigative reports, though, Sue was covered with a blanket after she was killed, and this blanket had come from her bed. This one act on the part of the offenders is probably the key to who's responsible for the murders. We always hear...

If someone covers the face, it's someone who knew or cared about the victim. Yeah. Douglas said the crimes appeared to lack an obvious motive, which really reflected the general consensus of law enforcement about this case. The killings had a lot of mixed messages left behind. The homicide appeared to be without any motive. Neither sex nor money was the motivating factor. The crime scene reflects anger and rage on one hand and remorse and guilt on the other. But I still think if it was like a pedophile there to take Tina, then we don't know what was done to Tina. No, we don't. So the murders could have been an afterthought because of the weapons used, like you said.

because these could be called weapons of opportunity. The offenders knew the victims, particularly John and Sue Sharp. The profiler also offered a theory about Tina Sharp that fueled the belief that maybe an admirer of some kind, that's kind of a polite way to say a pedophile, who was known to Tina was somehow responsible for the crimes. And this offender was motivated by his commitment and love for Tina Sharp. So the profile suggested that the killer may have been in love with her and she was planning on running away with him. Douglas said,

it was tina sharp who probably went to her mother's bedroom after she was killed got the blanket from her bed and covered her mother with the same tina sharp at twelve years of age may have had conflicts with her mother like many pre-adolescent girls at that age douglas continued however since the homicide she's probably demonstrated a great deal of remorse and guilt her feelings will be in direct conflict with her abductor and may lead to her own death if her abductor feels that she may go to the police so i don't know we've dealt with teens that have wanted to run away and have had their parents killed and twelve seems awfully young Yes, it does. So the offenders spent a fair amount of time in the house in order to control, tie up, and kill the victims. However, the scene indicated that the offenders left immediately after killing the victims. The three younger children were left unharmed in the next room, either because the offenders didn't know they were there, or they may have been close to one of the offenders. The offenders also used a vehicle to kidnap Tina. The nearest town was at least seven miles away, and they would have been seen walking on the highway by someone if they'd done that. But the case study was really at a loss to determine why the killers committed the crimes. So although profiling can be valuable, it really didn't seem to help in this case.

Still, the person or persons responsible for these murders did display characteristics of a psychopath. And Douglas said that this would include an absence of guilt. The crime scene reflected a lot of anger and rage on the one hand, but then remorse and guilt on the other. Since it's unknown whether the offender or Tina or Justin put the blanket over Sue's body and the pillow under Dana's head, the remorse may not have been from the killer. So the way the three victims were killed indicates a complete lack of guilt on the killer. The offender likely rationalized the need to kill these victims and would put blame on them for being in the wrong place or maybe for saying the wrong thing to him.

so another characteristic that would line up with being a psychopath is the need for immediate satisfaction whatever the motive was for the murders the offender wanted it right then he was not willing to wait for another time when he may not have had to kill these victims to prevent him from getting what he wanted now this was evidenced by the weapons and the bindings coming from inside of the cabin douglas also said the killer would be extroverted there was no evidence of forced entry into the residence which was another indication that he knew the victims so for the offender to gain access to the inside of the cabin gain control of the victims and then take tina with him he would have had to play against reactions of all the victims especially Tina. The offender demonstrated control and confidence, which is consistent with someone who is generally outgoing and accepted by others, or maybe even looked up to. He showed disregard for community or group standards of behavior and had the need to kill all of the victims, which demonstrates his loyalty only to himself. Brutally murdering women and children shows the ultimate disregard for the acceptable social standards. So the profile laid out the case that there were at least two killers, primarily because of that confusing crime scene. The crime scene displayed characteristics of both an organized and a disorganized offender.

And the reasons for this would be best explained if there was more than one offender. Yeah, well, otherwise you're trying to explain a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde type of character. Right. So either one of the victims was made to help or there was more than one offender. Right. The characteristics of the crime scene were consistent with those of an organized offender. When you think about that the kidnapping appeared to be a planned event, that the crime scene did reflect a lot of control of the victims with submissive action on the part of Dana, restraints used on all the victims, and there was a great deal of violent aggression.

in the course of murdering the victims. So it's not like the person just went in and murdered them. There was a lot of violence, a lot of fighting and torture, as some people put it. But there were no signs of any sexual acts prior to or after these deaths. Now, the characteristics of the crime scene that are consistent with those of a disorganized offender are that the murders of the three victims at the residence really appeared to have been an afterthought and were not planned. The offender was familiar with the Sharpe's residence, and he was known to the victims. So there was minimal conversation between the victims and the offender, except that which would be necessary to gain control.

The crime scene was sloppy, bindings and weapons were obtained from and left at the residence, and potential witnesses were left unharmed. So the attack on the victims was sudden and very violent, probably triggered by some resistance, especially by John, and no efforts were made to hide the weapons that were used to kill the victims. There was blood spattered throughout the crime scene, and the profile report concluded that the killers were psychopaths. So based on the demographics of this violence profile, an analysis of the crime scene, and characteristics of antisocial behavior displayed by the offender, it was concluded that the person responsible for this triple homicide kidnapping, and subsequent fourth murder of Tina was a psychopathic, disorganized, or perhaps an inexperienced, organized offender who would not likely benefit from any form of punishment or any attempts at rehabilitation. Which I don't think you need to be a profiler to come to that conclusion. No. Sue's husband and the father of her children, James Sharp, had to be considered as a suspect. Sharp was registered as a sex offender in Missouri, having been convicted of second-degree statutory sodomy. So there was a possibility that he had sexually abused one or more of his children. It may be more than a possibility, more like a likelihood.

given his history. Yeah. It was determined that James Sharp was off duty April 10th at about 4 p.m. and returned to duty as expected on April 13th, following two days off work. So at first glance, his timeline leaves open a window of opportunity for Sharp to travel 5,800 miles round trip. That's so difficult to see that as an opening. Yeah, that's quite a trip. But on closer examination, the opportunity for Sharp to travel to Keddie from Groton and back while committing a complicated crime pretty much is non-existent. I agree, yeah. And also because Sharp went...

To his part-time job added on a repair shop on April 12th, working a sling shift from 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. Yeah, so that's virtually impossible. I don't see how he can even come close to doing that. No. If the homicides happened between midnight and 2 a.m., then his window of opportunity was about 12 hours. To commit three or four homicides, somehow move Tina or Tina's body to Feather Falls and then fly back to Connecticut. Pretty much impossible. Yeah. Yeah. Too many things would have had to go perfectly for James Sharp to accomplish this, even if he did have help. When he was interviewed by police in September of 1981, he insisted he did not commit these murders. He said he had no idea who killed them.

stating that sue's brother would probably have a clearer picture than he did of what was going on in sue's life that's because sue and the children moved into the brother's home near downtown quincy when they first split up in september of nineteen seventy nine then about a year after they split up sharp drove a nineteen seventy five chrysler from connecticut to quincy to visit sue and to retrieve his vehicle and she was still living with her brother at that point so james had traded vehicles with sue and it was the last time he had seen sue alive he recalled that he had phoned her about five months before her death that would be around november of nineteen eighty using the payphone at the auto repair shop where he worked He also recalled that at some point following the phone conversation, he received a letter from Sue informing him of the family's move to Keddie. He also told investigators that he had not communicated with Sue or any of his children since the November phone call. Now, I would think if he was a registered sex offender, he would not be allowed around the children. So I'm not sure what was up with that, if the laws were different in the 80s, or if that's the case. I would think that he wouldn't be allowed to be near his kids. Right. Or at least not without supervision. That's true. Yes, I agree. Detectives did extensive interviews with residents of Keddie and the surrounding areas. That included the Sharp family's friends and acquaintances.

They hoped to uncover any leads or information about the suspicious activities of individuals in the area. So the police also canvassed nearby cabins and businesses, searching for anyone who might have seen or heard something unusual on the night of these murders. A significant part of the investigation centered on the disappearance of Tina Sharp. Her absence from the crime scene was really perplexing, and searches were conducted through the area, and her information was circulated nationally. The two lead suspects early on in the investigation were Justin Smart's stepfather and Sue Sharp's neighbor, Martin Smart.

as well as his house guest ex-convict john budebi budebi was known to have connections to organized crime in the area he had a long criminal history as a thief and even as a hitman both men had been seen in suits ties and sunglasses behaving oddly in the bar the night of the murders So Martin's wife Marilyn told the police that Bo had asked Sue out earlier that night, and Sue had rejected him. So that could have been a motive. Sure could. She also said that she had overheard Bo telling Martin that he felt like killing someone. So there's a couple of red flags. Quite a bit. So when the police interviewed Bo, he claimed to be a former police officer. He also said that he would have no interest in Sue because he was impotent. His alibi was that he had been with Martin at the bar that night. Yeah, they're kind of each other's alibi. Yeah, which isn't great. Nope. Detectives interviewed Martin and Bo together, and before it was released to the public that a hammer had been one of the murder weapons...

Martin Smart told the police that he had a hammer that matched the one discovered and that his hammer had gone missing shortly before the murders. Really? Yeah, he gave an extremely specific description of that hammer, but this was never investigated. Martin and Bo left the state for Reno, Nevada, and it really seemed like a purposeful cover-up, and the case went cold. So that's a big part of this story, is bungled or purposely... Interviewing them together? Yeah. Separately? Right. So it seems like a cover-up that included some of the crime enforcement agents. Yes. So later that year, a knife was recovered in a trash can outside of the Keddie General's store.

and authorities also believed that this item was linked to the crimes during the reopened investigation which was started in twenty thirteen investigator gamberg located a second hammer likely owned and used by martin smart and missing since nineteen eighty one and they believed that that had also been used in the homicides so that was found in march of twenty sixteen in a nearby pond about three years after the homicides about one hundred miles southwest of ketty a man named ronald pedrini was searching for antique bottles and other discarded items at a camp in a remote area known as feather falls when he discovered what he believed to be the remains of a partial human skull. The caller suggested that the skull could belong to Tina Sharp. So although Feather Falls lies on the Plumas National Forest, it's part of Butte County. And as a result, Pedrini's discovery was first investigated by Butte law enforcement. So at about noon on April 22nd, 1984. So really almost three years to the day. Butte County Deputy Ron Lorimore met Pedrini at an area in Feather Falls known as Camp 18. So it took a lengthy, extensive search by the Butte County Sheriff's Department.

and the California Department of Justice to track down the part of the skull containing the lower jaw. It was found on June 8th, about six weeks after Pedrini's original discovery, and more than three years after Tina Sharp's disappearance. So scientists were able to confirm the skull belonged to Tina when they matched the skull parts with her dental records. But they didn't find any more remains, and they could not determine a cause of death. So two days after completing testing on the skull, Loomis County coordinated door-to-door and terrain searches, trying to track witnesses and evidence. A helicopter was used for an aerial search as well. Investigators found an empty medical tape dispenser.

a portion of a pair of Levi's jeans, and a decomposed blue nylon jacket. And these are believed to be associated with Tina and with the home invasion. So years later, it became known that Marilyn Smart, Marty's wife, and the mother of Justin Smart, had left her husband on the day the murder was discovered. Now, afterwards, she provided the Plumas County Sheriff's Department with a handwritten letter sent to her and signed by her estranged husband. It read, I've paid the price for your love, and now that I've bought it with four people's lives, you tell me. We are through. Great. What else do you want?

This is only part of the letter, but this is the part that the police thought could be quite significant because, of course, he's a suspect. He's a suspect. It sounds to me like a confession. Kind of. I mean, it wasn't treated as one, but it wasn't even followed up on really in time to do much either. Even though Marilyn admitted in a 2008 documentary that she thought her husband and his friend Bo were responsible for the murders and the kidnapping, Sheriff Doug Thomas contradicted this. And he said that Martin Smart had successfully passed a polygraph test. Well, so what? Right. Those are not that reliable. Plus, it was later confirmed that Martin Smart was close with the sheriff, so they had a friendship.

So this is very corrupt once we get into it. Well, it smells that way. It certainly does. So in 2016, investigators met with a counselor at the Reno Veterans Administration, and the anonymous counselor said that in May of 81, Martin Smart had confessed to killing Sue and Tina Sharp. So according to this counselor, Martin said, I killed the woman and her daughter, but I didn't have anything to do with the boys.

But when the DOJ was alerted to this confession in 1981, they just dismissed it pretty much out of hand as hearsay, which is another really questionable thing. Yes, it is. But why in the world didn't it come out until 2016 anyway? That's just weird because the confession was supposedly in 81, the same year. Yeah, something smells like corruption. Yes. Now, the most widely accepted theory involves Martin Smart, Marilyn Smart, and Sue Sharp. It was believed that Sue was counseling Marilyn on leaving her husband because Martin was abusive to Marilyn. And when Martin found out about this, he got his friend Beau.

And, you know, Bo was like a known mob enforcer who was living with the Smarts for about 10 days before the murders. So he got him to go with him to kill Sue. According to Marilyn, Martin Smart had clashed with Sue Sharp and the whole family right away after they moved to Keddie. She said that Martin had expressed a lot of hostility toward the victims on several occasions. She also said that Martin detested Johnny Sharp and had vowed to break the boy's hands.

And what was wrong with Johnny? Why was he singled out? I don't know. Martin also accused Sue and Tina of being professional prostitutes. We're talking about a child when we're talking about Tina, remember? So these are just crazy accusations that are really not based on anything factual that we know of. But this could quite possibly explain why Marilyn left her husband the day that the murder was discovered. Yeah, if you look at it that way, it all falls into place. Yeah, it would also explain why Justin Smart and the other two sharp boys in that adjoining bedroom weren't harmed. If that was Martin's stepson and he didn't want to kill him, they might just leave those boys alone because they knew them. Yeah.

But then also I haven't heard anything about any of those three boys reporting that it could be Martin. Well, other than that dream that Justin described. Right. Yeah. Well, anyway, it really gives some context to Martin's handwritten note that Marilyn gave to the Plumas Sheriff's Department, which they basically did nothing with. So some investigators who picked up the case when it was reopened in 2013, that's when it was initially reopened after many years, tied the slayings into an even larger plot. They alleged that Bo and Martin fit into a larger drug smuggling scheme that involved the federal government. So Martin was a known drug dealer.

And Beau was connected to Chicago crime syndicates with some monetary interests in their drug distribution. This might explain why the Sacramento DOJ sent two allegedly corrupt organized crime special agents instead of agents from the homicide department to investigate the Keddie murders. And it also provides an explanation why the two lead suspects were given a free pass, really, and just told to leave town by Sheriff Thomas. And that's when they went off to Reno. And that was what, like less than a month after the murders? Something like that. Yeah, very short time. Yes. Furthermore, it suggests an answer as to why this case was managed so sloppily, why it still remains unsolved, and it really doesn't seem like a priority to the Sacramento DOJ. But there are some detectives that handled this case who are really dedicated to it and have passed it on to younger detectives who do want to solve it. So not all of law enforcement is corrupt here, but there certainly was a segment. There's a portion that has a whiff of corruption. Yes. Yes.

So Bo died in 1988, and then Martin Smart died in the year 2000. Although both Martin Smart and Bo Bodebi are now deceased, new DNA evidence may point investigators to other suspects who may have had a part in these murders, and they think some of them may still be alive. Well, yeah, that could be. But you could also look at it that two of the primary suspects are dead, end of case. It might be. Yeah, we might never know, right? It's been so long. 81, you know, over 40 years. Right. Yeah. So in this book I read called Solving Keddie by David Heller.

In a Plumas County Sheriff's Office report submitted by Special Investigator Mike Gamberg sometime around 2016, Gamberg stated, during my investigation and review of the case, my attention was drawn to the manner in which the investigation was conducted. This has to do with suspicion of a possible cover-up during the initial investigation in 1981. So even he is acknowledging this. So crediting internet websites for bringing to light a cover-up, Gamberg explained, while reviewing documents pertaining to the investigation of the Keddie homicides, it's brought to rise questions that I feel need to be answered. So in the report, Gamberg names DOJ agents Mike Krim and Harry Bradley and former Sheriff Doug Thomas as the alleged perpetrators in the cover-up. Gamberg said law enforcement did not further investigate suspects Martin Smart and his friend Bo and other persons of interest. Law enforcement may have taken a hands-off approach with Bo and Smart because Bo may have been an informant for either state or federal government, and possibly he was in the witness protection program, which would be a reason for them to cover up for him and just tell him to move away.

Although normally if you're in that program, don't you have a different name? Yeah, they usually provide a new identity for you. Well, anyway, due to the severity of these 1981 crimes, the DOJ was contacted by the Plumas County Sheriff's Office for assistance with the investigation. And it appeared unusual that Bradley and Krim arrived in Plumas County because they were assigned to the DOJ's Organized Crime Unit. So why are they being called in for this, this home invasion in a rural area? Why indeed. It makes you question it, doesn't it? It does. Now Gamber questioned why members of the unit would be sent to investigate a local rural homicide.

And Gamberg said this leads one to believe the possibility that one of the subjects involved in the case and later identified as a suspect, they're mostly talking about Bo here, was possibly an informant or in the witness protection program. So there are several people who believe this could be the case. A compelling argument. Well, it's believed that Bo reached out to his handlers for assistance due to the way the case was being handled. And Gamberg explained that Bradley and Krim controlled the investigation from the get-go. Krim and Bradley interviewed virtually all of the major persons of interest in this case. Most importantly, Martin Smart and his friend Bo, both who were less than truthful.

And actually, Bo was the worst of the two. For example, he told DOJ investigators that he was a retired cop from Chicago who'd been shot in the line of duty, when, in fact, he was a convicted felon spending time in prison for armed robbery, and he had been arrested in Oakland for attempted armed robbery. Yeah, and both Bo and Smart gave what could have been planned statements to Bradley and Krim. And after their interviews, both men were released and never contacted again. Remarkable. No follow-up or anything. Nope. Even after receiving information that Bo had lied to them, he was allowed to leave the county almost immediately after the interview.

Martin Smart was never interviewed again after his polygraph test when the polygraph examiner advised law enforcement to talk to Smart again as he believed he had more information. Though it was Bradley and Prim who spoke with Smart's counselor regarding his supposed confession, and the report on this did not mention his admission. Yeah, it was never even mentioned. Can you imagine? Even if you didn't 100% think it was true, it should be in the report, right? Absolutely. So Krim already had a bad reputation in law enforcement circles. In some California appellate court documents, he was described as an incompetent investigator. And Krim also had been accused of attempting to block an official investigation. Also, the district attorney put together a report about Krim, which noted his incompetence and unreliability. Crazy.

Absolutely crazy. So there's another book I read about this case. It's called Keddie 28, Behind the Scenes of the Keddie Murders. And this was written by Brian Lee Tucker. And he wrote that Keddie holds many skeletons in its closets.

There were in 1981 so many potential perpetrators in count, you could have stood in the main street, thrown a dart with your eyes closed and hit one. So this was a fascinating book because Brian Lee Tucker wrote the book kind of like a novel, like a story. Now, of course, he had to assume and make a lot of inferences, but it was a more interesting read than just a factual book, to be honest with you. Fascinating. So if you really are interested in kind of how the victims were feeling beforehand, maybe some things that were happening before the murder, these things are not proven, but they are still interesting to read about. So the Sharp family were in this little resort town.

surrounded by child molesters, drug runners, professional criminals, corrupt cops and businessmen, habitual transients, and at least one known serial killer, according to Brian Lee Tucker. It was discovered also that Tina Sharp's teacher, who later became a registered sex offender, had had an obsession with Tina. Robert Silveria was around at the time and was even employed by Plumas County at one point. That he'd been to Ketty is highly likely. He would be later linked to a murder in a hobo camp nearby. Even the owner of the Ketty resort had once been a suspect in a similar murder.

Several of the men leaving a stone's throw from Cabin 28 were said to be creepy around children as well. And the resort's caretaker has been described as a chronic peeping Tom. More than one registered sex offender was connected to the case, either closely or incidentally. So it feels like the Sharp family was just moving into a hornet's nest without knowing. It sure does. Moving in there with her children, where all these people were living. Not a healthy environment. No, it really didn't seem to be. 31 years after the homicides, Sheila Sharp, the girl who found her family members dead.

published a memoir, and it really gives insight into her life after this tragedy. Now, she takes issue with how certain people have inaccurately characterized her mother, and she wrote, My mom's character has been subject to all manner of cruel supposition, including accusations that she was a drug addict, drug dealer, prostitute, or at the very least an unfit mother. For the record, she was none of these things. She was a kind and loving mother who was doing her best to raise five children on her own. She was dutiful in her attention to each of us, and while we lived in relative poverty, we also lived in a home of love.

So it doesn't surprise me that a woman, especially a woman that's a single mom with five children and is attractive, that she would be talked about in that way. It's just blaming the victim, victim abuse, really. So that doesn't surprise me, unfortunately. So it was in 2004 when Cabin 28 was torn down to keep ghost hunters and other people from trespassing there. Yeah, I'm sure it was a magnet for all sorts of people. Yeah, right. And there was actually a horror movie made that was titled Cabin 28. And it was about kind of a similar thing. I haven't watched it, but it was about a similar type of thing. But of course, it was a horror movie and it was very hyped up.

So there's been a lot of talk and a lot of media about this case over the years, but still unsolved and really doesn't appear like it's going to be. No, I think at this point, I mean, when was the committee in 2016? Well, they reopened it in 2013 and then there was more investigation in 2016. Yeah. And there was talk about, well, there's maybe some DNA testing. Right, right. Yeah. So that's like nine years ago. Right. So if that was somebody they could identify, it would have happened. Yeah. I think we would have heard it would have been news by now. Right. So the fact that here we are in 2025, not any closer really to solving.

whodunit, I don't think it's going to be solved. Plus, the main suspects are both dead, so they're not going to give any sort of confession. No. No, they're not. No. And anyone who was involved in this would be getting on the elderly side by now, unless they were a teenager or something. Well, Sheila would be in her 60s right now. She was 14 and 81, so yeah. Yeah, it's unlikely that it will be solved at this point. But it's a fascinating story. This is the kind of story that's just terrifying to me.

Because it feels random. It may not have been completely random, but I don't think that there was any real reason that anyone would want to kill all these people. I think that they really did target either Sue or Tina. Or it could have been one of the boys for a drug thing, but I really don't think that would have happened over the kind of drugs these kids were dealing in. These kids were maybe doing some acid and pot. I don't think it was enough that people are going to go in and kill a family. Yeah, probably not. Although the two boys that were killed were troublesome. Yeah, but a lot of teens are troublesome. Their families don't get slaughtered. Right. Right. Plus, I think if it was just random drug dealers, why would they leave those three boys alive?

When it seems like maybe Justin did see something. Maybe. And why would they take Tina? I know. That's what I can't get. The taking of Tina makes me feel like it was a pedophile who wanted Tina. Or even more horrific, a couple of pedophiles who wanted Tina. Because we don't know exactly when Tina was killed. She could have been kept for quite some time. Her remains were found a distance away. Yeah. So Tina could have been held and God knows what could have happened to her. Her remains were skeletal by the time they did find some. So we have no idea how she was killed or what she went through. No. But the fact that they took her instead of just killing and leaving her. Exactly. Makes you think she was the target. Right. Yeah.

Because Sue Sharp was not sexually assaulted. So I kind of feel like if she was the target, she would have been sexually assaulted. Makes me think they killed those other three and took Tina because they wanted Tina. Yeah, although Sue Sharp was found nude from the waist down. Yeah, but no sign of anything happening to her sexually. Now, I guess something could happen without any evidence of it now that you bring that up. But they didn't seem to think she was raped or anything. There was no semen. There was no injuries to the genitalia. So there was really no signs of a rape or an assault in that manner. Yeah, just that the fact that nothing was found doesn't mean that nothing had happened. I see what you're saying. Yes.

But just the, I go back to Tina being kidnapped and think Tina was the target. That's how I see it in my mind. Yeah, I'll go with that. I mean, in the book I was telling you about where it reads more like a novel, the two killers, which would be Bo and Martin, were actually really horrific people who wanted to kill everybody. So I'm not sure if that's true either. We just, there's so much we don't know, I guess. But if any of our listeners know more about it, I know there's a lot on Reddit about it. So if there's anything you'd like to add, we'd be happy to address that in our feedback one of these days. Good thought. Yeah. It's time for listener feedback.

Okay, well, speaking of feedback, what have we got? I got some emails for you today. So the first one is from Jacob, and he wants us to do an episode on Doris Andrews. So Doris Hoskins, that was Doris Andrews before her marriage. Doris Hoskins thought she'd finally found the man of her dreams when she met Mark Andrews in 2009. Doris had been married and divorced three times and was hoping to find a man she could grow old with. Now, her boyfriend at the time, Mark Andrews, was a four-time loser in marriages, but he seemed to Doris to be the one.

So after a year of dating, they got married in 2010 and seemed to be a happy couple. Doris was a teacher. Mark was a truck driver. However, he liked to gamble in his spare time. And he won some, he lost some. But in 2015, he won $200,000 gambling. So this made him think that he was quite the expert in gambling. So he quit his job as a trucker and became a full-time gambler. That doesn't seem very wise. Well, it turned out not to be. He wasn't real good at doing the gambling part.

So by Christmas of 2015, he was deeply in debt. His credit cards were maxed out. There was no money in their bank. He had borrowed money from everybody who would be willing to lend him money, so he wasn't going to get any money from anybody to keep his gambling going. But Doris had life insurance policies that totaled over $300,000. So when you can guess the rest of what's going to happen, I'll leave it at that. Okay, sounds interesting. Our second email is from David, and he has comments on a case we did on the Susan Woods murder.

So David writes, hello guys. This was an informative episode on how not to do police work. In my opinion, there needs to be some serious reform regarding how cops go about destroying innocent lives when trying to solve a crime. I think it's called accountability. I'd love it if police departments could get charged with aiding and abetting criminals who continue to cause harm while the cops rely on confirmation bias instead of evidence to continually harass an innocent suspect. Also put a stop to the lies, the tricks, all the deceitful behavior to coerce someone to confess. I also think we citizens are held to a higher standard than the cops are. It should be the other way around.

When I see a police car behind me, I don't feel safer. I feel terrified. I do not respect authority that relies on fear and intimidation to attain cooperation. If they have to operate that way, then there is something very wrong with the kind of person who wants to be a cop. Oh boy, David, you really opened a can of worms here because I do believe there is a segment of people, usually men, who want to be a cop because of bad reasons, not the best intentions. They want the power. They want to carry the gun. I mean, of course, we could go on and on about how policing is done in our country. When it comes to Susan Woods, I think it was really just terrible. You're right, because this guy wasn't even there.

He had no history of violence. They were kind of basing their idea that he was guilty on him being a hippie and the ex-boyfriend. Yeah, hippie freak. Or ex-husband. I think they were married, actually. So, yeah, I am with you there. I think that we do need to take a look at that and have some reform for sure. I think that would definitely play into the case we just covered as well, the Keddie murders, which we see a lot of corruption there.

We don't see anyone being forced to confess, but we do see people who were probably guilty being let off the hook. And we don't really know the reasons why, but it certainly seemed that way. Well, I think it would be nice to have a pre-hiring neuropsych exam or at least some questionnaire filled out. Well, there might be, but I think it's kind of easy to bypass that. Could be. Yeah, but no, I do see what you're saying. I would like to see some screening to see if there's any antisocial behaviors that could be present. Yeah, well, we do find that there are quite a few policemen who are abusive to their families and their wives. And I'm not saying this to criticize all policemen because I think there are many police.

who have a very difficult job and do their best to do it right. On the other hand, I think the system does need to be- It needs to be fixed. Needs to be fixed, yeah. Okay, so those are our thoughts, David, and I think you have a really good point there. Thank you so much for sharing that with us. So our next email is Carrie from Australia with a case suggestion. And Carrie writes, hi from Australia, still enjoying your podcast and slowly working my way through all of them. I've just finished the story on Eton Pats. As with a lot of your stories, I search after to see if someone has been found guilty or is still in jail.

I found that, surprisingly, Pedro Hernandez was found guilty in 2017, but just this past week a federal appeal court has overturned the conviction and ordered a retrial. Now I have a case suggestion. Constance Martin and Mark Gordon, who this week have been found guilty of the death of their newborn in a British court. I listened to a podcast of the original trial, which resulted in the jury being unable to reach a verdict. They were then retried this year. Lots involved in this case. Would be interested in your take on this one. All the best. Thank you, Carrie. I think we'd be happy to do that.

We try and do a limited amount of cases involving children or infants just because they're so difficult for most people, ourselves included. We do have some people who won't even listen when it's that kind of a case for their own reasons, but we all have things that trigger us and we certainly would be, I wouldn't say happy, but we would be inclined to cover this. Also, I really think that all Dick's years of pediatrics really helps with these kinds of cases, especially with infants. So yes, thank you very much. And Carrie did go on to explain the case a little more and a little bit more about it. In early January of 2023, Constance Martin and Mark Gordon

were stopped by authorities when their burning car was found on the breakdown lane of a highway. The couple was found almost two months later. Constance had given birth very recently, but there was no baby with them. Then the infant's body was found two days later in a sack hidden in a hut adjacent to a public garden. The couple was arrested and went to trial. After two trials, the couple was found guilty of manslaughter by gross negligence. So that's just very curious because if something happened to the baby from their own negligence, why wouldn't they at least get help? Why would they hide the body? That just makes them look so guilty. You know, there's a lot of stuff about this couple. I bet.

She was born to a fairly high status family, money, and Gordon was below them culturally, socially. So the interesting dynamic between the two, they had four kids, four other kids. I think they had been taken away from them by the state. Well, God, I hope so. They kind of snuck the pregnancy in there without anybody realizing she was pregnant, apparently. Oh, so maybe that was one of the reasons for hiding it.

I think so. Could be. Okay. I mean, it's pretty recent. Well, yeah, there have been three or four cases I've been following recently about parents and young children or infants. So there are quite a few of those to cover, but this one seems particularly interesting. Yes, it does. All right. One last email. And this is James who wants an episode on Noah Pressgrove. I think we kind of remember that. We did hear about that case before. We've heard about that. This was fairly recent. This was Labor Day 2023 when the body of 19-year-old Noah Pressgrove was found next to an Oklahoma road. So his body was nude and he was wearing two mismatched shoes.

the medical examiner stated that noah died by blunt force trauma and the manner of death was undetermined the oklahoma highway patrol called the case suspicious but six months later said it was not a murder Noah's family has filed a civil suit against several people. So his family thinks it was a murder? They do. They said that someone in four or five civil suits filed, and the family suspects that one or more of them was involved in Noah's murder. Okay. Do we think it was some kind of a hate crime? Was he a person of color or a gay man or anything? No. No? So we don't know what the motive would have been? We don't. Maybe a personal motive. He had been to a Labor Day party that day. There was no report of anything happening at the party other than he was in an RV that tipped over, wasn't hurt.

So kind of a wild party. It sounds like it was a kid's party that was a little bit unruly. A little bit of drinking going on. Quite probably. Okay. And I would be suspicious saying it wasn't a homicide. If you find this body nude with mismatched shoes on, it certainly doesn't sound like a hit and run or anything like that. No, the nudity kind of puts that to rest. Plus, yeah, he was off to the side. And usually if you get hit by a car, they say your shoes come off. Yeah, that's right. Just really weird. Huh. Okay. Well, I don't know enough to say anything intelligent about it, but I'll definitely look into it. I'll have to keep track of these civil suits and see what's going on. Absolutely. All right. Well, thank you, James. Thank you, everyone, for your emails.

We do have more on the Adelson family and the murder of Dan Markell. So we've had several emails and voicemails on that case. So next episode, we'll go over that again. Still waiting for Wendy to be arrested, but I still think it's happening. We'll see. Okay. All right, everyone. Thank you for listening. And thank you so much for sharing your feedback and your case suggestions. Very much appreciate it. We hope you're all having a wonderful week. We will see you next time at the quiet end. Come on down. Plenty of seats. Bye-bye. Bye, guys.