Canadian True Crime - 94 The Klaus Family Murders — Part 1

Episode Date: September 1, 2021

ALBERTA | In 2013, a tragedy struck a tight-knit farming family near Castor, Alberta and before too long, a twisted story would unravel.*Part 1 of 3: Part 2 will be released on September 8Part 3 will be released on September 15Ad free version of all three parts now available now for supporters on Patreon or Supercast Learn moreCanadian True Crime donates monthly to help those facing injustice. This month we have donated to: Indian Residential School Survivors Society Podcast recommendation:The White Saviors Thanks for supporting our sponsors!See the special offer codes hereDon't like the ads?Access early episodes without the ads plus bonus content and more on Patreon and Supercast. Learn more Website and social medias:Website: www.canadiantruecrime.caFacebook: facebook.com/CanadianTrueCrimeTwitter: @CanadianTCpodInstagram: @CanadianTrueCrimePodCredits: Research: Gemma HarrisWriting: Kristi LeeAudio editing and production: We Talk of Dreams Disclaimer voiced by the host of TrueTheme Song: We Talk of DreamsOutro theme song: Space TripAll credits and information sources can be found on the page for this episode at canadiantruecrime.ca/episodes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Canadian True Crime is a completely independent production, funded mainly through advertising. The podcast often has course language and disturbing content, and it's not for everyone. Hi everyone, and welcome back to the next season of Canadian True Crime. Thank you for joining me, and I hope that you're all as well as can be expected in these very, very strange times. So this month there happen to be three episodes, a series, and they'll be released a week apart with Part 2 coming September 8th and Part 3 on the 15th, and the series does carry an additional content warning. It's not the focus of the case, but there is mention of the hunting and killing of animals,

as well as the grooming and sexual assault of a minor. Please take care when listening. If you're a supporter accessing early release episodes, keep an eye on your feed because the ad-free versions of all three episodes are there now. Also, you might notice a few tweaks to the podcast. There's a new theme song by We Talk of Dreams, and I ditched that wordy introduction. I could not stand it either. Well, I know you want to get right into it, so with that out of the way, it's on with the show. Thanks again for tuning in.

Just over 900 people live in the small town of Casto, located in southeast Alberta about 140 kilometres east of Red Deer. It's a hub for many area farming families, including the Klaus family, who had established a multi-generational cattle farm on their expensive 2000 acres in the 1940s. By 2013, the farm was in the hands of Gordon Klaus and his wife Sandra. They were in their early 60s with two adult children, Monica, a 40-year-old HR professional, and her younger brother Jason, who had spent all of his 38 years working and living on the family's farm.

And since neither Monica nor Jason had partnered up, it remained just the four of them. The close-knit Klaus family worked well together, but they also played well together. They were all active in sports and outdoor adventures, and their family deer hunting trips were legendary. Monica lived alone in the nearby town where she worked, but most weekends she would head back to the family farm with her beloved shih tzu dog Patches to spend time with her family and help out where she could. And that's exactly what she was doing in December of 2013, as winter was establishing itself with freezing temperatures and a blanket of snow.

Her parents, Gordon and Sandra, had a dog of their own. Keela was a dark red chocolate lab, a farm dog who generally lived outside unless it was freezing cold. But she was treated like a queen, with Gordon often making her personalised omelets and homemade soup broth. That December Saturday night, Gordon, Sandra and Monica got together for a family dinner in the farmhouse, where they were joined by 38-year-old Jason, who lived on the farm also but in his own trailer in a separate field. During dinner, Monica confirmed plans with Jason for her work holiday party, which was coming up the following week. Jason often tagged along as his sister's plus one to work functions.

After dinner, the family made loose plans to go out for dinner again the following night, and then Jason said his goodbyes as he had plans to go and meet a friend for drinks. His mother and sister waved him off and walked off to decorate their Christmas tree together. The next morning, just after 7am, Jason received a phone call at his trailer from a concerned neighbour on a nearby property. The neighbour had just looked across the field and saw smoke billowing from the Klaus family farmhouse. Did Jason know what was going on? Where were Gordon and Sandra? Jason started panicking, saying his parents were both in the house as far as he knew, and his sister Monica was staying there too. He jumped in his truck and sped across the access road towards the farmhouse.

When he arrived, the house was well and truly engulfed in flames, and local neighbours and first responders had to physically restrain him from running towards them. There was no sign of 61-year-old Gordon Klaus, 62-year-old Sandra Klaus, or their daughter, 40-year-old Monica Klaus. As Jason grappled with the fact that his parents and sister were likely inside the burning house and he was clearly helpless to do anything about it, first responders had a decision to make. The house had been fully ablaze by the time anyone got there, thanks in part to the fact that it was heated by coal and there was a significant amount stored in the basement, six tonnes of it. This would have made the fire extremely hot and dangerous, too dangerous for them to attempt any rescue.

This was a recovery mission only. But the decision was around the prospect of an arson investigation. It was a freezing cold December morning. The temperature was around minus 30 degrees Celsius or minus 40 with the wind chill, and if they attempted to extinguish the fire, they risked the rubble being frozen. And the problem with this is that frozen rubble is not good for an arson investigation because they'd need to wait until spring for it to thaw out. It was decided that they would let the fire burn itself out.

It was beyond the point of salvage at that point anyway. In a 2018 piece for the Globe and Mail called Murder on the Prairies, journalist Jana Prudin described the scene as a house that had been reduced to a searing pit of ashes and embers, like a vision of hell in the falling snow. Music Once the RCMP arrived, it didn't take long before firefighters pointed out what they'd discovered as they stood by, helpless to do anything but poke around the property.

About 30 feet from the front of the house lay the body of Gordon and Sandy's farm dog, Keela. The chocolate lab had a visible injury to her head, which was surrounded by a blood stain. And about five meters away from Keela's body was an orange traffic cone that a firefighter had placed to mark a certain spot. There lay a separate small red stain that had been frozen in the snow, and it didn't seem to be connected to the body of Keela. Forensic investigators swabbed it for testing. Another strange thing found by the firefighters was about six feet from the front of the property.

It was a red gerrycan which had been partially melted in the heat of the fire, but was still around two-thirds full of gas. With a dead dog and a gerrycan nearby, there was reason to be suspicious. But at the same time, RCMP investigators were puzzled about who might want to hurt the Klaus family. Everyone knew of them as a close-knit salt-of-the-earth farming family. A thorough investigation of the remains would need to be conducted to determine if Arson was involved, and of course to locate the bodies of Gordon, Sandra and Monica. But even after the fire stopped burning, the embers of the building were so hot

that investigators couldn't begin scouring the rubble until the next day. Two days after the fire, Jason Klaus, the only remaining member of the family, was brought into the station to give a recorded statement to RCMP Sergeant Rob Crop. He was visibly emotional and cried as he told the investigator about their last family dinner the night before, and their plans to go out for dinner the next night. Jason said his biggest fear was going through life without his father. They were a tight family and he couldn't understand what happened and why. Jason gave his account of the night, telling the RCMP that after the family dinner,

he took off for a night with friends at a Hutterite colony. That's a commune of people who have similar beliefs to the Amish. He said he returned to his trailer between 1am and 2am and noticed no evidence of a fire anywhere when he went to bed. The first he knew of it was when the neighbour called him just after 7am. After the statement, Jason was asked if he wanted clarification on anything and he said he was wondering whether all the vehicles were still present on the farm. It was a question he'd asked before.

He also wondered out loud what might have happened, saying his sister and parents didn't have an enemy in the world and he had no enemies either. He wondered if maybe the fire was caused by a malfunction in their coal furnace, but it seemed to him that foul play was the more likely answer, maybe to mask a robbery. Jason then brought up a potential motive involving a very valuable mounted deer head that his family had on display in the farmhouse. The RCMP later released audio of him explaining it.

And the only reason I'm thinking it's foul play is because of what was inside the house which was a deer head of mine that was worth a lot of money. Like we're talking around the 200,000. It was a real big, big deer head. It was one of the biggest ones around. Like it was not far from the world record kind of deer head. And that's the only thing I can think of that somebody would come in to steal or try to steal. But I don't know if that stuff burns in the fire.

I don't know if there'll be proof of that. I don't know. He wasn't lying about the deer head. Jason had killed the whitetail deer six years earlier in 2007 when his family was on one of their many deer hunting trips. He'd won a $250 prize for it and was named White-Tailed Deer Hunter of the Year by Alberta Outdoorsmen magazine. The photo they published was described by journalist Jana Pruden

as showing Jason holding the deer, quote, by the antlers. Its eyes blank with death. The bottom of its face smeared red with blood. The theory Jason seemed to be mulling over was this. Jason's parents actually had several mounted deer heads but he believed this one was worth far more than the others, around $200,000. And the thing that made it a public target was that Jason's prize win had been highly publicised which may have made his parents' home a target.

And he had an idea of who it could possibly be. He told police that recently hunters from the US had been on a trip in the area but they may have been scoping things out with intent to return and steal the prized Taxi-Dermi deer head. Jason speculated that when they returned for it his family had simply been collateral damage. Investigators made a note to check out this possible lead. Jason asked if the police had found any evidence at the scene of the fire

specifically whether they'd be able to tell whether guns were involved or if shell casings had been found or would the evidence have been destroyed in the fire? Now this struck investigators as a strange question to ask since for one this was a house fire there was no reason for Jason to think there would be guns involved but also they had found two 9mm shell casings near the body of Keeler the dog. They were waiting on confirmation but it looked like the poor dog had been executed. A day or two later the RCMP found a vehicle that was missing from the farm.

It was Gordon Klaus's white 10 year old GMC Sierra truck and it had been found abandoned near Battle River about 25km north of the farm. Investigators would form the opinion that Gordon's truck must have been used by the killer or killers to escape the property but who were they, what was the motive and where were they now? Do you have a passion project that you're ready to take to the next level? SquareSpace makes it easy for anyone to create an engaging web presence grow a brand and sell anything from your products to the content you create and even your time.

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and when you're ready to launch use offer code CTC to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain that's squarespace.com.ctc with offer code CTC and get your passion project off the ground today. Music Gordon and Sandra Klaus were high school sweethearts and both were known for their keen senses of humour. Gordon was a talented athlete and loved the outdoors especially hunting and fishing and his cheeky pranks which frequently had everyone in stitches including Sandra. She also shared her husband's love of adventure and excitement. The couple dealt with a gut-wrenching tragedy early on.

They actually welcomed their first child, a daughter, Lisa, in the early 70s. Monica was born two years later but when she was just a few months old, toddler Lisa was killed in a farm accident. It was a devastating time for the family but they found strength in staying together. Two years after that Gordon and Sandy welcomed a third child, Jason, a sibling for Monica. The family always kept Lisa in their memory but moved on with their lives as a family of four. So now it was Gordon and Sandy, their daughter Monica and son Jason and even though Sandy often had employment outside the farm, they all pitched in where needed with Sandy regularly cooking meals for the farm's employees

as well as pulling calves, transporting grain and anything else that needed to be done. As Monica and Jason grew up, the four remained close, active in sports and outdoor adventures. Sandy loved curling and playing cards with friends. Gordon's big thing was hunting, like those family deer hunting trips that started when the kids were younger but would continue into adulthood. After Monica graduated high school, she earned a paralegal qualification and started working for a law firm in the town of Stetla about 40 minutes drive away. And while she stayed close to her family, after all she went back to the farm most weekends to stay,

she still liked to keep her own place. Monica was known to be kind with a good sense of humour and she was never without patches, her little shitsoo dog who even accompanied her to work every day. Monica was also close with Jason. The siblings were only two years apart and got on well. Apart from a stint as a truck driver, Jason had always worked full time on the family farm and was known to family friends as a normal farm boy who enjoyed hockey. And since neither he nor Monica had partners or families of their own, it was a win-win for Jason to accompany Monica to her corporate work events as her plus one.

He knew all her co-workers anyway. Now, while family patriarch Gordon Klaus was known for his sense of humour, one thing he was serious about was farming. It was the priority, his life's purpose. Gordon had been taught to have a strong work ethic and was disciplined and tough in both how he ran the farm but also how he was as a father. This was instilled in Jason, his only son. But as Jason grew into adulthood, he never actually emancipated himself from his parents. And the three came to what some might consider an unusual arrangement but one that seemed to work for them. In exchange for Jason's labour on the farm, Gordon and Sandy purchased a trailer for him to live in.

It was situated just a few minutes drive up an access road from their farmhouse across a field but on the same sprawling property. And while Jason technically lived in that trailer, he really only slept there. He was back at the house every day, back for most meals, his parents paid for his bills and they also paid for his black Chevrolet Suburban. While they gave him spending money when he asked for it, he wasn't paid a wage or a salary. The understanding was that he would take over the farm one day and would live in the farmhouse his parents occupied. So there would be some payoff for all that hard work. But even as he entered his mid-thirties, Jason's trailer on his parents' property was essentially just a giant man cave,

a place to sleep and to bring women back occasionally. The arrangement worked for a while although Jason struggled with his father's expectations and fierce work ethic. In the fall of 2013, just months before the house fire, 61 year old Gordon Klaus was diagnosed with some cardiac issues that required him to rest and over the next few months he had several stints inserted to open clogged arteries. Obviously, the lion's share of the farm work fell on Jason's shoulders and he ended up working seven days a week on the farm, starting at 7.30 am every day. As arson investigators combed the ashes of what was once the Klaus family farmhouse, a police sniffer dog was brought in who had a very specific set of skills. This dog was able to detect human remains or the presence of a fire accelerant or both. And the dog found both in multiple locations in the house and on the ground outside the house.

Inside the house, the dog detected what was determined to be two sets of human remains. One belonged to 61 year old Gordon Klaus and the other belonged to his daughter, 40 year old Monica Klaus. It was believed that Monica's beloved shih tzu patches perished in the fire too. But these were the only remains discovered there. The remains of 62 year old Sandra Klaus were not recovered from the rubble of the family home. But when Jason heard the news he insisted that his mother must have been inside too. Sandy being in the house was the most rational and logical conclusion to come to, especially given the heat and intensity of the fire. It would be determined that the most likely scenario was that she was inside the house.

But the coal in the basement made the fire so hot that her remains were completely consumed. In the meantime, the RCMP had looked into Jason's lead with the US hunters and the deer head. The story checked out, the hunters were real and they had been on a trip in Canada at the time Jason said. So investigators flew to Utah to interview these hunters and find out what they knew about the Klaus family and that deer head that Jason was making such a fuss about. But they said they'd never even heard of the deer head, let alone seen it. Their travel records confirmed that after they left, they hadn't even returned to Canada. They were eliminated as suspects.

It was so puzzling. While it seemed like it could well have been an accident, a tragic house fire, the autopsy of Keeler the chocolate lab had come back with strong evidence that it was not the Klaus family. A bullet was recovered from her body, which was determined to have come from a 9mm semi-automatic ruger. So it seemed to be that someone had shot a dog to death so they could either burn down the house or kill Gordon, Sandra and Monica Klaus, or both. But why? The RCMP were stumped and continued digging for more answers.

In the meantime, the whole nearby town of Casta and the surrounding area had been in a state of shock. It was a tight-knit farming community of less than a thousand people and everyone knew everyone else. In the absence of any news on what caused the fire, everyone had been trying to make sense of what had happened. Local residents were spooked, furiously checking their smoke alarms and fire extinguishers, to make sure everything was working, and the media was trying to get hold of Jason Klaus, the lone family member who survived the blaze, anything to get some answers. They weren't able to get hold of him until the day before Christmas Day 2013, just two and a half weeks after the fire, when CBC journalist Janice Johnston managed to get Jason on the phone.

He told CBC that the RCMP were treating him like a suspect and he felt targeted. When asked if he had anything to do with the fire, he said no. Quote, I did not start this fire, I had nothing to do with this fire, I had nothing to do with killing my parents if they did get murdered. Jason Klaus said the whole thing was an indescribable nightmare, where he lost his entire family and his whole life overnight. He brought up the fact that his mother's remains had never been located. Quote, I don't see why she wouldn't have been in the house, they sleep in the same bed together,

why weren't the remains found in the same place? He said the police wouldn't give him any answers. About Keela, his parents read Chocolate Lab, who was found with a head injury outside the house, Jason said he was baffled about what happened to her, but he'd heard that she may have been shot. This was of course correct, but the information wasn't public yet. And he was also baffled about his father's truck

and why it had been abandoned 25 kilometres away. Jason became emotional as he described his family as his best friends. His parents, Gordon and Sandra, were dedicated, honest and committed people, he said, and his older sister, Monica, was one of the hardest-working people around. He said he couldn't think of anyone who would want to cause them harm, but told the CBC journalists that many in the community seemed to believe that he was the one who set the fire. He referenced the melted jerry can that was found,

saying he had left one at the property, but not in the location it had been found in, so it had clearly been moved by someone. Jason said he was frustrated, and while he understood that the RCMP were just trying to do their jobs, there was no reason to look at him as a suspect. He described his treatment as being like a twisted little game the police were playing with his head,

trying to twist his words or make him nervous so he'll trip up and say something stupid. He told CBC news that all it was doing was pissing him off. When asked about a funeral for his family, he said he was waiting until the new year to make arrangements, because he was still in so much pain, crying himself to sleep almost every night. Since the interview was on Christmas Eve, Jason was asked what he was going to be doing for Christmas Day.

He said he was going to spend it alone on the farm, likely just doing chores. According to extended relatives of the Klaus family, Jason ended up spending the day with them, but they would report the conversation took a strange turn. Jason started talking about his dealings with the spirit world, specifically the spirits of his deceased family members. He said that he'd actually been visited by Monica's spirit

and she had given him some very specific details about how their family had been murdered. And another time, Jason told a similar story to his father Gordon's sister Marilyn, a sibling that Gordon was especially close to. A belief in the spirit world wasn't an uncommon thing, in their family, according to the Globe and Mail piece by Janet Prudin. In fact, Jason's grandmother, Sandra's mother,

was said to have been a medium herself, so the conversations about spirits weren't as out of place as they might have been in another family. But there were some other strange things. One day, Jason was visiting with his aunt Marilyn and he handed her three rings. Two of them belonged to his mother Sandy, her gold wedding band, as well as the pinky ring she always wore.

And the other ring was a cubic zirconia ring that Monica sometimes wore. Now, what was strange was that when Jason gave the rings to his aunt, he told her that he'd recovered them from the rubble of the fire in the basement. But Marilyn noticed the rings were still shiny and bright, there was no evidence that they had been through a very hot fire. And in the meantime, the RCMP had noticed

that Jason was inconsistent when he told his account of his movements that night. Every time police spoke to him to get clarity, there always seemed to be a new detail that he'd left out in his prior versions of events. And while this definitely happens, the details he suddenly remembered were so specific it didn't make sense for him

to have not known that before. And weeks into the investigation, Jason continued to insist that his family had been shot, even though the fire burned so hot that there was no detecting gunshot wounds on the remains that survived. But he kept on insisting. The RCMP interviewed him again on January 7th,

a month after the fire. Jason was told for the first time that he was officially a suspect in his family's murders. He demanded to know why. Sergeant Crop told him that he was the last person to see his family alive, he's the sole surviving member of the family, and the RCMP had heard some stories

that Jason might not have gotten along with his family the way he said he did. Here's some audio that was later released to the public. Did you kill Gord Sandy Monica Close? No, I did not. And I would gladly take a lie detector test, and I did not kill them. I did not start the fire.

I don't know how they got killed or had murdered or anything else. Should I believe you? I would hope you would believe me. Yes, you should believe me. Yes. And for someone to accuse me of that, it doesn't make me mad.

It doesn't make me sad. It hurts. You know, it would really... No, and the reporter asked me that too. And no, it had nothing to do with this fire or whatever, however they died. Being murdered, being stabbed, being whatever they were, I don't know.

I don't know how they died yet. I don't know if they felt the fire. I don't know. Give me one reason. Give me one reason why I should believe you. One reason to believe me, because I lived for that family farm. Okay?

I've been there 38 years on that farm. I had breakfast, dinner, supper. Yeah, Dad and I would bunt heads once in a while. Mum and I would bunt heads once in a while. Monica and I, she always looked up for my girlfriends. She would never like any of my girlfriends. But there was never a time where I would not want them in my life for any reason.

Like that... I know that's a question you have to ask me, but... Jason, if what you just told me right now is the truth, if what you just told me is the truth... Could you... Can you go ahead? You have nothing to worry about. Could you kill your parents?

If what you told me is the truth, you have nothing to worry about. I don't have nothing to worry about, and I don't. He said that he wasn't a cold-blooded killer. Quote, I have a conscience. If I shoot a deer and it doesn't die right away, it bugs me. He then brought up his belief in the spiritual world

and the paranormal, saying that he has spirits in his house all the time they're a part of his world. Quote, my sister has come to me and said, we miss you, we're all together, we're safe. She said I have to stay focused. I have to trust them. I have no idea what that means. He said that if talking about his experiences

makes him look crazy, then so be it. There wasn't much the RCMP could do with this information until they received a call from the man who was Monica's boss before the fire. As you remember, Jason Klaus often accompanied his sister, Monica, to work functions and events as her plus one. It was a small, rural area, locals were far from strangers, and Jason was well known to her work colleagues and employer.

Her boss was a man in his 50s called Brady, who was also the owner of the company where she worked. And five days after the house fire, Jason had contacted Brady with a request. He explained that he was in dire need of financial assistance. He didn't earn an income as such. He was given a place to stay. His mum used to buy all his groceries and did his laundry,

and she gave him money when he asked for it. But now that his parents were dead and their accounts and the farm were locked down, he had no income. Brady took pity on Jason. After all, the man had just lost his entire family in a house fire. Jason left with $10,000 to tide him over. But several weeks after that, around New Year's Eve,

he contacted Brady again, but this time it was to tell him that he knew exactly what had happened that night because Monica's spirit had been visiting him from beyond the grave. She told Jason that she heard a noise that woke her up, but before she could get out of bed, she was shot in the head first and then Gordon and Sandy were next. Monica's boss, Brady, soon learned that the spirits of all three Klaus family members were communicating with Jason.

They'd shown him that the person who killed them had nine letters in his name and warned him to stay away from the sky because he's bad news. Brady likely didn't know what to think about this strange turn of events, but while he didn't shut Jason down, he did urge him to take this information to the police. Jason refused, saying he was scared about retaliation, but then he asked for another loan. While Brady was patient and understanding,

now he was starting to get suspicious. He took notes of everything Jason had told him and took it to the RCMP. They were likely delighted with this information as their own investigation was turning up more questions than answers. They asked Brady to consider becoming an RCMP informant. After all, it seemed that Jason wanted to talk about who the killer was, however he got that information, so maybe Brady could get him to talk more

and record their conversations in the process. Brady had no hesitation in saying yes. He would say he felt he owed it to Monica to work with the investigators and help them with whatever they needed, but he did live in fear that if this killer discovered he was providing information to police, his own family's lives would be at risk. From that time onwards, Brady wore a wire and his phone was bugged

so the RCMP were listening to and recording every meeting and phone conversation with Jason Klaus. Jason continued to talk about the details Monica's spirit was giving him. While there was some variation in detail, the main idea that he seemed to be building towards was this. The spirits told Jason they were watching him the morning of the fire as he tried to run towards the house and save his family. They were watching as he was restrained by first responders

and they told Jason not to worry. They knew exactly who had killed Gordon, Sandy and Monica and told Jason they'd take care of it. All he had to do was take care of the farm. The spirits, including Monica's spirit, told him in fairly vivid detail exactly what happened, exactly how his family was killed. Jason said the spirits told him the killer walked down the driveway

and into the front yard, walked towards the house and shot Keela, the chocolate lab. Jason said the spirits were watching as the killer entered the house and went into Monica's bedroom. She'd heard a noise and sat up and before she even had time to ask what was happening, the killer shot her in the head. Gordon then exited the bedroom and was shot too.

The killer looked back at Monica and when he saw her eyes were still moving, he shot her in the head again. Then he shot Sandy in the head. The killer walked back out the front door, grabbed the jerry can of gas, poured it over the coal and in the basement and lit it. All this information was delivered to Jason, courtesy of the spirits of his dead family.

This wasn't the last of the strange stories. A month after the fire, an independent arson investigator was sent by the insurance company to inspect the burnt wreckage that was the Klaus family farmhouse. Jason was on site and during the inspection he told the investigator that he was being guided by the spirit of his sister, Monica, to go over what happened that night. He then proceeded to stage a highly detailed reenactment,

taking the investigator around the house and saying Monica's spirit was telling him what happened and where. The arson investigator wasted no time in contacting the RCMP. Jason told Brady about this recreation as well as another meeting he arranged at the site with a psychic that he hired. He said she gave him even more information about what happened and had even pulled an unspecified item from the basement debris that she said was important to the investigation.

She also apparently gave Jason a detailed description of where the murder weapon could be found in the Battle River. After listening to this latest tale, Brady asked Jason to describe this psychic, remarking that she sure seemed to know a lot. Jason said that she wore a turban and looked like Aunt Jemima, a well-known fictional character depicted on pancake boxes since 1889. Earlier this year, the brand acknowledged Aunt Jemima

as a racist stereotype originating from minstrel shows and changed their name to Pearl Milling Company. In any event, for many in North America, the picture of Aunt Jemima on the Quaker Oats pancake box is burned into their brains from childhood. So Jason was getting quite the multi-directional message from the spirit world. But before Brady had time to assess the likelihood of finding such a magical black woman operating as a psychic in rural Alberta,

Jason was quick to point out that she told him that after she left, she would never be seen or heard from again. One of the journalists Jason spoke to on a regular basis was Jana G. Pruden, an award-winning feature writer who included details of their interaction in her 2018 long-form piece in the Globe and Mail called Murder on the Prairies. In the early weeks after the fire, Jana found Jason Klaus to be sympathetic and likeable.

He told her his family were his best friends, his whole life, his mother Sandy was his angel and his heart was lost. He seems sincere, but the experienced crime journalist knew not to take anything at face value. One night, Jana was out for dinner when her phone rang. It was Jason Klaus and he had something important to tell her. He had found what he believed was his mother Sandy's tooth and part of her shoulder bone in the rubble of the fire.

Jana told him that he needed to bring anything like that to the RCMP. Another night, he told her that a psychic who looked like Aunt Jemima had told him everything that had happened to his family. Jana also wrote about other strange things Jason said, like when she asked him how he was feeling about the investigation, he said, I'm nervous, excited, scared. And when he was asked what he'd most like the public to know about his situation,

he said, I would just want everyone to know what a frustrating adventure this is being. Jana wrote that even though no two situations were alike when it came to victims of violent crime, his comments were notably different from interactions she'd had with victims in other cases. And she had never heard anyone use words like excited or adventure after such a life-altering tragedy. Jana wrote that she was left with so many unanswered questions.

Like if Jason never went into the house, how was he able to describe what happened inside in such graphic detail? She asked him about these and other things that didn't make sense, like those rings he produced that he said came from his mother and sister, but he was good at giving vague explanations that led to more questions. She wrote that it all added up to a confusing tangle of stories and lies. So Jason had been speaking to several different people about the case, increasingly divulging more and more specific details

that apparently had been passed on to him from beyond the grave. While there were some slight variations in detail, like which person was shot first, the general description of his family's murder was the same, and no matter which version he told, it seemed important to the spirits that everyone know that his family were shot before the fire started. Jason stressed that the spirits had assured him that his family were at peace

because they were already dead when the fire started. They didn't feel any pain. But then he started to get very specific about the identity of the killer. Again, he gave different details to different people, but the overall picture was this. The spirits told him the killer was someone with a beard, living in the town of Caster, who wore green Dunlop boots and who was younger than Jason.

The killer had apparently been a good friend of Jason's or a drinking buddy and was a user of drugs, and they communicated that this killer had been in and out of jail and a mental health facility, and he had the skills to kill anyone. The spirits also told Jason the murder weapon was a Ruger handgun that had been thrown in the river. And also that the name of the killer had nine letters.

Monica's boss Brady kept encouraging Jason to talk, knowing that their calls were being recorded. Eventually, Jason handed him a piece of paper that had a name written on it with nine letters, Josh Frank. Jason told Brady the name he'd been given belonged to his friend who was also a, quote, low-life drug dealer badass. Brady again tried to persuade Jason to hand the name over to the police so they could investigate this person properly,

but Jason didn't want a bar of it. He was scared they might not believe him, or they would lock him up in a mental health facility, or even if he reported it anonymously, he was worried that he might be killed. By this time, the RCMP had grown increasingly suspicious of Jason, and six weeks after the fire, they decided to start wiretapping his phone. This meant that there were now two ways they were listening in. Firstly, through any conversations he had with Brady,

which were already being recorded, but now the RCMP could record all of Jason's other phone conversations too. Just a few weeks into the wiretap, the RCMP asked him to take a polygraph test. We all know polygraph tests are notoriously unreliable and not admissible in Canadian court, but law enforcement still used them as an investigation tool, and this time they likely wanted to see if Jason would call someone to discuss their request for a polygraph, and maybe they could catch him out.

But he didn't, he refused. Investigators tried to persuade him, telling him that all others involved had taken one, and if they were in his shoes, they'd want to make the truth known. They even brought the polygraph operator to show Jason how it worked, but he still refused. He did say that if it was up to him, he would take it, he wanted to take it, but his lawyer told him no, so he was just doing as he was told. When an officer asked Jason what he thought of the person who murdered his family,

he said that jail was too good for them, and the thought of the crime was horrifying. A judge would later say that the descriptions given about the killer were not inconsistent with that of the real Joshua Josh Frank, a big guy with a beard, just like Jason Klaus. Josh was a local who grew up in the nearby town of Caster and was 29 years old at the time, 9 years younger than Jason was. And while Jason would insist they didn't start associating with each other until Joshua was in his 20s, Josh would tell a different story later.

But as Jason's story went, it was cocaine that brought them together. See, behind the scenes, Jason struggled with both the rigors of farm life and his father's expectations, and in his spare time, he partied hard. At some point in adulthood, he started using cocaine, eventually developing an addiction to the drug as well as to gambling. A family friend who grew up with Jason would tell the Red Deer Advocate that he had two sides. He was a person who would do anything to help someone,

but also someone who had a talent for deceit, which he readily brought out when needed. It was described as a Jekyll and Hyde type thing. And because Jason never earned a salary or wage from his farm work, he just had that arrangement with his parents. He had to find a way to get some extra cash to fund his bachelor party lifestyle. So at around age 30, he started dealing cocaine, and Josh Frank was one of his customers.

At the time, Jason said they began their cocaine-centered relationship. Josh was in his early 20s. Eight years after that, 38-year-old Jason had just taken over his father's farm duties as Gordon rested and recovered after having six stents put in. But the resentment was building in Jason. He felt that he'd always worked hard, but he was now completely overworking himself seven days a week, leaving no time for any social life or fun to blow off steam.

Jason resented his father's strict and authoritarian approach to running the farm. In his cocaine and gambling situation had worsened. He had asked his parents for more money, but it was never enough to fund his social and drug habits. So he started forging checks from their bank account, which he later said he planned to pay back. At the same time, Joshua Frank's life wasn't going too well either. According to court documents, the 29-year-old welder wasn't able to work

because of a tendinitis problem in one of his arms, which he had to wear in a sling for the best part of two months. Without an income, Josh quickly found himself destitute, and while his family gave him small amounts of cash to get by when they could, it wasn't enough. But luckily, he had a helping hand. He had been in an on-off, casual physical relationship with a woman called Amanda, who happened to own a low-rent hotel in Caster called the Cosmopolitan Hotel.

And she let Josh stay there for free until he got back on his feet, offering him free meals and drinks as he needed. So that was in October and November of 2013, and the fire happened in December. Now, things got complicated in January of 2014, about a month after the fire, and around the time that Jason Klaus's phone was wiretapped by the RCMP. See, Jason had started dating Amanda,

and things were getting serious pretty quickly. The situation with Josh may have all been fine, but before long, Jason started hearing rumours that Amanda was still sleeping with a 29-year-old who was also living at her hotel for free. Jason confronted Josh several times to ask him if the rumours were true. Josh confirmed that they were true, but Jason couldn't decide if he was telling the truth or if he was just trying to brag.

Jason would say that he asked Amanda about the rumours, and she denied it, suggesting that Josh had started them himself. So regardless of whether the rumours themselves were true, Jason started to believe that they did originate from Josh himself, and that was enough to make him angry, but he let things lie for a bit. According to court documents by March 9, 2014, Jason and Amanda were engaged to be married, but Jason still heard those rumours about her and Joshua still sleeping together.

The RCMP recorded three phone calls between Jason and Amanda, where he expressed that he was angrier than ever at Josh for starting the rumours. In one call, Jason said when he sees Josh next it wouldn't be pretty, he'd start cracking heads, and he didn't care if he got an assault charge. And in yet another call that day, Jason told his fiance Amanda he'd sent Josh a quote, very, very threatening, nasty text, and Joshua was going to visit him on the farm, where they were going to be having a serious chat.

Quote, he's a pain in my ass, if I get in trouble, I get in trouble. That's where we'll leave it for Part 1. Thanks for listening. Part 2 will be released in a week, and it's available right now for supporters on Patreon and Supercast. To see the full list of credits and resources for each episode, go to CanadianTrueCrime.ca. You'll also find out how to access early, ad-free episodes, submit case suggestions, and anything else you want to know.

CanadianTrueCrime donates regularly to help victims and survivors of injustice, and this month we have donated to the Indian Residential Schools Survivors Society. Back in June, I spoke about the devastating news that the remains of 315 Indigenous children had been found in unmarked graves on two former so-called residential schools, which were basically abusive re-education camps. In the time since the news came out, sadly, more remains have been found in other locations in British Columbia, as well as Saskatchewan.

And now the tally is at least 1,800 Indigenous children who died on their school grounds and were buried in unmarked graves, and that number is still climbing. The Indian Residential Schools Survivors Society is one of several organisations assisting residential school survivors and their families. For more information on this and other ways you can help, see the show notes and CanadianTrueCrime.ca.

Today's podcast recommendation is The White Saviors, another really great investigation from Canada Land. This is the story behind Wee Charity, a global children's charity started by a 12-year-old Canadian called Craig Kielburger. You might know it as Free the Children. Last summer, there was a huge scandal here in Canada, and it came out that its founders had made millions in cash and had a massive property portfolio.

They announced that they were closing the charity for good in Canada, after all that, but they continue to operate internationally when no one knows why they were forced to shut down. The White Saviors tells you why and a whole lot more with pretty explosive interviews from people in the know, including students, those who worked with them early on and top-level whistleblowers, who paint a picture of the cult-like culture within the organisation. From the reporters who spent five years investigating Wee Charity and broke the story, The White Saviors is the story of a charity that did very well when it was supposed to be doing good.

Don't miss The White Saviors from Canada Land wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you all so much for your kind messages, ratings, reviews and support. Thanks also to We Talk of Dreams for composing the new theme song you heard earlier in the episode. Not this one. I'm bringing the OG theme song back at the end just for funsies. I'll be back in a week with part two. See you then and enjoy. The White Saviors