Crime Weekly - S3 Ep248: Crime Weekly News: Bear Attack Turns Out to Be Murder

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

**UPDATE!** Since recording this episode, there's been an arrest in this case: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c629xz8z15go Daren Christopher Abbey has been arrested and charged with the murder o...f Dustin Kjersem. Police have still not pieced together the motive for the vicious attack, but they say Daren has confessed to the crime. They were able to link Daren to DNA left at the crime scene. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. MintMobile.com/CrimeWeekly - Get a 3-Month Premium Plan for just $15 a month!

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Starting point is 00:00:45 we have you covered with bold hues, soothing neutrals, and everything in between. Shop the sale online or visit your neighborhood Sherwin-Williams store. Click the banner to learn more. Retail sales only. Some exclusions apply. See store for details. Hey everyone, welcome to Crime Weekly News. I'm Derek Levasseur. And I'm Stephanie Harlow. And we're going to get right into it tonight. This is more of a call to action. We're really
Starting point is 00:01:24 passionate about unsolved cases. You guys know I do Detective Perspective every week, and there's a lot of cases out there, not like Gypsy Rose, not like the Menendez brothers, actual cases just like those, but who involve people who you may not have heard of, but are looking for justice, are looking for help, just like everyone else. And this is one of those instances. So in this particular case, investigators are asking for help just like everyone else. And this is one of those instances. So in this particular case, investigators are asking for help in solving a vicious murder that was initially
Starting point is 00:01:50 reported as a bear attack. So the person who found the victim sees the victim and thinks, oh my God, this person was attacked by a bear. They call 911. Because it was so brutal and so bloody that they assumed because they were camping. This person was camping, by the way. That's right. That's right. And so they thought, oh my God, must have been a bear attack. And that was not the case. And Stephanie's going to fill us in right now. So the victim is 35-year-old Dustin Gersom. He was last heard from on October 10th as he was leaving to go camping for the weekend. He was going camping in Montana. It's a very remote area in Montana, in the mountains. And his friend actually found him the following Saturday on October 12th, dead in his tent. And like I said, and like Derek had said,
Starting point is 00:02:40 the way that this man's body was, he was so brutalized that they assumed it was a bear attack. So wildlife and parks agents with expertise in bear attacks didn't find any sign of bear activity at the scene. This prompted the police to begin investigating what did happen, according to the sheriff's office. And the sheriff's department has said in a statement, quote, this incident was a vicious attack and detectives are working hard to develop and track down leads. A suspect has not been arrested at this time, end quote. At this time, as we record this, no one has been apprehended for this. But this is very terrifying, right? Somebody goes out into the woods to camp. And this is the Moose Creek area in Gallatin Canyon in Montana. And also understand the person we're talking about, Dustin Gerson, he was an avid camper. He was a construction worker. He always worked with his hands. He was very outdoorsy. And he just goes and he's in his tent and he literally gets attacked.
Starting point is 00:03:48 And you're starting to ask yourself, who could have possibly done this, right? Was it somebody he knew? That's not likely because how would somebody he knew track him down? So now you're thinking there's somebody out in the mountains wandering around just killing random people in their tents. And even the sheriff, Sheriff Dan Springer from Gallatin County, he said people have been asking him if there's a threat to the community. And he said, the answer is, we don't know. We don't have enough information. That's the right answer, by the way.
Starting point is 00:04:18 Well, of course, I would say there was potentially a threat. Not all on for it. We know that they don't all do that. Yeah. And he says multiple leads are being investigated. But apparently, Dustin Gersom, he drove to a makeshift campground in Moose Creek to spend the weekend with a friend. Now, this area is just north of Big Sky. It's fairly remote, but it's typically busy with hunters and campers.
Starting point is 00:04:41 So it's remote to like you and me. Yeah. But to the people who are just regularly going out there, it's beautiful. There's good fishing. A lot of people go out there to camp and hunt. And so you know that there's other people out there, but they say that Dustin Gerson would usually set up a wall tent, roughly eight by 10 feet, and he would stock it with all the essentials. The investigative captain, Nathan Karaman, said that he was well prepared for a weekend of camping and he had plans to meet with a friend on Friday afternoon, but he never made that meeting. So he goes out there Thursday, he gets his camp all set up. He's supposed to meet his friend at a
Starting point is 00:05:19 predetermined location, bring him back to the tent, never made it there. That friend, who at this point hasn't been identified, went looking for Dustin and found his body around 10 a.m. local time on Saturday. Now, the sheriff's office said in its initial statement that the caller indicated the death may have been caused by a bear attack. Now they know that's not true, and evidence gathered through an autopsy further indicated that this is a homicide. The autopsy showed that Dustin Gersom sustained multiple chop wounds from an axe that led to his death. So there's an axe murderer wandering the mountains in Montana, literally. And it's absolutely ridiculous. And so last week, the sheriff's office asked the public to be on the lookout for a number of items that are believed
Starting point is 00:06:02 to have been removed from the scene of the crime. An Estwing camp axe, lightly with a 26-inch handle, a Remington shotgun, a Ruger Blackhawk revolver, and an Orange Yeti brand cooler. I believe that what this person is saying is these items were Dustin's, and they were used in some capacity in his murder, and then removed from the scene. And anybody who has information about these items or about the case at all should contact the sheriff's office by phone or email. People are obviously the family of Dustin. He had a young daughter. He was only 35 years old, but he had a young daughter.
Starting point is 00:06:45 And they're asking for people to come forward with any information that might be of help. The sheriff said, quote, think of this as a large jigsaw puzzle. It might be that little piece that puts this together for us, end quote. They have shared a photo of Dustin Jerusum's black 2013 Ford F-150. So they're asking anyone who may have seen him or his truck out in the mountains to come forward. They're also urging anyone who is in the area of Moose Creek or Gallatin Canyon between Thursday afternoon and Saturday morning to reach out with information. So this is going to be like, did you see Dustin, right? Also, did you see somebody maybe with Dustin or following Dustin or somebody in the general area of where Dustin had pitched
Starting point is 00:07:21 his tent? And it's crazy because Dustin's sister, Jillian Price, there was a press conference and she said, quote, there is someone in our valley that is capable of truly heinous things. Please, if you're in Moose Creek at any time from Thursday to Saturday, please call and talk even if you think you didn't see anything, end quote. So yeah, yeah, not only did Dustin have a young daughter, but he had a stepson. And he was an amazing father. He was a hardworking, skilled tradesman. His sister said that he could have framed your house, he could have poured your foundation, could have installed your countertops. He was a loving, helpful, and adoring father who in no way deserved this. Dustin has loved fishing and camping since a young age. I mean, he was born
Starting point is 00:08:05 in Bozeman, Montana, so that makes sense. It's a very outdoorsy place. There's pretty much nothing else to do in Montana besides go outside and enjoy the beautiful scenery. But yeah, this is crazy because at this point, they really don't know anything because Dustin was out in the middle of nowhere, a very, very remote area. Yeah, there's so much to unpack here. So first off, I want to talk about how do we solve this case? And we're going to do that in a couple of minutes. But first off, just to kind of unpack what you've explained to everyone the first thing you got to do is figure out or at least come to a few theories as far as was this personal in the sense where he knew this person
Starting point is 00:08:51 prior to this incident or was this a random attack by someone who he may have only encountered moments or even like a day before what do i mean by that well we know that some hunters especially when it comes to their certain areas that they like, like fishermen, I'm a, you remember my thing? I fish all the time, you know, even fishing, there are fishermen who are like territorial about their spots, right? And I'm doing air quotes because it's not their spot, but there are times where they don't like other fishermen to come in and disturb the waters that they like to kind
Starting point is 00:09:24 of go and find their fish because it screws up their, what they got going on, their methodology. And some hunters, especially if they're killing their, you know, their animals and eating them, right? So they're really, they rely on this stuff and they can become very upset when someone encroaches on their territory, right? And so- Upset like that? Well, that's the thing, right? This is obviously a disturbed individual. This is not someone who's operating under a normal set of standards. So that's something we have to figure out. You have to develop that profile. And the first thing you would want to do is look into the historical data that you can find behind
Starting point is 00:10:01 Dustin. Did he have any enemies? Did he have anything going on in his life? Or is there anyone out there who would have wanted to hurt him and would have known that he was going to be out in those woods where he potentially would be and maybe use this as an opportunity to seek revenge or carry out a plot because of some other motive that you and I are unaware of at this point? And that's kind of what I was going over in my head too. And I actually have not a theory, but I have something I want to present to you, but let's take a quick break and then we'll talk about it. Let's do it. When I look through my bills and I wonder which ones are the highest, it's usually,
Starting point is 00:10:43 you know, in the top three, my cell phone bill. And I've been getting a little tired of paying so much when I know there's other options. I love a great deal as much as the next guy, you know, but I'm not going to crawl through a bed of hot coals just to save a few bucks. It has to be easy and there has to be no hoops, no BS, really quick. So wanting to try something different, but trying to change something as important as your cell phone, that was difficult. When Mint Mobile said it was easy to get wireless for $15 a month with the purchase of a three-month plan, I called them on it, and it turns out it really is that easy to get wireless for $15 a month. The longest part of the process
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Starting point is 00:12:45 month plan only. Speed slower above 40 gigabytes on the unlimited plan. Additional taxes, fees, and restrictions apply. Okay, we're back. Hit me with this theory. Okay, so obviously, right, there's only one of two options. It's somebody he knew from home who was aware that he was going to be camping and would also have to be aware of where he usually chose. What's his spots? Yeah. Or maybe they had his cell phone location. That's possible, too. And they could have some other type of GPS technology that we're unaware of.
Starting point is 00:13:20 Sometimes the guys use the garments and stuff. It's not necessarily, you know, their cell phone data. Because you don't get super good cell phone service up there in the mountains all the time. So a lot of these campers and fishers and hunters do have backups for something like that. That go off satellites. A satellite, exactly. So that could be an option. Somebody tracked him there who knew he was going to be there, found his exact location. On the other hand, it could be a complete stranger, but then you have to ask, what's the motive? As far as we can tell, not many things were taken, like a Yeti cooler and a gun and an ax, which it appears he was killed with this ax.
Starting point is 00:13:57 Two guns, right? A shotgun and a- And a rifle, right? A handgun? Or whatever the other one was, But yeah, you said two guns. So, but I'm thinking of the friend, okay? Yeah. Now I'm not accusing this friend. They're going to be on the list. But they're going to be on the list and they're going to be at the top of the list, right? If this is not a stranger, this friend's going to be at the top of the list.
Starting point is 00:14:19 And why? Well, because he definitely knew that Dustin was supposed to be there. They were supposed to meet Friday. Dustin never met him on Friday. He doesn't find him until Saturday morning. And it appears, I mean, he knew where to go to eventually find his tent. So why did it take so long when he didn't meet you on Friday? Why did it take so long for you to find his tent on Saturday? Were you just wandering the mountains looking for his tent, you know, and we just happened to come upon it and it took you that long? Or what's the deal there? Maybe you did
Starting point is 00:14:49 know exactly where he was located. And I would, if that was the police, I would want to know, did these two people, Dustin and his friend, have some sort of issue? Had they had a dispute? Had they had an argument? Did somebody owe somebody money? Did somebody start talking to somebody's girlfriend? Something like that. What was the issue? And the other guy pulled a gun and shot his friend. So to your point, there could have been something out there where there was no previous issues, but they're arguing maybe having a drink or two by the fire and something said, and it could have happened just from that to just kind of add to the point you're making right now. Well, and I mean, that's the obvious thing, right? You were supposed to meet him on Friday.
Starting point is 00:15:40 You didn't find him till Saturday. Were you actually with him on Friday? Something happened and then you found him till Saturday. Were you actually with him on Friday? Something happened. And then you found him on Saturday. That's that's really kind of going to be at the top of my list. And then other than that, yes, some strange person walking by, maybe somebody who's not mentally well, maybe somebody who's struggling with a drug or alcohol addiction, somebody who has problems and maybe they're kind of like living in the mountains kind of thing. And like you said, they see this tent and they're like, this is my area. This is my home. What are you doing here? And they take him out. But that does seem less likely than somebody who knows him who might have a motive or might have a reason to get that angry. Because from what it sounds like, this wasn't just a quick, you know, one chop. It was pretty violent. It was pretty brutal. That comes from a place of anger.
Starting point is 00:16:32 And would a stranger who had just encountered him have that level of anger to commit a crime like this if they were mentally stable? So we're either talking about a mentally unstable mountain man who who's just or you know or like a yeti or something um or we're talking about somebody who knew him who had an axe to grind with him so i think i think both scenarios are at play here the the good news for the investigation is as you said at minimum the friend is going to be a person of interest even if it's just for the information that's why he hasn't been identified i think yeah they're going to be a person of interest, even if it's just for the information. That's why he hasn't been identified. I think they're going to be a person of interest. It's just the way it works. And there's a,
Starting point is 00:17:08 there's a real possibility he wasn't involved, but they're going to treat him just like they're going to treat everyone else. They're going to vet his, his, his story, his, where he was, his alibi.
Starting point is 00:17:17 And also forensically, because of the times we're living in now, they're going to ask him if he was at that campsite at all that day before this walking up on it. And do DNA tests. Yeah tests, check his cell phone. Exactly. So they're going to be able to go there and corroborate his story based on technology. So first off, his coordinates, how long was he at that campsite prior to making that phone call? They're going to be able to look at footprint impressions around the campsite to see if his boot print was in other areas of that campsite where he stated that he did not go. They're going to be able to look at footprint impressions around the campsite to see if his boot print was in other areas of that campsite where he stated that he did not go.
Starting point is 00:17:48 They're going to probably swab some things to see if his DNA is inside the tent at all as well. So there's some things they can do to verify his story as far as how much like they'll say, yeah, we know you opened the tent. What did you touch? You touched the screen door. You opened it up. Did you go inside? They're going to ask these questions. Now, to counter that, if he knows what he did, he can give excuses for why his DNA would be certain places. That's up to detectives to kind of facilitate that and figure out what's fact from fiction.
Starting point is 00:18:16 And also, I think they're going to check his alibi, right? Because I'm looking and I'm saying, you were supposed to meet your friend, Dustin, on Friday. You didn't find him until Saturday morning. So what were you doing between the time you were supposed to meet him and the time you found him? And if he's like, oh, I went to a gas station and I had breakfast at a diner, they're going to go to that diner and they're going to, yeah, they're going to go to that gas station and they're going to verify his alibi. But let's say he's not the guy for a second, right? Let's say there's someone out there. There's a lot of hunters out there. Like you said, where do we go from here? Well,
Starting point is 00:18:43 what I would do is first and foremost, you want to find the cell phone tower that's in that area. I'm assuming there's not a ton and there's going to be multiple cell phones and other devices that bounce off that tower during that time period to use that to make phone calls or to at least have service. Even if you're not using the phone, the phone's still going to grab that tower at certain points as you pass by it. So I would want to download all the cell phone tower data from that area at that time to see what devices you had in the area. You're going to get all those phone numbers. You're going to want to go through, create a suspect list.
Starting point is 00:19:19 You're also going to want to look into other hunters that are in that area. And don't you have to get like, am I wrong? Because I don't hunt. You might have to, you need a license. Do you need a license? And sometimes they get like a weekend license or you have a license for the season. So, I mean, if they don't get a lot of leads from the cell phone dump, because they're, like I said, maybe not good service, then they might have to just pull the records and
Starting point is 00:19:42 see who had applied for a license for that time or even that season? You're going to want to do that. You're going to want to grab any licenses you can grab. You're going to want to talk to the local hunters. You're going to want to start to develop a list of all the individuals who were there that weekend. Once you have that list, you can run background checks on all of them. Do any of them have some history of violence? Were any of them in the military? Things like that. Things that may suggest one way or the other that they could potentially have an involvement. You want to go speak to them.
Starting point is 00:20:10 And not that you're saying everybody in the military has the potential to be a murderer. Anybody who takes that, that's more on you than on me. I'm talking about in general. Listen, there are vets who come back and are going through things. And sometimes they can go back into a place where they think they're in They're over in overseas again fighting a war So i'm not i'm not isolating them out. Everyone knows i'm pro military. I love you guys So nothing to say that these are just the facts
Starting point is 00:20:36 But either way you want to go and look up all of these hunters and develop a profile and a background on each and every One of them that you can confirm. We there. You want to go and speak to them. You want to go corroborate their stories by speaking to family members and friends. If they say they came home at a certain time, were they actually there? When they came home, what was their behavior like? All of these things you're going to do. You're going to grab their DNA. You're also going to look for trail cams. That's what I was just going to say, trail cams. I was thinking there's probably a ton out there, right? Yeah. You think? You would think maybe they passed them. Maybe they didn't. It's all stuff you have to at least cross off your list. These are things, it might just take one
Starting point is 00:21:15 trail cam to get something right. And you can go to these hunters and ask them, hey, do you have any trail cams up there? Let's create a map. Let's start marking them off Let's see what paths would be in and out of the area where dustin was found This is going to be an extensive this gets me excited actually just talking about it But it's going to be a lot of work But there's a lot of angles here that can be explored to potentially give you that piece of the puzzle that you mentioned because all you Need is the one breadcrumb if you find it It's going to lead to another breadcrumb and then another breadcrumb and then you find your person and it's just as far as the specifics of the crime itself which you had kind of mentioned this is speculative on my part but to me the fact that
Starting point is 00:21:56 it appears the murder weapon was in fact owned by dustin they they haven't said that for sure but that's what i'm that's what i'm pulling from it this This is me. If I'm wrong, I'll own it. I mean, I think I, I garnered the same. So, so my thing is the person who did this was at that campsite and grabbed an item that was already there. And so to me, it doesn't sound premeditated. It doesn't sound like somebody who followed them into the woods. It could still be the friend, that whole argument, something goes wrong while they're out there is plausible, but it's also possible. Dustin gets into a verbal disagreement with another hunter in the area. Dustin goes to sleep. This hunter follows him in. They grab something that would not be traced back to them, like their own firearm or their own weapon. They grab one of
Starting point is 00:22:41 Dustin's weapons and they carry out the event in order to try to leave as little bit of a trail back to them as much as possible. So a lot of things to explore here. It's a very unfortunate situation. It does sound like it was a passionate crime where this person had some actual issues with Dustin. It could have been a road rage thing. Dustin could have accidentally cut somebody off. They could have followed him to his campsite. Yeah. You know, like road rage, Jesus. But I'm saying like, like I've seen people snap, you know, like people who are under enough pressure who got, you know, who maybe aren't totally mentally stable. It doesn't take a lot. So that could have happened. But I think this goes to show you, you know, we associate crime with big cities and huge populations, but it sucks when you can't even
Starting point is 00:23:30 go out into the mountains and have, you know, a peaceful weekend without having to worry about somebody randomly attacking you and not a bear. And it's kind of like that whole thing that's going around on TikTok and social media, like, would you take the bear or the man? And women say they would take the bear because they feel safer with a bear in the woods than a man. Well, this kind of supports that. It does. No, there's so much to do here. We could do an hour episode just on breaking this down.
Starting point is 00:23:59 This is why I love Detective Perspective is like this is where we would just go through it all. Another scenario is this person approaches the campsite as a friendly and they say, hey, you know, I ran out of water or I ran out of food and maybe we don't know yet. And we won't know because it's a relatively new case. Maybe Dustin sends a text message to a family member and says, oh, I'm just, I'm here with this guy who needed help. We don't know yet. They wouldn't release that. So there's so much to unpack here. And most of it, we don't even know because investigators are not going to share that with us. But we'll keep up to date on it.
Starting point is 00:24:31 Just like the North Carolina story. I have a feeling. Oh, there's going to be updates on this. There's going to be updates on this one. Something will happen. I'm trying to keep an optimistic mind about it. And for Dustin's friends and families, I really hope that's the case. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:24:44 Our thoughts are with you. It's very, this is obviously you don't want everyone to lose a loved one, but to lose somebody like this and then not know what happened, not know why, that's awful. So if anybody's in the area who's listening and you know something, or you're familiar with the area, or maybe you know where there's trail cams, anything, anything, like Dustin's sister said, anything, Even if you don't think you know anything, you could. So. Vehicles, any suspicious vehicles in that area, if you're a hunter or a fisherman in that area, license plates, anything you could have grabbed that maybe you caught on camera when you were filming something, any of it, reach out. So anybody with information you can um go ahead and call 406-582-2121 or you can email
Starting point is 00:25:31 detectives at gallatin.mt.gov yeah absolutely that's gonna do it for us guys as of right now we're actually recording this one early so as we speak now, I am on a cruise ship hanging out with some of you guys, hopefully not seasick. That's the plan. And if I am, Stephanie already knows about it because I'm texting her, bitching and complaining about it, but hope that's not the case. That's going to do it for us guys. Everyone stay safe out there and we will see you later this week with Gypsy Rose part six. Okay. We're going to be going over all the interrogation footage. We've been talking about it. We've been teasing it. Now it's time to get into it. It's time. So audio on Friday, video on Sunday. We'll see you then. Have a good night. Bye.

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