Going West: True Crime - Brooke Wilberger // 182

Episode Date: March 12, 2022

In May of 2004, a 19-year-old BYU student who was home in Oregon for summer break was abducted in broad daylight while working around an apartment complex. It would be years until crimes in another state would reveal who her killer was. This is the story of Brooke Wilberger. BONUS EPISODES patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES https://www.newspapers.com/image/507023505/?terms=Joel%20Courtney&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/383816309/?terms=Brooke%20wilberger&match=1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Brooke_Wilberger https://www.nbcnews.com/watch/dateline/bringing-brooke-home-part-11-240078915819 https://www.newspapers.com/image/383866268/?terms=Brooke%20Wilberger&match=1 https://abcnews.go.com/2020/vanished-brooke-wilbergers-remains-found-coed-case/story?id=8634304 https://democratherald.com/timeline-investigation-of-brooke-wilbergers-disappearance/article_5f470888-a741-11de-9218-001cc4c03286.html http://special.registerguard.com/csp/cms/sites/web/news/cityregion/25907923-41/brooke-says-wilberger-cammy-courtney.csp https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/details-reveal-final-hours-of-brooke-wilbergers-life/283-89993491 https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/details-reveal-final-hours-of-brooke-wilbergers-life/283-89993491 https://www.newspapers.com/image/441379859/?terms=Stephani%20Hansen&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/441548388/?terms=Sung%20Koo%20Kim&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/507023505/?terms=Joel%20Courtney&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/383812008/?terms=Sung%20Koo%20Kim&match=1 https://www.abqjournal.com/22615/730am-dragging-it-out.html https://casetext.com/case/wilberger-v-creative-building-maintenance-2 https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2009/09/twists_and_turns_in_the_brooke.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/383738298/?terms=Joel%20Courtney&match=1 https://www.angelfire.com/jazz/jazzyrose/BrookeWilberger.html https://www.heraldextra.com/news/2004/may/28/police-have-no-break-in-missing-byu-student-case/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/485145909/?terms=Joel%20Patrick%20Courtney&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/565968953/?terms=Cammy%20Wilberger&match=1 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/20455323/brooke-carol-wilberger https://www.newspapers.com/image/388587602/?terms=Brooke%20wilberger&match=1 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host, Teeth. And I'm your host, Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. You know what I've realized? A lot of people think your name is Keith. Yeah, a lot of people think my name is Teeth, like T-E-E-E-T-H. I just wanted to address that because we get so many emails now. It's like, hey, Keith and Daphne. I'm gonna clear this up for y'all. It's Heath, but like Ledger.

Like Ledger, yes, or the candy bar. Yeah, a lot of people are like Heath, like Heath bar. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I've gotten that so much. Yes, so, anyway, thank you guys so much for tuning in today. Hope everybody's having a great week. This case has been one that Heath has been wanting to cover for a while because it happened near where he grew up and you actually remember this case happening, right? Yes, I remember this case very, very well. I was probably a

sophomore in high school and this case actually happened like two towns over from where I grew up. So it was very, very, very big in the area that I lived in. Yeah, absolutely. So I know we have been recommended this case. I think somebody recommended it like years ago. We've been meaning to cover it

and I don't know why we haven't, but it was just one of those things where we just didn't do it. And here we are doing it today. Well, we're finally here, so. But yeah, we appreciate you guys listening and without further ado, let's get into today's episode. This is episode 182 of Going West,

so let's get into it. In May of 2004, a 19-year-old BYU student who was home in Oregon for summer break was abducted in broad daylight while working around an apartment complex. It would be years until crimes in another state would reveal who her killer was. This is the story of Brooke Wilberger. Brooke Carol Wilberger was born on February 20 20, 1985 in Fresno, California to parents Cammy and Greg Wilburger. Brooke grew up with three sisters, Shannon and Stephanie who were older and Jessica who was younger alongside two older brothers, Spencer and Bryce, and Brooke was the fifth child in the family, so the second

youngest of six. Her mother, Cammy, was a teacher, and her father, Greg, was a process engineer for a chemical company called Borden Chemical. And at some point, the Wilburgers moved from California to the beautiful Pacific Northwest when Brooke was very little and landed in the very small rural town of Vanita, Oregon, which has a population of under 5,000 residents today. It's located a few miles west of the larger city of Eugene, Oregon, which hosts over 150,000 people, and it's nestled on Highway 26, which if you keep going west for about 40 minutes, it will take you

straight to the Oregon coast. And actually about 5-10 minutes from that small town is where Heath grew up. Yes, I grew up about 5 minutes from, well, 5-10 minutes from Venita, where Brooke is from. Brooke was a shy, blonde, haired, blue-eyed little girl, who her older siblings love to dress up, but when she entered middle school, she became much more outgoing and very popular. Brooke became involved in 4H because she loved animals, but she was also extremely athletic, and she played like a multitude of sports, including basketball, track, which her favorite event was the long jump, and soccer, and she also loved to snowboard, bake, and scrapbook. What is 4-H?

4-H is essentially like farm animals, like you take care of farm animals, like pigs and stuff like that. Oh, I don't know how I've never heard of that, but that's cool. Yeah, it's kind of a more rural thing, I suppose. So Brooke also played the piano, and she was a part of her school's drama club as well.

But not only was Brooke athletic, she was also very intelligent, and in high school, she was an honor student with dreams of going to college to become a speech pathologist, due to the fact that when she was very little, about four or five, she had her own speech impediment, she wasn't very verbal when she was that little. So Brooke basically had it all. She had looks, she was very fashionable when she was that little. So Brooke basically had it all. She had looks, you know, she was very fashionable and she loved the shop. She had brains and wit, but also she was just an overall genuinely nice and caring person. And as her brother Bryce put it, quote, she made everyone feel better about themselves.

Brooke attended El Maira High School, which is a little community right next door to Venita, and when she was 16 in 2001, she began dating a local boy named Justin Blake, who was in the same grade as her, and who she had known almost her entire life. The two were extremely happy together, and Justin had plans to attend at Brigham Young University, also known as BYU, located in Provo, Utah, after graduation. So in 2003, that's exactly what he did. But Brooke, not wanting to, you know, kind of be left behind and also looking for a change

herself, decided that it would be best that she too attend BYU. So in the fall of 2003, the couple made their way to Utah for the next exciting chapter in their lives. And by the way, I just wanted to bring this up. Brooke and her family, as well as Justin and his family, are all LDS members, so they're all Mormon. Right. It makes some sense to go to BYU. BYU, exactly. So Brooke made a ton of new friends during her freshman year in college, and she was also able to return home for the holidays like Thanksgiving to spend time with her family.

But when her freshman year was coming to a close by the spring of 2004, her boyfriend Justin decided that he was going to do some missionary work for his Mormon church in Venezuela so he was doing that as of that summer. Brooke didn't really want to spend the summer without her boyfriend in Utah, so as most college freshmen do, she returned home to Oregon, where she could just get a summer job and kind of just save up money. Brooke's older sister Stephanie was married now and was living in the city of Corvallis Oregon, and an apartment complex called the Oak Park Apartments, which she managed alongside

her husband Zach. Now, I want to give you guys a description of this area so you can have a better idea Oak Park Apartments, which she managed alongside her husband, Zach. Now I want to give you guys a description of this area so you can have a better idea of what we're talking about. So growing up in the immediate area, typically you're either a University of Oregon Duck fan or you're an Oregon State University Beaver fan or possibly you're just neither. But both locations of the universities are known as college town slash cities. So, you know, the basically the whole city is revolved around these universities.

Oh, totally. So now Eugene, which is home to the University of Oregon, is the closest city that's to Venita where Brooke is from. But Corvalis, where Brooke's sister lived, is about a 47-minute drive north of Venita. Yeah, and I know this probably sounds a little confusing, but Corvalis and Vanita and Eugene, these are all very close to each other. I mean, when we, Heath and I used to live in Eugene and I worked in Corvalis, when we started going west

in the very beginning, I was working in Corvalis. Yeah. And it's like an hour drive, maybe a little bit less. So like Heath said, they are two college small cities. They're both very small cities. Exactly, yeah. And they really revolve around these two major colleges. Yeah.

Yeah, and Corvallis hosts around 54,000 people, mostly college students. And I dad. Yeah, and Daphne's dad. And it's known to be very safe. In fact, as far as violent crime goes, Corvalus is 2.41 times less than the national average and 1.82 times less than the state average. Yeah, Corvalus feels very safe too. Yeah, small little community. So it's known as a very

outdoorsy community rooted in agriculture with views of the surrounding mountains as well as farmland. And I hope this helps you guys get more of a visual. So I don't know if we explain that very well. It's funny because most almost every single case we cover, you and I personally don't know the area. So it's nice to be able to be like, we both know this area. Yeah. Here's what it's like, but I don't know if that. And for those listeners who are listening in Oregon, you guys probably know this area as well. Right.

So during May of 2004, right after Brooke returned home from BYU for a summer break back to Oregon, she had picked up a bit of a part-time job working for her sister, Stephanie, who again was managing the Oak Park Apartments in Corvallis, just kind of doing odd jobs around the property. She was happy to be back home in the very lush green state of Oregon, and she had plans to see old friends and also had made a plan to go on a girls trip with her sisters and mother. That

summer down to San Francisco, because again for those who don't know this area, Corvallis is what like a nine... nine-ish hour drive from San Francisco, give or take. Yeah, about nine hours. So, good, pretty good road trip. So, the apartment complex that Brooke was working at is essentially a stone's throwaway from the Oregon State campus, and you can actually see the research football stadium

from these apartments. Monday, May 24, 2004 was just like most days being back home. Brooke was up early because she had to make the 45-minute drive north to Corvallis that morning to help out her sister. Remember she is driving from Vanita. She was in a bit of a rush that morning, but before she left, she peeked back inside the front door of her parents' home, smiled at her younger sister Jessica, who was a seventh grader, and about to leave

the house to head to school herself. And she said, I love you, before getting into the car and heading out for the day. At about 9 a.m. that Monday morning, which again was May 24th, Brooke arrived at the Oak Park Apartments in Corvallis. Brooke's sister Stephanie was at the apartment complex at that time with her children, and she gave Brooks a list of maintenance jobs to do around the property. And by the way, this property or this complex has about 100 units.

So pretty, pretty big. Yeah, fairly big. So the first task on the list was to go around the complex and clean the glass lamp post covers. So Brooks filled up a bucket with soap and water, grabbed some cleaning rags and headed out of her sister's apartment. At some point that morning, Stephanie had to take one of her kids to preschool, but rather than bother Brooke who is most likely hard at work, she decided that she would just talk

to her when she got back that morning. When Stephanie returned to the complex, she didn't see Brooke initially, but she wasn't concerned at all. Stephanie and Brooke had made plans for Brooke to take a break at 1pm and come inside to eat some lunch that she had prepared for her, but when Brooke didn't show up, she was a bit confused. But again, she wasn't all that concerned because she just kind of figured that maybe Brooke was finishing up a task and that she would be in shortly. So a few minutes passed and Brooke still hadn't shown up.

So Stephanie wrangled up her kids and jokingly said to them, let's get the search party together. Stephanie left her apartment that afternoon, expecting to see her sister scrubbing light posts around the property. But when she got out to the parking lot, she noticed something odd. that afternoon, expecting to see her sister scrubbing light posts around the property. But when she got out to the parking lot, she noticed something odd. Lying on the ground was the bucket filled with water that Brook had been using to clean with, next to a lamp post along with a few discarded rags on the asphalt. But that wasn't the part that alarmed her the most. As she got closer to the bucket, she noticed a set of light blue thong sandals on the

ground next to the bucket, and she recognized them to be the same ones that Brooke was wearing that morning. But the panic really started to set in when Stephanie approached the sandals and saw that one of the plastic straps that goes in between your toes was broken. And also that there were mud streaks on the front of the broken sandal as if Brook had been trying to stay in place during a struggle. On that warm spring morning in May, 19-year-old Brookwillberger vanished without a trace.

All that was left at the scene where Brook disappeared was a bucket of water, some rags, and two thong sandals, one of which was broken. Brooke's sister Stephanie looked around the complex for her, hoping that maybe there was some sort of explanation as to why she would be gone. But as the hours passed and still there was no sign of Brooke. Stephanie's husband, Zach, made a very calm and collected call to 911 at 307 PM, and nobody had seen Brooke since 1030 AM that morning. Brooke's family began calling one another to see if anyone knew where Brooke could be, but each person was just as confused as the next.

Brooke's car, which was a beige Ford contour, was still in the parking lot of the Oak Park apartments. And inside her sister Stephanie's apartment was Brooks' phone, wallet, and purse. Something that Brooks would never have left behind. When detectives arrived to the apartments, they really didn't have much to go on considering the physical evidence left behind wasn't very substantial. So they began to question people who lived in the apartment complex to see if it was possible that someone had seen something. But sadly, after interviewing all of the residents that afternoon, no one had.

But, although no one had seen anything, one resident claimed that they heard something. Shortly before 10.30am, the tenant heard what they described as a blood-curdling scream. But after that, the complex went silent. So right away, police felt as though this had to be an abduction, and that Brooke had not gone off on her own free will. I know that this being a Monday 10, 30 AM, you can assume a lot of people are at work, but the fact that only one person really reported hearing this scream is kind of bizarre.

Very bizarre, yeah, because I mean, it seemed like a pretty quiet complex and it's 10, 30 in the morning. Well, especially saying it was a blood-curdling scream, like that's a pretty loud significant scream to hear, So yeah, kind of weird. Very descript. Yeah. So that first day, detectives began to question Brooks family to see if they had any information that would help the investigation. First, they asked if Brooks had a boyfriend, and if so, where the boyfriend was at the time of her disappearance. But it was quickly discovered that Justin was still out of the country on his LDS mission,

so he was ruled out immediately. Then detectives turned to Stephanie, who was the last person to see Brooke. Stephanie later explained that police looked into her extensively, even asking her if she had done something to her little sister. But Brooke was very close to all of her siblings, and there was no bad blood between any of them, so it seemed pretty unlikely. That afternoon, what started out as a few volunteers turned into hundreds of people, including many members from Brooke's church, all there to help try and locate her. But sadly, the first day you'll did no information or clues. Brooks case caught national media attention very fast, and two days had already passed

without Brooks' return. Her family was completely horrified given the crime scene and what investigators felt had happened, but the community banded together and hopes of just finding any clues. Corvalus has a lot of farmland, rivers, wooded areas that made it very hard to search, but still thousands of people joined in to help. On the 26th of May, again, so two days after Brooke vanished, her father, Greg, made a public plea on Good Morning America saying, quote, we just want to tell Brooke that we love her and that we hope she's well and that she will have courage. Detectives thought that it was possible that someone within the apartment complex could have

abducted Brooke. Well, I mean, that makes sense considering there's a hundred units, you know, but there's a lot of people around there. Yeah. So definitely makes sense. But the bad thing was that students from OSU were about to leave for the summer, and that would make it much harder for investigators to question potential witnesses. Another thought detectives had was to take a closer look at sex offenders living in the area, but that proved to be pretty difficult considering that there were over 2,000 of them in this immediate area. I don't like that. Don't like it at all.

But still, police did their due diligence and made sure to question everyone that they could. Missing person flyers and posters were also created and posted all over town, as well as neighboring towns with this description. Brook, Carol Wilberger, is five feet four inches tall and weighs 105 to 119 pounds. Blonde hair, blue eyes. The Vanita woman was last seen wearing a grey t-shirt with BYU soccer in small print on it. A dark blue-colored hoodie, fresh jive, brand sweatshirt, blue jeans and no shoes. She was wearing an engraved ring with the letter CTR on it,

small hoop earrings and possibly a silver watch. She had a piercing on the top of her right ear and a scar on her right forearm that extends from her elbow to her wrist. It also mentioned the Corvallis Police Tip Line as well as the initial $30,000 reward for information leading to Brooks' whereabouts. There was also a number that you could call in order to volunteer to help in the search

for her. And there were hundreds of tips and sightings of Brooke from all over the state as well as other states. But every tip that came in proved to be unrelated. After a week of searching, Hope was really starting to dwindle, but another family in the state of Utah had gone through this very same horrific scenario, just two years prior.

And I just wanted to interject real quick and say that I do remember all of the missing person flyers. Like, because it was so close to where I grew up, I mean, you would go to the grocery store and someone would have like a flyer in their back window of their car and there was billboards. I mean, it was everywhere.

This was huge news. Well, it's crazy because obviously we cover so many cases, but I have never personally seen anything like that. In Cal and Cal. In Cal. In California. In California where I grew up. So, yeah, but that, I mean, just so sad

that you remember this. Yeah, yeah, very close to home. But let's get back to this family that had gone through this kind of similar scenario. Yeah, and probably something that you guys might have heard of. Yeah, absolutely. So a young girl named Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped from her Salt Lake City home in June of 2002.

So two years before Brooke, by a self-proclaimed religious preacher named Brian David Mitchell, and I'm sure a lot of you guys have heard of this story. We've gotten this recommended to us a lot, and I don't know why we haven't covered it. Again, it's just one of those that we haven't gotten to, but we might do it. We see you, everybody.

So he and his wife kept 14-year-old Elizabeth captive for nine months, and eventually the two deranged an evil couple were caught in public with Elizabeth, and she was returned to her family safely. The smarts knew exactly what the Willburgers were going through, and they offered up tools on how to cope with the stress and the best ways to get Brooke's story in the public eye. When asked how he felt about the situation, Brooke's father responded, quote, you don't feel, you don't think, you can't have any feelings, you just go forward. Pink Ribbons were distributed to volunteers searching for Brooke as a reminder not to give

up hope. The FBI even stepped in to try and help find Brook, but due to the fact that there was virtually no information and zero evidence aside from Brook's flip flops, there really wasn't much that they could do. But four days after Brook went missing on May 28, 2004, police got their first big break. Just a few weeks before Brooke disappeared, a 30-year-old man named Sun-ku Kim, who was originally from South Korea and who was an unemployed microbiologist, was arrested on May 13th for burglary in Newberg, Oregon. Now Newberg...

I can't remember. I'm like so stupid today, I'm sorry guys. Newberg is about an hour north of Corvallis, where Brooke went missing from, but the circumstances of his arrest made police suspicious of his potential involvement in Brooke's disappearance. See, there's a Christian university in Newberg called George Fox, and some students begin to notice a man

creeping around the campus who was not a student of the college. And just so you know, the college only hosts about 5,000 students, so it's pretty easy to detect an outsider. So anyway, these students started noticing a man hanging around the campus. But then, these female students began to notice their undergarment started to disappear. Highly suspecting Sunku Kim to be the culprit, a young woman followed Sun and wrote down his license plate from his 1991 Black Honda Accord, and this information was given to police

and they were able to get a search warrant for Sunku Kim's parents' house, Intigred Oregon, which is just outside of Portland. And this is where he was living at the time. And what they discovered was extremely disturbing. Yeah, you guys ready for this? I don't think so. I don't know. I don't know.

So inside the home, police found over 1,000 pairs of women's underwear, most of which were dirty, and attached to the underwear, were labels indicating what college campus dorm he stole them from. Oh, God. Fucking creep. That's just so goddamn weird. Like not only to steal them and to keep them, but to label them.

Label them? Yeah, and it just gets weirder. Yeah, and it gets and it just gets weirder. Yeah, keep going. So amongst the many pairs of underwear found were two pairs labeled Sacket Hall OSU, the floor number of the hall, two women's first names, and the date that they were stolen, which was five two. I don't know how did you even know their names? This I don't know. I don't know how he gathered that information. So investigators then tracked down the women and found out that those undergarments indeed did belong to them and they had been taken. So a few weeks later, at 2.40am on May 29th, 2004, so a few days after Brookwimp missing, well five days,

another search of Sunku Kim's parents' property was conducted. There, they found an abundance of weapons, including handguns and rifles, which were loaded and ready to use at any time, as well as another box of bras and panties inside, and a book titled, The Beginner's Guide to Picking Locks. Police also seized his cell phone, digital camera, video camera, various notebooks, computer discs, and some receipts that he had. It gets so much worse. So when SONGS computer was accessed,

police found 40,000 pictures of women being tortured and raped, but that wasn't all. They also found videos of two Portland University students doing their laundry taped without their knowledge. But here's the kicker. Police also found dryer lint that was labeled by sung, and that lint came from the laundry room at you guessed it, the Oak Park apartments in Corvallis. So again, where Brooke disappeared from. Yes, so this dude is like stealing...

He's like dropping around Oregon, like taking creepy shit. But the weird thing is... ...takes dryer lint and label it. And also the fact that it's at the same apartment building... It blows my fucking mind. It's insane. So also found on his computer was child sexual abuse content, but also, some had been putting together biographical information on a female student at Oregon State in Corvallis,

who was a university swimmer that he had become infatuated with. So basically, he's just writing down all these notes about her height, weight, what she looks like, what, you know This is like top tear cream. It's very, very stalker. Yes. And apparently this student looked similar to Brooke and had also moved into the Oak Park Apartments in late May of 2004, right when Brooke was abducted. But there's more.

A document was found inside of his home that was essentially a list on how to commit a sex crime, including tools that you would need like a hood, glasses, and a video camera. His computer showed that he had searched the words non-extraditable countries. Then investigators found out that Song had bought Cinder blocks the day that Brooke went missing, so he instantly became a person of interest in Brooke's case, but he was only arrested for the burglaries and child content at that point, and his bill was set at $1.5 million. But his family was able to make deposits to four different counties, in which his crimes occurred of $150,000 for him to stay out of jail until his trial dates. In the meantime, investigators needed to find out if he really was connected to Brooks

case. So a lot of very strange shit going on here with some who came. Why is his family trying to keep him out of jail? Well, they don't believe he's responsible. Well, I don't know how that's true. I mean, at the very least, he's a creep and he's just gonna go to jail for the crimes he has committed. But this is so much further than,

oh, I just steal underwear. Like you're watching child abuse sex content, whatever you wanna call it, cause we don't wanna call it child pornography. And you have 40,000 images of women being raped and tortured. This is a sick individual. Yeah, and I think police are like, you know, if he hadn't been caught for these things,

I mean, it would have escalated. The situation would have escalated in some way and who knows what would have happened. So it had now been two weeks since Brooke disappeared and nothing was moving forward in her case. So sadly, the large-scale search parties had ended. So detectives took a step forward with Sunku Kim to see if they could figure out where

he was on the day that Brookwent missing, and through their investigation, they found that Sung had purchased shares of stock on his computer that morning around 11 a.m. Then a witness stated that Sung had answered a phone call that morning at his parents' house in Tiger D'Orrigan. And lastly, Sung and his father were captured on surveillance video entering a circuit city electronics store at 1242 p.m. all the way up in Portland, about 70 miles from where Brooke was abducted. So although Sunkoom looked like the perfect suspect, eventually he was ruled out as having anything to do with Brooke's abduction. But I will add that Sun served seven years for the crimes that he was

charged with and he was released in 2012. So now police were really stumped. They basically thought that they had their guy, and it was right back to square one. Months continued to roll on with no new leads or any information at all. That is, until November of 2004, a whole six months after Brook disappeared, police finally caught another big break. But no one suspected that that break would come over 1,000 miles southeast in the city of Albuquerque, New Mexico. On November 30, 2004, just as the sun was setting in New Mexico, a young woman who was a UNM exchange student was seen running across a busy intersection clothed only in an unzipped

jacket with underwear around her neck and she appeared to be extremely frantic. A 43-year-old woman named Dara Finks was driving her kids to her mother's house that night when she and her daughters noticed the young woman run across the street and into a Mexican restaurant while they were stopped at a red light. Dara's 17-year-old daughter told her mother to pull into the restaurant's parking lot where they were able to jump out and help this horrified girl. And we won't mention the young woman's name for her safety, but she jumped inside the Finks SUV and told them a story that they would never forget. Just after 6 p.mpm as the young woman got off work,

she was walking home when a man abducted her at knife point and forced her into his car. Once inside the man's car, the woman who spoke with a Russian accent was tied up and gagged with her own underwear. She had blonde hair and blue eyes just like Brooke. The man then drove to a secluded parking lot where he tied her ankles with her own shoelaces and her hands with a scarf and ordered her to have sex with him. But at some point,

the man stepped out of his vehicle and the young woman was able to wriggle free where she escaped from the vehicle and ran towards the intersection. Now, Dara and her daughters noticed visible knife marks on the woman's neck, and moments later, the man who had abducted this unknown woman, holed up to the same stoplight that Dara had been sitting at previously in his red, two-door hatchback Honda Civic with tinted windows and Hawaiian print seat covers, and then he quickly just disappeared. He just drove away. I think that's a little too descriptive of a car to have if you're going to be a rapist. Yeah, well, and I did read some reports that when he was sitting at that stoplight, he noticed that the woman that he tried to abduct was in Dara's car.

That's wild. And I also read that he may have driven back by the scene to see if Dara had let her go so that he could try and abduct her again. Oh my god, that's so scary. So the woman was able to lead police to the parking lot where she was assaulted. And there, police found a shoelace on the ground. But when they began to interview people in the area, one witness gave the name of a man who hung out in that area pretty often, a man the witness called Joe. And also this witness said that this man was Caucasian, but he did speak Spanish. And it

didn't take very long for police to track down the man driving the Red Honda Civic, who was a 38 year old man named Joel Patrick Courtney. Now, let's talk a bit about Joel before we move on. Joel was born in June of 1966, and he grew up in Beaverton, Oregon, which is a city just outside of Portland. At the age of 11, he began using drugs, and by the time he was 15, he was in a juvenile detention center.

This was around the same time that his history of sexual assault began. When Joel was 17, he tried to rape his own sister, and she said that she was asleep in her bed when he crawled on top of her, began choking her and played with himself. She was able to hit him over the head with a clock,

which got him to stop, and then a cousin of Joel's later explain that he tried to sexually assault her on four separate occasions during their teens. I don't know what it is with this guy trying to rape his own family members. Fucking weirdo. So disgusting. In 1986, when Joel was 19, he was charged with first degree attempted rape, and this was

of his friend. The pair had been driving home from a party, and Joel was drunk and high and began to fondle the woman who was driving. She fought back, and Joel punched her in the face. When the woman stopped the car, Joel dragged her out of the vehicle, took off her pants, and began to try to rape her. And when the woman stopped fighting, Joel became uninterested and stopped the assault. So it seemed like he was trying to get gratification from...

The struggle. For, yeah, forcing her to do this. But when she just gave up, he was like, oh, I'm not into this anymore. So gross. So by the early 1990s, Joel was 23 and married to a woman from Mexico named Rosie, and they had three children together.

He was living in Rancho Rio, New Mexico, which is a suburb of Albuquerque, and on the outside appeared to be this perfect family man. But he was extremely abusive, and at this time he was using crack cocaine, as well as drinking excessively. On numerous occasions, the police were called to Joel's home for domestic altercations. And I remember reading on one separate occasion, Joel's son actually called police because he was screaming at his mother. And I think trying to fight her or something.

So in December of 2004, Joel Courtney was in a New Mexico jail on charges of sexual penetration, kidnapping, and aggravated battery of the UNM student, and police found out that Joel had previously lived in a few different states over the decades, including Alaska, Florida, New Mexico, and Oregon. And he even lived in Mexico for a period of time and was able to speak fluent Spanish as we said. So when looking into Joel's background, even further, detectives noticed that in January of 2004, Joel was arrested in the coastal town of Newport, Oregon, which definitely

and I love Newport, for driving under the influence. But months later, Joel had failed to show up to court, and an arrest warrant was issued for him in that state. So fast forward to Joel sitting in jail in New Mexico. A detective in Albuquerque decided to call the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office in Newport to inquire about this warrant out for Joel's arrest in Oregon. And when he spoke with a detective in Oregon, he learned that Joel had never shown up to

his court date, which was set to occur on Monday, May 24, 2004, the same day that Brooke was abducted. And because this is such an important detail, just for reference, Corvallis to Newport on the coast is one hour away, so it is definitely drivable within that same day. So very, very close by and very suspicious that it didn't show up. And then that happens to be the morning that Brooke was abducted. Yeah.

So this is where things really get rolling with the investigation. Police contacted Joel Sister Dina, who was living in Portland, Oregon. And after questioning her, they were able to discover that Joel and his family had moved to Portland in May of 2004 because they needed a place to stay, so Dina opened up her house to them.

Joel had gotten a job working for a company called Creative Building Maintenance Inc. And with this particular job, Joel was part of a cleaning crew which meant that he would be traveling all over Oregon to clean different commercial buildings. Well, on May 24th, Joel was set to be a new port for court, as we said, but that morning he called the courthouse explaining that he was going to be late, but Joel never showed up at all. The most shocking part of this though was that the call Joel made to the courthouse that morning was made from Corvallis Oregon.

So investigators at this point were completely blown away by this information, but they needed to do a bit more digging. So detectives continued to speak with Joel's sister, Dina, and she told them a story that gave them absolute chills. Dina said that she hadn't seen her brother for a few days, but all of a sudden, on May 26, he showed back up at her house in Portland and told her a very bizarre story. Joel said that three men with guns had kidnapped him and a girl and took them out to a wooded area and that there was

blood everywhere. But Dina really didn't believe him and she was pretty sure that Joel was back using drugs again. But there didn't seem to be any real physical evidence linking Joel to Brooks' abduction. But then, detectives were able to find out what type of vehicle Joel was driving that day, and things started to click. Police had a tip in the beginning of the investigation about a green van seen in the

Corvallis area on the day that Brook went missing, and when cross-checking that with Joel's vehicle, they determined that Joel had been driving a green Dodge Caravan with Minnesota license plates, which was supplied to him by his employer for work. When looking back at the reports from that day, police had a revelation. A young OSU student again in Corvallis named Randy Hanrod reported that at 9.30am on May 24, a white male stopped his van and asked for directions to a fraternity house nearby. He then opened the side panel to his van and asked the young woman to come closer, but

she had a very uncomfortable feeling so she turned around and walked away. Then shortly after this incident, about 100 yards from the Oak Park Apartments, another student named Crystal Thornton was stopped by Whitemail in his 30s, who asked her if she knew where the athletic department was. But an athletic director for the university named Bob Clifford, who was getting into his car in the research stadium parking lot, noticed this exchange between a student

and an older man, and he stepped in. He's a fucking hero. I absolutely agree, I love that he did this. I mean, he could have saved her life. So Crystal was on the phone with her mother at the time that the man asked for directions, so she was distracted and the door to the man's van was open, just like the last report. So Bob Clifford drove over to the situation with the gut feeling that something just

was not right. And he convinced crystal to walk away. Bob Clifford then watched the man leave in his vehicle headed towards the direction of the Oak Park apartments. So very strange that there were two witnesses that morning that reported a white male

and is mid to late 30s with a green van. Well, this is super. This is super important, especially with Bob noticing that he was going towards the Oak Park Apartments that morning around 10 a.m. because we know that's when Brook would have been abducted. Exactly. So this is this is huge information. Right. So now the search was on to find this green van driven by Joel Courtney and the FBI once again

became involved. In 2005, months after Joel was charged with the assault in New Mexico, that exact green van was found in Washington state. And it was taken apart piece by piece, looking for any evidence that could confirm that Joel was responsible for Brooks' abduction. It had now been one year since Brooks had been abducted, and on that anniversary, the Wilburger's held a press conference, and news stations highlighted Brooks' tragic and still unsolved story. Joel thought that he had outsmarted police because without physical evidence, detectives wouldn't be able to charge him. But miraculously, on May 24, 2005, exactly one year to the day that Brooke went missing.

The crime lab investigating the Green Van broke the news to FBI that not only did they find Joel Courtney's DNA in the van, but also found the DNA belonging to Brooke within the carpet of this van. With that, this was enough to officially charge Joel Patrick Courtney for the kidnapping and first-degree murder of 19-year-old Brooke Wilburger. Now, Joel was still in jail awaiting trial in New Mexico and when he was sent a letter detailing the charges and that the prosecution in Oregon was seeking the death penalty, Joel turned to his fellow inmates, held up the paper, and began laughing as if it was like a badge of honor. Over the next few months, Joel did just about everything he could to delay his trials,

and at one point even claimed that he was too mentally incompetent to stand trial. The following year in June of 2006, Brooks' family held a memorial service for her, although her remains at this point had still not been located. On September 10, 2007, Joel pled guilty to the rape and kidnapping charges in New Mexico and was sentenced to 18 years in prison for those charges. But Joel didn't leave the courtroom without a parting remark. He told the judge who sentenced him that he would spit in his face if he was close enough. Then three months later in December of 2007, the Benton County District Attorney revealed that he

would be extra-dieting Joel to Oregon to be prosecuted for Brooks murder. But Joel maintained his innocence, so a plea deal was put in place to, you know, kind of spare Joel of the death penalty if he would just tell investigators where Brooks remains were. But Joel refused to take the deal after months of stalling and holding the Wilburger's emotions hostage. I mean, that's a really tough situation. They just want to know where their daughter is and he's just a dick. Yeah, I mean, he basically was like, yeah, I'll think about it.

I'll think about telling you. And then months go by and the wheelers are waiting on pins and needles. Daily agony. And then he just rips the rug out from underneath them. And by the way, this was on November 4th, 2008. So it didn't seem like things were moving very quickly with the prosecution of Joel Courtney

for the murder of Brooke. So then in May of 2009, so five years after Brooke disappeared, witnesses testified against Joel, explaining that they had seen him driving a green van in Corvallis the day that Brooke was abducted. I don't even know how this is up for debate. You're a DNA's in the van, her DNA's in the van. How can you even deny this? Yeah, and I don't know what's taking so long.

So maybe there's just so many charges and appeals that he's doing, like we said, he's just trying to delay everything. Right. So on July 28th of that same year, Joel attacked a Benton County jail psychiatrist by throwing a fax machine at the doctor for refusing to give him anti-anxiety medication.

So it seems like Joel was just kind of falling apart at this point. Joel was getting frustrated because the inmates in the organ jail system where he sat awaiting trial knew about his charges and they really didn't take kindly to it. Good. Yeah, a numerous occasions get this.

Joel got his ass beat in jail, but not only this, his appeals in New Mexico were being denied left and right, and new charges were being brought forth against him for other attempted abductions and rapes, one that occurred in 1993 where Joel tried to abduct a runaway in Portland, so basically the walls are seemingly closing in on Joel. And with really no way out or no way to outsmart the justice system, Joel finally confessed to Brooks' abduction and murder in exchange for a life sentence. But Joel also didn't want to serve his time in Oregon because he kept getting his ASP. But instead, in New Mexico,

he could be closer to his family. And the prosecution agreed to do this. And this is what Joel told the prosecution had occurred on the morning of Monday, May 24, 2004. Joel was high on cocaine and was prowling around Corvallis trying to abduct a student. His first two attempts were unsuccessful, as we mentioned earlier, so when he saw Brooke, he took advantage of the opportunity. He drove up beside Brooke and positioned his van between her and the apartment complex so that he could abduct her without any witnesses seeing. He approached Brooke, holding a FedEx envelope as a ruse, but then quickly

pulled out a knife and pulled her into his van. And that was at the moment that her thong sandal broke. Right. And also when the tenant heard that blood-curdling scream because she was being, you know, pulled into a freaking van. Yeah. Joel then drove Brooke a short distance away where he bound her arms and legs with duct tape. And after that, Joel drove he and Brooke into the coastal range woods, which is west of Corvallis. But his tune kind of started to change and it's almost as if he was trying to court Brooke

on some sort of really messed up date, and Brooke pled with him to let her go, and as she wouldn't tell anyone but Joel wasn't convinced. After a few hours of walking around the woods with Brooke, Joel drove her back into Corvallis and went through the drive throughout McDonald's where he purchased burgers for he and Brooke. Meanwhile the search for Brooke had already began. I mean, it began that same day. The next morning on May 25, so 24 hours after Brooke's abduction,

Joel drove back into the coast range and tried to rape Brooke in his van, and she fought back aggressively, so Joel picked up a piece of wood and struck her in the head, killing her. Joel then laid Brooks' body underneath the log and covered her remains with ferns and moss. So after 5 and a half years of not knowing where Brooks could be, the wheelburgers finally got their answer. And on September 19, 2009, Brooks Brooks remains were found at 9.30am off of Highway 20 west

of Falomuth, Oregon, about 20 miles from Corvallis just off of a logging road. The very next day, Joel was sentenced to life in prison and avoided the death penalty. Although Brook had now been found and her killer was behind bars, it didn't make the closure any easier for Brooke's family. The day that Joel was sentenced, Brooke's mother, Kami, spoke to the media, expressing her gratitude to the public and law enforcement for everything that they had done for her family. But not only that, Kami, who seems like just an amazing individual, thanked Joel Courtney

for giving up the location of Brooks remains, so that they could finally bring her home and lay her to rest. Joel Patrick Courtney is incarcerated at the High Security Supermax Prison in New Mexico, where he will remain for the rest of his days. And the entire state of Oregon will never forget the beautiful smile of Brookville, Berger, and one of the largest and most tragic

investigations in its state history. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Tuesday we'll have an all new case for you guys to dive into. This is such a sad case just the fact that he was prowling around literally looking to abduct a student when he should have been in court for another crime like so frustrating and really, you know, so sad at the end there when you mentioned that Brooks mom thanked him for Yeah, you know, oh god

Just so what a frustrating situation for them for years just waiting for him to give that information up I'm so glad that he's in prison and I'm also glad that He did give up the location of her remains because I know a lot of families Go years and decades without knowing where their loved one is. Well, and so many killers will deny, you know, they'll will maintain their innocence and they will never give up that information

even though they're gonna sit behind bars anyway. So I'm glad, at least in this situation, he did that, but he should have never abducted her. He's a horrible, horrible piece of shit. Yeah, evil person. Just so sad. And then there's fucking, uh, just, what's his name?

What's his name? Who? Oh, the Suncook Kim. Suncook Kim, I, uh, that man is free, right? Free, yeah. Don't know what's going on there. And he's like, because you and I live in Portland and he's probably nearby.

I don't like it Anyway, thank you guys so much. I'm sorry. I feel like this whole episode I've just been so stupid. She's having a rough day. I'm not for your rough day Thank you guys so much for tuning in today. We love you all so much He's gonna say something. Yes, also, um, we're gonna be at crime con. I know we've said that in the last few episodes And we're gonna keep saying it because we want you guys to come see us So that's gonna be April 29th through May 1st. You got it right. I got it right this time.

So come hang out with us. Come take a picture, give us a high five, say hello. Yeah, come give us a high five. What, I don't know, give us a fist bump. You know, it'll be super fun to see you guys. I said this a few episodes ago, but it's cool because, you know, some of you have come up to us in person before, but not on like a large scale, and like it'll be for CrimeCon, so it'll be really cool to actually see everybody and, and meet a bunch of you guys

and we're really looking forward to it. Yeah, also, if you guys are going to go head on over to CrimeCon.com and use our code GoingWest to get 10% off of your standard badge. So come hang out! Alright guys, for everybody out there in the world, don't be a stranger! Thank you. you