Going West: True Crime - Courtney Holden // 315

Starting point is 00:00:00 What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host Tee. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody! Today we have a Washington case. For the first time in kind of a while, I found this case it was not recommended, but this story is so insane. Yeah I mean it's literally one of those cases that is just gonna piss you off to your core. I mean two of the people in this story today are just horrible horrible individuals. Yeah so make sure that you share this one after you guys listen and remember, honor socials is where you can find a bunch of photos from this case and all of the other cases that we cover.

Starting point is 00:00:51 But yeah, so let's dive right into this one today. Alright guys, this is episode 315 of Going West, so let's get into it. Bye. In July of 2018, a 26-year-old Washington woman attempted to flee her adoptive mother's house, but was carried back inside by her adoptive brother. She hasn't been seen by friends or neighbors since, and her family claims that she ran away. Strangely, it would be nearly a year and a half until she was reported missing. And as police dove into the lives of her adopted family, suspicions heavily grew against them. This is the story of Courtney Holden, was born on February 28, 1992.

Starting point is 00:02:51 Now very little information has been made public about her childhood and her upbringing, including what tribe she belonged to as she was Native American. But a big part of this story is the fact that she was adopted, so we know that she entered the foster care system as a young girl in Spokane, Washington. Spokane County itself happens to have the highest rate of domestic violence in the state. And Washington sadly has one of the highest rates

Starting point is 00:03:17 of missing indigenous women with over a hundred reported every year. That is insane to me. I know, agreed. So when indigenous children are removed from their homes, foster placement families who are also Native American are given priority. And this is in order to maintain the foster child's

Starting point is 00:03:35 connection to their culture, which is great. But when a Native American foster family is not an option, the child is placed within available family, any available family, any available family. And that's how Courtney wound up in the Haldon household. But alongside Courtney was her little brother named Rubin and he was not placed in the Haldon's home with her, which it happens often because actually 30 to 40% of siblings in foster care are split from their siblings completely and a higher

Starting point is 00:04:05 percentage are placed with one sibling and separated from others. So Courtney and Rubin were separated during this process but they did remain in contact luckily. So Judy Holden and her husband were known in their community for taking in foster children, but according to one former foster child, they did this for financial gain and not actually to help these kids. Jensen Tyler lived with the Holden family alongside his brother from when he was very young until 12 years old.

Starting point is 00:04:38 Jensen claimed the Holdens had no interest in actually helping children." I think at first they took foster children in for a monetary thing. They needed money and more income. In Washington, foster parents make around $800 per child per month. So the holdings took advantage of like, churning kids into their home. But obviously, this money is supposed to go to helping support the child, and that is not what they were trying to use it for. They were just trying to get away with having these kids and taking the money and not utilizing that money to support the child and just give them like bare minimum lifestyle.

Starting point is 00:05:17 Yeah, and sadly this happens a lot through the foster care system. I mean, not all the time, but it is an unfortunate thing that does happen. Yeah, and in probably a lot of those cases as well as this one, there is abuse involved. And the abuse in the Holden household in particular became so bad that Jensen's brother actually stabbed one of the family members, but his interview doesn't reveal which one or exactly what happened, but things severely escalated. But thankfully, they were able to petition their sisters to become their legal guardians and get them out of the Holden House. So, they didn't have to put up with that abuse anymore, but then of course, the Holdens, as we know,

Starting point is 00:06:02 they're like serial child adopters. But it seemed that at the time that Jensen and his brother were living there, so was Courtney, and they didn't adopt any other children after her. But Courtney unfortunately was not so lucky to leave the house like Jensen and his brother were. So Jensen remembered, quote, it started with me and my brother. When we left, they started doing it to Courtney. Courtney told me all these horrible things that they were doing.

Starting point is 00:06:29 Now, it's unclear when exactly Courtney joined them, but at some point she was officially adopted by the couple, and even after aging into adulthood, Courtney remained in the house with them. So let's fast forward a little bit. So in 2014, when Courtney was 22 years old, Judy and her husband divorced and he moved out. It was at that time that Courtney's adopted brother, Joshua or Josh moved back in with them. So he kind of replaced that male figure in the house.

Starting point is 00:07:00 It's still Judy and another guy. Exactly. But this guy is being considered her brother. Right. But again, there's so little that's been made public about this family and their dynamics, so it's unknown if Judy and her husband adopted Josh after housing him as a foster child,

Starting point is 00:07:15 or if he was theirs biologically, and it's also not known when he left their home. But when he did move back, the whole neighborhood knew about it. He marked his arrival at the house by installing multiple security cameras around the property. One local commented that the neighborhood in which they resided was not known for being particularly affluent, and that it was rare to see security cameras there, especially such an excessive amount. The yard was also adorned with signs that read,

Starting point is 00:07:45 Smile, you're on camera. Yeah, it's just, I get security cameras, I love them, I think everybody should try to have them, if you can, even if it's a cheap one. But this guy's going over the top. Yeah, this is like, he's like patrolling everything, which will make a lot more sense as the story unravels of why it seems he was actually doing this,

Starting point is 00:08:03 and not for safety. Well, yeah, and I mean, now it's believed that it was to keep a close watch on Courtney and to prevent her from leaving without Josh and Judy knowing it. But Josh, who was in his late 30s at the time, had a bit of a reputation in the community for having a short temper and an aggressive nature. One source claimed that he was paranoid and even claimed that he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He has a lengthy history of trouble with the law, including twice being accused of rape once in 2003 and once in 2005. But the shitty part here is that he was never convicted of the assault in 2003, but he is considered a suspect. Now the charges that were brought against him in 2005 were eventually dropped due to

Starting point is 00:08:46 lack of evidence. And for the preservation of her own mental health, the victim no longer wanted to press charges after a lengthy and difficult investigation which totally makes sense. His record includes previous arrests for unlawful imprisonment, domestic violence, and also burglary. Jensen explained that the kids in that house had to keep their heads down and cooperate in order to survive, and he said, quote, it turned into abuse. It was like my brother was a dog, and just there for Joshua to beat up. It kind of became a survival thing just to get through the day. Though the Holden home was already sunken in mystery and suspicion of abuse, Josh's

Starting point is 00:09:30 return brought even more alarm from locals. So after he moved in, neighbors were call seeing Courtney emerge from the house less and less frequently. When they did see her, she only came outside for short periods of time in the evenings and she rarely left the property completely. As you can imagine, her living situation made it very difficult to maintain friendships, but she did have a few close friends that she kept in touch with. However, according to Courtney's own account of her living situation to her friends,

Starting point is 00:10:03 she was not allowed to leave the home to meet up with them. Remember, she's a grown woman, she's an adult. So whether the rules were like this stringent under Judy or if they became this way after Josh moved in is still a mystery, but Courtney quickly became like a prisoner in her own home. And in addition to not being able to leave the house for any reason, she wasn't allowed to use the phone or computer, she was not allowed to use a car or a cell phone, and she was forbidden from having social media.

Starting point is 00:10:38 Neighbors and friends even frequently reported seeing Courtney with bruises and black eyes that she said were from her adopted brother Josh being too rough with her. To keep in touch with friends, she managed to sneakily hide a Facebook page under the fake name Shortney Pie, and it was there that she would chat with friends and share updates, despite essentially being imprisoned at home. But once, while talking to a friend on Facebook Messenger, she wrote, I gotta go, I gotta go, Josh is coming. So that should definitely give you even more of an idea of how sensitive and tight this

Starting point is 00:11:13 situation was for her, particularly it seems with Josh. Now this friend says that she didn't seek Courtney online again after that and believe that Josh had likely found out about her secret Facebook page and forbidden her from accessing it again. Courtney also once told a friend that she believed Josh watched the security footage from every single camera to make sure that she wasn't sneaking out. They didn't allow her to leave to get a job and instead they put her to work around the house. Like she even once told a friend that they nicknamed her Cindy like short for

Starting point is 00:11:50 Cinderella because of the way that they treated her at home and the fact that she was responsible for all the housework. Like that is that is the person that she was to them. Yeah, they're not even trying to hide being assholes. Like they're just literally coming right out with it. Yeah, which is, it's just crazy to me, which is why I would be so interested to know more if Josh is Judy's real, you know, birth child or I don't mean real. I just mean birth child or adopted child because of the dynamic between them. Because if he is adopted and so is Courtney why does Josh get to have

Starting point is 00:12:25 this kind of higher position whereas Courtney is kind of the peon like that's that's super unfair in any situation but what kind of gives him that authority I wonder. Maybe just the fact that he's aggressive and you know over the top and kind of a bully. I mean I don't really know but we are going to talk about the dynamic between Josh and Judy here in a little bit because there's got some speculation that they might have been involved with each other. Yeah. And well, that's why I wonder even more because like what? Yeah, exactly. But we'll get there. We'll get there. So from her Facebook, she appears to be like any other young woman in her early 20s. She shared pictures of places that she wanted to visit, you know like a post of the Northern Lights, Palm trees and Los Angeles, and the

Starting point is 00:13:09 Eiffel Tower, etc. alongside sharing quotes and graphics that she related to. And in 2012, before Josh moved in, she started sharing pictures with a boyfriend. It was around that same time that she and her boyfriend Michael Dowd got pregnant and had a baby named Micah. Now, it's unknown exactly when Micah was born, but according to her Facebook photos, it looks like the spring of 2012 when she was about 20 years old. And just as a reference, she stopped using her Facebook in December of 2013, so five years before her disappearance. So when Daphne mentioned her, you know, like not returning to Facebook, this was over

Starting point is 00:13:48 a year after she gave birth to her son and used Facebook to post about her pregnancy and other things. Now in response to a friend's comment on her photo of Micah, she wrote about her pregnancy saying quote, "...being pregnant was so hard for me. I was always moody and eating a lot. It's not that easy being pregnant, but she also shared, quote,

Starting point is 00:14:09 my son was worth it. Eventually she and Michael broke up for unknown reasons, although one source claimed that he was struggling with an alcohol dependency at the time. And because of this, Courtney became her son's primary caregiver and he lived at home with her, which obviously is really bad because she's living at the holding residence. So with Michael no longer coming to see Courtney and Micah regularly, Courtney became even

Starting point is 00:14:34 further isolated from the outside world. Like so many other things, this dynamic changed when Josh moved in. Micah was instructed to call Judy Mom and to call Josh Daddy, and to simply call Courtney by her name, just Courtney. And obviously this is incredibly disturbing, but also given that Judy and Josh were mother and son again we don't know biological or adopted, this led some to believe that they were possibly engaged in a romantic or sexual relationship. And they were both clearly in complete control of Courtney.

Starting point is 00:15:10 Judy and Josh also started calling Micah Forest instead of his given name. Yeah, so they just like took Courtney's baby and acted like he was their own, and they set the rules. Like, these are horrible people, but again, it seems like the dynamic, I'm not saying that Judy was a good person before this, because from what we're going to explain later as well, it doesn't seem like she was, but the fact that it seemed like when Josh moved in was kind of around the time that Michael moved out, and now it seems like Josh is trying to have everything his way, and now suddenly he wants to be Micah's daddy?

Starting point is 00:15:49 Like what? Yeah, that's so, oh god, it's so weird to me. You said the right word, disturbing, for sure. Yeah. So, over the next four years, by 2017, public sightings of Courtney were growing few and far between. One next door neighbor claims that they used to talk to Courtney through a hole in the fence, but that eventually Josh caught them and stopped her from doing so.

Starting point is 00:16:13 Another neighbor says that Courtney used to call them in the middle of the night when she knew that Judy and Josh were asleep to complain about the treatment that she suffered in the house, but those calls eventually stopped as well. Most likely Josh, uh, telling her that she...or catching her using the phone. Yeah, like keeping her under his thumb. So in October of 2017, Courtney went to see her doctor for a routine checkup, but she didn't report anything out of the ordinary. Neighbors reported seeing her through April of 2018 at Home and Spokane, but very few

Starting point is 00:16:44 people spotted her at the house after that. One neighbor who was interviewed later said quote, it wasn't happy there. I would see Courtney come out in the evening. She'd be out in the yard doing chores. They were not allowed out in the daytime. Another neighbor added that Josh would even scream at Courtney's young son saying, quote, "'Courtney's son would come out in the evening and try to play. Josh would be yelling at the top of his lungs to get back inside.

Starting point is 00:17:13 Something wasn't right, you just knew." And I know a lot of you guys are probably wondering why none of these neighbors called the police or anything like that, we are going to touch on that soon. But July of 2018 is believed to be the last time that she was out in public away from the house. That particular day, she stopped at the pharmacy to pick up a prescription for a medication that she refilled monthly. Now while some reports vary, most agree that the last sighting of Courtney Holden was at home in the front yard,

Starting point is 00:17:45 leaving in the midst of what appeared to be an argument. In August of 2018, 26-year-old Courtney was supposedly seen by a neighbor attempting to flee the house. Now according to this account, Courtney was dragging a large black duffel bag across the porch headed for the street. This neighbor then witnessed Judy chase after her yelling, get back in that house. To which Courtney reportedly responded, no, I'm not staying here anymore. Josh then stormed out of the house, forcibly picked Courtney up, threw her over his shoulder and brought her back into the house as she screamed. And for reference, Josh is over 6 feet tall and weighs about 300 pounds, as opposed to

Starting point is 00:18:31 Courtney, who is 5 foot 6 and weighs about 160 pounds. So he's much larger than her and he just picked her right up and brought her back into the house against her will. And why this neighbor source who apparently witnessed this very shocking event didn't report it is just unknown to us, but this was the last known sighting of Courtney. But her disappearance grew stranger after that. So shortly after this incident, neighbors were call seeing Josh setting up a swing set in the backyard and placing spotlights around it.

Starting point is 00:19:08 Now oddly, he did this in the middle of the night, and many now believe that this was a cover-up for Courtney's burial, and that she did not survive her escape attempt that night. Months passed without anyone spotting Courtney, not Mike's father Michael, not her friends, not her neighbors, no one. But with this being fairly routine, no one reported her missing. The only people accustomed to seeing her every day were her son, who would have been about six years old at this time, and then Judy and Josh.

Starting point is 00:19:41 On October 8, 2019, about 14 months since Courtney had last been seen, Courtney Holden was reported missing by an unlikely source, her baby's father's girlfriend. Michael's girlfriend Autumn Schatz became concerned when there was no sign of Courtney, and it seemed that Judy and Josh were keeping Micah to themselves. So awesome of her by the way, like she probably never even met Courtney or if she did it would have been fairly brief and the fact that she out of everybody is taking this into her own hands and saying, like this is still a person, this is still a woman who deserves to be treated well and something is clearly wrong here so I'm going to take that action. It's so awesome. Yeah I love that. I love that she did this and this is exactly what she had

Starting point is 00:20:31 to say about this. She said quote, things didn't add up. I kept making more phone calls, more reports. I knew something was wrong. I thought it was really wrong that no one was speaking up for her. It breaks my heart. Josh took advantage of the fact that Michael had other heavy things going on in his life at that time. Josh used that to do whatever he wanted with Courtney. I don't think that she is still alive. I'm scared. Police responded to the report stopping by the Holden's house to look for Courtney. So according to Josh who answered the door that day, Courtney

Starting point is 00:21:05 had started dating a trucker and had run off with him accompanying him on his route. Josh even said that she had taken her son with her. He then told police that he couldn't talk to them because he had to get back inside to tend to a sick cat. That's just a weird excuse. Yeah, right? Then that same day, $600 was withdrawn from Courtney's bank account. But here's where things get really weird. After this, a woman called the Spokane Police Department's crime tip line, saying that there was no need to continue searching that she was Courtney. This mysterious caller that Heath just told us about, the person who called the Spokane Police Department's crime tip line and said that she was Courtney, pretty much then substantiated

Starting point is 00:22:16 Josh's claims, saying that she had in fact run off with her boyfriend and she would not be returning. But suspecting that something was off, the police dug deeper and they found that that call had been placed by Courtney's adoptive sister, who was another daughter of Judy's, who was living in Texas and was seemingly put up to it by Judy and Josh themselves, which obviously just looks so suspicious like Judy and Josh have now been caught in this lie, it's very clear that they know exactly what happened to Courtney.

Starting point is 00:22:52 Yeah, without a doubt. So when asked why she had impersonated Courtney, Judy's daughter couldn't give an explanation, but was never charged for aiding Judy and Josh in their criminal activity. Later that same day, yet another red flag emerged for investigators when Judy and Josh visited the local grocery store and used Courtney's food stamps to purchase food, which they had been doing fraudulently since she disappeared. When police reviewed footage of this shopping trip, guess who they spotted? Judy, Josh, and Micah, who again, like Heath told us, had apparently left with Courtney months prior. This is what Josh told the police that Micah was not with them, yet here he is with them at the grocery store and Courtney is still nowhere to be found.

Starting point is 00:23:40 Well, we already know that they're liars. Yeah. So this is just caught getting caught and yet another lie. So as their story unraveled, detectives investigating her disappearance grew even more suspicious. And I'm so glad that they weren't just letting this all slide that they saw this and they were like something is up. So on Thursday, October 10, 2019, police again paid the hold in home a visit. This time it was Judy who answered the door. She tentatively allowed them inside for a cursory search, and while there, police noticed that she seemed kind of nervous and agitated during their visit. They also observed that the home was a borderline hoarder house.

Starting point is 00:24:22 I wouldn't expect anything else from these people. Totally agree. It was like covered wall to wall in clutter, which spilled out onto the patio and into the yard as well. This house sits on East Haroy Avenue in Spokane, and it's known in the neighborhood for being a kind of an eye sore on the outside, because like there's flaking, white paint,

Starting point is 00:24:42 coating the frame of the house, and the porch was covered in decrepit furniture and dead plants, and on top of this, the lawn and garden were in despair, and the windows blocked the outside world. But inside, things were even worse. Police observed that Courtney's room appeared static and untouched.

Starting point is 00:25:03 Few of her belongings remained, and her bed had been stripped of sheets and blankets. While Judy said that Josh was not home at the time, she refused to allow them in Josh's bedroom. At one point, Judy lost track of one of the officers in her home, and according to them, seemed to panic. So with that, she kicked him out. Now suspecting that Josh was concealing something in his bedroom and that the quickly erected swing set may have been a cover-up for Courtney's body, police worked quickly to obtain a search warrant for the home. But when it was served on October 24, 2019, police were met with

Starting point is 00:25:41 an empty house. Josh, Judy, and their six pets had fled, and they took with them the video footage from the multiple security cameras that Josh had put up all around the property. Police turned the house upside down, but they found no sign of Courtney, at least not that they've announced publicly.

Starting point is 00:26:01 However, police still managed to pull over 80 items of evidence from the home, including multiple computers, 18 cell phones, and Courtney's ID cards as well as her journal. They also recovered what they described as, quote, blackmail notes, although they've not explained what this means. And I'm kind of assuming that this may be coming from Courtney, like maybe she had made some sort of like blackmail notes against Judy and Josh, like maybe a list of things that they had done to her

Starting point is 00:26:32 that eventually when she did escape, she could go and tell police about. Yeah, definitely possible. But it's also possible that it's the other way around and that they're holding this blackmail list over Courtney so that she doesn't leave. But we may never know. So at this point, the charges were mounting against Judy and Josh, who had now interfered

Starting point is 00:26:51 with a potential homicide investigation, abducted her son and assumed Courtney's identity to steal her money and access her ebt discounts. According to their phone records, Judy and Josh deactivated the cell phones that they used in Washington and activated new numbers, this time with Texas area codes. So this tipped off Spokane police who joined forces with investigators in Texas to zero in on a location. Then a neighbor of Judy and Josh's from back in Spokane called the police to report suspicious activity at the Holden's home. When police responded to the tip, they found that it was one of Judy's daughters and her husband,

Starting point is 00:27:34 like kind of staying at the house, and they said that they had been asked by Judy to check on the house because she was on a retirement road trip. Yeah, you know, when people go on retirement road trips, they often just get rid of their cell phones and get new ones. And it's also usually when the police are investigating you. That's the perfect time to just so all of you guys know, that is the perfect time to take a retirement road trip. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:28:00 Mark that on your calendars. Yeah, it's the only time that makes sense, really. Yeah. So when police asked about Courtney The couple said that they hadn't seen her in two years Then on December 16th, 2019 40-year-old Josh Holden and 74-year-old Judy Holden were located in Plano, Texas along with Courtney's son. Remember Courtney's son, Micah, has a father, and

Starting point is 00:28:28 he wants to be able to see his child. But again, they're acting like this is their kid, and they can just take him wherever they please. Just took him and ran off with him. So they had been staying at the home of Judy's other daughter who was the same one who called into the police impersonating Courtney. Three days later, on December 19, 2019, Judy and Josh were arrested in Texas and detained. Police pushed for their extradition to Spokane, but neither agreed and refused to speak about Courtney's

Starting point is 00:29:00 whereabouts. The Spokane Police Department actually had to consult the governor to obtain a warrant to force the two back to their home state. And after they were successfully extradited, a search was conducted of the house in Plano where they were hiding out, but this didn't turn up anything weird or anything really of note. Police also searched a vehicle and trailer that belonged to Judy, which they believed

Starting point is 00:29:25 Josh and Judy resided him for some time during November of 2019 while staying at an RV park in Oklahoma. And there, they had been using fake names, which, you know, people also do on their retirement road trips. Absolutely. Remember to take notes, people. So Spokane Police returned to the Holden's home to search the property with cadaver dogs But the search again failed to turn up any sign of Courtney and you know obviously they're on this long road trip

Starting point is 00:29:53 There's probably a few thousand places that they could have Disposed of Courtney's body sadly. Yeah, who who knows what they did yeah exactly so Yeah, who knows what they did. Yeah, exactly. So, Judy and Josh were charged with custodial interference for taking unlawful custody of Micah, and also identity theft for using Courtney's identification and debit card to take money from her account and use her government assistance. They retained a lawyer who continued to push the narrative that Courtney had left on her own accord with a boyfriend. But not that this narrative makes sense anyway, but she didn't have her license or her debit card

Starting point is 00:30:29 or money with her, so this so clearly was not the case anyway. Yeah, it's just honestly, it's pretty stupid. So Josh pled guilty to criminal mischief, domestic violence, and custodial interference, and was sentenced to only 135 days in jail with credit for time served, whereas Judy pled guilty to domestic violence and custodial interference. In 2020, Joshua was being held in a federal prison

Starting point is 00:30:57 in Oklahoma, but was moved to a state prison in Texas as COVID began to spread and pose a threat to prisoners. For one court hearing, Josh showed up using an oxygen tank and Judy was released early due to COVID concerns and overflowing within the prison system. So yeah, both of them are now free people. Morgan Colburn, who is a domestic violence expert, weighed in on Courtney's tragic case and why no one seemed to raise alarms until long after she had disappeared.

Starting point is 00:31:28 And in this report, she emphasized the bystander effect, and that people often think that someone else is going to take care of the problem, saying, quote, sometimes people see this as a family problem, something that needs to be dealt with in the home. That means that makes sense. A lot of people see things, and they're like, that's not my problem, that's not my business. Oh, absolutely, yeah. Which is unfortunate because, you know, nobody from the outside knew the extent of how much she was really suffering.

Starting point is 00:31:56 And Courtney's sister-in-law, who is married to her birth brother, Rubin, her name is actually Courtney as well, she agrees with this assessment and she explained that Courtney's life was so insular that no one on the outside really knew how bad things were. She said quote, that's all she's been around, so she thought it was okay to be treated that way and that it was normal. But she never fought to get out either, so that's why I didn't step forward and say, hey I'm gonna make a call and I'm gonna get you out of this. Because she didn't bring it to my attention that she was in it that bad.

Starting point is 00:32:28 If the family knew and if everybody knew exactly the degree to what was happening to Courtney, they would have stepped forward and we would have gotten her help and gotten her out of there. I should have called when I knew. When I saw Courtney last, when I knew that she was being held and isolated. I had maybe put it in my mind that she was being held and isolated, I had maybe put it in my mind that maybe Courtney checked herself into a mental institution or something and that she was getting some help.

Starting point is 00:32:52 That's what I wanted to believe. Spokane Police Department Detective Randy Leser stated, quote, "'My concern is that she could potentially be deceased. People don't just disappear, especially if you have a child. But Randy maintains that her case is active and that they are still trying to locate her, adding quote, this one is probably one of the more in-depth cases trying to locate a person. I've got four notebooks full of stuff. Sadly, court documents stated, quote, I've seen no evidence that she's alive. After Judy and Josh were arrested,

Starting point is 00:33:29 Michael was notified that his son was safe, and he drove down to Texas to retrieve him, actually. Michael was taken into his father's custody and is now living with Michael and his family. Michael maintains that Judy and Josh harmed Courtney, and although the two were no longer together at the time of her disappearance, he wants to continue to fight for answers in Courtney's case for the sake of his son. Michael said, quote,

Starting point is 00:33:54 I don't think this was an accident or anything like that. I think it's a strong possibility that she was murdered. She wouldn't ever disappear and leave our son. She was a good mom. She just never leave him Autumn claimed that thankfully Micah is adjusting to his new life and she said quote He's adapting well. He has a good father and good grandparents a good home. I'm proud of him Courtney's legacy lives on through her beloved son and a friend of Courtney's added quote She really really loved him.

Starting point is 00:34:26 Autumn and Michael now make sure that Micah knows his mother didn't abandon him. Autumn says quote, she was a good person. Courtney's sister-in-law, Rubens' wife also Courtney again, is incredulous at Judy and Josh's release saying quote, why wouldn't they be protecting Courtney and also questioning where Courtney is? Why would they run all the way to Texas?

Starting point is 00:34:48 It just makes me think more that they hurt her and did something to her. I think that the two of them have something to say and they won't ever say it. Jensen Tyler, who remember is the Holden's former foster child, is now helping detectives trace the path from Courtney's disappearance back to Josh, saying quote, Joshua Holden's anger has no direction, it just spurts off. I know Courtney was murdered. These people don't want to be held accountable.

Starting point is 00:35:17 When they sense accountability is coming, they run. Courtney's sister-in-law echoed this saying quote, I feel like Courtney is not here. I feel like there needs to be justice for her and that somebody needs to come forward. We need to find her, whether it's her or her body, we just need it. Judy and Josh remain the only persons of interest in the case of Courtney's disappearance.

Starting point is 00:35:41 Courtney Holden was about five feet six inches tall and again weighed around 160 pounds at the time of her disappearance. Courtney Holden was about five feet six inches tall and again weighed around 160 pounds at the time of her disappearance. She had black hair and brown eyes and would now be 31 years old. If you have any information about the disappearance of Courtney Holden, please call the Spokane Police department at 509-242-8477. 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 Friday we'll have an all-new case for you guys to dive into.

Starting point is 00:36:27 Don't forget to share this episode. Again, these people are free. They have not been charged in anything regarding Courtney other than, you know, taking her identification as well as using her government funding. Which it also just, you know, feels like there might be enough circumstantial evidence to put them in prison anyway. Yeah, it kind of feels like the answer is really clear here, and luckily the police are on it, but they haven't solved it yet, you know, they still need to find Courtney, or at

Starting point is 00:36:56 least some type of evidence that can help prove that she was murdered by Josh and Judy. So please share, thank you guys so much for listening to this one. This is a really important case. And we will see you in a few days. All right, guys. So for everybody out there in the world, don't be a stranger. 1.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5%

Starting point is 00:37:30 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% 2.5% you

Going West: True Crime - Courtney Holden // 315

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