Going West: True Crime - Lana Harding // 166

Episode Date: January 15, 2022

One morning in January of 1974, a young schoolteacher didn’t show up to her rural Montana classroom for the day, and the police were called to investigate. When her body was found in a field nearby, police arrested a new town resident, and it was quickly suspected that he was involved in another murder in a neighboring state. This is the story of Lana Harding, as well as Debra Prety. BONUS EPISODES patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES https://www.newspapers.com/image/353899034/?terms=lana%20harding&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/353899000/?terms=lana%20harding%20murder&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/?clipping_id=8120895&fcfToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmcmVlLXZpZXctaWQiOjI0MzU1OTM1MSwiaWF0IjoxNjQxODM5NTE4LCJleHAiOjE2NDE5MjU5MTh9.R9Oj0n7BasFQA9hDh9VD0nSB8i_T7rgPMH8InJw_odc https://www.newspapers.com/image/240258745/?terms=lana%20harding&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/240137561/?terms=lana%20harding&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/412983234/?terms=lana%20harding&match=1 https://www.newspapers.com/image/240116846/?terms=lana%20harding&match=1 https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F2/801/801.F2d.1519.85-4156.html https://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/crime-and-courts/inside-montanas-death-row-1985/article_15fab538-23cc-5ef4-b505-e18160a9f682.html https://greensboro.com/killer-listened-to-music-as-he-got-lethal-injection/article_d3ffe0bc-6dc8-593c-804c-72c7ddb5e2a8.html https://murderpedia.org/male.M/m1/mckenzie-duncan.htm https://casetext.com/case/state-v-mckenzie-jr Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on to Crime fans? I'm your host Heath, and I'm your host Daphne, and you're listening to Going West. Howdy folks! Thank you so much for tuning in to the Friday episode of Going West. Hope everybody is having a good week and has a good weekend planned. Heath and I are just doing a ton of moving stuff we're moving to Portland in about three weeks, so much to do. Yes, I know we're kind of crazy people, we're moving yet again. But big thanks to today to Drew, who's our editor, who suggested this case. Yes, thank you so much Drew and thank you everybody for tuning in.

Alright guys, let's not waste any more time. This is episode 166 of Going West, so let's get into it. One morning in January of 1974, a young schoolteacher didn't show up to her rural Montana classroom for the day, and police were called to investigate. When her body was found in a field nearby, police arrested a new town resident, and it was quickly suspected that he was involved in another murder in a neighboring state. This is the story of Lana Harding, and it's also the story of Deborah Prattie. Lana Claire Harding was born on May 19th, 1950 to parents Ethel and Warren Harding in the city of Billings, Montana. But she and her brother Greg spent a lot of their upbringing in Poulson, Montana, which

is a very small city that has a lot of like outdoor recreation, and it's about a six-hour drive northwest of Billings, and it's actually pretty close to the state of Idaho. Lana moved to a ranch there with her family there, I mean, you know, Poulson, Montana. She moved there when she was about four years old, and that's where her mother, Ethel, began working for a local county sheriff's office as a deputy clerk, whereas her husband Warren worked in construction. And actually later on, Ethel would serve three terms in the Montana Senate before she opened a child's ministry.

But back to Lana, so Lana went to Poulson High School and after graduating in 1968 at the age of 18, she followed her passion to become a teacher. And that brought her to a private Christian university, Northwest Nazarene College in Nampa, Idaho, which is a city located outside of Boise, Idaho, just around 20 minutes away. But anyway, Lana graduated from there four years later in 1972 and from there, 22-year-old Lana headed off to Ontario, Oregon, which sorry for all the directions, but Ontario, Oregon, is just about 40 minutes northwest of Nampa, Idaho, so it's very, very close. So after doing some teaching there for a short period, Lana headed back to her home state

of Montana to take her very first official teaching job near Conrad in Montana's wheat country. The very small rural city of Conrad is located in Ponderay County in northern Montana. By the way, I just want to say we heard on some news segments, people say Ponderay County, somebody else said Ponderay County, I'm going to go with Ponderay. So sorry if that's wrong. So this was not nearby Lana's hometown of Poulson nor near her birth city of Billings. So this was a whole new place for her.

But she was super excited to start teaching at the Pioneer Elementary School near there. And Lana's students absolutely loved her, one describing her as enthusiastic, fun, and someone who encouraged creativity. And she had actually replaced a very strict and disciplinary teacher, so all of her students were very excited to have her.

And she went over all of their hearts. And to give you guys a little bit more context here, so Pioneer Elementary was a one-room school like many rural and small town schools are. This means that all the students of different ages as well met in one room and there was only one teacher, but there were only five students total, so this was a very, very small school. But something absolutely terrible happened to Lana in the middle of her first school year at Pioneer. On Tuesday, January 22nd, 1974, 23-year-old Lana Harding didn't show up to teach her class.

She was last seen the previous evening at about 5 p.m. when she had visited the Pondray County Superintendent of School, a man named Elmer Swoke, in Conrad about 13 miles from Lana's home, but she hadn't been seen since. So Lana lived alone at the Pioneer School Teatridge, which is basically a house that offers living accommodations for a teacher and it's provided by the school. But by mid morning when Lana didn't arrive to school, the Ponderay County Sheriff was called and officers were dispatched to the school to investigate. So when they

check the teacher's, Lana wasn't there, but they did take note that her bed was disheveled. Various suspicious things were discovered at the school as well by Lana's house, including a red tennis shoe that belonged to Lana, which was found just outside of Pioneer Elementary, so pretty weird. A drag trail outside of the teacher-age that led to a nearby road, you know, which indicated that something or someone was dragged from Lana's home and up the road, blood near the end of the drag trail, and Lana's wristwatch found near the blood. So this is pretty alarming.

Right, yeah, this is not looking very good. Not at all. So this day was a chilly yet calm day with just a little bit of snow on the ground, and the school painted almost an eerie setting with Lana's disappearance. Just that, you know, that very calm setting, ground, and the school painted almost an eerie setting with Lana's disappearance. Just that, you know, that very calm setting and long grain fields kind of stretched out all around

the school, and she was just nowhere to be found. But something had clearly happened, and the children were terrified. The rest of that Tuesday was spent looking for Lana, but no trace of her was uncovered. That is, until the following day. On Wednesday, January 23rd, 1974, Lana's body was found partially clothed in a farmfield called the drill site, about four miles away from Pioneer Elementary. She was wearing a bra, shirt, and sweater, and was actually found draped over a grain drill, which is that machine that's often used in agriculture to plant grains and seeds in the soil.

Which is really interesting that her body was draped over this as if it was like, come find her, you know, like it was out there in the open for you to just see draped over a machine. Yeah, I mean, it didn't appear that her body was hidden in any way. So the location of her body was actually one mile east of Interstate 15 and just around 200 yards from the nearest road, which was the Conrad Shelby Highway. She had been beaten severely, mostly in her head, but also her body. After her body was taken in and in autopsy was conducted, the medical examiner determined that Lana had died from blunt force trauma to the right side of her head and her school

was fractured. There was also evidence that she had been strangled with a rope before her death. There was a coil of wire found in her hair and she had been raped. Very quickly into this investigation, like almost immediately, there was a potential suspect, and he was actually arrested the same day that Lana went missing before her body was even found, and he was arrested for an assault. And due to these charges,

a search was conducted in his home, and some very damning evidence was uncovered. This man was 22-year-old Duncan McKenzie Jr. Now Duncan was born October 5, 1951 in Chicago, Illinois, so he was almost a year and a half younger than Lana. He had previously served time in prison for assault, and he had only recently moved to the rural Conrad, Montana area, and had taken a job at the K&K wholesale

seed company just a week before Lana's murder, which was just about three miles from Lana's home at the Pioneer School Tetridge, so he was super close by. Three days before Lana was last seen, so Saturday, January 19th, 1974, Duncan had purchased a black 1948 Dodge pickup truck. And according to what he told his co-workers, he quote, like to break in every new vehicle he got by having sex in it after buying it. What a creepy thing to tell your co-worker. Yeah, that's just a weird thing to say.

Like, hey, I bought this new car. I'm going to go bang in it real quick. Also, it's kind of like braggie. It's weird. I don't know, it's weird. Yeah, it's definitely weird. It's weird, anyway. He even mentioned that he liked to have sex with country school teachers

because they were quote, naïve and easy to get and he could teach them. Yeah, that's awfully specific considering, you know, Lana's career. Well, that's why they brought it up because they were like, that's kind of weird that he just brought this up to us and said this to us, you know, and now this teacher in the area is murdered. So, you know, definitely very suspicious. So this particular truck that he bought was pretty recognizable to people in this area, because the whole county, by the way, of Pondray County only had about 6,000 residents, and the guy who had owned the truck previously had owned it for quite a long time.

And because of this, his truck was noticed the night that Lana was last seen. So on the evening of Monday, January 21, 1974, two days after purchasing the truck, Duncan worked on the vehicle after getting off of work that day. He was seen leaving his job at K&K wholesale seed co at 6.45 pm that evening, and his truck was seen heading towards his home, which again was also in the direction of Lana's home. About an hour later, around 8 p.m., 22-year-old Duncan McKenzie Jr. knocked on the door of the piercens,

who, by the way, are a local farming family. He asked for directions to his own home, as well as help with starting his truck, which, at this point, was about 26 years old. While he was there, he called his wife, and, yes, he was married and he did have three kids, and explained that he was coming home after getting the pickup started. But Don Pearson noticed as he pulled out that he didn't drive in the direction of his home

as he had been instructed to do. A bit later, Duncan's black-dodge pickup was seen driving towards the area where Lana would later be found. And by the way, the teacher is that Lana lived at was just across the road from the piercings property. So if all of this doesn't seem suspicious on its own, let's talk about what police found at the location of Lana's remains, and then also what was found in Duncan's truck. So in the field near where Lana's body was found was a pair of gloves with human blood on them,

as well as over shoes, which is like this protective shoe cover that you put on your shoes to make them non-slip. So these were found that also had Lana's blood type and brain tissue on them, and these were found about a quarter of a mile from her body. There were also some shoe impressions found and lawn-as-perce, which were near the overshoes. So the shoe impressions, although, you know, it's not a perfect science, especially not in the 1970s, were matched to a pair of shoes that were taken from Duncan's home. And the gloves were confirmed to be gloves that he wore to work that Monday. Pretty suspicious.

So now on to Duncan's truck. There was blood found in the bed of his pickup truck as well as on the springs, and the back end of his truck had recently been sprayed with black paint. So inside the truck was the very same coil of wire that was found in Lawness Hair, as well as an exhaust manifold that was painted black, which had traces of blood and brain tissue on it. So like it's obvious that this guy was the killer. I mean, so much clear evidence here.

And by the way, an exhaust manifold is like a part of a vehicle's exhaust system. It's this big hunk of metal with multiple tubes on it, so it's probably pretty heavy. And because it was found with brain tissue and blood, investigators pondered if it was, you know, the murder weapon. I mean, I would assume that it definitely was just giving, you know, like you said, the weight of the manifold and then the fact that brain tissue is found on it and we know that Lana died of blunt force trauma to the head, so yeah, no question.

Yeah, I mean, and it's so sad. I mean, she died in such a brutal way. So just finding all of this stuff in his truck is like, wow, especially because they found it so quickly after she had disappeared. Yeah, and also, this guy's a complete dumb dumb. Like, you just left all of this physical evidence all over the place, like in your truck, on your truck, so much.

Yeah, you're just a dumb dumb guy. So, once all these connections were being made, Duncan McKenzie Jr. was then arrested again, but this time for the deliberate homicide of 23-year-old Lana Harding, including other charges for sexual intercourse without consent, aggravated kidnapping, and more. Meanwhile, Lana's family, who of course was completely devastated by this whole situation, held a memorial service for Lana at the Ledger Community Hall the same day of Duncan's arrest. So Thursday, January 24th, 1974, and over 100 friends and relatives

attended to honor her. Just days later, the mother of three of Lana's students actually wrote a very lovely letter in the newspaper, and it was featured in the independent observer of Conrad Montana and it stated, I've heard some of the stories going around about mislawing a harding. Some ask, what kind of pretty young girl would stay out in the country by herself? Maybe I can help answer

that. Lana was a one and a million kind of person. She made the children part of her family. She not only taught them from the book, but by example. Having three of my boys in her school was a challenge to any teacher. She had put into them the desire to look forward to each day of school because they knew it would be another day of learning adventure. Never once did she lose her temper or even as much as raise her voice during all their times at school. She had a tremendous amount of talent in art and music, giving some of the rural children the opportunity to have piano lessons.

Her social life was spent with her aunt's family, a close girlfriend and attending church regularly. She led an exemplary Christian life. If I am ever fortunate enough to have my daughters grow up to be the kind of person that Lana was, I would consider myself to be very richly blessed indeed. Val Drishinsky. After a few months in the Ponderay County jail, Duncan Mackenzie Jr. declined to enter a plea

because he had not admitted to killing Lana at all, which I don't know how the hell this guy is not going to plead guilty. Oh, I feel like in cases like this, even when it's super obvious that somebody murdered somebody, they're still gonna try to get away with it. I mean, obviously this guy is a POS. So, an innocent plea was entered on his behalf.

A temporary trial date of September 10th of that same year was scheduled, but it was believed to be required to move due to evidence still being at the FBI laboratories. While he waited, Duncan was held on a $125,000 bond, which would roughly equal about $700,000 today. And the trial didn't end up taking place until the following year, January of 1975, so one year after Lana's murder. During the trial, one of Duncan's co-workers, a 16-year-old named

David Prey, testified regarding Duncan's statements about wanting to have sex with school teachers. He stated, quote, "...Dunkin said how homely they were and how easy they were to get and that they were really uneducated. He said he had one in mind several times." David also confirmed that the bloody gloves that were found at the scene were actually his gloves. But according to another coworker, the day before Lana was killed, Duncan told him he was going to take them. And later that day, he saw Duncan wearing them. During Duncan McKenzie Jr.'s trial, evidence was also shown that proved the blood found, you know, in its truck, on the gloves on all the other

evidence, belong to Lana. And Dr. John Favre testified and stated that the exhaust manifold that was found could have definitely been used to inflict the fatal blow to Lana's head. And because this shit had never confessed, it is unknown how Duncan had found or chose in Lana, but it's believed that in the very late-night hours of January 21, 1974, Duncan entered Lana's home where he kidnapped her before raping her, torturing her by strangling her with a rope, but stopping before it could kill her or render her unconscious, and then murdering her by using his pickup truck's exhaust manifold to viciously beat her head.

God, this guy is just so sick. That's just awful. But whether he went to Lawnitz Helm, you know, with the intentions of murdering her or not, is also unknown. So during the 18-day trial, four FBI agents testified alongside many other people and over 100 pieces of evidence was presented by the prosecution. So although Duncan entered no guilty plea, the jury of seven women and five men deliberated for nine hours total before finding that Duncan McKenzie Jr. committed deliberate homicide by means of torture, which by the way is one of the six types of homicide punishable by death in the state of Montana,

and they also believed that he committed aggravated kidnapping. So as a result of this trial and as awful doings, Duncan McKenzie was sentenced to death. Dunkin McKenzie was sentenced to death. District Judge RJ Nelson stated, you were to be hanged by the neck until dead on April 30th and Ponderay County. Duncan's mental state was considered in the final days of the trial, but Judge Nelson said that Duncan had an

anti-social personality and that he was dangerous and he knew right from wrong, so there's no way of getting out of this one. They also of course considered Duncan's other crimes as well, which include the following. He was arrested on December 27, 1970, so at the age of 19, and sentenced to prison for three years in Montana after brutally beating a woman who was later found crawling alongside a road in Blaine County, Montana, with only a portion of her blouse left on her, how messed up is that? I just feel like people like this don't deserve a second chance. Like, you brutally beat a woman and like,

she was crawling alongside the roadside, it's just so messed up that he was able to get out of prison. Well, as I know you're about to mention, like he did get a second chance, which is so messed up, but even after doing that, I mean, I mean, that's really like showing serial killer tendencies, like you're beating women and leaving them for dead. Exactly. So Duncan was paroled just seven months later, which I mean, seven months later for that, it's just crazy. For like a woman being found crawling

on the side of the road because you beat her nearly to death? Insane. So however, he was back in prison in December of 1971, so five months after being paroled. And this was due to numerous violations. So obviously, he's a career criminal, he didn't learn his lesson. And he's only 19 years old doing this, and he's married, and you know, kids are on the way,

and he's out there just like attacking women. Yeah, so he was paroled again over a year later in March of 1973. And because Duncan was paroled, then it's actually suspected that he murdered someone else before Lana. So right after Duncan's parole in early 1973, so 10 months before Lana's murder, Duncan moved with his wife and three children from Montana to Cordelaine Idaho. Now Cordelaine, for those who don't know, is a city in Northwest Idaho that's very close to the Washington border near Spokane, and it's a very beautiful late community with lots of outdoor recreation options. So this isn't only where then 21-year-old Duncan Mackenzie moved to, but where 15-year-old Deborah Alice Pretty lived with her family.

By the way, I don't know if it's pretty or pretty. It's PRETY and I could not find a pronunciation online. So do you think that's pretty? I definitely think it's pretty. Okay, I'm gonna go with pretty. So Debra had moved to the Corte Lane area with her family from Missoula, Montana, the year prior, which is kind of weird that she happened to also be from Montana,

but a different area for more Duncan lives, so like no relation there. And in October of 1973, Debra was in her new school in Cortalain when the fall dance was coming up. So on the night of Friday, October 26, 1973, 15-year-old Debra went to the dance, and afterwards, she walked home with a friend of hers. But during their walk, Dabra and this friend parted ways to go to their respective houses, Dabra finishing her walk to 17th Street.

But Dabra never made it home. And crazy enough, Dabra lived just mere blocks from Duncan's house. But we'll come back to him in just a minute. So, when Debra didn't arrive home, her family became very worried. Of course, because remember, although she's a teenager, she's still only 15, and she was supposed to come home after this dance. That's when the search for Debra began,

and sadly, she was found the next day by a quote, neighborhood youth, who discovered her body in a neighbor's yard across the street. next day by a quote, neighborhood youth who discovered her body in a neighbor's yard across the street. But some sources also state that she was found by her 26 year old brother Paul Jr., which would have just been absolutely horrible.

Debra had been murdered by strangulation and she had also been raped. A week later, police had no suspects or ideas as to who was behind Deborah's murder. With police chief Robert Nuddleman stating, We are intensifying the investigation, but there's nothing new that we can report. We have nobody in custody, but we're following leads. And sadly, I mean no movement came in this case at all, and there's virtually no other

details about it, you know, online or in old newspapers that we read. You know, I definitely wonder more about where she parted ways with her friend because we're assuming this friend, although their identity has not been released as far as we have seen. You know, as somebody that she went to school with, as somebody she went to the dance with, I don't know if it was a female or a male, we really don't know. But, you know, I definitely wonder where they parted ways because like Heath mentioned, she lived just blocks away from Duncan McKenzie Jr.,

who we know is a fucking predator. That's the most terrifying part to me about this whole thing is that there was a predator in the area at that time. Right, but of course nobody really knew about it because you know, he had just moved in the area at that time. Right, but of course, nobody really knew about it because he had just moved to the area. He wasn't like a known criminal at that time because this was also before Lana's murder, of course,

so he wasn't convicted for that yet. He was just this guy living in the neighborhood. So of course, I mean, this was extremely hard on Debbie's family. There being no suspects, no leads at all, and it actually resulted in her mother staying home most of the time and often just sitting at the window, staring at the home that her daughter's body had been found at. But by the way, it doesn't seem that the neighbor whose yard Debbie's body was found

in was a suspect at all, which brings more questions to like, did if Duncan did kill her, did he, like, how did he get into this neighbor's backyard? I don't know, that's just so weird to me. Or what's the purpose of leaving her body in the neighbor's backyard? I don't know. Especially if it's a neighbor that, whether you know them or you don't know them,

somebody lives there and they could have seen you. So to put her in a kind of a public place like that, not a public place, but you know what I mean? Like somebody's freaking backyard. A very obvious place. Yeah. Yeah, like an open place. I don't know.

I've really never seen that in any other case. Like somebody putting somebody's body in another person's backyard. Well, what's interesting here is this could actually tie in to Lana's case because remember, her body was found pretty much out in the open in this field. That's very true, no hiding her body as well. So of course, Debbie's murder caused a great deal of concern for the entire community, you know, just knowing that someone was out there and that no child or young person was safe until this person was caught, which they never were, which

I can't imagine how frustrating that was. And it instilled this very same fear in Debbie's parents, Paul and Sandy, who became so afraid of letting their kids walk to the bus, or be outside by themselves, you know, worried that they could lose another child. For months, no suspects came to mind, not even Duncan McKenzie, who suspiciously moved from Cordillane just a couple months later, and then Lana Harding was murdered. So as we know, you know, he had just moved to the area when Lana was killed, like weeks prior, but he had only lived in Cordortalaine for nine months maybe?

Right, and this is not a common type of crime that would happen in Cortalaine. Cortalaine is not that big. So to have a 15-year-old girl be murdered in this town and to know that a person who was living there at the time moved away and then murdered another girl, it's very, very suspicious. Well, right, and as you'll get into right now, kind of how they put the puzzle pieces together,

but it is so suspicious to me every time that somebody moves after a murder occurs, because we see that in so many cases where the perpetrator will move, obviously, because they're like, I'm gonna get out of here so I don't get caught. Right, yeah, it's really unfortunate that we see that, because that also complicates the investigation so much.

So it wasn't until a neighbor of the Freddie family read about Lana's murder over in Montana and that Duncan McKenzie was arrested for it. That's when she remembered that he had lived in their neighborhood and it occurred to her that Duncan could have murdered Debbie too. So she pointed it out to police as well as the Freddie family, and ever since, investigators have tried to see if Duncan was really behind it. Though they pretty much wholeheartedly believe that he was. The fact that this neighbor was able to uncover this as well, that she just happened to,

you know, in the 1970s, read about a murder that occurred in a different state. You know, it's not like today where we read about so many cases that happen in other countries in other states on social media and in the news, but this is the 70s and she still found out about it and put the pieces together like, wait, this dude lived in our neighborhood and maybe he killed Debbie. Yeah, so she was basically doing some sleuthing before the internet really existed. Considering both Debbie and Lana were strangled and raped, it's definitely possible. So although Duncan was originally set to be executed in April of 1975,

he wasn't actually executed until 1995. And Duncan had appealed his case numerous times, but they were always rejected. On March 3rd, 1995, Duncan was set to be executed by lethal injection. At this point, he had still never admitted to murdering Lana Harding, nor Debbie Prety for that matter. But court-a-lane investigators hope that, you know, since he was about to die, he would tell them what he did. So Captain Carl Burr sent a letter to Duncan asking questions about Debbie's murder, and Duncan never responded. He also requested

to interview Duncan, but Duncan's lawyer refused, so he couldn't do that either. In case anybody's curious, Duncan's death row meal at Montana State Prison included and a state prison included tenderloin steak, French fries, a salad, orange sherbert, and a whole glass of milk. A glass of whole milk. I hope he choked on that milk. I don't think he did, but he also requested to listen to country music in headphones as he was put to death. And more specifically, Marty Robbins.

When Duncan was asked if he had any last words, he shook his head, which of course, you know, left the harding and the pretty families, extremely disappointed because this was his chance to kind of tell all this was literally the last opportunity and he just shook his head no. And 21 years after murdering Lana Harding, 43-year-old Duncan Mackenzie Jr. was sentenced to death shortly after midnight. Lana Harding's mom had this to say about her daughter's murder. I can't reverse what happened. If I could, I would. I can't afford to be bitter. When we have tragedies in our lives, we can grow and progress, or we can grow within

ourselves and curl up and die. If we do that, we're no help to ourselves or anybody else. 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. Yes, I really think that Duncan was behind Debbie's murder. I just feel like it makes a lot of sense, especially since he moved right after it happened, and he's a horrible piece of shit, I just definitely see that being the case. I do too. I mean, for him to be in that neighborhood, it just really, it makes you wonder, and it's

so sad that her family doesn't have those answers. I know, I completely agree, and something I wanted to bring up that I didn't really want to put in the episode, because I didn't want to, I don't know, I don't know how many people believe and go, so whatever, but I had read something about how the Montana State Prison is supposedly haunted, and it's believed that Duncan McKenzie Jr.'s spirit, if you wanna call that, haunts that prison, and he has touched employees and put his hands around their neck apparently.

And he says his name is Duncan, which is why people think it's him because he strangled, you know, Lana and potentially strangled Debbie if he murdered her too. So I thought that was kind of interesting that he's, like, supposed to be haunting that prison or supposedly haunting that prison. Yeah, and I mean, I know a lot of you probably think that we're full of shit here, but there are articles out there that explain that this guy is, like, roaming around the Montana State Prison. haunting that prison. I'm not saying I believe it either, but I think it's really interesting because some of these employees have sworn by it that it is haunted and that he is potentially one of the people who haunts it. So I just thought that was crazy because I've never read that about any other murderer. So yeah, there's that.

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