My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 23

Episode Date: April 3, 2017

This ain't our first minisodeo, but it is a new My Favorite Murder mini where Karen and Georgia read your hometown stories! This week, we read hometown murders and near misses from Portland and the surrounding Oregon wilderness.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Welcome. Welcome to a Minnesota episode of My Favorite Murder. The Minnesota episodes. This is the Minnesota. That's an episode. It's not really an episode. It's a Minnesota. Oh, God.

How are you, Karen? Why won't we just write some small phrase up to start these fucking podcasts? Like a gimmicky like that. You know why? That's it. That'll be our death. If we do that, we're done for. Okay.

So. Isn't it? I think that's good. Okay. But just let's never write it down. Let's start. Okay. And we again.

Hey, this is my favorite murder mini. So that's Karen. I'm Georgia. We're going to read your mini. So it's that you guys fucking send us, which we love. Just awesome. You know how it works. You've been here before.

This isn't your first. Mini. So do. Yeah. Get it. Wait, what did you see? Minnesota. Thank you.

That's all. That's all I needed. Did you want me to go first? Yes, please. Because I'm looking in a subject line. That's the cook, the vet, the knives and her blender. I need this in my life. Someone who really bent over backwards for that one.

That'd be good. All right. Hello, Karen and Georgia. Looking forward to seeing you in Portland on March 25th. Too late. Already happened. How was it? Yeah.

Let's actually, we'd love to circle back and find out what your experience was like. My hometown murder is still a mystery to those who knew the family. Although someone has been put in jail, none of us really believe we have a whole story. Nice start. I've been working for the same program for 15 years. We were a tight knit community, myself and a couple of other murderinos are camp directors just outside of Portland in Corbett, Oregon. Corbett is a small farm town, is small farm town USA.

Everybody knows everyone. One general store, one school. Hazelin and Jerry Stomps were known as, oh my God. Hazelin and Jerry Stomps were known as a happy couple around town. She, a cook at the local camp and he, a community volunteer, a minister and Vietnam vet. This sounds like a perfect life. What a life. They had two sons and were grandparents to their kids.

I get it. Okay. Yeah. We'll assume that's exactly what we think it means. Jerry would often bring his hunting trophies home to the large farm. Lynn would bring the samples of Jerry's hunting trips out to us at site. Milk, deer, once even a bear for us to sample. Wow.

It's a nice bear stew. Oh, she says in parentheses, I passed on the bear. Right after. Lynn was our head cook for almost 20 years. Upon arriving to work on a Monday in February 2009, the first question out of everyone's mouth was, did you hear what happened to Lynn? Love that question. Lynn was found on the side of the road with several broken bones, including her hip and

was in the hospital. Her and Jerry had had plans to sell their boat and meet two men at the Gordon Creek Road Bridge. Upon arrival, one of the men pulled a gun and threatened them. Jerry told Lynn to run, which she did, but one of the men ran after her, cut up to her on the bridge and chucked her 19 feet over the side. Holy shit. Jerry was missing.

It took her almost three hours to army crawl through the river and up the hill to reach the road. God. She said she could see her neighbors driving by and tried to flag them down, but wearing all camo like you do in Corbett, Oregon. That is so true. Oh my God. Like every fifth person when we were in Portland had camouflage, something on a jacket or some

shorts. Wow. Okay. So she, this is the downside of wearing camo. Yeah. You actually can't be seen when you need to be seen. You can't get seen when you get thrown off a bridge, when you get chucked off a bridge. Jesus.

Okay. Eventually a neighbor of Lynn's noticed her hand reaching just above the guardrail and stopped and took her to the hospital. Oh my God. Can you imagine fucking driving and seeing a hand coming out of the guardrail? You're like, I'm going to stop, but I have no idea what it's going to happen. You're like, is that Lynn's hand? That's like the opposite of when you see a kitten climb out of the brush.

You're like, oh my God. I must tell them there's a kitten. Then you're just like, oh my God, I have to stop because there's really like four things, this hand coming through the guardrail could be all worse. I'm picturing that and it's like, hopefully it was nighttime and it was right as that car rounded a turn. Oh my God. So it was like the headlights flashed down onto that guardrail.

You're like, do I really just see that? Oh my God. And I hope Lynn was very pale. Yeah. Okay. Let's find out. It was all over the news. We brought her flowers and a card in the hospital.

Lynn fretted about Jerry and hoped that the police were working to find him. She worked with the police to prepare the composite sketches, but was shady on the details due to the fact that she was so traumatized. Things began to fall apart when the police noticed so many inconsistencies in her story. Lynn's story really began to unravel when one of their sons noticed that Jerry's revolver was still at his residence, a fact that didn't add up to his family as Jerry always traveled with it. Lynn's story didn't hold water for the police and they searched the Stomps Christmas tree

farm. Of course you have a Christmas tree farm. I got to call it 1030 at night for my colleague who does not call me the greatest, saying Lynn Stomps was just arrested for murder and mutilation of a corpse. Oh my God. Their house was filled with Pepsi cans and everything was a little too clean. Wait, I feel like those contradict each other. Lynn, high on caffeine apparently, chopped up her husband of 39 years and buried or burned

him on the property. The bones so badly burned and fragmented that he had essentially been turned into charcoal, the prosecutor stated. I'm sorry, caffeine doesn't do that to you. You know what does that? Meth and anger. Yeah. I wonder if that's sarcasm that's not reading because also just like how is their house filled

with Pepsi cans and then meticulously clean or just maybe that she cleaned afterwards. Right. Yeah. For someone who drinks coffee all day long, I still can't get it up to murder my husband. All right. Okay, it took a lot longer to identify the bones of Jerry because they use the same methods when processing an animal. So the burned piles had many different types of bones in them.

Oh, fuck. Oh, good. I've never heard of this. Hazel Lynn. Well, that name alone. Hazel Lynn was no stranger to rendering a game animal in her days as her husband was an avid hunter and she had a set of sharp kitchen knives. Oh, shit.

Oh, she had our set of sharp kitchen knives, which we never got back. What? Do you want them back? I mean, at that point, you're going to go to the police and be like, hey, if you're done using that evidence. Yeah. It gets who knives are not cheap. I mean, they were Hankels, you know, we got them for our wedding anniversary.

We love the block. It's just sitting there empty. It's just like depressing. Okay. In court, the defense stated that Lynn 125 pounds and five feet tall, couldn't have killed her 220 pounds, six foot tall husband with her hands. The prosecutor made a quick point to say, I didn't say she used her hands. A news film, a news video filmed from a helicopter would focus in on different areas, the wood

pile, the burn pile. Jerry was spread out all over their property. What really sealed the deal was the fully intact human spine in a burned out garbage can. We all speculated domestic violence or Lynn covering for one of her sons and her family pleaded with her to share more information, but she remained silent. The most likely scenario is Lynn was mired in a secret debt that Jerry didn't know about. Upon that realization, a fight or altercation resulted in Jerry being shot at close range

with his own gun. Lynn, disposed of his body, went to the bridge to plant his fishing pole and other items to imply that he drowned or disappeared fishing one day upon planting the evidence. She slipped and fell down the hillside and had to make her make up her story while fighting to survive with a broken hip in icy cold, Gordon Creek. Oh my God. So like she didn't do that on purpose. That was an act because I was sitting for one second, I was like, so she threw herself

over a bridge. Yeah. That's intense. Lynn had remained silent. The case was closed quickly and she currently resides in the women's state prison on a 25 year sentence. To this day, I work in the same kitchen that Lynn did with her former best friend. We all speculate on why it went down, but the secret stays with Lynn.

Thanks for the humor, the strange and enjoyable hobby that is true crime and for being some kick-ass ladies, I honestly believe that fucking politeness and all your otherwise words are helping empower women and other humans to truly stay sexy and not get murdered. Thank you. That's so nice. Cheers. Andrea, Lynn and Amanda. That's amazing.

They all sent it together. What a fucking crazy story. Don't you think if it was domestic violence, she would have been like, it's fucking domestic violence? Yeah. Like, what is it called? A reason? What's it called?

A motive. A motive. A really good reason. So we have a true crime podcast. That's right. We love it. What was her reason? My first guess is her son.

Something with her son. Yeah. Yeah. I mean. Yeah. She flanked him. Maybe she cut him up in all this shit, but she covered it. Maybe he was ab- No.

Only abusing the son? Yeah. I mean, but they were married for so long. I know. Jesus, I don't know. You also, it couldn't have been an accident because then you don't have, you don't burn the bot. No.

The burning part is really intense. Yeah. Cut up and burn. Like, and even being like, oh, saying it was an accident and it wasn't makes more sense if you, if you killed them than actually do it, like going to that level of fucking covering up. Yes. Yeah.

There's a, there seems to be bad intentions behind that. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. A hatred or a lack of feelings. Yes. Anyhow. I like the idea of that there's three women that just stand around and talk about the fourth

that's not there anymore who used to work there. Totally. And they work in a fucking kitchen and they like serve up food all day and just talk shit. They got their hair nuts on and they're just leaning and not cleaning. That sounds like a perfect life. That's the dream. It really is.

Okay. This is called a murderer, a foot. There have been a few murders in the area I live, but one sticks out to me more than others. FYI, sorry in advance for being long-winded. Uh-oh. So we're only doing two this week. My friend lived in an apartment complex that didn't seem entirely safe.

One day I told him about a car in the parking lot with its window busted in and he informed me that that sort of thing happened once a week. I told him that he needed to move. He later informed me that while walking from the apartment to the mailbox that someone hit him over the head with something heavy and stole his wallet. What the fuck? I told him to move. It took a little while after this when he finally found a new apartment.

A few weeks later, a few weeks after he moved, a woman from his old apartment complex went missing. Oh. Well, maybe not important. This is an eastern Gresham, 30 minutes from downtown Portland, Oregon, and 30 minutes from complete lack of civilization, which surprises me so much about Portland. Yeah. It's like in the middle of the forest or something.

Yeah. Like you go outside of the hipster areas and it's like small, small town. I have often thought of it as the armpit of Portland, but Urban Dictionary has us as the asshole of Portland. Wow. Can't argue with that. I mean, Urban Dictionary. Her name was Whitney Heichel, and while I don't know her at all, I knew her shitty apartment

complex. She worked at a local Starbucks and was leaving her apartment ahead there. The morning of October 16th, 2012, she never arrived. Later that day, her SUV was found at the local Walmart, and two days later, her cell phone was found at a different apartment complex. When the car was discovered, I immediately knew she had to be dead. On October 19th, her body was found at Larch Mountain. The murderer is Jonathan Holt.

According to his confession, he waited outside her apartment and asked for a ride. He had been to her church a few times, but I don't know how well they knew each other. After they were in the SUV, he pulled a gun on her and forced her to drive to a secluded lake. After he forced her to perform oral sex on him, he shot her four times, killing her. He claims to have thrown her phone in the lake and then took her body to the previously mentioned Larch Mountain. How the phone ended up in a different apartment complex, I have no clue.

The admitter of the crime and the victim's family agreed to allow the state to make a plea deal in order to shorten the trial so they could move on. I doubt such a deal was made because the family asked that he not be given the death penalty and Holt instead was sentenced to life without parole. The state said that the family had not asked for the death penalty to be removed, that's what they would have gone for. A small side story, if you don't mind, there were a series of severed feet that mysteriously peered on the Washington coast a few years back.

There are theories, but I think they have only linked a couple of the feet. Authorities for some reason do not suspect foul play, which seems crazy to me. My uncle, who lives up there and is a funeral director, was one of the people to find one of these feet. I haven't talked to him quite a few years, but I'm sure it would be an interesting story if I can catch up with him. And as if this wasn't long enough, I'm putting a request to hear one of you read about the monster of Andes.

Thank you, you guys are the best. Stay sexy, don't get murdered, Eric. That's just sad. Now, the thing they tacked on about the feet, I've heard about that, that happens in a lot of places. It's not just there. And some theories are that when larger fish eat people, like it's common that they kind of chomp them and don't eat the shoes, which is where the feet are.

That's why feet wash up. And it's their buoyant shoes. And I've heard that when they're near like a bridge, it's like suicide people. Oh, really? Like, you know, the body be composing after suicide. And again, the foot detaches and because the shoes are so light and buoyant. It like takes them away, takes them out to sea and then back in. God, I love that mystery.

Or it could be the foot murderer, the no more feet murderer, could be all of the above. There was lots of good stuff in there. Who's the monster of the Andes? The Yeti? I don't know. You know, I had really quickly, it's so weird to me that like when you go to work in the morning and say it's still dark out, you're like, oh, I'm safe. It's the morning.

But there's so much that it's like, it's still dark out and people don't think about it. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's like you walk home at late at night by yourself and you're freaked out. But then you leave work at five, four, work at five, three in the morning and it's still fucking night out. But it's, um, it almost feels like it's a reset.

So it doesn't count. Yeah. Like you don't expect anything to happen that early. So usually if you're up that early, you're sick to your stomach. Like it's that thing. You have a headache and you're sick to your stomach and you're just trying to get where you need to go. So you can't imagine anyone would get up to murder people.

Yeah. You're not paying as much attention probably. You're like, murderers are in bed right now. No. Yes. Every, anyone who could be in bed is definitely in bed. So you have the security of knowing any decent human being is sleeping. Carry that pepper spray.

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Hey, I'm Aresha. And I'm Brooke. And we're the hosts of Wondery's podcast, Even the Rich, where we bring you absolutely true and absolutely shocking stories about the most famous families and biggest celebrities the world has ever seen. Our newest series is all about the incomparable diva, Whitney Houston. Whitney's voice defined a generation, and even after her death, her talent remains unmatched. But her incredible success hit a deeply private pain.

In our series, Whitney Houston, Destiny of a Diva, we'll tell you how she hid her true self to make everyone around her happy and how the pressure to be all things to all people led her down a dark path. Follow Even the Rich wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app. Dear Stephen and Karen and Georgia, if this passes Stephen's screening, sarcasm. I have been listening to the podcast since day one. Seriously, it's like finding my peeps.

My grandpa was in the Benton County Sheriff's Department for 30 plus years, and it wasn't until high school that I was informed that murder is not an appropriate lunch table topic. These days, my friends allow me 30 minutes of murder talk before we have to move on. That's cute. I have so many hometown murders for you largely because I grew up between Napa, California and Corvallis, Oregon, and also because my grandpa was in law enforcement. Naturally, I was taught to be afraid of everyone and to fuck politeness. My main hometown murder happened in Corvallis, Oregon, home of the Oregon State Beavers and

also where Ted Bundy murdered a girl. That's not my story. In the spring of 2004, Brooke Willberger was cleaning lamp posts in an apartment complex that her sister and brother-in-law managed. Brooke was beautiful and a devout Mormon. She had just finished her freshman year at BYU. She was 19 years old. She disappeared in broad daylight sometime late that morning.

Her car and flip-flops were found in the parking lot. This was a big deal for our tiny town. I had just turned 11 and my mother was on me like white on rice 24-7. I used to take my dog on walks down my street and then one block over. After that, I could only walk the dog to the end of the driveway. The end of the driveway. The dog's like, what the fuck, dude? She says the dog got chunky that year.

Brooke's picture was up on billboards and flyers all over town. For months, it was all we talked about. At one point, the brother-in-law was suspected, but I believe that was very brief. Then this guy that used to break into women's dorms and steal panties was suspected. But he was just a low-grave perv. Eventually, the search narrowed to Joel Courtney. He had been arrested for kidnapping and a rape of a woman in New Mexico. Police were able to confirm that he was in Corvallis that day and drove a van similar

to one seen by witnesses. You'd think you wouldn't drive a van just to, just how about a Toyota Corolla? Like powder blue van? What the fuck are you thinking? Toyota Corolla. Whoops. Okay. The police found the van and found Brooke and Joel's Courtney's DNA inside.

Despite not having a body, this was enough to charge him. This was late summer 2004. It would be five more years before she was found and her family would be able to put her to rest. After being convicted of rape in New Mexico for 18 years and then extradited to Oregon to stand trial for Brooke Wilburger's murder, Courtney took a deal offered to him. The Wilburgers weren't involved in this plea deal as they were very much wanted to know where their daughter was.

The death penalty was taken off the table in exchange for a full confession. Courtney took her from the apartment parking lot that morning. He lured her to the car to ask for directions, but I'm not sure. I heard he lured her to the car asking for directions, but I'm not sure if that's true. And he raped her and she fought back so hard he realized that he would have to kill her. The Wilburgers flew in town and I heard that he even came back into town and went to Burger King while she was still alive in the car. After he killed her, he hid the body so well in the woods it's unlikely it would ever have

been found. After his sentence in New Mexico is up, he will spend a true life sentence in prison for Brooke's murder. More hometown murders to come. I'll try to keep them shorter. Stay sexy. Don't get murdered. Shelby.

Jesus. Shelby, you need to move out of that fucking town. I mean, yeah. Wow. That's awful. That's really sad. Let's see. This one, Home Alone Saved My Life, sounds fun.

And she writes, she or he, and they write, hey, hard kills, which is like, okay. My name is Alicia J. from Portland, Oregon, and I can tell you the exact moment I became a murderer. I grew up in your typical suburban town of Beaverton, Oregon, and when I was 12 years old, my parents allowed me to stay home alone for the first time while I went to a party expecting to be back rather late. They sent me up with a pizza, blockbuster VHS tape of my best friend's wedding. About near the scene where they start singing in the restaurant, I hear my front door rattle.

I looked down the window at this entry and fucking saw the doorknob rotating back and forth in all caps. We're sorry, really quick, 10 or 12? 12. Fuck. Are we allowed to be alone at 12 now? Not now. No way.

Oh my God, I was alone at eight. I know. We were. Yeah, we were. So yes. We are alone. Ridiculous. Panicking like an idiot, I dropped on all fours where they might be able to see from

other windows around the house and crawled towards my kitchen, grabbed the biggest knife, and pulled my dog in from the garage, scared they would hurt him. Then I crawled back to the entryway watching our 70s house heavy solid wooden door at this point, forcibly jerking with a metal on metal sound. Not knowing what else to do, like, I don't know, call 911, I took a clue from Macaulay Culkin from Home Alone and yelled out, Mom, you need to see this movie. It's hilarious. The door immediately stopped rattling and several seconds later, I was able to see headlights

backing out for, backing out for 25 yard, or 25 yard driveway. Pretty stupid, stupidly. I didn't say anything to my parents as I was worried they would never let me be alone again. Two days later, it was reported on the local news that a home invasion down the street for me had gone wrong. This time there was an older man at home instead of a kitchen knife. He had a shotgun and you guessed it, the two home invaders were both shot one killed on

scene, the other critically injured. The homeowner was facing murder charges, but I believe was dropped after claiming self-defense and the injured plead, pled guilty to this day. My parents still don't know what happened and I'm in my thirties, holy shit, tell them and then videotape you telling them and then send it to us, please. I saw you gals at Seattle after Portland's show sold out so quickly. I bought the tickets before the announcements of the second show. I raised my hand to tell the story, but I swear to God, Karen, you looked straight at me and

I quickly lost the courage and lowered my hand, which I will always regret. I became an RN and through the shit I literally seen and swarmed through, I developed a morbid sense of humor that I will admit is usually not popular at parties. However, after being with you guys since the third episode, I finally found my people, hundreds screaming and clapping over Ted Bundy and realized you can laugh to cope and fuck all who don't understand. Keep it up by spreading the humor and joy of dark subjects, hugs and cuddles to Steven and all four babies, Alicia.

Oh, that's nice. That was a good one to end on because the rest were like really depressing. I know. Here's what I love. So she doesn't tell her parents that this really horrifying thing happens so she can stay home alone again. It's such child thinking. She's not put off staying home alone.

Your brain doesn't really finish until like 25, you know what I mean? I love her so much and she still hasn't told them. I think we should call them right now. Oh my God, can we please call your parents, Alicia? That would be the funny thing. We'll tell them. We'll tell them with like big wide eyes and smiles on our faces. We'll be like, oh, they could have saved the guy who got broken in on down the street.

Oh, no. I love that. I was afraid you were going to say something else. I love that. That old man was just like. Nope. Yeah. That was amazing.

Why wasn't the dog barking? Bad dog. Well, it was in the basement. Yeah. It's like, can you give me the fuck out of the garage? Remember when you used to keep your pets in garages? I know. It's such a different world now.

It's like, it's a different world. She's like, she's like 21 and it was 10 years ago. No. That's not true. Um, that's fun. I also can't imagine being so scared and still being able to yell mom, come and see this movie. Totally.

Totally. Oh, that was such a good one. Yeah. All right. Well, those are your hometown murders. Way to go, you guys. Oregon, Portland area. Send, uh, ask your hometown murder, send him a Stephen because he's still enrooting

them now. It's his actual job. I mean, this is his job. He loves it. My favorite murder at Gmail. If you have, listen, if you have a good subject line, it's more likely that we'll pay attention to it. It helps.

It helps us. It helps you. It helps us. But if not, you know, don't sweat it. Just stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Okay?