Timesuck with Dan Cummins - Short Suck #8 - Horror in the Woods: The Keddie Cabin Murders

Episode Date: April 26, 2024

On Saturday night, April 11th, 1981, a young mother, her teenage son, and her son's teenage friend, were all violently murdered in the small, picturesque community of Keddie, California. One of her daughters was also kidnapped, and also murdered. No one was ever charged. Did local authorities help coverup the most gruesome killings in the history of Plumas County? Watch the Suck on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Yf5vYWfrE88For Merch and everything else Bad Magic related, head to: https://www.badmagicproductions.com

Welcome to this edition of Time Suck Short Sucks. I'm Dan Cummins and today we are exploring the Keddie Cabin Murders. Do you live in a quiet little town? Does it have a dark enduring mystery? A terrible crime that left the entire community in shock? A crime that wasn't supposed to happen in a place like this? A dark brutal crime that has never been solved? A crime that completely changed the future of your community. One that left a terrible stain, cast a dark shadow that remains to this day. The small, unincorporated Northern California community of Kedi had just such a crime occur

over 40 years ago. The Kedi Cabin Murders. One horrible night that to this day is still by far what the little community is unfortunately most known for. Prior to April 11th 1981, the worst Saturday night in the community's history, life was simple in the small resort community of Kedi. Not even a town, Kedi was and still is a census designated place in the truly beautiful, picturesque Plumas County, California.

Plumas County, named for the Spanish Rio de las Plumas, the Feather River which flows through it, is located just northwest of Lake Tahoe, in between Reno, Nevada and Redding, California, at the northern tip of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Prior to gold strikes in 1848 bringing in European Americans, small decentralized tribes of mountain Maidu people lived in the area for centuries, subsisting on everything from roots, acorns, grasses, and seeds to fish and big game like deer and elk. The mountainous heavily forested rugged area has always been sparsely populated. As of the last census count in 2020, despite having over 2,500

square miles of land, less than 20,000 people live in Plumas County. The largest community in the entire county is East Quincy, which is roughly 2,500 people. Keddie now only has around 60 people, down from close to a hundred at the time of the murders. A substantial population drop for a place whose population has never been very substantial. Ever since the murders, Keddie has been slowly slipping off the map. Back in 1901, before the murders, Keddie was a popular vacation locale not far from the famed Feather River Canyon. Highway 70 cuts through the bottom of Feather River Canyon, which was designated as a scenic

byway for good reason. The North Fork of the Feather River dramatically cuts through the Sierra Crest with nearly a mile-deep canyon spanning from Bald Eagle Peak at an elevation of 7,183 feet to the tiny community of Tobin. Population of only 12 at the last census at 1,992 feet. Is your community even a community when the entire population could be comprised of just one very large family? The beautiful crystal clear Feather River is full of huge granite boulders and waterfalls cascading around seemingly every corner It really is beautiful country

The whole area seems to cater to people looking for peace and quiet People coming to go camping and fishing maybe zip around us some dirt roads and they're side-by-sides people coming to relax in the great outdoors Numerous beautiful campgrounds RV parks and lodges where I bet you can find a mean stack of pancakes and biscuits and gravy made from scratch Pepper the landscape Mountain lakes full of kayaks and stand-up paddleboards abound There are a hundred miles of hiking trails hundreds of miles Excuse me The overwhelming majority of the country or county is protected forest land and you're bound to run into mountain bikers or picnickers

If you show up on a sunny day, you'll also likely see a lot of wild game. Deer, beavers, maybe some black bear, more. Little towns once known for mining and logging are now known more for art galleries and tourism in the county. This is a place I would visually associate with Columbia and Patagonia jackets, teva sandals, fishing poles, and yoga mats much more than I would ever associate it with murder. sandals, fishing poles, and yoga mats much more than I would ever associate it with murder. Keddie was once one of the county's many popular vacation destinations. Keddie had a hotel complete with a bar and restaurant, general store, a post office, and a boarding house where some Feather River Community College students lived. The tiny college catering to local rural students, the only college in the county

is located in the little 1600 person-ish town of Quincy, just six miles away from Keddie, where many from Keddie work, where their kids go to school and play in baseball leagues and so forth. People used to come to Keddie to go horseback riding, to pan gold, to stay in a rustic lodge or cabin for a weekend with their family. People came to relax, to get away from their troubles, from any troubles. They came to get away from the stress of the city, stressors like violent crime. Sue Sharp came to the area to start a new life. Full name, Glenna Susan Sharp. She went by Sue. The 34-year-old

homemaker moved to the county in July of 1979 after separating from her husband, a Navy man who was allegedly physically abusive, James Sharp. They'd been living back in North Carolina, although some sources say they left Connecticut. Sue's brother Don lived in the area and originally she moved into a small rented trailer that Don had lived in at the Claremont trailer village in Quincy. She brought her five kids with her, 15-year-old John who went by Johnny, 14-year-old 12 year old Tina, 10 year old Ricky, and 5 year old Greg. James came out to visit his estranged wife and kids in Quincy, sometimes shortly after

they arrived, in some attempt at a reconciliation, but he only showed up once. He left and never returned after that one visit. I'm sure there's a big story there and it probably revolves around James being an asshole and a deadbeat dad. In October of 1980, Sue and her kids moved into cabin number 28 at what was called the Ketti Resort. The Ketti Resort, long closed now, the murders were not good for business at all. It was never much of a resort. You weren't gonna get a mani-pedi there, deep tissue massage, you weren't gonna enjoy crafted cocktails,

whipped up by some fancy mixologist by the infinity pool. It's frequently described as being rustic, which I find is often a nice way of calling a place a shithole. It was a bare bones hotel, bar, and restaurant way out in the woods with a number of standalone cabins in addition to the hotel rooms for either short-term or long-term rental. Most people living in the cabin seemed to be local staying there for months,

not for a few nights. The Cady Resort was charming, but a backwoods place. You know, a place you'd take your family for a real cheap camping trip if you didn't live there. Or a place to meet some friends to get drunk and camp without having to actually pitch a tent or make your own meals. The cabin the Sharp family moved into was much larger than their previous trailer and had become available when Plumas County Sheriff Sylvester Douglas Thomas had vacated the property. Remember Sheriff Doug's name. That dumb shit is a big player in today's story. Despite being bigger than the trailer they lived in, Cabin 28 was still small for a family of six. It only had two bedrooms for Sue and her five kids. So 15-year-old Johnny Sharp moved into part of the basement that could only be accessed

from outside. This detail is important because Sue now kept her doors unlocked around the clock so that Johnny could access the upstairs, which included the only bathroom whenever he needed it. The way the cabin was set up, Johnny would have to go outside of the basement, then back inside the cabin on the next floor up when he left the basement to use the bathroom and vice versa. The two younger Sharp boys shared one bedroom upstairs, and Sue and her daughters, Sheila and Tina, all shared the other bedroom.

Living conditions were cramped. But the house was cheap and Sue didn't have much money. She had just left her husband, she was not getting child support, she was the homemaker, was raising the kids, she got $250 a month from the Navy, food stamps, some extra cash from a part-time job of some sort at the Quincy Elks Lodge, as well as a small stipend from a California Education Training Act program. Sue participated in a typing class at Feather River College as part of said education program. Also attending that class were Marilyn Smart, who went by Loon, that's a fun nickname,

and Martin Smart, who went by Marty. Marty and Loon, remember their names, the Smart's big players in this story. Smart's were the Sharps' neighbors who lived in two cabins down, cabin 26, less than a hundred feet away. Marilyn and Marty lived in a cabin with Marilyn's sons, Justin and Casey. Though things were certainly tight financially, the Sharp kids apparently loved living in this little cabin community, running around with neighbor kids like the Smarts, having sleepovers just a couple feet away from their own cabin and their mother. It was a lot of fun to be had. Johnny, the oldest child, had a friend, Dana Wingate, who was two years older than he was,

17 years old. Dana lived down the road in Quincy. Dana was off and over at the Sharp household. The two boys would frequently hitchhike the seven miles to nearby Quincy, six, seven miles, where they both went to school to see what fun could be had in the bigger census designated area. And that was precisely what they did several times on the day of the murders. Saturday, April 11th, 1981. The Saturday morning of the 11th began like any other. Hanging out, visiting friends, enjoying time with family. Around 1130 a.m. Sue Sharp, her 14-year-old daughter Sheila, and five-year-old son Greg drove from their friends the Meeks house The Meeks will not factor into the story. So don't worry about keeping track of the Meeks. You know what fuck the Meeks

Forget I even brought up those no-name dipshits They drove to go pick up Sue's 10 year old Ricky who was attending baseball tryouts in Quincy And now I'm there's so many kids in this in this Episode okay, that's making sure I didn't give Ricky's age wrong He's had him confused with Greg in my mind for a second there long the way back They ran into Sue's oldest son Johnny and his friend Dana Hitchhiking at the mouth of the canyon from Quincy to Kenny so Sue picked him up drove everyone back to her house Two hours later at around 3 30 p.m. Johnny and Dana hitchhiked back into Quincy

I had to did this all the time where they planned to go to a party a One a woman named Donna Williams Also a nobody in this story fucked the meeks and fucked Donna Williams picked the boys up Gave him a ride to the home in Quincy where the party was at Meanwhile, the rest of the Sharp family was having a lazy afternoon at home Early that evening Sue made dinner and then did the dishes around 8 About a half hour later 14 year old Sheila 12 year old Tina left to watch TV at the Seabolt family's cabin cabin 27 directly next door

The Seabolt's also not really big players in the store, but they did see something and You know some of one of the smart sharps kids stayed there, so We're not gonna say fuck them. Parents Paula and Pearl Seabolt looked at a front window that evening, noticed a green van parked outside of cabin 28 at around 9 p.m. They would later tell investigators that they didn't recognize this green van, which was odd because their section of cabins were all being lived in by long-term tenants. Everyone seemed to know everyone.

Around 9.30, Tina Sharp asked what time it was and realizing it was getting late, went home to find her mom lying on the couch in her bathroom, watching TV. The younger boys, Ricky and Greg, were already in their room where they were having a sleepover with their friend and neighbor, 12-year-old Justin Smart. Sheila asked her mom, Sue,

if she could spend the night with the Seabolds, and she said yes. So many sleepovers. Which makes sense, right? Saturday night. When I was in junior high and high school, I think I, you know, made more sleepovers on Saturday nights or, you know, had them at other people's houses. Probably more than I was home on Saturday nights.

Around 10 PM, a local man listed in sources only as Timothy. Uh, don't have to worry about his name either. Fuck Timothy. Uh, left the back door bar in Keddie and on his way home saw a dark colored boxy van. Could be that green van parked across the bridge by a pond near the cabins. Like the Seabolt, he didn't recognize it. Not only was this mysterious green van observed in Keddie that night, a small brown car, perhaps a Datsun, was also parked near cabin number 28.

Like the van, numerous witnesses also didn't recognize this vehicle. Making the second mysterious vehicle more noticeable was that it had a tire that looked like it was going flat. And now enough about mystery vehicles. Almost enough. I think they're gonna come up one more time. But still, fuck mystery vehicles. Fuck the van. That shitty ass Dotson. The entire Meek family. Donna Williams. Timothy McShithead. Most of all. But for real, the vehicles won't really factor into the story further,

other than they seem to distract investigators from who clearly, clearly should have been the primary suspects. And before we get into the rest of the story, building towards the murders, of course, time for today's mid-show sponsor break. If you don't want to hear these ads, you can sign up on our Patreon, become a Spacesister for five bucks a month, get the entire catalog ad free and more. And I'm back. It's late at night, Saturday, April 11th, 1981, night of the Keddie Cabin murders.

At the Seabolt's, Cabin 27, Sheila Sharp goes to sleep around 11 p.m. Her sister had gone back home, just her having to sleep over. Right around that same time, a man named Donald Davies, also don't care about his name, but drives by cabin 28 notices that the front porch light was not on, which was unusual because Sue typically always kept her front porch light on at night when her son Johnny was still out and about, which he was. Closer to midnight. Two people who left a little back door bar at the Keddie resort noticed a stranger's car coming across the narrow Keddie bridge into the cabin area.

A resident of the area, Carl Sprang, witnessed a small light colored car pass slowly by number 28 around that same time. And now we're truly done with the mystery vehicles. And at the back door bar that night, Loon Smart, Justin's mother, would later say she overhe, uh, overheard something, uh, very strange. She said two men were talking and one of them said,

yo, Bo, let's go. Then the other man replied, just a minute, I'm so mad. Boy, the way I feel like to kill somebody. She never said who these men were, which is really fucking weird because she clearly had just hurt her husband Marty Smart who was also at this bar, tiny little bar in this catty resort and his friend John Bubeed or Bo Bede excuse me who went by Bo who was staying at their place like her place that night. Mary will later say when questioned separately that he or Marty excuse me will later say when questioned separately that he and Bo first met a few weeks earlier

at the Veterans Administration Hospital where they were both receiving treatment for PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder. It's over in Reno. Smart claimed to suffer from PTSD as a result of his time spent fighting in Vietnam. And he said that earlier in the evening of April 11th, he, his wife, Loon, and Bo all decided to go to the back door bar for a few drinks. He said that earlier in the evening of April 11th, he, his wife, Loon, and Bo, all decided to go to the back door bar for a few drinks. He did not say that she was leaving him, which will come up later.

Marty Smart also said he worked as a chef at the back door bar, but it was his night off. However, he may have gotten fired that night or may have been fired just before that night. This will also come up later. A lot of conflicting reports. He said that on the way to the bar that night the group stopped in on Sue Sharp, asked her if she wanted to join them for drinks. She said no and they left for the bar. At the bar Marty was in a foul mood and complained angrily to the manager

about the music that was playing. He and Bo or perhaps he and Bo and Loon left shortly afterwards. Their stories don't line up. Maybe all three of them, maybe none of them, maybe two of them, one of them. I'll go back to the Smarts cabin where Loon would say she watched some TV and then went to bed. Marty, apparently still angry about the music, will say at one point he called the manager from home and complained again and that maybe he and Bo went back to the bar for some more drinks or maybe he stayed home or maybe they killed their neighbors. So many conflicting stories. Moving away from the Smarts now, at around 1 30 a.m. fellow Keddie Resort

resident Michael Plyer was awakened by his girlfriend Barbara Meyer in their cabin which was within just 10 feet of the Sharp cabin according to several sources. Listen, she whispered, he did and they both thought they heard muffled screaming. It was hard to tell where it was coming from after a while it stopped and Michael and Barbara went back to sleep. And now we're on to the following morning, the morning after the murders. Around 7am, April 12th, 12 year old Sheila Sharp awakens at the Seabolt's cabin.

You know, she's done with her sleepover. She returns home to her cabin, cabin 28, and what she would see when she walked in would haunt her for the rest of her life. Lying on the couch in the living room was her mother Sue, who had been bludgeoned with a claw hammer. Her bloody body was partially covered by a yellow blanket. She was still wearing her bathrobe. Her underwear had been removed and stuffed into her mouth. Also in her mouth was some balled up medical tape and she'd been gagged with a blue bandana as well.

An electrical extension cord was wrapped around her legs and ankles. And lying on the living room floor were the dead bodies of Sheila's brother Johnny and his friend Dana. They too had been murdered. And they'd been bound with medical tape and electrical cords.

The whole place looked like a slaughter pen. There was blood on the walls and blood on the floor. Imagine seeing all of that as a 12 year old. It seemed impossible. Sheila had been sleeping in the cabin next door less than 20 feet away and claimed she hadn't heard a thing. Somehow neither had anyone else in the Seabolt home. In shock, she ran next door told the Seabolts what she'd seen. The deputy Hank Clement was the first to arrive on the scene and he reported that there was blood everywhere on the walls, the

bottoms of the victim's shoes, Sue's bare feet, the bedding in the girl's bedroom where 12 year old Tina slept, the furniture, the ceiling, the doors on the back steps. Speaking of Tina Sharp, she was missing. The younger boys were not. Shockingly, both younger Sharp boys, Ricky and Greg, and their friend and neighbor, Justin Smart, were unharmed and still asleep in a back bedroom in the cabin where the murders occurred. They'd apparently slept through the murders, which makes no sense at all.

Lot of hard sleepers in this short suck, like a preposterous amount. I didn't know the Time Suck character Sleepy Greg had so many family members living in Ketti, California. In addition to being bludgeoned with a claw hammer, Ricky and Greg's mom Sue had been stabbed in the chest and slashed across the throat. The stabbed woman passed through her larynx and nicked her spine. I say slashed, it seemed more like a horizontal slab from what we were able to tell. Yeah, just like stabbed across her throat, kind of diagonally into her throat, I guess. Also on the side of her head was an imprint matching the butt of a Daisy 880 Powerline BB pellet rifle.

How had she been beaten like that? Quietly. Her son Johnny's throat had been slashed and Johnny's friend Dana had multiple head injuries from being beaten with the claw hammer and he had been strangled to death. Making all this so much stranger when you think of how many people slept through this shit it appeared that whoever had done this had somewhat taken their time. The house's telephone had been taken off the hook, the cord cut from the outlets, the drapes had all been closed. So what the hell happened? I mean, the house was unlocked, so anyone could have just walked in.

Tina was, of course, believed to have been abducted. The FBI would oversee the investigation into where she'd been taken. Local police initially thought the murders were connected to drugs. Sue was a single mom struggling to raise five kids. Did she maybe venture into dealing out of desperation? Or were Johnny and Dana selling drugs That could account for all the trips back and forth to Quincy where their mom and sister dragged into this mess Deputy coroner Douglas McAllister did not believe illegal drugs were involved nor did he think burglary was a factor

But if not drugs if not, you know burglary, why were they killed? Why the savagery of the killings? How had the killers not been detected? Why hadn't anyone seen anything? How had several nearby people slept through this entire massacre? Adding to the mystery when Plumas County Sheriff Sylvester Doug Thomas Who not that long before had lived in the exact same cabin the murders occurred in Called the Sacramento Department of Justice which then sent in two special agents from their organized crime unit, not from homicide. Along with special agents, Crim and Bradley, Spiro Vasos, a fingerprint expert, and Bruce Palmer, an evidence expert, also arrived from the Department of Justice. And although a lot of potential evidence was collected and cataloged, none of it would lead anywhere.

Suspicious. These agents were soon joined by two FBI agents, Dick Donner and Larry Ott. There's an agent, Dick, in this one, who were handling the search for Tina Sharp. They had a couple theories. The first was that Sue, Johnny, and Dana all knew their attackers and possibly they thought or had been told that was a robbery and that they just stayed quiet and didn't fight being tied up they wouldn't get hurt and then once bound and gagged they've been executed another theory was that Johnny and Dana had walked in seen Sue being attacked by some unknown assailant and

were then overpowered and killed themselves but wouldn't that be very noisy at least noisy enough to wake up Johnny's little brothers who were just a few feet away. Same floor, nearby room. And these cabins didn't look like they were that well-built. I'm guessing the walls were not real soundproof. The Plumas County Sheriff's Office sent out scent dog teams to assist the FBI

in looking for Tina Sharp, but nothing would turn up. This led investigators to deduce that Tina had been driven away from the scene of the crime, rather than dragged from the cabin down the street where her scent would still be apparent. Q intends focus on those mystery mobiles. By the second week after the murders, the Feather River Bulletin ran the ominous headline,

Tina Sharp Feared Dead. Despite the use of jeeps, scent dogs, and an intensive grid search of the area, not one trace of Tina was found. Not one trace would be found for several years. The FBI, who had been prepared to deal with the ransom, soon felt there was nothing more they could do. The trail had gone cold.

Back to the murders now. Let's talk about 12-year-old Justin Smart, Loon's son, Marty Stepson, the boy from two cabins over, who had been sleeping in the murder cabin that night, told authorities he'd had a very odd, very specific dream. And he had that dream the night of the murders. Check this out. I am on a passenger boat. Somebody got thrown out and there was a fight.

He had long black hair and his hair was combed back. He had black glasses with a gold frame and dark lenses. He had a mustache, jean jacket, blue jeans and wore cowboy boots. He had a hammer in his left hand and it had a wooden handle. Johnny and Dana fought the man. Dana was almost drunk. Johnny was thrown overboard and then Dana. The man ran away. My body was lying on the bow. Sue, she had black hair and a sheet over her. I looked under the sheet and she was slit in the chest. Everybody gathered around her and wanted to go to shore.

I was down by Sue trying to take care of her. All the blood was coming down and I was trying to patch her up with a blue and white flowered rag. I threw the rag in the water. That's a pretty strange dream. Lot of details corresponding to the murder that happened a few feet from this kid. Later Justin did tell the polygraph operator, not surprisingly, that maybe he didn't have a dream. Maybe

he actually had witnessed the murders. But then that testimony differed from his dream description. Justin said now that he had heard a noise and woken up which would make sense. He said he then went to the bedroom doorway peeked out in the living room. Sue was lying on the sofa. Two adult males were standing in the middle of the room. One did have black hair combed back dark glasses. The other one had brown hair, wore blue jeans and army type boots. Justin said that Johnny and Dana then came in through the front door. And those descriptions, by the way, that he just gave will match up with Marty and Bo. Johnny began arguing with the two men, he said. A fight broke out. Dana tried to get away,

fled to the kitchen, but the brown-haired man struck him with a hammer and Dana fell to the floor. Then the two men tied up Johnny and Dana. Justin went on to say that young Tina came out of her room, dragging a blanket and asking, what's going on? The two men then rushed forward, grabbed Tina by the arm, dragged her out the back door. Justin claimed that Tina was crying out for help. And again, how did no one hear that? How did that not wake up her two brothers

who were sleeping in the same room as Justin? Justin told the polygraph operator that the black-haired man was the one who cut Sue in the middle of her chest with a pocket knife. And investigators had found a pocket knife in the living room, right at the crime scene where the murders happened, one with the bent blade. That blade might've been bent if it struck bone,

like Justin was saying, and Sue was stabbed in the chest with a knife. Based on Justin's descriptions of the possible murders, composite sketches of the two unknown men were produced by Harlan Embry. This is one of the weirdest details of the story. Harlan was a man from Reno described in numerous sources as having quote no artistic ability and no training in forensic sketching. Who called this asshole? I've seen his work. Yeah he does not have any artistic ability. I could have sketched out a and no training in forensic sketching. Who called this asshole? I've seen his work.

Yeah, he does not have any artistic ability. I could have sketched out a better description than he did. It looks so bad, it looks like it's a joke. He might as well have drawn some stick figures. Are these the men you saw? What, those are stick figures. And then cue him just adding single line smiles, little dots for eyes.

You gotta draw us three strands of hair on one stick figure's head, put a little top hat on the other. How about now? Plymouth County Sheriff Doug Thomas, the guy who used to live at the side of the murders he hired, Harlan. Sheriff Thomas was botching this investigation. It has never been explained why, with access to the Justice Department's and Federal Bureau of Investigation's top forensic artists, Sheriff Thomas would choose to use an amateur from Reno who sometimes would volunteer to kind of help local police. Years later, in 2016, Plumas County Special Investigator Mike Gamberg will admit that

the investigation was a complete shit show. He would say, you could take someone just coming out of the academy and they'd have done a better job. Then another interesting piece of evidence coming up from another smart Justin's mother Marilyn aka Loon. Loon told authorities now that her husband and Justin's stepdad Marty Smart hated Johnny Sharp with a passion. Loon also claimed that Marty had burned some item. She said in their fireplace. Not a piece of firewood I'm guessing. Early in the morning of April 12th. So just hours, you know, within a few hours of the murders that happened just a few feet from his place. Authorities would also talk to Marty Smart. Confusingly, Marty told him that some tools were stolen from him a few weeks before, though he did not report that at the time.

Tools like, I don't know, a claw hammer. Almost as if he's now trying to distance himself from one of the weapons, definitely using the murders. While talking to police about this, Marty actually said that whoever took his hammer, they would have been wiser to take a hatchet. This was especially suspicious because police had not told anyone outside of, you know, no one outside of investigators knew that anybody had been beaten with a hammer. So what the fuck? Officers, you're looking for the guy beaten with a hammer. So what the fuck? Officers, you're looking for the guy who used a hammer to kill my neighbors, right? Yeah. I just want to mention now that whatever hammer, whatever hammer was used to bash them with, you know, that kind of hammer, that was the one that was stole from me a few weeks ago.

Oh, one more thing. I wouldn't use the hammer. I would have taken an axe to him. Crevy Marty's new friend, Bo, also interviewed by police. Bo initially told investigators that he and Martin had been at the back door bar from 930 to 10 p.m. that night. Then he changed his story. He said that they weren't there from 930 to 10. He said they were there around midnight. Why do that?

Trying to make sure the cops thought he was at the bar when the murders happened? Also Marty's buddy, Bo, aka John aka John Bubid allegedly had strong ties to organize crime in Chicago. But for some reason police still felt there was not enough evidence to tie Martin and or Bo to the crimes. Months now pass with no answers. After the slains the remaining Sharp children Sheila, Greg and Rick are all sent out of state to live with an aunt. But because the aunt already had several kids the Sharp kids were eventually placed in foster care first together and sadly later apart no idea why their dad James did not step in to take them probably was a piece of shit Sheila waited and prayed for Tina to be found and reunited with her siblings

a dream she would hold on to for three years but But then, April 11th, 1984, three years to the day after the Keddie Kavan murders, 50 miles from Keddie, in the small, rural, unincorporated community of Feather Falls in Butte County, California, a man discovers a human skull. Near the remains, detectives also would find a child's blanket, blue nylon jacket, a pair of jeans with a missing back pocket, and an empty medical tape dispenser. Medical Medical tape just like the tape found on the body of her brother and mother. Initially investigators had no idea whose remains these were but then Butte County Sheriff's Department received an anonymous call. The caller said, Hello, I was watching the news and they were talking about the skull they found at the Feather Falls

and they asked for any help. Uh-huh. I was wondering if they thought of the murder up in Keddie, up in Plumas County a couple years ago where a 12 year old girl was never found? Shortly after that tip, the remains would be identified as being Tina's. This seems significant. Remarkably, the tape of the anonymous tip regarding Tina was found sealed in case files untouched by the Plumas County Sheriff's Department until 2013. When the case was reopened and new investigators Plumas Sheriff Greg Hadwood and Special Investigator Mike Gamberg were now looking into things. Hagwood in his third year of office had many priorities to contend with inside his

department and in the county. His department was short of funding and he was short staffed. Despite that the unsolved murders of a woman, two teenage boys and a girl still haunted him and he wanted to do something about it. These were boys he went to school with. Hagwood personally knew them as a kid. He was also familiar with Cabin 28 in Keddie. In earlier years, before the Sharps had ever moved in, he had spent nights there with a friend and his family.

Hagwood would graduate from California State University, Sacramento, with a degree in criminal justice. He would become a deputy in his hometown in 1988. And as a deputy, he knew what was and what wasn't happening with the case. Although still technically open, it was just not a priority. The Keddie murders, as the case became known, had become infamous as one of the state's leading unsolved crimes. That and his personal connections led Hagwood to resurrect the case to provide the resources

and time needed to solve it, even though he was understaffed. That's when Hagwood asked Gamberg, a private investigator, if he would like to take over the investigation. Gamberg also had known the two boys. He was their coach in martial arts and other activities. Dana Wingate had been at Gamberg's house the day before he was killed. Gamberg would take on the task of diving through boxes, boxes of evidence, and he found a couple

of strange things. The original case history log, who did what and on what date, was missing, just gone. All of the physical evidence was incredibly disorganized, and a freezer that some evidence had been placed in for preservation had gotten turned off. Some items were never even entered into evidence. To begin with. A crucial part of the chain of procedures needed to prove a suspect's guilt. Meanwhile, Sheriff Thomas, the lead investigator on the Keddie murders, he resigned from the investigation just three

months in to take a new job at the Sacramento Department of Justice. His handing of the case in retrospect would be considered disastrous at best, extremely corrupt at worst. And that investigation was carried out with the assistance of the Department of Justice that gave him that new job. Some like Sheila Sharp started wondering if there was a cover-up. In his reinvestigation, Mike Gamberg found out that Marilyn Loon Smart, Marty's wife and Justin's mother had left her husband on the very day of the murder discovery. The 12th. Kind of a very important detail. She'd apparently been having

troubles with him for a while and Sue, her friend, had been advising her to leave him. Marty was rumored to have been a womanizer, quite the ladies man, and he was supposedly sleeping with several women in the area including his neighbor, murder victim Sue Sharp. Remember that Sue was found naked from the waist down, her underwear stuffed in her mouth? As far as I know, she was never tested for any evidence of sexual assault. Why? Did Marty and his buddy Bo rape Sue, kill her, and her sons who witnessed what they had done, then abduct her daughter when she came out of her room, and also saw them possibly also raping and then murdering her as well? Did all that happen because Sue

told Loon that she should leave her piece- shit floundering husband while also sleeping with said husband Did all that happen because Marty drunk the night of the killings was told by his wife that loon You know told by his wife loon Excuse me that she was done with him told that sue sharp had let loon know that Marty was cheating on her Told that by woman he was sleeping with, and then his mysterious buddy Bo, Vietnam vet, reportedly connected to organized crime in Chicago, maybe went along for the ride, all too happy to crack some skulls. And now the Department of Justice covers it all up because Bo is maybe valuable to them.

And they give Sheriff Thomas a new job to pay him back for helping them cover up murders in Keddie. Let's say Marty did do it. He did seem to have been a hothead. Loon's aunt Joan Andrews would remember how Marty had a disagreement with his dad once in Phoenix and decided to make a bomb and blow his old man up because of it. He actually went to the store, bought the supplies needed to make the bomb, but then calmed down and changed his mind I guess. Andrews also said that while Marty and Loon were living with her, she allegedly saw Marty

practice throwing a hatchet quite a bit, and he kept the hatchet in his residence and also tried to purchase numerous guns during that time. And Andrews also said that Marty, the hothead womanizer with PTSD, quote, spent a considerable amount of time reading the Bible and was fanatical about other people's morals. This dude sounds fantastic. A very stable, solid piece of work. Then Loon would say that Marty tried to run her and Justin over once, right? Marty her husband. And then in 1980, the year before the murders, he had put a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her if

she left him. A knife. He sounded guiltier by the second. Some sources state that Marty also lost his job as a cook at the back door bar either right before the murders or possibly even the night of the murders and perhaps the combo of losing his job and feeling like he was about to lose his wife you leave him the next day you know caused him to crack. Perhaps his wife left him the day after the murders because she knew he did it. What was burning in their fireplace that morning? Now for the most damning evidence pointing to Marty, decades after all of this in the original case files was a letter. This is so bad. Luna provided Plumas County Sheriff's Department with the handwritten letter sent to her, signed, sent, you know, handwritten.

It's signed, I'm sure it has his fingerprints all over it, sent by her now estranged husband Marty, who had moved to Klamath Falls, Oregon. And in it, at one point, he wrote, quote, I've paid the price of your love. And now that I've bought it with four people's lives, you tell me we are through. Great. What else do you want? That letter was sent less than six months after the murders. How the fuck was he not arrested? Some would say that Marty was referring to his wife and three children whom he had left

for Maryland when she was still his girlfriend. Bullshit. Somehow, that letter was not seen as a confession, nor was it ever followed up on during the original investigation. Cover up. That is seeming more and more likely. In a 2008 documentary about all this, Loon straight up said she thought her husband and his friend Bo were responsible for the murders.

But former Sheriff Doug Thomas still held the belief that Marty did not commit the murders. As proof of this, he pointed out that Marty had successfully passed a polygraph test. But come on, we know those aren't reliable. And Marty and Sheriff Thomas reportedly were close friends. Marty also, according to some, had been dealing weed and hashish in the area not Sue Sharp as investigators led by Sheriff Thomas originally speculated. Making Marty look even guiltier in 2016 special investigator Mike Gamberg met with a counselor at the Reno Veterans Administration. An anonymous counselor told him that in May of 1981 so just a

month after the killings Marty Marty Smart literally straight up confessed to killing Sue and Tina Sharp. He supposedly said, I killed the woman and her daughter, but I didn't have anything to do with the boys. But then when the Department of Justice was alerted to this confession in 1981, they completely dismissed it, as hearsay didn't follow up. Cover up! This is all so fishy. Many have speculated the Department of Justice overlooked it because of Marty's friend Bo's connections to organized crime. There's been rumors that Bo was a highly valued snitch working with the Department of Justice and because of his possible value to them, you know, him taking part in some murders was overlooked. And then Marty

also got away with the murders because you couldn't arrest and charge Marty and then not risk having him rat on Bo. And what about the hammer that Marty claimed was stolen from him? Gamberg actually recovered it from a local pond in 2016. His tip came by way of someone who attended a wedding in the Keddie area. A woman lost a ring, so the man returned with a metal detector in an effort to recover it. What he discovered was not the ring but a hammer in a dried up pond near the resort entrance. He left the hammer, eventually contacted Gamberg. Gamberg and the unnamed man went to the pond. By then it was full of water, but they did manage to recover the hammer, and it matched

the physical description of the one Marty Smart said he had lost. The one he almost certainly tossed into the pond after using it in the murders. The pond is not far from the cabins. It would have been a natural place to ditch a murder weapon. Someone leaving the murder scene could have easily tossed in the murder weapon, Gamberg thought. And yet there doesn't appear to be any evidence that special agents or anyone from the Sheriff's Office checked the pond. For evidence, 1981. Why not? To Gamberg, it is crystal clear that the DOJ and the Thomas Run Sheriff's Department did in fact cover

up the murders. Ganberg alleges that Bo and Marty fit into a larger drug smuggling scheme that also involved the federal government. He says that Marty was in fact a known drug dealer, Bo was for sure connected to organized crime in Chicago with financial interests in drug distribution. This would explain why the Sacramento DOJ sent two allegedly corrupt organized crime special agents instead of agents from the homicide department. Also explains why Marty Smart and Bo simply were able to leave town right after the murders.

John Bo, Bo Bede, died in Chicago in 1988 and it's hard to find out much more about him. Marty Smart died in 2006. Neither man ever returned to Keddie after leaving within weeks of the murders. Will we ever have closure on these killings? Maybe not, but there's still a chance that more important information will come to light after all these years. Keddie police now say that new DNA evidence has pointed investigators to other suspects who may have had a hand in these murders and are still alive.

It's my belief that there were more than two people who were involved in the totality of the crime, the disposal of the evidence, and the abduction of the little girl," Pluma Sheriff Greg Hagwood said. We're convinced that there are a handful of people that fit those roles who are still alive. So was it a cover-up, a conspiracy? Who was ultimately responsible in the end? Some people like Gary Wingate, Dana's father, don't think a conspiracy is to blame for the

events. He thinks there were just too many agencies working on this and collectively they just fouled up the investigation. He said, nobody has the faintest idea who killed my son. So I long ago had to let this thing go or it would have eaten me alive. I don't think about it. I don't go to that ghost town. Gamberg however is still hopeful that the true perpetrators of the Kitty Kavan murders may come to light. Out of the living suspects, Gamberg has had this to say. They better batten down the hatches because we're coming. We're continuing with the investigation and we're doing interviews and we have several persons of interest. Whether or not we ever get any closure on these crimes,

it's too late to repair the damage that's been done to the community of Keddie. The once popular resort community has never been able to capture the relaxed, easygoing feeling it had before the murders over 40 years ago. People began to shun the Keddie Resort soon after the killings. Within just a year year it was completely empty. The owners would put the property up for sale in 1984 for 1.8 million and would not get a single offer. Over the next decade or so it rotted into a refuge for drifters and squatters. The county ended up condemning a good portion of the majority of the buildings. In 2004 the infamous Cabin 28 was finally torn

down. Now only a depression and a few bits of boards and foundation are left as testimony that had ever existed. The resort's owner, Gary Moleth, who did eventually buy the place for pennies on the dollar, grew tired of kids and ghost hunters breaking into it. Dubbed the Murder House, it had gained quite the reputation for being haunted. Kids would break into the condemned building with yellow and white paint flaking off, its doors nailed shut, most of its windows covered with plywood. And then they'd flee off in a hurry, reporting that they'd seen murky, shadowy forms, moving chairs. Once someone said they even saw a pitchfork, and the word no carved into the kitchen door. An hour later, when they returned, pitchfork was gone, so was the carved word. And a local 22 year old, Forrest Jones, said he heard moans, doors slamming, and footsteps when

the house was obviously deserted. With Cabin 28 now demolished, there isn't even really a reason for ghost hunters or true crime junkies to come by anymore. And if people want to travel to and vacation in the still just as beautiful as ever, Plumas County. Keddie is far from the only little community in the area. But it is the only one where the brutal and strange murders, how did no one hear anything that night, of four people occurred, three of which were all members of the same family. We may never know for sure who killed Sue, Johnny, Sheila Sharp, and Johnny's friend Dana Wingate. Although Marty Smart certainly has my vote, he and John Boe, Bo, Sheila Sharp, and Johnny's friend Dana Wingate. Although Marty Smart certainly has my vote, he and John Boe, Boe Bede, what we do know

for certain is that the unsolved Keddie Cabin murders definitely killed the now run down and haunted community of Keddie, California. That is it for this edition of Time Suck Short Sucks. If you enjoyed this story, check out the rest of the Bad Magic catalog, beefier, not so bite-sized episodes of Time Suck every Monday at noon Pacific time, and new episodes of the now long-running paranormal podcast Scared to Death every Tuesday at midnight. Thanks to Sophie Evans for the initial research. Thank you to Logan Keith for recording and uploading today's episode. Please go to BadMagicProductions.com for all your bad magic needs and have yourself a great weekend. Add Magic Productions