True Crime Campfire - For the Love of Money: The Crimes of Randy Roth Pt 2

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

Last week, we introduced you to Randy Roth, and described his early life and his escalation from ridiculous loser and petty criminal, to the chief suspect in the death of his second wife, Jan. Jan plummeted to her death from Beacon Rock, on the Washington-Oregon border, leaving behind a young daughter and a hefty life-insurance policy with Randy Roth as the beneficiary. This week, we find out more about Randy and Jan, and learn how close yet another wife came to death at the hands of a husband she barely knew at all. Join us for part 2 of this chilling true story. (Listen past the outro for a funny blooper.)The Shangri-La Lounge podcast, with Whitney as the guest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-aLwZIU6fcSources: Fatal Charm, Carlton SmithA Rose For Her Grave, Ann Rulehttps://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/shes-got-her-name-back-teenager-murdered-in-1977-finally-identified-with-new-dna-technique-and-genetic-genealogy/Follow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfirehttps://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/Facebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=enTwitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail]! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.comBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

Hello campers. Grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire. Last week, we introduced you to Randy Roth and described his early life and his escalation from ridiculous loser and petty criminal to the chief suspect in the death of his second wife. Jan. Jan plummeted to her death from Beacon Rock on the Washington, Oregon border, leaving behind a young daughter and a hefty life insurance policy with Randy Roth as the beneficiary. This week, we find out more about Randy and Jan and learn how close yet another wife came to death at the hands of a husband she barely knew at all. This is part two of for the love of money, the crimes of Randy Roth.

Janice Miranda grew up with her mom, Billy Jean, and three siblings in Texas. Their dad had run off to Arkansas, and Billy Jean had to work three jobs to make ends meet. When her dad belatedly tried to repair his relationship with Jan by sending her birthday cards and offering her little bits of money, she said, if you want to help somebody, start sending checks to mom. She grew up simultaneously hoping for a good man for her mom, and later herself, and doubting that such a thing existed. But when she was 17, she started dating a soldier, Joe Miranda, and a year later, they got married. When Joe was transferred to Germany, Jan went with him, and that's where their daughter, Jolina, was born in 1973. They were back in Texas soon after.

There are plenty of exceptions to this, obviously, but getting married really young and immediately having a kid can be a recipe for disaster. Jan and Joe separated in 1975 and were divorced the next year, all fairly amorting. with Jan getting custody of Jalina. Jan had been raised as Jehovah's Witness, but despite what Randy Roth would repeatedly declare later on, she did, in fact, smoke and she liked to drink now and then. She danced, too. Every chance she got, Jan would be out at a disco getting down,

and she was good, too. She had dreams of becoming a professional disco dancer, which in the 70s was at least a semi-viable career path. But for now, her life was similar to her moms, working two jobs to make sure Jalina had everything she needed. Whenever she could, Jan put aside some cash as a college fund for Jolina. Most of Joe's meager child support payments went into that. Although she was one of those people that always tried to show an upbeat attitude to the world,

Jan was occasionally prone to bouts of melancholy. Hardly anybody got to see that side of her, but her friend Louise did. They'd met at church right when Jan was separating from Joe and hit it off right away. When Jan moved to California, hoping for a fresh start, she stayed in touch with Louise through phone calls and letters. As it turned out, California was just as miserable as Texas if you were lonely and had no money. That's the thing, right? When you pick up and move, your problems tend to come with you. Louise moved to Seattle in 1979, and a few months later, Jan followed her, getting an apartment right across the street from her bestie. That'll cheer you up right there. I've lived across the street from one of my besties, and it was the best thing.

ever. The moves from Texas to California to Washington had taken everything Jan had except for her 1974 Ford Pinto and Jalina's college money, which she didn't touch. She got two jobs, one as a receptionist at a pediatric clinic and an evening gig at Kmart. To say she and Jalina lived simply at first would be an understatement. They slept in sleeping bags on the floor of the apartment and used a suitcase as a table. But they were happy. Jan had friends and a reliable job. Everybody at the clinic liked her. It seemed like she'd finally

found her home. One thing that was still missing, though, was romance. Jan's attitude about that hadn't changed much since she was a kid. She was hopeful, but skeptical. Still, she joined a local parents without partners group and went to all their dances, including the New Year's Eve one on the last day of 1980, held at the Highland Ice Arena. As with all the group's events, there were about four times as many women as men, and most people were over 40. Jan was just looking to dance, and she was pleasantly surprised when a voice behind her asked her to. She'd met him before at previous dances, but they hadn't really talked. He was good-looking, muscular, had warm brown eyes and a thick, glossy mustache. Now, we're in 1979, remember? So the full-on Ron Swanson pornstash

was all the rage. That was like a major selling point back then. Unlike Jan, Randy Roth couldn't dance to save his life, so instead of dancing, they talked all night. Randy was recently divorced and was raising his three-year-old son Greg all by himself. That touched Jan. It was so much like her own situation. At the end of the night, Randy asked if he could call her, and Jan said he could. She'd been in this situation before, and the guy just didn't call, but Randy did. And afterward came a textbook barrage of love bombing, all sweetness and romance and flowers. Randy had a steady job as a mechanic for the Vitamilk Dairy and rented a house in Linwood with an option to buy.

He seemed steady and secure and immediately started suggesting that he and Jan get married. He wanted them to raise their two kids together, just one big happy family. Louise and Jan's other friends at work told her things were moving too fast, but Jan had no interest in pumping the brakes. In February, Jan hurried into work and showed off a tiny diamond on her finger. He's going to take care of me, she said. Randy's going to marry me and take care of me. That's so sad. Ugh.

And having met Randy on December 31st, Jan married him on March 13th. They honeymooned in Victoria, British Columbia, and stayed at the fancy Empress Hotel, which felt very romantic and European. But the architecture was the only spectacular thing about their honeymoon. After such a passionate and intense courtship, Randy was a damp squib in the bedroom. I'm shocked. Get out.

Sir Randolph? No. I refuse to believe it. He told Jan that a post-phosectomy infection made sex painful for him, which was probably not true. I mean, as you'll see, he'd have no hesitation about sticking his dick in other women in the future, so he was probably lying. What was probably going on here was that Randy had. no real interest in Jan, either romantically or physically, which is crazy. She was beautiful. Oh, she was absolutely gorgeous, yeah. He had joined parents without partners looking for someone

he could take advantage of, and he'd chosen Jam. Yeah, and think about it. If you were a psychopath looking for a woman to manipulate, what better place to find her than a club like that, where the average member is going to be a single woman trying to raise a kid or kids by herself? I mean, that kind of vulnerability was just catnip to this asshole. I'm sure he figured he could just play Jan like a fiddle. Yeah, you see predators do that all the time. Go after single parents. It's like clockwork. That's why you got to keep your head on a swivel, people. Mm-hmm. Hell yeah. After they were married, Jan and Jalina moved into Randy's house, and he pressured Jan to quit her job and be a stay-at-home mom. Within a few weeks and after a state inspection, Jan opened a daycare

center in the house, but Randy still insisted on leaving Greg with his old babysitter. Weird. Unfortunately, for those of us who like our tea hot, the name of Greg's babysitter isn't in any of our sources. She was married. She and Randy had lunch together a lot, and when they went over to her place to pick up Greg, Randy always made Jan stay in the car. Hmm.

Jan was understandably suspicious, but Randy just laughed off her questions. She just wants my attention, he told Jan, which was. not too much comfort because Jan wanted Randy's attention too, and she was not getting much of it. Randy was, in fact, banging the babysitter and would continue banging the babysitter for years afterward. In fact, this adulterous affair was the longest romantic relationship of his life. Except, as trophies to be counted, Randy really didn't like women at all, but he cared a great deal about impressing and competing with other men. Yeah, exactly. Getting one over on some dude by sticking it to his wife was as happy as a relationship was ever going to make him.

That's probably where his boner came from, not from the woman herself, but from the fact that she picked him over the other guy. Just pathetic. Greg's babysitter would later insist the relationship was totally platonic, just two old friends have a lunch together sometimes. But one time her husband came home early and found the two of them wrapped in each other's arms in front of the fireplace. Oh, well, come on. Don't we all have to? intimate little cuddle sessions with old friends in front of the fireplace when our husbands aren't home. All perfectly normal and harmless. Nothing suspicious going on here. Get your minds out of the gutter. Around the time Jan started getting suspicious of Randy, her car got stolen. This was weird because

there wasn't much of a market for seven-year-old Ford Pinto's. Her friend Louise thought Jan acted kind of weird when she talked about the car. In fact, Randy had pressured her into going along with his scheme to fake the theft to trash the car and collect the insurance. This accomplished two things for Randy. It put some money in his pocket, and it made Jan more dependent on him, since now she couldn't drive anywhere on her own. Immediately after the wedding, despite Randy's shortcomings in the bedroom, Jan had been a happy newlywed. Fast forward just three months in, she thought he might be cheating, and he'd involved her in insurance fraud. The bloom was most definitely coming off the road.

Yeah, and I want you to notice, okay, he first thing he does is pressure her to quit her job, which she loved, where she had friends, so now she's cut off from that support system. She stays home all the time. Now he has taken her car away, so she can't drive anywhere by herself. You see how that coercive control starts? Insidious and gross. And Jan started to realize she'd made a mistake. Randy's tender romantic gestures had evaporated as soon as Jan had a ring on her finger. No more love notes, no more roses, hardly any smiles. Randy's face usually held no emotion at all other than annoyance. Jan felt like she'd gone from the center of Randy's world to a glorified babysitter, and not the babysitter he was sleeping with. Oh, right? You don't even get that.

In July, they took their two kids down to the south of the state to visit with Randy's dad and stepmom. While down there, they all camped out at Beacon Rock State Park, and Randy suggested they hike up the rock itself. Jan, let herself be talked into it, but she wasn't keen. She was scared of heights and sometimes suffered from vertigo, and all the way up and down the trail, she kept way back from the edge. She knew if she looked down, she might get dizzy. She was relieved when they were back on the flat ground.

In August, they bought a house together. Randy's brief service in the Marines still qualified him for a VA loan with no down payment, but that meant the monthly mortgage would be higher, almost four times as much as Randy had been paying in rent. To make sure the house wouldn't be lost if either of them died, Randy said they should both take out $100,000 life insurance policies, more than enough to pay off the mortgage. Jan said, okay, and in September they were both issued identical policies,

which would go into effect in early November. Jan had waited a few months before telling her family back in Texas that she'd gotten married, knowing they'd think she was moving way too fast. By now, much as she hated to admit it, Jan mostly agreed. She finally wrote a long letter to her mom. Randy, she said, was very strong, a former karate champion with trophies to prove it. Actually, he'd bought the trophies at the same pawn shops he got his military memorabilia from.

Oh, Sky. The only karate Randy did was practicing by himself in the backyard like a giant dork. I really wish we had footage of that. It's like the poor Star Wars kid that went viral on YouTube. That's what I'm picturing. With his pawn shop trophies. Oh, God, he's such a loser. Randy, of course, had fed Jan the same imaginary version of his military career that he'd given to his first wife, Donna.

Sometimes his drawbacks are due to the years he spent in Vietnam, Jan wrote to her mom. He used to have nightmares, some depression after his tour there. You probably wouldn't believe some of the things he had to do there. He isn't proud of them, but it's either you or the enemy. Yikes. As we learned last week, of course, Randy had signed up for the Marines after combat in Vietnam had ended. He'd been a clerk. He'd never been in Vietnam or seen any action, and had left after less than a year.

The world itself can make you a hard, cold person, but so can war, Jan wrote. He has to learn to be human again if you can understand that. Honey, he was filing paperwork. Yeah, for someone who liked to pretend he was a big, strong man, he sure liked playing like a meek, pathetic loser to all the women in his life. Yeah, I wonder if, I'm still learning about covert narcissism, but it makes me curious about whether he might have a strain of that. In her letter, Jan made it clear that she adored Randy's little son, Greg. She always did her hair and makeup before Randy came home from work, and Greg would all. always tell her she was pretty. Bless his heart. What Jan left out of the letter was that

Randy never did the same. In the letter, Jan mostly tries to convince her mom that her new husband is a good guy, but toward the end, she shows her doubts about her seven-month-long marriage to Randy. Sometimes playing housewife isn't always fun, she wrote. Sometimes I miss my independence. Randy's good to all of us, and fair, but I sometimes remember liking to be my own boss. I do love Randy very much, but sometimes I ask myself, is love really worth it? I don't know the answer yet. Bye. It was the last letter she'd ever send anyone. Randy had a friend named Tim Bracotto. Tim was 19 years old, just out of high school, and he was just the kind of friend Randy preferred, impressed by Randy, scared of Randy,

and utterly convinced that Randy was a deadly veteran who had killed dozens of people in wartime. On Halloween, just four weeks before Jan's death at Beacon Rock, Tim and Randy went out trick-or-treating with Greg, Jolina, and Tim's daughter. The guys waited on the sidewalk while the kids hurried from door to door. Later, Tim couldn't remember if there was any prelude to the conversation, but all of a sudden Randy asked him, could you kill your wife? What? Tim said, what do you mean?

What if we were invaded, Randy said. What if the Russians were coming and you knew she was going to be tortured? or raped. Could you kill her first? Tim shook his head, bewildered and freaked out. Jan asked me if I could kill her if something like that happened, Randy said casually, and that was the end of the conversation. Yeah, for the record, I do not give anyone permission to kill me in the event of an invasion. What the fuck?

I just want that. I just want that on recorded tape just in case. Jan had never asked him that, of course, but as the fall of 1981 went on, she was increasingly full of dread. Her friends knew her marriage wasn't going well. Over the past couple months, her bubbly personality had gone quiet. She had bags under her eyes from lack of sleep. In early November, when Tim Burkato came over to visit, he could tell Jan was sad and frightened. Randy wasn't there, and for some reason, out of the blue, Jan told Tim she was scared. of dying. We don't know if Randy had done something concrete that scared her or if her subconscious

was sending her warning signals, as we see so often with murder victims. Jan was 29 years old, in great shape from jogging and exercise, had no health problems and no unhealthy habits. She should have expected to still be around and active right now in 2025, so why was she scared of dying in 1981? On November 25th, Jan brought Jalina into the master bedroom for a talk. You know I love you and I want to stay with you forever and ever, Jan said. But if anything should happen to me, if I'm not here, I want you to know I have some money put away.

It's for you. There was a cabinet built into the wall. Jan pulled a drawer all the way out and showed Jalina a white envelope taped to the back of it. It was full of bills, thousands of dollars, all the money Jan had kept for Jalina's college. fund. Remember, honey, Jan said. If I'm gone, I want you to come in here and take this and hide it. Eight-year-old, Jalina, just nodded, confused and worried. If she'd had just a little longer, Jan might have gotten them both out of there. She told her mom that she and Jalina would be coming back to Texas for Christmas, but she hadn't mentioned Randy at all. As scared as she was,

there's every chance Jan would have just stayed there. But their mutual $100,000 life insurance policies had gone into effect on November 7th, and Randy was not a patient man. They went down to the south of the state to spend Thanksgiving with Randy's dad and stepmom and their kids. Randy's half-sister Marcy had two horses, so Jalina was having the time of her life. Jan seemed happy, too. She liked Randy's family. Well, most of them. His dad Gordon wasn't around much. Just like his childhood, right? Mm-hmm. The day after Thanksgiving, Randy and Jan set out for the Jansen Beach Mall across the river in Oregon. The kids wanted to come, but Randy insisted they stay home.

And according to Randy, they had barely started down the backroad when Jan asked if they could go climb Beacon Rock instead, just the two of them. It would be romantic. They climbed the rock before, remember in July, and Jan, scared of heights, had hated it. So she wanted to try it again on a cold November day? I don't think so. And that just about brings us back to where we started this story last week, with Randy racing down the trail at Beacon Rock and telling a group of hikers that his wife had fallen

while Jan's body lay dead and broken 300 feet down. The first person to think there might be something seriously wrong with Jan's death was Bill Wiley, the mountaineer who repelled down the cliff face and discovered there was no way Jan could have fallen from where Randy said she had. The second was Dick Reed, the ambulance driver who drove Jan's body to the funeral home. This was Dick's second career. He was a former detective who'd just retired after, working for 15 years in Seattle PD's homicide unit. He had a lot more experience with violent deaths than any of the officers were in the case, and when he saw Jan's body and heard what had supposedly happened to her,

he got a hinky feeling. He tried to convince the sheriff Ray Blaisdale that something was up, and that they should at least have Randy take a polygraph, but Blaisdale was convinced this whole thing was just a tragic accident. He'd seen how badly Randy had been shaken up by Jan's death. In fact, he'd seen Randy stumble away with his hands over his face, apparently sobbing, but with any possible tears hidden from view. As we heard last week, Randy told his family about Jan's death with casual cruelty. That's the grossest thing I've ever heard in my life, what he did, like, at the pizza place, just casually pushing that cremation receipt across the table.

Oh, my God. And he didn't tell her daughter Jalina about it at all, just saying her mom was in the hospital. The morning after Jan's death, Randy got up early, had some pancakes for breakfast, and called his insurance agent, Daryl Lundquist. It was a Saturday, and early enough that Daryl was still in bed, so groggy that he didn't initially quite pick up what Randy was putting down when Randy said he wanted to file a claim. But there has to be a death before you can file a claim in this kind of policy, Lundquist explained. Yeah, my wife died yesterday, Randy said. It hadn't even been 24 hours since Jan's death. Randy told Lundquist about the horrible accident that had killed Jan and said he wanted to start processing his insurance claim right away.

Lundquist told him what he'd need for that, which included Jan's social security number, which Randy didn't know. He called up the clinic where Jan worked and asked the office manager, Shirley Lenz, for the number. It was just after 8 a.m. and Shirley said Randy would have to call back after 9 when the doctor was there. to unlock the files. Doesn't Janice know it? Shirley asked, but Randy just hung up, so he calls her work. He doesn't tell them. This man is something else.

Right after nine, Randy called back and got Jan's social security number and Shirley asked if anything was wrong. Yeah, Randy said. We had an accident when we were hiking and they had to fly Janice out in a helicopter. How is she? Shirley said. I don't know, Randy said. you don't know Shirley said astonished

well what hospital is she in but Randy just hung up again Randy packed up got Greg and Jalina in the car and started north for Seattle Jalina who still thought her mom was in the hospital said couldn't we just go see her she can't have

visitors Randy said I find this interesting by the way that he didn't want to tell the little girl because it suggests that there's some shame in there somewhere, you know? Like, he's obviously cold as ice, but he didn't have a problem, I mean, he didn't have a problem jokingly telling his own family about it.

Yeah, or he just wanted to keep the little girl in control. That's very possible, too. Because, yeah, I've been thinking about that a lot as like, why wouldn't he just tell her? But if he just wanted to keep her calm. Yeah. Maybe he just didn't want to have to deal with it. Yeah. That's interesting. Back in Seattle, he made no effort to tell anyone about Jan's death.

He certainly didn't get in touch with their family back in Texas, who he didn't know and didn't care about. When his friend Tim called and asked how everything was, Randy just said, Janice is no longer with us. It took Tim a little while to figure out what Randy was saying, but when he did, he rushed over to his friend's house to try and help him. He wasn't welcome.

Everything's fine, Randy said, obviously annoyed to see Tim and ushered him out of the house. Jan's friends and co-workers heard about her death on the news. Slowly, the story spread to everyone in Randy's orbit. Nobody saw him shed any tears or show the slightest shred of grief. Most thought Randy, the tough Vietnam vet, was just being strong and holding everything in. The truth, of course, was that there was nothing to hold in.

He just didn't care about Jan's death. It wasn't a big deal to him. He got irritated when people acted like it should be. The son's friend Louise was the one who had to call Jan's family and tell them what had happened, and she herself hadn't found out until Monday, three days after Jan's death. Louise had been picking up Randy and Jan's mail for them while they were away, and when Randy had come over on the weekend to pick it up, he hadn't said a word about Jan. Randy did eventually tell Jan that her mother was dead. Shell shocked, the little girl did what Jan had told her to do. She went into the master bedroom and got the envelope Janet hidden there, filled with the thousands of dollars Janet saved for her daughter's future.

She was headed back to her room when Randy spotted her and asked what she was carrying. Delina held out the envelope and told him her mom had said she should go get it if anything bad happened to her. Randy took the envelope and looked at the cash inside. This is something else she's been hiding for me, he said. I think I should take this, Julina. I'll keep it and I'll use it. it to buy you presents. It wasn't a request.

Randy walked off with the money and Jalina never saw it, nor any presents it bought again. Oh, you absolute piece of shit. He is cartoonishly evil, like Lord Farquod or something. Yeah. The next day, Jalina's father, Joe Miranda, arrived in Seattle along with his new wife. They wanted to take Jolina home with them. Randy was furious, as he always was when someone threw a wrench into his plans.

Of course, Jalina's family becoming involved after Jan's death was entirely predictable to anyone who understood human emotions. But that was not a category that included Randy Roth. And to be clear, he didn't want to keep Jolina because he loved the kid. He just wanted to get his grubby little hands on her Social Security survivor payments. Jolina didn't want to go either. She lived for eight months with Randy as her father. figure, and that's a long time for a little kid. She didn't know Joe Miranda at all.

But there is no question about Joe's legal right to take his daughter back to Texas. Randy definitely didn't want any legal proceedings that would put a magnifying glass over Randy's life and Jan's death. Furious, he told Julina to pack what she wanted. She was eight. She packed a few clothes and some toys and treasures. Rand didn't give her any of her mom's jewelry or keepsakes. didn't give her any pictures of Jan

and he didn't give her a dime of the money Jan had left for her. Jalina flew south with her dad and Rani never made any attempt to contact her or find out how she was doing. They never saw each other again. I hate this guy, Katie. I hate him so much.

Oh, he's the worst. Jan's funeral was a simple affair, which is a nice way of saying cheap. Randy told Jan's mom that even this simple affair would eat up all of Jan's life insurance. But, of course, he was lying. He actually stood to receive $100,000, remember?

He also said he was getting an ornate, hand-carved, wooden chest custom made to hold Jan's ashes, but it hadn't been ready in time for the funeral. It would never be ready. Randy would just keep Jan's ashes in the black box the funeral home had put them in and shove it in the back of the closet. Eventually, he'd throw it in the trash. Meanwhile, down in Skamania County, home to Beacon Rock, investigators were coming around to the idea that Janice Roth's death was suspicious.

Randy had given multiple conflicting accounts of Jan's fall. He'd refused to take a polygraph. Jan had just taken out of life insurance policy with Randy as the beneficiary, and a detective and park ranger climbing Beacon Rock could find no indication that she had fallen. On the slope where Randy said Jan had slipped and slid down to the end, edge of the cliff, there were plenty of shrubs and protruding roots, the kind of things someone falling might reflexively grab at. None of them had been pulled up at all, and there was no sign of a human body crashing through the shrubs. The ground was solid and not slippery at all. In one version of

Randy's story, Jan had gone close to the edge to take a picture. No camera had been found on her body or anywhere near it. If you can do it as a complete surprise and not give your victim a chance to grab onto you, pushing someone off a high cliff won't create much physical evidence. Jan's autopsy uncovered no surprises. The injuries from her fall had been immediately fatal. She would have been traveling around 95 miles an hour when she hit the ground, and her skull took a lot of the impact. The investigators weren't finding much evidence to support Randy's story,

but they weren't finding much that was incriminating either. Tim Riccato happened to be over at Randy's place, when a detective came to interview Randy, and he listened from the kitchen. Randy told the detective he blamed himself for what had happened to Jan. Not directly, of course, but he'd given into Jan's stupid idea to go hiking up the rock, and he'd let her do it in her stupid, slippery leather shoes. Dumb ladies and their dumb shoes, am I right, guys? Remember?

Until now. Sorry. This is the second time a killer husband has brought up. fucking shoes. Yeah, fits you, right? Kenneth fits you. Those goddamn shoes. Women be shopping.

You know, we do love our shoes. I hate him so much. Until now, Tim had no idea there was anything suspicious about Jan's death, but he just heard a detective quiz his friend about it. And after the detective left, he was like, what's going on? Randy could never resist acting like he was in an action movie, even if it meant screwing himself over. Don't ask me to tell you something, you'll have to lie about, he said. Smart, man, good choice.

Where's this guy's Mensa membership, by the way? Like, doesn't he seem like the type to have one? He really seems like he should be on the list of Mensa murderers. We're going to give him an honorary card. Skamania County Investigators remained deeply suspicious of Randy Rer. Roth, but the fact was that there was nowhere near enough evidence against him for charges to be made, you know, probably would have been good to hold on to her body for a little while. I didn't even know you could have somebody cremated on the same day.

Like, that's bonkers. And I know they did an autopsy. But when you do an autopsy, assuming that the story you've been given is true, you don't look for the right things necessarily. So it probably would have been really good if they'd still had access to her body to look for other things. but anyway, he made sure that didn't happen, didn't he? Mm-hmm.

So the case went cold, and Randy received $100,000 from Jan's life insurance. And that was a lot of money back then. He put down $50 grand on a $90,000 house and spent a ton more on landscaping. Randy was acting like he had infinite money. He bought a car, a motorcycle, and a ton of tools, but he did not, in fact, have infinite money. Just two years after Jan's death, things were getting... and tight, and despite all the landscaping work, Randy sold his new house for exactly the amount he'd paid for it. Dumbass. Still, he had enough to get a new place, smaller but still nice, on a

cul-de-sac in Misty Meadows. It was a good place to live. An older couple across the way more or less became foster grandparents to little Greg, and Randy made friends with his new neighbors, Ben and Marta Goodwin. He'd known them even before the move, because their son Ryan was buddies with Greg from school. Ben was a decade older than Randy, and actually was what Randy pretended to be, a former Marine who'd seen a ton of action in Vietnam. He did his best to forget about his wartime experiences and thought Randy's obsession with his own service was kind of weird.

Randy's new house was full of shoulder patches and framed memorabilia. Randy's favorite outfit was his marine camouflage fatigues. On national holidays, he'd put on his dress uniform. It was all a bit much. Do we even need to say that as soon as Soldier of Fortune magazine came out, Randy was one of their first subscribers and best customers? He bought a lot of his military crap from ads in the back of it. Ben thought right away that Randy looked a little young

to have seen all the action he claimed he had, but he kept quiet about it. I mean, some people do look a lot younger than their age, and questioning Randy's service would have been a good way to make an enemy out of his new neighbor. And with a deeply ominous and creepy rumble of distant thunder, we have to tell you that, in addition to their son, Ryan, the Goodwin's had a pretty young daughter, Brittany, who by the time she was 13 years old,

had developed quite a crush on her good-looking neighbor. Oh boy, this part of Randy's story is going nowhere good. For now, though, Randy became one of the Goodwin's best friends. He was outgoing and friendly. They had dinner at each other's houses all the time, and he and Ben shared a love of class. classic cars. There was already a deep darkness

behind the suburban facade of the cul-de-sac. Randy was always buying things for Greg, who was now eight years old. He got a Nintendo and a ton of games as soon as it was released, and in today's money, that system cost around $600. Greg always had new bikes.

He had whatever toys he wanted. The other side of all that, though, was a sad story as old as time, as Randy, whose own father had abused him to make sure he wasn't a sissy, passed on that abuse to Greg. One time, Greg forgot to put out the garbage can for collection, so Randy, in the pouring rain, dumped out the can and spread the trash all across the cul-de-sac.

He made Greg pick it all up on his hands and knees. Greg got it all except for one tiny little scrap of paper, and when Randy saw that, he dumped out the garbage can and made Greg pick it all up again. If anything at all in Greg's room was out of it. a place, Randy would wreck the place and make Greg clean it up until it was perfect. Greg's third grade teacher once called Randy to tell him Greg hadn't turned in his homework. Randy grounded him and yelled that he'd better do the work and it had better be perfect. Greg did the homework but didn't turn it in because he was terrified it wasn't perfect.

Oh, it just broke my heart into 15,000 pieces. So the teacher called again. That night, Greg forgot to flush the toilet. Randy held his son's head in the bowl and flushed it again and again until the kid almost drowned. Then he kicked Greg in the stomach until he threw up. Bless his little heart. This stuff just absolutely kills me and I hope with every atom of my being that this man is getting daily shit swirlies in prison. Every day of his life, garbage bag.

Little Greg told his buddy Ryan Goodwin what had happened the next day and showed him his bruises. Ryan had heard plenty of these stories before, but none as bad as this. So he went straight to the principal's office and ratted out his buddy's dad. And good for him. It takes a lot of guts for an eight-year-old to do something like this. Randy was put on CPS probation, and he sulked. He didn't speak to Ryan for months afterward, just pretended the kid didn't exist. As his friendship with the Goodwin's grew, Randy's relationship with Tim Burkado,

disintegrated. After his life insurance windfall, Randy had loaned Tim and his wife some money. When things got tight for Randy, he arbitrarily changed the terms of the loan and Tim had trouble making payments. Randy sent him letters that quickly descended from guilt-tripping to threatening. Threats were spray-painted onto Tim's house, and then, once you know it, Tim's house was mysteriously burgled. And with the insurance payment, he was able to pay back the vast sum that had caused all this trouble. $1,500. Jesus. Also, if you burgle your friend's house for the equivalent of what they owe you,

you're double dipping, my friend. Randy dated a lot and used poor little Greg as bait. Greg was a cute kid, and Randy would have him approach young women and say, would you go out with my dad? Oh. The lady would look over and see Randy, smiling and looking over, embarrassed at whatever hijinks his adorable little munchkin was getting up to.

Oh, God, Barf. By the way, eight years old is way too old to be doing that. I know, right? Yeah, that would make more sense if he was like a toddler, you know? Yeah, but it just goes to show that Randy didn't understand, like, human behavior at all. God, poor Greg. Randy was fishing.

He had made a lot of money from Jan's death, but most of it was gone by now, and his hours as a mechanic at Vitamilk had just been cut back. He targeted young women who were either divorced or widowed and had at least one child. If they were young, they could be easily and cheaply insured for a lot of money. You know, just in case something unfortunate should happen to them. And Randy hadn't given up the idea of getting his hands on a surviving child's social security benefits. He also wanted someone who didn't drink, didn't smoke, and didn't wear too much makeup, or didn't, as he told Ben Goodwin, look like a whore. Randy's mom, Elizabeth, who he hated, drank, smoked, wore makeup, and dressed in tight,

sexy clothes. He might as well have summed up his dating criteria as, don't look like mommy. I'm scared of mommy. In 1984, 21-year-old Donna Clift arrived in Seattle from Arizona, along with her three-year-old daughter, Britt. Donna had gotten pregnant, then married straight out of high school, a marriage which quickly burned out. After her divorce, she headed north to be close to her dad and stepmom and got a job as a cashier at the plaid pantry grocery store and Bothel. She'd been working there for just a couple of days when a cute little boy came up to buy something. His smiling dad came over a

moment later and they started talking. When Donna said she'd just gotten into town and didn't know anyone, Randy Roth asked her out to dinner. Randy executed his love bombing campaign with the precision of the military man he pretended to be. Three or four times a week, he sent Donna a dozen long-stemmed American beauty roses. He bought her jewelry, sent her love letters, and he was sweet and attentive. So it was a little weird the first time she came over to his house and saw a medieval flail and throwing stars hanging on his walls.

And like a baseball bat with nails poking out of it sitting in the corner. Okay, I'm willing to grant a provisional Dungeons and Dragons nerd exemption for medieval weaponry on your walls, but I'm going to have to draw the line at a baseball bat with nails in it, okay? That's a red flag, I'm saying it. Randy, of course, also had a ton of guns, so it wasn't like he needed the thing for self-defense. He just had it because it was creepy and scary. Ugh. Of course, Randy had a ready-made excuse for his violent fascinations.

The terrible trauma he'd suffered in action in Vietnam. He didn't give Donna many details. It was obviously too hard for him to talk about. He'd done awful things and had to undergo three months of what he called brainwashing before he was safe to return to society. That's interesting, because what you'd actually get is therapy. So, you know, if that were true, so it's interesting that that's how he would think of therapy, brainwashing. And then there was the tragic death of his second wife, Jan, how she'd slipped on pine needles while they were high.

hiking, how Randy had grabbed her hand but couldn't hold on and had to watch her plummet to her death. It was awful, and it explained why he seemed so lonely. Donna quickly fell for Randy and appreciated that he didn't seem to have any interest in hurrying things along to the bedroom. Donna was pretty, and her life had not been short on guys trying to get in her pants. She felt like Randy was interested in her for her. He never told her he loved her. Instead, he said, I want to make an investment in you. He managed to make it sound both kind of romantic and jokey, but of course he was having a little cruel fun of his own. This one time, he was being absolutely sincere. He intended to make a huge profit on the time and gifts he gave Donna.

On Valentine's Day, just a few weeks after they met, he took her out to dinner and proposed. She said yes, and she and Britt moved into Randy's house. Soon after, Donna was neatening up the bedroom closet, making room for her shoes. Under a pile of Randy's clothes, she found a small black plastic box, with the name Janice L. Roth written on the top. Jan's ashes, with the wrong middle initial, by the way. Donna was kind of freaked out that her supposedly sweet boyfriend could treat his dead wife's remains so casually. But Randy insisted he'd just forgotten about Jan's ashes. Is that much better? I don't think that's better.

Later, anyway, Randy told her he'd thrown Jan's remains across Silver Lake. He'd actually just put him out with the trash. They got married in May. Randy's courtship of Donna had almost been a mirror image of how he'd gotten Jan to marry him, and Randy saw no reason to change the pattern. Stick with what works, right? For their honeymoon, he took Donna to the same fancy Victoria hotel he'd taken Jan. The similarities didn't end there.

Right after they were married, Randy's... sexual interest in Donna dimmed like somebody was turning down a dial. In fact, any attention to her other than irritation faded away. He pressured her to help him adopt Britt, but Donna refused. Brit already had a dad. She wasn't eager to go along with Randy's plans for mutual $250,000 life insurance policies either. She was 22 years old. Why would she care about life insurance? Like Jan before her, Donna quickly suspected Randy was having an affair with Greg's now-divorced babysitter. Too late, she realized she didn't really know this man she'd married. Randy would go out running at night in a full black bodysuit, which is an easy red flag.

You're risking getting splattered by traffic just so you can be sneaky. Why do you want to be sneaky? He refused to give even basic information about his past. Wouldn't even tell her how old he was. So Donna did what a lot of us probably would. She snooped. She found his birth certificate, some military papers, and an expired driver's license, all with different birth dates. The birth certificate looked like it had been altered.

Randy kept a tight grip on their finances and got mad if Donna spent anything at all, but she found a recent bank statement with a $99,000 balance. Not long into the marriage, Randy had started letting the mask drop about how he treated Greg, too. He made him take cold showers, made him do a hot. hundred push-ups out in the cold rain, beat him with a showerhead. Three months into the marriage, Donna knew she'd made a mistake and started thinking about getting out. Randy was disappointed, too. Donna hadn't been the pushover he'd hoped for, and now here he was, married to a woman who wouldn't make him rich when she died, and whose kid wasn't going to

bring him social security money. What was the point of that? So it seems pretty likely that he started trying to kill her, just get her out of the way so he could move on to somebody. more lucrative. Randy bought some ATVs and took Donna with him to try them out on a steep hill. Donna had a daredevil streak and had driven in stock car races in the past. So this kind of thing was fun for her. And I want to acknowledge, by the way, he was married to a Donna before. This was a different Donna, obviously. Yeah. No relation. She sat behind Randy as the ATE raced up the hill. And right before it got to the top, Randy just let go of the throttle and jumped off.

The ATV stalled and rolled over. Donna fell out and tumbled down the bottom of the hill, then looked up and saw the ATV bouncing toward her. It landed on her, twisting her right leg and causing permanent nerve damage. Randy stood at the top of the hill, laughing his ass off. In July, Randy wanted to go rafting on the Skycomish River. They'd done it before with Donna's parents. Randy hadn't seemed to enjoy it, but he was all gone.

gung-ho now. He bought an inflatable raft, cheap one, made of thin material. Donna, who was nervous of Randy by now, agreed to go as long as her parents came to. Randy suggested the kids go in the bigger raft with Donna's parents. He and Donna would follow behind. Not long after they started, the current took the lead raft out of sight from Randy and Donna. Right away, their own raft changed course. Donna saw they were headed straight for the big, sharp rocks at the site. of the river. She turned around and saw Randy grim and dark-faced. It looked like he was paddling straight for the rocks. And he had the only paddle. Donna had no control. What are you doing? Donna yelled. Randy ignored her. Downstream, Donna's parents had paddled to the shore to wait for the others.

Soon, from around a bend in the river, they heard Donna crying out, Dad, I'm going to die. Save me. I'm going to die. And Randy's shouting, Shut up, shut up, shut up. Jesus. Randy's raft eventually came around the bend, full of water and barely afloat. Randy was calm, Donna near hysterical. Donna's stepmom immediately thought Randy had tried to kill her. Her dad was oblivious, just calmly helped Randy patch the big holes the sharp rocks had torn in the raft, then re-inflated it. But Donna was done.

She wouldn't go back in the raft with Randy, wouldn't go home with him. She and Britt went back to living with Donna's parents. After a month or so, Randy filed for divorce and started stalking her. She'd find flowers and notes from Randy on her car, regardless of where she was. He was following her. He'd come into the 7-Eleven where she worked and just stare at her. After Donna's stepmom scolded him into leaving Donna alone, Randy had Greg call her and ask her to come back.

That broke her heart because she loved Greg, but Randy had scared her too much. He made one more attempt, coming into the 7-Eleven with weird, tearless sobs. He told her he'd just got an awful news. His mom had been killed in a car accident, and it got worse. My sister was so distraught in the hospital room that she shot herself, Randy said. She's dead, too. It just had to take it too far, Randy. The car wreck, believable, happens every day.

But the rest of it, you've been reading too much soldier of fortune, dude. And just to be clear, Randy's mom and sisters, We're all fine. His mom actually lived within walking distance of Randy's house. He just never bothered to take Donna over there. He kept on stalking Donna, creeping around in his dark body suit until she started dating another guy. And then, poof, he was gone. Donna was off the table, and Randy would have to start hunting for a new wife. But to hear about that, and about this creep finally getting what he deserves, you're going to have to come back next week. we're going to leave it there for part two campers you know we'll have the finale for you next time but for now lock your doors light your lights and stay safe until we get together again or on the true crime campfire and if you'd like to hear me talk about cults check out our friend aaron's new podcast the shangri-law lounge on youtube we'll put a link in the description i know he's only done like one episode and i'm in it but i love this show i love the idea of it it feels like you're just up way too late having a great conversation with friends

Just shooting the shit about life and all its weird little corners. Aaron calls it the last dive bar at the end of the world, which I love. So check it out. It's so good, you guys. You have to go watch it. It's going to be great. I think he's going to take off. And as always, we want to send a grateful shout out to a few of our lovely Patreon supporters.

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you get even more cool stuff a free sticker or rat enamel pin or fridge magnet while supplies last virtual events with Katie and me and we're always looking for new stuff to do for you so if you can come join us at patreon.com slash true crime campfire this was Dick's second career

He was a former detective who'd just retired after working for 15 years in Seattle PD's homicide unit. In Seattle PD's homicide unit. I said homicide, like killing garbonzo beans. Anyway, homicide. That's what you get if you poison somebody's hero sandwin. We should add that to the end as a blooper. Thank you.