Up and Vanished - S4E2: Man On West Beach

Episode Date: February 17, 2024

Florence Okpealuk is not the first Alaska Native to go missing from Nome. Seventeen years prior, Sonya Ivanoff was reported missing by her roommates and was found murdered. The crime has forever left a mark on the relationship between the community and the local police department. Payne arrives in Nome and learns that not much has changed since Ivanoff's tragic end. He connects with journalist and Alaska Native, Alice Qannik Glenn, who shares how the story inspired her journalism and changed the way she viewed the world. Follow the show on Instagram: @upandvanished Subscribe to Tenderfoot+ for ad-free listening, exclusive bonuses and early access starting on 2/23. {apple.co/upandvanished} To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Get ready for Las Vegas style action at BetMGM, the king of online casinos. Enjoy casino games at your fingertips with the same Vegas strip excitement MGM is famous for. When you play classics like MGM Grand Millions or popular games like Blackjack, Baccarat and Roulette with our ever-growing library of digital slot games, a large selection of online table games, and signature BetMGM service. There is no better way to bring the excitement and ambience of Las Vegas home to you than with BetMGM Casino. Download the BetMGM Casino app today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. BetMGM.com for T's and C's.

19 plus to wager. O-N only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to any operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. The newest installment of HBO's True Detective, Night Country,

brings a new twist to the thrilling series. Repeating the feeling that that first season created has been really, really hard. And I love the feeling of a darkness contained in all things and in ourselves. The story takes place in an area I've recently become familiar with, deep in the Alaskan Arctic, where detectives are searching for answers in mysterious disappearances. These men disappeared 48 hours ago. Fact is sometimes stranger and scarier than fiction, and the Arctic is no different.

The True Detective Night Country podcast will dig deeper into the story. You'll hear from the show's stars and creators, shedding light on the making of the show. Alaska felt like a natural place to explore these themes. Join host Alice Cunnick-Glenn on the new True Detective Night Country podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts. And don't miss the HBO original True Detective Night Country, streaming exclusively on Max. Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun is released every Friday and brought to you absolutely free. But for ad-free listening, exclusive bonuses, and early access starting next week, subscribe to Tenderfoot Plus at tenderfootplus.com or on Apple Podcasts.

You're listening to Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun, a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with Odyssey. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the individuals participating. This podcast also contains subject matter which may not be suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised. They haven't found the body.

They haven't found anything. The evidence is gone. You sure about that? She was supposedly last seen with this guy. They found her things in his tent. I don't know the guy's name. Where the guy went, I don't know. But he's not here? No. He's not, no.

He left? I don't know where he he's not here? No. He's not, no. He left? I don't know where he went, but I do know that if I was an investigator, I'd be on his ass like stink on shit. Welcome to season four of Up and Vanished, in the midnight sun. I'm your host, Payne Lindsey. My producer Mike and I had finally touched down in Nome, Alaska, where Florence Okpialik disappeared on August 31st, 2020. She was last seen on West Beach, where freelance miners

like to set up camp. The airport in Nome is tiny, and there's no Uber or Lyft, just a single cab company that loads up as many people as they can in their 12-passenger van. I was in a completely different environment. And before I could even get my bearings straight, I was interviewing a gold miner who'd been living in Nome for over 25 years. He seemed to know a lot about Flo's disappearance, and he spoke vaguely of a man he considered to be the number one suspect. Flo's personal belongings were found directly outside of his tent.

He claimed this mystery man has since fled the town of Nome, long gone since 2020. But I found it a bit odd that for as many details as he knew, he couldn't for the life of him recall this individual's name. I need to know his name. After a long day of travel, we grabbed some food from a local restaurant in town and tucked in for the night. We had a long day ahead of us. We're a pretty interesting little community isolated here on the edge of the Bering Sea. This is Sue Steinecker. She's lived here in Nome for decades.

In some ways, it feels like a tiny little Midwest town where you have folks that are third-generation gold rush families and people that have moved here for the country, the Brocklimers, the outdoor enthusiasts. We are full-spectrum political, from super-conservative to super-liberal. I feel like everybody who's been here any length of time. Sure, maybe you voted this way and I vote this way

and your faith is this and mine is this, but you're stuck in a ditch. I'm going to pull you out. People don't live in Nome for the town. They live in Nome because there's subsistence camps down the beach. This country out here is fabulous. It's gorgeous. Nome, the town, is a dump. When the weather's bad, you can't do anything with your house anyway.

And when the weather's good, you want to go to camp, and you want to go fishing, and you want to do other things. Houses kind of fall to the wayside. There is a recognition amongst the Native community that they have not been always treated very well in Nome. Fair amount of racial discrimination. You know, there was a movie theater, the Dream Theater, that had segregated seating and signs that would say, no dogs or Eskimos allowed. Nome has this very different history. And yet, Native people have been here and been part of Nome's history from the very beginning.

We're the only one that began on a Western model because of the Gold Rush. 1900 is the big rush. The Nome Gold Rush forever reshaped this town, and its impact still lingers today. Somebody goes down to the beach, finds fine gold in the sands. Word goes out, there's gold on the beaches. 40,000 people came and left through Nome that summer.

That's the big gold rush. People just lining that beach. And it was on this beach that Florence Okpialik disappeared. She was first reported missing by her sister, Blair. She knew that Flo hadn't come home one night. She knew that she'd been taken down to some of these tent camps.

Blair went down the beach to try to find her sister. Flo's sister, Blair, was the first to initiate any search efforts for her. Flo was last seen leaving a bar, heading to West Beach. Blair goes out, her sister's missing, but this guy gives her some of Flo's clothes. But she's not there. In the sand, outside of one of the miners' tents, some of Flo's clothes, but she's not there.

In the sand, outside of one of the miners' tents, they found Flo's shoes, socks, and jacket. The theory that I think that the search and rescue and the city wanted to work on was that she'd gotten really drunk and left the tents, tried to walk back to Dome, and passed out and died of hypothermia somewhere. Hypothermia. In the winter in Nome, it can get unbelievably cold.

The temperatures can drop to 50 below zero. But Florence went missing on August 31st, in the summertime. And according to the official weather report for that day, the average temperature was only 48 degrees. Pretty unlikely to die of hypothermia in weather like that. When they first start search and rescue, it's on the assumption that this person is missing and not murdered. Until a body's found, every search starts where the person was last seen. Once the police department was finally taking her disappearance seriously,

the city tapped into every resource they had in an effort to find her. Nome is very good at search and rescue, which is largely through the fire department. Things were organized and word went out pretty fast. apartment. Things were organized and word went out pretty fast. We'd started a certain place, arm lengths apart, and we would just do a complete tundra sweep. The Coast Guard came out and they were looking to see if she had gone into the water. They got on four-wheelers and teller and came all the way down and troopers were flying the area, looking. And slowly, the searching reached farther out. There were lots of little squirrely-away places further back from the coast

where if you wanted to dump a body, you could, and I wanted to see those areas. We flew that pretty thoroughly. All of a sudden, we might see a bone. Well, let's go down. It's a piece of reindeer antler. It was not human. We did get to one pond where it looked like there was a sunken 50 gallon drum.

It looked like two feet under the water was the top of a drum, 55 gallon rusty drum. Where it was and how it was placed, let's check this out. If you think you're investigating a murder scene, things have to be documented. They had to wait for a calm enough day to fly an illegal drone, because you're not supposed to fly within five miles of the airport, so that the drone could film them pulling this drum out. It just held some old ratty clothes.

Nothing conclusive ever came up. Had she just simply walked off and died, we would have found her. The police department's standard line is until we have a body, we assume that person's missing and we keep looking for them following a missing person protocol. Why are we not thinking where somebody might have dumped her body? There wasn't enough follow-up. I kept thinking there'll be a search central with a big map and an overlay that shows where we went and where we went and where the dogs went.

And none of that was ever done. Unfortunately, a lot of police investigations don't happen like they do in the movies, with big cork boards and strings of yarn connecting different clues. Despite the efforts of Flo's family, it appeared the known PD was a bit disorganized from the jump.

To a lot of people, Sue included, it seemed as though law enforcement didn't treat this case with the possibility of foul play. During the search, Sue learned in more detail the moments leading up to her disappearance. So Flo was drunk when a guy picked her up and took her out to his tent. Local people used to have camps down the beach. They could just put up a shack and just use it to get out of town. Who was Florence with that night? Who took her out to the beach in the first place? So the log line on just a standard missing person reports says that Flo was last seen on West Beach. Beach, right. With gold miners.

Can you show me where this West Beach is on the map? OK. So the beach is that way or east. The beach that way is west. OK. OK, so here's an old dredge. They were in this general vicinity, not too far from town. Presumably picked her up maybe here at this corner.

But then you have to go over this bridge to get out here. And then here, you would just hit the beach with a four-wheeler. Looking at West Beach on a map, getting there from the downtown bars would almost certainly have to involve some form of transportation. So Blair goes out, her sister's missing, but this guy gives her some of Flo's clothes. But she's not there. Why would her belongings be there and her not be there? It's all part of the mystery, isn't it?

This guy, I've been told he is obese and not in very good health. I've heard that. I don't know him. I just know he was a cab driver in town and a lot of people didn't like him Whether it was intentional or an effort to shut her up she's clearly been murdered. My next stop in Nome was to meet up with Wendy. It was Wendy and her family who were really spearheading the community search.

And they're also the ones who were followed by an unknown truck. That truck with blacked out windows and no license plate. What does that have to do with all this? They didn't care. They wanted to get rid of the problem. She's a person. As nomites, we say if somebody abducts us, scratch them, pull their hair out, leave as much evidence as you can behind and rely on the public to find them. Not the police department because they're not capable or willing to.

I've got a couple friends who were beaten up by them, but they were too scared to go forward. My one girlfriend, she's from St. Lawrence Island, and she was dropped off by the police department two different times, two different places, while she was pretty intoxicated under cold weather situations. My cousin was left way out down the road too. The police had a history of dropping natives off way out in the country and letting them walk back if they made it. There's a lot of people that they did that too, that I know of.

Wendy described the horrific behavior of some of Nome PD's former officers, a long history of discrimination toward Native people in the community. Search and rescue didn't look for her until day three, and then I believe it was day six that the police department started to look for her. When there was two Caucasian women missing, they went out the same day and they found out those two people the same day. This is a missing person. Why didn't they help find her? It was the townspeople that went looking for her.

Locals. People from the villages. They didn't act like they cared at all. I think it was all a show. They acted like they were busy on the case, but they... they failed her. It's an emotional case because we spent so much time looking for her.

We just didn't have the help that we needed to find her. I think it was day nine. My girlfriend and I, we were paired up looking for her. And we were at it every day. And I started bawling and I says, why aren't the police doing anything? We were just trying to find her. There wasn't any help. There's a lot of people that don't trust them.

They've been failing the Native community for years. Think of the last time you bought something to wear, something to decorate your house, something for your family or friends. What if each time you made a purchase, you got a little something back? With Rakuten, you can. You can earn cash back on just about anything you buy from over 750 stores. If you've ever bought electronics, home decor, fashion and beauty,

or booked a trip, well, you could have got cash back. But don't worry, it's not too late. It's free and easy to use, and you get cash back deposited into your PayPal account or sent to you as a check. Earn cash back at stores like Sephora, Old Navy, and Expedia. It's the smartest way to shop, plain and simple. Start your shopping at Rakuten.ca or get the Rakuten app. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N dot C-A. Experience basketball like never before with BetMGMm an authorized gaming partner of the nba ready to shoot your shot we've made the bet mgm experience more immersive and fun for all types of basketball fans being on the sidelines is one thing this season experience basketball on the

foul line exciting state-of-the-art live tracking technology and dozens of sportsbook selections await you at BetMGM Sportsbook. Tap into every game on your mobile devices. Get up off the sideline and drive to the basket yourself. No matter which team starts popping off, you'll find out why there's truly nothing like laying up a W with the king of sportsbooks. Visit BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone else close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. In almost any unsolved case, it's certainly common to point the finger back at law enforcement.

It's easy to blame the police because solving the case is their responsibility. I always try to take that with a grain of salt because every circumstance is different. It's not in every situation that the police department is committing some form of misconduct in an investigation. But the known police department has a long, dark history unlike anything I've ever seen. In 2003, the Sonia Ivanov went missing. This is Alice Kinnick-Glynn,

an Alaska native, who hosts her own podcast celebrating Native culture called Coffee and Quok. 21 years before Florence went missing in Nome, another Alaska native woman also disappeared, 19-year-old Sonia Ivanoff. She was walking home. Her roommate said she didn't come home and was reported missing two days later. Eventually, an anonymous witness came forward and described the

last known sighting of Sonia. A police officer stopped her on the road and was talking to her. Someone saw her hop in to a police car. She was seen getting inside the squad car of a known police officer, a white man named Matthew Owens. Then she was never seen again. The community knew that she had hopped into a police vehicle, so this person was probably the last person to see her. They knew that there was some kind of connection with that. Can't just go in a police officer car in Nome and then disappear. How could you not have some connection to that?

A few weeks later, Nome police officer Matthew Owens reports that his police car is mysteriously missing. Talking to the police officer that was last seen with her, they did some polygraph tests with two police officers that were on duty that night. There was a native police officer and he passed. The white police officer failed. They had some suspicions about this guy. Matthew Owens failed a polygraph test. This known police officer became the main suspect. One evening, while police were out searching for the missing squad car, dispatch received a strange call on the radio from Officer Matthewthew owens you could hear gunshots in the background and he claimed he was under fire and when other officers arrived there at the scene they found matthew owens completely

unharmed and with the missing police car its windows were broken and inside the vehicle there was an envelope that contained sonia Ivanov's driver's license and along with it, a letter that said, Pigs, I hate cops. I hate every one of you. Investigators found this whole thing pretty suspicious. There was some kind of shoot-off, a note.

Come to find out, he just staged it all. There was nobody else there. It was just him. His vehicle was out there. After this happened to Sonia, a bunch of these women came forward and told about their experiences with him as this creepy guy messing around with young Inupiaq women. Like he was known to pick up Inupiaq women for sexual favors, driving them around, and saying that nobody would ever believe them over him. Nobody would ever believe a drunk Inupiaq woman over a white police officer in Nome.

It's just textbook evil. Ultimately, Nome police officer Matthew Owens was found guilty of murder. The community's distrust of the Nome police department is completely valid. It's rooted in a dark, twisted truth. To think a police officer would do this to such a bright, beautiful, great Inubeck woman, anti-person.

How can anyone allow that to ever happen? In some deep down way, this story of Sonia Ivanov really affected me when I was young. The Sonia Ivanov case influenced me in growing up and becoming aware of this issue. Deep down, influenced the work that I do. I've always had this yearn for accurate and authentic Alaska Native representation in media

because it just felt like everything was sensationalized on TV. Media has such a profound effect on how people see us, number one, and then number two, how we view ourselves. So important for me, especially as an older sister, that I'm helping to create a better, more equitable world, providing accurate and authentic media representation for Alaska Native people. Missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls, Two-Spirit people,

it's a crisis. I really feel like language is important, and to say it's something like an epidemic, I don't try to say that, because an epidemic kind of eludes or elicits this idea of something that's not preventable. It's not an epidemic, it's a crisis. It's something that we're dealing with,

but we can help alleviate. It's something that we can have power and influence over if we all work together. According to statistics, in cases of violence committed towards Alaska Native women, 97 percent have experienced violence committed by an interracial perpetrator. Missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls, and two-spirit people, it's not that we are inherently weak or powerless. It's that we're inherently powerful, but we're victimized by people who want to assert that power.

And I think that comes out in violent ways. My first time ever going to Nome was in 2020. As we were there, there was currently somebody missing. There was a woman missing. The missing woman was Florence Akpialik. That really affected me. I just remember thinking when I was in Nome, I just really can't believe that anybody allows this to happen to our people.

Where am I? You know, like, how can this happen in a place like this? I felt like I hit a fourth dimension in my mind, feeling a lot of feelings. I went to school for aerospace, you know, so I'm rational, logical. I didn't consider myself spiritual until I went to Nome, but it really awoke all of those senses in me somehow. I felt a profound connection.

The land itself, that was evoking feelings in me. I think what's so important is to share that human story, to humanize Inupiaq people, to humanize indigenous women and real people living today. Atrocities are committed against us every day and it's everyone's fault. It's not my fault or your fault, it's all of our fault. I find myself so scared in my own hometown for myself and for my sisters. I see a problem in the community and I want to help do what I can with the tools that I have to help fix it. Since the gold rush of 1899, over 100 metric tons of gold have been discovered in Nome. Outsiders come to the city and exploit it for its resources, then disappear, many of them clearly not believing the phrase, leave only footprints.

A few years ago, there was a major drug bust in Nome, and a mass arrest was made, many of them gold miners. Well, they may have been known for their gold, but they're also known for their drugs, so... They're not gold miners, they're troublemakers. I think the drug dealers got away with murder. If it happened once, it's gonna happen again. Gnome is an easy target. They got private planes, they got private airports. Where there's a will, there's a way.

I think they're waiting for it to calm down before they tempt it again. I don't think gnam is safe still. I'm kind of scared to be telling all this because... I'm worried about retaliation. From who? We don't know who to trust. We don't know who to trust. This is really hard to, really hard to talk about. It's unsafe here.

Since the very beginning of my investigation, there's one piece of information that has remained consistent throughout nearly everyone i've talked to the man on west beach the man who had flo's personal belongings in his tent who is this man from the day she was missing we were told was missing, we were told that that's who she was with. Had you heard of this person before? Yeah. There had been word he was a drug dealer. And then he was a cab driver for checker cab. Taxi cabs in Nome are nothing like I've seen in other cities.

Big passenger vans, and everyone piles in together. And my girlfriend flagged him down. He already had passengers on board. And so he stopped, picked her up. He dropped everybody else off but her. And she had the creeps. And he says, you know what? I could have killed you and nobody would have known about it.

Because you didn't call this in. This guy said that? He said that to her. She freaked out and got out. I believe every word he says. I believe he could have. I don't trust him. This story is beyond creepy.

This person sounds like a real predator. I know people with a dark sense of humor, but no one's joking about killing their passengers to a stranger. Where is all that coming from? Whoever this person is, they definitely sound a little dangerous. So what have you heard recently? That he's moved, I think, to the Philippines.

That's all I know. I was just glad he moved because I think he was in danger. In the Philippines? Why would he be there? And where did he come from before he was in danger in the philippines why would he be there and where did he come from before he was a gnome at some point she ends up on west beach west beach is the last place you've seen okay so on west beach from what you've heard what transpired exactly from this what you've heard What transpired exactly from just what you've heard? I don't know if she was intoxicated.

I don't know if they got her on drugs or not. There's been a lot of rumors. They got her on the drug and maybe she possibly had a bad trip. But that's just rumors. Flo's sister Blair had just left work for the day, and she planned to meet up with Wendy and I. Just buy that. Just buy that.

I mean, buy the store. It is pretty close to the grocery store, yes. When Blair arrived at the house, she was wearing a T-shirt she made with Flo's face on it, a constant reminder to the community that her family's still looking for her. She recalled the last time she spoke to Florence, a moment that's forever stuck in her mind.

I was bartending at Polar Bar. It was quiet, It was empty. Flo came in with her head down. Not wanting to talk. She had an alcohol problem. It broke her life. Took everything from her. From her job.

Time with her daughter. And I got angry, very angry. I told her, you're losing everything, Flo. You're losing it. And that was the last time I saw her. And that hurt me for months. So I thought I could have said something more sincere. I wanted to get better, to not turn to booze.

Blair recounted the moment she first realized her sister was missing. Dan texted me and said, have you seen Flo? And I said, I haven't. Then I looked and looked. And then it was a day. She never came home yet. I'm concerned. I went bar to bar looking for her. At the very beginning I wasn't too concerned because I thought she was just partying or drinking. So I went back to the bars. Have you seen Flo? Have you seen Flo? After Flo went radio silent, Blair went looking for her at the bars in downtown Nome.

The bartender messaged me on Facebook. That's where we headed. Which bar was she at last? B.O.T. Which one's that? That's the one right on Front Street. It's the oldest bar downtown. And which bartender had messaged you?

Naomi. She said, I got a guy in the bar saying throw us at West Beach. West Beach. West Beach. Sweetheart. West Beach West Beach This will be far According to one of the bartenders There was a man at the bar that night Who claimed Florence went to West Beach

This is the first time West Beach ever comes up at all Who was this man who knew this information? How did he know where she went that night? Did he take her there himself? This, to me, was important information. Eventually, Blair and her family made the trek to West Beach themselves. And as they walked down the beach, going tent to tent, they were greeted by a man who had Flo's personal belongings in his possession. This was a puzzling discovery, to say? Nothing. I went around his tent.

Where is she? He said he didn't bring her out there. Why did he have her stuff? I don't know, but he said he didn't bring her out there. But he knew it was her stuff that he had. Yeah. Everything that he said was a lie. Where is she? Where is she?

Where is she? Did you ask him? Yeah. She's not here. I don't know. What was his demeanor like? He was standing like this. Like a stern.

Quiet. Direct. Wendy pulled out her phone and showed me pictures of this tent where Flo's belongings were found. But unfortunately, there was no picture of this mystery man who had these items in his possession. We went back to him several times. And then there's a tent right next to you. Right there, yes.

Is this the empty one? This is the empty one. This is the one he's seeing. Okay, I'm gonna send it to him. The guy that had a tent next to him saw his neighbor with Flo on the back of the four-wheeler and went up West Beach

and he didn't come back till morning, but he came back without her. Wendy and Blair spoke to the owner of the tent next door, an older gentleman. He told them that on the night Florence went missing, he had seen the man from the tent next door drive off down the beach with Florence on his four-wheeler. And then in the morning he returned, but Flo was gone.

Was he a white guy? He wasn't English. He didn't speak English very well. What national have this mystery man who had possession of Flo's belongings in his own tent. Why would he have that? When confronted by Blair and Wendy, offered up little to no explanation as to why he had these things. Then we have a guy in the tent next door who claims to have witnessed this man drive off with Florence on the back of his ATV, then return the next morning without her With no names or detailed descriptions finding the identity of these people is going to be a difficult task What we do know is the man who had Flo's belongings in his tent, whoever he was, was also a cab driver in town

We're getting closer to something. I just need to talk to more people." It was time to backtrack a little. We know Florence was last seen on West Beach. But before that, she was seen at a local bar in town called the Board of Trade. Flo's sister, Blair, mentioned that a bartender named Naomi recalled a man sitting at the bar that claimed Florence had gone to West Beach. The biggest question is, how did he know that? Is this the guy? Did he see her leave with someone else? From all the research I've done, this is the very first time anyone at all even says West Beach. And it's not like it's super close by. Either this man saw Flo leave with

someone else, just heard this from somebody, or he took her there himself. These are questions that drive you crazy, until you get some sort of significant lead. So I hit the bars on Front Street myself, and tried to find Naomi. I need to hear her story. Hey, does Naomi still work here? She does? Good news is, it seemed like Naomi still worked here, but usually on the day shift. So I'm going to have to try again tomorrow.

But if this bar was the last place Florence was seen before she went to West Beach, I want to stick around tonight and try to talk to some regulars. A few hours went by, and I started asking strangers about Flo's disappearance. I eventually struck up a conversation with a woman whose name I'm going to keep confidential. I asked her if she'd heard anything about this case. And the first thing that came to her mind was a bizarre encounter she had in this same bar a few years ago with a man who was a cab driver. years ago with a man who was a cab driver.

There was problems with a cab driver. This guy comes up to me and he followed me. He pulled out a knife. The only thing for me to respond was, you're going to fucking stab me, you're going to fucking kill me. I said, this guy has a knife. Could this be the man we're looking for? I asked her if she remembered his name.

This guy, though, his name starts with J. And I can't... I don't know who he is his first name started with the letter J. Whoever this man was, he seemed to be up to no good that night. And the fact that he was a white guy and a cab driver behaving in this manner is a huge red flag for me. We're getting closer to something. The next day,

I went back to the Board of Trade bar in the daytime when they first opened and there was Naomi. I asked back to the Board of Trade bar, in the daytime when they first opened, and there was Naomi. I asked her to recall that conversation she had at the bar, the one she told Flo's sister about, the mystery man that somehow knew that Florence went to West Beach. Do you remember where you learned that she had gone to West Beach that night? She'd been missing for two days. Her sister came in looking for her, Blair.

She came in asking if anybody had seen Flo, that she'd been missing for a couple days, and I said, no, I hadn't seen her since her birthday. There was a man, he was sitting there drinking, and he was talking about an incident that was going on with his girlfriend, and he was saying she'd gotten a restraining order on something something something he turned around and said oh i seen her down west beach she was

partying with some of the miners down there she was pretty pretty intoxicated at that point but that's pretty much all he said what was his demeanor like when he was speaking about this calm sharing information like like, yeah. I said, I seen her down West Beach a couple days ago. She had stopped by his tent and was talking to him. I feel like he said he had a bottle that he was sharing and that she didn't drink any of it, but he said she was acting like she was out of her mind,

like she was acting, talking crazy. I don't really remember everything that he was saying, but I remember thinking that that was out of her mind, like she was actually talking crazy. I don't really remember everything that he was saying, but I remember thinking that that was kind of weird or she wasn't drinking to be acting like that. But I'd never known her to do any drugs either. Definitely drinking heavily, but not weed, not any drugs. But he admitted that he was with her that night there.

Yeah, that she had stopped by his tent and was talking to him and he moved shortly after that he took off but there was you know no proof or nothing linked to him besides her cell phone and shoes being found outside of a tent did he ever talk about why those items were in his possession like that? I feel like I recall him saying something about sleeping and hearing something in the middle of the night and getting up to go out and look and seeing her stuff there, but he didn't see her anywhere. If she was last seen on West Beach and her items were around his tent then he would be one of the last people to see her if not the last and I kind of knew

him because he's a cab driver and I'd see him once in a blue moon here but you ever seen him since all this like effort moved shortly after that he took off I don't even know his last name what was the name that you knew them by oregon john what do you think happened to her i'm pretty sure somebody murdered her Pretty sure somebody murdered her. I guess it's time to find Org and John. To be continued... and give you an in-depth breakdown, a deeper look into my investigation,

my personal thoughts, and exclusive audio from behind the scenes. You can hear my first recap of episode one and two right now on Talking to Death. Again, this is a real-time investigation. If you want to follow along completely in real time with me, subscribe to Talking to Death on your podcast app and tune in every week after the latest episode. Again, that's Talking to Death on your podcast app. Enjoy the show.

Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with Odyssey. Your host is Payne Lindsey. The show is written by Payne Lindsey with additional assistance from Mike Rooney. Executive producers are Donald Albright and Payne Lindsey. Lead producer is Mike Rooney, along with producers Dylan Harrington and Cooper Skinner. Editing by Mike Rooney and Cooper Skinner, with additional editing by Dylan Harrington. Supervising producer is Tracy Kaplan. Additional production by Victoria McKenzie, Alice Kanik-Glen and Eric Quintana.

Artwork by Rob Sheridan. Original music by Makeup and Vanity Set. Mix and mastered by Cooper Skinner. Thank you to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at UTA, Beck Media and Marketing and the Nord Group. Special thanks to all of the families and community members that spoke to the team. Additional information and resources can be found in our show notes. For more podcasts like Up and Vanished, search Tenderfoot TV on your favorite podcast app, or visit us at tenderfoot., it's Payne. I want to tell you about a new true crime podcast from Tenderfoot TV called The Raven.

The Raven reinvestigates a double homicide that took place after the biggest night in sports, the Super Bowl. And the man caught up at the center of the crime, Baltimore Ravens star linebacker Ray Lewis. Hours after the game, in Atlanta's affluent Buckhead neighborhood, Lewis and a group of friends got into an altercation. Within seconds, two men were stabbed to death in the street. Lewis and two friends were charged with murder. A media frenzy ensued, but in the end, all three defendants walked free. Ray Lewis would go on to become a Super Bowl champion and is widely regarded as the greatest middle linebacker in NFL history.

For 20 years, he's professed his innocence, but the victim's families believe there is more to the story. Join host Tim Livingston, who brought you the award-winning podcast, Whistleblower, as he investigates the tragic double homicide and unveils new evidence that paints a vivid picture of what happened that tragic night in Atlanta. Check out this trailer of The Raven. What you can learn from all this is that big cases make for big mistakes. Look what happened to O.J. Simpson. And look what happened to Ray Lewis.

mistakes. Look what happened to OJ Simpson and look what happened to Ray Lewis. A couple of weeks ago, the family of the incident in 2000, and I'm paraphrasing, but it goes something like this. While Ray Lewis is being celebrated by millions, two men tragically and brutally died in Atlanta. Ray Lewis knows more than Ray Lewis ever shared. What would you like to say to the families? It's simple, you know. God has never made a mistake. It happened just hours after the Super Bowl,

and it happened in a flash. Oakley says he was leaving the club with Lewis when the two victims started arguing with their group. Then it was mayhem. Two men were stabbed to death in Atlanta. The primary suspect, Baltimore Ravens star linebacker Ray Lewis. Ray Lewis absolutely took control and told everybody to shut the fuck up. I am not gonna let you motherfuckers ruin my career. You motherfuckers ruined my career. Charged with murder, Ray Lewis, Reginald Oakley, and Joseph Sweeting would stand trial and walk free. We had one job, one job, get Ray to training camp.

But for the victim's families, justice was never served. So you think on this day, Ray Lewis knows what happened that night? Oh yeah. I hope it haunts them for the rest of their life until they burn in hell. Questions and theories still surround that night in Atlanta. And the murders have remained a cloud over Lewis's otherwise remarkable career. So what do you think they're hiding? They know what happened. They know exactly what happened. When he murdered my nephew, they made Ray Lewis famous.

Did one of sports' biggest stars get away with a heinous crime? Or was the whole thing a tragic misunderstanding? If our system took the time to really investigate what happened 13 years ago, maybe they would have got to the bottom line truth. Over 20 years later, it's time to tell the story of what happened that tragic night in Atlanta. From Tenderfoot TV, I'm Tim Livingston, and this is The Raven.

Football, murder, and the man in the middle. From Tenderfoot TV, raven is available now listen for free on apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts