The Least Obvious Killer

[0] Today's podcast is about places you can't go and people who went there anyway.

[1] This will be a top three style episode, so you'll hear three unique stories back to back to back, and each story will be more intense than the last one.

[2] The audio from all three of these stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called Mr. Ballin, and they have each been remastered for today's podcast.

[3] The links to the original YouTube videos are in the description.

[4] The first story you'll hear, which is the number three stories, story on today's list is called Luge, and it's about a group of teenagers who try their luck on a dangerous race course after hours.

[5] The number two story on today's list is called The Loner, and it's about a House of Horrors that was discovered in Texas.

[6] And the final story you'll hear, which is the top spot of today's list, is called Ruaheen Range, and it's about a mystery disappearance that was solved 15 years later.

[7] But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the Strange, dark, and Mysterious delivered in story format, then you come to the right podcast because that's all we do, and we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday.

[8] So, if that's of interest to you, the next time the five -star review button needs a pair of socks, offer to loan them a pair of yours.

[9] But make sure they're the kind of socks that immediately slip down under your heel into the shoe as soon as you start walking.

[10] Also, please subscribe to the Mr. Ballin podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts, so you don't miss any of our weekly uploads.

[11] Okay, let's get into our first story called Luge.

[12] I'm Dan Tversky.

[13] In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York.

[14] A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast.

[15] What's the answer?

[16] And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

[17] Hysterical.

[18] A new podcast from Wondry and Pineapple Street Studios.

[19] Binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad -free on Wondry Plus.

[20] One of the most dangerous Olympic sports is called luge.

[21] In a nutshell, one or two people who are called lusiers will ride a sled down a hill as fast as they can.

[22] But this hill is this narrow, winding, banked ice track, and these lusiers will ride a sled that will go as fast as 80 miles per hour or faster.

[23] While accidents in lushing are actually quite uncommon, when they do occur, they can be catastrophic.

[24] In 1986, a luge track was built on a ski hill in Alberta, Canada for the luge event of the 1988 Winter Olympics.

[25] This track and the surrounding ski area was called Canada Olympic Park.

[26] After the Olympics were over, this park was open to the public for recreational purposes.

[27] Nearly 30 years later, on January 29, 2016, three teenage boys snuck into Canada Olympic Park after hours.

[28] They made their way up the hill until they reached this blue six -foot -tall fence that was covered with warnings telling people to stay back and don't go past this fence unless you are authorized personnel, and these three teenage boys were not authorized personnel.

[29] Inside of this six -foot -tall blue fence was what looked like this tall flight of stairs that led up to what looked almost like a log cabin, and that cabin was the starting house of the Luge track.

[30] The track literally came out of the cabin and fed down below.

[31] The three boys, one of which had actually worked at this park the winter before selling tickets, they looked at each other and grinned and then chucked their plastic sleds over this blue fence and then they climbed up and over themselves.

[32] Once on the other side, they each picked up their sled and then made their way up the stairs into the starting house.

[33] Once they were inside, they kind of arranged themselves to see who would go first, second, and third.

[34] They put their helmets on because they all brought helmets.

[35] They strapped on headlamps so they could see the course because there were no lights on the course.

[36] And then one by one, they began going down this luge track.

[37] But surprisingly, it wasn't that fast.

[38] As they went down, they would actually stop and have to use their feet to get going again.

[39] But that was because they had these cheap plastic sleds that were not designed for this luge course.

[40] What you needed were these specialty sleds with blades on the sides that got you up to full speed.

[41] And so after the three boys eventually, slowly, painfully made their way all the way down to the bottom of this luge track, they were pretty disappointed but they thought okay well let's just all get in one sled and we'll go down again and with the added weight we should go faster and so they marched their way back up all the way up to the top of the starting house and all three of them sat in one sled and they pushed off and sure enough they went way faster they bombed all the way down this track it was so much fun they were totally exhilarated and after doing it a couple more times they decided okay you know our luck's going to run out we're going to get caught and so they climbed back over that blue fence and so they climbed back over that blue fence and so snuck out of the park without getting caught.

[42] The following weekend, those three same boys, along with five of their friends they had recruited, returned to Canada Olympic Park after hours.

[43] And so the three boys that had been there the weekend before, they led the group up the hill, they got to that blue fence that surrounded the Luge starting house.

[44] And one by one, each of these teenage boys climbed up and over this fence, and they made the way up the stairs into the starting house.

[45] Once they were inside, they began figuring out who was going to go in each of the three sleds they had brought along, and they determined they would put three boys in the first sled, three boys in the second sled, and two boys in the final sled.

[46] Because of how successful the previous weekends trip down the Luge track had been, according to the three boys that had gone, this time the group decided they did not need helmets because this was relatively safe.

[47] They also decided not to bring headlamps because they figured it would be more exhilarating to go flying down this track in the darkness.

[48] And so a little after midnight on February 6th, the first three boys climbed into the first sled and pushed off.

[49] At first, it was going exactly to plan.

[50] It was fun, they were going fast, it was exhilarating, but then disaster struck.

[51] Unlike the previous weekend, this night, this weekend, there was a metal chain that had been strung across one of the sections towards the bottom of the Luge track.

[52] It was there to keep a particular section of the track in place.

[53] And so these boys, as they come flying around the corner, they don't see it, and they strike this chain at full speed.

[54] Now, this chain was at neck height, and so when it hit them, it instantly decapitated and killed one of the boys.

[55] It was a 17 -year -old named Evan Caldwell, and so he dies immediately, and the other two are thrown from the sled and landed unconscious.

[56] Now, back up at the starting house, they have no way of knowing this has happened to the first sled, not only because they can't see anything, but also because the boys in the first sled are not making any sound they're either unconscious or deceased and so at some point this second group of boys thinks they've waited long enough to account for the first sled to get down and out of the way and so they load up their sled and they push off and so they go flying down it's going great but just like the first sled at some point they turn that corner and they hit that chain but miraculously the second group of three boys they hit the chain in such a way that they kind of slipped under it.

[57] And so they were all thrown from their sled and kind of smashed into the track, but the worst injury of the second sled was just a broken ankle.

[58] And so this group, they stand up and they're totally disoriented.

[59] It's dark.

[60] They don't know what they just ran into.

[61] And before they had a chance to kind of collect their thoughts and yell up to the starting house to try to warn the third and final group not to go, it was already too late.

[62] All the boys could do in the second sled group was to just get out of the way as the third and final sled carrying the final two boys came bombing down and way too struck that chain at full speed.

[63] One of the two boys on board this third and final sled was a 17 -year -old named Jordan Caldwell, and he too, unfortunately, would be decapitated by the chain and would die instantly.

[64] And he was actually the twin brother of Evan Caldwell, the boy on the first sled who had also died.

[65] The other boy on the third sled would be thrown from the sled and would suffer grievous injuries as well.

[66] One of the survivors of the crash, who was actually on the first sled, his name was Caleb, and he was knocked unconscious from being thrown.

[67] When he came to, he was laying in a section of the track that was covered by a tarp, and at first he couldn't see anything, he couldn't hear anything, but he just felt like there was something lodged in his throat, and it was making it very hard to breathe.

[68] Most likely, that was just from his throat being crushed in from hitting that chain.

[69] And so as he's struggling to breathe, his senses began to come back to him, and his sight came back, and he noticed he was laying down, and one of the boys who had been on the second sled was kneeling next to him.

[70] This was one of the boys that had not been badly hurt, and he had his hand on Caleb's shoulder, and he was praying for Caleb to survive.

[71] And so as Caleb is taking in that someone is praying over him, he notices somewhere else, his hearing is starting to pick up.

[72] He can hear someone else, and it would turn out to be a boy named Mark, who was on the first sled, who had been very badly injured, his face was very badly beaten up.

[73] He was laying somewhere nearby, and he was just singing this religious song.

[74] He was trying to keep spirits high, and he was trying to will people to hold on and to survive as long as they possibly could.

[75] And then Caleb remembered hearing someone calling 911, and then he doesn't remember what happened next.

[76] When the paramedics ultimately arrived within the hour, they got to the track, and they found all of these boys.

[77] spread out all over the track because when they hit this chain they got sent flying but they discovered the twins were actually laying right next to each other and none of these surviving boys had moved their bodies and so even though the grief was just unfathomable amongst this family that had lost their two sons there was some solace in the fact that despite having come down in different sleds that the twins Evan and Jordan were together in their final moments.

[78] The six survivors of this accident would walk away from it with life -changing head injuries and other medical issues, and they would walk away with an indescribable sense of guilt and regret.

[79] But they consider themselves lucky because at least they survived.

[80] Hey, all you fans of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious.

[81] It's me, Mr. Ballin, and today I have some big news.

[82] It's something I'm holding in my hands right now, and so obviously you can't see it, but this is something you're really going to want to see.

[83] It's the first ever official Mr. Ballin publication.

[84] It's a graphic novel, and it's called Mr. Ballin Presents, Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, The Graphic Stories.

[85] It's an anthology of both classic and brand new, terrifying stories that we've never covered on any of my other platforms, because we created them specifically for this first book.

[86] Each of these stories in the book are feature -length, Mr. Ballin's stories that really needed to be told visually.

[87] And the artwork in this book is, I mean, I'm looking at it, and it's just absolutely.

[88] stunning.

[89] So the book is not actually coming out until my birthday this year, October 1st, but you can pre -order it right now at book .ballinstudios .com.

[90] Again, that's book .bollinstudios .com.

[91] If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good, you are a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious.

[92] And if that's the case, then I've got some good news.

[93] We just launched a brand -new Strange Dark and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.

[94] And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years, and we finally decided to take the plunge, and the show is awesome.

[95] In this free, weekly show, we explore bizarre, unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between.

[96] Each story is totally true and totally terrifying.

[97] Go follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a prime member, you can listen early and ad -free on Amazon Music.

[98] The next story, which is our number two story on today's list, is called The Loner.

[99] Mary Sirudy had a difficult childhood.

[100] Growing up in the 1950s and early 1960s in Houston, Texas, Mary's family barely had enough money to get by, and then by the time Mary was 21, both of her parents had passed away, leaving her with nothing.

[101] After their deaths, Mary kind of bounced around Houston, going from one low -paying job to the next, and then eventually she met a man that she fell madly in love with, and they got married, but unfortunately that marriage would end in divorce.

[102] After Mary got over that heartbreak, she would meet another man who she would also fall in love with and they would get married too, but like her first marriage, this one also ended in divorce.

[103] At this point, Mary was so devastated by yet another heartbreak that she just kind of accepted that she was not going to get married again.

[104] She was not going to have a family of her own.

[105] But she didn't let this get her down.

[106] Instead, she kind of embraced her life as a loner.

[107] Fast forward to 2015, and Mary was 61 years old, and she was still living alone.

[108] She lived in a small home in a Houston neighborhood.

[109] This neighborhood, over the last several decades, had really begun to grow.

[110] Lots of new apartment complexes were being built all the time, and in fact, one of the apartment developers had approached Mary and offered to buy her house so they could build over her land, but she had refused because she loved her house.

[111] She did not want to sell.

[112] It didn't matter what they offered her.

[113] And so she was the only house in this long stretch of apartment buildings that didn't sell.

[114] But Mary kind of liked it.

[115] She wrote in her diary that her bungalow was like a castle, and all these apartment buildings all around her were her castle walls.

[116] Mary didn't really have much contact with other people.

[117] She didn't have a consistent job, so she didn't have relationships with coworkers.

[118] She didn't have much contact, if any, with her living family.

[119] And she really didn't have any friends, with the exception of one woman who was in town, who owned an arts and craft shop, who Mary would periodically go into town and say hello to.

[120] But despite all that, Mary was not lonely.

[121] She had lots and lots of cats, and she loved cats.

[122] Anytime she saw a stray cat out in the neighborhood, Mary would get the cat food and water, and then eventually would try to coax the cat to come into her house, and then when it did, she would win the cat's trust, and then she would give it a place to live, and she would feed it and take care of it.

[123] And so before long, she had dozens of cats living in the house with her.

[124] And so these cats kind of became Mary's best friends.

[125] And so she rarely left the house, if ever.

[126] She mostly just stayed in the house with them.

[127] In February of that year, one of Mary's neighbors happened to be walking by her property, and they looked over and they saw a stack of mail had grown on her front porch, indicating that Mary had not opened her door to get her mail.

[128] And this neighbor also noticed that while Mary's property did tend to get a little bit overgrown, with the trees and the grass.

[129] It was exceptionally overgrown, like no one was even trying to take care of it.

[130] And so this neighbor was concerned that maybe something had happened to marry, and so they opened up our fence, they walked across the yard, they went up onto the porch, and they knocked on the front door, but it was silent.

[131] And so this neighbor kind of leaned over and looked in the window that was just to the left of the door to see if maybe they could look inside, but there was a curtain drawn across that window, so they couldn't see anything.

[132] And so the neighbor tried knocking on the door one more time, but again, met with silence.

[133] And so after standing there for a minute, the neighbor left the front porch and walked around to the side of the house to see if maybe they could look in one of those windows, but when they went around to the side, those windows were covered with curtains too.

[134] So the neighbor walked back to the front of the property and just stood there looking at the house, wondering what they should do, and something told them that something's off, something's wrong, someone needs to make sure Mary really is okay.

[135] Someone needs to get inside of this house.

[136] And so the neighbor called the Houston police and explained the situation.

[137] A few minutes later, the Houston police arrived, and they too went right up onto Mary's porch, they knocked on her door, it was met with silence, and so after that, the police talked to one of the other neighbors and got a key that Mary had apparently given them previously, and the police went back to Mary's front door, they used the key, they unlocked the door, they opened it up, and right away they were hit with this horrible smell coming from inside the house.

[138] The police pushed the door the rest of the way opened, and they stepped inside and they yelled out for Mary, but it was silent.

[139] And then before the police even began walking around looking for her, they looked off to their left and the right inside of the house, and they saw there were all these dead cats all over the ground.

[140] And so the Houston police didn't know what happened to Mary, but right away they're thinking, okay, you know, we've seen scenarios like this before where someone who lives alone that no one really checks on, dies unexpectedly, and then when they pass away, all of their pets are trapped in the house, they're not getting fed, and so they pass away too.

[141] And so the police at this point are fully expecting to find Mary's dead body somewhere in the house.

[142] And so they begin walking through the house looking for it.

[143] But after searching the house top to bottom, they could not find Mary.

[144] And so the police leave Mary's house.

[145] And at this point, there are people outside gathered because they see the police cars.

[146] And so the police grabbed a couple of the neighbors and they asked them, you know, do you know anything about this woman?

[147] You know, did she say anything about where she was going?

[148] Did you see her leave at any point?

[149] and the consensus amongst the neighbors they spoke to was that Mary basically kept to herself, she did not travel, she didn't go anywhere, she mostly just stayed in her house with her cats.

[150] And so it was very unlikely that she would have just abandoned the property and abandoned her cats because she loved them so much.

[151] And so the police at this point are thinking, okay, she's got to be in this house somewhere.

[152] And so the police called a few more officers to the property and the group went back inside of Mary's house and they really looked for Mary, thinking that, you know, maybe she slipped into a closet and that's where she passed away, or, you know, maybe she's just hidden somewhere in the house.

[153] And so they really kind of ripped the house apart looking for her.

[154] But again, there was just nothing.

[155] And so after they finally stopped the search without finding Mary, the police contacted Mary's extended family and they asked them the same questions, you know, did Mary say anything about a trip she was going to take?

[156] You know, is there any reason she would just abandon her property?

[157] And they all would say, look, we don't talk to Mary, we don't know where she went, we have no idea.

[158] And so for a little while, the Houston police continued to search for Mary in and around Houston, but eventually, after finding nothing, the search kind of stopped, and they reached out to Mary's family and said, you know, if you hear anything else about what happened to Mary, please let us know.

[159] Several months later, Mary's house went into foreclosure because no one was making the payments anymore, and the bank put her house up for auction.

[160] And a real estate entrepreneur in Houston bought the house up quickly, and after cleaning it out, he put it on the market to be rented out.

[161] And for the next couple of years, several tenants lived in Mary's old house, none of them staying for very long.

[162] Then in March of 2017, when the property was vacant, this young couple reached out to the landlord and said they were looking to rent and they were hoping to potentially stay in this property for two or three years.

[163] The landlord was thrilled and he sent over a lease for them to sign.

[164] And then once the couple had signed the lease and the property was theirs, the husband decided to just go over on his own and walk around the property and see what they would need to buy in terms of furnishing.

[165] And so the husband arrives at the property, he goes in the front door, he walks around the first floor, and then at some point he decides he wants to go up into the attic to see how much storage space they have.

[166] And so he gets underneath the trap door in the ceiling, he grabs the string and he pulls it down, revealing this folded up ladder, he flips down the lower ladder piece and puts it on the ground, and then he began climbing up.

[167] Once he got up into the attic, he stayed standing on the ladder and just kind of scanned around, and he saw there really wasn't much up there.

[168] There was a couple of metal cages that appeared to have been for pets or something, but it was very dirty and dark, and it appeared like no one had really come up here in a long time.

[169] And he kind of assumed that, you know, the other tenants weren't using this as a storage space.

[170] And so the husband was about to go back down the ladder when he noticed off to the right side of the attic, kind of far away from the ladder, right where the roof begins to pitch down, he saw one of the floorboards was kind of popped up like it shouldn't be.

[171] And he stared at it and he's looking around at the rest of the attic and all of the floorboards were perfectly uniform, but that one was really jacked up.

[172] And so he was curious, and so he climbed up into the attic, and he kind of stooped down, and he walked over to this loose floorboard, and when he was standing over it, he could tell that this floorboard had kind of popped off of this hole in the ground, that the floorboard had been covering this hole, but the hole was dark, and so he pulled out his phone, and he turned on his flashlight, and he looked straight down, and he aimed the light into this hole.

[173] Now, this hole was basically just a gap between two of the walls on the first floor, And so he's shining his light down into this gap, and he sees at the bottom the remains of the woman the Houston police have been looking for for the past two years, Mary Saruti.

[174] While no one knows for sure exactly what happened to her, it's believed back in early 2015 when she went missing, she had gone up into the attic where perhaps her cats liked to sunbathe off to the side of the attic because there was a big window that looked into the attic.

[175] And so she went up there to maybe feed the cats or check on the cats that were up there.

[176] And when she walked over to that side of the attic where the window looked in, she stepped on that loose floorboard and it gave out from her weight.

[177] And she kind of fell through it like a trap door and fell down into that gap between the walls.

[178] It's unlikely she was hurt from this fall.

[179] But when she stood back up again in this kind of narrow space, she would have realized very quickly that there was nowhere for her to go.

[180] You can't go left, you can't go right, and you can't get back up into the attic.

[181] It was too far up for her to reach.

[182] And there was no way for her to kind of use the walls to climb back up because the space she was in was so narrow.

[183] I mean, she could barely move.

[184] She also didn't have a cell phone on her, so she couldn't call anyone.

[185] If she screamed out, no one would have heard her because she was behind several walls of insulation.

[186] And because no one ever checked on her, there was no one that was just going to find her trapped in the wall.

[187] She was totally on her own.

[188] And so trapped in this little space, Mary spent probably a couple of days screaming and trying to get her way out, but nothing worked, and then eventually she passed away, and then unfortunately, all of her cats did too.

[189] Her death was ruled an accident.

[190] The next and final story, which is the top story of today's list, is called Ruaheen Range.

[191] In late 2002, 25 -year -old Jason Chase worked as a sheep shearer in an area called Gisborne, which is located in the northeastern section of New Zealand.

[192] When Jason wasn't working, he was often on his bike, cycling up and down the coast, preparing for his next road race.

[193] In early December of that year, Jason contacted his family who lived in a small town called Daneverg, which is located about 200 miles southwest of Gisborne, and he told them that he wanted to come visit them for Christmas.

[194] However, he didn't know exactly when he would actually arrive at their house because his training and work schedule were fairly hectic, but he told them, don't worry, I will be there at least on Christmas Day December 25th or a couple of days earlier.

[195] His family was thrilled and they said, no problem, we can't wait to see you whenever that is.

[196] And so by the time mid -December rolled around and Jason still had not arrived at his family's home in Danneverk, his family wasn't concerned at all.

[197] However, that would soon change.

[198] On December 13th, a hunter was driving along the many winding backroads of the Ruaheen Mountain Range.

[199] This mountain range, which is located about 8 miles north of Danverk, is a very isolated and rugged wilderness area that's full of steep gorges and gullies and very thick brush.

[200] And so as this hunter rounds the turn on this road, he looks up ahead and he sees there's a car parked on the side of the road.

[201] And so this hunter pulls up right alongside this car and he looks over and he can tell, you know, there's no one inside of it, there's no obvious damage to the car.

[202] And then the hunter began kind of scanning around the area to see if there was some.

[203] some obvious reasons someone would stop right at that particular spot, but when he looked around, all he saw was thick trees on either side, and the mountain kind of sloped down on either side.

[204] And so there was nothing unique about the spot, and so something just kind of struck the hunter as odd about this car.

[205] It just seemed totally out of place.

[206] And so operating on a hunch, the hunter would leave the mountain range and head into Daneverg, and he would contact police, and he would tell them about this car and where it was located, because in the hunter's you know, maybe someone had been reported missing in the area, and maybe this car is connected.

[207] And so after hearing about the car, the police did not know of any missing person cases that were connected to a car that matched the description the hunter had given.

[208] But just to be safe, the police hopped in their vehicles, and they drove up into the Ruhaheen Mountain Range, and they went to the spot the hunter described, and sure enough, off to the side of the road is this parked car, and it's still unoccupied.

[209] After inspecting the vehicle, the police came to the same conclusion the hunter did that there was no obvious signs of damage to the car that might have forced someone to abandon it, and then when they looked in the window at the gas gauge, they saw the gauge was full.

[210] And so the police kind of wandered around the area, kind of doing an initial search to see if maybe the owner of this car was nearby, but there was no one there.

[211] They're in this very isolated part of this wilderness area, and so the police just took down the license plate of the car, and they went back to their station.

[212] station.

[213] And when they got there, they ran the license plate number and it turned out the car belonged to Jason Chase.

[214] When Jason's family was contacted about, you know, why is Jason's car up in the Ruaheen Mountains?

[215] You know, where's Jason?

[216] His family was pretty surprised.

[217] They explained to police that Jason had made plans to come visit them around Christmas time and so they were expecting him to come this way.

[218] And you know, the Ruaheen Mountain Range, it is only eight miles away from Daniburk.

[219] So, you know, In theory, maybe he stopped there on the way to their house, but they told police that just didn't make any sense.

[220] So, as a precaution, the police decided to launch a search for Jason.

[221] And unfortunately, despite hundreds of people on the ground searching the Ruaheen Mountain Range and helicopters overhead flying all over the place, no trace of Jason was found.

[222] And so the official search was called off right before Christmas, but Jason's family and friends, they continued to look for him.

[223] And on January 3rd, they would find him.

[224] One of the family friends who had agreed to continue looking for Jason after the official search had shut down was a farmer who owned a plane.

[225] And on January 3rd, as he did one of his passes over the foothills of the Ruaheen Mountain Range, he looked down and he saw this bright red thing that looked totally out of place.

[226] And the pilot couldn't tell what it was, and so he took note of its location.

[227] And then when he landed, he passed those coalitions.

[228] coordinates off to the ground team.

[229] And so the ground team, they made their way over to this location, which was quite far away from where Jason's car had been.

[230] And after making their way through some very thick brush and some very steep sections, they eventually walked out to this big open clearing.

[231] It was a dry riverbed.

[232] And right in front of them in the middle of it was the bright red thing.

[233] It was Jason's shirt.

[234] And Jason was still wearing it.

[235] He was found lying on his left side with his legs stretched out, he had on his bright red rugby t -shirt, some khaki shorts on, and he had no shoes or socks on.

[236] According to the searchers who first saw Jason in this dry creek bed, they would say the scene was very peaceful and it almost looked like Jason had lied down to fall asleep, but Jason was not sleeping.

[237] He was dead.

[238] Jason had no visible injuries and there was no sign of a struggle in the area.

[239] In fact, it didn't even look like Jason had been in the wild for very long because his clothes were pristine and despite being barefoot, his feet were in great condition.

[240] Despite a lengthy search around the area where his body was discovered, his shoes and socks would not be recovered.

[241] The only thing they found in the area was a water bottle that belonged to Jason.

[242] Adding to the mystery of what happened to Jason were the results of his autopsy.

[243] The pathologist was unable to find any injuries.

[244] Jason also seemed well -nourished, because he had food in his stomach, and he was hydrated because there was urine in his bladder.

[245] His toxicology report also came back negative for all drugs, medications, and a range of common poisons.

[246] The only odd thing the pathologist found during the autopsy was that Jason had two very small ulcers in his duodenum, which is the first part of the small intestine.

[247] According to this pathologist, these type of ulcers only appear from acute stress moments before death.

[248] However, these ulcers don't indicate what caused the stress.

[249] Typically, things like severe injury or septicemia, which is blood poisoning, will cause these stress ulcers.

[250] But Jason had neither of those.

[251] So at the end of the autopsy, the pathologist concluded that Jason had not been the victim of a homicide, he had not committed suicide, he had died from, quote, obscure natural causes.

[252] Interestingly, though, the pathologist was able to determine with some certainty that Jason died on or around December 30th, which means he was alive for the entirety of the official search for him, as well as the bulk of that private search conducted by friends and family.

[253] After the autopsy results came out, Jason's case was closed, and his family, despite having lots of unanswered questions, was forced to just move on.

[254] Fifteen years later, the same pathologist that had conducted Jason's autopsy was talking to a colleague about Jason's case.

[255] And as he was describing where Jason was found, the colleague suddenly stopped the pathologist and said, wait a minute, I think I know what happened to him.

[256] And it would turn out he did.

[257] The following is a reconstruction of what happened to Jason Chase.

[258] On December 13, 2002, Jason left his home in Gisborne and began heading south towards Danaverk where his family lived.

[259] But before he got to his family's home, He took a detour up into the Ruaheen mountain range where he eventually parked his car on the side of the road.

[260] Once his car was stopped, he got out and collected his backpack and sleeping bag.

[261] Those were two items that were never discovered during the search or after his body was found, but it was later determined they were missing from his vehicle.

[262] And so after he has his pack and his sleeping bag, he also grabs a water bottle, and then he leaves the main road and begins walking into the woods, making his way down the mountain.

[263] He eventually would find a spot on the side of the mountain that he liked, and so he set up a campsite.

[264] What happens next is very confusing, because we don't actually know why Jason actually went camping in the first place or when he intended to leave, but we can make one assumption.

[265] Whatever he was doing in the mountains, he planned on wrapping it up in time to still get to his family's house in Danneverk on or before Christmas Day, December 25th.

[266] So, from December 13th, when he first got out of his car and entered the wilderness until December 25th, it's believed Jason was by choice out in the wilderness of the Ruhaheen Mountain Range.

[267] And so as this huge search is launched for him in the area he is in, it's entirely possible that he either did not see any of the searchers.

[268] This is a very rugged and heavily forested area, and so that's not totally outlandish.

[269] Or two, even if he did see the searchers, he may not have recognized that they were looking for him, because remember, during that time frame, he didn't think he was in danger.

[270] He was out in the wilderness camping by choice.

[271] But sometime around December 25th, or maybe a couple of days before, when he needed to leave and go back to Danever to see his family, after packing up his stuff, for whatever reason, he could not get back up to the road where his car was.

[272] Either there was some sort of physical boundary, or maybe he got lost, but either way, instead of going back up the mountain, we know Jason actually turned and began going down the mountain, away from the road and away from his car.

[273] It's believed Jason actually just decided he would hike his way out of the mountains.

[274] He was in great shape, very healthy guy, and he probably figured he could just hike the eight miles to Daneverk, and then he could have someone drive him back up and retrieve his car at a later date.

[275] But on or around December 30th, Jason was still out in the mountains.

[276] And at this point, he had abandoned his backpack and his sleeping bag and had most likely removed his shoes and socks for reasons we don't know.

[277] But he had managed to get much closer to Daneverk.

[278] He just had to navigate a few more steep sections and then he'd be home free.

[279] And so on or around December 30th, Jason began slowly making his way down the mountainside until he reached a decision point.

[280] He found himself standing at the top of two very steep gullies that both would bring him down to a dry stretch of riverbed, and so either option worked, it just became a matter of which one is safer.

[281] And so after making his assessment about which gully he should take, he made his choice, and he made his way down, and he reached the dry riverbed.

[282] And it was at this point that Jason would have begun to feel a pain in his stomach.

[283] and that pain would have gotten worse and worse and worse to the point where Jason likely sat down on this dry riverbed, kind of waiting for the pain to subside, but it wouldn't.

[284] It would only intensify.

[285] And so as he's sitting there kind of wondering what's going on, his vision would begin to blur, and then he would start to struggle breathing.

[286] And before he could deal with all of these strange symptoms that were coming on really suddenly, he lost the ability to move his body and he slumped over onto his left side, and there he would lay until he died.

[287] It would turn out the gully that Jason had chosen to go down when he was standing at the top and he had those two choices.

[288] The one he chose, that one contained a plant called Erticaferix.

[289] This plant, which is endemic to New Zealand, grows leaves that are covered in little rigid stinging hairs that contain a toxin called Trifidin.

[290] And Trifidin, in high enough doses, not only causes stomach pain and blurred vision and trouble breathing, but it also causes total body paralysis and even death.

[291] Jason, who, according to friends, would have known about the dangers this plant posed, likely just didn't see the cluster of plants when he was assessing which gully to go down.

[292] And so it wasn't until he was partway down the gully and was in these plants that he realized his mistake, but when he turned to go back up, it was just too steep.

[293] And so he was forced to trudge through these toxic plants.

[294] And because he was wearing shorts, his lower legs were exposed and they were stung repeatedly.

[295] And so he was dealt a lethal dose.

[296] The reason the pathologist was not able to identify this as Jason's cause of death is because the stingers on those plants, they don't leave any marks on the human body.

[297] And its poison, Trifidin, is so rare that when they sent out that toxicology report, they didn't include it.

[298] They did not test for Trifidin.

[299] And so it wasn't until 15 years later when the pathologist's colleague heard that Jason had been found in the Ruhaheen Mountains that the colleague said, wait a minute, have you checked for Trifidon?

[300] Because he knew the Ruhaheen Mountains were home to clusters of that toxic plant.

[301] And so sure enough, they went back to where Jason's body had been found.

[302] and lining the gully that he had come down for dozens and dozens of those plants.

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[325] She struck him with her motor vehicle.

[326] She had been under the influence and that she left him there.

[327] In January 2022, local woman Karen Reid was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O 'Keefe.

[328] It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location.

[329] What happens next?

[330] Depends on who you ask.

[331] Was it a crime of passion?

[332] If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling.

[333] This was clearly an intentional act.

[334] And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia.

[335] Or a corrupt police cover -up.

[336] If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover -up to prevent one of their own from going down.

[337] Everyone had an opinion.

[338] And after the 10 -week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision.

[339] To end in a mistrial, it's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is.

[340] Law and crime presents the most in -depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen.

[341] You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery Plus.

[342] Join Wondery Plus in the Wondry app, Apple Podcast, or Spotify.