September 14, 2018 • 44 mins
Join Ben, Matt and Noel as they interview Payne Lindsey, the creator of Atlanta Monster and Up and Vanished, for a behind-the-scenes look at Payne's process for developing these shows (as well as a sneak peek on Up and Vanished Season 2).
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M
(00:24):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my
name is normal. They call me Ben. We are joined
with our super producer Paul Decans. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know, but not any normal episode of
stuff they'll want you know. Not as if we've ever
had a normal episode. Yeah, it changed so quickly on us.
(00:48):
But this episode is a little bit different because we
are delving into uh several different stories that you are
doubtlessly familiar with if you have explored podcast in the past,
and we're not doing it alone today. We are joined
by UH filmmaker, documentary and co creator and host of
(01:12):
the hit podcast Up and Vanished, Friends and neighbors, conspiracy
realists and skeptics alike. Uh say hello to Payne lindsay
not too much, man, We're just over here. You know.
On this show, we talked about true crime a whole lot. Um.
We delve into all different aspects of it, but we
really were excited to talk to you somebody who's created
(01:35):
a whole show and a series of shows about true crime,
specifically where you you get to spend more than just
one episode talking about a case, where you get to
delve into every single aspect. And you know, with your
show Up and Vanished as season one, man the Tera
Grinstad case. UM, I just wonder if anybody hasn't listened
to this yet, who was listening to this show right now?
(01:56):
Can you give everyone just kind of a brief overview
of that case? Yeah? Sure so, Stephen, one of the
Up and Vanished covered a missing person's case in South
Georgia is a missing beauty queen and high school teacher
named Tera Grinstead. It was over ten years cold and
there were no leads anymore, and people pretty much just
stopped talking about it in South Georgia. And I came
(02:19):
around and made a podcast about our disappearance and it
started interging people in the town. And then about six
months into the podcast, about halfway through, there was a
major break in the case and a tip came forth
to law enforcement, which promptly to search this e con
orchard and um, they've made two arrests for terrorist murder.
(02:40):
So it was a huge story. And UM, it's bizarre
because when I first got involved, it was kind of
like this sort of um part of the town that
people don't want to talk about this anymore at all.
They were um afraid to mention people's names. Over the years,
over a decade, people of pointed fingers at each other,
and they kind of given up on the idea of,
(03:01):
you know, ever really finding out what happened is here.
It was such a big mystery. But about six months
into the podcast, there was a major break in the case.
And from that point forward we essentially followed um the
suspects and their friends and interviewed everybody and actually just recently, um,
the one of the accused, Ryan Duke, hired a new
attorney and in the next six months or so, there
(03:22):
should be a trial in Tyr Grinstead's case. Oh man, wow,
that's I mean, that's powerful stuff too. And this is
something that a lot of the folks in our audience
today are definitely wondering when when they hear about the
story about the investigation that you conducted under your own power,
(03:44):
especially at first there several of the people listening now
are probably aspiring keyboard sleuths right to use use the
phrase that I think you came up with, Matt. So
we'd like to ask on their behalf about the process.
How did you begin, um, making these connections and tracking
down the this information that in some cases it sounds
(04:07):
like people did not want you to find. I mean,
it's really difficult, but it's it's the same way as
you could think of on your own if you've ever
been on Reddit or the up Advantage discussion board, different
websites like web slues. Um, it's all the same thing.
You know, you try to find people's names, you find
their contact information. Actually use Facebook a lot because you
(04:29):
can see their faces and you can verify that that's
who they are. You can see their friends and so
I know I'll I do that usually just just with
my own real Facebook profile too, So you know, if
I'm reaching out to a stranger, I'm saying, hey, look
here's pictures of me and my family. I'm a real person.
I'm not just some catfish online. So um, you know,
(04:50):
it's a It can be exhausting sometimes because you know,
you can go down a rabbit hole that is just
completely just nothing, and you know I've done that before.
Several times admittedly, But UM, I think you have to
do that to find the truth. Sometimes, UM, you don't
know that until you reached the bottom of that hole
and you realize, oh, okay, well there's nothing here, or
(05:11):
this is just all wrong. Um. And that's kind of
like the synopsis of she'son one of up and vanished
in a lot of ways, you know, I was. I
basically started with the two or three persons of interest
that law enforcement had unofficially announced to the media and
that everyone had covered over the years, and explored all
(05:32):
of these people and their friends and um, everything else extensively,
and then it didn't really go anywhere. Things were weird
and suspicious, but there was nothing concrete, none of it
really made sense. And then sure enough, out of the blue,
there was a tip that came forward, and um it
was two guys no one ever heard of, two former students.
So you know, there's a lot to be learned, um
(05:54):
from my first go around. And uh, I had definitely
am applying a lot of that to season two, and um,
it's an entirely different case and it's complex in different ways. Oh,
it most certainly is uh, and I want to get
into that in just a second page. I just want
to stick on season one just because they're there are
a couple moments in here in um in Minutia I
(06:15):
want to just explore with you. So you know, you're
talking about just giving your Facebook out to random people
that you don't know, you don't know how they're involved,
necessarily in the case at least behind closed doors, right, Um.
But you're putting yourself out there doing that, and this
is a small town where people know each other, where
there is a real threat of some kind of perhaps
(06:37):
retaliation from either a person or a group of people
that actually carried out this murder. Um, Like, what what
kind of security measures did you end up getting in
place when you're walking around that town on foot, when
you're talking to people maybe in their house or at
a public place, Like, how do you protect yourself? It's
funny because that at first I didn't really think about
(06:58):
it too much. I just have my blinders on one
and I was just being almost foolishly fearless about it
and just didn't really, you think too much about my
own safety. I was too determined to figure out what
was going on, and most of the time it was
from the comfort of my own home if I was
on my computer and making phone calls. But um, when
I went down there, I definitely took more precautions and
(07:20):
I didn't really you know, make a whole bunch of
noise when I was there. And it really wasn't until
the very end um of the season, after the arrest
had been made and I was interviewing different friends of
the suspects, that I felt really uncomfortable down um, and
I was still a Georgia for the first time, And
it was at that point that I realized, Okay, I'm
(07:41):
not coming down here again alone one and UM, I'm
gonna have a completely different game plan whenever I come
back here. And so i've um, I've since been back
to film some stuff for the TV show that we
have in the works, and this this go around, we
actually had security with us and they were outside of
our door the whole night. Um, they were staying the
(08:04):
stay in the same hotels as we did, so we
actually kind of hiring security. And the last time we
were there. And by the way, that is the I
think it's been announced enough now that we can say
that's been It's going to be developed with oxygen, right, Yeah,
that's correct, So look for the Up and Vanished TV
show on Oxygen. Everybody, Yes, yeah, and let us let
(08:24):
us know what you think about it, because it's no
secret that here at stuff they'll want you to know.
We're also excited and you can't wait to see, can't
wait to see how it all turns out and how
the puzzle pieces matched together. When we're talking about security,
naturally we begin to wonder about law enforcement, right, especially
(08:47):
in the situation that occurs in Up and Vanished season one,
And for everyone who's listening there there may be spoiler
territory here. But one of the questions and we have
to ask is, given that the relationship between law enforcement
and journalists can be such a complicated thing, Uh, did
(09:08):
did you feel any support or did you feel any
I guess, on the other extreme animosity from local authorities
when you were poking around initially in this case, well,
at first, um in Terra Grinsett's case, at first local
law enforcement, the Asilibo Police Department was pretty welcoming to me. Uh.
(09:31):
They wanted the case solved too, and they had essentially
run out of leeds. Anyone who was going to go
out on a limb and try to solve this and
piece this together on their own. Um, they supported that.
So at first it was they were pretty cooperative. Now,
the gb I, the Georgia Room investigation, they never really
talked to me in the beginning, and from what I've heard,
(09:54):
that's that's sort of like them. It's still an active
case in their eyes, there was an active investigations. They
didn't want to divulge any details about the case or
really comment on it too much. But um, really halfway
through the series is when things started to change. Once
there was to arrest in the case, it just got
real again. It went from being a colde case to
(10:16):
a murder case with two suspects that have been arrested,
and so with that comes all these new rumors about
these people and almost a live investigation again. And so
from that point forward, really no law enforcement wanted to
talk to me at all. And um, you know, really,
if you listen to the entire series, there's not a
(10:38):
single interview with a police officer that was a part
of that case. None. And it's kind of hard to
imagine that now, but um, that's just the way it was. Wow.
But you so you did have assistance there, I mean,
there are so many voices on the show. You had
assistance from investigators and some other people that came through
and ended up assisting you in some way, right, I
(11:00):
wouldn't I wouldn't call an assistance. I think it was
just they were they were supportive of the podcast and
someone telling terror story on a major platform, but they
weren't giving me tips or pointing me in a direction.
They stayed. They steered very clear of that, and really
(11:21):
they it seemed like after the arrest they didn't really
want to touch the podcast at all. So when you're
out there interviewing folks, I'm sure you want to travel
lights so you can be kind of like you know, UM,
nimble and getting around and getting as much in as
you can. What kind of equipment do you use when
you're out in the field recording interviews and chasing down leads?
(11:41):
What's your kid? My kid is my MacBook Pro and
all of my files sinked on dropbox and for the
team to share. And I usually I just run with
a Zoom eight six and either a shotgun mike attached
to it, or I'm running like a really short xcel
(12:03):
our table to a better sounding mic UM and then
someone's usually holding that. But I like to have one
eight six with an onboard mic on it at all
times just in case I'm all of a sudden talking
to someone who's telling me something very important, I'd rather
not record it on my phone, so I get some
decent audio from an onboard microphone with the Zoom made six.
(12:23):
But that's that's pretty much it. It's pretty simple. That's awesome,
and it's actually pretty affordable. And there are some other
versions of that Zoom that you can get there even cheaper.
If you're thinking about starting your own thing listening out
there or you know, checking it out, you can you
can affordably get some stuff to make a pretty cool show.
And we'll return to this story after a word from
(12:46):
our sponsor, and we're back. While we're talking about inspiration,
let's take a let's go a little bit further down
the rabbit hole, because, as long time listeners, No Pain,
You and Tenderfoot TV did not just create up and vanished.
(13:10):
You also have created Atlanta Monster along with for peek
behind the scenes, uh collaboration with our very own Matt
Frederick and Ben Bowling and Paul and you know, yeah,
well it's a teamwork makes the dream work. But the
reason this goes to a question of inspiration is I'm
(13:30):
sure many people are curious to learn what originally inspired
you and uh, you're Donald and your team at Tenderfoot
to investigate the story of Wayne Williams. Yeah, definitely, Really
it was. It was my business partner Donald who brought
Way Williams to my attention, and I had never heard
of the Atlanta childmers before it happened in the early eighties,
(13:52):
and I just started diving into the story and looking
into it and just taking me back to that time
period is seeing how different Atlanta was. I just saw
so many different reasons to tell this story. Beyond the
question whether or not Wayne Williams was incent or guilty.
I saw sort of paying a picture of a time
period that was in some ways forgotten and that shouldn't be.
(14:14):
If I didn't know about the atlantild murders, that meant
that there was probably thousands, hundreds of thousands of people
who also didn't know about the child murders, and it
turns out that was correct. Um. I just saw there
was so much to explore there, and I thought the
race part of it seemed extremely relevant. To today, and
I thought that we could, you know, extract some sort
of positive silver lining message from it in some way
(14:37):
so difficult, I thought that we did that. Um and
I just thought it was in some way the history
lesson for people and even for myself. And that's what
I thought. It was so cool because as I was
diving through all the old archives and just inter doing
these people being taken back to a time period that
I wasn't a part of and seeing how different it
was really kind of opened my mind a little bit.
There's a lot of reasons why I chose to to
(14:59):
tell the story the Atlanta child murders, and they weren't
all about Wayne Williams. Just for anybody who hasn't listened yet, Um,
hey to do this to you, Fay, but can you
give us an overview of the Atlanta jal murders case.
You mean you haven't listened to Atlanta Monster. I mean
I haven't heard any of If you haven't listened to
(15:20):
Atlanta Monster, you should be pressing pause right now. Um. So,
Atlanta Monster is about the Atlanta child murders that occurred
in the eighties. There is a man in prison for
some of the murders. His name is Wayne Williams, and
for the past several decades a lot of people have
questioned whether or not Wayne Williams is the right guy.
(15:41):
And Wayne Williams today in still says I'm not the guy.
I didn't kill anybody. So there's always a bunch of
a bunch of conspiracies around this case, a lot of
different advocates either for against Wayne Williams, and a lot
of unsolved murders of these children. Um either way, how
do you slighted? Um? There was upwards of kids on
(16:05):
this list of children who were murdered in Atlanta in
that time period, and only about half of them were
um blamed on WAYN Williams. And what at leasas was
basically is a bunch of unsolved murders of children, And
so they're either way. There was a huge injustice done
(16:27):
whether way Williams was a seal killer or not. So
we essentially explored that and not to get too much away,
but during the podcast, we make contact with way Williams
in prison and he gives us his take on everything,
and he's still flaiming his innocence, but as he gives
us new information that is supposed to prove his innocence.
(16:48):
We kind of go back through that and dissect it
and find out whether or not it's legitimate, and it's
it's complicated, but it would take listening to the whole
series to get a big, bigger picture. So you you
did talk to Wayne Williams. Um Now, perhaps you don't
have to, you don't have to answer to this pain,
But I'm just gonna ask it. How does one talk
(17:11):
to convicted possibly serial killer in prison? Oh? My, I
don't know how I did that. It was I found
it pretty difficult, just because I had to sort of
put on this sort of persona of wanting to hear
everything he had to say, and I wanted to gain
(17:34):
his trust, and I did want to hear him out.
I wanted to hear he told me he had proof
that he was innocent, so I wanted to hear it.
I was gonna give him the benefit of my own
doubts and hear him out. But over time it just
became really difficult because he would call me at random
hours from different numbers in prison, and we would just
(17:56):
talk for long periods of time about the same exact things.
And I sort of realizing that He wasn't really calling
me to to tell me he was innocent, or for
me to get him out of prison, and what he
didn't really seem too concerned about that. He really just
wanted the spotlight. He wanted to He wanted someone to
talk to, like myself, and if it wasn't me, it
(18:17):
was somebody else. And so over time it became harder
to talk to him, and my patience levels significantly decreased.
My patience was pretty much lost there by the end,
and I had to sort of pass way Williams off
to Donald's for a little bit because we were building
the podcast, and you know, our calls weren't very constructive.
(18:40):
They were just sort of rehashing things that didn't really
make sense, and so just kind of grabbing the steering
wheel and and taking it somewhere at all, anywhere of significance.
Was just playing difficult. But um, we did our best
to extract as much information, legitimate information as possible, whether
or not it was true. You know, it is just
(19:03):
for some more background information here, Um just paining you're
talking about just how little time you actually had when
we were in production of this. So, um, there was
a production team on the house stuff works end that
would and you know engineer and work on the shows
and edit to a certain extent, but most of everything
was edited, at least in the major first past, by
(19:25):
you by paying himself, um as he's also like going
out and recording everything and doing the interviews and stuff.
So yeah, time was of the essence, And I can't
imagine getting stuck on the phone for like two hours
at a time you're in a crunch, and even the
hassle of going through the bureaucratic steps necessary to gain
(19:47):
access right to convicted. So we're your calls monitored as well?
Surely they were right, Definitely in any call that came
from the prison itself, it's always monitored, and there little
voice that comes on before the call starts that lets
you know for sure that it's definitely being recorded. And
within these in these conversations, you know, you you hit
(20:10):
on the fact that there was at times this feeling
of talking to a broken record or hearing a record
on repeat. But one thing that fascinates me in this
story is something that you mentioned at the very top
when we're talking about this, that you found stories and
threads that did not necessarily have a direct relationship with
(20:34):
Wayne Williams. Could you tell us maybe one or two
aspects of this journey that surprised you as you dug
further into the investigation. I guess the most surprising part
of it to me was just how severe the injustice
was to some of these families. Talking to the families
myself and um, just hearing their stories in person really
(20:59):
shane to my entire perspective of the Atlantic Ship murders
and way Williams and what the true injustice was here,
So that that threat alone was the biggest just sort
of seeing all these children's murder cases essentially being swept
under the rug, and the FBI and the Atlanta police
honing in on way Williams and wanting this to go
(21:21):
away so badly, and for reasons that aren't just about
catching a killer, reasons that are about preserving the cities. Um,
you know, the way the city looks and feels to
the newcomers, and just Atlanta was on the rise and
people in power saw this as something that needs to
go away, and it needs to go away fast. And
(21:42):
so with that mentality came this sort of um sweeping
under the rug with these cases. And so what happened
is you talk to these families and almost all of
them will tell you that they don't think way Williams
did it. And in my opinion, I don't think that
that's because way Williams didn't necessarily killed there their son
(22:03):
or their daughter. I think it's because they were It
was never proven to them otherwise. No one ever proved
to these families that Wayne Williams killed their child. And
that's the biggest part of this whole whole mystery to me.
And so over the years, decades and decades, it sort
of perpetuates this idea of conspiracies and you know what
(22:25):
the KKK involved, all of these other different threads that
just come to light because it was never proven to
them that it was Wayne Williams. Even if it was
WAYN Williams, they would still tell you otherwise because over
the years, it's sort of the they've developed this sort
of way of thinking about it, and you know, it's
just awful. Um. But that was the biggest thread that
(22:46):
I wanted to explore outside of this Wayne Williams themselves,
was sort of the impact on the families and the
way people have perceived this generations ago. People felt this
way about it and now they're telling them this way
about it. Just sort of seeing the then and out
and kind of exploring all the different people that were
affected by this and there have views on it. To
(23:06):
me was really just the core of the podcast, dude.
So okay, this is another kind of personal question. Making
a show like Up a Vanish or Atlanta Monster, it
requires a certain amount of obsession. I think you would
agree with that, Um, just to get it right. Definitely.
Have you found that that has any psychological effects in
(23:29):
a way that makes you think about the world differently
or just shapes your vision in some way in the
real world where you're walking around, Um, if you've got
all this dark stuff just kind of looming in the
back of your head, yeah, I mean, it definitely has
an effect on you. It's a pretty dark subject matter,
and I try not to focus too much on the
(23:50):
dark parts of it. I'm not the kind of person
who wants to take the story of a murder and
just punctuate all the story details of it. That is
something that I'm ever interested in. I'm more interested in
interviewing the people surrounding this event or this unsolved mystery
and sort of diving into the hundreds of people that
(24:13):
it affects, or even in the thousands. Um. So I
try to like keep my focus on things that aren't
the darkest elements of these stories. But regardless, at the
core of it is this really sad and disturbing story,
whether it's a missing person's case or it's the Atlantia murders,
and so it definitely has an effect on me psychologically,
(24:34):
but I do my best to sort of tune that
out and not let that affect my day to day
life and also not affect the way I tell the story.
It's really really easy, especially if you're becoming obsessed over um,
a murder case or a story like this, to to
just kind of lose all sight of what's what the
reality is, you know, what's really going on. It's easy
(24:57):
to get lost in it, and then you could come
up with an episode that sounds crazy to people. So
I have to kind of check myself at all times,
and you know, keep a certain amount of distance. Even
though I'm plopping myself right in the middle of these things,
I still have a certain amount of distance I keep,
and that's for my own safety, in my own sanity
(25:18):
really and also so I can tell a better, more
objective true story. So does Wayne Williams ever like shoot
you the occasional text or anything. Oh not anymore. I
think he's got I think his cell phone's got snatched up.
But um, I've definitely got some phone calls from prison
that I believe our Wayne, and I haven't even listened
to the voicemails, but um, I think it's probably Wayne Williams.
(25:41):
But really since the podcast, I haven't really been talking
to him at all. I think that if I were
to reach out to him and want to talk to
him again, he would totally do it without a doubt,
and at the drop of the hat, he would hop
on the phone, and beyond any of my podcasts, I
would think, and we're gonna take a quick break and
then we'll be right back. All right, we're switching gears here.
(26:11):
We're moving to the present. We're getting to Up and
Vanish season two, which just came out August twenty is
when it was first the first episode came out. Um,
I've listened to it. I hope you out there have
also listened to it. So it focuses on the disappearance
of Crystal and uh is it reason rising er reasinger,
(26:33):
and so let's let's just get into exactly how this
case is different from season one tera Grinstead's case. There's
a lot of similarities, and there's a lot of differences
between season one and season two of Up and Vanished.
The main differences are, well and see the one it
was a small town, right, it was Oscilla, Georgia, South Georgia,
(26:54):
kind of middle of nowhere, off the highway, a few
thousand residents, pretty small. In this case, we are even
more remote. We are three and a half almost four
hours southwest of Denver, and the closest store really that's
um a Walmart or you know, a chain restaurant is
(27:16):
over an hour drive away from here. And this town
only has a hundred and fifty residents. Now, there's people
outside the town in this area called the Baka that
has about a thousand or so more. But in the
town proper of Crestone, where this um missing person's case
is set, it's a very tiny place, and it's also
a very unique place. This is a place full of
(27:39):
over fifteen different spiritual centers. It's a very holy place
that attracts different proof seekers and uh people seeking enlightenment
see you have all these kind of interesting people here.
And it's really the reason that Crystal came here was
for all the positive energy here and all the different
um ways of life that are kind of clashing here
(28:01):
together and working together as one. And that draws a
lot of people from all over the world here. And
what I've found is that even though this is a
very holy place, a very spiritual place in the mountains,
it's eight thousand feet elevation, it's a beautiful place. Even
though it's all these great things, it's not immune to evil.
(28:22):
Just like everywhere else in the world, in Denver, in Atlanta,
in any big city, there are bad people there. And
just because this is a holy place in a special place,
unfortunately it seems like it's not immune to bad people.
And that's what we're exploring now, is, um, you know
what happened to Crystal. We don't know. Uh, Crystal's family
(28:43):
doesn't know, law enforcement does not know. And so we're
here in Creston. I'm actually here now on this pretty
bad WiFi talking to you guys, But we're here to
try to find out and we want to tell crystal story,
um and memorialize her and you know, introduce a different,
unique person to the world, and that's what we're excited
to do. So, you know, beyond just you know, worrying
(29:04):
about people wanting to murder you in your sleep out
where you are in this very rural area, there's other
things you have to worry about, like, you know, hostile wildlife.
What's what's that like? So apparently the wildlife here is
extremely abundant. I mean, I'm right now, I'm looking out
the window and I just see huge mountaintops that are
(29:25):
just a few hundred yards away from me. I'm surrounded
by mountains. We the people are the smaller population here.
There are more animals here than there are people, and
it's just an extremely vast place. I was talking to
one local named David, and he was telling me a
story about his friend Um who and we kind of
(29:46):
cover this an episode two. One of his friends, a
bear broke into her car because she left food in
her car, and somehow the beer fummable the door and
hopped inside and then the door closed and then it locked,
and so she comes out the next morning and she
finds literally a raging bear eating the inside of her car.
And so somebody to go over there with a big
(30:07):
broom and put the door open and the bear runs off.
And there's mountain lions here, there's wolves, there's all kinds
of animals that are really in your face here. And
so obviously with with the terrain and the wildlife here,
like it is one of the possibilities because we don't
know what happened to Crystal. Is you know, did she
(30:29):
go into the woods hiking and um, you know, have
an encounter with an animal or is she um have
an accident somewhere. There's tons of cliffs here, there's mind
staffs here, There's a bunch of unexplored territory that's just
off the grid that would be very difficult to find
someone in if you needed help. So there's tons of possibilities.
(30:50):
It's not just this idea of there being bad people
here or something which are everywhere. There's also this element
of being in the wild and it's are you real here?
It's it's also intriguing that you mentioned being in the
wild and living and off the grid sort of life
here because from we what we understand aspects of this
(31:17):
case may touch on, uh, something that we've talked about
in the past on the show The Rainbow gatherings, this
intentional recurring community wherein people I guess only trade or
give things to each other. Also a place candidly or
an environment candidly known for a being very open and
(31:40):
welcoming to certain types of drugs. Definitely, there are tons
of groups like that here. The Rainbow Gathering is just
one of them that comes through every now and then.
There are countless different groups and religious groups and spiritual
centers and different beliefs, and you may even refer to
some of them as cults. There's all kinds of different
(32:01):
groups here and they're kind of clashing, and it's this
melting pot of the best of the best and the
worst of the worst. And it just opened so many
different possibilities to where Crystal may have gone or what
may have happened to her. And so in episode two
we do cover the Rainbow Gathering briefly because, uh, talking
(32:24):
to the Sheriff's department here, one of the early rumors
was that someone said they solved her getting in this
car with a group of people and they were going
to the Rainbow Gathering. They reached out to the Rainbow Gathering,
no one seeing Crystal, and it kind of fizzles out personally.
I don't think she went there. I think something else
happened to her, but the possibility is still there, and
(32:44):
if not the Rainbow gathering, maybe it's something else. There's
tons of groups of people here who do weird stuff,
and um, you know, not all of it is bad,
but um, some of it includes drugs, and um it's
sort of a rougher lifestyle that could potentially put someone
in danger. And so there's so much to explore with
(33:05):
the different types of people here and what they believe
in and what they do. And you know, what's crystal.
What's crystal associated with them? You know, we don't know,
but that's one of the avenues that we're exploring. You know,
there's this is completely off topic, but also in episode
two you speak to someone named Candice, and Candice Candice
(33:26):
is part of this thing that's called the UFO watch
Tower that's out there in a valley somewhere. Can you
tell us a little bit about that. Oh yeah, it's funny.
I was actually at the UFO watch Tower yesterday and
talking to the other lady who works there, who's very nice.
Her name is Judy. But there's just outside of town
on the main Highway. There's a UFO watchtower, which is
(33:47):
literally exactly what you think it is, is a watchtower
where you go and look for UFOs in the sky.
And beyond just being this platform where you can have
this essentially unadulterated view of the sky, I it's also
a place that, according to them, is very holy and
there's different portals here and all this sort of magical
(34:10):
stuff happens there. Right, So your first inclination is where
mine is at least. Yeah, right, you know, I believe
in uphos. I've I've seen uphos once in my life,
and I think that there's definitely odd things happening in
the sky sometimes that isn't explained. But start talking about
portals and this being some you know, they're mentioning that
there's a space craft buried under this place, and they
(34:34):
sounds kind of, you know, untrue to me, or on
the least skeptical at first. And then she said, well,
pull out your pull out your phone and open your compass.
App I said okay, And so I started walking around
and she said that way and she pointed to the
left that's north, and then on my compass to the
far right it said north. So I sort of walking
(34:55):
around in my compass literally was jumping around like crazy
it you know where we were or what was going on,
and everyone's phone was doing it. So it wasn't a
magnetic thing. It's like a satellite thing or something. But
what maybe it's just a coincidence. But for whatever reason,
if you pull a compass out in this place, it
doesn't know where you are, what's going on, or something
(35:17):
is interfering with it. So after I saw that happen
with my own eyes, this was yesterday, Um, I opened
my own eyes up a little bit more. And UM,
kind of I don't know if I believe everything, but
I am open to it. People have a bunch of
different beliefs here and it's not my job is tell
(35:38):
them it's true or untrue. I just want to learn
more about it. And um, I've seen some stuff in
my own eyes and that was one of them. But
that that's one of many places that are extremely unique
and um, really worth checking out. And actually funny little
side note this is I thought it was kind of funny. Um.
So we were there yesterday getting some more audio with
(35:58):
the owner. It was just us there and a car
pulls up with two people and it was like a
husband and wife and they pulled me aside and said, hey,
do you make a podcast? I was like, yeah, I do.
They said is it up and vanished and I said yes,
are you paying? Yes? And they said that's so crazy.
(36:19):
Because as we were rolling up we just finished episode two.
I was like, this is absolutely insane right now? What
are the chances? So I guess, um, people are as
interested in Crest Stone as I am, and um, it's
not all bad. There's a lot of good people here,
a lot of interesting people here, and there's a lot
to learn here. But yeah, I thought that was so
(36:41):
strange that the only running I had yesterday was with
a listener who had just heard on the podcast Candice
telling this story about UFOs and the sky. And then
I overhear them as I'm leaving Candice telling them the
same story that they heard on the podcast just a
few minutes earlier. All right, So there's one more just
connection that we have to ask you about, and that is, uh,
(37:05):
this little Netflix documentary called Wild Wild Country and the
raj Nish movement is there? What is the connection between
that group of people and Crestone. So I was in
a in a different interview. I was talking about a
guy who will emerge later on in the series, and
he's one of the people who attends the drum circles.
(37:28):
Very nice guy, very eclectic, very interesting background. His life
story is just would blow your mind. But as we
were in there in his um hobbit shaped house, he
called it a Hobbit house. It looks like it's straight
out of Lord of the Rings um and he built
it himself. Were in this hobbit house of his and
I see a picture of um raj Nish on the wall,
(37:49):
and so one of our producers asked him about it,
and he says that he was a part of that group.
He was there, and then after he left there, he
came to Crest Stone and you've been here ever since. Like,
that's unbelievable. And I had just finished um Wi Wild Country,
which is amazing. You should check it out if you haven't.
But um that's just gives you a little insight to
(38:12):
the kind of people that are here. It's the same
kind of people. It's a bunch of different beliefs and
everyone is very convicted about it, but they all work
together in unison and it's pretty bizarre to see, but
just everyone here has their own story. You do not
end up in Crestone. Crestone is at the very end
of the road. It You do not end up here
(38:32):
on accident. So everyone came here for a reason. So
the more people you talk to, the more interesting stories
you find, because everyone has a backstory. And we start
to hear in the early episodes of the new season
about one of the reasons people might have ended up there,
which is the kind of somewhat booming to my understanding,
drugs scene. Um and Crystal supposedly possibly had some involvement
(38:57):
in that world. Is there anything that you can tell
us about what might be coming next to some kind
of teaser. Don't want any spoilers, but this is fascinating stuff. Yeah.
So this being a very spiritual place, over the years,
it has attracted sort of a drug culture, and I
think it's in some way it's been perpetuated by the
legalization of marijuana. Hear personally marijuana use. That's totally fine,
(39:22):
that's not of big deal to me. It's shouldn't be
a big deal anywhere, and it's extremely legal here. No
one even thinks her talks about it. There's you know,
weed stores everywhere here. But I think that UM being
so remote, it's not very policed here. There's not a
lot of police presence here. And so I think what's
happened over time is um what the sheriff refer us
(39:43):
to as trust fund kids, people UM kids that are
in their mid twenties, late thirties who have money and
don't work and just come out here and live off
bread and sort of kind of you know, linger around
town and cause disruptions and and just living wild out
here and being crazy. And there's been over the years,
(40:06):
the past couple of years, there's been more and more
people like this. And so what we're thinking is that
at some point along Crystal's journey here in Crestone, she
had to run in with these people and got closer
with them, and something in this friend circle may have happened.
And so as the series goes on and we start
kind of honing in on who and what are we
(40:29):
looking for here? Who did Crystal know here that knows
where she is? Because we are very confident that someone
here knows where Crystal is. And the question is why
aren't they saying anything about it? And isn't a murder
case dude, Okay, I'm in. I'm in. Well, like I said,
(40:52):
I just listened to season two today, so or excuse me,
episode two today and yes, I just want to go
to that watch are That's all. I want to love it.
And we hope that you listeners will take this as
a sign, whether directly from us or from uh some
(41:12):
extra treshot in the sky to check out Up and
Vanished season two. And just to be completely clear with
everyone listening, Matt Noel, super producer Paul and I also
don't know what's going to happen, correct, So so we
are we are experiencing this story along with you and pain.
(41:35):
We want to thank you so much for giving us
this first hand look behind the scenes of Up and Vanished,
of Atlanta Monster, and a little bit of a prescient
look at Up and Vanished season two. But these are
these are some huge projects that you have done with
Tenderfoot TV, which is the larger entity at work here.
(41:59):
Could you tell our listeners where they can go to
learn more about upcoming projects from Tenderfoot Sure, our company
website is tenderfoot dot tv. As far as up in vascoes,
you can go up in vantis dot com. We're currently
in season two. There's been two episodes released so far.
We're playing on going twelve episodes, but also sprinkling in
(42:20):
a few bonus episodes that are really, in my eyes,
uh not even bonus episodes. There will be people that
you meet along this journey that you may find very interesting,
and we found them pretty interesting as well. So some
of the side episodes will be sort of on these
different characters we run into and all of the all
the strange ways they intersect into Crystal's life. But yes,
(42:42):
all the social media animals are up and vanished. I'll
follow me. It's just Paint, Lindsay. But um yeah, we're
excited about season two and hope to have a positive
result and at the very least be able to memorialize
Crystal and tell her story. Awesome, Thank you so much, Paint.
We all look forward to the journey that we're gonna
take with you as you take us there. Agreed. Agreed.
(43:04):
And as a reminder, if you, for some reason to
have not listened to Atlanta Monster yet, you can listen
to the entire thing today. It is very much binge worthy.
You can also find every single show that we have
ever done on our website Stuff they don't want you
to know dot com. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook,
(43:26):
and Twitter. We don't want to have to do the
whole rundown there. We did take a note out of
your book, pain, and we have a call in number now.
It's one eight three three s t d wy t
K and you can leave us a voicemail a message
and you might be on the air very soon. So
so do that and let us know what. Thanks for
(43:48):
the thanks for the tip man uh and listeners, let
us know. Let us know what you think might be
happening and up and vanished season two again. We we
don't know. We're honestly asking. We don't have any spoilers. Yeah, yeah,
we don't have any spoilers, all right, yeah, And if
(44:11):
all that fails, if you if you don't really care
for social media brew ha ha, we of all people
get it, you can email us directly. We are conspiracy
at how stuff Works dot com
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M
(00:24):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my
name is normal. They call me Ben. We are joined
with our super producer Paul Decans. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know, but not any normal episode of
stuff they'll want you know. Not as if we've ever
had a normal episode. Yeah, it changed so quickly on us.
(00:48):
But this episode is a little bit different because we
are delving into uh several different stories that you are
doubtlessly familiar with if you have explored podcast in the past,
and we're not doing it alone today. We are joined
by UH filmmaker, documentary and co creator and host of
(01:12):
the hit podcast Up and Vanished, Friends and neighbors, conspiracy
realists and skeptics alike. Uh say hello to Payne lindsay
not too much, man, We're just over here. You know.
On this show, we talked about true crime a whole lot. Um.
We delve into all different aspects of it, but we
really were excited to talk to you somebody who's created
(01:35):
a whole show and a series of shows about true crime,
specifically where you you get to spend more than just
one episode talking about a case, where you get to
delve into every single aspect. And you know, with your
show Up and Vanished as season one, man the Tera
Grinstad case. UM, I just wonder if anybody hasn't listened
to this yet, who was listening to this show right now?
(01:56):
Can you give everyone just kind of a brief overview
of that case? Yeah? Sure so, Stephen, one of the
Up and Vanished covered a missing person's case in South
Georgia is a missing beauty queen and high school teacher
named Tera Grinstead. It was over ten years cold and
there were no leads anymore, and people pretty much just
stopped talking about it in South Georgia. And I came
(02:19):
around and made a podcast about our disappearance and it
started interging people in the town. And then about six
months into the podcast, about halfway through, there was a
major break in the case and a tip came forth
to law enforcement, which promptly to search this e con
orchard and um, they've made two arrests for terrorist murder.
(02:40):
So it was a huge story. And UM, it's bizarre
because when I first got involved, it was kind of
like this sort of um part of the town that
people don't want to talk about this anymore at all.
They were um afraid to mention people's names. Over the years,
over a decade, people of pointed fingers at each other,
and they kind of given up on the idea of,
(03:01):
you know, ever really finding out what happened is here.
It was such a big mystery. But about six months
into the podcast, there was a major break in the case.
And from that point forward we essentially followed um the
suspects and their friends and interviewed everybody and actually just recently, um,
the one of the accused, Ryan Duke, hired a new
attorney and in the next six months or so, there
(03:22):
should be a trial in Tyr Grinstead's case. Oh man, wow,
that's I mean, that's powerful stuff too. And this is
something that a lot of the folks in our audience
today are definitely wondering when when they hear about the
story about the investigation that you conducted under your own power,
(03:44):
especially at first there several of the people listening now
are probably aspiring keyboard sleuths right to use use the
phrase that I think you came up with, Matt. So
we'd like to ask on their behalf about the process.
How did you begin, um, making these connections and tracking
down the this information that in some cases it sounds
(04:07):
like people did not want you to find. I mean,
it's really difficult, but it's it's the same way as
you could think of on your own if you've ever
been on Reddit or the up Advantage discussion board, different
websites like web slues. Um, it's all the same thing.
You know, you try to find people's names, you find
their contact information. Actually use Facebook a lot because you
(04:29):
can see their faces and you can verify that that's
who they are. You can see their friends and so
I know I'll I do that usually just just with
my own real Facebook profile too, So you know, if
I'm reaching out to a stranger, I'm saying, hey, look
here's pictures of me and my family. I'm a real person.
I'm not just some catfish online. So um, you know,
(04:50):
it's a It can be exhausting sometimes because you know,
you can go down a rabbit hole that is just
completely just nothing, and you know I've done that before.
Several times admittedly, But UM, I think you have to
do that to find the truth. Sometimes, UM, you don't
know that until you reached the bottom of that hole
and you realize, oh, okay, well there's nothing here, or
(05:11):
this is just all wrong. Um. And that's kind of
like the synopsis of she'son one of up and vanished
in a lot of ways, you know, I was. I
basically started with the two or three persons of interest
that law enforcement had unofficially announced to the media and
that everyone had covered over the years, and explored all
(05:32):
of these people and their friends and um, everything else extensively,
and then it didn't really go anywhere. Things were weird
and suspicious, but there was nothing concrete, none of it
really made sense. And then sure enough, out of the blue,
there was a tip that came forward, and um it
was two guys no one ever heard of, two former students.
So you know, there's a lot to be learned, um
(05:54):
from my first go around. And uh, I had definitely
am applying a lot of that to season two, and um,
it's an entirely different case and it's complex in different ways. Oh,
it most certainly is uh, and I want to get
into that in just a second page. I just want
to stick on season one just because they're there are
a couple moments in here in um in Minutia I
(06:15):
want to just explore with you. So you know, you're
talking about just giving your Facebook out to random people
that you don't know, you don't know how they're involved,
necessarily in the case at least behind closed doors, right, Um.
But you're putting yourself out there doing that, and this
is a small town where people know each other, where
there is a real threat of some kind of perhaps
(06:37):
retaliation from either a person or a group of people
that actually carried out this murder. Um, Like, what what
kind of security measures did you end up getting in
place when you're walking around that town on foot, when
you're talking to people maybe in their house or at
a public place, Like, how do you protect yourself? It's
funny because that at first I didn't really think about
(06:58):
it too much. I just have my blinders on one
and I was just being almost foolishly fearless about it
and just didn't really, you think too much about my
own safety. I was too determined to figure out what
was going on, and most of the time it was
from the comfort of my own home if I was
on my computer and making phone calls. But um, when
I went down there, I definitely took more precautions and
(07:20):
I didn't really you know, make a whole bunch of
noise when I was there. And it really wasn't until
the very end um of the season, after the arrest
had been made and I was interviewing different friends of
the suspects, that I felt really uncomfortable down um, and
I was still a Georgia for the first time, And
it was at that point that I realized, Okay, I'm
(07:41):
not coming down here again alone one and UM, I'm
gonna have a completely different game plan whenever I come
back here. And so i've um, I've since been back
to film some stuff for the TV show that we
have in the works, and this this go around, we
actually had security with us and they were outside of
our door the whole night. Um, they were staying the
(08:04):
stay in the same hotels as we did, so we
actually kind of hiring security. And the last time we
were there. And by the way, that is the I
think it's been announced enough now that we can say
that's been It's going to be developed with oxygen, right, Yeah,
that's correct, So look for the Up and Vanished TV
show on Oxygen. Everybody, Yes, yeah, and let us let
(08:24):
us know what you think about it, because it's no
secret that here at stuff they'll want you to know.
We're also excited and you can't wait to see, can't
wait to see how it all turns out and how
the puzzle pieces matched together. When we're talking about security,
naturally we begin to wonder about law enforcement, right, especially
(08:47):
in the situation that occurs in Up and Vanished season one,
And for everyone who's listening there there may be spoiler
territory here. But one of the questions and we have
to ask is, given that the relationship between law enforcement
and journalists can be such a complicated thing, Uh, did
(09:08):
did you feel any support or did you feel any
I guess, on the other extreme animosity from local authorities
when you were poking around initially in this case, well,
at first, um in Terra Grinsett's case, at first local
law enforcement, the Asilibo Police Department was pretty welcoming to me. Uh.
(09:31):
They wanted the case solved too, and they had essentially
run out of leeds. Anyone who was going to go
out on a limb and try to solve this and
piece this together on their own. Um, they supported that.
So at first it was they were pretty cooperative. Now,
the gb I, the Georgia Room investigation, they never really
talked to me in the beginning, and from what I've heard,
(09:54):
that's that's sort of like them. It's still an active
case in their eyes, there was an active investigations. They
didn't want to divulge any details about the case or
really comment on it too much. But um, really halfway
through the series is when things started to change. Once
there was to arrest in the case, it just got
real again. It went from being a colde case to
(10:16):
a murder case with two suspects that have been arrested,
and so with that comes all these new rumors about
these people and almost a live investigation again. And so
from that point forward, really no law enforcement wanted to
talk to me at all. And um, you know, really,
if you listen to the entire series, there's not a
(10:38):
single interview with a police officer that was a part
of that case. None. And it's kind of hard to
imagine that now, but um, that's just the way it was. Wow.
But you so you did have assistance there, I mean,
there are so many voices on the show. You had
assistance from investigators and some other people that came through
and ended up assisting you in some way, right, I
(11:00):
wouldn't I wouldn't call an assistance. I think it was
just they were they were supportive of the podcast and
someone telling terror story on a major platform, but they
weren't giving me tips or pointing me in a direction.
They stayed. They steered very clear of that, and really
(11:21):
they it seemed like after the arrest they didn't really
want to touch the podcast at all. So when you're
out there interviewing folks, I'm sure you want to travel
lights so you can be kind of like you know, UM,
nimble and getting around and getting as much in as
you can. What kind of equipment do you use when
you're out in the field recording interviews and chasing down leads?
(11:41):
What's your kid? My kid is my MacBook Pro and
all of my files sinked on dropbox and for the
team to share. And I usually I just run with
a Zoom eight six and either a shotgun mike attached
to it, or I'm running like a really short xcel
(12:03):
our table to a better sounding mic UM and then
someone's usually holding that. But I like to have one
eight six with an onboard mic on it at all
times just in case I'm all of a sudden talking
to someone who's telling me something very important, I'd rather
not record it on my phone, so I get some
decent audio from an onboard microphone with the Zoom made six.
(12:23):
But that's that's pretty much it. It's pretty simple. That's awesome,
and it's actually pretty affordable. And there are some other
versions of that Zoom that you can get there even cheaper.
If you're thinking about starting your own thing listening out
there or you know, checking it out, you can you
can affordably get some stuff to make a pretty cool show.
And we'll return to this story after a word from
(12:46):
our sponsor, and we're back. While we're talking about inspiration,
let's take a let's go a little bit further down
the rabbit hole, because, as long time listeners, No Pain,
You and Tenderfoot TV did not just create up and vanished.
(13:10):
You also have created Atlanta Monster along with for peek
behind the scenes, uh collaboration with our very own Matt
Frederick and Ben Bowling and Paul and you know, yeah,
well it's a teamwork makes the dream work. But the
reason this goes to a question of inspiration is I'm
(13:30):
sure many people are curious to learn what originally inspired
you and uh, you're Donald and your team at Tenderfoot
to investigate the story of Wayne Williams. Yeah, definitely, Really
it was. It was my business partner Donald who brought
Way Williams to my attention, and I had never heard
of the Atlanta childmers before it happened in the early eighties,
(13:52):
and I just started diving into the story and looking
into it and just taking me back to that time
period is seeing how different Atlanta was. I just saw
so many different reasons to tell this story. Beyond the
question whether or not Wayne Williams was incent or guilty.
I saw sort of paying a picture of a time
period that was in some ways forgotten and that shouldn't be.
(14:14):
If I didn't know about the atlantild murders, that meant
that there was probably thousands, hundreds of thousands of people
who also didn't know about the child murders, and it
turns out that was correct. Um. I just saw there
was so much to explore there, and I thought the
race part of it seemed extremely relevant. To today, and
I thought that we could, you know, extract some sort
of positive silver lining message from it in some way
(14:37):
so difficult, I thought that we did that. Um and
I just thought it was in some way the history
lesson for people and even for myself. And that's what
I thought. It was so cool because as I was
diving through all the old archives and just inter doing
these people being taken back to a time period that
I wasn't a part of and seeing how different it
was really kind of opened my mind a little bit.
There's a lot of reasons why I chose to to
(14:59):
tell the story the Atlanta child murders, and they weren't
all about Wayne Williams. Just for anybody who hasn't listened yet, Um,
hey to do this to you, Fay, but can you
give us an overview of the Atlanta jal murders case.
You mean you haven't listened to Atlanta Monster. I mean
I haven't heard any of If you haven't listened to
(15:20):
Atlanta Monster, you should be pressing pause right now. Um. So,
Atlanta Monster is about the Atlanta child murders that occurred
in the eighties. There is a man in prison for
some of the murders. His name is Wayne Williams, and
for the past several decades a lot of people have
questioned whether or not Wayne Williams is the right guy.
(15:41):
And Wayne Williams today in still says I'm not the guy.
I didn't kill anybody. So there's always a bunch of
a bunch of conspiracies around this case, a lot of
different advocates either for against Wayne Williams, and a lot
of unsolved murders of these children. Um either way, how
do you slighted? Um? There was upwards of kids on
(16:05):
this list of children who were murdered in Atlanta in
that time period, and only about half of them were
um blamed on WAYN Williams. And what at leasas was
basically is a bunch of unsolved murders of children, And
so they're either way. There was a huge injustice done
(16:27):
whether way Williams was a seal killer or not. So
we essentially explored that and not to get too much away,
but during the podcast, we make contact with way Williams
in prison and he gives us his take on everything,
and he's still flaiming his innocence, but as he gives
us new information that is supposed to prove his innocence.
(16:48):
We kind of go back through that and dissect it
and find out whether or not it's legitimate, and it's
it's complicated, but it would take listening to the whole
series to get a big, bigger picture. So you you
did talk to Wayne Williams. Um Now, perhaps you don't
have to, you don't have to answer to this pain,
But I'm just gonna ask it. How does one talk
(17:11):
to convicted possibly serial killer in prison? Oh? My, I
don't know how I did that. It was I found
it pretty difficult, just because I had to sort of
put on this sort of persona of wanting to hear
everything he had to say, and I wanted to gain
(17:34):
his trust, and I did want to hear him out.
I wanted to hear he told me he had proof
that he was innocent, so I wanted to hear it.
I was gonna give him the benefit of my own
doubts and hear him out. But over time it just
became really difficult because he would call me at random
hours from different numbers in prison, and we would just
(17:56):
talk for long periods of time about the same exact things.
And I sort of realizing that He wasn't really calling
me to to tell me he was innocent, or for
me to get him out of prison, and what he
didn't really seem too concerned about that. He really just
wanted the spotlight. He wanted to He wanted someone to
talk to, like myself, and if it wasn't me, it
(18:17):
was somebody else. And so over time it became harder
to talk to him, and my patience levels significantly decreased.
My patience was pretty much lost there by the end,
and I had to sort of pass way Williams off
to Donald's for a little bit because we were building
the podcast, and you know, our calls weren't very constructive.
(18:40):
They were just sort of rehashing things that didn't really
make sense, and so just kind of grabbing the steering
wheel and and taking it somewhere at all, anywhere of significance.
Was just playing difficult. But um, we did our best
to extract as much information, legitimate information as possible, whether
or not it was true. You know, it is just
(19:03):
for some more background information here, Um just paining you're
talking about just how little time you actually had when
we were in production of this. So, um, there was
a production team on the house stuff works end that
would and you know engineer and work on the shows
and edit to a certain extent, but most of everything
was edited, at least in the major first past, by
(19:25):
you by paying himself, um as he's also like going
out and recording everything and doing the interviews and stuff.
So yeah, time was of the essence, And I can't
imagine getting stuck on the phone for like two hours
at a time you're in a crunch, and even the
hassle of going through the bureaucratic steps necessary to gain
(19:47):
access right to convicted. So we're your calls monitored as well?
Surely they were right, Definitely in any call that came
from the prison itself, it's always monitored, and there little
voice that comes on before the call starts that lets
you know for sure that it's definitely being recorded. And
within these in these conversations, you know, you you hit
(20:10):
on the fact that there was at times this feeling
of talking to a broken record or hearing a record
on repeat. But one thing that fascinates me in this
story is something that you mentioned at the very top
when we're talking about this, that you found stories and
threads that did not necessarily have a direct relationship with
(20:34):
Wayne Williams. Could you tell us maybe one or two
aspects of this journey that surprised you as you dug
further into the investigation. I guess the most surprising part
of it to me was just how severe the injustice
was to some of these families. Talking to the families
myself and um, just hearing their stories in person really
(20:59):
shane to my entire perspective of the Atlantic Ship murders
and way Williams and what the true injustice was here,
So that that threat alone was the biggest just sort
of seeing all these children's murder cases essentially being swept
under the rug, and the FBI and the Atlanta police
honing in on way Williams and wanting this to go
(21:21):
away so badly, and for reasons that aren't just about
catching a killer, reasons that are about preserving the cities. Um,
you know, the way the city looks and feels to
the newcomers, and just Atlanta was on the rise and
people in power saw this as something that needs to
go away, and it needs to go away fast. And
(21:42):
so with that mentality came this sort of um sweeping
under the rug with these cases. And so what happened
is you talk to these families and almost all of
them will tell you that they don't think way Williams
did it. And in my opinion, I don't think that
that's because way Williams didn't necessarily killed there their son
(22:03):
or their daughter. I think it's because they were It
was never proven to them otherwise. No one ever proved
to these families that Wayne Williams killed their child. And
that's the biggest part of this whole whole mystery to me.
And so over the years, decades and decades, it sort
of perpetuates this idea of conspiracies and you know what
(22:25):
the KKK involved, all of these other different threads that
just come to light because it was never proven to
them that it was Wayne Williams. Even if it was
WAYN Williams, they would still tell you otherwise because over
the years, it's sort of the they've developed this sort
of way of thinking about it, and you know, it's
just awful. Um. But that was the biggest thread that
(22:46):
I wanted to explore outside of this Wayne Williams themselves,
was sort of the impact on the families and the
way people have perceived this generations ago. People felt this
way about it and now they're telling them this way
about it. Just sort of seeing the then and out
and kind of exploring all the different people that were
affected by this and there have views on it. To
(23:06):
me was really just the core of the podcast, dude.
So okay, this is another kind of personal question. Making
a show like Up a Vanish or Atlanta Monster, it
requires a certain amount of obsession. I think you would
agree with that, Um, just to get it right. Definitely.
Have you found that that has any psychological effects in
(23:29):
a way that makes you think about the world differently
or just shapes your vision in some way in the
real world where you're walking around, Um, if you've got
all this dark stuff just kind of looming in the
back of your head, yeah, I mean, it definitely has
an effect on you. It's a pretty dark subject matter,
and I try not to focus too much on the
(23:50):
dark parts of it. I'm not the kind of person
who wants to take the story of a murder and
just punctuate all the story details of it. That is
something that I'm ever interested in. I'm more interested in
interviewing the people surrounding this event or this unsolved mystery
and sort of diving into the hundreds of people that
(24:13):
it affects, or even in the thousands. Um. So I
try to like keep my focus on things that aren't
the darkest elements of these stories. But regardless, at the
core of it is this really sad and disturbing story,
whether it's a missing person's case or it's the Atlantia murders,
and so it definitely has an effect on me psychologically,
(24:34):
but I do my best to sort of tune that
out and not let that affect my day to day
life and also not affect the way I tell the story.
It's really really easy, especially if you're becoming obsessed over um,
a murder case or a story like this, to to
just kind of lose all sight of what's what the
reality is, you know, what's really going on. It's easy
(24:57):
to get lost in it, and then you could come
up with an episode that sounds crazy to people. So
I have to kind of check myself at all times,
and you know, keep a certain amount of distance. Even
though I'm plopping myself right in the middle of these things,
I still have a certain amount of distance I keep,
and that's for my own safety, in my own sanity
(25:18):
really and also so I can tell a better, more
objective true story. So does Wayne Williams ever like shoot
you the occasional text or anything. Oh not anymore. I
think he's got I think his cell phone's got snatched up.
But um, I've definitely got some phone calls from prison
that I believe our Wayne, and I haven't even listened
to the voicemails, but um, I think it's probably Wayne Williams.
(25:41):
But really since the podcast, I haven't really been talking
to him at all. I think that if I were
to reach out to him and want to talk to
him again, he would totally do it without a doubt,
and at the drop of the hat, he would hop
on the phone, and beyond any of my podcasts, I
would think, and we're gonna take a quick break and
then we'll be right back. All right, we're switching gears here.
(26:11):
We're moving to the present. We're getting to Up and
Vanish season two, which just came out August twenty is
when it was first the first episode came out. Um,
I've listened to it. I hope you out there have
also listened to it. So it focuses on the disappearance
of Crystal and uh is it reason rising er reasinger,
(26:33):
and so let's let's just get into exactly how this
case is different from season one tera Grinstead's case. There's
a lot of similarities, and there's a lot of differences
between season one and season two of Up and Vanished.
The main differences are, well and see the one it
was a small town, right, it was Oscilla, Georgia, South Georgia,
(26:54):
kind of middle of nowhere, off the highway, a few
thousand residents, pretty small. In this case, we are even
more remote. We are three and a half almost four
hours southwest of Denver, and the closest store really that's
um a Walmart or you know, a chain restaurant is
(27:16):
over an hour drive away from here. And this town
only has a hundred and fifty residents. Now, there's people
outside the town in this area called the Baka that
has about a thousand or so more. But in the
town proper of Crestone, where this um missing person's case
is set, it's a very tiny place, and it's also
a very unique place. This is a place full of
(27:39):
over fifteen different spiritual centers. It's a very holy place
that attracts different proof seekers and uh people seeking enlightenment
see you have all these kind of interesting people here.
And it's really the reason that Crystal came here was
for all the positive energy here and all the different
um ways of life that are kind of clashing here
(28:01):
together and working together as one. And that draws a
lot of people from all over the world here. And
what I've found is that even though this is a
very holy place, a very spiritual place in the mountains,
it's eight thousand feet elevation, it's a beautiful place. Even
though it's all these great things, it's not immune to evil.
(28:22):
Just like everywhere else in the world, in Denver, in Atlanta,
in any big city, there are bad people there. And
just because this is a holy place in a special place,
unfortunately it seems like it's not immune to bad people.
And that's what we're exploring now, is, um, you know
what happened to Crystal. We don't know. Uh, Crystal's family
(28:43):
doesn't know, law enforcement does not know. And so we're
here in Creston. I'm actually here now on this pretty
bad WiFi talking to you guys, But we're here to
try to find out and we want to tell crystal story,
um and memorialize her and you know, introduce a different,
unique person to the world, and that's what we're excited
to do. So, you know, beyond just you know, worrying
(29:04):
about people wanting to murder you in your sleep out
where you are in this very rural area, there's other
things you have to worry about, like, you know, hostile wildlife.
What's what's that like? So apparently the wildlife here is
extremely abundant. I mean, I'm right now, I'm looking out
the window and I just see huge mountaintops that are
(29:25):
just a few hundred yards away from me. I'm surrounded
by mountains. We the people are the smaller population here.
There are more animals here than there are people, and
it's just an extremely vast place. I was talking to
one local named David, and he was telling me a
story about his friend Um who and we kind of
(29:46):
cover this an episode two. One of his friends, a
bear broke into her car because she left food in
her car, and somehow the beer fummable the door and
hopped inside and then the door closed and then it locked,
and so she comes out the next morning and she
finds literally a raging bear eating the inside of her car.
And so somebody to go over there with a big
(30:07):
broom and put the door open and the bear runs off.
And there's mountain lions here, there's wolves, there's all kinds
of animals that are really in your face here. And
so obviously with with the terrain and the wildlife here,
like it is one of the possibilities because we don't
know what happened to Crystal. Is you know, did she
(30:29):
go into the woods hiking and um, you know, have
an encounter with an animal or is she um have
an accident somewhere. There's tons of cliffs here, there's mind
staffs here, There's a bunch of unexplored territory that's just
off the grid that would be very difficult to find
someone in if you needed help. So there's tons of possibilities.
(30:50):
It's not just this idea of there being bad people
here or something which are everywhere. There's also this element
of being in the wild and it's are you real here?
It's it's also intriguing that you mentioned being in the
wild and living and off the grid sort of life
here because from we what we understand aspects of this
(31:17):
case may touch on, uh, something that we've talked about
in the past on the show The Rainbow gatherings, this
intentional recurring community wherein people I guess only trade or
give things to each other. Also a place candidly or
an environment candidly known for a being very open and
(31:40):
welcoming to certain types of drugs. Definitely, there are tons
of groups like that here. The Rainbow Gathering is just
one of them that comes through every now and then.
There are countless different groups and religious groups and spiritual
centers and different beliefs, and you may even refer to
some of them as cults. There's all kinds of different
(32:01):
groups here and they're kind of clashing, and it's this
melting pot of the best of the best and the
worst of the worst. And it just opened so many
different possibilities to where Crystal may have gone or what
may have happened to her. And so in episode two
we do cover the Rainbow Gathering briefly because, uh, talking
(32:24):
to the Sheriff's department here, one of the early rumors
was that someone said they solved her getting in this
car with a group of people and they were going
to the Rainbow Gathering. They reached out to the Rainbow Gathering,
no one seeing Crystal, and it kind of fizzles out personally.
I don't think she went there. I think something else
happened to her, but the possibility is still there, and
(32:44):
if not the Rainbow gathering, maybe it's something else. There's
tons of groups of people here who do weird stuff,
and um, you know, not all of it is bad,
but um, some of it includes drugs, and um it's
sort of a rougher lifestyle that could potentially put someone
in danger. And so there's so much to explore with
(33:05):
the different types of people here and what they believe
in and what they do. And you know, what's crystal.
What's crystal associated with them? You know, we don't know,
but that's one of the avenues that we're exploring. You know,
there's this is completely off topic, but also in episode
two you speak to someone named Candice, and Candice Candice
(33:26):
is part of this thing that's called the UFO watch
Tower that's out there in a valley somewhere. Can you
tell us a little bit about that. Oh yeah, it's funny.
I was actually at the UFO watch Tower yesterday and
talking to the other lady who works there, who's very nice.
Her name is Judy. But there's just outside of town
on the main Highway. There's a UFO watchtower, which is
(33:47):
literally exactly what you think it is, is a watchtower
where you go and look for UFOs in the sky.
And beyond just being this platform where you can have
this essentially unadulterated view of the sky, I it's also
a place that, according to them, is very holy and
there's different portals here and all this sort of magical
(34:10):
stuff happens there. Right, So your first inclination is where
mine is at least. Yeah, right, you know, I believe
in uphos. I've I've seen uphos once in my life,
and I think that there's definitely odd things happening in
the sky sometimes that isn't explained. But start talking about
portals and this being some you know, they're mentioning that
there's a space craft buried under this place, and they
(34:34):
sounds kind of, you know, untrue to me, or on
the least skeptical at first. And then she said, well,
pull out your pull out your phone and open your compass.
App I said okay, And so I started walking around
and she said that way and she pointed to the
left that's north, and then on my compass to the
far right it said north. So I sort of walking
(34:55):
around in my compass literally was jumping around like crazy
it you know where we were or what was going on,
and everyone's phone was doing it. So it wasn't a
magnetic thing. It's like a satellite thing or something. But
what maybe it's just a coincidence. But for whatever reason,
if you pull a compass out in this place, it
doesn't know where you are, what's going on, or something
(35:17):
is interfering with it. So after I saw that happen
with my own eyes, this was yesterday, Um, I opened
my own eyes up a little bit more. And UM,
kind of I don't know if I believe everything, but
I am open to it. People have a bunch of
different beliefs here and it's not my job is tell
(35:38):
them it's true or untrue. I just want to learn
more about it. And um, I've seen some stuff in
my own eyes and that was one of them. But
that that's one of many places that are extremely unique
and um, really worth checking out. And actually funny little
side note this is I thought it was kind of funny. Um.
So we were there yesterday getting some more audio with
(35:58):
the owner. It was just us there and a car
pulls up with two people and it was like a
husband and wife and they pulled me aside and said, hey,
do you make a podcast? I was like, yeah, I do.
They said is it up and vanished and I said yes,
are you paying? Yes? And they said that's so crazy.
(36:19):
Because as we were rolling up we just finished episode two.
I was like, this is absolutely insane right now? What
are the chances? So I guess, um, people are as
interested in Crest Stone as I am, and um, it's
not all bad. There's a lot of good people here,
a lot of interesting people here, and there's a lot
to learn here. But yeah, I thought that was so
(36:41):
strange that the only running I had yesterday was with
a listener who had just heard on the podcast Candice
telling this story about UFOs and the sky. And then
I overhear them as I'm leaving Candice telling them the
same story that they heard on the podcast just a
few minutes earlier. All right, So there's one more just
connection that we have to ask you about, and that is, uh,
(37:05):
this little Netflix documentary called Wild Wild Country and the
raj Nish movement is there? What is the connection between
that group of people and Crestone. So I was in
a in a different interview. I was talking about a
guy who will emerge later on in the series, and
he's one of the people who attends the drum circles.
(37:28):
Very nice guy, very eclectic, very interesting background. His life
story is just would blow your mind. But as we
were in there in his um hobbit shaped house, he
called it a Hobbit house. It looks like it's straight
out of Lord of the Rings um and he built
it himself. Were in this hobbit house of his and
I see a picture of um raj Nish on the wall,
(37:49):
and so one of our producers asked him about it,
and he says that he was a part of that group.
He was there, and then after he left there, he
came to Crest Stone and you've been here ever since. Like,
that's unbelievable. And I had just finished um Wi Wild Country,
which is amazing. You should check it out if you haven't.
But um that's just gives you a little insight to
(38:12):
the kind of people that are here. It's the same
kind of people. It's a bunch of different beliefs and
everyone is very convicted about it, but they all work
together in unison and it's pretty bizarre to see, but
just everyone here has their own story. You do not
end up in Crestone. Crestone is at the very end
of the road. It You do not end up here
(38:32):
on accident. So everyone came here for a reason. So
the more people you talk to, the more interesting stories
you find, because everyone has a backstory. And we start
to hear in the early episodes of the new season
about one of the reasons people might have ended up there,
which is the kind of somewhat booming to my understanding,
drugs scene. Um and Crystal supposedly possibly had some involvement
(38:57):
in that world. Is there anything that you can tell
us about what might be coming next to some kind
of teaser. Don't want any spoilers, but this is fascinating stuff. Yeah.
So this being a very spiritual place, over the years,
it has attracted sort of a drug culture, and I
think it's in some way it's been perpetuated by the
legalization of marijuana. Hear personally marijuana use. That's totally fine,
(39:22):
that's not of big deal to me. It's shouldn't be
a big deal anywhere, and it's extremely legal here. No
one even thinks her talks about it. There's you know,
weed stores everywhere here. But I think that UM being
so remote, it's not very policed here. There's not a
lot of police presence here. And so I think what's
happened over time is um what the sheriff refer us
(39:43):
to as trust fund kids, people UM kids that are
in their mid twenties, late thirties who have money and
don't work and just come out here and live off
bread and sort of kind of you know, linger around
town and cause disruptions and and just living wild out
here and being crazy. And there's been over the years,
(40:06):
the past couple of years, there's been more and more
people like this. And so what we're thinking is that
at some point along Crystal's journey here in Crestone, she
had to run in with these people and got closer
with them, and something in this friend circle may have happened.
And so as the series goes on and we start
kind of honing in on who and what are we
(40:29):
looking for here? Who did Crystal know here that knows
where she is? Because we are very confident that someone
here knows where Crystal is. And the question is why
aren't they saying anything about it? And isn't a murder
case dude, Okay, I'm in. I'm in. Well, like I said,
(40:52):
I just listened to season two today, so or excuse me,
episode two today and yes, I just want to go
to that watch are That's all. I want to love it.
And we hope that you listeners will take this as
a sign, whether directly from us or from uh some
(41:12):
extra treshot in the sky to check out Up and
Vanished season two. And just to be completely clear with
everyone listening, Matt Noel, super producer Paul and I also
don't know what's going to happen, correct, So so we
are we are experiencing this story along with you and pain.
(41:35):
We want to thank you so much for giving us
this first hand look behind the scenes of Up and Vanished,
of Atlanta Monster, and a little bit of a prescient
look at Up and Vanished season two. But these are
these are some huge projects that you have done with
Tenderfoot TV, which is the larger entity at work here.
(41:59):
Could you tell our listeners where they can go to
learn more about upcoming projects from Tenderfoot Sure, our company
website is tenderfoot dot tv. As far as up in vascoes,
you can go up in vantis dot com. We're currently
in season two. There's been two episodes released so far.
We're playing on going twelve episodes, but also sprinkling in
(42:20):
a few bonus episodes that are really, in my eyes,
uh not even bonus episodes. There will be people that
you meet along this journey that you may find very interesting,
and we found them pretty interesting as well. So some
of the side episodes will be sort of on these
different characters we run into and all of the all
the strange ways they intersect into Crystal's life. But yes,
(42:42):
all the social media animals are up and vanished. I'll
follow me. It's just Paint, Lindsay. But um yeah, we're
excited about season two and hope to have a positive
result and at the very least be able to memorialize
Crystal and tell her story. Awesome, Thank you so much, Paint.
We all look forward to the journey that we're gonna
take with you as you take us there. Agreed. Agreed.
(43:04):
And as a reminder, if you, for some reason to
have not listened to Atlanta Monster yet, you can listen
to the entire thing today. It is very much binge worthy.
You can also find every single show that we have
ever done on our website Stuff they don't want you
to know dot com. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook,
(43:26):
and Twitter. We don't want to have to do the
whole rundown there. We did take a note out of
your book, pain, and we have a call in number now.
It's one eight three three s t d wy t
K and you can leave us a voicemail a message
and you might be on the air very soon. So
so do that and let us know what. Thanks for
(43:48):
the thanks for the tip man uh and listeners, let
us know. Let us know what you think might be
happening and up and vanished season two again. We we
don't know. We're honestly asking. We don't have any spoilers. Yeah, yeah,
we don't have any spoilers, all right, yeah, And if
(44:11):
all that fails, if you if you don't really care
for social media brew ha ha, we of all people
get it, you can email us directly. We are conspiracy
at how stuff Works dot com
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United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
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