Murder and Mystery in the Last Frontier
Listen to tales of true murder and mystery in Alaska.
Episodes
June 4, 2025 • 22 mins
Nineteen years after his son disappeared while climbing Mt. Denali in Alaska, Guy Waterman ascended a mountain ridge in New Hampshire in February 2000 and committed suicide by sitting in the snow in the bitter cold until he froze to death. The life stories of both Guy and Johnny Waterman exemplify the narrow line between passion and madness.
Sources
Brown, Chip. March 2003. The Last Cairn. Adventure.
Brown, Chip. June 2000. “Mu...
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May 21, 2025 • 28 mins
With landmarks bearing the names of Deadmen Valley, Headless Creek, Funeral Range, and Hell’s Gate Rapids, you might think twice before planning a trip to Nahanni National Park in Canada. However, the legends behind these names make the park even more daunting.
Sources
Berge, Chloe. “The haunting history of this Canadian National Park.” March 9, 2020. Fodors.com.
Malbeuf, Jamie. “Families call for case of mysterious 2005 deaths to...
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May 7, 2025 • 24 mins
When Bethany Correira disappeared, the residents of her hometown of Talkeetna, Alaska, immediately responded to search for one of their own.
Sources
Klinkhart, Gle nn. 2014. Finding Bethany. A True Crime Memoir. Securus Media.
James, Daid. 2014. ‘Finding Bethany’ details detective’s quest to solve horrific murder
Mystery at Bootlegger’s Cove. Dateline. NBC.
Johnson, Greg. 2-2008. Lawson draws 99 years. MatSu Valley Frontiers...
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April 23, 2025 • 20 mins
Most people understand they face the risk of encountering wild animals when they enter the woods in Alaska, but they do not expect someone to shoot them. When a series of murders occurred in parks and on trails near Anchorage in the summer of 2016, residents demanded more information from the police. Were the murders related to each other? Was a serial killer stalking the city? Was it safe to go hiking after dark? And what were the...
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April 9, 2025 • 32 mins
When testifying at his trial, Teddy Kyle Smith said he thought he was shooting Enukins in self-defense when he fired his rifle at Chuck and Paul Buckel. Few believed him, but his testimony highlighted the inequalities of jury selection in rural Alaska.
Sources
My primary source for this article was the Audible Original production of Midnight Son by James Dommek Jr. I highly recommend this three-hour audiobook. James Dommek Jr. does...
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March 26, 2025 • 33 mins
Mechele Hughes-Linehan
When a beautiful, intelligent, young woman pitted her three fiancés against each other, someone would die.
Sources
Brennan, Tom. 2015. Dead Man’s Dancer. Epicenter Press.
Kent
https://www.amazon.com/Dead-Mans-Dancer-Mechele-Linehan/dp/1935347160/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Dead+Man%27s+Dancer%2C+Tom+Brennan&qid=1591316098&s=books&sr=1-1
Mechele K. Linehan. Murderpedia.
https://murderpedia.org/female.L/l/...
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March 12, 2025 • 35 mins
Alaska has spawned a long list of serial killers from the gold rush era in the early 1900s to the present day. Is Brian Steven Smith the latest member of this notorious fraternity?
I did an episode on this case several months ago, but a great deal has happened with it since then. Smith’s first two murder cases have moved through the court system, and the police have released information suggesting he has more victims.
Sources
Batts...
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February 26, 2025 • 34 mins
Alaska’s slogan is the “Last Frontier.” To some people, this means Alaska is the Wild West, a place with less law and order where they can live as they choose. The man who called himself Papa Pilgrim believed moving his family to the wilderness of Alaska would offer him the opportunity to do anything he wanted. Papa Pilgrim was the worst kind of hypocrite because he hid his crimes behind his religious zeal. Like a charismatic cult ...
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February 12, 2025 • 25 mins
When a shooting at a precious metals and coin shop in Anchorage left three men dead, the two survivors claimed the other one was responsible. It took six years, two trials, and more than one thousand pieces of evidence for a jury to unravel the whodunnit and decide which survivor was a murderer and which was another victim.
Sources
“Anchorage man gets 300-year sentence for 2017 triple murder in gold shop.” May 24, 2024. Anchorage D...
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January 29, 2025 • 22 mins
Neil Mackay was ruthless in both his personal and business dealings, and associates learned not to cross him. When a car bomb instantly killed his ex-wife, Muriel Pfeil, police knew Mackay had planned her murder, but they could not find enough evidence to charge him with the crime.
Sources:
Associated Press. “Jury acquits Mackay of murder.” February 7, 1988.
Brennan, Tom. Cold Crime. Chapter 10: “An angry man.” 2005. Kenmore, WA: ...
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January 15, 2025
Mt. Iliamna is an active cone-shaped volcano located one hundred and forty miles (225 km) southwest of Anchorage and seventy miles (113 km) northwest of Homer. It is part of the Chigmit Mountains and rises from its base near Cook Inlet to 10,016 feet (3052.9 m), one of the highest peaks in the volcanically active area of the Alaska Peninsula. Ten glaciers radiate from the volcano's slopes.
Iliamna last erupted in 1867, and observe...
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January 1, 2025 • 22 mins
In 1988, forty-four commercial fishermen died at sea near Kodiak, Alaska, making it the deadliest fishing year on record. That year, fishermen also earned $2.40 per pound for sockeye salmon, the highest price ever paid to fishermen for sockeye salmon before or since. Commercial fishing proved lucrative but dangerous in 1988.
Alaska fishermen know their jobs involve risk. They work on the North Pacific, often in big seas and bru...
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December 18, 2024 • 22 mins
The Greatest High-Seas Rescue in Coast Guard History
Imagine alarm bells startling you from a peaceful sleep aboard a luxury cruise ship at 1:00 a.m. You didn’t take the “abandon ship” drill seriously on your first afternoon on the boat, and now, you struggle to remember what to do in an emergency. You find your life jacket and open the door to your cabin. The passageway smells smoky, and you hear an explosion in the bowels of the...
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December 4, 2024 • 38 mins
Most teenagers fight with their parents, and during a heated argument, some kids might even scream, “I hate you” at their mother or father, but such disagreements signal normal growing pains. Few teens order a hit on a parent, simply because the child feels the parent is too strict.
Matricide, the killing of one’s mother, is uncommon, and matricide by a girl under the age of 18 is extremely rare. Of the few cases in recent history...
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November 20, 2024 • 27 mins
What was his name? How old was he? Where did he come from? What happened to him? These are a few of the questions concerning the man known as William Dempsey. Eyewitnesses saw him murder Deputy U.S. Marshal Isaac Evans, and a jury convicted him of killing Marie Lavor, but did he murder others? Was he a young man named William Dempsey, as he claimed, or did he steal the real William Dempsey’s identity? One hundred years later, these...
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November 6, 2024 • 23 mins
We’ve all seen the horror movie where a stranger towers over his unsuspecting victim while she sleeps, and she awakes just in time to see him swing the machete toward her head. Imagine if this is no horror movie but a terrible, true event happening as you struggle to clear your mind from sleep and attempt to focus on your survival instincts. Now, what if you know the maniac wielding the machete, and he is someone close to you? C...
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October 23, 2024 • 24 mins
When the Kotzebue police entered a bedroom in a house on the mayor’s property on May 23, 2018, they found the lifeless body of twenty-five-year-old Jennifer Kirk curled at the foot of the bed. A rifle lay across her feet. She had strangulation marks on her neck and a bullet wound under her chin. Even before receiving the autopsy report, the Kotzebue police quickly ruled Kirk’s death a suicide. Two years later, the police were ca...
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October 9, 2024 • 27 mins
In one of my last episodes, I profiled Israel Keyes, a serial killer who moved to Anchorage in 2007. Many serial-killer experts consider Keyes to be one of the most intelligent, organized serial killers of all time. He randomly chose victims who lived thousands of miles from his home, and he stashed murder kits around the country, planning to access them at some future date. It is easy to understand why Israel Keyes wasn’t captu...
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September 25, 2024 • 40 mins
Harvey Carignan was a vicious serial rapist and killer. He murdered his first victim in Alaska, and she should have been his last because the jury condemned him to death by hanging for the crime. Unfortunately, the sentence was overturned when it became clear a police officer had obtained Carignan’s confession illegally. Instead of death, Harvey Carignan served eight years at Alcatraz and then headed out into the world to prey on m...
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September 11, 2024 • 32 mins
“I’ll tell you everything you want to know. I’ll give it blow by blow if you want. I have lots more blow-by-blow
A monster moved to Anchorage in 2007. Israel Keyes didn’t look evil; he appeared normal. To those who crossed his path, he seemed like a dedicated businessman, a doting father, and a loving boyfriend. No one could see the darkness lurking inside him, but by the time he moved to Alaska, Israel Keyes was already a thief,...
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