Theories, Truth, & The Yuba County 5: A Closer Look At The Netflix Documentary

This video covers the disappearance and search for the "Yuba County Five", as well as the Netflix documentary released on the subject last year. (2024)

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PREVIOUS "YUBA COUNTY 5" VIDEOS

PART 1 - https://youtu.be/I7DTCak0DOo

PART 2 - https://youtu.be/IweN7uLhGRc

PART 3 - https://youtu.be/3uNWHPFglLk

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Hey there, folks.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
This video is a bit overdue, but I wasn't really
sure how I wanted to structure it. Last year, a
new documentary came out on Netflix that centered around the
Yuba County Five, and it contained some interesting ideas. I
received quite a few emails asking me what I thought
about it, and it's taken a while to get around
to it. So this video will partly be a discussion

(00:40):
of the information revealed in that documentary, but also an
analysis of some of the theories that were presented in it.
For those who don't know, it was about an hour
long and featured as an independent episode of a series
called Files of the Unexplained. If you have already watched
my series on the subject, then you probably didn't hear
too many new revelation. But they did get interviews with

(01:02):
many family members of the five men who disappeared. Personally,
I was always looking forward to hearing what they had
to say, and I knew the documentary crew had been
working on this for quite some time. The family really
gave us a lot of good background on the Yuba boys,
what they were like and so on, and also a
few clarifications when it came to their behavior before watching

(01:23):
this video. It might be beneficial if you have seen
the Netflix documentary I'm talking about, but it's probably not
all that necessary because I'll bring up and explain everything
that I think is important to discuss. I'm also not
going to do any rehashing of the case timeline like
I did in the last video. I'm assuming if you're
watching this video, you know something about the Yuba County

(01:44):
five case, so I suppose this video isn't really for
a Yuba County Five beginner. All right, With all that said,
let's move on to the recently released documentary, what new
information is in it and also where it falls short
of expectations. I know a lot of people, myself included,
were confused that Joseph Schoenes wasn't even mentioned once. So

(02:05):
I'm just going to start going through topics and important
information that comes up throughout the movie in chronological order.
The first little nugget came from Jackie Hewittt's brother. He
says that Jackie didn't have a problem using a telephone
and would talk to his girlfriend for long periods of time.
This information matters because the official sheriff support makes mention

(02:26):
that Jackie either couldn't or wouldn't use telephones. This is
further relevant because there were a few sightings of the
Uba five in the weeks and months following their disappearance.
One of the more important ones occurred on March third
of nineteen seventy eight, at a place called Mary's Country Store,
where a witness said she saw the boys getting out
of a reddish truck. When she brought this information to

(02:49):
the sheriff and she was making identifications of the boys,
she said she saw someone who looked like Jackie Hewitt
using a payphone. Originally, it was thought that this sighting
lacked legitimacy because Jackie couldn't or didn't use telephones, but
as it turns out, he can. Obviously, this doesn't mean
it was actually the Yuba boys at Mary's Country Store

(03:10):
that day, but it does help remove an inaccuracy and
perhaps lend a little more credence to this sighting. Another
point that is worthy to hammer home is that the
family that is interviewed in the film seemed to all
agree that there was no way the boys missed a
turn and accidentally wound up in the mountains. One even
states that Jack Madruga had made the drive one hundred times,

(03:31):
probably an exaggeration, but his point is well made. They
knew the way home. I always felt this was true
as well. If you do that drive up into the mountains,
there are countless times and opportunities for you to say, hey,
this doesn't look familiar or this doesn't make sense. I mean,
you have the town of Oroville, the Bidwell bar Bridge,

(03:52):
and then a narrow mountain road leading up into the
snowy mountains. There were a thousand signs that would have
been apparent to them, and there were countless opportunities to
turn around, but they didn't. Now that really only leaves
two options. One, they fully intended to go up into
the mountains, or at least they fully intended to divert
from their known path home. It could be possible that

(04:15):
they wanted to make a stop somewhere in a region
that they were unfamiliar with and for reasons that we
don't know, and then they became lost. It's possible the
alternative for that would be that someone somehow forced them
to drive up into the hills, and that one is
quite a bit trickier. It would seem rather unlikely that
there was anyone other than the five boys in the car,

(04:36):
because it was packed pretty tight as it is, could
another car chase or force them up into the hills?
I don't know. It seemed unlikely as well, because this
mystery car would have had to be chasing them for
well over an hour, so they would have had some
really determined pursuers. And if they were being chased, why
not stop for help in the town of Oroville. The

(04:58):
Montegos undercarriage was also completely undamaged, despite the rough road
leading into the mountains, So while Jack Madruga was driving,
he was driving carefully. Would that really be the case
if someone was chasing them? It's hard to know how
they would react to a situation like that. But again,
I think these five men had a lot more intelligence

(05:19):
than people like to give them credit for, and there
were five of them, so combined, you would think that
they could come to a reasonable solution to solve whatever
problem they had found themselves in. That is, if they
were being chased. If they made their way into the
mountains on purpose for reasons that we simply cannot know,
then that is a different story. Ultimately, the documentary helps

(05:41):
to give us a fuller picture by really debunking any
idea that the boys could have simply gotten lost and
ended up there. It's also clear from listening to the
family's speak that they place a lot of blame on
the authorities for the lack of results from the search.
There were at least two men surviving, or rather starving
for many weeks in a trailer owned by the Forest Service.

(06:03):
The search brought personnel to locations that wouldn't have been
very far from the trailers, but nobody in the end
made the decision to go and actually look. It gets
worse when you consider that the Forest Service says they
informed the Butte County Sheriff's office of those trailers and
basically suggested they go and take a look at them,
but for some reason that never happened. The family openly

(06:26):
criticized this failure in newspapers back in the day, and
Butte County probably either denies this was the situation, or
perhaps they give themselves the excuse that it was unthinkable
that the boys could have walked that far in the
snow and the cold without proper clothing. You can almost
understand why they would think that. I mean, we're talking
about a distance of almost twenty Miles and I believe

(06:49):
the evidence shows that three of the men did die
while trying to get to that trailer, but at least
two survived and with severe injury. And with all the
searching the authorities did without success, you would think the
first thing you would do would be to seek out
any place that could be used as a potential shelter.
It is, without a doubt, a massive failure on the

(07:10):
part of the Butte County sheriff. Another interesting tidbit comes
from the Hewitt family regarding Jack Hewitt sor Hewitt Senior,
was heavily involved in the search efforts and was even
the one who ended up finding the remains of his
own son along the forest road.

Speaker 1 (07:25):
There has always been a.

Speaker 2 (07:25):
Lot of how best to say this a differing information
that came from Hewitt. For example, in the documentary, his
family says that he witnessed only four sets of tracks
leaving the Montego and heading north up into the hills.
There thinking was that Matthias was never up there in
the first place, having been killed earlier in the night

(07:47):
and thrown off a bridge. Hewitt Senior also claimed to
have witnessed writing in the trailer that was a match
for his son, meaning he believed Jackie Hewitt actually made
it to the trailer and survived there for quite some time.
He claimed that the authorities basically ignored him when he
pointed this out. It's also mentioned in the documentary that
Hewitt Senior knew about the forest trailers and even told

(08:10):
searchers to go and check them. The response he got
was that the boys would never make it that far.
A lot of this points to the idea that authorities
were ignoring evidence and just wanted to have this case
over and done with. I'm sure a lot of people
see it that way too, but it is a bit
more nuanced than that. You have multiple agencies working on

(08:30):
this case. You had the Yuba County Sheriff, the Butte
County sheriff, Plumus County, and more. I'm not thinking of
these agencies all helped in the search. It was Butte County,
not Yuba County, that seemingly ignored the advice from the
Forest Service to go out and check their trailers. Frankly,
given that Hewitt Senior worked tirelessly to search those hills

(08:51):
by himself, if he felt his child had made it
to those trailers, then I'm surprised he didn't try to
go there himself. But anyway, bring all this up to
say that I don't think it is true that all
of the authorities simply did not care for some of them.
I'm sure that's probably true. But Lance Airs, who was
the lead detective on this case for Yuba County, really

(09:13):
seemed to genuinely care about solving this thing. This case
haunted him for years until his death. I doubt he
ever stopped thinking about it. His dedication to solving it
comes through when you read the Yuba County case file.
We have a lot of detailed information because Yuba County
really worked this case. I've seen what it looks like
when an investigative agency shirks their duties and doesn't investigate.

(09:36):
It does not look like this. I have a hard
time believing that someone as invested as Lance Airs would
simply ignore evidence like only four sets of footprints in
the snow or Jackie Hewitt's handwriting being found in the trailer.
If this stuff existed, then I would have little doubt
that he would have included it in his reports. It
would be really relevant stuff. I'll add one other point

(09:59):
to this. The four sets of footprints, and the snow
thing makes little sense to me, mainly because we know
for a fact that people went up into those mountains
after the boys went missing, people who wanted to ski,
people who wanted to play in the snow, the people
who went up to get Shown's car, and who knows
what else. Both cars and people were in that area,

(10:20):
destroying tracks and traces for days after the boys went missing.
To top it all off, it apparently snowed the day
before the Mercury Montego was found. The point is, if
there had been obvious tracks leading somewhere, I think it's
a given that someone, either a searcher or a family
member would have followed them to their natural conclusion, and

(10:41):
in doing so, the boys would have been found a
lot sooner. Obviously, that did not happen, and I have
to think it was because there were no actual clear
tracks present in the area. Tracks in snow are usually
the first thing you look for and the easiest way
to track somebody's movement. If they existed, they would have
been in important and noted personally. I doubt there were

(11:03):
any tracks, as a SnowCat had come up the road
and likely flattened all the snow. You don't leave very
good tracks when you're walking on packed snow. I hate
to question the validity of anything a family member has
to say, but I just don't see how these things
that Hewitt Senior said he saw could have actually been real.
The documentary goes on to pose some interesting questions that

(11:24):
have been brought up before about the events that took
place at the trailer. Why did they not find the
additional food that was locked up. Why didn't they turn
on the gas heating system so they could be warm.
I think these questions might have relatively simple answers, but
we also lack information, so that makes it a bit
more complicated. Obviously, the two men who made it to
the trailers were scavenging after they got there, because they

(11:47):
broke into the trailer. That's clear from the photographs. They
broke a window and climbed through, and of course they did,
they were likely on the verge of death. There was
evidence that they also used a pry bar to break
a padlock. Doing this, they broke into a storage locker
that had cans of food, and those cans were found
empty and consumed on the floor of the trailer, so

(12:08):
we know that they were looking for and found supplies.
They were doing the smart thing that anyone should do
in that situation, searching for resources to keep themselves alive.
When it comes to the additional food locker that was
left untouched, I've always wondered what the lock on it
looked like. Was it larger, was it more difficult to
break into? Did it exhaust the men just trying to

(12:30):
break in and get the food from the first locker?
Did they believe, perhaps that the food would have been
all in one place, so that essentially they thought the
food they found was all that there was. These all
lead to possible answers. With the gas heating system. You
have to wonder if they saw a large gas tank,
would they automatically assume it is used for the purposes

(12:51):
of indoor heating? Was turning the system on really as
simple as pushing a button or turning a valve? Did
they think the tank was even full or did they
assume that it was empty because the trailer camp appeared abandoned.
The best way to help sort out these questions would
have been to do a detailed walk through of the
forest trailer camp, which no longer exists. You have to

(13:12):
see how these things work, and then imagine what it
would all look like under many feet of snow. Would
it even be visible to them at that time. It's
easy to read a piece of paper that says there
was food and gas available at the site and then
for us to wonder why they didn't find and use it.
But it's a whole other matter to wander into a
seemingly abandoned camp that's buried in snow and then try

(13:35):
to figure out what resources are there that could be
helpful to you. Mind, you, whoever made it to the
forest camp was likely in terrible shape. Frostbite, hypothermia, exhaustion, confusion,
all things that prevent you from thinking clearly. If you
follow this channel, then you've heard stories of ridiculous things
that people have done while hypothermic. When it comes to

(13:58):
the two men who made it to the trailer, more
than anything, I would imagine they just wanted to get
out of the weather, to have a place to rest
that wasn't under an open sky. In the documentary, Ted
Weer's family proposed that he would not have done anything
that he felt was stealing, like taking food that didn't
belong to him. They mentioned this in reference to the

(14:18):
food storage locker that was left untouched, but it kind
of ignores the fact that places were already broken into
food already did get taken and eaten among other supplies.
So whatever morality ted Weir had in his day to
day life, some of it likely went out the window
due to the life or death situation he was in,

(14:39):
and this would hold true for pretty much anyone in
a similar situation. Ted's family also mentions that he wouldn't
have known how to turn on the propane, and this
might very well be true, but it seems unlikely that
ted Weir was involved much in the collection of any
of the camp's resources. He likely struggled to make it
to the camp in the first place, and once they

(15:00):
he probably got into that bunk bed and stayed there
until his death. I think it is much more likely
that Gary Matthias was the one to take the food
and use it to keep them both alive, at least
for a time. And while we're still on the subject
of what the men did or did not do while
at the trailer, it's worth bringing up the idea of
creating a fire for warmth. I know some folks don't

(15:23):
see it this way, but to me, I still have
not seen evidence or mention of a wood burning fireplace
in the trailer. Today we have a few new pictures
that actually show some of the interior of the trailer,
and none of them show a fireplace. Not to say
that one wasn't there, of course, but let's say there
was one. Why wouldn't they make a fire to stay warm?

Speaker 3 (15:45):
For me?

Speaker 2 (15:45):
I wonder how much access they had to dry wood,
or at least do they know where to find dry wood? Remember,
this area is covered in snow at this point. On
the topic of staying warm, you might also ask why
didn't they try to seal up the large window they
broke to get in. The wind that must have blown
in there was likely freezing, but they didn't do anything

(16:05):
about it. Well, if Weird as disabled because of the
condition of his feet, then in my opinion, we just
have to contend with why Matthias didn't do anything. Both
of these men were likely sapped of their strength after
the near twenty mile walk in the snow. Surely they
were unbelievably exhausted, But over the course of roughly seventy days,

(16:27):
or the amount of time it took for ted Weir
to pass away. You would think that something would have
been done to create warmth, except there wasn't. So we
have some strange behavior and Gary Matthias. You do wonder
to what extent his schizophrenia affected him while he was
trapped in that trailer. Could it be the reason nothing
was done. It's hard to say. Speaking of Gary Matthias,

(16:50):
we need to talk about him. The film brings up
the popular theory that Gary was somehow responsible for whatever
happened that night. One of the family members says the
boys were scared of Matthias and that they didn't want
him to go with them to the game in Chico.
It's something to note, but it's impossible to prove. I mean,
these guys did let him into their friend group, and

(17:12):
Gary had been behaving well for the time that they
had known him, according to reports. The idea that Gary
somehow coaxed the four boys up into the mountains that
night is a bit far fetched. I mean, each of
these guys was their own person. They weren't just some
lemming that you could just boss around. Jack Madruga loved
his car more than anything. It's doubtful you could talk

(17:32):
him into driving into those mountains without a damn good reason.
All of them had a big basketball game the next morning,
which means all of them were likely eager to get home,
go to sleep, and get up to tackle the next day.
All of the boys knew that their parents were expecting
them to return home at a reasonable hour. Gary Matthias

(17:53):
is and always has been an easy scapegoat. He suffered
from schizophrenia and drug addiction, which led to him committing
some heinous crimes in the past, but again, those crimes
occurred while he was basically in the midst of a
psychotic break. Since that time, he had been taking medication
that kept him stable and a functional member of society.

(18:14):
I don't think there is any scenario in which Gary
Matthias is the sole instigator for whatever happened that night.
I just cannot imagine a situation where he talks the
men into driving up into the mountains, and then they
get their car stuck, and then he talks them into
walking further up into the snowy hills and to certain death.

(18:35):
Gary's brother defends him in the documentary, saying that there
is no way his father would have let Gary leave
the house without taking his medication, and while on this medication,
he had been well behaved. All of this leads into
the next item, Jack Madruga's niece Kathy Roberts. She states
that after the boy's disappearance and discovery, after the searching

(18:56):
was all over, she saw Gary Matthias in a bar
one night. He says, she locked eyes with him and
swears it was Gary. She ran to tell her mother
and the two were going to call the Sheriff's department,
but the man she believed was Gary got up and left.
She backs this story up by saying that Gary was
seen by other folks at different locations around town.

Speaker 1 (19:16):
I had heard.

Speaker 2 (19:17):
About this story before, but I didn't include it in
my other videos because it is just an unverified sighting.
These literally happen in just about every single missing person's
case you can cover. People think that they see missing
people and then they report it. Now, this is something
a little more substantial because it was someone who knew
Gary somewhat. But the issue is there is a lot

(19:39):
of evidence against it. As I've said in my other videos,
if Gary did survive and got out of the mountains
and just continued living his life, I can't imagine there
would be any possibility we wouldn't know about it. While
Gary was unmedicated, he committed quite a few crimes. There
were other incidents where he did things that weren't criminally charged,
but there are documented incidents of Gary assaulting people or

(20:03):
getting aggressive. My point is, when Gary was not medicated,
he couldn't stay out of trouble for long periods of time.
He just couldn't. So if he survived and was on
the run, how was he medicating himself? That would be
pretty difficult. If he had no meds, at some point,
he would do something wrong and the police would get involved.
If the police come, they would either arrest him or

(20:25):
at the very least, not let him leave without idine
him first. That has not happened. Gary has never gotten
into trouble since the disappearance. The only way he could
pull something like that off is if he somehow stayed
consistently medicated all of these years. But how would he
do that without the help of his family, whom he
totally and utterly relied on. You'd have to say that

(20:47):
the Matthias family somehow took him in and kept him
under wraps for years, hiding him from the public and
acting distraught for the rest of their lives well at
the same time, somehow continuing to get his schizophrenia medication
from a doctor. But even that story doesn't make sense
because if Gary is seen supposedly drinking at a bar,
then that means the key missing person in a huge

(21:10):
mystery is just out bar hopping on the weekend in
and around the same town that he disappeared from. You know,
I never like to eliminate a possibility completely, but I
just don't see how this one works. I don't see
how Gary Matthias could have survived this incident. The other
big theory that is brought up in the film comes

(21:31):
from a member of the Hewitt family and involves a
man who was known as the town bully back in
the day. Anyway, the theory goes that the bully and
a small group of others like him decided to attack
the Uba boys, and they beat up Gary Matthias and
they threw him over the Bidwell bar bridge. Afterwards, they
chase the remaining four up into the mountains until their

(21:51):
car gets stuck, at which point the perpetrators threaten or
scare the boys into running up into the snowy hills
on foot. The family theory says that it was Ted
Weir and Jackie Hewitt who made it to the trailer,
and Jackie took care of Ted until he passed, at
which point he left and died in the snow. Again.
I never like critiquing any of the theories of family members.

(22:15):
It always feels a bit insensitive, but I still feel
it's important to discuss as I think this theory has
many holes. For one, why would Gary Matthias's shoes be
found in the trailer if he was thrown over the bridge.
The family seems to claim that the four remaining men
had retrieved Matthias's shoes from him at some point and
then took them on the journey up into the mountains,

(22:37):
but say somehow they had Gary's footwear. In what world
does one of the boys grab Matthias's shoes from the
car as they begin their trek on foot into the mountains.
Why would they want to bring them, and during the exhausting,
nearly twenty mile walk they continue to hold on to them.
I just don't see it. If they still had them,
they would have thrown those converse shoes into the bushes

(23:00):
after the first few miles. There'd be no sense in
carrying them all that way, They would serve no purpose.
Matthias's shoes were not good in the snow or anything
like that. They're just dead weight. And if those boys
were chased up into the mountains by a group of
bad guys, why didn't Joseph Shones ever tell that story?
It would be an easy one to tell, and he

(23:20):
wouldn't have to lie. He would look clean and probably
even look like a hero because he finally had the
answer to what took place that night. He would be
the witness we so desperately need. He could easily pass
blame off onto the town bully and others. He could
say he didn't do anything because he was scared and
he didn't want to get hurt. He would just need

(23:41):
to tell the police that he saw a group of
guys force the five men up into the mountains. The
Yuba boys would have walked right past Shoanes, he couldn't
miss them. But Shones never tells a story like that,
and Shones's version they all head back down and out
of the mountains. The Hewett family theory never accounts for
Shoons in inn They never even mention him in the documentary.

(24:03):
But you can't leave him out. Whatever happened to the boys,
they still had to walk right past a man named
Joseph Shoones in order to get into those mountains. I
can understand the Hewett family wanting to believe that their
relative Jackie made it to the trailer and that he
took care of Ted in his last days. I can
sympathize with wanting to believe that, But you have to

(24:25):
recognize that it is basically a miracle that anyone made
it to that forest trailer. I mean, just imagine trying
to walk almost twenty miles in the snow and cold
in the dark without wearing good cold weather clothing. It
really is a miracle that anyone survived the trek to
that trailer. When it comes to this case, I am

(24:45):
in the minority of people who think that Sterling, Madruga,
and Hewitt all died along the forest road leading to
that trailer. Consider how much damaged Ted Weir's body took
just getting there. His feet were essentially falling off. He
barely survived the journey. And if Jackie made it to
the trailer, if he had done all of these things

(25:05):
to keep himself and Ted live for weeks, would he
really just start walking back on the path that brought
him there. It was about twenty miles back the same way,
and he would have already been immensely weakened by months
of starvation. To me, the most convincing evidence that Jackie
Hewitt died on the way to the trailer's is the
physical evidence. When Jackie Hewitt's remains were found, they were

(25:28):
completely skeletonized. When his shirt was picked up, his spinal
column fell out along with other bones, so he was
fully decomposed within his clothing. In fact, there was no
soft tissue left on the bones. According to the autopsy,
Madruga and Sterling's remains were located over a mile away
as the crow flies. Their remains were largely skeletonized, but

(25:51):
both still had soft tissue. If the contention is that
Hewitt made it to the trailer and stayed to take
care of Weir until his death, then that would mean
that Hewitt survived the same seventy ish day period that
the coroner claimed Weir was alive. After Weir's death, Hewitt
would wrap his body and then leave the trailer, walking

(26:11):
back on the road for a few miles and then dying.
His body would be found about a month later. But
how then our Jackie Hewitt's remains just as decomposed, or
an actuality, maybe even a bit more decomposed than those
of Madruga and Sterling. You'd be saying that Jackie Hewitt
died far later than the other two, but his remains

(26:33):
decomposed faster. I actually consulted with a couple coroners on
this just to make sure my thinking was sound, and
they both agreed. While there are plenty of variables when
it comes to outdoor decomposition, it doesn't make much sense
for Hewitt's remains to be more decomposed after a month
or less than Madruga and Sterling's remains were after being

(26:54):
out in the elements for over three months. So until
I see some solid physical evidence that Jackie Hewitt was
actually in that trailer, I'm going to continue thinking he
died on the way there, but I will always remain
open to the possibility that I'm wrong. Obviously, a lot
of this is based on the estimates made by the
coroner who observed Weir's body, and to be clear, this

(27:17):
is how he reached that conclusion that Weir had been
alive for around seventy days first, he was informed that
Weir had been clean shaven on the day that he disappeared.
When Weir's body was found, he had a full beard.
The coroner measured the facial hair and found that most
of it was three to four centimeters long. He then
used a growth rate of three millimeters per week to

(27:38):
conclude that Weir had survived for ten to thirteen weeks
or seventy to ninety one days. Obviously, that is an
incredible length of time, and believe it or not, the
growth rate the coroner used is actually on the higher
end of the averages, which usually range between two and
three point five millimeters per week, meaning the corner or

(28:00):
assumed that Weir's hair was growing pretty fast. I think
it's a fair assumption to make things like hair growth
rate come down to a lot of different factors. Genetically,
if you look at Weir's male relatives, they're all pretty
hairy guys. I could see them having a higher than
average hair growth rate. But you might also consider that
Weir was starving, which slows hair growth. Lastly, Weir's body

(28:23):
would have been very dried out, which can sometimes make
things like facial hair appear longer because the skin pulls
back a bit. It's something the coroner likely would have
considered if it was a factor in this case. The
coroner was actually very thorough about this. In order to
get the most conservative calculation he could, he took the

(28:43):
fastest hair growth rate on record and use these shortest
hairs that he measured for his sample to calculate a
length of time equal to eight weeks or fifty six days.
But again that calculation is under the assumption that Weir
had the fastest hair growth on record and using these
shortest hairs taken in the sample. But to boost his

(29:05):
original calculations that Weir had survived for at least seventy days,
the coroner observed that the extent of the decomposition on
Weir's body was consistent with a post mortem interval of
about three to four weeks, meaning he estimated Weir had
been dead for three to four weeks prior to being found.
And remember, Weir had been missing for one hundred.

Speaker 1 (29:27):
Days, so if you shave three to four.

Speaker 2 (29:29):
Weeks off of that, you get seventy two to seventy
nine days that he would have been alive in that trailer.
I know, it's a lot of math Ultimately, I guess
what I'm trying to say is it would appear that
the coroner had good reason to believe that Weir survived
for months in that trailer. It would appear that seventy
days is not out of the question, as unthinkable as

(29:52):
that may be. Whoever was with Weir was with him
until the end, and that means they survived for the
same amount of time. Based on all of this, I
tend to think that it was Gary Matthias who wrapped
up Weir and made the walk out of that trailer,
because he had a convincing history to support such a thing.
Gary once made a five hundred and thirty five mile

(30:13):
journey from Oregon to California by walking and hitchhiking. He
didn't have any money, so he scavenged for food during
that time. This shows that he had an ability to
endure and some good survival instincts. Beyond that, there is
physical evidence that Gary may have made the journey out
from the trailer. Blankets and a flashlight were found half
a mile to the northeast of the trailers on another

(30:35):
forest road. Who else would have left those there but
one of the boys. If you believe it was Jackie
there and not Gary. Then you have to say that
Jackie climbed up the ridge, dropped the blankets and flashlight
after finding a road, and then climbed back down to
another road where he died. It just doesn't make much sense.
A lot of people say that it couldn't have been

(30:55):
Matthias taking care of Weir because he had schizophrenia and
he no longer had access to his medication. I don't
entirely accept the idea that someone with schizophrenia will automatically
just go insane and be incapable of doing anything. Prior
to his disappearance. There were a few times that Gary
did some pretty messed up things when he was unmedicated,

(31:16):
but as far as I know, it wasn't like every
single day he was trying to burn down a house
or murder someone. The only thing Gary would be responsible
for while at the trailers is getting water and opening
food cans. The question becomes, could a schizophrenic person do
that even on an inconsistent basis. I think they probably could. So.

(31:38):
While Gary likely suffered great mental anguish in those trailers,
he would just need to keep it together enough to
get water and open food cans. Obviously, the only thing
we know for certain is that Ted Weir was in
that trailer, But the best physical evidence of the apparent
presence of Gary Matthias was his shoes. He left his

(31:59):
shoes behind, likely changing into Ted's larger shoes because the
frostbite on his feet had swollen and damaged them to
the point that larger shoes would be more comfortable. I
think the Matthias family largely agrees with this idea, at
least according to their statements in the documentary. It seems
like over the course of the weeks they were stuck

(32:19):
in that trailer, Gary probably slowly started losing his mind. Eventually,
Ted dies and is swaddled in the sheets. Afterwards, Gary
walks out into the snowy abyss, dying somewhere in the
forest north of the trailers, and even to this day
he still hasn't been found. This is probably as good
a time as any to mention something else related to

(32:40):
Gary Matthias. Recently, a Yuba County five researcher named Anthony
Dunn put out a two thousand dollars reward for anyone
that finds Gary Matthias's remains. Obviously, if you were to
go searching for remains in the plumus, you should be
an experienced hiker and one who is very cautious. My
own journey wandering around the forests of that area didn't

(33:01):
go so well. The discouraging part is that we really
don't know how much of Gary would be left at
this point, but maybe, just maybe someone could come across
something someday.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (33:13):
So that pretty much covers most of the new information
and theories that I wanted to go over in the
UBI five documentary, And if you saw it while already
being familiar with this case, you might have noticed something
important was missing. The name Joseph Shones was never mentioned
a single time. I was rather taken aback by that
the only potential witness in the entire case, the man

(33:35):
who many theorized played some part in the disappearance, and
he isn't brought up at all. I really couldn't wrap
my head around it. So I contacted a man featured
in the film, Tony Wright, the author of a book
on this case called Things Aren't Right. I wanted to
ask him what he knew about the omission, because I
know I'm not the only one who was surprised Yeah,

(33:56):
Uba five documentary on Netflix. That was a big thing.
I remember getting a lot of emails about it when
it came out. It took me a little while to
actually get around to watching it, but a lot of
the feedback I got, and I agree with you know,
it was like great to see you and so many
of the family members on there talking about their experience,
what the kids were like, and you just got a

(34:18):
lot of information. But there was this one thing that
everyone had the question for me. They were like, why
did they leave out Joseph Shoones And I think a
lot of people they jumped to like kind of maybe
I admittedly did this too, like some sort of malicious deception,
like how could they leave that out? But you worked
on this documentary and so you got a lot of

(34:39):
experience with them. So was there a more legitimate reason
why that wasn't featured in the actual documentary.

Speaker 3 (34:48):
I think it had to do with time, from what
I understand, to get all the family members on air
and to discuss the background and the case. I believe
in this they were hoping to do that episode in
two parts four files the unexplained, and there could have
been a decision at the last moment editing purposes or whatever,

(35:11):
and some things just had to be cut and they
just probably had to leave it at forty five minutes.
And that's been my understanding with it.

Speaker 2 (35:23):
Probably came from up top somewhere or something I would imagine,
huh yeah.

Speaker 3 (35:27):
And when we recorded the episode, when we filmed it
was February twenty twenty three, and I believe the writer
strike happened not long after that, So I don't know
how much of all of that going on in the
industry slowed things down or changed things. Plus there seemed

(35:49):
to be like a back to work kind of thing
for a lot of production companies, you know, post COVID,
and I know that they were hoping for a big,
big episode, if not one, maybe two, And that's what
I believe, like what you said, a decision from up

(36:10):
top and it had to be trimmed down and it
went to forty five minutes. But I still see it
as a great episode as as a way to introduce
people to the case. And there's plenty of things they
can watch, especially your videos. You had the two part
series on the Ubu County five case, and they can
learn all about the case and the Mopak audio podcast,

(36:33):
and you know, people like Drew Beeson who has his channel,
and more Lodge and some other people. I mean it
files The Unexplained did a good job of opening the
door to the casing.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
This is what it is.

Speaker 3 (36:44):
You can learn more about it.

Speaker 2 (36:46):
Yeah, it was absolutely beautifully done, Like yeah, beautifully done
documents in terms of like a piece of art. It is, like,
you know, really great, but just out of curiosity. And
you know, I think you told me in an email
you did like hours that day just talking to them.
And so during that time, are you do you mention

(37:06):
Joseph Shones as you're just talking to them? How does
that work? What does that look like? Are they just
asking you questions and you're answering them and they're just
recording and uh, and then they trim that down because
you're featured on there as the UBA five expert, which you.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
Know you are.

Speaker 2 (37:19):
You spent probably I don't don't has anyone else spent
more time with you? I don't know, but.

Speaker 3 (37:24):
There's a few there's a few people up there with me,
Shannon McGarvey at Mopac Audio and Drew Beeson. Yeah, you know,
you did a lot of work along with some other
people out there, so I appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (37:35):
But yeah, it was a ten hour day.

Speaker 3 (37:37):
And what happened was I was supposed to be interviewed
for an hour and a half two hours, and they said, hey,
meet us at this house in Utuba City. We've got
it set up. It's where we're doing all the interviews
with certain people. And so I said, cool, I'll be there.
I got there. Uh, it was probably ten am. We're

(37:58):
done by noon. So we're eating lunch and I met
Tammy Phillips, Gary Matthias's sister for the first time in person.
We had talked of the phone and texted and emailed,
so that was great. And they said, oh, hey, hey,
if you're interested, later tonight, we're going up to the
Plumas and we're going to try to get up to
Roger's cow camp area and we don't know if we

(38:19):
can make it up to the firebase and daniel Zinc area.
Do you want to come because someone's going to be
driving us up there and just kind of leading away.
And I said, yeah, perfect, that's fine, let's do it.
So I was done with recording and I probably got
back to my hotel like one o'clock and I talked
to Gary Mathias's brother for a little bit and then
my phone starts ringing and they're like, hey, can you

(38:41):
just get here now. We're just going to leave as
soon as possible for the Plumus. I said sure.

Speaker 1 (38:46):
The person that was.

Speaker 3 (38:47):
Supposed to drive him was sick and they had a
whole production for a moment and they kind of stopped
and looked at me and said, hey, do you know
the way to the plumis And I said, yeah, I
know how to get up there. I will drive. They'd
like mic me up and put cameras on me, and
we drove up to the Plumas and we spent a
while up in that area near Lake Oreville at the
Bidwell Barbridge. We were We got as far as Mountain

(39:10):
House before the road was closed.

Speaker 1 (39:12):
Were you driving?

Speaker 3 (39:13):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (39:13):
I was driving.

Speaker 3 (39:14):
So we had two cars and you said I was
beautifully filmed. All credit to sky Boardman, who was the producer.
She did like Abducted in Plain Sight and I think
it's called the Girl in the Picture. She's done some
Unsolved Mysteries episode. So yeah, we were in an suv
driving up, so there's like a camera person next to me,
one person behind me. The sound guy was behind me,

(39:37):
and then like the producers, she was like in the
basically the trunk area of the suv with like pillows
around her, like directing the episode. And then there was
a car following us to the rest of the crew.
And so yeah, we spent a lot of time getting
up into the Plumas and once we got you know,
to the.

Speaker 1 (39:53):
Bidwell Barbridge and Lake Oreville, we.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Spent some time filming there, and then we got further
up towards Mountain House, did a lot of filming up there,
which was really cool. And the thing about that shoot,
there's bits and pieces of me in the car, there's
bits and pieces of me up there in your mountain house.
And it's pitch black up there. We had no cell service,
and we were up there probably around the first or

(40:20):
second week of February, and it was cool temperatures. It
got dark fast, and we kind of got a better
understanding of what it was for the guys that night
when they were driving up into the Plumas and the crew,
I mean they were just saying the same thing, like,
these guys didn't get lost, There's no way, I mean,
we're on this road, we're doing this traveling we went

(40:41):
through Oreville. I mean, they weren't convinced, and I'm like,
I completely understand, and this is a mystery that's perplexed
us for a long time.

Speaker 2 (40:50):
So you're having conversations with the crew about what could
have happened that kind of thing. So I'm sure you
guys probably talked about Shown's during that time at some point.

Speaker 3 (41:00):
I mean, I'm sorry. I think when they were interviewing me,
he was brought up a little bit. But basically the
majority of the talk for me, I remember, was a
little bit of background on the guys and then the
investigation itself. We really focused on the investigation.

Speaker 2 (41:16):
Like there was there anything they told you we don't
want to talk about. Yeah, they town bully guy maybe
or something.

Speaker 3 (41:27):
Yeah, they were kinda They didn't say they had talked
to anyone else about it, because I did. The day
I arrived, I met Tom and Claudia Hewett and Dallas
Weird Junior, and we all sat down and had dinner.
And I don't remember if Tom and Claudia had mentioned
they talked about the town bully or not, but I
knew we weren't going to talk about it. In my

(41:49):
part they said, you know, we won't cover that with you. Yeah,
but that's where it was left. But I think things
like probably like more bigfoot UFO gotcha Like they weren't
feeling that at all. They were like, yeah, we're not
going there. That makes sense.

Speaker 2 (42:07):
Yeah, because yeah, they did cover the town bully and
and that's what I actually liked about. You get a
lot of the theories from the families or what they
think is going on, which is something else I wanted
to ask you about because I hadn't heard the Hewitt
family specifically. They were talking about things that Jackie's father,

(42:29):
Hewitt Senior, was saying and he al he said that
he saw four sets of tracks in the snow leading
up from the Montego and up into the mountains. Had
you heard that before from the family.

Speaker 3 (42:42):
Yes, So I spent so, Like you said, I spent
a lot of time on the case. I spent about
four years and quite quite a bit of phone calls
with the Hewitts, the Madrugas, the Matthias family as well
in the Weirs. The Sterlings have not been in communication
with anyone, but talking with Tom and Claudia, they retained

(43:04):
a lot of the information that jack senior had given
them over the years, and he said, yeah, four sets
of tracks went from the Montego up the road and
in the police report, and I believe you had a
copy of that as well when you did your series,
and I don't know if yours got redacted, but there
is information it's kind of buried in there that there

(43:27):
were tracks from the car, but it didn't say how
many sets of footprints. Also, another thing is there were
people up there the day after on Saturday, of course,
Joe Shunes his wife and helper, and then there was
just up that way and I actually have made contact

(43:49):
or actually if Drew Beeson and someone else's made contact
with the guy. He was up there the day after
near the Montego. So we found him after the Netflix
which was huge.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
So, yeah, did he provide any interesting tidbits you want
to share or anything?

Speaker 3 (44:07):
Yeah, he said, I think it was his I don't
want to see if it was his dad or stepdad,
and his mom had a very colorful interaction with Joe
Shoones' wife. I don't know. He was young at the time.
He said, you could go up that road and you
could get on like a snow tube or something, and

(44:27):
just go down the roads because they're so winding and mountainous.
If it was just a fun thing to do, and
if you knew the spot, that's where you went. He
says from what he remembers, And this was told to
me from some other researchers that either Cindy shown Joe's wife,
and the person helping him were mad that other people
weren't helping moving the car, or that they were up there.

(44:49):
Something was just going on and some words were exchanged,
and he was doing his best rememories, Like I was
the kid. I don't remember it that well, but I
do vivially recall there was an argument that's about it.
So yeah, very interesting.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
And one other question on the topic of like of
Hewitt Senior. I think someone sent me this in an
email because I still need to listen to the MOPAQ audio.
I really should. I need to get on that. But
I think someone told me that in the Mopack series
that there was something from Hewitt Senior and there too
about supposedly seeing some of Jackie's handwriting and the trailer.

(45:31):
Is that is that true?

Speaker 3 (45:34):
Yes? So that was in the MOPAQ audio. They were
able to do an interview with Jack Senior in person
before he died around twenty eighteen, he did say that
that he saw Jackie's handwriting. In my conversations with Tom
and Claudia Hewitt, they doubled down on that too and

(45:55):
said Jack Hewitt claims that when he was in the
trailer he saw handwriting that they or Jack Senior said
he saw Jackie's handwriting, And also talking to Gary Matthias's sister,
Cammy Phillips, she said she saw paper with Gary's handwriting
on it. So this kind of puts Gary, Jackie, and

(46:17):
Ted in the trailer. So we definitely know Ted, We've
got Gary and now Jackie. So you know, with the
families and what they said, it's been consistent over the years,
and if they firmly believe this, I mean, yeah, they
saw what they said. They saw what they saw, and unfortunately,

(46:37):
I don't think we have any clues left from the trailer.
I think they've all been destroyed.

Speaker 2 (46:42):
As I've always been a little bit skeptical that Jackie
made it up there, and I know I'm kind of
in the minority on that, but I just found interesting
that Hewitt Senior, he kind of has these tidbits of
the facts that aren't really in the report, because like,
if the handwriting was in the trailer, a part of
me wonders, wouldn't that get back to Lance Airs at

(47:02):
some point because he seemed like a really dedicated guy,
you know, in terms of doing this, And would he
admit that if it existed from the report? You know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (47:12):
Yeah, And that's the biggest blow that we've received during
research on the case was finding out that Lance Airs
had passed away around twenty thirteen, right, and not having
him I think he was the ultimate knowledge of the case,
and losing him you lose information.

Speaker 1 (47:31):
Another thing is the.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
Trailers in Plumus County. Could Lance have put something in
a report and said that they found handwriting and it
never got in? I mean, that's possible, but was it
the responsibility of Plumas County to do the inventory of
the trailer. But again, like I keep going back to,
shouldn't they have said something about the information found in

(47:57):
the trailer? All they said is they found ration cans, cardboard,
and paper. So in saying that they had paper, that
should give you some kind of you know, idea, Well,
maybe there was something on the paper. And because they
were trying to get fingerprints off of anything, and they
had little to know luck with getting latent prints getting

(48:21):
a complete print. Ted had so much frostbite on his
hands that it just it just wasn't working and they
couldn't do it. And I don't think they were able
to get Gary's prints out of the trailer for some reason.
And then when Jackie, I don't think his prints were
on file, so they couldn't have used anything like that,

(48:43):
which just adds to the frustrations to the case.

Speaker 2 (48:46):
Well, it's funny how as time goes on, things still
continue to happen. And you know, it's like when you
sent me that video of the Sacramento News doing a
piece and they had new photographs I had never seen.
I don't know if anyone had ever seen them, you know,
and I it made me think, wait, what did they

(49:07):
have that they don't know that they have that's in
some you know, you know file cabinet somewhere, Because these
were some pretty fascinating photos Gary shoes, some things. I mean,
if they were taking photos of anything in the trailer,
I would start thinking, what did they take pictures of
anything that had riding on it? What else is there

(49:29):
you know, it raises all these other questions about what
could still be out there that could I don't really
add to the case, you know.

Speaker 3 (49:38):
Yeah, and whatever is out there, I mean, I haven't
seen it. And when I saw the pictures, there were
some pictures of the trailer, of the two trailers that
I've never seen before, and the shoes of course, so
we started asking around, like where did you.

Speaker 1 (49:56):
Get those pictures?

Speaker 3 (49:57):
And we were able to get those of the shoes
because there's like a belt next to the shoes that
if we can see in the picture. And with the trailers,
we just kind of wanted some more information like who
may manufactured the trailers, because we just maybe wanted to
know some schematics about the trailers, like maybe how easy

(50:19):
it would have been to hook up the propane and
get the heat on, and what other amenities were in
the trailer that they could have used.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
I'm really curious about that too, Yeah, like how easy
was it?

Speaker 3 (50:31):
You know? Yeah, and we have some leads on it,
but you know, hard to get it, yeah, just to
get the schematics. Because I did talk to a person
and we're getting into the SnowCat who was with the
Forestry Service and they said that, you know, those trailers
came down a year later, so they no longer exist.

Speaker 2 (50:53):
A year after the disappearance, they came down.

Speaker 3 (50:56):
Yeah, So a couple of people have talked to me.
They've been up in the Plumus area and they've lived
up there, and they said, I remember those trailers coming down,
and it was about a year later when they took him down.
They said they tried to use the one trailer, but
because of it being a crime scene, it just wasn't
usable and they may have tried cleaning it and it

(51:20):
didn't work out and they had to come down. And
so the trailers are gone. And I have been in
touch with a photographer who's been up to the Daniel
Zinc Fire fire basin area up there. I know, I
know him.

Speaker 2 (51:37):
I showed me, Yeah, his photos are going to be
in the video.

Speaker 1 (51:41):
Yeah, excellent. He's a great photographer.

Speaker 3 (51:44):
And he showed me the information and showed me the
pictures and it's really good. And I think that ABC
ten crew from Sacramento went up there as well and
showed me a little bit of footage and it was
really neat. But still just getting information from people on
the whole trailers and walking there and the snow cats

(52:08):
and everything. I mean, it just yeah, there's.

Speaker 1 (52:10):
Aking a lot of questions.

Speaker 2 (52:11):
I think you mentioned in an email to me that
talking to someone who used to work for the Plumus
or the forest Service, that you essentially confirmed that a
snow cat did go up there the day before the
boys went missing.

Speaker 3 (52:24):
Is that correct? Yeah? I have a source. I don't
name them just because of their privacy. They just want
privacy and I respect their concerns, but yeah, they worked
with the Forestry Service. They said the snow cat was
sent up there Thursday the twenty third because the trailer
where they would eventually find ted, let's brand new. They

(52:46):
didn't want snow building up on the roof because they
were having heavy snow. They wanted the snow cat to
head up to those trailers, clear the snow off the
roofs and come back. So the station that they would
have used, or the area would have been around Mountain House.

Speaker 1 (53:02):
That's all I know.

Speaker 3 (53:04):
And in talking to the person you know, I've been
able to confirm that they were with they had the job,
they were with the Forestry Service. They have a good reputation,
so we know about the SnowCat now that and from
what I've been told, and I truly believe what they
have to say, that the SnowCat went up there Thursday,

(53:25):
and if so, there was a path that the men
could have seen and may have decided to follow if
the tracks were visible, which may have given them some
kind of hope like oh, we may run into someone.
And of course with the case now, there's a lot
of people saying they did walk, they didn't walk, they

(53:47):
someone took them up that way. I mean, these are
all theories we can explore, and I just tell people
leave enough room open with these theories to let us
have these discussions, because you just can't slam the door
on anything. So but yeah, the SnowCat theory, it's it's
pretty well solidified at this point in my opinion.

Speaker 1 (54:08):
And how do.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
You know for sure what the at least what appears
to be the boys route, that kind of long route
around the granite basin that goes to the trailer. I
remember at least one newspaper source I read called it
a paved logging road. Do you know or have you
talked to anyone about what that road looked like back then?
It was at gravel? Was it paved. Was it dirt?

(54:32):
Do you know?

Speaker 3 (54:33):
Well Oraville Quincy, the highway where they abandoned the car
wasn't paved at that point, right, And some other people
have said that. My source said that they would have
chained off that road near where the guys abandoned the car,
so they probably would have noticed that the road was
chained off and they couldn't get the past. As far

(54:54):
as the side roads, I don't think they were paved.
They could have been dirt gravel roads. But I have
seen a picture of that road and I can't remember
if it was paved.

Speaker 1 (55:09):
I saw a picture of.

Speaker 3 (55:10):
The road in June leading up to the firebase and
Daniel's inc.

Speaker 1 (55:13):
Area.

Speaker 3 (55:15):
It looked paved, but I need to go back and
double check, because there was still remnants of snow and
it kind of covered up the road.

Speaker 1 (55:22):
And I'm like, ah, is that well.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
That's That's why I've had trouble with it, because with
the Oral Quincy Highway only being paved up to a
certain point, right, Yeah, then and then all of a
sudden you have a paved forest road in the middle
of nowhere. It seemed kind of odd, you know, So
I've always tried to see confirmation on that. But to me,
if I mean when I went there, that road is

(55:45):
definitely the nicest one in the area today, but we're
forty five years down the line. But to me, you know,
if it was nice back then, if it was the
nicest road for a snow cat to get to that area,
maybe that would be the good path to go, because
there is that shorter path that kind of heads north
Forest Road. But even today I couldn't get down that one.

(56:07):
It was it was so trashed.

Speaker 3 (56:09):
Yeah, so yeah, I had a lot of trouble getting
up I've never made it past what they call Merrimac area,
which is near Rogers Colb Camp, because every time I've
tried to go up towards the fire basin, Grant whatever
Daniels Zinc area, the roads are closed or trees are down.
One time was after the the fires up there, and

(56:32):
they said not to go that way, so it.

Speaker 1 (56:34):
Just wasn't worth it.

Speaker 3 (56:35):
And then second time I was up there, like the
road was closed near Mountain House, so we knew that
was with the film crew and we had no lug
past that. But I think they eventually got up that way.
Another day, I decided to make another trip. So yeah,
it just it'd be helpful to know more about the roads.
There's a lot of conflicting information in the reports and

(57:00):
that doesn't help anything. But I personally, I don't know
if they would have paved those roads. I think because yeah,
they're logging roads, but in talking to the people up there,
it doesn't seem like they would have paved at that time.

Speaker 1 (57:14):
And so I'm just like, man, come on.

Speaker 2 (57:16):
Well, it could be something as simple as like, you know,
a newspaper reporter is up there, talks to someone and
what was maybe like a packed gravel road somebody just
called paved and then that was that. You know, it
could be something.

Speaker 3 (57:30):
Just like that.

Speaker 2 (57:31):
You're still promoting your book right, still out there.

Speaker 3 (57:34):
Things aren't I didn't think things aren't right the disappearance
of Uba County five available to Amazon and it yeah,
please and thank you.

Speaker 1 (57:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (57:43):
So I've been talking to libraries and been at a
few bookstores and some presentations here and there, and still
have stuff lined up for this year, which is cool.
I didn't realize how many people would be interested in
the book, and happy to say I've had a chance
to talk to libraries in person or through zoom. And
there's a lot of people who've watched the Netflix special

(58:07):
and they've done their own research, They've picked up my book,
they've listened to Mopak. I've actually met some people. I
was at uh an event in Suit Falls, South Dakota,
and there were people who had watched your video and
they've watched the lore Lodge and they were subscribers and
they were super excited that I was on your channel.

(58:30):
So it's great to know that you've got fans in
South Dakota and so they're very excited about all your work.

Speaker 1 (58:37):
But yeah, and.

Speaker 2 (58:39):
You're still continuing to research the case even despite the
book being out in.

Speaker 3 (58:43):
That Yeah, because there's a group of people and I
mentioned in the book, like Drew Beeson, there's a researcher
in the UK named Anthony Dunn. There's a research in
Argentina named EDWARDO. Cooyea, and there's a few other people
who are just kind of they kind of keep quiet
about their research.

Speaker 1 (59:02):
But they've been in huge help as well.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
And we still chat about the case and still try
to we find things like that are buried in either
newspapers or archives or things like that, and so yeah,
we're finding out some interesting stuff that we're trying to
tie into the case, and people have reached out to
me who have lived in the area and we get

(59:25):
some interesting information from these people. So all of this
is super helpful, but it just doesn't put all the
missing links together, like why did they exit the highway,
what got them up into the plumas. We've just we're
kind of hearing some things that kind of solidify some
stuff that we know, but at the same time, we

(59:48):
really need more information. And it's good to know that
other people are still researching the case. You're still talking
about the case. Some other people out there I know
are still talking about the case. I know. I see
people like the guys the low Lodge still talk about it.
Some people like TikTok and on Instagram still you know,
reporting on what they've what they've been researching themselves. So

(01:00:09):
it's good to see people have not stopped trying to
find out what happens to the the County five. It's
still talked on Reddit, Twitter, other places. The more people
that are researching, the more information that comes.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):
About new theories.

Speaker 3 (01:00:26):
You get a lot of people with different backgrounds who
can share some ideas, and that's always helpful, right.

Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
Yeah, just a few short years since I first released
my couple of videos on it, I think I'm gonna
be doing I think I'll probably have to split what
I'm doing right now into another two parter because there's
just more stuff to talk about keeps coming out, whether that,
you know, new photos, the audio transcript we've been talking about,

(01:00:54):
just you know, things keep happening, you know, whatever it is.

Speaker 3 (01:00:59):
Yeah, it's pretty cool, and that's what's good. People like
I keep saying they're researching the case, they're finding new.

Speaker 1 (01:01:09):
Alleys to go down. I guess you would say.

Speaker 3 (01:01:11):
Because someone who's researching the case found there was like
a logging dispute at the time. And I've talked to
some people who were working up in the area. So we're,
you know, we're finding some good things out. It's just
we really just need to know what got them in
the Oraville and what happened in Oraville that led to that.

Speaker 2 (01:01:34):
That really is the key, isn't it.

Speaker 3 (01:01:36):
Yeah. And I've been able to get like a good
lead on a person who may want to talk about
the case, which is always important.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
I always appreciate.

Speaker 3 (01:01:47):
Someone willing to talk about the case. On or off
the record, and if this happens, definitely what some people know.
You included if I can just get this person to talk.
Can't see who it is right now because I don't
want to. I totally understand get out to them and
they're like, oh no, now I won't talk, So all right, okay,
gotta be quiet.

Speaker 2 (01:02:08):
Well, I'll put your email in the description of the
videos too, if people want to contact you, if they
got information, if they were living there around the time, anything.
I'm sure you're a collector of information, so I'm.

Speaker 3 (01:02:21):
Sure you'd appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:23):
So absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
Anyway, thanks again, Tony, I appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:27):
Thank you. Thanks, have a good evening.

Speaker 2 (01:02:30):
So I think we now have a good grasp on
the Yuba County five documentary and the numerous theories presented
in it. Again, it is a really well made film,
very professional, and I would expect no less from Netflix.
It is a great way to introduce people to the
mystery that is the Yuba County five. There really is
so much to discuss when it comes to this case,

(01:02:52):
and fitting it all into a single hour would be difficult.
I think with the release of this video, I'll have
about five solid hours of you content on my channel.
What the documentary really brings that is difficult to get
anywhere else is the interviews with the families. They knew
these men the best, so there is a lot to
be learned there about the personalities of these five men.

(01:03:14):
And of course, over time, each family is going to
develop a theory as to what happened. I may disagree
with some of those theories, but in the end, I
don't know what happened any more than the next guy does.
All I can do is present my thoughts on any
given theory based on the evidence we have at hand.
And theories are very difficult to develop when it comes

(01:03:34):
to this case, mainly because we have two very difficult
questions to answer. Why did the ub of five stray
from their intended path of travel and head up into
the mountains? And why did they abandon their car and
walk up into the snow and cold. There could be
one answer to both questions, or there could be one
answer to each. We really don't know. We have a

(01:03:56):
set of facts things we know to be true, and
all we can do is really build around that. The
positive news is that new things are being learned every year.
We have the new shown's information from my last video.
We have some new photographs that are important that were
presented in this one. So even after all of these decades,
things still move forward, even if they're moving slowly. Let

(01:04:19):
me know what you thought of the theories presented in
this video, or let me know if you've come up
with some of your own that you think explains the situation.
And until next time, thanks for watching.