0709 | Kootenai - True Crime Bullsh**

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
This is a studio both and production. In understanding Hunter's Washington,
we have to take a few steps back and take
a look at what we know about Keys's crimes prior

(00:29):
to his move to Alaska, and how what he's told
us about those crimes may tie into eastern Washington. So
for the next few episodes, we'll be spending less time
in Hunters and more time diving into the at least
five Washington area victims. Keys told the FBI about the
male female couple, two separate victims who were buried using

(00:50):
his boat, and one victim whose body was found but
whose death was ruled accidental. Through my meetings with Holla,
Old and new FOIA files and other interviews, we've learned
a great deal more about these victims. But I want
to be clear. I believe that there are more than

(01:11):
just five victims in the Washington state area between two
thousand and one and two thousand and seven. Just because
Keys eluded to five Washington State area victims does not
mean there were merely five Washington State area victims. In fact,
I believe there's more than likely double that number. This

(01:37):
is true crime bullshit. The serialized investigation into Israel, Keys
season seven, Episode nine. Kutineye will begin in the Kuteneie
National Forest, a federally managed park located in northwestern Montana

(01:57):
that spans the entirety of the northern Idahope Panhandle along
the U. S. Canadian border. The forest is approximately two
point two million acres and it includes the Cooteneye and
Clark Fork Rivers, three major hydroelectric dams, Lake Kukanoosa, and
Priest Lake, among more than one hundred others, more than

(02:19):
ninety miles of hiking trails, and peaks with elevation greater
than eight thousand feet. The general area has always been
on our radar. It's a fairly small swath of land
that spans multiple state lines Washington, Idaho, Montana, and the U. S.
Canadian border. It would be a very easy area to

(02:41):
abduct someone from one state and then bury them in another.
In fact, the quickest route from Washington State to Montana
is a long route too, through the Cooteneye National Forest,
which just takes an hour and fifteen minutes its own,
about a ninety minute drive from Calville, and it connects

(03:03):
directly to Spokane via US Route two, the US highway
that connects Everett, Washington, all the way to Smyrna, Maine
to Keys hotspots. And while this area has always been
on our radar due to its proximity to Callville and
multiple state lines, it only recently became a central focus

(03:25):
of our Washington investigation because we received more Keys maps
from the FBI. Last week, a listener named Emmett reached
out to ask if we had received files from a
specific FOYA we filed earlier this year. We had not.

(03:47):
Luckily for us, Emmett had seen the riding on the
wall during the transition of power and cabinet appointments following
the twenty twenty four election, and he more hastily filed
this specific FOYA in fear of a shut down or
slowdowns within the federal government and FBI, which did eventually come.
And so while we waited for our response, Emmett sent

(04:09):
along his thirty three pages of maps seized from Keys,
and we'd only previously seen about half of those maps.
It's worth noting these were not maps extracted from his computer.
These are physical maps that were found from multiple properties.

(04:31):
There were maps of New Hampshire, Arizona, Washington, Oregon, Arkansas.
There were maps with keys handwriting on them. There were
maps he numerated. There were maps with circles and highlights,
and there were multiple topographic maps of the Kootenaye National Forest.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
Here's the deal. I know what you have because I
know you have the computer.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
Right and I've got maps. I mean, I mean, I'm
not I'm never going to bluff you Israel, Okay, I've
got maps.

Speaker 4 (05:06):
That I know.

Speaker 3 (05:06):
Come up with a bunch of other states. Okay, I've
got Washington, Texas, Utah, mon, I've got I could list
them out for it.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
I like, I say, I know what's on that computer.
I know what you have. I know as time goes by,
the longer I'm in the system, the longer the investigation
goes on, You're going to keep finding things. You're going
to start to connect dots. I'm only going to give
you the dots that I know you're going to eventually connect,

(05:39):
basically what's on that computer. And frankly, if I hadn't
been picked up in Texas, that computer would be in
the landfill right now because I was going to get
Kimberly March twenty fourth new computer. So I'm telling you
that you Yeah, that's all you're a smart guy.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
Get it, I get it.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
But I'm not going to talk about those things that
I know you're eventually going to connect me to unless
I know that I'm going to get what I want,
and I don't know.

Speaker 3 (06:08):
I tell me, tell me what you want. I don't
know what you want.

Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, it's related to what to that.

Speaker 3 (06:14):
Case, so well, to tell me what you want if
that case didn't exist and we were going to connect
the dots on other bodies, tell.

Speaker 4 (06:21):
Me what you would want.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
I want the I want an execution date.

Speaker 5 (06:26):
A bunch of maps, Yeah, anything, you should computer any
X on them, anywhere, highlight.

Speaker 4 (06:46):
Highlights the.

Speaker 6 (06:50):
Only map you don't have highlight.

Speaker 7 (06:52):
I didn't believe highlight.

Speaker 3 (06:56):
I don't know what about the map that.

Speaker 6 (07:00):
When you hit There was one in the car. I
think it was highlighted.

Speaker 7 (07:04):
When I was arrested.

Speaker 6 (07:05):
Yeah, yeah, but I didn't do the highlight anymore.

Speaker 8 (07:12):
Well, it was the interstate that was highlighted, and it
don't seem to really be an interstate kind of person.

Speaker 7 (07:21):
Well, that's just.

Speaker 1 (07:25):
As is mentioned in that clip, we know that some
of these maps were seized from his rental car upon
his arrest. They're the maps I already received and discussed
earlier this season, the map with Port Angeles to Los
Angeles highlighted, the map with Flaming Gorge Reservoir, and Salt
Lake City to Green River highlighted, along with other cities

(07:48):
in Washington and Oregon. And we know that some of
these other maps were found at the Constable House. Again
they mentioned it in the previous clip, and the copies
we have appear to be ripped out of an old
atlas and then secured within an old real estate mailer
that was sent from Winslow, Maine in nineteen ninety seven,

(08:11):
which likely corresponds to the Keyes family looking to move
to Smyrna Main the following year. It's unclear, however, if
those are the sole origins of these maps, or if
there are other maps in this file that were seized
from other places. What we do know is the Montana
maps were found in Constable and likely include the Kuteniye maps,

(08:36):
which were interesting because, in addition to their being multiple
of them, those maps seem to drill down on a
single location within the Kuteneye National Park. The Coutenie maps
seem to drill down to and focus on a stretch
of U S Route too between Troy, Montana and Elmira, Idaho.

(09:00):
That stretch crosses the Idaho Montana state line, passes through
two large valleys, one at the Koutenei National Wildlife Refuge
and one just north of Lake Pendoa, and then one
narrow valley along the Yak River. This segment of Route
two also travels along segments of Deep Creek and the
Koutene River, But this span that seems to be of

(09:23):
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(10:52):
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(11:12):
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(12:14):
all out of the ordinary. Let's begin by taking a
look at when israel Keys could have been in Kootenay
National Forest and how those times may correspond to what
we know about is Washington State victims and any potential

(12:35):
victims we've looked at previously. Now, it's worth pointing out
that Keys could have traveled to or through this area
at almost any point between getting his driver's license in
nineteen ninety five and leaving the area in nineteen ninety seven,
although based on what he's told us and what we
know about this time in his life, it's unlikely he

(12:56):
committed any murders in the Washington State area during the
time frame Following his move to the East Coast and
then army training in Texas, California, and Panama. Keyes wasn't
back in Washington until he was stationed at Fort Lewis
in the summer of nineteen ninety nine. Our records indicate
that he first traveled to eastern Washington over Thanksgiving weekend

(13:19):
that year, when he visited Annie in Calville. He rented
a car and drove out for the holiday weekend, and
between his departure from Annie's and his return of that
rental car, Gary Shawn Bryant mysteriously disappeared from Morton, Washington,
not far from an armed robbery the following day, on

(13:40):
January fourth of two thousand, just eleven days before going
to Egypt, Keyes rented a car in Spokane, Washington. It's
unclear how he got to Spokane or for how long
he stayed. According to an FBI interview with Annie, Keyes
visited her again in Callville over the weekend of July
twenty eighth, two thousand and then again over the weekend

(14:03):
of October sixth, two thousand and According to a second
interview with Annie, Keyes returned in August of two thousand
and one to help her move from Calville, Washington to Holbrook, Idaho.
Keyes would return to the Calville area that December, when
Tammy reported that he took her son James to visit

(14:23):
his father over a weekend that month. And then, of
course there's that April second, two thousand and five trip
when Keys drove out to look at the boat and
visit friends in eastern Washington. He bought the boat the
following weekend, on or around April ninth, two thousand four,

(14:43):
and it remains unclear whether that happened in Moses Lake
or Port Angelus. But that boat trip or those boat trips,
they're the last time we can place Keys with certainty
in eastern Washington before his move to Alaska, and it's
the t trip the FBI and ted Halla are most
interested in. However, we do have two very interesting tips

(15:10):
placing Israel Keys in the Kuteneye National Forest. In November
of twenty twenty one, I received an email from a
listener who believed that Keys had followed her in the
middle of the night a long route too from Spokane, Washington,

(15:32):
all the way to Priest Lake in Idaho in the
Kutenaye National Forest. She wrote that the man flashed his
lights at her and continually sped up behind her, almost
touching her bumper, before slowing back down over and over again.
At times, he would wave his arms at her, trying

(15:53):
to get her to pull over on the side of
the highway. She would slow down, hoping he was just
trying to pass her, but he wouldn't. He'd pull up
right behind her until she sped up again. She had
just stopped to Philip Gass, so she knew that her
gas wasn't empty, None of the warning lights were on
in her car, and she could tell that her tire
wasn't flat, so she couldn't think of any reason why

(16:16):
this man would be trying to get her to pull over.
So frantically for so long the man followed her for
over an hour before she eventually pulled off the highway
to go to the cabin where she was meeting friends.
One of her friends would later tell her that this
same stretch of highways where there was no cell service.

(16:39):
She did not describe the driver's car nor his appearance,
simply stating that she thought it could be keys, and
she believed that this occurred over Independence or Memorial Day
weekend in two thousand six, seven or eight. Additionally, another
listener reported just a year and a half ago that

(17:00):
he believed he saw Israel keys at Priest Lake over
the summer of two thousand six. He described a tall,
white man in his late twenties or early thirties with
greasy shoulder length wavy air walking alone along one of
the lakeside trails. He said that the memory only stands
out because the man made him incredibly uncomfortable, and that

(17:23):
he was mirroring the witness's movements whenever the witness would
stop on the trail, so with the man, almost as
though the man were intentionally trying to keep the same
distance between himself and the witness. This went on for
a while until at one point the witness noticed the
man walk from the trail and into the woods, and

(17:45):
rather than proceeding forward toward the man, the witness decided
to turn round and head back. When looking at this
area and the dates we can and can possibly place
keys there, six cases immediately come to mind. One Helen
Suzanne Gracia, two Ellen Beth Sloane, three Nicholas Edward Welchlin,

(18:11):
four David Eugene Lewis, five Roxanne Mary Toulsen, and six
Zachary Weston. As you may recall from my previous coverage,
Helen Gracia disappeared from Anaconda, Montana, on May twenty third

(18:32):
of two thousand and eight. On the morning of her disappearance,
she told her family that she was heading out to
pick up groceries and a prescription for her mother, but
she never returned home from those errands. At some point
that afternoon, an eyewitness saw Helen with an unknown male
companion at the Rock Inn tavern in downtown Anaconda, and

(18:54):
that was the last known sighting of Helen. Two days later,
on May twenty fifth, Helen's was discovered parked behind a
different bar one block away from the Rock in Tavern.
Helene's purse, along with her groceries on her mother's prescription,
were found locked inside the car. Keys cannot be accounted

(19:14):
for between late February until early June of two thousand
and eight, when an old friend ran into him on
a ferry heading toward the Olympic Peninsula in Washington. We
do know that Kimberly was working in Rock Springs, Wyoming
from May nineteenth until June seventh. And while Anaconda, Montana
is barely a bullip on the map, if you drove

(19:36):
from Rock Springs to Callville, you drive right through both
it and the Cooteneye National Forest. Additionally, while it's the
less credible sighting, the priest Lake car incident took place
over either Independence or Memorial Day weekend in two thousand six,
seven or eight, and Helen Gracia disappeared over Memorial Day

(19:59):
weekend of two thousand eight. Ellen Beth Sloane disappeared from
her home on South Shore Route and puls in Montana
on April sixteenth of two thousand five, exactly one week

(20:21):
after Keys bought the bay Liner boat. Twelve days after
Ellen was last seen on April twenty eighth, her silver
two thousand two Toyota Tundra truck was found seventy miles
away at a shopping center in Missoula, Montana, and it
appeared that Ellen may have been traveling at the time
of her disappearance because her truck was packed full of

(20:43):
luggage and her possessions. When Ellen disappeared, both she and
her boyfriend were riddled with legal issues. Ellen had recently
been charged with federal tax evasion, and she had just
posted bond for her boyfriend, who had been arrested for incest.

(21:03):
After posting his bond, she moved her boyfriend into her home,
where within days he had used both Ellen's name and
her son's name to attain lines of credit and credit
cards for himself, and ten days after her disappearance, her
son kicked her boyfriend out of the house and he
eventually disappeared until twenty nineteen, when he was arrested for

(21:24):
possession of meth. According to the Charley Project, authorities believe
that Ellen's boyfriend may know more about her disappearance, However,
he hasn't been charged in connection to it. And while
I air on the side of Sloane's boyfriend being involved
in her disappearance. There are few details in her case
that stand out to me. Specifically, this is right in

(21:48):
the window of time that the FBI believed the Hunter's
farmhouse visit occurred, and we know that Keys had been
in the general area at least once, if not twice,
in the weeks before her day disappearance. And now it
stands out because Ellen Sloane disappeared just ninety minutes south
of the Cooteneye National Forest. Next up is David Eugene Lewis,

(22:13):
who disappeared while boating on Priest Lake on July twenty
third of two thousand and four. There isn't much information
available online about David's case, but what we do know
is that on the morning that he disappeared, he told
friends that he was going boating at Priest Lake, and
that same morning he left his Sandpoint, Idaho home with

(22:34):
his unidentified car and boat. Later that day, David's empty
boat was found on Priest Lake with no sign of David.
Local law enforcement conducted extensive searches of the lake and
surrounding area, but with no luck. At the time of
his disappearance, David was fifty four years old and six

(22:56):
foot three and two hundred twenty pounds. While David's case
remains open, he is presumed drowned. Obviously, his case stands
out because of multiple sightings at Priest Lake in addition
to Keys specifically referencing one of his victims being presumed drowned,
but of course that could be connected to any one

(23:18):
of multiple people we've mentioned on the show before who
were presumed drowning during some sort of lake incident. Keys
can't be placed anywhere between May twenty fifth, two thousand
four and August first, two thousand four, although there is
one credible and terrifying sighting of him in Bountiful, Utah

(23:39):
in early summer two thousand four two thousand six. You
may recall this is where a man was aggressively following
a woman on the freeway until she finally parked. When
he noticed that she was pregnant, he got upset, asked
for directions, said that he was a contractor from out
of state, and then disappeared. The other three cases I

(24:03):
mentioned stand out the most because they don't just line
up with the locations and time frames we've been looking at,
they also line up with each other or other cases
we've looked at. Before.

Speaker 2 (24:17):
Oh, one of the Washington things that was.

Speaker 7 (24:19):
Uh, uh doesn't I don't know.

Speaker 6 (24:24):
It's just no, it wasn't.

Speaker 7 (24:25):
It wasn't s strangles.

Speaker 9 (24:28):
Uh I hit somebody in the head.

Speaker 7 (24:30):
So did that?

Speaker 3 (24:33):
Did you mean to kill anim where they died? Is
there a struggle and you get them and they died
or what did you.

Speaker 9 (24:39):
Need to kill about?

Speaker 7 (24:45):
I'm trying to kill 'em?

Speaker 3 (24:46):
I just uh tek them out of action.

Speaker 10 (24:51):
I read that in one of those letters you sort the.

Speaker 7 (24:55):
Mail you don't need no comfor.

Speaker 4 (25:02):
That's a lot.

Speaker 10 (25:04):
O d You mentioned that they gave you all.

Speaker 7 (25:13):
I should have asked.

Speaker 4 (25:14):
Him, so give any copies so I know which ones
you would have.

Speaker 3 (25:20):
We could go over that together and you could fill
any lags.

Speaker 1 (25:29):
At some point in time, Roxanne Toulsen and Zachary Weston
disappeared within twenty four hours of one another, and Nicholas
Edward Welchlan and Celia Darlene Barnes also disappeared within twenty
four hours of one another. And we'll dig into all

(25:51):
four of those cases next week on True Crime Bullshit.

Speaker 10 (25:55):
Most of our efforts have been since he passed has
been to really try to look at missing persons cases.
That you know, potentially be connected to him, knowing that
the data, we may not be seeing the data at all,
because you know, he made it clear that early on
his victims received little to no media attention. That you know,

(26:17):
he had this uncanny luck of grabbing people that didn't
go easily missed. But all he had to really look
for is what was already out there and hope that
you know, one or two of those may coincide with
one of his victims. And what we what I learned,
you know, is that with missing children, there's really good
databases and there's good records, but with missing adults that's

(26:39):
not the case. You know, if you look at people
that go missing from out of state a lot of time,
the record of their missing is from their home state,
not where they went missing. So it became clear that
it was going to be really hard for us to
feel like we had a good grasp of all the
missing people in a particular area because we don't. But

(26:59):
the data base, especially back then, just weren't that good.

Speaker 8 (27:03):
Yeah, which it brings up I think a point of
frustration for us is particularly earlier on in his criminal activity,
he was operating mostly in state parks or you know,
federal land, places where tourists generally flock to. So you know,
as we go through NamUs, I've had to remember, like
I can't just click on Pacific Northwest disappearances because they

(27:27):
could be anybody.

Speaker 7 (27:28):
Yeah. Yeah, later.

Speaker 6 (27:46):
Decades, the spelled Blue Dream comes out and.

Speaker 9 (27:57):
Posing it back there again.

Speaker 6 (28:05):
By Sell, I shall serve to mald.

Speaker 1 (28:32):
This episode was written, research, edited, and produced by me
Josh Holmark, with additional research by Jordan Taylor, Kathleen s
and Michelle Tooker. Sources include NamUs and The Charlie Project.
This episode was made possible by the following Patreon producers,
Amy Basel, Kendall, c Heather Horton, Whedon, Sherry d Kristen Hoffman, Dale, Axidon,
Stephanie Taylor, Lydia Rodarte, Quail Drew Ipond, Amelia Hancock, Christina Sisson,

(28:55):
Nicole and Dennis Henry, Gilian, Natale, Lana Holiday, Rural, Juror,
Tuesday Woodworth, Zach Agnat, It's Warren, Kathleen Snett, l Casey Jensen, Richardson,
sc Benjamin Chopaphong, Tristan Nicole, Ashfish, Becky c Pink, Jen
j Cory D. Robin Carrol Jordan, M, Kate Lusier, John Comery,
Kathy Nation, Carrie Jordan, t Bethany, Lauren Ferry, Emily Payne,
Tory Meyer, Sabrina Abbott, Meghan Man, Meghan Dagele Ashley Cooplan,

(29:19):
Michael Randall, Dwayne c, Jen, Justin Runyon and Trixie. Thank
you to True Crime Bullshit's newest Patreon supporters Jude K,
Carolyn Kay, Tracy B. Matthieson, B Teresa M, Stephanie Kay,
and Van hung P. To support the investigation, go to
Patreon dot com, slash Studio Both and. This episode included
music by Lebon, with featured music by Sarah Belkner.

Speaker 4 (30:03):
Still Mad and she Compe Cracking in the Woods.

Speaker 9 (30:19):
Mambo, The Two Reds, When you call me, you call
me home.

Speaker 6 (30:33):
I shall serve a tired when I'm marry, just a
hell hold, I shall serve the.

Speaker 4 (30:48):
Tell when I'm marry, just a hell hold. Ghost man
of shape in the Hunting, Oh who now you're in

(31:13):
my dream?

Speaker 11 (31:16):
Good name everything, ghost to mother sheep, Oh trespass.

Speaker 4 (31:35):
Ooh who now you're in mind? Dream? Oh gold, Still
my shap go, still shap

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