エピソード

  • Eleven Minutes: The Quiet Vanishing That Hid a Killer

    Eleven Minutes: The Quiet Vanishing That Hid a Killer
    2026/07/26
    Eleven Minutes: The Quiet Vanishing That Hid a Killer

    Fear rides on routine: a 54-year-old HVAC technician left work at 7:53 p.m., his eleven-minute commute vanished into thin air, and his truck sat unlocked with keys and phone inside the next morning. Two years later a dry, intact wallet reappeared wedged against a footbridge abutment - but who had already been arrested when that wallet surfaced, and what did an eleven-minute phone call reveal about a pattern of violence?

    In this episode, we follow the timeline from the Tuesday morning rituals and the 7:15 diner booth to the empty truck on Clement Drive and the detective who treated objects as evidence; we trace the eleven-minute gap, the Walgreens prepaid phone purchase, and the wallet that showed up January 9, 2011, asking how those pieces finally fit together.

    Person: Paul Vickers
    Date: August 25, 2008
    Location: Clement Drive, Fenwick, Ohio
    Item found: Wallet recovered January 9, 2011
    Investigator: Detective Judith Underwood

    - Paul Vickers had worked 22 years as an HVAC technician and was 54 years old in the summer of 2008.
    - Last seen at 7:53 p.m. August 25, 2008, leaving Caldwell Climate Systems and driving a 2007 gray Dodge Dakota.
    - The drive from his job to his house normally took eleven minutes; his truck was found the next morning with engine cold, doors unlocked, keys on the front seat, and his TracFone in the cupholder.
    - Phone records showed a call on August 18, 2008, lasting eleven minutes from a prepaid number traced to a Walgreens purchase in Fenwick.
    - Paul’s wallet surfaced on January 9, 2011, dry and intact, wedged against a footbridge abutment over Dellwater Creek, nearly two years after the case was officially closed.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    16 分
  • The Dry Book on Sycamore Terrace: Why Howard Vanished

    The Dry Book on Sycamore Terrace: Why Howard Vanished
    2026/07/25
    The Dry Book on Sycamore Terrace: Why Howard Vanished

    A paperback library book found completely dry against a frost-covered north wall during six straight sub-freezing days should have been impossible - yet gas meter reader Scott Hensley photographed it on December 14, 2011, untouched and un-frosted. Who knew that narrow, wind-sheltered strip would keep a book dry, and why was that same book checked out four days before twenty-three-year-old Howard Harris disappeared?

    In this episode, we follow the timeline from Howard Harris's last confirmed activity to the discovery that reshaped the investigation, tracing his routines, relationships, and the small, unusual evidence that became central. What does a dry paperback reveal about who was in the exact right place at the exact right time?

    Person: Howard Harris
    Date: December 14, 2011
    Location: 714 Sycamore Terrace, Portsmith
    Event: Missing person last seen/last bank transaction December 8
    Witness: Scott Hensley photographed the book

    - Howard Harris was 23 years old and employed as a data-entry clerk at Maplewood Insurance Group.
    - Harris was last known to use his bank card at 7:51 AM on December 8, 2011, at a gas station near his workplace.
    - Scott Hensley found and photographed a dry paperback against the north wall of Sycamore Terrace on the morning of December 14, 2011.
    - Harris had checked out three library books on December 3; two were found in his apartment and the third was the dry book at the meter housing.
    - Neighbors reported no disturbance, Harris’s car remained in the Sycamore Terrace lot, and the north wall was concealed from view and sheltered from frost.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    17 分
  • Who Kept the Campfire Burning While Diane Vanished?

    Who Kept the Campfire Burning While Diane Vanished?
    2026/07/24
    Who Kept the Campfire Burning While Diane Vanished?

    A live flame still burned on two substantial logs at 7:42 AM while Diane Peterson’s sleeping bag lay empty and cold; frost covered the campsite and her silver Pontiac sat undisturbed, locked, with an untouched windshield. Who kept that fire alive before Diane disappeared, and why would that single detail take investigators four months to understand?

    In this episode, you’ll hear the timeline of Diane’s last night at Sable Creek Campground, how trackers and friends described the morning, and the small, concrete clues that redirected an investigation - including a motor heard idling at 2:00 AM and a scent trail that ended at the access road. Could those details point to how Diane left the campsite?

    Person: Diane Peterson
    Age: 38
    Date: November 8, 2003
    Location: Sable Creek Campground
    Investigator: Randy Turner

    - Fire: live flame burning on two substantial logs at 7:42 AM
    - Temperature: 31 degrees Fahrenheit with frost on picnic table and windshields
    - Sleeping bags: five arranged in a circle; four occupied, one unzipped and empty
    - Last cell call: evening of November 6, 2003, made from the campground
    - Scent trail: dogs followed scent 90 feet to the gravel access road, then it stopped

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    15 分
  • Dry Satchel, Wet Forest: How a Mailbag Broke an Abduction Case

    Dry Satchel, Wet Forest: How a Mailbag Broke an Abduction Case
    2026/07/23
    Dry Satchel, Wet Forest: How a Mailbag Broke an Abduction Case

    A canvas mail satchel was found canvas-side-down in a wet drainage ditch with its interior perfectly dry after two days of rain - a single, precise detail that took investigators nineteen days to understand and would upend their assumptions. How did sorted, rubber-banded Orchard Loop mail end up twelve feet from County Road 7 in a forest if the carrier had finished his route?

    In this episode, we follow the timeline and scene details that trace Scott Reed’s last known day, from his routine Thursday phone call to the van’s unexplained return to Barrow’s with keys and phone inside. What does the dry mailbag, GPS outage, and signed-out overflow tray tell us about what really happened on October twelfth?

    Person: Scott Reed
    Age: 62
    Route: Route fourteen-N (Orchard Loop referenced)
    Date: October 12-14 (events and satchel discovery)
    Location: County Road 7 / Prentice State Forest

    - The last routine Thursday call to his daughter lasted 17 minutes on October 9.
    - A secondary overflow tray was signed out under his employee number at 4:20 PM on October 12.
    - Van GPS recorded departure from Barrow’s at 4:51 PM and went offline about 200 yards from the Prentice trailhead.
    - The van reappeared at Barrow’s at 6:15 PM with engine cold, keys in ignition, cell phone on passenger seat, and no Scott inside.
    - A USPS shoulder satchel was found canvas-side-down in a drainage ditch 300 yards into the tree line on October 14; mail inside was rubber-banded, postmarked October 12, and completely dry.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    17 分
  • The Dry Shoe on the Sycamore: What Paul Never Explained

    The Dry Shoe on the Sycamore: What Paul Never Explained
    2026/07/23
    The Dry Shoe on the Sycamore: What Paul Never Explained

    A single dry white canvas sneaker, women's size seven with laces tied in a neat bow and orange upland clay on the sole, sat upright on a sycamore root above a drowned body - a detail the man later convicted never once addressed. Why was the shoe dry, cleaned of river silt, and deliberately removed and placed after death, and what does the upland clay point to?

    In this episode, we lay out the concrete facts from the scene, the timeline of Erin O'Brien's last confirmed movements, and the discovery that connects a July service call to the missing spare key and the man named Paul Erickson. How did a crawlspace job and a changed lockbox code become part of the same mystery?

    Person: Erin O'Brien
    Date: September 11, 2014
    Location: Morrow River, Millhaven, Illinois
    Person: Paul Erickson
    Event: Keating Climate Solutions crawlspace service in July

    - Erin O'Brien was 24 years old at the time she was found.
    - The sneaker found on the sycamore root was women's size seven with laces tied after death.
    - The sole of the sneaker contained orange upland clay, not river silt or bank mud.
    - Erin's last confirmed use of her bank card was on September 5, 2014.
    - Paul Erickson, age 31 and a Keating technician, performed two days of crawlspace work in the building in July and had been issued a lockbox code later changed in August.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    16 分
  • The Planner on the Culvert: Why Kimberly Never Reached the Courthouse

    The Planner on the Culvert: Why Kimberly Never Reached the Courthouse
    2026/07/23
    The Planner on the Culvert: Why Kimberly Never Reached the Courthouse

    A leather day planner sat upright and open on the lip of a concrete culvert - dry, circled to an evening courthouse appearance, and found forty-one miles from the courthouse nine days after its owner vanished. How did an object so deliberate and specific end up in a dry drainage ditch, and what did it reveal about Kimberly Griffin’s last hours?

    In this episode, we follow the sequence of observations and physical evidence that linked a missing LPN’s circled appointment to a culvert on the lower reach of Dunmore Creek, and we trace the questions investigators asked when a routine property survey became a turning point in the case. What did a single clay smear and an upright planner tell them about where Kimberly had been taken?

    Person: Kimberly Griffin
    Age: 48
    Date: August 9, 2011 (missing); August 19, 2011 (planner found)
    Location: Dry drainage ditch on lower reach of Dunmore Creek, eastern Dunmore County
    Event: Planner found upright on concrete culvert, page circled "Seven p.m. - Courthouse. Don't be late."

    - Kimberly was last seen backing out of her driveway at approximately 6:40 p.m. on August 9, 2011, and did not arrive at the courthouse for a 7:00 p.m. subpoenaed appearance.
    - Her car was found the afternoon of August 10, 2011, on the gravel shoulder of Old Millhouse Road with the engine cold, doors unlocked, purse on the passenger seat, and a dead phone.
    - A reddish-brown alluvial clay smear from the Dunmore Creek drainage basin was identified on the driver’s-side door handle of Kimberly’s car.
    - Jeffrey Vaughn, a county surveyor, found the leather planner upright on a culvert lip and called 9-1-1 at 8:52 a.m. on August 19, 2011; the planner’s cover was monogrammed K.G.
    - The culvert where the planner was found sits forty-one miles from the Dunmore County Courthouse and is in the same drainage basin as the clay type found on Kimberly’s car.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    17 分
  • The Tote on Decker's Mill: Why Erin Vanished Without a Trace

    The Tote on Decker's Mill: Why Erin Vanished Without a Trace
    2026/07/23
    The Tote on Decker's Mill: Why Erin Vanished Without a Trace

    A single canvas tote bag, zipped and upright, appeared on an abandoned platform that hadn't seen a scheduled train since 1994 - yet its owner had bought a Route Seven return ticket the same morning and vanished. Two days later the bag was found with a boarding-pass stub at page 67 and an eighteen-inch length of new knotted nylon looped on an iron stanchion; who placed it there, and why, is the question that haunts this case.

    In this episode, we tell the sequence of events from Erin Callahan's last known photograph at 6:04 a.m. to the discovery at Decker's Mill, laying out the tangible clues that forced investigators to rewrite their timeline and the one administrative detail that revealed planning; how did a woman who never boarded the train leave a perfectly packed tote on a platform no train had served in twenty-five years?

    Person: Erin Callahan
    Date: July 9, 2019
    Location: Decker's Mill platform / Halverson Junction
    Status: Missing
    Case: Route Seven disappearance

    - Erin sent a last photograph of a grain elevator at 6:04 a.m, on July 9, 2019.
    - She purchased a Route Seven ticket at 6:42 a.m. the same morning with a return booked for that evening.
    - Route Seven runs 51 minutes between Halverson Junction and Millhaven with zero scheduled stops.
    - The tote was found on July 11, 2019 at 8:51 a.m., upright and zipped, containing folded clothes, a toiletry kit, a paperback with a boarding-pass stub at page 67, half-eaten crackers, and a phone charger.
    - Investigators found a size eleven work boot print and an 18-inch length of new knotted nylon looped around an iron stanchion at the north end of the Decker's Mill platform.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    17 分
  • The Running Combine, the Green Thermos, and Eleven Missing Days

    The Running Combine, the Green Thermos, and Eleven Missing Days
    2026/07/23
    The Running Combine, the Green Thermos, and Eleven Missing Days

    A running John Deere combine was found with its engine on, header engaged, cab door open and a green thermos upright on the exterior step-yet its lead operator, Nancy Dempsey, was gone. Eleven days would pass with no confirmed sighting after a 9:15 p.m. exit from a food distribution center and a final phone activity at 9:47 p.m.; how did a reliable, experienced operator vanish between her truck and the tree line?

    In this episode, we lay out the timeline and the physical evidence discovered at Alderman Farm, from the farm routines Nancy kept to the anomalous running equipment and the mysterious prepaid phone text. What do the engine runtime, the thermos, and an anonymous message tell us about where Nancy might have gone?

    Person: Nancy Dempsey
    Age: 53
    Date first found scene: June 9, 2011 at 7:14 a.m.
    Location: Alderman Farm, Fulton County, Missouri
    Last confirmed sighting: June 8, 2011 at 9:15 p.m.

    - The combine engine was running and fuel was near empty when discovered at 7:14 a.m.
    - Nancy had worked at Alderman Farm for eleven years as lead equipment operator and was the only woman to hold that position full-time in at least two decades.
    - Nancy’s routine included being in the cab by 5:00 a.m. and stopping for lunch around 11:00 a.m. with black coffee in a green Stanley thermos kept in the cupholder.
    - A text received at 9:47 p.m. read “I left something at the pump house, need five minutes,” and was opened on her phone; after 9:30 p.m. there were no outgoing texts or calls.
    - A prepaid phone used to send that text had been purchased for cash seven weeks earlier and had called the Alderman Farm equipment barn three weeks earlier.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
    続きを読む 一部表示
    15 分