Missing, Murdered, Massacred: Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest

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There are some places we never expect anything bad to happen. Lighthearted family vacation spots are one of them. A visit to the amusement park, a hot summer afternoon spent in the air conditioning of an aquarium. or an evening at the local fair. Worst case scenario, families leave with sticky cotton candy fingers, a newfound obsession with jellyfish, or sore abs from the belly laughs resulting from a full night of riding roller coasters.

Yet we know those aren't worst case, because in all of these circumstances, we have heard of tragedy striking. Danger can lurk in the shadows, find concealment in crowds, hide in plain sight. and strike when we least expect it. When we have our guards down. When we feel safe and comfortable. During times we are having the time of our lives, unaware that it may very well be the end of it. Welcome to National Park After Dark. what an ominous intro it's an ominous story it's a rough one

We haven't dabbled in true crime in a little bit, and I think we're all due for a true crime story, but it doesn't make it any easier because this one's really, really bad. So just here's your warning. Heads up. This episode is going to contain graphic content, including discussions of sexual assault, child harm, and of course, murder. All right. And your eyes are the size of a dinner plate. Buckle up, everybody. Here we go. We're here for a...

We're listed as true crime. That's our genre of this podcast. So we might as well show up.

I guess. So here we are. Here we are. So we're going to be actually not in a national park today. We're going to be in a national forest. Okay. Whereabouts? We're going to be in Oregon. I love Oregon. I would love to spend more time there. I really enjoyed it when I did. You and Al weren't there for long, were you? No, we were there for like three or four days. Like when you came out?

to see ian and i right yeah yeah when we we drove down we were driving cross-country we visit you guys and then we came down and we visit one of al's friends and we stayed the night or we stayed a couple nights with him and then we stayed in um

God, I can't even think of the town. It's in Central. In Oregon? Yeah, it's in Central Oregon. It's a big town. I should know the name of it, but it's... Bend? Yep. Yep. We stayed in Bend. And then we ventured and we ended up... driving straight through went to utah and continued our trip from there yeah it's been quite a while since i've been in oregon but this this story takes place

in an area that i've been through so um it was really interesting especially hearing the details and the descriptions of the places and we'll get into that But we're going to start in April of 1975. In April of 1975, 24-year-old Marvin Proctor and 25-year-old Roger Allen West had the gold bug. The Forest Grove, Oregon residents heard that there was a lot of...

gold to be found in Oregon, apparently overlooked in the previous century's gold rush. Along with the thrill of looking and hopefully finding this precious metal, they were hoping

to strike it rich. Marvin was hoping to cash in and afford a new car, and the friends had grown up together and found work in a variety of different jobs, odd jobs, temporary seasonal jobs, in order to pay for their hobby of prospecting. And aside from- spending a brief couple of months in Colorado the previous year, his last extended vacation was too long ago, and he was excited to get out into the forest.

Their destination was the Rogue River Siskiyou National Forest. Located in southwestern Oregon and stretching into northern California, the Rogue River Siskiyou National Forest extends from the Cascade Mountain Range west into the Siskiyou Mountains.

and even includes several portions of the coastal range, reaching nearly right into the Pacific Ocean. So this is a really, really beautiful national forest. It covers seven counties and two states and is home to eight different designated wilderness areas. and six wild and scenic rivers. This national forest is certainly a Pacific Northwest wonderland. It has kind of like everything that the Pacific Northwest offers as far as landscapes and things like that. It's like you want to see it all.

come right here the national forest we know it as today was first two separately designated ones the rogue river national forest was first known as the crater national forest and was established by the man who established a lot of things here in the country, President Roosevelt back in 1908. The Siskiyou Forest Reserve was established by the same guy three years earlier in 1905. And their names are really cool because they commemorate different aspects.

of indigenous peoples of the area. So the Rogue River honors the Talkema tribe, whose defense of their homeland led early European colonists to nickname them the Rogues. And Siskiyou is a Cree word for bobtailed whore. So it kind of commemorates and honors the indigenous peoples of the area. Very cool.

and those two different designated forests combined in 2007 and are known for their two distinct geological provinces, so the Cascade Range and the Klamath and Siskiyou Mountains. Covering nearly 1.8 million acres, landscape varies from open oak woodlands, coastal rainforest, deep canyons, lush meadows, snow-capped volcanic peaks, dense conifer forests and dramatic rocky ridgetops. Given its varied landscape, it's home to hundreds of species of plant and animal life, some prevalent and others

pretty elusive. So everything from elk, Pacific fishers, cougars, black bears, wolves, sturgeon, and the mountain king snake. So there's a lot going on in this national forest. And people come here to camp, hike, river.

raft, horseback ride, wildlife watch, and mountain bike as there are endless opportunities for exploration from the seacoast to the thick forests. And when I was looking up the location, because obviously, you know, geographically, When hearing it described, you can kind of pinpoint on a map mentally. But I wanted to see like based on the route that Ian and I did on our road trip, if we even like went by it or near it. And we drove right back.

buy it and probably given its size through it at times because the national forest was on our way from a campsite at mount shasta to our next destination of crater lake so you were like right you were right there technically technically yeah we didn't stay in it but anyways there's also a national monument that is a direct neighbor.

to this national forest. And it's also absolutely stunning. And that was the area of one of the coolest campsites we had of our whole trip. And that national monument is called the Cascade Siskiyou National Monument. And it's near Crater Lake and it's, God, I'm getting like, not FOMO because I did it. Nostalgia. Nostalgia. Yeah. That's it. Tis the season for identity theft.

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So back to Marvin and Alan. They packed up and headed south towards the Rogue River, about a five-hour drive south from where they lived in the suburbs of Portland. Finding the waters a little too high for panning, they stopped at a local grocery store and... learned of another location to try out. Talking to the locals, they heard nearby Applegate County had a lot of gold and they packed up and headed right over there. They set up camp at Sturgis Campground near Carberry Creek and settled in

to bed and called it a night. But they rose super early the next day with the sun, excited to get out there. The day was April 12th, and they spent most of that day panning for gold, again, with not a ton of luck, but enough to keep the gold bug going. Because when they were panning for gold...

There were some gold flakes glimmering in their dishes, and they were really small. They had to pluck them out with tweezers. They weren't like huge nuggets or anything, but it was enough to catch their eye and keep the momentum going. They saw the gold. It was what they needed, their little...

adrenaline rush of like, oh my gosh, we have something. It's here. Invigorated and recalling that bigger nuggets are sometimes found in the roots of washed out trees and gullies, they chose to ditch the creek for another location. Making their way up separate gullies, they picked their way along over downed trees and scrambled over loose earth. Alan took his time picking up and examining various rocks because he remembered that sometimes quartz concealed gold in the veins of the rock.

completely focused on the rocks, laser focused on his task. He tripped over a log. He wasn't looking where he was going. And he landed full force on the ground, flat on his stomach, didn't even catch himself. And he went to push himself up off of the ground. to recover. And as he was doing that, his eyes locked eyes with someone else or what remained of them. It was a human skull looking directly at him. Oh, that's terrifying. Yeah, he was frantic.

totally freaked out, and he alerted Marvin, and the two returned back to the campground to seek out authorities to let them know what was going on. Fortunately, a sheriff's deputy's vehicle was pretty nearby, right on Carberry Creek Road. So within minutes, authorities...

were aware of this discovery. So this was just a skeleton? It was a skull that he found. Okay. And they didn't stick around to investigate further. I wouldn't either. I would run. I just picture when you see something like that. in your dreams where you're like running, but you're not going anywhere. I feel like I'd try and run as fast as I could away and it would be like the slowest run of my entire life. I get that. Not really that much with running, but with trying to call out for help or...

And it always comes out as a really, really soft like whisper. Yeah. I get, I don't get the running one. I get in my dreams, I try to dial 911 and I always dial the wrong number. And in my dream, I'm tiling it over and over and it'll be like 912, 914, 811. Like it's... Any number except for 911. Yeah, these are stress streams. Oh, yeah. Anxiety. Anxiety for sure. Comes out at night. So authorities were alerted.

where the discovery right away, and it turns out that the pair finding the human skull led to the subsequent discovery of additional human remains, and that... was something that state and local police, explorer scouts, the United States Forest Service, the Oregon National Guard, and hundreds of volunteers had failed to do for the previous seven months. And that was the attempt to locate the warehouse.

abouts of the cowden family so this is going to be a story about the murder of an entire family that they just came across the remains of yes heavy

so getting into the cowden family and who they were the cowden family was a young one comprised of 28 year old richard his wife 22 year old belinda their two children five-year-old david whom belinda had with her previous husband and five months thold melissa and their young basset hound droopy so that's their family unit

The family lived in White City, Oregon near Medford, where Richard worked as a logging truck driver for Steve Wilson Logging, and Belinda worked as a stay-at-home mom. Labor Day weekend of 1974 approached, and while many Americans prepared to kick their feet up for the...

welcome, break, and work, Richard was not planning to be among them. He was planning to get a home project completed, consisting of hauling a lot of loads of gravel for his driveway. But unexpectedly, the gravel truck that he was going to be using for the job

broke down. And with no hope of getting it repaired over the holiday weekend, Richard and Belinda jumped on the opportunity to do one of their favorite things, and that was to go camping. Packing up for a last-minute long weekend, the couple loaded their Ford pickup and headed into the mountain.

They arrived on August 30th and chose a site near Carberry Creek in Copper, Oregon, a place that they actually visited many times before down to the exact campsite that they were heading to. So this was a favorite for the couple. young family. And it's important to know, and this will come back a little later, but Copper, the town of Copper, no longer exists.

today. It was flooded to create the Applegate Lake in 1980. It was a super small town. We've heard of this before. I actually touched on this in the Mount St. Helens episode as well, because Harry Truman, where he grew up in Washington, same thing. super small town and it was flooded when a dam was created. So it's underneath the reservoir now.

Yeah, there's a around the area I'm in. They have something similar to that, too. It's interesting to see how many if you look around you, how many towns have been flooded in the wake of making dams for. resources for people that's right but back at this time in the mid-1970s belinda's mother ruth lived in this town and she actually lived less than a mile away from the cowden chosen campsite and they had made plans to join Belinda's mother for dinner on their last night of

the weekend which would have been sunday september 1st before heading home they have a great weekend there was nothing that anyone noticed was awry over the weekend it was pretty radio silent so it's expected that everything was fine sunday

first comes around, so the end of their camping trip. And around 9 a.m., Richard took his son David, the five-year-old, on a walk to the Copper General's store. And Ruth, Belinda's mother, owned and managed the store. And she was there working when Richard came.

in with David and they talked and Richard purchased a quart of milk before heading back to the campsite and that would be the last sighting of them alive. As the evening approached with no sign or word from her daughter and the rest of the family Ruth's concern grew. She called up a friend named Guy Watkins to join her to their campsite to see why they had not arrived to her home for dinner yet. And as they approached the campsite, Richards Ford...

pickup truck was in view, parked right next to their tent. Stepping into the campsite, Ruth called out for them, but received no answer, and she began poking around, noting that the family's clothes were neatly folded in the tent. Melissa's diaper bag was there, along with Richard's shoes.

and all of their belongings, as far as she could tell. There was fishing poles leaning up against a nearby tree. Nothing seemed to be disturbed, not even the food or the place settings that were set out on the table.

like, in preparation for a meal. The milk jug that Richard had purchased earlier that morning was on the picnic table. In fact, even the keys to the truck, Belinda's purse, Richard's wallet still containing money, and his expensive gold wristwatch were all still there spooky and everything's in place like people should be there and no one's there right and the only thing that caught her eye as kind of being odd or off right off the bat other than

the family's obvious absence from the campsite, was one of Belinda's blouses. It was on the cot inside the tent.

and ripped in two there was no stains no blood or anything but it was almost ripped clean in half and the only thing apparently missing out of their entire campsite and their belongings was their swimsuits so thinking that they had gone off swimming ruth and guy hung around the camp hoping to intercept them when they arrived back maybe they got caught up with something lost track of time was just having a good day so they were she was kind of giving the benefit of the doubt and

they hung around for a little while. But as minutes ticked on and melted into an hour, the sun was starting to set and the sinking feeling that something was really off was getting bigger and bigger. Ruth and Guy left the site and made the short drive into town and made calls.

the Jackson County Sheriff's Office and the Oregon State Police. They responded quickly and arrived to the campsite to meet Ruth, who explained her last encounter with Richard and David earlier that morning, and then the responding officers took to the trails and the surrounding logging roads. on foot to search, but came up with nothing.

Quickly falling, they discontinued their efforts for the night and resumed the following morning. That next morning, Droopy showed up. The Basset Hound puppy was found scratching and whimpering at the front door of the general store. Relieved to see someone from her...

missing family, Ruth scooped up the pup and alerted the police to this new development. Obviously, it's impossible to know where Droopy had been, what or if anything he had seen, but by speaking to nearby campers and hikers, officers were were able to construct a loose timeline of the last 24 hours of this dog's activity. It's kind of funny how much you can just ask people, have you seen a dog? And people can be like, at 11.15 a.m., I... hugged a cute little basset.

puppy and they're like that's kind of what happened yeah and in the 70s maybe it's a little different like people like leash laws aren't really weren't really as big of a thing it was a little more lax but you're gonna remember seeing a puppy yeah on its own

According to two separate witnesses, around 2.30 p.m. the previous day and roughly four miles from the Cowden campsite, Droopy was spotted wandering alone. And then, approximately four hours later, so around 6.30 in the evening, he was seen alone again, this time even a bit further away from that

original sighting location, so a little later in the day, a little farther away from the campsite location. Between the early evening and that morning, at some point in time, he managed to find his way back to the general store, unsure what happened before.

between, etc. The search quickly became one of the largest in Oregon state history. The search grid widened to about 25 miles in every direction from the Cowden campsite. Searchers from various offices and in the form volunteers flooded the area geologists were enlisted to help navigate abandoned mine shafts bloodhounds were brought in in an attempt to track down the family scent and planes with specially equipped infrared technology combed

crisscrossed the area, hoping to detect some heat signatures that they could connect with the family. And while it was a really good thought and certainly was way more helpful than not having that tool at all, the towering trees, the redwood cedars and... ponderosa pines made it really difficult to get a clear view of the ground underneath because this national forest is thick. She thick. The ICC.

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Five days after the family was last seen on September 6th, Oregon State Police released a statement that noted they were working on leads that indicated the family was no longer near the campsite. And then the following day, an Oregon State Police sergeant spoke. to reporters for the Capital Journal and said in part, quote, it's getting to look really strange. This is about the strangest thing I've ever seen. So this statement was a big...

shift in the investigation and the overall tone of the situation, because up until this point, the public and likely members of the Cowden family themselves were thinking that this was a case of a family getting lost in the woods. But as time went on... it was becoming difficult to deny that something more sinister was at play. Especially...

with the knowledge that the Cowden family knew this area pretty well. They've been here multiple times before. Getting lost wasn't very realistic. Right. The family lives in close proximity and... I would imagine, I mean, I don't have children, but I have been in the vicinity of children. And going that far away to get turned around or lost with a five-year-old and a five-month-old.

It doesn't seem like they would be wandering too far away from trails. And you know what I mean? Especially like whether you're breastfeeding or you're or you are using formula, you are going to need to like be pumping or. You know, there's just a lot that goes into the care of a five-month-old. You're not going to be venturing with it unless, especially with all your gear and all your stuff behind. Your diaper bag is gone. Your diaper isn't gone. It's left behind when you have a five-month-old.

that's not realistic. Right. An early theory that the family simply picked up and abandoned their life. was quickly dismissed yeah the family had just redecorated david's room something that he was super stoked to do for quite a while before this trip so people kind of pointed to that like why would they put on in all that effort Yeah. To do this and then just abandon their life. And why would they leave the puppy behind? Yeah.

Why would they do that? They wouldn't do that. They have a lovely family. Investigation into their three-bedroom White City home revealed nothing was out of place and nothing indicated that they didn't have plans of returning. There was food in the pantry, in the refrigerator, everything.

like they didn't take anything. It was just all left, like they were about to come right back. A second theory that popped up pretty early on, kidnapping for ransom, was again, quickly. kind of tossed to this side. Well, no one's come forward asking for money.

Right, and Ruth informed investigators that the Young family had a small amount of debt, but nothing out of the norm for a typical family. They didn't live lavishly and had no major outstanding financial debts or unpaid debts to anyone personally who it may have... lent them money and we're looking

to get it back in some wild way, lead investigators started leaning more into the idea that someone had taken the family and driven them to a secondary location for the pure reason that there's literally no trace of all four of these people. This is the biggest... search and rescue operation up until this point in state history. There's so many boots on the ground.

There's nothing. It just seems very odd. Despite the state and local police, United States Forest Service, and the Oregon National Guard already being involved, local investigators contemplated requesting the FBI for assistance in the case. but instead decided to wait on that request as there was really no concrete proof of a kidnapping or a transfer across state lines. So it's super frustrating, but at the same time, I mean...

you got to present some concrete evidence to get the FBI involved. But the local community felt very differently and petitioned the FBI to come in and help. They're like, okay, well... There's nothing concrete. They're doing everything they can and they're not finding anything. They need other help. Yeah, back up here. Unfortunately, with no evidence indicating a federal crime, the FBI could merely weigh in. Only if the local authorities...

requested that assistance, which they ultimately did not decide to do. Search efforts were called off on September 7th, and as the weeks rolled into months, the case turned cold. Investigators followed up with hundreds of tips various different leads, interviewed everyone in the campground vicinity that they could find, countless nearby homeowners, family members, and friends of the family. They even followed up on visions presented by psychics who had called in claiming to know what happened.

And while law enforcement worked on the case, the family did what they could on their end, offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the location of, if alive, or information... leading to the arrest and conviction of any persons responsible for their disappearance. Referring to the Cowden family, of course. And this reward grew over time, partially in thanks to the result of public donations from the community. So people are putting in their...

own money they're rallying together to try and figure out what happened to this family and that's devastating to have an entire family go missing you just you know in your heart that something really bad has happened and exactly it feels like that the town is rallying around that in any way that they can to try and either help in any way they can or solve this in any way that they can right and you just feel so helpless but it's so frustrating because it's like all right four people didn't just

get sucked up into this guy yeah like i'm all for aliens and like i love a ufo thing but this isn't it this is this isn't it and it's so kind of like you want to pull your hair out. And I'm sure everyone involved on the law enforcement side felt very similarly.

Nearly a month into the vanishing of the family, authorities were looking into their first suspect. 26-year-old James Doan had been accused of stabbing to death a young man in Northern California the same day that the Cowdens went missing. It was also believed that he was responsible for murdering a second man in Northern California the next day. And while the crimes were different in nature, authorities looked into the lead before dismissing it. But...

James had no means of transportation, wasn't in the state of Oregon, and would have been unable to commit all three of the crimes. So the killing of those two separate individuals and the abduction of an entire family, given the time frame. I was going to say that. seems a little far-fetched how far is this drive it's actually not so if you look up carberry creek oregon right now on the map it's pretty much on the border of northern california okay

That's how southern this national forest is in relation to the state of Oregon. But still, this guy didn't have a mode of transportation. How is one person with a knife? Because it says he stabbed. people to death with a knife over power for two adults who are protecting their children. It's just, it's not, that seems a little, not impossible, but it seems very far-fetched.

And yeah, to get back and forth from Northern California to Oregon. Yeah. To commit two separate crimes and add in a third. Yeah. It seems a little far-fetched. Yeah, so he was guilty, just not of the Cowden, anything related to the Cowden family. Once again, trail goes cold. In December...

Richard's father, Robert, died by suicide, apparently largely in part to his son's disappearance and the lack of headway being made in their case. Fall gave way to winter, which turned into spring, with little to no developments in the case.

That is, until seven months later when Marvin, Proctor, and Alan West decided to go searching for gold. The same day the skull was discovered, it was sent off for analysis and dental records confirmed it to be that of Richard Cowden's. The scene was immediately secured and processed. And actually, Alan and Marvin stuck around and helped process the scene, like look for any evidence, which seems wild because it's like these just two guys.

That are just out there. You wouldn't be like, yeah, come help us. Yeah, come help us search. Come help us look for evidence. Yeah. It's a different time. But either way, they were involved for a little while, but then they were like, this is too much. It's. Yeah.

freaking me out, honestly, and we gotta get out of here. So they moved on and they were paid some of that reward money as well. What came next provided some answers to what happened to the Cowdens. Not far from where the skull was recovered, it appeared that Richard

had been tied to a tree. However, the state of decomposition, exposure to the elements, and scavenging animals rendered the cause of death impossible to determine. He's been out exposed to elements for seven months, and although this area... doesn't historically get a lot of snow. It's super rainy and wet and the fluctuation in temperature and obviously the time going on. It's just it was impossible to determine what he died of. There was no obvious bullet.

holes, I will say, in his skull or anything like that. And they do say he was tied to a tree based off of rope and how some of his remains were still positioned. About 100 feet from his remains were those

of the rest of his family stuffed into a small cave in a nearby hillside, the entrance of which was purposefully concealed with large rocks and a scattering of brush. The state medical examiner conducted autopsies on all of the remains. and confirmed what authorities suspected based upon the initial discovery of the remains, basically by just looking at them. Belinda and David, the five-year-old.

had both died of multiple gunshot wounds to the head that came from a .22 caliber rifle, and Melissa, the five-month-old baby, was likely beaten to death due to the massive blunt force trauma she suffered to her. head holy shit that's it's horrendous brutal for a baby like come on the location of the cave baffled everyone involved in this case it was located about six miles from the campsite

well within the search area. And in fact, it had been searched. Local volunteers came forward to state that they had climbed that exact hillside and investigated inside of that small cave, which at the time had no debris blocking its entrance and was empty. To confirm this, investigators requested one of the volunteers bring them to the location to ensure that it was the same spot. So they never told these volunteers, like, this is where we found them.

Exactly. They wanted to make sure like, hey, can you bring us to this area and show us everywhere where you looked in? And the cave was part of that. So they brought him right to the spot, said, yep, I was here. There was nothing blocking the entrance. Nothing was in here. really validated that okay that something is up here

Also, the entrance was off the beaten path and pretty difficult to locate. In fact, government dispatch search members were never even aware it was there. It was the local volunteers that searched that area. So he was able to find that local volunteer. was able to find it without prompt or issue, kind of insinuating that, okay, well, maybe the person who is responsible for this is a local because they know this area and know that this cave was here. Very good point.

Tis the season for identity theft. This time of year, most of us are checking off our holiday gift lists. But guess what? Identity thieves have lists too, and your personal information might be on them.

Protect your identity with LifeLock. LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points every second and alerts you to threats you could miss by yourself, even if you keep an eye on your bank and credit card statements. If your identity is stolen, Your own U.S.-based restoration specialist will fix it.

guaranteed or your money back. And all plans are backed by the million dollar protection package. The last thing you want to do this holiday season is face drained accounts, fraudulent loans, or other financial losses from identity theft all alone. Make this season about joy, not identity theft, with LifeLock. Save up to 40% your first year. Call 1-800-LIFELOCK and use promo code IHEART. Or go to lifelock.com slash IHEART for 40% off. Terms apply.

Make sure your catfish is U.S. catfish. Raised in clean, freshwater ponds and fully inspected by the USDA, U.S. catfish is one of the healthiest fish you can buy. But imposter imports like Bassa and Suai frequently find their way onto menus and grocery shelves. Most of these imports come from countries where ponds are often polluted. If the menu doesn't say U.S. catfish, ask before you order.

and look for the U.S. farm-raised catfish seal at the grocery. Learn more at uscatfish.com slash imports. So I'm curious, and you're probably going to go into this, did they find that... This family was killed in this location and it just hadn't happened yet with search parties or...

do they believe that they were moved to this location? That's a good question. We'll get right to it. Okay. Because that is the main question that was kind of first on everybody's minds. In the days following the discovery of the remains, Oregon State Police sealed off the cave and the surrounding...

areas to comb for evidence. All that was recovered was a single Marlin manufactured .22 rifle bullet. This discovery propelled the case from a missing person case into a full-blown homicide investigation, obviously between knowing that this family was murdered. They were

There's bullets, casings here, so this has completely changed the game. And while they had the make and the caliber from the potential murder weapon, there were still more hurdles to overcome, and these answers that they got were just spurring new questions. If the cave was truly inspected during the search, was the family taken?

killed elsewhere, and then dumped there. If they weren't taken away, were they held there for a period of time, or were they killed immediately? Based off of the location of the cave, like I said before, police were almost certain that the killer, or killers, knew the area well. and most likely used a vehicle. For an entire family to be marched six miles away from their original campsite on foot without being seen by anyone else seemed extremely unlikely. Plus, Carberry Creek Road was located...

less than a quarter of a mile from the entrance of this little cave. And there's only one. So there was only one. bullet found, casing found on the floor of that cave. And they said that both Belinda and David were killed with multiple gunshot wounds or sustained multiple gunshot wounds. Which points to that maybe this happened in another location. they tried to clean up.

after themselves and missed one it's so hard to say especially because this is now seven months later this isn't like there's other evidence around that could indicate and again i didn't read anything about it but my first thought would be It's clearly not obvious because there's no other material in there indicating that the crime occurred there. Like, okay, two people died by multiple gunshot wounds to the head. I would imagine there would be blood, brain matter.

some sort of other substance that would show that that they were killed in that location versus being just moved there. But it's also weird that Richard was tied to a tree. Like, that to me indicates he was alive when he was tied there. Like, why would they... Yeah, because why would you have... to tie someone up that was not alive also I'm curious too because there's no obvious indications of you said any gunshot wounds to him so there's that and there's a lot

But I agree with you where you're talking about in the cave that there would be some other indications going on. And as we've seen, and I'm not into forensics or anything, but we've seen a lot in caves that they have an environment. where things are preserved a little bit better. And I imagine cleaning a cave would be extremely difficult, especially when you're talking about blood. So the fact that there's nothing at all there, for me...

it sounds like it probably happened somewhere else. Yeah. And there's...

Also, the other thing, though, that it could quite possibly have been there, but this is 1975. Oh, right. So, of course, they're doing everything they can, but it's just not what we're used to if this was to have happened today. Okay. But again, it's... so hard we read about it a lot about how crime scenes out in nature are so difficult to process because there's so many different factors this isn't someone's living room there's temperature and

Natural elements, wind and sun and animals and weather. It's, yeah, it's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot more. A young family from LA who had been hiking in the area was questioned by police after they came forward with information.

that provided the first new development in this case in months. Apparently, the LA family was out walking around 5 p.m. on Sunday, September 1st, the day that the Cowdens went missing, and noticed a woman sitting in a pickup truck on the side. of Carberry Creek Road, stating, quote, they acted like they were waiting for us to leave and frankly, they made us nervous so we moved on. And it was just one woman that they saw? There was a woman in the truck but they said there was...

a group of people in there. Okay. But they specifically noticed the woman, but there were more people there. Mm-hmm. The surviving members of the Cowden family were able to hold funeral services for Richard, Belinda, David, and Melissa in April of 1975, and the family was laid to rest in the Eagle Point National Cemetery in Eagle Point, Oregon. By that summer,

The lead brought forward by that LA family kind of fizzled to nothing. There was nowhere to go with that information. Were they ever shown a photo of? I'm not sure. I just know that nothing ever came of it. Okay, because that would be huge. I mean, if they could identify her in the vehicle. I would imagine, yes. Yeah. Like, have you seen these people? Have you seen this family? Was this the woman you saw in the truck? Right. Yeah. And at this point, years.

go by. And it's 1978, and construction broke ground to construct the Applegate Reservoir Dam, which would result in the eventual flooding of the Town of Copper, the Carberry Creek Campground, and the cave, which now lays at the bottom of Applegate Lake. Two years later, in 1980, Oregon State Police stepped forward to announce they had a person of interest in the cave. and his name was Dwayne Lee Little and he was 31 years old. That's a big step if...

police announce that they have a suspicion of someone, that means that they have a really big reason. This isn't just like a suspect, like the first guy we talked about. This is an actual person of interest. So this is a big development, especially after so many... years have gone by with

little to nothing. By the time the police named Dwayne as a person of interest, he was already facing charges. In 1980, he was 31 years old, but in November of 1964, he was just 15. It was then that he encountered... orla phipps a 16 year old girl from springfield oregon and she was riding her horse home from school alone when duane attacked her he raped and stabbed orla to death in the woods

right next to her home. As a 15-year-old? Yes. He was later arrested, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison for that crime when he was 17 years old. In accordance to Oregon state law, he was eligible for parole after serving just...

10 years and it was granted that's there's so many feelings towards that when you murder someone and you get let out granted he was a child when it happened but oh my well in that vicious of a way as well it wasn't like an accident it wasn't not that murdering someone is ever an accident by definition but you know what i mean like it was just really aggressive and there's cause for concern there and i don't think

that was addressed appropriately. Yeah. Well, and it gets worse. So he was released in May of 1974, just a few months before the Cowdens disappeared. And he was sent back to prison a year later after violating his parole by... And that's the same gun that was used with the Cowden. family yes so it's thanks to her that he was sent back to prison and

Originally, when she was informing the police about the rifle, she didn't think that he had any connection with the Cowdens. She just wanted to make sure that he was following the conditions of his parole. Oh, yeah, because she wasn't thinking that. It's just like, he's allowed to have this, right? like hey just so you know he has a gun and like that's not

chill with the parole. So he just went right back to prison for that violation. So he's sent back to prison, but he was paroled again in the spring of 1977. And as a shock to probably no one, three years later, he committed another horrific crime. He sexually assaulted a pregnant woman named Margie Hunter whose car had broken down near Portland and after the sexual assault he attempted to beat her to death but she lived and she pressed charges against him. Good for her.

In 1980, Duane was charged and convicted of the attempted homicide and finally sentenced. to three consecutive life sentences and his opportunity for additional paroles were officially revoked. So that was it. Thank you. He's finally, finally, he's in, he's not coming out. Having a 22 caliber rifle and being a convicted murderer.

doesn't already look great, but it wasn't enough to tie him to the murders. There had to be something additional to get him to a person of interest status. Well, did they have his gun? I don't know. I'm sure they did. But again, technology, I mean, I could also be totally butchering this, but technology for matching the exact weapon with the exact bullet, I don't know. I would love to talk to someone in forensics on this who could give us the answers to all of these questions.

If I followed a different life path and went to school for... forensics like I almost did I could have had a different conversation with you but I'm just I'm just I'm not sure so I would love to if anyone's listening and you're in forensics and know the answer to all of these questions we'd love to pick your brain

Because it's interesting. It's horrific. But it's interesting to see how people solve cases and crimes and what they link to. Because the first thing I think of, and maybe it's because I've watched too many movies, is that if you have the shell casing, then you can link the gun. And if the gun was...

was confiscated from him because he went to prison, maybe they still have it in a holding area somewhere. I just feel like... I solved it. That would have been an avenue that... Cassie just cracked the case. I just cracked the case. I just solved it.

hire me i just feel like that would have been something that was a no-brainer if that was available if that technology was available to them at that time they're already doing so much like why would they not do that if that's something that could have been done you see The ball dropped all the time on cases, though, where new eyes come in and they're like, hey, why don't we do this?

People are like, oh, we never we were so enveloped in this part of the case that wasn't even an option. And someone else comes in with new eyes. And I'm sure I'm not the new eyes, but. You know, I just feel like it is possible to miss things when you're so enveloped in a certain aspect of the case. But sorry, that was just my...

That was just my thought on the bullet. No, that's fine. Because I do totally agree with that 100%. And that's why they do pull fresh eyes into things and reopen cases and have different teams work on things for that exact reason. I just think in this certain circumstance. It's like, I would find it shocking.

If they didn't do that. Okay. And could have. But anyway. Okay. Where was I? Oh, yes. So the additional information to get him into that person's of interest status. Yes, yes. And that information came into play when investigators uncovered that... He had stayed the night just miles away from the Cowden family campground the night that they vanished, which was a time between his prison releases when he was on parole.

Additionally, a local cabin owner near the town of Copper says that on September 2nd, so the night after, Dwayne and his parents stopped at his cabin and signed his guest book. Which is bizarre. Wait, his parents signed it? Yeah, so his parents are involved now. Maybe. Because he wasn't there to sign it? No, they were all there together. So on September 1st, investigators somehow tied him.

pinned him to this location he had stayed the night he had been witnessed there like at a gas station people said yes 100 I saw him in this area on this night. And then the next night, people witnessed him, or this guy witnessed him and his parents at a cabin nearby, and they all signed the guest book.

at this cabin too bro so there's evidence that they were there now right like solid like written they wrote their damn names down like hi we're all here suspiciously and just a reminder that the la family who said they saw a truck parked on the side of carberry creek road the day that the cowdens disappeared remember when you're like oh did were they shown photo that truck also happened to match the exact description of the truck that duane and his family were driving

Now, on top of that, another couple stepped forward saying they saw that same truck, now this time, this is very important, filled with people on the day that the family disappeared, halfway between the Cowden's campsite and the site that the bodies were eventually discovered. Okay, so there's no, that's it. That's the truck.

this is likely what happened to the Cowden family. So now taking all of this evidence, all of this testimony, witnesses coming forward, and obviously eyewitness accounts are historically difficult to rely on. a lot of different reasons, but just based on all the information.

that was gathered, he thinks that this is what happened. Dwayne was passing through the area when he came across the family swimming in Carberry Creek. He then followed them back to their campsite where he then abducted them. He may or may not have held them against their will for a...

short period of time, but he murdered them all and enlisted the help of his family to stash the bodies on the hillside. That is what the theory of Richard Davis, this retired Oregon State Police detective who was heavily involved in the case, believes happened. Obviously, it's hard to fill in the gaps and all the tiny details, but essentially he thinks that's what happened those days over Labor Day. Dwayne has remained...

uncooperative and refuses to speak of any details of any of the murders that he's been convicted or accused of, including the Cowden family disappearance and murders. However, Floyd Forsberg, one of Dwayne's previous cellmates, has claimed that Dwayne confessed to the Cowden murders directly to him in conversation. But it's worth noting that Floyd isn't exactly a saint himself. He has a questionable character. He's been caught lying about things before. He's not the most reliable.

witness for that also again me watching too many movies but i just think of if you are able to get someone convicted on something and lessen your own sentence. It might be motive to say that he confessed to these things because then you can go to court and you can sit on trial and be like, yes, he told me this. This is what he told me, blah, blah, blah. And get yourself out and get him convicted. Right. Oh, what an awful story.

Dwayne Little remains incarcerated in the Oregon State Prison, and despite the heap of circumstantial evidence connecting him to the Cowden murders, he has never been officially charged, and the case remains open and unsolved. the story of the Cowden murders. That is horrible. I hope that they're able to convict him and find he sounds like a viable suspect and to hear all these accounts that come forward and say that they saw that truck with a whole family.

with the dog chasing. I mean, it's all there. It's just proving it. I know. I know. And I will say that obviously Dwayne's parents have been. thoroughly investigated interrogated questioned you know the whole nine yards but they've never admitted to anything And they're probably, I mean, I also don't know, but they're probably deceased by now, just given their age. I mean, Dwayne's still alive, but. It's hard to fathom that you could get your parents to.

help you with the murder of an entire family. I know that my parents would do anything for me, but if I presented them an entire family that I had just murdered, I don't think that they would stand behind me and help me get away. with that, especially if children were involved. Maybe if I had killed a couple like creepy older adults that were criminals or something, my mom and my dad would be like, all right, we'll handle this. But if I showed up with a family...

and there was an infant and a child involved, there's just no way. I feel like that's such a hard thing to fathom that these parents could have assisted in hiding their bodies. I know. But the other thing I think of when you say that is... This took place allegedly.

if we're going with this theory that he's responsible. This took place during his parole. In their mind, just playing devil's advocate, like, if you get caught for this, you're going away for life. Because this is before... You would either way. It doesn't matter if you're on parole.

if you get caught murdering an entire family it doesn't matter if you're on parole you're going away forever i understand that but what i'm saying is like they wanted to do everything maybe, wanted to do everything in their power to avoid him getting caught for another crime or anything that would violate his parole again and get him sent back to prison because this is before he attacked the woman that survived and he went back fine.

Finally for life. Okay. And he, so at this point he had only murdered one person. Only. Only murdered one person. God. Right. I'm not a parent, but I imagine that if I had a child. who turned into something like this, I would, I just... Put them away. You know, and I know that's really hard to say, but if I had a child that was murdering and sexually assaulting people, be like, I am so sorry. Please rehabilitate in a jail. Keep them off the streets. They're dangerous to themselves and others.

And that's hard to say because I'm not a parent and I'm looking at it from an outside perspective. Right. I know.

parents do whatever they can for their children but there's just there's some extremes that are very hard to well there's got to be a line yeah you know there's got to be and i mean that's all going on the assumption that that is what happened but it's hard to kind of like think of another alternative scenario like with this just matches so alarmingly well i almost wonder if there was someone that we don't even know about that was there

like uh well that's the thing a prison mate or something because parents doing it's just unless i don't know his family maybe he has a criminal family maybe he gets his behavior because of things that his parents did to him as a child I mean, he started these things as a child and maybe that's a reflection of.

how he was raised. And I don't know anything about his childhood. So I'm making wild assumptions here. But maybe his parents and his father were not good people either. So who knows? I don't know. It's hard to fathom. Yeah, it's really hard to think. And it's hard to wrap your mind around someone also just happening to be in the area. It's a total random act of violence. There's no rhyme or reason. You have no relation to these people. Yeah.

like oh i happen to be in the area and you look like i can take advantage of the situation robbery obviously wasn't the motive if he truly did follow them back to their campsite yeah There's money there. There's gold watches around there. There's purses lying around like he didn't take anything. It was strictly because he wanted to harm someone. Stories like this just bother me too. my core because it's so, it's so sad. It's just.

Children lost their lives, a mother, a father. This whole family had their whole life ahead of them. And it was stolen from them by someone who we officially don't actually know who did it. And we don't really know why either. They were just enjoying their life. been on vacation and I just people yeah who do things like this just make me very upset yeah and it's also like an added layer which it seems really weird but like we've talked about this before like we used to watch

true crime, absorb true crime all the time, read, watch, discuss true crime cases all of the time. And we've kind of like stepped a little bit back from that a little bit just for different reasons. And it's just really difficult. Like you said, it bothers me. to you, to your core. It's a lot to digest. It is, and researching it, it's like, of course we've heard, no matter...

how old or young someone is that is affected and a victim of a crime like this, it's awful. But when I'm reading like Richard and Belinda's ages and their children's ages, like I and we are at an age that like my... family my sister my cousins like my friends are that those people are those people like they have young children they just got married they're in their 20s and 30s and it's like you can't help but kind of project of like, what if this happened to someone I knew?

or me or whatever and it's like that's what makes it even more difficult i think because you associate it to like oh my god like i could relate to this like in a weird way like an alternate dimension well it's a way to get know the people who were victims to this because you do you put your family's faces on them because they are the same age they have the same family dynamic whatever it is and you you just see your own loved ones

in these people which it changes it it's not just a story it's personal when you hear it that way and yeah so i know that people love a good true crime story and we get them requested a lot and we will always you're messed up you're messed up it's not a true crime podcast i don't know where you ever got that idea but um yeah so while we will obviously do these stories and it's something it's kind of like our roots i guess you could say it's just we like to space them out because it is really

heavy material despite like true crime being everywhere and everyone covering at least in our worlds like i mean there's some people some friends that are like i never listen to true crime you guys are crazy but in our world like our friends like it we like it but Yeah, so despite it seemingly everywhere, when you're the one, like, spending nights and hours researching the material, getting to know the people, and not just, like...

consuming it for 45 minutes and going on with your day it gets a little hard that's all i'm saying what i love about our podcast is everything that we have brought it in to be like we're survival stories we're animal attacks we're adventures we're we're so

much in the outdoors that is supposed to be inspiring and get you to want to be outdoors and some of that is dark and some of that is scary but the underlying of all of it there's so much that's happening in the outdoors that is exciting to talk about and And what I love that we've done with our podcast is we've taken this true crime genre that is typically murder and attacks. And we've almost transformed it in our own little circle of being it's not just an animal attack. It's a treasure hunt.

People are breaking the laws in different places. It's a true crime organization that's running rampant. And I just did the hot springs episode or it's like crime can be in so many different forms. Like you're. story that you did in Effigy Mounds where someone was taking the remains and holding them in their garage. And that was a huge crime. I mean, crime...

can be in so many different genres. So we have that, but we've also added this survival aspect, which I'm like hyping up our podcast right now to the people who are listening. I'm like, this is what we do. They're like, yeah, we know. We listen. It's like, got it. like thinking about it and i'm just stoked on it and i i like a lot of the content that we do do and

Stories like this, I think are just, they're really hard to listen to. And I just feel for the families. And I guess that's my rant. The story's been over for like 10 minutes. So everyone was still listening. But yeah, well, it's important. Important to say, I think, because it's something that we discuss personally like off air a lot. And we always want to deliver content that people are most interested in. But we also have to walk the line of, you know.

mental health and what we're most interested in which is right and i'm interested i love history okay like give me a break i like history i try and make it dark because i love dark things so it's just kind of like without being rude it's our podcast and um

And we will always do what, you know, is true to ourselves while also taking into account what people most want to hear. I mean, we love suggestions. Suggestions are awesome. We totally take them into account. And a lot of our episodes that we have done are... Based on suggestions. So I like getting them.

Anyway, I feel like we've ranted. I'm going to get fresh. I'm going to get like, yeah, defensive of our show. I feel like we've ranted for a while. So thank you, everyone who's still listening and hanging around. We hope you enjoyed this podcast. back again next time in the meantime please enjoy the view but watch your back bye everyone bye

Thank you so much for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale or story suggestion, send us an email at stories at npadpodcast.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NP. Unlock monthly bonus episodes and exclusive content.

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