What else do you want?". He also said there are at least six people of interest. In a way, their work has only just begun. Unsolved in California: The Case of the Keddie Cabin Murders January 12, 2022 / Jamie Day The little town of Keddie California lies nestled in the mountains to the north-eastern part of the state in Plumas County. Its known that John Sharp, and his friend Dana were in Quincy and caught a ride home sometime between 10 p.m. and 1 a.m., Gamberg said. Backpackerverse.com does not include the entire universe of available offers. But knowing the details, the minutiae of the crimeit was not a pleasant place to be. ", "It's obviously a worthwhile pursuit," he says. Sue had left a broken and abusive marriage and was described as a "quiet woman who loved her kids." As Marty said in his 1981 confession, they were just collateral damage. (Hester changed her name to Rhyanna Cerise McCormick before she died) also, do any of you know what the name of the surviving daughter is today? The two men, both now dead, are also the primary suspects in the narrative taking shape by the revived investigation, although the sheriff at the time, Doug Thomas, tells PEOPLE that no evidence tied either to the crimes when they occurred. It's a case that's gathered far more dust than clues over the years. However, Marilyn Smartt did not recall the meeting and also said the two were not friends to her knowledge. Apparently, as the suspects bludgeoned and stabbed their victims to death, none of the suspects were injured or left their own blood at the scene. The Scene Suggests More Than One Killer. The tape was never admitted into evidence, and it was in fact found at the bottom of a box. Thats when Hagwood asked Gamberg, a private investigator, if hed like to take over the investigation. As police continued to search for Tina, other officers brought in multiple suspects. CBS13 was there when Sheila was shown the hammer and a knife that may also be connected to the crimes. The hope is coming from an unlikely sourceinformation from a family member of Boubede has led to a discovery investigators thought was long gone. When finding out about Sue's interference with his marriage, Marty reportedly went "ballistic" about it. He also compared the available evidence in 1981 to someone firing a shotgun loaded with evidence and no one followed up on all of it as it spread out like pellets. Amazingly, Sheila's two little brothers, Greg and Rick, then 5 and 10, were asleep and unharmed in an adjacent bedroom, along with a friend. Relief is something Sheila Sharp has been searching for since that dark day in April 1981. . These were boys he went to school with. The one he missed or more accurately wasnt allowed to cover was the Keddie murder case, he said recently. Gamberg said he was fortunate in that he was able to get his piece of DNA processed in a timely manner. However, she did recognize her ex-husband's handwriting. "It struck this community harder than anything," he said of the killings. Victoria didnt do any research for this one and it sounds like Gamberg is part of the problem! KEDDIE (CBS13) Investigators believe they may have found one of the weapons used in a 35-year-old murder mystery. As word spread through Keddie and the rest of Plumas County of the murders, its clearly a crime that not only affected Shelia Sharp and her remaining brothers and the boy who was spending the night, it deeply affected some members of the sheriffs office and the community, Gamberg said. Advertiser Disclosure: Backpackerverse.com is a free online resource that offers valuable content and comparison services to users. "There's times I think, Gosh, should I go get hypnotized to see what I remember?" It wasnt followed, he said. "I guess I don't want to relive that," she tells PEOPLE in this week's issue of the memory 35 years ago when, at age 14, she opened the front door of her family's northern California cabin to find their bloodied bodies on the living room floor. More than 35 years after a teenage girl came home to find her family brutally slain in their resort cabin, police say the cold case is heating up. On April 11, 1981, Sue's 14-year-old daughter, Sheila, spent the night at a friend's cabin, returning home to her own cabin the now infamous cabin number 28to discover her mom, one of her brothers (Johnny, 15) and his friend Dana Wingate (17) brutally murdered. Note the sign on the front tree proclaims this was a home where a mom and her five children lived. My kids don't know who my mom is. Backpackerverse.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. Just as important, Gamberg and Hagwood wonder if they've also recovered another of the murder weapons. Sheila's sister was missing her remains were found in the woods three years later. ", Thomas wasn't so sure. "There were some theories that [Marty's friend] Boubede was involved, and there was some theories that some other people in Keddie were involved," Thomas said. Updated on July 15, 2019. "I knew the two boys who were murdered. He wonders if DOJ protected him. Perhaps one day they will finally confirm those suspicions but for now, the devastating case remains unsolved. And I have every confidence that they either participated after the fact or they have first-hand information. Echoes Of Grisly Murders Will Find A Way To Haunt You At This Abandoned California Resort, True Horror: Beware Angry Spirits At This Richmond Swimming Pool, Paranormal Lies: Theyll Tell You Not to Be Afraid At This Berkeley Park, Your Truest Nightmare: Demons Crave Companionship At This Nortonville Hill, Supernatural Child Checks into the Yosemite View Lodge in El Portal. Case file update is a new column featuring previous cases involving Plumas County and its people. This was Cabin 27 where the Seabolt family lived. What occurred next shocked the country: Four people were killed, three of which were found in Cabin 28. Sue's 12-year-old daughter Tina was taken from the cabin, but her decomposed remains wouldn't be found for another three years. * Watch our new true crime show, People Magazine Investigates, which continues with an episode on the Keddie cabin murders on Monday at 10 p.m. In 2016, authorities once again were asking that question, reviving the investigation. All had been bound and suffered extreme violence. There is not an expiration date on homicides, and to the extent that we have surviving siblings and family members, it is our fundamental obligation to them to understand who did this and why, Hagwood said in 2016. Until now, lack of fingerprints and identifiable DNA left at the scene by the perpetrators has stymied investigative efforts. He said, And I was wondering if they thought of the murder up in Keddie up in Plumas County a couple years ago where a 12-year-old girl was never found.. She said she learned of it long afterward by investigators, but she recognized her ex-husband's handwriting. And some of the evidence in storage is contaminated. He reportedly left for Reno, Nevada after the murders. Truly a case of wrong place, wrong time. "But do I really want to remember?". But for some, Keddie is synonymous with murder and despair. The sheriff at the time of the murders, Doug Thomas, is accused of a cover-up in many online theories. 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. As I stood there, fighting to breathe, I couldnt help but think of Dana Wingate, and how she had been strangled to death in the house. Dana suffered multiple head injuries and was manually strangled. S.C. 1. Boubede died in 1988, and Marty Smartt died in 2006. Its suspected that someone brought a hammer, the one recovered in a nearby pond in 2016, as well as using a hammer and knives found in the home. In 1981, the gruesome murder of four in Cabin 28 of the Keddie Resort in Northern California has long been unsolved.or has it?. It was tested for trace DNA or blood residue. The call came just after someone discovered a skull and a few bones about 80 miles down the Feather River Canyon in a spot known as Camp 18 about 5 miles from Feather Falls. Remember, this was 1981 and DNA collection and processing at crime scenes didnt begin until 1985. And now two years after that, hes announced that theres more that links a living person or persons to the crime. May 2, 2016 / 11:47 PM in 1990. It's a believe long-shared by the victims' family. WANTED: The Keddie Cabin Killer Episode Summary A family's brutal murder rocks a tiny California town and leaves behind too many unanswered questions. Keddie murders: Keddie: 1981-04-11: 4: . "I have always talked about the situation," Sheila says. Why were corrupt DOJ BOCCA agents immediately assigned to this rural case? Dead were Sheila's mother, brother and a family friend. Listen Now For our friends in the Deaf and Signing community, you can view an ASL version of this episode HERE. "But rarely did I speak to the family about it. Deputy Hank Klement was the first to arrive on scene. Crim from the divisions organized crime unit not from homicide to investigate. "She was a kind and loving mother who was doing her very best to raise five children alone. This case is as screwed up as a soup sandwich, Gamberg said recently. 2. Growing up in Taylorsville, Kendall (Name changed for privacy) had heard about the Sharp murders from a fairly young age. Something for everyone interested in hair, makeup, style, and body positivity. She looked at me and smiled and in my head I heard the name, Tina.. His home was just a short distance away in Cabin 26. Gamberg thinks the tape was deliberately ignored when it arrived at the Plumas County Sheriffs Office. To keep this resource 100% free, we receive compensation for many of the products and services listed on the site. He accepted the job and the challenge of following the evidence and leads that still existed. Some of the evidence was ignored. It's debated whether it was the murders themselves that led to less interest in renting in the once-busy area, or if it was the allegedly poor management of the cabins themselves that led to fewer people being willing to live there. 28 of the Keddie Resort. Subscribe now to PEOPLE, or pick up this week's issue, on newsstands now, for more on this case. It was discovered later that 12-year-old Tina Sharp was missing. As a martial arts instructor at the time, he taught both Johnny and Dana, and says Dana was at his home the day before he died. ", "But then it's also, I think, made me stronger," she says, "because I've had to look out for my two younger brothers. The discovery came three years after Tinas disappearance by a man out hunting bottles. Marilyn claimed to never receive the letter. "They can't defend themselves. Many were questioned, but without sufficient evidence nobody was convicted. And also, as I'm growing older, what can I expect in my later years? We still have to live on without our loved ones. The murders took place in house No. It's not the only troubling aspect of the case to Hagwood. He found a letter written by Marty Smartt to his wife reportedly written soon after the murders. The California Department of Justice was immediately given the case and then didnt follow through, said Gamberg. The second development was something else found in the same boxes of case files: the taped anonymous phone call that tipped off the location of Tina Sharp's remains. In the rural town of Keddie, California, a mother and three children were attacked on Saturday, April 11, 1981. Boubede died in 1988, according to Gamberg. The morning of April 12, 1981, Glenna Sue Sharp and her kids, Tina and John, and John's friend, Dana Wingate, were brutally murdered inside house #28 in Keddie, California. Lone pools of blood on the living room floor and on the sofa pillow indicate the boys bodies were also moved and staged, Gamberg said. DNA taken from a strip of white medical tape consistent with that used to bind the victims hands and ankles, and to cover the mouth of one victim, has revealed much as the Plumas County Sheriffs Office moves forward in its efforts to solve the quadruple murder case. It emerged that Marty was angry about Sue's interference in his troubled marriage. 2021. Thomas recently addressed these accusations: In 2013, the case was reopened by current Sheriff Greg Hagwood and investigator Mike Gamberg. The Keddie Cabin murders was a case that involved a triple-slaying as well as a missing child whose remains were later discovered. Hagwood personally knew them. In the larger community of Quincy, with a population of just under 2,000, Sheriff Hagwood was a schoolmate of victims Johnny and Dana, and the summer before the murders they'd all worked together as teenagers on a painting crew. Although two of the main suspects, Smartt and Boubede are dead, they were alive at the time of Tina Sharps discovery. "It could be next month, it could be next year but really the focus in our priority is getting the truthgetting the answers.". Those who were inside Cabin 28 the night and/or early morning hours of April 11 and 12, 1981, were somewhat prepared, according to Gamberg. When Tina's remains were first found in 1984, on the third anniversary of the murders, her skull was unidentified. This murder is shrouded in mystery, leaving behind a messy and compelling trail of clues. In earlier years, before the Sharps moved in, he spent nights there with a friend and his family. She reported the possibility of a homicide in Cabin 28. 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