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Hi Crime Junkies. I'm your host Ashley Flowers. >> And I'm Britt. And before we jump in,
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you guys, today is kind of a big deal because we have officially hit 500,000 subscribers on YouTube, which is a huge
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milestone. And if you've been here a long time, you probably know that I started out on Crime Junkie believing I
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would always get to be in my comfy clothes when we record. Not that I'm like all dressed up or anything, but
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like >> But there used to be pajamas in the early days. >> I never imagined we would be on camera
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every single week. [laughter] But it means so much to us. It's so many of you are showing up to listen to us every
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single week. And now so many of you are tuning in to watch every week. And if you haven't hit subscribe yet on
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YouTube, today is a great time to do it. Because this is a case where truly it has elements that you won't believe
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until you see. And I bet this is a story that is going to sink its hooks into you
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the way it has me. I mean, it's one of those where nothing makes sense and there are so many rabbit holes and red
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herrings involving real-life struggles and supernatural beings that the lore of this story starts to become bigger than
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the facts of the case. But if you ask me, the hard, cold facts tell a story of a family looking for a
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fresh start. A family who was this close to getting it when something or someone intervened.
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And if that's true, then someone is getting away with murder. Because these undetermined deaths are no longer being
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actively [music] worked. Making me wonder if there will ever be justice for the Jameson family.
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October 17th, 2009 isn't when the Jameson story begins. [music] But that is when everyone around them
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first realizes that something's wrong. Because October 17th is when the Latimer County Sheriff's Office gets a call
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about an abandoned pickup truck on Panola Mountain, which is a small part of the larger Sand Bois Mountain in
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Latimer County, Oklahoma. This truck had been spotted there a few days earlier, but today was the day that someone
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noticed a dog trapped inside the locked truck. By the time Sheriff Israel Beacham and a few of his deputies
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arrive, it's already dark and they have to break a window to get the small emaciated dog out. Now, it's clear that
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she had been in there for days and was on the verge of honestly death. But, the dog was maybe one of the least strange
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things found in the vehicle. According to The Oklahoman, the keys are still in the ignition, even though the car was
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locked. Someone's Blackberry was left behind along with a few coats and other items of clothing like a purse, $32,000
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in cash in a bag under the seat, and IDs belonging to Sherilyn and Bobby Jameson.
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Then there's a seven-page letter signed by Sherilyn to Bobby, who it becomes clear is her husband. Now, I have
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highlighted some of these parts, but I'm going to have you read it. Bobby Jameson,
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I'm writing you this letter with a spirit of truth and shame. I am asking you forgiveness for ever
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coming into your life for everything that I have done to you that has hurt or offended you.
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I also ask that you forgive me for the things that I have done to you that has offended God and the Holy Spirit.
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You have broken my heart and called me names like [ __ ] [ __ ] and I rebuke you and pray for your soul.
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You are a very toxic person. You need to find happiness. You contaminate everyone that you are
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around. It breaks my heart and saddens my soul that you have turned into the monster
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that you are. Thank God for It kind of cuts off. >> Yeah, like it the copy Yeah. Maybe you
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and me both. That with the force that you beat me on the spine that I did not have a heart
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attack or being paralyzed from the neck down. [music] You have tried to take my life on more
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than one occasion. I would not wish my daughter to be raised in foster care because of you
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being in prison for attempted murder and her mother [music] dead. You have put me in the corner so many
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times that you have brought the worst out in me. There is no need to keep writing. I will
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pour my pain out in my own journal. Thank you for my daughter. That's all God intended to happen. We were never
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meant to be together. I fear for your soul. Signed, Sherilyn. Now, Beecham and his team know very
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little about the James and family at this point. So, what this letter means or why there's so much cash in the car,
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they don't know. I mean, all that attempted murder talk in the letter are like That would have me scared that this is
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some kind of like family annihilator situation. >> That would be worst case scenario, but
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they haven't found anything to prove that. Like there's no letter from Bobby back to her. There's no suicide note.
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Though, deputies have been able to piece together that it was Bobby who brought them up there. It turns out he's spoken
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to a realtor about some land that was for sale up there on the mountain. And the realtor said that she usually takes
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people to go out and like look at the properties because they are pretty hard to find. This is a super undeveloped
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rugged area, like rugged terrain. >> Mhm. But Bobby was pretty insistent that he
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was going to take his family, his wife Sherilyn and their 6-year-old daughter Madison up there alone. Like if she
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could just give him the coordinates, they'd be fine. So, she did. But that was back on October 8th. Now, when they
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look at the Blackberry that was left behind, it has GPS and the coordinates for the land are in it. It looks like
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they got up there on the 8th at around 2:15 p.m. But I'm not sure everything that comes after fits in with a plan for
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Bobby to do something to his family. Because based on the GPS, it looks like they spent a little time just kind of
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like walking around and exploring. I mean, they were looking at nearly 40 acres. And at one point, they actually
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ended up taking a photo of Madison that has become infamous in this [music] case.
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The picture was taken at 2:51 p.m. on the 8th and she's in front of this cluster of rocks like in the woods.
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Now, it's clearly a candid photo. Her arms are like crossed. Her mouth's like a little bit open like maybe she was
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about to smile or say something or was in the middle of saying something. And this is important to me because
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authorities found this phone in the truck. Meaning that the Jamesons had the phone with them while they were out and
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walking around. They know exactly where this picture was taken, but they had come back to the truck.
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>> Right. Even the way the truck was facing, [music] it's on this like narrow one-lane road
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with a 3-ft drop on either side and it's pointed like they were about to head down the mountain.
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>> Like they were leaving. >> Yes. So, what stopped [music] them? Now, there's nothing in the
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immediate area around the truck that would suggest something happened to the family there. No sign of a struggle, no
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blood, but I will say there had been big rainstorms the last few days there that
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could have washed away evidence if there was any to find. Either way, all signs point to bad and authorities need to get
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boots on the ground and find the Jamesons because they're already days, if not a full week, behind and this
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isn't going to be an easy search. This area on the mountain, I said, rugged terrain." And I do not mean that
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lightly. This isn't a developed area with fully built homes or walking trails. This is middle of nowhere
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country. And the people who live up there are living off the grid. In fact, that was Bobby and Sherilyn's plan.
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[music] They were going to buy some land and live out of a shipping container and
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home school Madison. Which honestly, when I heard the story years ago, back when I first learned about this case,
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like I couldn't even wrap my head around that. Off-grid, I don't know, these days
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is kind of sounding more like the way to go. But like they were excited about this plan. So over the next week or so,
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massive searches start getting underway to find the family. They're combing the mountain up from the base through the
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north side into an area called Smokestack Hollow. And not only are they dealing with the harsh environment as it
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normally is, but those rainstorms that they had earlier make it so that they're slogging through mud and wet brush along
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the way. But they search and search, and there is just not so much as a sign of this
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family or what happened to them on the mountain. But that might be because the biggest
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clues are actually buried in what was happening with the Jamesons before they ever even got to the mountain.
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In the parks and forests you love, there are stories waiting to [music] be told.
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I'm Dilia D'Ambra, the host of Park Predators, a true crime podcast that reminds you sometimes the most beautiful
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places hide the darkest secrets. Listen now wherever you get your podcasts. Bobby and Sherilyn met around 2002, and
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they were married in an out-of-state wedding in 2004. [music] But many people didn't approve. I
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actually spoke to a source who knew Bobby before and after Sherilyn, and they say that Bobby completely changed
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after getting with her. Before they said he was smart and creative, but they watched as he seemed to slip into
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addiction alongside Sherilyn. Now, she had bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, and ADHD, all of which she was
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prescribed meds for, though she didn't always take them. And the addiction she had to painkillers may have at least
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started as a way to self-medicate. Then in 2003, Bobby suffered a bad back injury, like from a car accident, and so
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he began managing the chronic pain with pills, which was a slippery slope. Before he knew it, he was addicted to
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pills, too. With neither of them working, money was getting tighter and tighter. Their nice
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lake house in Eufaula, Oklahoma was getting tougher and tougher to afford, and their financial troubles were
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putting a lot of stress on an already strained marriage. It seems like Bobby and Sherilyn may
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have turned to lawsuits to solve some of their money problems. We know that Bobby
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sued the people involved in his car accident, that was resolved in 2007, and there's other documentation showing that
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he and Sherilyn were plaintiffs in a pair of civil suits. Then Sheriff Beecham told The Oklahoman
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that just before Bobby and Sherilyn disappeared, they were planning to sue the Eufaula school district, but he
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didn't know what for. I'm assuming it had something to do with Madison. People online do a lot of guessing, but the
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truth is that we weren't able to talk to anyone who really knows what that was about. But there is one more documented
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lawsuit that I found really interesting, because it was ongoing at the time that
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they disappeared, and the person that Bobby was suing was his own father, Bob Jamison.
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The claim started in 2008, and it all boiled down to this gas station Bob owned. Bobby claimed that he worked for
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his dad at the gas station for free because his dad always told him that he would give him an ownership stake of the
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station when he sold it. But apparently that never happened. >> [music] >> And then it just got uglier from there.
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We spoke to Bobby's uncle, Jack, and he told us that Bob warned him Sherilyn was, quote unquote, dangerous. And Jack
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took that to mean physically because Bob told him this story about her pulling a
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gun on someone. But, she may have seemed dangerous in other ways to him, too, because I spoke to someone who said that
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Sherilyn was spreading rumors that Bob was in the mafia, which from Bobby's POV made his dad the dangerous one. And one
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point during the ongoing legal battle, he filed for a protective order against his father claiming that he had tried to
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kill him on at least two occasions. Once in November 2008 when Bob allegedly hit
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him with a car, and again in April 2009. But, I don't know what happened in that
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second incident. But, a protective order was issued following that in May of 2009. This is just 5 months before the
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Jamesons went missing. So, maybe because of all of this going on or in spite of it, it seems that by the end
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of the summer, at least, Sherilyn had gone off her meds, and [music] clearly the effects were having a major impact.
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Now, she had another child, an older son from a previous marriage, and he told author Jake Anderson in his book The
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Vanishing at Smokestack Hollow that Sherilyn had started physically abusing him.
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So, in August, he was removed from her care and sent to live with his dad. Then in September, Sherilyn attempted
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suicide and was hospitalized for 3 weeks. That same month, something strange started happening. The shipping
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container that the family planned to live in was sitting near the driveway at their lake house property,
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and Sherilyn started spray painting it with messages. Things like, "Three cats killed to date by people in this area."
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And "Witches don't like their black cat killed." And did she claim to be a witch? So, this is the thing. I've heard
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a lot of different things, but her friend Nikki told people that she did this because a cat of hers had died. She
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thought it was the neighbors, >> [music] >> and she just wanted to scare them to
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like make people think that she was someone that they wouldn't want to mess with.
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I didn't see any sign of her actually practicing witchcraft. In fact, in the time leading up to their disappearance,
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there is evidence that they were gravitating to more traditional religious outlets, but still with a
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really dark focus. You see, inside their house investigators found pamphlets and books
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about death and the end of the world. There were Bibles around the house that had highlighted verses that talk about
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the apocalypse. Deputies learned that recently the Jamesons started going to this
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Seventh-day Adventist Church, and a month before they disappeared, they'd apparently reached out to the pastor
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asking for help with a really concerning problem. [music] He said Sherilyn told him that Madison
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was speaking to two children, and then Sherilyn's sister Marla, who had died 2 years earlier.
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And Bobby told the pastor that he was looking for some kind of like special bullets to kill demons, and he was
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reading a Satanic Bible to learn how to get rid of spirits. So, is [music] is Bobby like humoring Sherilyn, or is he
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like all in on on believing this? >> It seems like he really believes it. Because as easy as it would be to write
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this all off as just like nonsense from someone who is off their meds, there are
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some weird things that I have to tell you. So, we talked to Sherilyn's friend Nikki. I I mentioned that earlier. And
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she says that they told her about the spirits, too. And she says that she definitely believed that the Jamesons'
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house was haunted, because every time she visited them over the summer of 2008, there was just this heaviness in the
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house that she said made her sick to her stomach. And there was one moment in particular that really freaked her out.
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Nikki says that she and her husband were sitting with Sherilyn in the Jamesons' living room,
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and Nikki could see this like huge gray mist floating down the stairs slowly. And she said literally the hairs on the
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back of her neck stood straight up, and then she just watched it until it disappeared near the bottom of the
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stairs. I'm sorry, like paging Russia and Eva, like did this just turn into a so
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supernatural? >> like, what? >> I don't know. And I Listen, I know people will roll their eyes, whatever.
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This is These are people's own experiences. But it's really hard to write off the next thing, which
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brings me all the way up to October 8th, the day that the family goes missing. Police docs show that Bobby called the
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realtor, whose name is Peggy, to ask about the land for sale at around 8:00 a.m.
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>> Mhm. Per a written statement from her, Bobby told her that they were really interested in living off the grid. They
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spoke for like 2 hours, and in this conversation he talked about Madison and how smart she was and how he was excited
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to home-school her, and he assured Peggy that he knew what they were getting into.
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And she said that he sounded excited, but nothing really jumped out at her. It was like many of the conversations she
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had with people about selling land. So, that call ends at 10:00 a.m. At 10:30, things get weird.
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The Jamesons had a surveillance system set up around their home. And when police pulled the footage from that
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morning, it shows the family loading up their truck from like [music] 10:30 to 11:00.
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Except they're not really loading much. It's like the most eerie thing, Brett. Now, there were only clips of this video
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that live online today. As far as I could tell, the full video that captured like multiple angles during this time
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has never been released. And when we tried to FOIA them, we were told that the original no longer exists
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because apparently a flood at the department where it was stored ruined it. But in the little bit that was released
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to the media and that has survived, you can see Bobby and Sherilyn walking back and forth [music] to the
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truck over and over and over. But no one can figure out why. Like the truck doors appear to be open, but it's
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not like they're loading it up. Most of the time they're walking back and forth with nothing in their hands.
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Though at one point, authorities say that they see Sherilyn take what looks like a brown briefcase type thing, like
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a bag to the pickup truck. Now, I don't see a clear moment of that in the short clips we have.
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If it is included in what we're looking at, I'm thinking it might be right here at this moment. You can kind of see like
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I don't know if you see that, like a shadow, right? Like on the side of Sherilyn by like by her legs.
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>> Yeah. But the footage just like isn't great quality. So like it's it's really hard
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to tell. Now this video has become hugely sensationalized because this idea has kind of gotten perpetuated that the
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way they were walking was like they were in a trance. Which makes for good TV when you've got
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talk of witches and demon killing bullets. But I'm a little reluctant to go all in
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on that based on what I've seen. >> I mean yeah, I mean I can hardly tell anything from this like kind of really
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short loop of footage. Right. And I don't know what's been manipulated or cut. >> Right. Or even if like these are like
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consecutive. >> Right. We can't even see timestamps. So I don't know what to make of it. But,
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what I know is that after a full half hour of this, that's when they set off to make the about 1-hour drive to the
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coordinates that they've been given. But, they make a few stops first to go look at some other land, which suggests
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to me that this idea of buying the land and the reason they're going up there isn't some ruse.
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>> Right, like it's a legit. Even more evidence of that is the fact that on their way up the mountain, they stopped
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at the home of this guy named Dan Clemmons. He lived on the mountain just a quarter of a mile from where the
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Jamesons' truck would be found. And in Dan's written statement, he said that he talked to the family for like 45 minutes
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before they headed up to the property. He was like telling them, you know, about what
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it's like to live up there, whatever. >> land type stuff. >> Yeah, and he told them to stop by on
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their way out, but he says they just >> [music] >> never did. Now, we know they arrive at the 40-acre
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property at 2:15. 2:51, that photograph of Madison was taken. And then poof, the entire family is just
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>> [music] >> gone. All of their stuff just left behind. Well, all their stuff that is, except
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one thing. [music] The brown bag that authorities say Sherilyn was seen carrying to the truck
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in the surveillance footage is not [music] found. I mean, do they know what was or
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what might have been in it? No, that's like that's the question. And [music] no one is ever going to know
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for sure because spoiler alert, to this day, that bag has never been found. But,
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Sheriff Beecham told the Oklahoman back in the day that he thinks the bag could have had money in it. Now, how much and
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what was the money for? >> Mhm. This is where we can spiral. Remember how there was like almost $32,000 under
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the seat like when the car was found? Yeah, cuz that's like a lot of cash. Right, so like that's the kind of thing
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that will make you think that this isn't something involving foul play, like at the hands of a stranger, right? Because
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like who is going to kill an entire family and not take the $32,000 in cash. >> Right. Well, now Sheriff Beachum
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wouldn't return our calls, but I did catch a recent interview that he did on a podcast called I Don't Drink Coffee,
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where he dives into his theory a little bit. So, remember the lawsuit that Bobby
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filed after he was hurt in the car accident? >> Yeah. So, Bobby's mom, Star, apparently
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told investigators that he got a $64,000 settlement for that, and that he and Sherilyn split it down the middle. So,
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$32,000 each. >> Correct. So, the theory that kind of gets floated is that maybe someone did
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make away with $32,000 or something around there. >> In the purse or the bag? >> They just didn't know that there was a
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whole second bag of money kind of hidden away in the truck. >> Mhm. Now, the only issue I have with that
00:22:01
though is that is a lot of cash to just be sitting on from 2007 when that lawsuit settled to October of 2009,
00:22:10
especially if there really were all these substance use problems. Not that it can't be done, but I don't know,
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they're having financial troubles, yet they're like just sitting on >> like cash.
00:22:21
>> For how long, Leah? Just it's weird to me. Yeah. Now, others have speculated that maybe it was drugs that was in the
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brown briefcase. [music] And that's usually from the camp of people who see the surveillance footage, and they don't
00:22:33
think that they're in a trance, but rather they think they may be drugged out, which is what a psychologist at the
00:22:38
sheriff's office brought in believed and told them. Which is just as, if not more, plausible. [music] I mean, you
00:22:45
think about it, like how this all played out. There's a half an hour between when
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Bobby gets off the phone with Peggy and then when he is seen on the camera. And I say that because like she doesn't make
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any indication that he is speaking strangely, that he's sounding intoxicated. >> Right, like it's a very normal
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conversation with her with like a possible buyer. >> saying if he if you're going to say then
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like a half hour later he's like in a trance or so drugged out that he's acting weird. Like there's a short
00:23:10
window of time where like something might have happened like after he got off the phone with Right, there's like
00:23:15
this gap. >> Right, and he could have taken something. So like she doesn't know what
00:23:20
he's like high or not, right? Like >> Right, for sure. Like I mean, he could have been high functioning. I think the
00:23:26
thing that I take issue with is there's to me a big difference between having an
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hours-long conversation with someone and like I said and then behaving in a way that some people would characterize it
00:23:35
as being in a trance, right? Like there has to be like something that happened. >> be a shift between those two times.
00:23:41
>> Right. Ghosts, is it drugs? Otherwise like whatever, which makes me go back to
00:23:46
questioning even the basis of this. Like that video. Again, I'm not seeing weird movements or
00:23:55
actions from the short clips that we have. I like I'm kind of taking law enforcement at their word here that the
00:24:01
way they were moving was super weird. If there is a a world where their movements
00:24:06
over the full video weren't all that weird and and this is something that has just gotten blown up over the years,
00:24:11
then they might have been in perfectly fine condition and then nothing weird happened after the call with the
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realtor. They were just >> [music] >> getting ready to leave. And I like to say like getting ready to leave with
00:24:21
like a small child Yes. >> which is not the easiest, most clear-cut, direct thing to ever do.
00:24:26
Totally fair, but but but usually if I've got if I'm thinking about like the stuff that like holds me up with Joe,
00:24:32
it's like I'm It's stuff. It's >> It is. It's the stuff. It's the it's the not having stuff that I think is
00:24:37
>> is the weirdest part of it. >> Odd, yeah. But if we are talking drugs in Oklahoma in 2009, meth is what
00:24:45
everyone was concerned about. Use and production was rising at the time and locals actually told us that the
00:24:52
northern part of these mountains in particular are known for illegal activity like drugs and dumping. So,
00:24:59
weird behavior, large amounts of cash, for a moment even the police think maybe this whole property sale thing was a
00:25:07
ruse and they were really going up the mountain to make some kind of drug deal. But, authorities debunk this one pretty
00:25:14
quickly because they don't find any illegal drugs in the Jamesons' house or their truck.
00:25:21
And they're not finding any evidence that Bobby or Sherilyn were illegal drug dealers or users. It seems like
00:25:26
everything that they were on was prescription. Though I will say Bobby's uncle Jack told us that he thought Bobby
00:25:34
was using something other than painkillers. But, not enough for their home or truck
00:25:40
to show signs of that. >> Right. So, I don't think that it was drugs in Sherilyn's bag.
00:25:47
Now, the only other thing that might have been in the bag, the only other thing that has never been found,
00:25:53
>> [music] >> is a .22 caliber gun that Sherilyn owned. Like drugs or money, we can't confirm
00:26:01
that she took it up the mountain with her that day. We just know that it is totally MIA.
00:26:06
It wasn't in the home when they searched it, and it wasn't in the truck. So, was it money? Was it a gun? Was it some
00:26:13
combination of things in that bag? I don't know. But, knowing everything you do now, you
00:26:20
might see why many in the public start honing in on a theory >> [music] >> that it was actually Sherilyn, off her
00:26:27
meds, having recently been suicidal, that picked out this plot of land, wrote a scathing letter to her husband that
00:26:35
she read all the way up there, and then once they got to the right place, she enacted some kind of murder-suicide
00:26:42
plot. Okay, but then where are they? That's the big hole, right? Why can't anyone find them after weeks [music] and
00:26:52
then months of searching. Well, and it doesn't make sense to me at least why you'd leave your dog locked in the car.
00:26:59
Like that's a prolonged death sentence for the pup. Like Yeah. Not to get graphic, but if the dog was shot, like
00:27:06
that's one thing. Like that's like everybody then. No, I know exactly what you mean. Like let the dog run free.
00:27:10
Leave the dog at home. Or like do a million other things, but this seems like the cruelest thing.
00:27:15
>> Yeah. And everyone who talked about the family said that Madison loved that dog.
00:27:20
Like she would not have gone anywhere without it. So it's just like another part that does not add up.
00:27:26
>> Yeah. Other things that don't add up to me are like the key being in the ignition and almost all of their things
00:27:32
being back in the car. Like if she wanted to take her family out to the wilderness and end things,
00:27:39
then why wouldn't the phone still be with them? Like why not the keys? They went back to the truck. They had to have
00:27:46
gotten in and then turned around so they were ready to go down this one-lane mountain road.
00:27:53
Then something happened to them. Like that like it doesn't fit for me. >> Well, that's assuming this was a
00:28:00
murder-suicide. Like what if that briefcase she had had the gun, had the money, and she was going to disappear.
00:28:09
Well, that would have been a plausible theory. I mean really for either Sherilyn or
00:28:14
Bobby. But that stops being a plausible theory in 2013. Because that's when the entire family is
00:28:23
actually found. Not too far from where their abandoned truck stood four years earlier.
00:28:33
On November 16th, 2013, this is four years after the Jamesons disappeared, a man named Tim Graham is with his wife
00:28:42
and family on their annual hunting trip to the mountain. They're just looking for signs of deer when Tim sees
00:28:47
something strange in the brush about like 50 yards away from a gravel road. He looks [music] like a turtle shell at
00:28:55
first. I mean it's weathered, discolored, and a little stuck to the ground. But when he picks it up, he realizes
00:29:02
that it is a skull. And there is a small hole near the forehead. Now Tim immediately puts it down and
00:29:09
yells to his wife, but then he sees another one like a slightly smaller one. And then as the family is trying to get
00:29:16
out of there and to go tell someone what they found, Tim's wife spots a >> [music]
00:29:20
>> third really small skull with two front teeth missing. And her mind immediately goes to the Jamisons
00:29:28
because she remembers seeing missing persons posters for the family. Madison's toothless grin is seared in
00:29:35
her brain. And in that moment, she says to her husband, "Oh my goodness, I believe we
00:29:41
just found that family that was missing." And she was right. Now there wasn't much
00:29:46
left out there, just an arm and a leg bone, a left boot, scraps of another boot, and a child shoe, but nothing
00:29:53
else. No briefcase, no gun, and after about 7 months of analysis in June 2014, they're able to
00:30:03
confirm that they found the entire family just 2.6 miles from where their truck was found.
00:30:11
Like 2.6 like 2 and 1/2 miles away. That's it. Which like I know this sounds like nothing to us like flat-landed folk
00:30:19
who like live in the Midwest. >> 5 miles for ages. Fields and fields, but Beecham said that to go from where their
00:30:26
truck was found to where their skulls were recovered, like as the crow flies, it would take like a half day for
00:30:32
someone who is in great shape to hike, which makes this location all the more strange because Bobby was not in great
00:30:40
shape. He had chronic back pain. And I >> don't know if you've tried hiking with a
00:30:44
6-year-old recently, but like in this area that would slow you way down. Most people don't think there is any way that
00:30:51
they got to that location on their own. And [music] this completely nixes the murder-suicide theory. Like it has to be
00:30:58
foul play. But for some reason, it like it doesn't for some people, right? So like
00:31:05
let's talk theories like and what works and what doesn't [music] work. So first,
00:31:09
the murder-suicide theory. People still point to Sherilyn's mental instability and like that hate letter is
00:31:16
what they call it, the one that was in the truck, as proof that she killed her family and herself. Okay, but if they
00:31:22
never found a gun and they can't determine a cause of death, that seems like it takes away all of the elements
00:31:28
that you need to make murder-suicide work. If it was a gun that was used and if they were shot in the head.
00:31:36
>> wasn't there a hole in Bobby's head? Well, yeah, but they officially say that
00:31:40
that hole is from animal activity. But like I'm with you like you could have been shot in like the fleshy parts of
00:31:45
your body that like you wouldn't see from the few pieces that they were able to collect, but even then like you
00:31:50
should see bullet fragments and [music] a gun >> left behind. But I mean, kind of going
00:31:55
back to what like if a gun was used, right? Like that's not the only way it could have gone down. Yes and no. Like I
00:32:02
kind of disagree because like unless mom and dad were in on this together and like quite literally drinking the
00:32:08
Kool-Aid, you have to do something quick like a gun. Like I don't think you can overpower the other parent and kill
00:32:14
Madison without being stopped. You know what I mean? >> Yeah. And so much of what we know
00:32:20
doesn't make sense with this to me. Like why are the keys and the phone back in the truck? Why was the truck positioned
00:32:26
like it was going back down the mountain? Where is the brown briefcase? >> Well, and
00:32:33
I don't know. Like what if someone came across the remains or the briefcase and just
00:32:40
never reported it. Especially the briefcase. Especially if the briefcase had money in it.
00:32:43
>> in it. Yeah, I mean, I could see that for this area, but it seems more likely
00:32:47
to me that it would have been left in the truck and then someone rifled through that once they'd seen the truck
00:32:54
unoccupied for a couple of days and they just like make a quick grab for the briefcase, maybe miss the fact that
00:32:59
there's other money under the seat. But like in that case again, they're not like running off with stuff like where
00:33:03
they are where the remains are, you know what I mean? >> Right. But like whatever someone taking
00:33:07
the brown bag solves, it solves none of the other problems I have with this story. How did they get to where they
00:33:15
were? Because I don't believe that they walked. Especially if this was a plan that just one of them had. Like, "Okay,
00:33:22
can you please leave your keys in the ignition, $32,000 under the seat, and your GPS behind, and let's just like
00:33:27
take a walk into the wilderness?" Like Right. >> No, that is going to raise like all
00:33:32
sorts of alarm bells. >> 1,000%. So, theory number two, misadventure. And >> [music]
00:33:40
>> misadventure, this idea that they like somehow got stuck out there and died, it
00:33:45
doesn't work for me for all the same reasons above. Yeah. But okay, say they were high or something. They're doing
00:33:53
things that don't make sense. Actually, this is the only theory where the strange surveillance footage makes
00:34:00
>> [music] >> like even a little bit of sense or like contributes to something I think.
00:34:04
In every other scenario, that's the thing that is like always this weird outlier.
00:34:08
>> But like okay, whatever. Say you're high, you're acting weird before you even get there, you spend your time in
00:34:13
the mountains and you're about to leave and go down the mountain and you're like, "You know what? Nope. Like let's
00:34:19
just start walking into the great wide nowhere without our coats or a phone or anything else that we previously brought
00:34:25
and used with us for the first time that we're exploring this place." Because remember, they did bring their
00:34:31
Blackberry with GPS when they were walking between 2:15 and 2:50. So, like they were using their GPS before. But,
00:34:37
you know what? Let's just do it without it for the funsies. Say all that happened. Here's the thing that doesn't
00:34:41
make sense to me. I don't think they would all die and end up in the same place.
00:34:46
>> [music] >> Like, if that's the scenario. Wait. No, because they'd have to like they're all
00:34:52
their their remains are all found together at the same place, suggesting they like died at the same time in the
00:34:58
same place. And also, with this theory, I'm thinking like that means that they're high from the time that they
00:35:02
leave the house to the time they get to the mountain. We know that they go to a couple different Like wait. plots of
00:35:07
land first. They talk to a guy on the mountain for like 45 minutes before they get to their like final location.
00:35:14
It just like that that feels like it would flat like that would flag somewhere along the way, right? I would
00:35:18
think. Again, this does not add up for me. Which brings me to theory number three,
00:35:24
>> [music] >> which is foul play. This is the only theory that I think works because it's the only one where
00:35:31
most of the pieces we have fit together. The Jamesons have come to the mountain.
00:35:37
They looked around. They'd gotten back in their truck and turned around ready to go home,
00:35:43
but then they were stopped somehow. Maybe it was innocent at first, or maybe there was
00:35:48
no niceties and they were forced out of their truck with like the threat of violence. Either way, I think they get
00:35:54
out so quickly that Bobby doesn't even pull the key out of the ignition or grab his phone, and they leave their dog
00:36:00
inside the car. >> [music] >> Then, I think they're driven somewhere else and eventually killed. Which like
00:36:08
you said, this is the theory that fits the most pieces, but there's still kind of a
00:36:15
gaping hole in the theory. Like, who would know that they would be out there then? That is the key to
00:36:22
everything. But, it's a short list. So, remember, barely anyone knew that the family was
00:36:28
even gone. Like they didn't It wasn't like abnormal for them to go away for a couple of days. It's why they didn't get
00:36:33
reported missing before their truck is found. So, >> [music] >> it's not like they checked in a lot with
00:36:39
people or had anyone really keeping tabs on them. So, really there's only like two people
00:36:44
close to them that authorities look at. And then people who were up on the mountain. Now, of the two people who are
00:36:50
close to the family, there's no evidence that they actually knew where the Jamisons were headed on October 8th. But
00:36:55
those are just the two people who might have had motives. They have to look at those people. Now, the first is Bobby's
00:37:01
dad because of the lawsuit and the protective order. But by the time the Jamisons went missing, Bob's health was
00:37:07
deteriorated and he was actually living in like a nursing home or some kind of like hospice care. [music] And he was so
00:37:12
sick that he could barely take care of himself, let alone hike a mountain or hurt his son and his family. And there
00:37:19
is no evidence that he could be tied to their disappearance in any [music] way. So, authorities rule him out pretty
00:37:25
quick. And Bob actually passed away just 2 months after they all went missing in
00:37:28
December 2009. So, the second person that they look at who had a personal connection to the family was this guy
00:37:35
named Kenneth Bellows. He actually lived with the family at their lake house in Eufaula over the
00:37:41
summer. The boarding arrangement was part of his compensation for helping them with things around the house since
00:37:46
Bobby's back pain had gotten so bad that he couldn't do much. But there was a huge falling out because
00:37:52
apparently Kenneth told Sherilyn that he was a white supremacist and said that people who had Native American heritage,
00:37:59
like she did, should die. So, Sherilyn ended up shooting at him and kicking him out of the house.
00:38:06
But in the end, Kenneth ends up providing the sheriff's office with a really solid alibi. And I don't think
00:38:13
they could even prove that he knew where the family was going that day since he'd
00:38:18
been kicked out weeks before and hadn't had contact with the family since. So, both dad and [music]
00:38:25
Kenneth cleared, which means that either leaves someone else who they knew personally who just hasn't come up in
00:38:33
the investigation or someone who lived on the mountain. Whichever it is, there might be someone
00:38:41
out there who has the answer. You see, Israel Beecham has retired from the sheriff's office.
00:38:48
But in his 2020 podcast interview with the host of I don't drink coffee, he said in no uncertain terms that he
00:38:55
believes the Jamesons were murdered and he even thinks he knows who killed them.
00:39:01
He just had no way to prove it. And he said he thinks someone shot Bobby and Sherilyn and then just left Madison on
00:39:08
her own to die. >> [music] >> And when it came to why, all he would say is follow the money.
00:39:16
And that's the thing I keep coming back to. Why did they have that much money in
00:39:22
their car anyways? I mean, this wasn't like an uber wealthy couple with cash just like coming out of their ears.
00:39:28
I think it's risky to drive around with that much money. Like, you know, maybe $32,000, maybe more. That's not
00:39:36
something you do unless you're intending to use that money. Don't you think? >> say without like intention. Like to take
00:39:41
it somewhere, to deposit it, for it to change hands. >> And we know that they were going up
00:39:46
there to possibly make a purchase. So, who knew that they were coming up there to make a purchase?
00:39:55
The answer is two people. One, the realtor Peggy, and two, Dan Clements, the local
00:40:02
landowner. And there's something I didn't tell you about Dan. He actually claims to have seen the
00:40:09
family on two different days. According to his statement, the Jameson family was
00:40:15
up on the mountain the day before they got the coordinates from Peggy. Apparently, they had seen the property
00:40:21
online and they decided to just like drive up and check it out on their own. But according to him, they had trouble
00:40:27
finding it. So, they pulled up to his place, likely since he was like the nearest house to, you know, where the
00:40:34
property was. It was like a quarter mile away. And they were asking for directions, he says.
00:40:38
And he says he talked to them that time for like an hour about, you know, building off-grid, like herbal
00:40:44
medicines. And he is the one who ended up giving them Peggy's number to call the next day. He's like, "Listen, you
00:40:49
contact her, come back in the morning." Cuz it was like 6:00 p.m. by that point.
00:40:54
Like So, by the time they're done talking, it's like 7:00. It's like getting dark. He's like, "It's not even
00:40:57
safe for you to be out here exploring the mountain in the [music] dark." So, he says they leave. He says they do stop
00:41:03
by the next day at around noon, where they speak for another 45 minutes. And then the family headed up to check out
00:41:10
the land. Now, remember he told them to stop back by, but he that they never did. But he says they never did. Right.
00:41:15
Now, right away this is a little off to me because if they are talking to him, he
00:41:21
says they start talking around like noon. If they're talking to him to like 12:45, why does their GPS say that they
00:41:25
make it to the land at 2:15? Where are they for the like hour and a half in between?
00:41:32
>> Right. >> We're a quarter of a mile from where their truck is. And you know, were his times just off?
00:41:36
Like, maybe. Either way, he apparently wasn't concerned when they didn't stop back by and wasn't concerned that he
00:41:42
never heard from them again. And it's worth pointing out that if all of Dan's statements are true, like
00:41:49
this makes the murder-suicide theory even less plausible to me. Cuz like, why not do it the day before when like
00:41:56
Peggy doesn't even know you're out there, right? The realtor. Like, they're spending a lot of time talking to people
00:42:01
about buying this land. Yes. Finding the exact location. Like, you don't need any of that if you just
00:42:07
want to go to the woods. Go to the middle of nowhere for this like murder-suicide plan.
00:42:12
>> Totally. Everything about the circumstances makes me believe that they were up there to buy land. Planning for
00:42:18
their future. And on October 8th, something or someone stopped them. Now, based on Peggy's statement to police,
00:42:27
someone alerts her to the Jamesons' truck being there on the 15th. This is 2 days before this story started.
00:42:34
And I guess at the time she was like, "Oh, no biggie. Whatever. The family probably just wanted to take a second
00:42:38
look at the land. Happens all the time." So, she didn't do anything. But then, 2 days pass, and it's the 17th at 3:00
00:42:46
p.m. when Dan is first alerted to the truck being there. And he asked some questions about the
00:42:51
truck, like specific like features or whatever, and he realizes that the description sounds like the family that
00:42:57
he had talked to. So, he gets super worried then and calls Peggy. Peggy apparently tries the family. She
00:43:03
couldn't reach them. And so, he called then another neighbor to ask that neighbor to go look at the truck with
00:43:09
him. But by the time they go up there together, it's 5:30 p.m. And that's when Dan says that he first saw the abandoned
00:43:17
truck for himself. But he doesn't call police right away. He does his own search looking for the
00:43:23
family first. And Peggy is actually the one who ends up calling the deputies, who then arrive at the truck at around
00:43:31
7:30 p.m. Here's what I find odd. One, why not call the authorities yourself? Like Peggy's the one that has to do
00:43:39
that. Like the second you hear about this trapped dog and you're admitting that you're making this connection to
00:43:45
the Jamesons, like why wait? Two, I find it super weird that he wanted to wait for a friend to go look
00:43:52
at the truck with him. Like there is no context in the report for why he did this. Like
00:43:59
you know, maybe he didn't have a vehicle of any kind. Or maybe he wanted someone
00:44:03
else to find it. Right. He's like creating this distance between like himself and the truck. Like
00:44:11
>> This has me wondering like was there any way he could have been behind the first call on the 15th? Like
00:44:18
hey, there's this truck up here like trying to get someone else to get up there then? I don't see evidence of that. I
00:44:23
had literally had the same thought, but that there that call came from another landowner in the area who is named. So,
00:44:30
if he was like if there's a world where he was behind it, he would have had to get that person to call and there again,
00:44:34
like I said, there's no evidence that that happened. The thing I'll say though is like who
00:44:38
isn't named are the two people on the four-wheelers that apparently alerted him to the truck on the 17th.
00:44:43
>> Mhm. From what I have, I can't tell if police ever even identify those men, if they
00:44:47
ever talked to them to verify Dan's story. My biggest question too is about the long conversations they had. [music]
00:44:55
They talked for an hour the first day, 45 minutes the next day. So, at any point did it come up that
00:45:03
they would be traveling up there with cash? Did it come up that nobody would really
00:45:09
know where they were? >> Mhm. We couldn't reach Dan for this episode, so we couldn't ask him ourselves [music]
00:45:16
what those conversations were. And do we know was the truck ever processed for like prints or anything? Like could they
00:45:22
tell if someone else drove it? Or cuz like maybe there's a scenario where the family left on their own or
00:45:28
otherwise and someone brought the truck back to this area later. >> Yeah, so according to police doc, they
00:45:33
did process the truck, but it doesn't go into detail about what was found. So, I
00:45:37
don't know if they got anything good, I don't know if they got anything to compare to anyone, I don't know if it
00:45:41
was like all wiped down. And then based on what we have when it comes to Dan, it just says that they thoroughly
00:45:48
checked him with {quote} negative results. But we looked into Dan Clemons ourselves when we were reporting on this
00:45:54
case in late 2025 [music] and we found something pretty interesting. A man with the same name and the right age was
00:46:01
arrested in 2017 for killing a man back in 1997. Now, we haven't confirmed whether these are the same people since
00:46:10
Dan would not return our calls, but we showed Sherlyn's friend Nikki this guy's mugshot and she confirmed that that is
00:46:17
the same man she knew as Dan Clements who she had interactions with on the mountain while searching for the
00:46:22
Jamesons. >> So, this '97 homicide, like it is it similar? Do we know much about it?
00:46:27
>> know a ton. All I was able to find was that So, like you said, it happened in
00:46:32
'97 and a man named David McCloud was found shot to death at his ranch in California. Nothing is taken from the
00:46:39
house, but his killer took his truck and drove it up to San Francisco and must have fled or whatever cuz they end
00:46:47
up arresting this Dan Clements guy in Oklahoma. This is where like our story takes place, where he'd been living
00:46:54
under a fake name. And the Trinity Journal reported that Dan ultimately pled no contest of voluntary
00:47:00
manslaughter and got 3 years in prison as part of a plea deal. I mean, okay. I assume police would have known
00:47:08
about this at the time though. I would hope so if it was in fact the same Dan >> right.
00:47:16
But, it's not mentioned anywhere in the reports that we've gotten. All we see when it comes to Dan is that they
00:47:22
thoroughly checked him with negative results. >> Which like I still don't even know what
00:47:27
that means, but did they thoroughly check anyone else on the mountain? I'm sure they talked to as many people as
00:47:33
they could. Like, I don't know, I don't have a list of everyone, but I do know one person because we tracked her down.
00:47:39
Her name is Ann Marie Deuhan. And I specifically tracked her down because as we were reporting on this, I heard this
00:47:45
rumor that her and her family moved off the mountain not long after the Jamesons
00:47:50
went missing. So, people were wondering if her and her husband might have been involved. And I actually found this
00:47:56
like, you know, these are rumors now, but I found a tip in the file that someone had made about them back in
00:48:01
2010. But our reporter Shara Adams tracked Ann down and she says that deputies did question her about the
00:48:07
Jamesons' disappearance. And she just laughed in their face, she said. She says that her and her family moved
00:48:13
off the mountain in the fall of 2010 because they'd been homeschooling their children and they wanted to move the
00:48:19
kids like back down so they could go to school. Though, that's not quite how her
00:48:25
daughter remembers it. When I talked to her daughter, she told us that her parents were not good people and that
00:48:31
they moved off the mountain so abruptly that they left a bunch of their stuff. But Ann was never named as a suspect and
00:48:37
she denies having anything to do with what happened to the Jamesons. So, I'm sure there are even more stories like
00:48:42
that. I just haven't been able to track down every person who is on the mountain
00:48:47
cuz turns out living off the grid makes it kind of hard to find you. Off the grid is off the grid.
00:48:52
>> Truly. Now, if anyone on the mountain did it, I have to believe the motive was
00:48:58
money. Beecham said, "Follow the money." But to who? Like I said, he never got back to us for
00:49:05
this episode. But Bobby's uncle Jack really wants to know what more Beecham knows that he hasn't shared in all these
00:49:12
years. Maybe all the pieces are there. Maybe they're just held by different [music] people. The problem is it
00:49:20
doesn't seem like anyone is really investigating this. It's that weird catch-22 we often see where the ME
00:49:27
classified these deaths as undetermined. So, there is no homicide that is being investigated.
00:49:34
All the investigative files we have were from when this was a missing persons case.
00:49:40
Now, it's just in limbo. Meaning that if Bobby, Sherilyn, and Madison were killed by someone,
00:49:47
that someone has gotten away with murder. But it doesn't always have to be that way. So, if you know anything that could
00:49:56
change the status of this case, you can contact the Latimer County Sheriff's Office at 918
00:50:03
465-4013.