Joann Peterson

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A shotgun blast through a windshield ends the life of a dedicated father in an instant.

When I saw the carnage in this car, it reminded me of a mob-style execution.

An execution that the victim feared was coming.

He had been the target of an earlier shooting, but they didn't get him.

Whoever had done this first shooting had gotten away and had not been identified.

He knew somebody was trying to kill him.

He was wearing a bulletproof vest at the time that he was killed.

Investigators realize no witness is safe.

People were just scared that if they said anything, they would either be killed or harmed.

One detective must risk it all to expose a heartless mastermind.

She gave me instructions to meet her at the cemetery and to come along.

Worst case was that somebody was going to be waiting there to ambush me.

Authorities uncover a meticulous plot crafted by a powerful criminal.

It was fairly astounding the control she was able to exert over other people.

She was a woman that you need to be fearful of because if you crossed her, she was going to get you.

November 18th, 1991, Spokane, Washington.

It's 7 p.m.

when a frenzy of 911 calls flood into the Spokane County Sheriff's Office, reporting a shooting at the Willow Street apartments.

I was home after a full day shift on a Monday night when I got a call that I was needed to respond to a homicide scene in the Spokane Valley.

When first responders arrive, they quickly gather information from several of the witnesses who called 911.

People in the complex heard the gunshots and then, you know, immediately called police.

The person that did this then escaped right away.

They direct officers to a vehicle where they locate an unresponsive male slumped behind the steering wheel.

Deputies found him shot dead in his vehicle.

And detectives, forensics,

people were called out and started their investigation there at the scene.

The crime scene was a small apartment complex, parking lot.

There was a male in the car that was fully dressed, still seat belted into the driver's seat, and he had a massive head and face wound.

The level of carnage is shocking, even for seasoned detectives.

He'd been shot point blank, almost.

The shot had actually been through the window glass.

He had died instantly.

When I saw the carnage in this car, there was no question that he was a target that somebody was making sure that they eliminated.

It reminded me of a mob-style execution.

We'd been down a lot of homicide scenes, and we just didn't see see those in our area.

Whoever pulled the trigger left a key piece of evidence on the ground just a few feet from the car.

The person that committed the crime left the shotgun there.

The shotgun led us to initially feel that was probably the murder weapon.

It was a Winchester 12 gauge.

The only distinguishing things on it was a little chunk of wood that was broken out of the stock, and there was some type of paint rub off on the stock as well.

While technicians continue processing the crime scene, detectives question residents of the apartment complex to ID the victim.

He was identified as Peter Zion.

He was about 40 years old.

The witnesses from the apartment complex told us that he was a resident there at the apartments along with his girlfriend and that he had probably just arrived home from work when the shooting occurred.

But none of Pete's neighbors have any idea why he would have been the target of such a brutal murder.

Starting into this investigation, there was many, many background questions surrounding Pete Zion.

This was a target.

This man was wanted dead by somebody, and they made sure they got him.

Why would somebody sneak up on him in an ambush attack?

Born on June 27, 1951, Peter Zion came from modest roots.

Pete had grown up in Chihuahua, Washington.

They lived on a small farm where they had a mill.

Pete's father was a real hard-working guy that would work the fields and knew how to do just about everything around the farm.

Pete's mom was on the city council.

They were a strong base

for Pete to grow up under.

With a work ethic as strong as his parents, Pete pursued a career in a highly demanded trade.

Pete and I met at Spokane Community College while we were taking industrial electricity.

Pete was a good electrician, hard worker, friendly, outgoing, kind of almost bubbly.

At 35 years old, Pete was living in Spokane, Washington when he met someone who would change his life forever, 30-year-old Orine Goldberg.

An avid runner, she met Pete during a local road race.

Her parents, Mel Goldberg and Joanne, they had one son, that was Theale.

They had two daughters, Oreen and Merv.

They were very well known.

Orine worked for her parents at their realty office in Newport, Washington, one hour outside of Spokane.

Joanne Goldberg, as the matriarch and the main head of the family, she made the decisions.

She insisted things be done her way.

Mel was pretty easygoing and was really friendly, was a really nice guy.

Pete and Irene dated for about a year before moving in together.

Four months later, Oreen became pregnant.

They married in 1988 after the birth of their daughter and made their home in Spokane.

His eyes would just twinkle talking about this little girl.

He'd smile from ear to ear.

He thought she was just heaven on earth.

But by 1989, not everything in Pete's life was going as smoothly as fatherhood.

I think not long after that the child was born that their marriage started to go south.

He was a good father.

His daughter meant a lot to him.

He made that very clear.

And I think that he would have stayed married just for the sake of his daughter.

When their attempts to reconcile failed, Orine left with their infant daughter.

When she left and took the child, she moved up to Newport, Washington, which is about 60 miles from Spokane.

That was to her parents' residence.

Oren kind of kept a low profile and let her mother, Joanne, really handle things.

Pete began traveling to the Goldbergs on the weekends weekends to spend time with his daughter and eventually filed for divorce.

That, of course, involved a request for a visitation with his daughter and at least partial custody of his daughter.

And that

just didn't sit well with Joanne.

That's not the way that she imagined her family with the granddaughter being able to be away for any period of time.

The divorce proceedings they became a bit ugly.

Joanne had basically told Peter that there's no way you're going to get my granddaughter.

He was going through the custody battle.

He was sad, kind of depressed over the whole situation.

He wanted to get his mind in a position where he could go on with his life.

While Pete struggled struggled for access to his beloved daughter, he found solace in his work and eventually met someone new.

34-year-old Helen Eakin.

We had some discussions about her and she was a very good person, had a good, responsible job.

In the fall of 1990, about a year after his split from Maureen, Pete was starting to settle into a new life with Helen.

He was living with Helen at her apartment.

Her and Pete were waiting for the divorce to be final so they could move forward in their relationship.

He was going through a hard time going through a divorce, but he still had a good outlook on life.

But Pete's attempt at a fresh start is cut short on November 18th, 1991.

Peter is shot point-blank range with the shotgun through the window right at his head and he dies instantly.

The shotgun is dropped there at the scene.

The assailant fled.

Though the scene indicates an ambush, what investigators discover under Pete's coat swiftly calls that theory into question.

He was carrying a handgun.

Plus, he was also wearing a bulletproof vest.

It was not common for us to encounter people wearing bulletproof vests at that time.

That he had one on was quite unusual.

People told me that he was scared and he was trying to protect himself.

Coming up, detectives discover this isn't the first time the victim faced an armed assailant hell-bent on murder.

This person was chasing him, bullets hitting off brick through the alley.

he was a changed guy paranoia had said you

november 18th 1991 spokane washington investigators on the scene of pete zion's ambush style murder are working to piece together a puzzling array of clues

the crime scene essentially consisted of the car that the victim was in, his body, and the shotgun on the ground.

There really wasn't any other physical evidence.

There was no video evidence or anything else at that scene.

While there are no surveillance cameras in the area, police do find a potential witness.

At the time of the shooting, One of the tenants in the apartments, Pamela, heard the shot, ran outside, and

saw a gold or tan-colored vehicle accelerate very fast out of the parking lot onto the street.

She couldn't really say for sure the people, if there was more than one.

She just knew there was a noise and there was a car racing out of there.

Her being able to identify the car as specifically as she did was pretty helpful because a lot of witnesses aren't that good.

Officers fan out in search of the vehicle based on the description, while detectives begin tracking down Pete's loved ones.

At the time of his murder, Peter was living with his girlfriend, Helen Eaken.

Investigators immediately locate the couple's apartment within the complex to break the news.

This is typical police procedure to interview boyfriend's girlfriends, significant others.

Meeting with Helen, her reaction to Pete being dead was appropriate to someone who had just suffered a severe loss.

She was home for the evening.

She had heard the sound of the shotgun, but didn't realize what it was and fortunately hadn't gone outside.

When detectives ask Helen about the handgun and bulletproof vest found on Pete, Helen reveals some startling news.

He had also been the target of an earlier shooting where they didn't get him.

Approximately two weeks earlier was October 25th at seven o'clock in the morning.

He had gotten up for work, noticed that his tire was flat on his car.

And he drove across the street to a mini-mart.

And he went to re-inflate the tire at which time he notices somebody was standing by him and when he looked up there was a figure that had a Richard Nixon mask on.

That person was holding a revolver.

This person is completely disguised, heavy clothing and something over their face.

and they immediately fire a round at him.

He reacts by jumping up, starts running.

This person keeps chasing him, shooting rounds as they run.

This short, stocky person

was chasing him, bullets hitting off brick through the alley.

None of the rounds hit him, and the person finally leaves and out of sight.

Pete gets on the phone, calls 911, so I just got shot at.

Helen confirms that Pete filed a police report two weeks earlier.

Whoever had done this first shooting at Pete Zion

had gotten away and had not been identified.

The examination at the scene determined that there was a hole in the tire in a place that somebody had punctured the tire intentionally to let the air out.

In Pete's statement on October 25th, he offered up his own theory of who was responsible.

He told detectives that the reason why I think this happened is because I'm in a bitter child custody dispute.

Peter, you know, made it very clear that if anything happened to him, that it would be his ex-wife's family that they needed to look at.

I saw him a short time after that, and

he was a changed guy.

I mean, mean, he was, paranoia had set in on him.

He was scared to death because, back of his mind, he knew somebody was trying to kill him.

He told them that, well, from now on, I'm going to start carrying a sidearm with me and wear a bulletproof vest.

Though Pete felt confident he knew who was out to kill him, he died before investigators could substantiate his claims.

That case was still being looked into at the time the murder occurred.

Another detective handled that investigation and the issues with Pete's estranged wife, Oreen, in the child custody had been brought up, but there hadn't been any interviews conducted yet.

There wasn't really much evidence to really narrow down.

After learning of Pete's accusations towards his former in-laws, homicide detectives reach out to Pete's longtime attorney to learn more about the custody battle.

They appointed a guardian at Leitum, which is not unusual in a divorce case.

So the guardian at Leitum is there to protect the child and to give a candid opinion to the judge as to who would be the best parent.

Her report said that Orine should have custody

and that Pete would have traditional

visitation, which would include overnights on weekends.

Irene's family had sworn that he's never going to see his daughter.

Joanne could not stand to have

her granddaughter be given to Peter, her son-in-law, even on the weekend.

She decided she would take care of it.

And her way to try and take care of it is she alleged sexual abuse by Mr.

Zion on his own daughter.

Pete denied these false allegations against him.

Child Protective Services got involved.

The Spokane Police Department got involved and were conducting an investigation.

They said that there was a lack of probable cause and the clinical psychologist thought it was unusual that

she met with Oreen and that there was never any discussion about any sexual abuse with the child.

And then all of a sudden, it pops up afterwards.

So they came to the decision that there wasn't any substance to these

allegations.

With his name cleared, Pete continued to advocate for visitation.

It was coming down to a pivotal time in the divorce proceedings because the trial was forthcoming.

The final decisions were going to be made, who the child would go with, if there was going to be child support, visitation, those types of issues that surrounded the infant child.

As homicide detectives dig into the police report from the first attempt on Pete's life, one detail immediately stands out.

In that first shooting, three weeks before Pete was murdered, there was another witness in the parking lot that had seen this car leaving the scene.

It was a tan or brown colored car,

and it had fled out of the area and out of view.

They knew that there was the connection with the getaway car because of the fact that, you know, it was described as a brown car.

In the first shooting, second shooting as well.

Detectives release the witnesses' description of the vehicle to the public.

It's a shot in the dark, but you try to at least get something to start looking for.

Coming up, a flood of tips rushes in.

Witnesses came out that the same vehicle had been parked in front of their residence for a couple of weeks.

And a killer tries to silence witnesses at any cost.

She was really afraid of providing more information.

They said, you know, not for nothing, but we are extremely scared of this family.

Within a couple of weeks, their house had been set on fire.

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November 19th, 1991.

Less than 24 hours after the murder of 40-year-old Pete Zion, a bolo issued for the getaway car yields promising leads from Spokane locals.

Photos were publicly disseminated of the vehicle.

Witnesses recognized those photos and made contact with the sheriff's office.

We got called that this car was sitting out pretty much in plain view in front of this lady's house, approximately half a mile or so from where the murder occurred.

investigators respond and find a car matching the description of the getaway vehicle parked on the suburban street the vehicle was recovered abandoned in front of a residential house the license plates had been altered to make them not identifiable immediately

The altered plates raise the level of suspicion.

Inside the unlocked Chevrolet, investigators find the VIN and run it through their database.

Turned out the car had been stolen a couple three weeks prior to all this from an area northwokamp, probably 10 miles from where the murder occurred.

And because of that, we were able to seize this evidence.

We still hadn't necessarily confirmed it as the murder vehicle, but we did take a picture of it back to Pamela at the apartment complexes.

She even identified that car in the picture as the same one she had seen leaving the scene of the murder.

While crime scene techs sweep the car for evidence, investigators interview Pete's estranged wife, Oreen, and her parents, Mel and Joanne, on November 19th.

Police suspected the family members because of all of just the rancor and the animosity that had come up from the divorce proceedings.

Mel, Joanne, and Areen said that they would be willing to sit down and answer any of our questions, but only as a group

and that that was the only way they would do it.

The family offers alibis for the night of Pete's murder.

The family told investigators that they were at a family dinner.

Joanna Mel's daughter and son-in-law, Merv and Greg, alibied them for that late afternoon, early evening.

The family had shown up sometime in the afternoon and stayed for dinner.

So from five o'clock to nine o'clock, they were at Greg and Merv's house.

The family members all had strong alibis and police couldn't connect the family to the first shooting or the second shooting.

With nothing to hold the Goldberg family on, investigators let them go.

We could not say who actually pulled the triggers.

And detectives hit another dead end when the search of the suspected getaway vehicle yields no results.

We were feeling pretty confident we had the right car, but we didn't have anything in the car immediately to identify anybody that had used it.

Without any physical evidence and no new leads to follow, the investigation begins to stall in 1992.

It wasn't progressing much, and I had other cases I was working on, but I would make callbacks.

often to everybody that we had talked to before to develop further information, but it was moving slowly.

It really goes cold when there's not other tips or new information coming in to act upon.

In late November of 1993, Newport residents Bob Lamb and Marcy Harrington reach out to the Spokane County Sheriff's Office with information that could break the case wide open.

Bob and Marcy Harrington were neighbors of the Goldbergs property up in the Newport area.

They said they were the owner of the shotgun that wasn't used in this murder.

Of course, that got my attention immediately.

Detectives are curious.

After all, they've never released a description of the murder weapon to the public.

Bob Lamb identified the shotgun specifically with the particulars about the damage to the woodstock and the paint rub off.

They had it stored kind of in a off the hallway up against behind a door.

One day, Oreen's brother, Theil Goldberg, had showed up.

He picked it up and walked out with it.

It wasn't unusual because Theo Goldberg was known to borrow their stuff often.

But after Pete's murder, they say Theo started acting strange.

He went back to the neighbor and attempted to buy the weapon from them, explaining that he couldn't return it.

Investigators ask Bob and Marcy why it took them so long to contact police, and they confess their guilt has finally outweighed their fear.

They said, you know, not for nothing, but we are extremely scared of this family.

And we didn't come forward to cooperate originally with any information because because of our extreme fear of them.

After speaking with Bob and Marcy, it quickly becomes clear that the couple had a good reason to be afraid.

Within a couple of weeks, Bob and Marcy's house burned down.

We were pretty convinced that it had been set on fire.

And it was because the conversations about them being witnesses where they might be asked to testify.

Despite the assertions, nothing links the Goldberg family to the fire.

And of course, as a result, Mr.

Lamb decided they no longer wanted to cooperate out of fear of what might happen to them.

After the fire, Pete's case stagnates yet again, leaving investigators frustrated.

Someone is making sure that no one's going to talk because they're going to be fearful for their life.

So without any hard evidence whatsoever, the police are just stuck.

This case languishes for several years.

There is no break in the case whatsoever.

Then, in 1999, eight years after Pete's murder, investigators get a big break.

I got a call at my my office from a lady who was real mysterious

and

she wanted to talk about the Pete Zion murder.

She knew somebody who had told her they had committed this murder.

She was pretty reluctant.

She mentioned being fearful.

Let's call her after quite a bit of convincing.

Finally said, I'll tell you my first name, which she did.

It was Shirley.

Shirley agrees to meet Detective Henderson but only under certain conditions she said well you come and meet me and it's gonna be in the cemetery outside of town she said if I see anybody else or any police cars around she says I'm gone and you won't have to talk to me again

coming up To solve the case, Detective Henderson puts his life on the line.

The worst case that came to mind was that somebody was there to either ambush me or was going to come in with guns of Blarin.

July 1999.

It's been eight years since Pete Zion's brutal murder.

Detective Mark Henderson is heading to a cemetery in northern Idaho to meet a potential witness alone.

I did not think it was a smart idea, but I think it was a calculated risk that I felt after years of chasing this case, this may be the golden key.

Kind of was on alert until this pickup shows up and I meet this lady and she starts telling me some details about the murder case.

She mentioned where the car had been stashed and gave the information on the gun.

She knows about this murder better than I do.

Either she did it or she's talking to the person that did it.

When Detective Henderson asks Shirley who her source is, she brings a longtime suspect back into the spotlight, her new friend, Joanne.

Joanne and Mel Goldberg, her husband, got a divorce relatively quickly after Pete's death.

And Joanne resettled up in Idaho.

Formerly Joanne Goldberg, Shirley's neighbor since 1998, now goes by her maiden name, Peterson.

Shirley says over the past year, the two women became fast friends.

But things took a turn recently when Joanne began divulging a dark secret.

Joanne started to open up about her life and things she had done.

And she started started talking about the murder of Peter Zion

and admitted that she was the mastermind behind it all.

Not only Shirley now have statements from her, but Joanne offers to take her to Spokane for lunch.

And after they're done with lunch, Joanne drives her a short distance away into this parking lot of this apartment complex,

stops, points at a slot, and says, that's where Pete got shot and killed that.

It was very detailed statement made by Shirley.

She's got her pointing out the crime scene and describing it to her, to a T, basically.

Shirley's statement is shocking, but detectives need to corroborate her story before they can bring Joanne in.

Then, a little over a month later, they get an unexpected visit from her son, Theo, and her daughter, Merv.

Theo and his sister decide that

they gotta talk.

So they go to the police and tell them what had happened to Peter Zion and that their mother had killed him.

The two then provide detectives with details about the night of November 18th, 1991.

The night of the murder, Merv and her husband get a phone call from Joanne, who says they're in Spokane at a store and they're heading towards Merv's house.

This is probably 7.30-ish in the evening, and they said, Well, why?

They were going to demand that Merv alibi them for that late afternoon, early evening.

But Theo Goldberg admits to a much bigger role in the murder.

Theo was the one who got a hold of the weapon that ultimately was used to kill Peter Zion.

He got the shotgun from the neighbors and then took it to his mother.

Thee confirms that in addition to the murder, his parents were involved in the first ambush on Pete.

Theo confirmed Joanne was the trigger person

and that all of them had been part of the planning, including Oreen.

Detectives ask why the siblings have decided to come forward now after all these years.

They became convinced that Joanne was going off the deep end and she was coming after them

and Mel.

Joanne had started making some threats towards Mel

and Theo was getting real concerned about being around her, and he was essentially getting scared of her.

I think keeping this family secret for so long was weighing on Theo.

He was just so overcome with that guilt.

And I think with finally deciding he didn't want to be controlled like he was being controlled by his mother that he finally decided to come forward.

Theo says Irene continued to raise her daughter and the family intended to insulate her from any trouble.

But things haven't worked out as planned.

Orine at the time was suffering from brain cancer and she was at high risk of, you know, of that ending her life.

In late October 1999, officers move in on Joanne Peterson.

We took Joanne into custody on the federal weapons charge on that date.

When news of Joanne's arrest spreads, her ex-husband Mel Goldberg surrenders to police.

He basically opened up and said, yeah, I did this.

She did it.

And I was involved.

I was the getaway driver.

Mel agrees to tell detectives exactly what happened the night of the murder.

He filled in the blanks.

blanks.

Mel and Joanne were waiting to see Pete pull in his parking lot.

They had a place where they could watch him from discreetly.

After Mr.

Zion had backed his car in, Mel drove up to Mr.

Zion's vehicle.

Miss Peterson got out of the passenger side of the vehicle with the shotgun.

Mel tells police Joanne wanted to make sure that Peter would know

that she was the one that was going to kill him.

And she looked him right in the eye and then pulled the trigger.

After she had discharged firearm into Mr.

Zion, killing him, she dropped the shotgun.

I don't think that shotgun was meant to be left behind.

I think she shot that gun and it surprised the hell out of

Coming up, the case seems like a surefire win for prosecutors.

At this point, really, the case is going to be a slam dunk.

But the defendants have other plans.

We expect him to plead guilty because he fully confessed, but he didn't.

Following detailed confessions from Joanne Peterson's estranged family, police file an array of charges in the murder of Pete Zion.

Both Mr.

Goldberg and Joanne Peterson were charged with aggravated first-degree murder.

And Theo was charged with first-degree murder because he had obtained the shotgun knowing what it would be used for.

Despite suspicions of her involvement, Pete's ex-wife Oreen continues to evade the law.

Orine, at the time of the prosecution, was suffering from brain cancer.

It wasn't a slam-dunk case against her, and the elected prosecutor ultimately made the decision that she would not be charged for those reasons.

In January 2000, Thele Goldberg cements his fate.

Thele pled guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree murder.

Of course, that was a negotiated plea.

He got the benefit of the fact that he came forward and broke this case.

Theo Goldberg received a fairly lenient sentence for his cooperation, and he agreed to testify in trial against his parents.

At this point, really, the case is going to be a slam dunk.

We expected Mel to plead guilty because he fully confessed, but he didn't.

When the time comes for Mel Goldberg to submit his plea, his decision is a shock to prosecutors.

He decided I'm going to trial.

Mel Goldberg was scared to death of Johann Peterson, and he would have done whatever she requested him to do during the time they were married.

But prosecutors argue he is far from innocent.

It was very clear to us as prosecutors that he was highly involved in the planning.

And he was actively involved, of course, in covering up the murder after it occurred.

Mr.

Goldberg was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

As prosecutors prepare for Joanne's trial, they work to pin down her motive.

Joanne's a person who was just totally self-involved and controlling and wanted to control every part of her own life.

And so that extended to her family.

And she just could not envision having her granddaughter leaving her family to visit even with her own biological father.

She decided to commit this murder so that he would not get visitation in this custody case.

Prosecutors are ready to argue their case in December of 2000, but suddenly they get word Joanne has changed her mind.

Joanne turns around and pleads guilty to the murder charges.

Completely surprised me and all of us.

There was no way that she was going to plead guilty.

Joanne was the talker and the person who loved bragging about stuff.

It's like, didn't see that coming.

Joanne decided to plead guilty to first-degree murder.

I'm sure that Joanne Peterson's attorney advised her that she was at high risk of getting an aggravated murder conviction, in which case she would have gotten a sentence of life in prison she would have never gotten out.

However, the impact of Joanne's manipulation will not soon be forgotten.

Pete was always a good father, very caring, loved his daughter dearly.

Not only were her grandparents in prison, her mom dies and her dad's dead, this poor girl just ended up with no family.

She never did get a chance to know her father's family and that was a real shame.

People had great respect for Pete.

Pete was just a wonderful person.

He was always happy in a good mood.

He was a hard worker.

He was friendly.

It was hard to find fault with people.

Neil Goldberg was released from prison in 2004 after serving three years of his four-year sentence.

Oren Goldberg died of brain cancer in 2005 when her daughter was 18 years old.

Mel Goldberg died in prison in April of 2020.

Two months later, Joanne Peterson died while serving her life sentence at Washington State Prison.

Prison.

Hi, I'm Denise Chan, host of Scam Factory.

You might remember hearing about our investigative series that exposed what's really happening behind those suspicious texts you get.

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