16 | The Woman in Florida

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Speaker 9 I know there's going to be a twist, wasn't there? A massive twist. At every level of the criminal justice system, there's been a cover-up in this case.

Speaker 8 I'm Heidi Blake. Blood Relatives is a new series from In the Dark and the New Yorker.
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Speaker 2 Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun is intended for mature audiences and may include topics that can be upsetting, such as emotional, physical, and sexual violence, rape, and murder.

Speaker 2 The names of survivors have been changed for anonymity purposes. Testimony shared by guests of the show is their own and does not reflect the views of Tenderfoot TV or Odyssey.

Speaker 2 Thank you so much for listening.

Speaker 10 Alright, this will be an interview between Andy Clamser and Jake. Is it Stettin Benz?

Speaker 11 Yes, sir.

Speaker 10 Did you have friends over to the house on Friday or Saturday night?

Speaker 12 I didn't have friends Friday, and

Speaker 12 I most definitely didn't have friends the next night.

Speaker 10 Were you aware of him going to the beach with Chrissy on Saturday?

Speaker 11 Saturday? Yep.

Speaker 12 No.

Speaker 13 He probably would have left like around noon.

Speaker 10 Okay, hold on.

Speaker 1 Let me...

Speaker 12 Okay, so he went missing Sunday afternoon, right?

Speaker 10 Sounds like it, because it sounds like you were the last person to see him.

Speaker 12 Okay, so I was confusing myself. I went bridge jumping Saturday evening.

Speaker 10 Do you remember what you were doing on Friday evening?

Speaker 12 No, I do not.

Speaker 10 Do you remember if Joseph's truck was at the house when you got home Saturday night?

Speaker 12 No, I don't.

Speaker 10 Did you just get dropped off? Yeah.

Speaker 10 Do you remember seeing the pickup that he was using at the house on Sunday?

Speaker 10 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 12 In the stressless summer, There might have been some confusion if you've talked to the state troopers before.

Speaker 12 They first asked me what I did that Saturday night, and I couldn't remember to save my life.

Speaker 12 And so, on the spot, I've never talked to the state troopers like this about a missing person.

Speaker 12 So, I made a dumb move and made up the story.

Speaker 1 To me, it seems like either you're lying now or you were lying then. It doesn't sound like you're being 100% truthful with me.

Speaker 10 But what did you tell the troopers that wasn't true?

Speaker 12 That I went down

Speaker 12 down the Tyler Road to a different bridge. They went straight to my friends and they got a different story.

Speaker 11 It didn't make me look good and swear I was lying to them.

Speaker 12 And then they came back to me after all the question. It doesn't match up with your story.
What were you really doing?

Speaker 10 And what did you say at that point?

Speaker 1 When you guys came back, where did you go? Did Tyler drop you off somewhere?

Speaker 1 somewhere.

Speaker 1 He dropped you off, and then you say you made it home at midnight: 30. So, what was the rest of it, brother? What did you do the rest of the night?

Speaker 1 It doesn't sound like you're being 100% truthful with me. We got four or five hours in the evening that I'd love to know what you did.
I mean,

Speaker 12 what happened after you guys went and Tyler dropped you off?

Speaker 1 That's the question.

Speaker 1 Man, honestly, I'm not just gonna play video games.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 10 So, what did you do Saturday night when you got back to Nome from bridge jumping?

Speaker 13 I want to say, more than likely, I probably just went to bed.

Speaker 6 From Tenderfoot TV in Atlanta, this is Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun, chapter 2. I'm your host, Payne Lindsay.

Speaker 6 The timeline for that weekend is covered with holes. After midnight Friday, something bad happened to Joseph.
And from that point forward, nothing makes sense anymore.

Speaker 6 Joseph texted his fiancée Saturday morning, but she feels like it wasn't really him. An unexplained 27-minute phone call with Christine.
Was he really at the beach with her?

Speaker 6 Jake does not remember that, but he does remember seeing Joseph in the hallway Sunday at 1 p.m.

Speaker 10 What are your sort of gut instincts about what probably happened to him?

Speaker 9 I think something bad happened to him.

Speaker 12 My mom said when they were searching for him, there was 30 plus bears in that area.

Speaker 9 I think a bear might have gotten to him.

Speaker 6 I talked to Joseph's sister, who was a part of every search, and she saw zero bears.

Speaker 12 I wish I could help you guys. I'm with you in the same boat.
I just want to find them. I just want to know what happened.

Speaker 10 You remember about when you got home after being out bridge jumping?

Speaker 12 I'm gonna be honest with you, I really don't remember what time.

Speaker 10 Okay.

Speaker 6 What does Jake remember exactly about anything?

Speaker 15 And who were you with?

Speaker 12 My friend Tyler and my friend Emery.

Speaker 6 Okay, Tyler and Emery. Maybe they can help.

Speaker 11 Here, Tyler? Yes.

Speaker 13 Yo, I'm Andy Clamser. It's nice to meet you.

Speaker 10 Since Jake had difficulty remembering events from Saturday or Saturday night, was he messed up that day? Was he like drinking or?

Speaker 14 I don't think he was drinking. Like I said, we went out bridge jumping every weekend, so I mean summertime, it's nice.

Speaker 10 saw him jump in the water off the bridge.

Speaker 15 Right.

Speaker 10 So, I mean, did you think it was unusual that Jake was trying to get people to say they were with him Saturday night?

Speaker 14 No, he wasn't doing that.

Speaker 6 No, he was because we have the text he sent you guys about that.

Speaker 14 I'm going to tell you the same thing I told the trooper. Jake didn't know what he was doing.

Speaker 14 Being stupid and he had to come up with a story or something because I don't know. I guess he just just wanted a trooper out of his way or something.

Speaker 10 Did you pick up Jake and Emory on Saturday?

Speaker 14 I think so.

Speaker 10 So what did you do after getting back to Nome on Saturday night at like about 1030?

Speaker 14 I got at Jake's, played some games.

Speaker 6 So Tyler takes Emery and Jake bridge jumping Saturday. Conflicting times and locations, but putting that aside, Tyler ends up back at Jake's house playing video games that night.

Speaker 14 When we start playing video games, we play for a couple hours or so.

Speaker 10 How long do you think you were at Jake Saturday night?

Speaker 14 I don't know. I didn't have my timer on.

Speaker 6 Is he a train conductor from the 1920s? What timer?

Speaker 14 We're wasting your time, you're wasting our time, and we got no beneficial stuff for you.

Speaker 6 Oh, he must have brought his pocket watch this time.

Speaker 12 What happened after you guys went entirely dropped you off?

Speaker 12 Man, honestly,

Speaker 12 he was playing players.

Speaker 6 Jake says he was playing video games Saturday night too.

Speaker 15 And who were you with?

Speaker 12 And my friend Tyler and my friend Emery.

Speaker 6 Jake and Tyler are playing video games past midnight. So what's up with Emery?

Speaker 10 All right, this will be an interview between Andy Klamser and Emery Bushu. We're at the Aurora Inn conference room.
It's the 1st of October 2016. The time now is about 2.21 p.m.

Speaker 6 Andy interviewed Emery.

Speaker 10 So we're trying to get better information on what was going on the weekend of June 25th. That's the weekend that Mr.

Speaker 10 Balderos went missing and that would be the weekend that the troopers asked you about at some point.

Speaker 13 Do you remember

Speaker 10 what you were doing on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of that weekend? This is exactly what I told the troopers. I

Speaker 13 have no memory of that day. I mean

Speaker 13 we obviously

Speaker 11 what I was What I believe is we went out to Sinook. I don't remember the exact day, so I can't really

Speaker 14 put anything in there for you.

Speaker 11 Okay.

Speaker 10 And this is to go bridge jumpy, right? Yeah.

Speaker 10 You think that would have been Friday or Saturday?

Speaker 11 Your guess is as good as mine. Okay.

Speaker 10 Do you remember if you went bridge jumping

Speaker 10 like two days or two nights in a row, like Friday and Saturday, both?

Speaker 11 I wouldn't be surprised.

Speaker 10 It sounds like you guys would go out and do this a lot in the summer, right? And so it'd be hard to distinguish

Speaker 10 from another.

Speaker 11 Oh, just a blur.

Speaker 10 Right.

Speaker 6 Just a blur. How are we to believe anything they say?

Speaker 10 Do you still have any of the text messages on your phone? There was this whole confusing thing where Jake was, you know, trying to.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 11 he, so here's what he said happened. He said

Speaker 10 they asked him what happened that day, and he...

Speaker 11 He's like, I couldn't remember, so I just made something up, and

Speaker 10 I told him we went out on this route.

Speaker 10 He's like,

Speaker 16 why did you lie it's the worst thing you could do but yeah he what did he say what did he say to uh he Jake yeah yeah

Speaker 10 what did he say like in the description when you told him no I mean when you guys when you were talking about told him it was like the worst thing you could do we were just dogging on him we're telling him you're stupid you're an idiot just giving him a bunch of crap so anyway do you still have any of the text messages from way back then?

Speaker 11 I'd have to scroll a lot, but

Speaker 11 I could find it right now if you wanted me to, but I'd be scrolling for

Speaker 10 but let's see, that's because otherwise at some point it's gonna get lost, so let's just see if you can find him.

Speaker 6 Emery eventually does find them.

Speaker 13 Can I just take a picture of him?

Speaker 6 Andy took pictures of Emery's phone and the conversation he had with Jake. It goes like this.
Jake, Emery, I had to use you and Tyler in a story for the state trooper. Emery.
What did you say? Jake.

Speaker 6 That us three took a drive to Solomon at 8 p.m. Got back at like 1 a.m.
This is supposed to be Saturday night, the day before he went missing. He asked what I did Saturday and if I saw him or whatnot.

Speaker 6 Emery. Alright.

Speaker 6 Pretty basic conversation. Weird though.
But I noticed something that was slightly different in the state trooper's report. Could be nothing, but it's at least odd.

Speaker 6 In the police report, they referred to these same texts, but in the trooper's version, Emri responded differently, saying, quote, I honestly don't remember that day at all.

Speaker 6 And Jake responded, quote, me neither. So either those two texts were deleted prior to Andy's interview, or the state trooper just pulled that quote out of thin air? I don't think so.

Speaker 10 Did you think it was unusual that Jake was trying to get people to say they were with him that Saturday night?

Speaker 6 We were with him.

Speaker 11 It's just he said he didn't remember that day. He just had to make something up.
I guess he panicked. I don't know know why.

Speaker 10 So what tell me what Jake said later about I was after the troopers contacted and you guys talked about

Speaker 10 you know talked about it what did he what did he say about why he lied about it?

Speaker 11 He just that's just what happened.

Speaker 11 That's just what came to his head, I guess.

Speaker 11 Because

Speaker 11 he said he doesn't remember that day, so he didn't want to seem suspicious or anything, but he did the worst thing

Speaker 6 If he didn't remember, then how would he even know he's lying?

Speaker 10 Because I'd like totally made him look suspicious.

Speaker 17 Yes, exactly.

Speaker 10 So you don't you don't really have an independent memory of this particular weekend, right?

Speaker 10 So it does wouldn't do any good to ask you questions about that particular weekend that the guy went missing.

Speaker 11 Yeah, that's why I called you yesterday. I just wanted to get it over with.

Speaker 11 He just told me what he told you guys.

Speaker 11 And I guess he assumed I was going to say the same stuff.

Speaker 11 I thought this was going to be just a few questions,'cause I there's really nothing I can say about it, or this is a few questions.

Speaker 1 I eliminated like ninety percent of the questions, so.

Speaker 11 Okay.

Speaker 10 Did Jake at any point actually ask you to lie for him about anything that weekend? Mm.

Speaker 11 He wanted me to stick with that story, but

Speaker 11 I figured, since I don't know what I did to either, I'm just going to tell him I don't

Speaker 11 know what happened.

Speaker 9 Has Jake said anything about Joseph's disappearance?

Speaker 11 Jake never talked to him.

Speaker 11 Man, their rooms are right next to each other. They just keep to themselves.

Speaker 11 Every time I was there,

Speaker 11 and Joe would come home, he'd go either to the kitchen,

Speaker 11 make some food, and then straight to his room. He talks on the phone a lot.

Speaker 11 That was pretty much it. He always always went straight to his room.

Speaker 11 Never said anything to us.

Speaker 10 Joseph, you mean?

Speaker 15 Yeah.

Speaker 9 Do you know if there's any friction between Jake and Joseph?

Speaker 9 I doubt it.

Speaker 10 Did you ever meet this fellow that went missing?

Speaker 11 Oh, one time. Downstairs in the kitchen.
Mm-hmm. Where he was staying at, where Jake lives.

Speaker 11 I introduced myself one night when he was cooking, shook his hand. That was about it.
I went back upstairs, started playing some more games with Jake.

Speaker 10 Okay.

Speaker 10 That was it, huh? That was the only time I was.

Speaker 11 That was the only time I ever talked to him.

Speaker 13 Have you known Jake all your life?

Speaker 11 My sophomore year of high school.

Speaker 11 Freshman, sophomore year, something like that.

Speaker 10 So what are your general impressions of Jake as a person?

Speaker 11 He's

Speaker 11 one of my best friends.

Speaker 11 That's all you gotta hear.

Speaker 15 Okay.

Speaker 11 I hang out with him every day.

Speaker 11 Is he honest?

Speaker 11 Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 11 I wouldn't be his friend if he wasn't.

Speaker 11 But he's one of my best friends. He's...

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 11 I'll probably head over there after this.

Speaker 6 The three bestest friends. I wonder what Emery talked to Jake about after this.
Or maybe he completely forgot to even go over there. At least they're consistent.

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Speaker 6 So, compiling all the facts and the statements made by Jake and his friends Tyler and Emery, it appears certain parts of that weekend they remember quite clearly.

Speaker 6 They did go bridge jumping, they think. Let's say it was Saturday, or both days, even.
Collectively, they do remember doing that and coming back into town that Saturday evening.

Speaker 6 Both Jake and Tyler claim they spent the rest of the night at Jake's house playing video games. And according to them, both Joseph and Joseph's truck were not there.
The rest of it is fuzzy for them.

Speaker 6 But on Sunday morning, Jake's memory is crystal clear again. And he recalls with near certainty that he saw Joseph's truck back at the house and saw Joseph himself in the hallway at 1 p.m.

Speaker 6 If this is true, it's like a David Blaine reappearing magic trick. The window of time in which Joseph could have come back to the house unnoticed and leave immediately again at 1 p.m.

Speaker 6 is beyond bizarre behavior. Also, how'd he do it? And you'd think if Joseph really came back to the house Sunday at 1 p.m., he'd respond to any of the dozens of missed calls and messages.

Speaker 6 People were blowing up his phone. Okay, devil's advocate.
Maybe his phone was broken. Then why not email your fiancé? just like you did on Friday.

Speaker 6 And where would Joseph be heading back out to at this point anyway? And did he bring his broken phone with him? Do you see what I'm saying here?

Speaker 6 Any way you try to rationalize Jake's sighting of Joseph on Sunday makes no sense whatsoever. So let's continue trying to fill these gaps here.

Speaker 6 After Andy spoke to Tyler and Emory, he followed up with another one of Jake's friends named Cam.

Speaker 6 Cam was also a part of Jake's friend group and hanging around that weekend that Joseph went missing. Here's Andy's phone call with him.

Speaker 13 We're trying to get better information and a better understanding of what was going on on the weekend of June 25th when Joseph went missing. Part of this,

Speaker 13 partly because Jake had trouble initially figuring out what was going on. Can you recall what you were doing on that Friday, Saturday, and Sunday?

Speaker 20 The Friday, I can't really remember, but I do know that Saturday we went out bridge jumping to Synook Bridge.

Speaker 17 We were probably out there till maybe 6-ish

Speaker 20 and then came back into town.

Speaker 13 What time did you guys get back in?

Speaker 20 I would probably say anywhere from 7 to 8, 8.30.

Speaker 17 Okay.

Speaker 13 Who all was driving?

Speaker 20 I believe I drove my vehicle. I know Tyler had his vehicle.

Speaker 13 So how sure are you that you guys went out there on Saturday versus Friday?

Speaker 20 I want to say I'd be about 80% sure that we were out there on Saturday and not Friday.

Speaker 15 I can look at pictures for what date was it again?

Speaker 13 June or what? Saturday was June 25th. So we're looking, we're wondering about the 24th and the 25th.

Speaker 17 Okay, 24th. I can look through my phone right now.

Speaker 17 June.

Speaker 20 Okay, June 25th, we were out at Salmon Lake.

Speaker 17 So that must have been the 24th that we went to Senook. Okay.

Speaker 17 And so yeah, the 25th, we were at Salmon Lake.

Speaker 20 I have a picture of me and one of my friends that was there, but that's it.

Speaker 13 And is there a date or something on it?

Speaker 20 Yeah, there is a date. No, A.K., June 25, Nome

Speaker 20 Taylor Highway.

Speaker 13 So the Jake ever ask you to say that you were with him that weekend?

Speaker 17 No, he never asked me to ever say anything to anyone specifically about anything about it okay

Speaker 13 sometime shortly after that weekend jake had some injuries on his face

Speaker 13 know anything about that

Speaker 20 yeah i was with them right before it happened and they went out to safety roadhouse and they were playing catch with the football and jake had fallen and scratched up his face bad, pretty bad.

Speaker 13 Is this based on what Jake told you, or did somebody else tell you about it?

Speaker 20 Tyler and Emory, who were with them, they told me about it.

Speaker 17 They sent me a snapchat of his face while he was sleeping in the vehicle.

Speaker 15 And then they said,

Speaker 15 Yeah,

Speaker 17 Jake, yeah, that's how I found out.

Speaker 13 What did his face look like?

Speaker 17 There was just some

Speaker 20 scratches on it, some scabs on like his chin, jawline area, one on his cheekbone.

Speaker 20 And I think he had one on his wrist, too.

Speaker 13 Let's see, so Saturday you would have gone to Salmon Lake.

Speaker 13 Yep. At what time do you think everybody got back to Nome?

Speaker 17 Probably around the same time frame, you know, 7 to 8, 8.30 when it starts getting a little colder outside.

Speaker 13 Was there any small gathering or party on Friday or Saturday of that weekend?

Speaker 17 Saturday night, I want to say there was a bachelor party at the pit, and that's what I was doing on that night, Saturday night. So Jake wasn't there? No, yes, Jake was with me.

Speaker 20 Jake was with me. That's when he first met

Speaker 20 that night at the pit.

Speaker 1 What pit was that?

Speaker 17 It's just they own a lot of land and they call it their pit, but it's the Palmeranke's from like Alaska Gold.

Speaker 17 Yeah,

Speaker 15 I remember it well now.

Speaker 13 Why? Why do you remember it well?

Speaker 17 That's when he first met

Speaker 17 that night.

Speaker 17 It was just funny.

Speaker 17 It was just funny watching Jake talk to her.

Speaker 6 Cam remembers clearly and differently that Saturday night. Cam and Jake were at a party.

Speaker 13 How sure are you that it was that Saturday night and that Jake was there?

Speaker 17 Oh, I'm positive that he was with me out there.

Speaker 6 So Jake went to a party with Cam on Saturday night.

Speaker 13 Did Jake ride out there with you?

Speaker 17 Yeah, he did.

Speaker 6 And Cam drove Jake out there.

Speaker 13 Did anybody else ride with you?

Speaker 20 Yes, two pharmacy interns that my mom works with.

Speaker 15 They rode out there with me as well.

Speaker 13 And so they would have ridden out there with you and Jake?

Speaker 20 Positive that he was with me out there. I know Jake was there because as we were leaving, he was trying to get

Speaker 20 to come to go home with him, but she said negative.

Speaker 13 Do you have a memory of dropping Jake off when you got back to town?

Speaker 20 Yeah, because I went over to his house with him with Abby and the other pharmacy student.

Speaker 13 We were there for a while and then I dropped him off to go to

Speaker 20 his house and then that's when I dropped off the pharmacy interns and then I had went home.

Speaker 13 All of you went over to Jake's initially when you got back?

Speaker 17 Yep.

Speaker 15 And we were there for

Speaker 20 no more than an hour. And then I had dropped him off his s ⁇ .

Speaker 17 Then I dropped them off and I went home.

Speaker 13 And then you dropped Jake off at

Speaker 13 Yep.

Speaker 6 The censored name you're hearing is Jake's summer girlfriend.

Speaker 13 So what time did you drop him at?

Speaker 15 I would say after 4 a.m.

Speaker 6 For her protection, I'm going to refer to her as Leah.

Speaker 13 When you got to the house saturday night

Speaker 13 it actually would have been here pretty early in the morning when you guys came back from that um palace party

Speaker 13 was joseph's truck there or was joseph at the house

Speaker 20 i know i don't believe i know he wasn't there and i do not believe this vehicle is there

Speaker 20 Jake didn't usually like us coming over too late or staying too late if Joseph was there.

Speaker 6 So Cam tells a completely different story. He says that Saturday evening, he drove Jake and himself out to a big bonfire party and he's certain it was that night.

Speaker 6 And he remembers it because it was the first night that Jake met Leah, a summer intern who would soon become Jake's girlfriend. So Jake lied to the police more than once.

Speaker 6 He told the troopers that on Saturday night he stayed in and played video games at his house. Tyler said that too.
He also told Andy that he went to sleep afterwards.

Speaker 6 But I have multiple videos and pictures with the metadata in them that clearly state the date and time and show for a fact that Jake was at this party. But why would he lie about this?

Speaker 6 Cam says they left the party super late, went back to Jake's house for about an hour around 4 a.m., hung out, and then dropped Jake off at Leah's house, which had to have been at 5 a.m. or later.

Speaker 6 Cam also did not remember seeing Joseph or his truck at the house. So this time window now has shrunk tremendously.
Joseph would have had to have magically appeared between 6 a.m. and like 12.30 p.m.

Speaker 6 on Sunday. And if Jake really went to this girl Leah's house, then what time did he go back home?

Speaker 6 In order to go to sleep, wake up, and all of a sudden have a perfectly clear recollection of Joseph in their house. It's more like, which lie do we want to believe?

Speaker 6 More importantly, why is anyone lying here in the first place?

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Speaker 6 Going back through all the tape, Andy himself pointed out something weird that Jake had said on his own about Leah, his summer girlfriend.

Speaker 6 On the day that Andy went to Jake's house to take pictures and have him cycle around through that rifle, he made an interesting comment that stood out to him.

Speaker 21 So would you mind cycling one of these through the rifle and then letting me keep it?

Speaker 21 I don't know when that would be.

Speaker 21 I mean, could you just do it right now? Just cycle one through? Basically, just load it and put one in the chamber and then eject it.

Speaker 1 Yep, that's it.

Speaker 20 All right, I'm out of here.

Speaker 6 Before Andy was out the door, Jake had one last question for him.

Speaker 21 I'm just curious, but my mom was asking me how everything went between you and I, and I was like, it was fine, totally now. It's a simple question, you know.
Right.

Speaker 21 And she was telling me that

Speaker 21 you knew about

Speaker 21 she was a Summer Science intern. She was brought up here from Florida for

Speaker 21 the Summer Science program that's held here every year.

Speaker 6 He's referring to Leah.

Speaker 1 He said that,

Speaker 21 That's not ringing a bell.

Speaker 21 Who was it again? Very real name.

Speaker 21 But she got the s ⁇ .

Speaker 21 She's an intern.

Speaker 21 An intern where?

Speaker 16 From Florida.

Speaker 21 But where she worked?

Speaker 21 She was working with the camp department here in Nome.

Speaker 21 They host this

Speaker 21 summer program for, I want to say, teenagers. Just

Speaker 21 get them exercising during the summer, you know,

Speaker 21 healthy-related things. But she said, my mom mentioned that.
Oh, is this a girl for your girlfriend? At the time. Oh, no, actually, I didn't know about her.

Speaker 21 I was just curious if someone said something to you about her. Because she...
No, actually.

Speaker 21 Was she even in Noam this summer? Yeah, they were here for about three, four months.

Speaker 21 Like her and her whole family? No, um, a bunch of other interns

Speaker 21 from the same program, but they were randomly chosen throughout the United States.

Speaker 21 And she was doing that. And you guys just dated while she was here.
I always dated.

Speaker 21 She came up here, I met her,

Speaker 21 we kind of played a little bit.

Speaker 21 I mean, I still talk to her today.

Speaker 21 There's no possession or anything.

Speaker 21 Good friends, I guess you could say. Okay.

Speaker 21 Did she go out bridge jumping with you?

Speaker 21 They were there, but I didn't tell them at the time. Okay.

Speaker 21 So did all of that group, were they all out there?

Speaker 1 Yeah, but those internet, they were there.

Speaker 21 So did she ever come by the house here?

Speaker 1 Yeah, I brought her over a couple times.

Speaker 21 Did she meet Joseph?

Speaker 21 No.

Speaker 1 No, she didn't.

Speaker 21 She's never seen mountains before, never

Speaker 6 It's kind of hard to hear him. So I'm paraphrasing.
But Jake basically says, I told her about this and she kind of freaked out. And he said, we didn't do anything.
I didn't do anything.

Speaker 6 Nothing to worry about. Freaked out? What do you mean freaked out?

Speaker 21 Why did she freak out? I wonder.

Speaker 21 She's just kind of like one of those inner city people.

Speaker 21 a gift blew my mind when she's never seen snow

Speaker 21 i don't know it surprised her i guess you could say

Speaker 6 hmm is right why would she freak out or did she even freak out or why are you so concerned about her in this moment you brought her up to andy on your own and why didn't you tell anyone else about this girlfriend or the night that you met her What does Jake not want her to know?

Speaker 6 Okay, I'm going to take you back nearly two years ago to the very first time I met Andy Clamser. We sat down in an Airbnb and Mike and I set up for our first interview with Andy.

Speaker 6 At this point in time, I knew very little about Joseph's case.

Speaker 10 I want to say the work you did is impressive, yeah.

Speaker 15 Oh, thank you.

Speaker 10 Hands down, it's just so in-depth, and I gotta just tip my hat.

Speaker 11 I'm impressed.

Speaker 16 Well, thank you. I never get any feedback on my work.
The attorneys I work for, it's just like, oh, well, this is just what they expect.

Speaker 6 And, you know,

Speaker 6 about an hour into our discussion, Andy starts to unpack the details of joseph's roommate jake

Speaker 16 they realized that he was texting friends trying to get friends to create an alibi for him for saturday night why would somebody be doing that obviously because he was trying to hide something so that alone should have opened a murder investigation, right?

Speaker 16 But they didn't.

Speaker 10 What do you think in terms of investigative steps would be the things that we need to focus on and hit?

Speaker 16 The woman in Florida.

Speaker 21 Oh, is this a girl for your girlfriend?

Speaker 19 At the time.

Speaker 21 Oh, no, actually, I didn't know about her.

Speaker 21 When did she go back to Florida?

Speaker 1 I was at the beginning of August this month.

Speaker 6 The woman in Florida. Leah, Jake's girlfriend.
that summer. The one lead he wanted to follow up on.

Speaker 21 i don't think so not unless the attorneys say there's some reason to i mean if she didn't know

Speaker 16 it's hard to hear but jake asked andy if the cops were going to interview her if i had continued working on this the first thing i would have done is talk to the woman in florida

Speaker 16 There were some college students from out of state who had come up to do some kind of field work that summer. The roommate had met one of these young women.

Speaker 16 That woman would be a very important person to talk to.

Speaker 16 In my opinion, all roads lead back to the roommate. When did she see him that night?

Speaker 16 How long was she with him? How was he acting?

Speaker 16 Did he say anything about his roommate?

Speaker 16 There's a lot of questions that someone should ask her. You know, why is he lying about what he was doing? Why was he trying to create an alibi?

Speaker 16 He's the only person who claims to have seen Joseph on Sunday.

Speaker 16 If I had continued working on this, the first thing I would have done is talk to this girl in Florida.

Speaker 6 All these years later, Like the true detective he is, the one thing that's kept Andy up at night about this case was Jake's girlfriend that summer, Leah, who apparently moved back to Florida in August 2016.

Speaker 6 So ever since then, for almost two years, we've been trying our hardest to find her.

Speaker 6 And we found her.

Speaker 1 During the day, on Saturday, June 25th, I went bridge jumping. But Jake was not there.

Speaker 1 Later that Saturday night, I went to a party at a camp outside Nome.

Speaker 1 The party was late. It probably started around 10 or 11 p.m.
and went until 4 or 5 in the morning.

Speaker 1 Jake was at this party. I know that for certain.

Speaker 1 Because I talked to him, face to face for over 30 minutes. Just me him.

Speaker 1 I was having a drink, standing by a keg at the party.

Speaker 1 And that's when Jake first approached me. We talked for a while, then eventually, we walked off on our own.

Speaker 1 It's a little fuzzy because I had been drinking, but I remember we had a very long conversation.

Speaker 1 Off to the side.

Speaker 1 Off, off, off,

Speaker 1 off, off to the side,

Speaker 7 off to the side.

Speaker 7 And then, then he kissed me.

Speaker 6 This is Leah, Jake's girlfriend that summer, who we met the night of June 25th.

Speaker 7 So I meet Jake at this party. Everyone's drunk.
And let me just preface by saying, my life is entirely different now. We drank a lot, a lot, a lot.

Speaker 7 He's just like flirting with me. Like he's literally just like wants my number, wants to get to to know me.
We're talking about our birthdays.

Speaker 7 And then he kissed me. Definitely wasn't like a five or 10-minute conversation.
We like talked, got each other's number.

Speaker 7 He literally kissed me, like, spent time talking, getting to know each other, interested in each other. He was mostly just hitting on me.

Speaker 7 I remember being by the car talking to him and the girls being like, come on, let's go. So I went from talking to him, him getting my number and everything, and then leaving right after.

Speaker 6 He claims to the cops by 12.30 a.m. he was back at his house playing video games.

Speaker 7 No, that is straight up not true.

Speaker 10 Why would he say that?

Speaker 11 I have no idea.

Speaker 7 So many people saw you at this party.

Speaker 7 Why are you not coming out and saying that you were there and that's what you did?

Speaker 7 Even if you were blackout drunk and don't remember being at that party and people are asking you your alibi, why not just say you're there?

Speaker 7 Wouldn't you just text us and say, hey guys, can you not just confirm that we were at this party?

Speaker 7 All the girls, the interns I've lived with, we all left together.

Speaker 7 I was drunk. I literally was completely asleep.
The next morning, I saw that he had texted me and tried to come over.

Speaker 6 But then I told Leah that Cam claims he dropped Jake off at her house around 5 a.m. And she says, he didn't come over

Speaker 6 I know who I believe it

Speaker 7 is shocking

Speaker 11 I'm I don't know I'm having a lot of thoughts

Speaker 6 we're still very deep into both investigations right now and the amount of new information we're getting is insane next Thursday We're dropping episode 17.

Speaker 6 It's a finale episode, but only for now.

Speaker 6 Because after that, we're coming back with eight more episodes.

Speaker 6 And in this final installment, we'll be tying together and closing the knots on the disappearances of Joseph Balderis and Florence Ocpialik.

Speaker 6 Starting with Florence. So like I said, this is far from over.
And next week will be the finale episode of this installment.

Speaker 6 And after a short break, we'll be returning with eight more episodes on these same two cases. Starting firstly with Florence Okpialik and what we've learned over the last six months.

Speaker 6 So, tune in next Thursday for the biggest episode this season by far and learn more about where these cases are going. If you want to discuss the case more, join our Discord.

Speaker 6 There's a link to the Discord in the description. You can follow me on Instagram at Payne Lindsey and at Up and Vanished.
See you next week.

Speaker 2 Up and Vanished in the Midnight Sun is a production of Tunderfoot TV in association with Odyssey. Your host is Payne Lindsay.

Speaker 2 The show is written by Payne Lindsay with additional assistance from Mike Rooney. Executive producers are Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay.

Speaker 2 Lead producer is Mike Rooney, along with producers Dylan Harrington and Cooper Skinner. Editing by Mike Rooney and Cooper Skinner with additional editing by Dylan Harrington.

Speaker 2 Supervising producer is Tracy Kaplan. Additional production by Victoria McKenzie, Alice Kanik Glenn, and Eric Quintana.
Artwork by Rob Sheridan. Original music by Makeup and Vanity Set.

Speaker 2 Mixed and mastered by Cooper Skinner. Thank you to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at UTA, Beck Media and Marketing, and the Nord Group.

Speaker 2 Special thanks to all of the families and community members that spoke to the team. Additional information and resources can be found in our show notes.

Speaker 2 For more podcasts like Up and Vanished, search Tenderfoot TV on your favorite podcast app or visit us at tenderfoot.tv. Thanks for listening.

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Speaker 6 Every story has layers and sometimes the truth hides in plain sight. I'm Josh Dean, host of Chameleon, the podcast about people who transform, deceive, and survive.

Speaker 6 From con artists to unbelievable yet true occurrences, we dive into stories where nothing is ever quite as it seems. Because to understand the world, you sometimes have to change the way you see it.

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