Same Crime, Different Time: A Historical True Crime Podcast With Jen Chambers

Today's episode covers the 1977 cold case of the murders of Liliana Adank and Eric Goldstrand that was finally solved in 2021 using DNA technology. Sources for this episode include: The Charley Project, The Register Guard , Lane County Sheriff case announcement, Oregon Today, Associated Press. Thank you for listening.

This is a re-air of the June 2025 episode The Case of Diane Downs: A Mother's Betrayal, with an update from May of 2026, including Downs' petition for evidence from the scene to be tested for DNA. On May 19, 1983, Diane Downs drove her wounded children to a hospital in Springfield, Oregon, claiming they were victims of a carjacking by a mysterious stranger. But as investigators dug deeper,...

Today’s episode covers the mystery of the man called Lyle Stevik, a man who came from seemingly nowhere and died on the edge of the Olympic National Park. To hear more, visit jbchambers.substack.com

The Pacific Northwest has always felt a little different. Maybe it’s the fog rolling through old forests. Maybe it’s the volcanic mountains. Maybe it’s the feeling that something is just beyond the edge of the flashlight beam. Because up here, the strange stories never really go away. A haunted hotel perched above the Columbia River Gorge. A serpent-like creature that is said to move beneath the d...

She wasn’t just one woman. She was many. A widow. A healer. A spiritualist. Over time, they became a legend. The Witch of Victoria Island isn’t just a story to keep people safe. It’s what happens when fear rewrites lives. New episode of Same Crime, Different Time out now. To hear more, visit jbchambers.substack.com

🚨 UPDATE 🚨 “Lost in the Gorge: The Martin Family Disappearance” In December 1958, the Martin family vanished during a holiday outing near Hood River, Oregon. Two daughters’ bodies were found five months later. But the rest of the family, and their station wagon, disappeared into legend. Until now. This week’s episode explores their final journey through the Columbia Gorge, and: * Theories from a...

Two Girls. Two Parks. One City Changed Forever. In 1986, Tacoma, Washington, was shaken by two devastating crimes. Twelve-year-old Michella Welch went to the park to meet friends. Thirteen-year-old Jennifer Bastian went for a bike ride. Neither came home. Months apart, their murders left a community searching for answers—and fearing something even worse: that a single predator was responsible. For...

In May of 1935, nine-year-old George Weyerhaeuser walked home for lunch from school in Tacoma, Washington. He never made it. Within hours, kidnappers demanded $200,000 for the return of the heir to one of America’s largest timber fortunes. What followed was a terrifying eight-day ordeal involving underground pits, coded newspaper messages, and one of the largest manhunts in the history of the Paci...

The day after Thanksgiving in 1989, eighteen-year-old Mandy Stavik went for a run along a quiet road in rural Washington. Her dog came home. She didn’t. For nearly thirty years, the small community of Acme lived with an unanswered question: who killed Mandy Stavik? In this episode of Same Crime, Different Time , we explore the heartbreaking case that haunted investigators for decades, and the unli...

Amusement parks are meant to deliver joy, laughter, thrills, and escape from the ordinary. But where there’s wonder, sometimes there’s tragedy. Today, we’re exploring accidents that turned places built for magic into scenes of heartbreak, with a focus on the West Coast, where early parks like Disneyland and seaside attractions helped define the American amusement experience. Stay with me for a twi...

A small memorial marks the spot in the tiny unincorporated town of Bly, Oregon where the only fatalities from enemy action in WWII occurred in the continental United States. May 5 was a sunny day in 1945 when Archie Mitchell, a pastor from Bly, his wife, Elsie Mitchell, 26, and five kids who went to Elsie’s Sunday School class decided to go for a picnic on nearby Leonard Creek. They saw a curious...

On October 15, 1973, Deborah Lee Tomlinson disappeared from Creswell, Oregon on the evening of her sixteenth birthday. A small town in Lane County, Creswell had few mysteries then and still has few answers now. According to public records and missing-person databases, Deborah left with a teenage female friend and was never seen again. For decades, law enforcement officially classified her disappea...

In January 2006, actor Joe Pichler left his apartment in Bremerton, Washington. He was never seen again. Joe had grown up in the public eye, appearing in popular films as a child. But by the time he disappeared at just 18 years old, his life looked very different than the one audiences remembered. This episode talks about the potential act of suicide. Help is available. Call 988 for the Suicide an...

In boxcars and rail yards, places a lot of us pass without a second glance, men were being murdered. Many were unhoused. Many were transient. Many were dismissed. This week’s episode of Same Crime, Different Time examines the case of Robert Joseph Silveria Jr. , known as the Boxcar Killer , whose crimes began in Oregon and spread across multiple states. It’s a story about violence, but also about...

In November 1988, Deborah Lee Atrops vanished after an ordinary evening in Washington County, Oregon. She was 30 years old. A bookkeeper. A new mother. A woman navigating the complicated end of a marriage and trying to build a future for herself and her daughter. Two days later, her body was found in the trunk of her car on a quiet dead-end road. For decades, Deborah’s case sat unresolved. She was...

In 1975, in a Soviet town defined by factory work and strict silence, Vladimir Sarenpya began a spree of violence that the state tried to hide. This week on Same Crime, Different Time , we’re going behind the Iron Curtain to explore a case of “The Ripper” you’ve likely never heard of, who may have started in tiny Coos Bay, Oregon. We discuss the victims, the chilling “signature” left at the crime...

The Brother Jonathan struck an uncharted reef near Point St. George off Crescent City, California, on July 30, 1865. The wreck is one of the deadliest maritime disasters on the Pacific Coast in the nineteenth century. Today, the story of the Brother Jonathan : the ship, the disaster, the salvage, and the strange afterlife of a shipwreck that has become both legend and litigation. To hear more, vis...

This week on Same Crime, Different Time , we head deep into Oregon’s Molalla Forest. It’s the site of one of the state’s most chilling serial murder cases. Dayton Leroy Rogers targeted some of Portland’s most vulnerable women, and hid his violence beneath the pines. I revisit this case with new context, including insights from my book Murder & Mayhem in the Willamette Valley . This episode is abou...

The double life of Robert Lee Yates , the Spokane serial killer who hid behind the façade of family, career, and community honor while murdering at least 13 women throughout the 1970s–1990s. Drawing exclusively from newspapers, court filings, and documented reports, this episode traces his timeline, victims, investigative missteps, and the complex social dynamics that shaped the case. It’s a story...

Oregon isn’t just forests and craft beer. It’s also home to whispered rituals, mysterious architecture, and a few cults that slipped under the national radar. This week on Same Crime, Different Time , we explore: A rumored Bigfoot-worshipping group at Cultus Lake The eerie Temple of Oculus Anubis An Oregon-linked Mother God cult La Luz del Mundo’s Oregon branch Why here? Why these groups? And what...

This week on Same Crime, Different Time , we’re doing something a little special. We’re stepping back into the pages of my own book, Murder & Mayhem in the Willamette Valley , to revisit one of the most chilling figures in Oregon’s early criminal history: Norman “Snake” Brooks . Brooks earned his nickname not for stealth, but for the venom he left in his wake. In the chapter we read today, we expl...

In the summer of 2000, 15-year-old Leah Freeman vanished from Coquille, Oregon. Her body was found weeks later. What followed was a decade-long investigation, a controversial conviction, and finally a historic exoneration—but the real killer remains unknown. On this episode of Same Crime, Different Time , we unpack the cold case that shocked a small town, the forensic oversights, and the human cos...

Rain, a quiet street, a glass of wine left half full. On March 6, 2009, Nancy Kareen Moyer vanished from her Tenino, Washington home. For 16 years, the question has lingered: what happened to Nancy? In this week’s episode of Same Crime, Different Time , I walk through the case, the evidence, and the heartbreak of a mystery that refuses to rest. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.#TrueCrime #Col...

Ever wondered what it’s like to stand in a place where the laws of physics seem to bend? The Oregon Vortex, nestled in Gold Hill, Oregon, offers just that experience. From brooms standing on end to the eerie sensation of shrinking or growing, this roadside attraction has baffled visitors since 1930. But is it magic, science, or just a clever illusion? Join us as we delve into the history, science,...

There are places where the walls remember. At the Oregon State Hospital in Salem, history lingers, in the scent of disinfectant, the echo of closing doors, the quiet weight of all that was once forgotten. Built in 1883, this was Oregon’s first asylum. It was a monument to both care and confinement. Here, generations lived and died under the label of “insane.” Many were buried without names, and th...