Pod Insights Park Predators The Sand About this episode When two soon-to-be newlyweds are found dead on a scenic Northern California beach, the mystery as to why they were killed and by whom is baffling. But when a familiar name to authorities resurfaces, the truth of what happened at Fish Head Beach finally unravels.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 Hi park enthusiasts. I'm your host, Delia D'Ambra. And today's case is one that I knew I had to share in a specific way at a specific time on the show feed. It had to go right after last week's episode, "The Beach," because if you'll remember from that episode, I briefly mentioned the victims associated with this story, and how for several years, there was speculation that the perpetrator from last week's cases, Joseph Henry Burgess, could also be responsible for these two murders. But turns out, that's not the case, and I'll get into all the details why in just a little bit. But because I had already done a significant amount of research about today's story, I wanted to present it as its own standalone episode to avoid muddying the waters.
0:44 Speaker 00 When I say that the young couple who I'm going to be talking about in this episode literally feels like they could be my friends, I'm not embellishing. There was a point in time while reading the details of this crime that I broke down in tears because their stories touched my heart in a very personal way. Of course, I didn't know them while they were alive, but I knew many, many people who have similar backgrounds and upbringings as them. And the more I dove into their case, the more my heart just ached. The geographic area where this story takes place is Sonoma County, California, at a spot known as Fishhead Beach, which is about two miles north of the city of Jenner. This area is known for being a pristine coastal destination, close to nearby beaches that
1:28 Speaker 00 are covered in driftwood, boulders, scenic beauty spots, and rock outcroppings. According to CaliforniaBeaches.com, ocean tides have a unique hold over this area, controlling much of visitors' ability to access it. When it's high tide, there's a good chance that the main trail to Fishhead Beach from Highway 1 will get cut off entirely, forcing folks to trek a slightly more difficult route to access the sand. Once you're there, you have to keep a sharp eye out for rogue waves that tend to crash onto the shore and wash over the rocks, which is always kind of dangerous. Back in the summer of 2004, there was unfortunately another kind of threat lurking on this beach, though, that no one knew anything about.
2:11 Speaker 00 One that took law enforcement years to identify. And when the harrowing truth finally surfaced, it changed this coastal community and the victims' families forever. This is Park Predators.
3:06 Speaker 00 Around 4 o'clock on Sunday, August 15, 2004, a woman named Ellie was working at a Christian Outdoors camp in Coloma, California, called Rockin' Water. And she was keeping an eye out for two counselors who'd taken some well-deserved leave time that weekend and were expected back by 5:00 PM. The two employees were 22-year-old Lindsay Cutschall and 26-year-old Jason Allen. The couple was engaged to be married with their wedding date about a month away. But before saying "I do," Lindsay and Jason had decided to work as river guides at Rockin' Water Christian Camp, which was known for hiking activities, swimming, whitewater rafting, rock climbing, and all the quintessential outdoorsy things that you do at summer camp when you're a kid or teen.
3:51 Speaker 00 Rockin' Water sits along the South Fork of the American River, so it was a great spot for a youth camp. Jason, who was from Michigan, was passionate about the great outdoors, and so was Lindsay. The pair had met a few years prior at Appalachian Bible College in West Virginia, while Lindsay was attending classes there. Jason had graduated from that school in 2001, but returned to be a rafting guide in an outdoors ministry at the college. Before her graduation in 2003, Lindsay had been super-involved in that ministry, and that's where they'd started dating and fallen in love. In February 2004, Jason had asked Lindsay's father, Chris, if the two of them could get married, and Chris wholeheartedly gave his blessing.
4:33 Speaker 00 The couple picked the date of September 11th to have their wedding, but in the meantime, they wanted to squeeze in just one more adventure before tying the knot. So on June 1st, they packed up Lindsay's early 90s red Ford Tempo at her parents' place in Ohio, and drove several hundred miles out west to Rockinwater to spend the summer working together as camp counselors. They were new to that particular ministry, but after they arrived, they immediately made good first impressions with the other people working there. They were described as kind, friendly people, who both had hearts for Christian mission work. Lindsay had been homeschooled most of her life and grown up in church. Even as a youngster, she'd told her parents, Chris and Kathy, that she wanted to grow up and become a missionary.
5:18 Speaker 00 Jason, who also came from a Christian family and had grown up attending church, expressed the same desire to his mom and dad, Dolores and Robert. According to coverage in the television program Final Moments, which was produced by Oxygen, Lindsay and Jason were both extremely close with their loved ones, and while working at Rockinwater, had made it a regular habit of using a payphone near the property to call their families every Sunday. Staff members at the camp, like Ellie, knew that the pair was ultra-responsible and very predictable. So when Sunday afternoon turned to night, and Jason and Lindsay had still not returned, Ellie thought that was super out of character for them. Now, she didn't necessarily panic right away, though,
6:02 Speaker 00 because she figured maybe Jason and Lindsay had just gotten bogged down in traffic or experienced car trouble on their way back to camp. I mean, when they left two days earlier around 7:00 PM on Friday, August 13th, they'd planned to drive about two and a half hours west to San Francisco to visit the Golden Gate Bridge area and do some camping and sightseeing. So, giving them the benefit of the doubt, and I imagine assuming that maybe they'd just taken an extra day to sightsee or something, Ellie and other camp staffers went to bed on Sunday night and tried not to worry too much about the couple's failure to return to camp. However, when Monday morning and afternoon passed with still no sign of them, that's when Ellie and the other workers became more concerned about Lindsay and Jason's well-being.
6:46 Speaker 00 Later that morning, the camp's manager called Chris and Kathy Kutchall, Lindsay's parents in Ohio, and asked if they knew where the couple was. But Chris and Kathy had no idea because they'd not heard from Lindsay the previous day like they normally did. And when they realized that their daughter and her fiance were missing, all the red flags went up for them. They knew in their gut that something was very, very wrong. So they got on the first flight the next day to meet with the El Dorado County Sheriff's Department, which had jurisdiction in Coloma. Jason's dad and mom did the same thing and quickly traveled to California from where they lived in Michigan. Law enforcement quickly generated an official missing person report for the couple because at that point, it had been a little over three days
7:31 Speaker 00 since anyone had seen or heard from them. So, time was of the essence to figure out what was going on. Kathy told "Final Moments" that initially the sheriff's office suggested that because the pair was due to be married soon, Jason and Lindsay might have spontaneously decided to elope without notifying their families. But Kathy and Chris felt pretty strongly that wasn't the case. They knew Lindsay and Jason well, and they didn't think that was something they would have done. Especially because they seemed to be looking forward to sharing in that celebration with their parents and siblings. So, to keep pressing for answers, the sheriff's office flagged the license plate for Lindsay's Ford Tempo as missing in the Department of Motor Vehicles database.
8:14 Speaker 00 And that entry guaranteed law enforcement agencies statewide would be on the lookout for it and the missing couple.
8:22 Speaker 00 After that, Chris and Kathy traveled to Rock and Water to join employees there who'd already organized a ground search for Jason and Lindsay. The reason staff wanted to scour the landscape and roadways around the camp was because they thought the couple might have had issues with Lindsay's car while on their way back. Or I imagine made the assumption that Jason and Lindsay could have been in a car accident or something, which might have prompted them to set out on foot to try and find help. Unfortunately, though, no sign of the pair turned up in or around Rock and Water during those searches on Tuesday. But the following day, Wednesday, August 18th, nearly 165 miles away near the town of Jenner, California, a critical clue surfaced. A clue that would lead a park ranger to a very grim discovery.
9:12 Speaker 01 You know that thing where you're scrolling the internet and suddenly you're three hours deep into a celebrity lawsuit?
9:17 Speaker 02 Where you hear a courtroom term and think, wait, what does that actually mean?
9:21 Speaker 01 I'm Eliza Orland, career public defender.
9:23 Speaker 02 And I'm Taya Johnson, law professor and legal analyst.
9:26 Speaker 01 And on our brand new podcast, Criminally Online, we break down the law behind the stories you can't stop talking about.
9:32 Speaker 02 No legal degree required, just curiosity. Find Criminally Online wherever you get your podcasts.
9:47 Speaker 00 According to Oxygen's program on this case titled "Final Moments," and coverage by the Associated Press and Muskegon Chronicle. On Wednesday, while deputies with the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office were in the middle of trying to rescue a teenage boy who'd fallen off a cliff near Fishhead Beach, just outside the town of Jenner. A park ranger patrolling a spot on California Highway 1 where people would often pull over to take in views of the coastline, noticed a red car parked by itself with no occupants inside. The vehicle being there wasn't all that strange, but it stood out to this ranger for one specific reason. It was positioned facing the wrong direction of traffic. Now, some source material says the vehicle was actually first spotted by the California
10:31 Speaker 00 Highway Patrol, but regardless of which agency initially noticed it, when authorities ran the license plate, they discovered that it belonged to Lindsay Kutchel, who'd been reported missing out of El Dorado County. A quick assessment of the outside indicated it was locked. The source material varies on the next few details, but based on what I gathered, since the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office already had its helicopter in the air to assist with the rescue of that teenage boy who'd fallen off the cliff, they were asked to fly their chopper over the beach to look for whoever might have been driving the abandoned red car.
11:06 Speaker 00 Meanwhile, a park ranger hiked downhill about 200 feet to Fishhead Beach to try and find whoever had parked it. Between what the pilot and the helicopter saw and what the ranger discovered on the ground, it became clear that there were two sleeping bags sitting on the beach. When the ranger got closer, he realized that there was a young woman in one bag and a young man in the other. Both were fully clothed and obviously dead. The ranger could tell from looking at them that they'd been shot in their heads and had been deceased for a while. Some sources say at least a day. So very quickly, the ranger notified the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office, which was the agency that had jurisdiction over the beach, and told deputies that they needed to send homicide detectives
11:49 Speaker 00 to the spot fast to secure the crime scene. And that's exactly what Sonoma County did. Investigators got there right away and started going through backpacks that were next to the bodies. Investigators got there right away and started going through backpacks that were next to the bodies. Inside one of the bags, they found a disposable camera with film in it, some personal belongings, and eventually discovered two driver's licenses. One bore the name Lindsay Cutshaw, and the other belonged to Jason Allen.
12:20 Speaker 00 The scene at the beach was profoundly concerning because there were no weapons found around the bodies, which ruled out a murder-suicide scenario. And there were no signs of a struggle or disturbance in the sand or obvious indications of sexual assault. There were even valuables, like Lindsay's engagement ring, a diamond necklace she wore, and money in Jason's wallet, all of which had not been taken. So pretty quickly investigators ruled out the possibility of a robbery gone wrong, which really only left one option: cold-blooded double murder. Seemingly two close-range executions that had occurred while Lindsay and Jason slept. Even more confounding and frustrating to law enforcement was that when authorities
13:03 Speaker 00 combed the beach with metal detectors, they didn't find any spent shell casings, which suggested that whoever had shot the victims likely picked up that evidence before fleeing the scene. As law enforcement continued to investigate the crime scene, they collected the keys to the red Ford Tempo and a beer bottle that was found lying nearby, hoping possible traces of DNA were on it. They also found a Christian book that belonged to one of the victims, reading material about weddings, camping gear, and the victims' backpacks. But really, other than that stuff, there wasn't much physical evidence to work with. When news of the murders made its way to everyone at Camp Rockin' Water, their reactions were disbelief, and I imagine horror.
13:45 Speaker 00 No one, and I mean no one, could wrap their minds around why someone would want to kill Jason and Lindsay. A spokesperson for the sheriff's office told the press, quote, "From all indications, the victims were very upstanding citizens. They were very honorable people. They had an absolute absence of enemies." End quote. To cope with the gut-wrenching loss and so many unanswered questions, Lindsay and Jason's families gathered at a church in Placerville, California, which was close to the camp, to comfort one another and grieve with Lindsay and Jason's coworkers, who'd grown close with them that summer. Lindsay's father, who was a minister in Ohio, told reporters that he was convinced whoever the killer or killers were, they would face justice.
14:29 Speaker 00 Quote, "If not in this life, certainly in the life to come." End quote.
14:35 Speaker 00 Shortly after the murders were discovered, the couple's bodies were transported for autopsies, and the investigators towed Lindsay's car to the sheriff's department's evidence lot. The results of their autopsies confirmed what everyone kind of already knew at that point, which was that they'd both died from single gunshot wounds to the head fired at close range. Unfortunately, investigators had very few leads to work with, because there seemed to be no apparent motive for the crime and no obvious suspects. So to get some traction in their investigation, detectives focused on piecing together where Jason and Lindsay had gone after leaving Rock and Water on Friday, August 13. Authorities were pretty certain the couple had made it to the Bay Area by Saturday morning, and then traveled about two hours north
15:20 Speaker 00 to the Jenner/Fishhead Beach area by that evening. Because there were handwritten entries in a logbook at the Fishhead Beach trailhead that bore Lindsay and Jason's signatures. And those writings were dated for August 14.
15:34 Speaker 00 Lindsay's note stated, "The sun is going down in the horizon, and all I see are the beams shining on the cliff face. And I know that God is awesome. I look around and I see His creation all around me."
15:50 Speaker 00 Jason's entry read, "As I stir this mac and cheese, I think to myself, what a wonderful life. I've just spent two awesome days with my fiancee Lindsay. Can life ever be so perfect? Only with a person who is so great. God gives me this privilege in life, and He has given me a wonderful woman to enjoy it."
16:12 Speaker 00 Other avenues of investigation authorities checked out were their recent credit card transactions and the film that had been found inside Jason's disposable camera. When the images from that roll of film were developed, they showed the pair visiting scenic spots in San Francisco, and seemingly having a really good time near the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz Island. Neither one of them appeared to be in any distress or danger while traveling around the city. Unfortunately, Jason and Lindsay didn't have cell phones, so any attempt to track their movements with that kind of technology wasn't an option for law enforcement. So digging into their bank activity was going to be investigators' best bet. Those records showed that there had been a charge on one of Lindsay's credit
16:54 Speaker 00 cards for at least one or maybe a few small bottles of Tabasco hot sauce at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco around 1:00 PM on August 14th. That transaction corroborated what the couple's photos showed, which was that they'd been doing normal tourist things in the city that Saturday. A few hours later, there was another charge that confirmed they'd bought gas at a store in Bodega, California, which is about 62 miles north of San Francisco in the direction of Jenner. The source material isn't super clear on if another charge happened after that, but somehow investigators determined that on Saturday afternoon, Lindsay and Jason had visited a few lodging establishments in the town of Jenner and had gone to a surf shop to inquire about places they could go camping.
17:38 Speaker 00 So, all of these sightings considered, it was looking more and more like whoever had killed the couple struck sometime overnight on Saturday or possibly early Sunday morning. The apparent randomness of the crime really freaked people out who lived in the Jenner Beach community. The sheriff's office ultimately fielded more than 1,000 calls and upwards of 350 tips, and residents told reporters that they were genuinely scared to know that a killer was on the loose. A spokesman for the California Department of Parks and Recreation told the Sacramento Bee that violent crime like murder was extremely uncommon for that part of California. He said that most calls for service park rangers received were related to people who had outstanding warrants or who'd been caught driving while impaired.
18:23 Speaker 00 At a press conference on Friday, August 20th, a week after Jason and Lindsay left Rock and Water, their parents spoke to the media and answered questions about their children's deaths. By that point, the sheriff's office had more than 24 detectives and employees assigned to the case. And each of those people were chasing down different leads, canvassing for surveillance footage, and helping however they could to piece together Jason and Lindsay's movements prior to the crime.
18:49 Speaker 00 Then, on Tuesday, August 24th, authorities turned their attention to a 21-year-old man from Wisconsin named Nicholas, who came forward to speak with them. By this point, authorities had received information about a mysterious man who'd been seen in the Fishhead Beach area the weekend of the murders. And according to reporting by the San Francisco Examiner, the description witnesses gave for this guy was that he was white, with a kind of darker complexion, between 6 and 6'3 inches tall, in his 20s or 30s, and had a thin build. Witnesses also said he was unshaven, looked a bit worse for wear, and had dreadlocks that hung below his shoulders. He was seen wearing a trench coat and carrying a black duffel bag with reflective tape on it. From what I gathered, and from my perspective,
19:34 Speaker 00 since Nicholas shared some of those same characteristics, it sounds like he took it upon himself to contact investigators. He'd spent some time in Mendocino and Humboldt Counties, which are north of Sonoma County. And according to what his mother told the press, he struggled with an alcohol use disorder and was known to have arguments with people about religion and politics. Photos of Nicholas that the San Francisco Examiner and Flint Journal published showed that he was white, looked a bit worse for wear, and had long, dark hair. So I kind of see why authorities in Sonoma County took a close look at him. However, just one day after speaking with Nicholas, authorities moved on from him as a potential suspect because he successfully passed a lie detector test. Also around that same time,
20:18 Speaker 00 authorities had become interested in another young man who they thought could be a potential person of interest. This guy's name was Shawn Gallin. 25-year-old Shawn had come onto detectives' radar because a woman called into the department and encouraged investigators to look into him because, according to the tipster, he often spent time in and around Jenner. And Shawn was no stranger to the law. Sonoma County Sheriff's officials knew exactly who he was. He had several outstanding fish-and-game violations on his record for killing animals without a hunting license, and was a self-professed survivalist who was known to engage in drug use. He'd also previously been charged for crimes related to weapons violations, theft, resisting arrest, and drunk driving.
21:01 Speaker 00 So with their suspicions mounting, authorities went to interview Shawn at his apartment in Guernville, which was only about 20 minutes or so from Fishhead Beach. He agreed to speak with detectives and even allowed them to search his place, but ultimately denied any involvement in Jason and Lindsay's deaths. While they poked around though, investigators had noticed that Shawn kept some unusual things in his home. For example, there were lots of guns, sharp weapons, ammunition, and even a Kevlar vest just lying around. They also found frozen animals in the apartment and other belongings that suggested to detectives Shawn was an antisocial person who liked living on the fringes of society. But with no hard evidence connecting him, or anyone else for that matter, to the crime,
21:46 Speaker 00 investigators returned to the drawing board and decided to go back out to Fishhead Beach and literally dig for more clues. On Wednesday, August 25th, a little over a week after the victims' bodies were found, teams of investigators and volunteers got on their hands and knees and crawled in the sand looking for anything that might be related to the crime. One lieutenant for the sheriff's department said, quote, "Trace evidence is hard to find. This is very rugged terrain. We feel we've been thorough. We had personnel to do additional field investigation and we committed them to that. It's an effort to be extra thorough." End quote. Unfortunately, no new concrete or aha evidence surfaced.
22:29 Speaker 00 I don't know for sure when this next bit of information was found, but there were several large pieces of driftwood that were sitting on the beach which were covered in carved messages that ranged from people's initials and sayings like "Make yourself at home", to more ominous warnings which read "My beach" and "Don't F this place up." While authorities were wrapping up at the beach, a $10,000 reward for information was established to help elicit more tips from the public. And just a quick side note, those funds were contributed by the Carol's son Carrington Memorial Reward Foundation, which for any longtime Park Predators listeners will ring a bell. In 1999, Carol's son, along with her teenage daughter Julie and Julie's friend Silvina
23:12 Speaker 00 Palloso, were victims of Yosemite National Park serial killer Kerry Stainer, whose crimes I covered in the very first season of Park Predators in an episode titled "The Predator." After those women and a park naturalist named Joey Armstrong were killed, Carol's family created the Memorial Foundation to help families and law enforcement offer awards in homicide and missing persons investigations. Jason and Lindsay's case also got a boost of attention from the television program "America's Most Wanted." A few days after the show's segment aired, more than 50 new tips came into the sheriff's department, and it was quickly reported that investigators were looking into a 1980s or 90s-era dark-colored sedan with peeling tint that had been seen in the area of Fishhead
23:55 Speaker 00 Beach around the time of the crime. The car also had what authorities described as a black-and-white crescent-shaped tadpole-like bumper sticker on the right side of its back window. That information circulated in the press for several weeks, but it doesn't seem like that vehicle was ever identified or traced back to anyone. On September 4th, around 300 friends and family members of the slain couple held a joint memorial service for them in Ohio. Just four months earlier, Jason and Lindsay's loved ones had gathered in a completely different setting to celebrate the pair at their wedding shower at Jason's parents' home in Michigan. After they were cremated and their ashes laid to rest side by side at a cemetery in Ohio, a scholarship fund was created at Rockin' Water in their memories, and their families
24:39 Speaker 00 established a charity in their honor. "The Kids in Creation Foundation," as they titled it, aimed to provide training for camp counselors and support kids or teens who wanted to attend a Christian Outdoors camp. More than a week after the funeral, authorities announced that ballistics testing results had come in and indicated the murder weapon was likely a .45 caliber lever-action or semi-automatic Marlin brand hunting rifle. They asked the public to be on the lookout for that type of firearm and contact them if they knew anyone who owned that style of gun. Several residents' weapons were taken in for comparison, but none matched the evidence authorities had in the case. A few months after that, California's then-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger increased
25:22 Speaker 00 the reward fund in the case by $50,000, bringing the total to $60,000. But even with more money up for grabs, the investigation grew cold. Six months passed, and then a year with no new information to report. Lindsay's mom and dad regularly flew out to Sonoma County every year to meet with investigators to express their gratitude for their ongoing work. But as far as new leads or updates, the sheriff's department had hit a wall.
25:51 Speaker 00 In 2006, to try and keep attention on the case, investigators announced that they had obtained DNA from a piece of evidence recovered at the crime scene that did not match anyone in California's known offender database. Law enforcement didn't say what item of evidence the DNA had been found on, but it was believed to belong to the perpetrator, which was a pretty big detail to reveal publicly. Authorities also stated that they were curious about a beer bottle and fur hat that were found near the crime scene, as well as a glass pendant necklace Jason had reportedly purchased for Lindsay that was missing. Authorities also wanted to know who'd carved some devil-like faces into driftwood that was discovered next to Lindsay and Jason's bodies at the beach.
26:32 Speaker 00 All of this information, which was completely new to the press, reinvigorated the public's interest in the case. And detectives hoped that by providing these additional details, fresh leads would come in. Later that same year, the Kuchals and Allens held a memorial vigil and press conference in Sonoma County to mark the two-year anniversary of the crime. But the case remained stagnant for another year, until, as an investigation by the Los Angeles Times revealed in 2007, the question was raised as to whether the international fugitive, Joseph Henry Burgess, who'd been on the run from Canadian authorities for decades for the 1972 murders of Ann Durant and Leif Carlson, might be connected to Jason and Lindsay's deaths.
27:14 Speaker 00 But despite the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office considering that lead for a while, it eventually became clear to them that Joseph wasn't their man. According to what a detective told producers for Oxygen's "Final Moments" episode, in 2009, after Joseph was killed in a shootout with Arizona authorities, his DNA was tested against the DNA evidence Sonoma County had in Jason and Lindsay's case. And he was not a match.
27:40 Speaker 00 After that, the case once again went cold. Lindsay and Jason's families watched the 10-year anniversary pass in 2014 with still no answers as to who had killed them. Throughout all those years, the sheriff's office had never given up on the case, though. They told the press that they'd preserved all of the physical evidence, and it was only a matter of time before detectives solved the crime. That prediction would come to fruition nearly three years later, in a way few people expected.
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28:57 Speaker 00 Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK, too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was Park Predators. It's the best way to support the show.
29:19 Speaker 01 You know that thing where you're scrolling the internet and suddenly you're three hours deep into a celebrity lawsuit?
29:24 Speaker 02 Where you hear a courtroom term and think, wait, what does that actually mean?
29:27 Speaker 01 I'm Eliza Orland, career public defender.
29:30 Speaker 02 And I'm Taya Johnson, law professor and legal analyst.
29:33 Speaker 01 And on our brand-new podcast, Criminally Online, we break down the law behind the stories you can't stop talking about.
29:39 Speaker 02 No legal degree required, just curiosity. Find Criminally Online wherever you get your podcasts.
29:54 Speaker 00 On March 24th, 2017, the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office received a 911 call from a woman in Forestville, California, who claimed that one of her sons had just killed his brother in a dispute. When investigators arrived at the address where the call originated from, they realized they were at the residence of none other than 38-year-old Shawn Gallin. Shawn's name was very familiar to the department because, almost 13 years earlier, homicide detectives had questioned him about the unsolved murders of Jason Allen and Lindsay Kutchel. And he'd never really been cleared of suspicion. In 2009, he'd been arrested and convicted for shooting a homemade arrow at a man driving in a convertible and injuring him.
30:36 Speaker 00 So, he'd always remained a potential person of interest, but not one that investigators could really act upon. But in the moment, when authorities learned Shawn had murdered his brother, Seamus Gallin, they had to put the Jenner Beach case on the back burner. According to what investigators told producers for Oxygen's "Final Moments" episode, Shawn and Seamus had gotten into an argument over something insignificant, and Shawn had snapped, grabbed an AR-15 rifle, brought the rifle upstairs to where Seamus was, and then shot him about seven times at point-blank range, execution-style. Initially, Shawn fled the scene, but authorities caught up to him, and when he was interviewed about what happened with his brother, he gave a full confession to that murder.
31:17 Speaker 00 A detective named Joey Horstman conducted Shawn's interview, and while he had him talking, he decided to ask him about Lindsay and Jason's case. Once again, though, Shawn denied being involved in that crime, but for reasons that make no sense to me, he agreed to take a polygraph. When that test ended, the person who administered it told Detective Horstman that Shawn had failed. Now, as we all know, and I'm sure Detective Horstman was keenly aware of in 2017, polygraph results are not admissible as evidence. So, despite Shawn failing the test, the Sheriff's Office didn't have enough to really peg him as their guy just yet. But that changed when they got search warrants approved that allowed them access into all of Shawn's social media accounts. According to the television program Final Moments,
32:02 Speaker 00 content and messages from Sean's Facebook profile included a lot of stuff about Satanism and other disturbing things. But one message in particular stood out to Detective Horseman as extremely suspicious. It was from one of Sean's former girlfriends who'd messaged him, "Maybe I should just go turn you in for that 50 grand reward. Why don't you go shoot some more people and try to get away with it?" End quote. To Detective Horseman, the words seemed to be cryptically referring to Jason and Lindsay's unsolved murder, because at the time the ex-girlfriend had sent the message, there was no other case in Sonoma County that had a $50,000 reward for information, except Lindsay and Jason's.
32:44 Speaker 00 At that point, authorities were fairly certain that Sean was their prime suspect, but they just needed more evidence to be able to prove it. So in the weeks after Sean's arrest for his brother's murder, investigators spoke with Sean's ex-girlfriend, who they learned was living in England. Which meant Detective Horseman was gonna have to get on a plane to go interview her in person. When he arrived overseas and was about to start her interview, he checked his phone and realized he had a voicemail from the Sonoma County Jail, informing him that Sean had passed a note to some guards claiming that he wanted to confess to two murders. After that, things moved very quickly in the case, and Detective Horseman's colleagues brought Sean out of his cell and into an interview room at the sheriff's office.
33:27 Speaker 00 Detective Horseman wasn't able to be a part of the interview because he was still in England, but over the course of a few hours, Sean eventually confessed to killing Jason and Lindsay in 2004. On May 5, 2017, the sheriff's office publicly announced at a press conference that they felt confident Sean was the suspect in the couple's murder. The sheriff stated that Sean had provided information and details of the crime that only the true perpetrator could have known, and the things he confessed to were in alignment with the physical evidence that investigators had on file. According to what Detective Horseman told producers of Final Moments, Sean revealed to authorities in his confession that he'd been out boar hunting along Fishhead Beach the weekend of the crime, and seen Lindsay and Jason camping.
34:11 Speaker 00 He said he disapproved of them being there because he felt like the beach was his, and so he killed them. He claimed he'd been tormented by voices in his head and approached the couple without them ever even knowing he was there. After the murders, he'd picked up the shell casings, hung around the bodies for a little while, and then left. Prior to seeing them on the beach peacefully asleep, Shawn had never met Lindsay or Jason. He told investigators that they didn't possess anything he wanted, and it seemed as if his only real motive for the crime was the fact that he enjoyed the act of killing. Period. What's kind of interesting to me is that in Shawn's mugshot from 2017, he has long, dark hair. Now, I don't know what sort of hairstyle he had back in August of 2004, but if he had the same appearance then,
34:56 Speaker 00 he would have resembled the man witnesses reported seeing near the beach on the night of the crime. You know, the guy that for a little while investigators thought was Nicholas. Well, I think a pretty solid argument could be made that that person was actually Shawn. To make sure their case against him was airtight, investigators followed up on some information Shawn had confessed to about the murder weapon. According to a Sonoma County Chief Deputy District Attorney who spoke with Oxygen, when Shawn gave his confession, he told authorities that the spent shell casings he'd removed from Lindsay and Jason's crime scene could be found in an old soda can that he'd thrown in a patch of blackberry bushes near a property his dad owned in 2004. And sure enough,
35:39 Speaker 00 when the sheriff's office searched that property, they found the soda can and the casings. Investigators who spoke to Oxygen indicated that they later confirmed those casings were linked to the rounds that had killed Lindsay and Jason. After that, a huge weight was lifted off the victims' families, who at that point had waited almost 13 years for answers. The Cutschalls and Allens released a joint statement after Shawn was identified, which read, "We are extremely pleased that our children's murderer is in custody where he belongs. We praise the Lord for his capture, and we trust the due process of the law. To all who have worked on this case over the years, we can't thank you enough. You are true heroes, and we thank God for you." End quote.
36:26 Speaker 00 For some of the victim's friends and former coworkers, the news that they'd been gunned down by a random person was hard to wrap their minds around. In May 2018, Sonoma County officials formally charged Sean with Lindsay and Jason's murders, and also tacked on counts for being a felon in possession of a firearm, and being a felon in possession of ammunition. But you want to know something else, Wild? According to reporting by the Associated Press, ABC 7, and SF Gate, a few weeks before Jason and Lindsay were killed in 2004, someone detonated a package bomb in the hamlet of Monterrio, California, which is about 15 minutes east of Jenner. A 27-year-old woman was injured when that package exploded
37:09 Speaker 00 on top of her boyfriend's car as she was leaving for work, but the crime quickly went unsolved. Fast forward to May 2018, though, and investigators had tied that bombing to Sean, who in 2004, it turns out, lived just a few miles away from Monterrio in the town of Guernville. It's a bit unclear from the source material what exactly his connection to the victim was in that case, but according to articles by ABC 7 and The Times reporter, Sean had previously gotten into an altercation with the bombing victim's boyfriend at a bar, which kind of implies the package bomb was probably meant for that guy, but his partner had just accidentally triggered it instead. So in addition to being charged with his brother's murder, and Lindsay and Jason's murders,
37:54 Speaker 00 Sean was also charged with attempted murder for the woman who'd survived the car bombing. When he was arraigned for the murder cases and bombing charge, he pleaded not guilty, but changed his tune in June 2019, when he pleaded no contest to all the crimes. The state could have sought the death penalty against him, but decided not to as part of that plea deal. In exchange, a judge sentenced Sean to three consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole, plus 94 years.
38:24 Speaker 00 Based on what the medical examiner determined from Lindsay and Jason's autopsies, it's widely believed that they died almost instantly after being shot. In a way, that's given their parents and families some sense of peace. Chris, Lindsay's dad, told the San Francisco Chronicle, quote, "I believe that after they saw the sunset and went to sleep that night, they woke up and saw the Lord," end quote. In the aftermath of such a painful loss, the Kutchells and Allens told the press that despite the tragedy, they have never wavered in their faith that God was still in control. They were confident that Lindsay and Jason were in a better place, and their deaths were not in vain. Jason's mother Dolores told Sacramento Bee reporter Jennifer Garza that Lindsay and
39:09 Speaker 00 Jason had a purpose to fulfill in their lives, and deaths, and that purpose was to lead others to find faith in God and to glorify God. Chris Kutchell had previously told reporters that his daughter and future son-in-law's killer was the worst of the worst. But he had only killed Lindsay and Jason's bodies, not their souls. So in the end, Sean had not won, and never would. A plaque in the couple's memory which features an etching of one of the last photos ever taken of them alive remains at Rock and Water to this day. High on the rocks above Fishhead Beach, a stone cross is also bolted into a boulder as a reminder of what happened there in August 2004.
39:51 Speaker 00 These are just a few of the reminders that prove Lindsay and Jason's legacies have lived on. Though they were taken from this world far too soon, they remain shining beacons of light and an inspiration to their families, friends, and now, hopefully, you. Park Predators is an AudioChuck production. You can view a list of all the source material for this episode on our website, parkpredators.com. You can also follow Park Predators on Instagram, @parkpredators.
40:30 Speaker 00 I think Chuck would approve.
40:36 Speaker 03 One day last year, detectives knocked on the door of a multimillion-dollar mansion in Los Angeles County. Inside, they found a strange scene. A dining area converted into classrooms with children and toddlers seated at rows of desks. The couple that lived there had 21 kids.
40:56 Speaker 04 It's a house that looks like a castle, but it's under investigation for being a possible factory, a baby factory.
41:04 Speaker 03 Where had these children come from? Almost all of them were born through surrogates. But those surrogates had been deceived.
41:11 Speaker 05 Me and my coworker, we named her the surrogate pimp.
41:14 Speaker 00 That's the one time that we called the cops because she was screaming. And then he pulled out a gun.
41:19 Speaker 06 I started crying. I was like, what the heck did I just get myself into?
41:24 Speaker 03 I'm Ava Kaufman. The Journey is a new series from In the Dark and The New Yorker. Find it now in the In the Dark feed, wherever you get your podcasts.
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