2020-04

May 27, 2000. Negril, Jamaica. After she is denied entry into Cuba for a junket, 29-year old travel writer Claudia Kirschhoch is rerouted to a Sandals beach resort in Jamaica while she waits for a flight back home to New York. After last being seen walking along a beach, Claudia vanishes without a trace and most of her personal items are left behind in her hotel room. The investigation leads to a resort bartender whom Claudia went out on a date with before she went missing and there are enough suspicious actions from the resort to suggest that a cover-up might have taken place. Who was responsible for Claudia Kirschhoch’s disappearance and how many people were involved? This week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold” explores a frustrating cold case about an American citizen who went missing during an unscheduled trip to a foreign country and has still never been found. Special thanks to listener Allysa Ramkerrysingh for narrating the opening of this episode.
Additional Reading:
http://www.unsolved.com/gallery/claudia-kirschhoch
http://charleyproject.org/case/claudia-ann-kirschhoch
https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Claudia_Kirschhoch
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/natalee-like-case-5-years-later/
http://articles.latimes.com/2001/aug/12/travel/tr-33308
https://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/22/nyregion/queens-travel-writer-who-vanished-in-jamaica-is-declared-dead.html
http://www.sabrinaerdely.com/docs/MurderInParadise.pdf
“The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content.
The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote.
All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

March 18, 2009. York, England. 35-year old Claudia Lawrence speaks on the phone with her parents and texts her best friend about meeting for drinks the following evening. When Claudia fails to show up for work the next morning and misses her meet-up with her friend, she is subsequently reported missing. The investigation would uncover allegations that Claudia was involved in some secret relationships which may have led to her disappearance, causing the story to become sensationalized by the media. Over the next decade, a number of different men are arrested on suspicion of Claudia’s murder, but due to a lack of evidence, none of them are formally charged. Was Claudia victimized by someone from her personal life, or could a stranger have been responsible for her disappearance? On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we travel to the United Kingdom to explore one of their most prominent unsolved missing persons cases of recent memory.
Additional Reading:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Claudia_Lawrence
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/what_happened_to_claudia
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-35759574
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/mar/18/ten-years-on-claudia-lawrence-search-frustrated-by-information-withheld-police
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-27418063
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/claudia-lawrence-murder-theories-latest-becky-godden-serial-killer-christopher-halliwell-yorkshire-a7986021.html
http://nyenquirer.uk/did-halliwell-murder-claudia-lawrence/
https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/local-news/everything-know-disappearance-claudia-lawrence-17946108
http://www.findclaudia.co.uk
“The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content.
The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote.
All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

June 13, 2001. Dallas, Texas. 51-year old teacher Sharon Davis drops her daughter off at a bus depot, but fails to show up for a scheduled training session at her school later that morning. Five days later, Sharon’s abandoned minivan is discovered in the parking lot of a local fitness club. Suspicion turns towards Sharon’s estranged husband, Ron Davis, as Sharon had filed for divorce from him only two days before she vanished. Ron maintains his innocence and claims that Sharon stole money from him and took off on her own. Did Sharon disappear voluntarily or was she the victim of a marriage gone bad? On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we cover a missing persons case which proved so controversial that “Unsolved Mysteries” produced a segment about the case and elected not to air it on television.
Additional Reading:
http://charleyproject.org/case/sharon-eugenia-davis
https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Sharon_Eugenia_Davis
http://www.dallasobserver.com/2002-07-18/news/the-reluctant-witness/
https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/a-fool-for-a-client-6388562
“The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content.
The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote.
All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

May 19, 1996. Shenandoah National Park, Virginia. 24-year old Julianne “Julie” Williams and her 26-year old girlfriend, Laura “Lollie” Winans, leave on a backpacking trip, but are eventually reported missing when they fail to return home. Nearly two weeks later, Julie and Lollie are found dead at a campsite inside the park and have been bound, gagged and had their throats slashed. The murders are looked at as a possible hate crime and a suspect named Darrell David Rice is indicted in 2002. However, when forensic evidence fails to link Rice to the crime, the charges against him are dropped. Was Rice actually the perpetrator or was someone else responsible? This week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold” explores the horrific double-murder of a lesbian couple, as well as its possible connections to some other infamous unsolved crimes from Virginia, including the Route 29 murder of Alicia Showalter Reynolds and the Colonial Parkway Murders.
This episode of The Trail Went Cold is brought to you by Best Fiends, a unique and exciting puzzle experience unlike other puzzle games out there. Download it FREE on the Apple App Store or Google Play.
Additional Reading:
https://www.blueridgeoutdoors.com/features/murder-woods-shenandoah-national-park/
https://www.fredericksburg.com/news/crime_courts/after-years-shenandoah-national-park-double-murder-still-unsolved-but/article_c161cfe5-156e-50e7-8b76-0761f186ae79.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2004/02/26/charges-dismissed-in-shenandoah-park-slayings/962f304e-1111-484b-ad9c-46cbad2362da/
https://barryyeoman.com/1996/11/murder-on-the-mountain/
http://www.readthehook.com/98890/explosive-words
http://www.readthehook.com/94820/cover-after-rice-new-questions-park-murders
http://www.readthehook.com/85777/cover-cold-case-alicia-showalter-reynolds-fall-and-rise-darrell-rice
http://www.readthehook.com/85806/cover-murder-park-rice-release-revives-memories
https://www.fredericksburg.com/news/local/families-want-evidence-checked-in-shenandoah-double-slaying/article_7873a07f-f56a-5448-a2d9-59c88fd5cc07.html
http://unsolved.com/gallery/alicia-showalter
https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Alicia_Showalter_Reynolds
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_Parkway_murders
“The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content.
The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote.
All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

February 24, 1983. Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. After receiving a temporary furlough from the county jail, 21-year old Don Decker attends his grandfather’s funeral and goes to stay at a friend’s house. It isn’t long before Don appears to go into a trance and water starts materializing from the house’s walls, ceiling and floor. Over the course of the next several days, Don seemingly has the ability to make water appear at different locations, including a pizza parlour and the county jail, and numerous eyewitnesses report seeing strange supernatural events which make them believe that Don is possessed by an evil spirit. The indoor rain finally comes to an end after a meeting between Don and a reverend, but everyone is left completely baffled. Did Don Decker really have the ability to control water with his mind, or was the whole thing nothing more than an elaborate hoax and an example of hysterical social delusion? After 168 full-length episodes and 32 minisodes, our podcast has finally reached its 200th episode and to commemorate the occasion, we are doing something a little different from the norm and chronicling the bizarre saga of Don “Rainboy” Decker, a paranormal-themed mystery of which there is no easy explanation.
Additional Reading:
https://unsolved.com/gallery/don-decker/
http://www.poconorecord.com/article/20120205/NEWS/202050307
http://www.poconorecord.com/article/20130526/NEWS/305260327
“American Hauntings: The True Stories Behind Hollywood’s Scariest Movies” by Robert E. Bartholomew and Joe Nickell
http://wnep.com/2012/10/19/rainman-charged-with-arson/
“The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content.
The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote.
All music is composed by Vince Nitro.