← Crime House 24/7
Crime House 24/7
First Watch: REMAINS in the Woods: Three Girls Killed By Their DAD Travis Decker
00:24:17
Loading summary
Transcript10 lines
- [00:01]
A
Crime House has the perfect new show for spooky season Twisted Tales. Hosted by Heidi Wong, each episode of Twisted Tales is perfect for late night scares and daytime frights, revealing the disturbing real life events that inspired the world's most terrifying blockbusters and the ones too twisted to make it to screen. Twisted Tales is a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. Listen wherever you get your podcasts new episodes out every Monday. This is Crime House. Today we're covering two cases making national headlines in Washington. Police say Travis Decker zip tied his three daughters and put plastic bags over their heads to kill them. A massive manhunt went underway for him. But in September there was a shocking twist. Travis own remains were found so badly decomposed that a coroner announced that an autopsy can't be performed. The second case comes out of Florida where Deputy Anthony Shea remains behind bars denied bond as he awaits trial for the shocking murder of his wife, Lieutenant Ellie Shea. Let's get into it.
- [01:20]
B
We begin with the manhunt for Travis Decker finally coming to an end after a nearly four month search. Decker was wanted for kidnapping and killing his three young daughters. Back in May.
- [01:30]
A
Whitney Decker reported her daughters missing after her ex husband Travis Decker failed to return them. After a scheduled visit back in May last week, remains were found in a remote mountain area and DNA results have finally been released confirming they are that of Travis Decker.
- [01:46]
C
It's a big day for Chelan County Sheriff's Office, all of our federal partners that we can finally bring a close to this dark chapter of Chelan county. Certainly pay respects to to the deaths of Peyton Neville and Olivia. We wanted to show honor to them, let them know that we never forgot about them.
- [02:03]
A
Hi, I'm Katie Ring, a true crime analyst, self defense instructor and fierce advocate for victims. And this is Crime House Daily, your essential true crime companion. Every weekday morning and night here at Crime House Daily, we dig into the true crime stories making headlines right now, where justice is unfolding, arrests are happening and new evidence is emerging. Every morning, First Watch gets you up to speed on today's biggest cases. Every night, Nightwatch takes you deeper. If you want to follow a case from the first 911 call to the final verdict, this is the place for you. Follow Crime House Daily Wherever you get your podcasts, leave a Review and for ad free listening, subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. For video, check out our YouTube channel, Imhouse Daily. This episode discusses active criminal cases and breaking news. The information we share is based on what's publicly available at the time of recording and may change as new evidence comes to light. We aim to inform, not to decide guilt or innocence. So everyone mentioned is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Before we get into today's cases, I want to start with something I saw in the news. A woman named Lizbeth Hurtado Breton was arrested at the end of September in Midvale, Utah in connection with alleged abuse of her four month old daughter. The baby was taken to the hospital with severe burns and a caseworker reported that the baby had multiple bone fractures, a brain bleed and other severe injuries. The child's father said that Lisbeth claimed she was trying to get rid of some congestion the baby was experiencing by holding her face over a cooking pot. She said she felt her hands getting hot and didn't think the steam would hurt the baby's face. The father also said that this isn't the first time Lisbeth has shown cruelty to the baby. He allegedly gave police images of Lisbeth taping the child's mouth and force feeding the infant. And what was her reasoning for all of this? The child's father said that Lizbeth wanted a baby boy, not a baby girl. Not only that, but he's saying she's allegedly cruel to other kids. Lizbeth faces charges of child torture and two counts of aggravated child abuse. And as of this recording, she's booked in Salt Lake County Jail. As always, we'll be sure to give you updates on the case as they roll in. For today's first case, we're diving into the heartbreaking investigation out of Washington state that has finally come to an end. On June 2, 2025, the bodies of three little girls, Peyton Evelyn and Olivia Decker, were discovered at a campsite in the Cascade Mountains in Washington. The girls had been reported missing three days earlier when their father, 32 year old Travis Decker, failed to bring them home after a scheduled visit. The truck Travis was living in was also abandoned at the crime scene, but Travis himself was nowhere to be seen. After several months of searching, human remains were discovered in a wooded area just a few weeks ago and are now confirmed to belong to Travis. But before we dig into the investigation that got us here, let's rewind and get into everything that happened before the early summer of 2025, when this awful story first grabbed national attention, starting with three young victims. At the heart of this case, nine year old Peyton Decker was a great example for her younger sisters. According to her mom, Whitney, Peyton always had a compliment to give whether she was at home or at School or out with Whitney on errands. Peyton's middle sister, 8 year old Evelyn, who went by Evie, loved bright colors and fancy outfits. And the youngest sibling, 5 year old Olivia, was always happy and started to come into her own. Their parents, Whitney and Travis, had gone through a tricky divorce and in the spring of 2025, the girls were living at home with their mom. Every night before they went to bed, Whitney made sure they played the three feelings game, where they went over all of their emotions and how their days were. But despite the tough situation, the girls still had a strong relationship with their father, Travis, who had been a present and active parent. Originally from Pewaukee, Wisconsin, Travis Decker was a military veteran. He'd enlisted in the army in 2013 at the age of 21, following in his parents footsteps, who had both served in the military themselves. In 2014, he was deployed to Afghanistan, and when he came home later that year, he met Whitney. The two of them get married in 2015, and Whitney is always there to support him through some extremely difficult times. According to Whitney's attorney, Travis suffered from PTSD as a result of his time in Afghanistan, and she did her best to help him deal with paranoia, nightmares and insomnia. After he and Whitney get married, he's stationed in Italy for three years and then in the state of Georgia for three years after that. Travis and Whitney have three daughters, Peyton, Evelyn and Olivia. Following their time in Georgia, the Deckers relocated to Washington state where they both had family. And in 2021, Travis transitions from the army to the National Guard. Sadly, this is when things start to spiral. Without the structure of the Army, Travis is really struggling mentally. Whitney says that he was never physically abusive to her, but his behavior could be a lot to deal with. He would leave the house for no reason and not tell her where he was going, or he'd scream at her in the middle of the night to wake her up. Whitney also claims that Travis was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. As a very important side note, just because he isn't hitting you, it doesn't mean you aren't being abused. And if you have any other questions on whether or not you may be experiencing abuse, please look up the wheel of power and abuse. These behaviors had taken a toll, and in 2022, their marriage reached a breaking point and Travis and Whitney divorce. She gets primary custody of the girls, but Travis does have overnight visitation rights. But despite their marital problems, Whitney says he is really doing his best to be a positive presence in their lives. He is open and communicative with her when it comes to co parenting the girls. And he always makes sure to be at their soccer games or school plays. And the girls love spending time with their dad. They never say anything to Whitney about things being off or weird. But in 2024, something has changed. That September, Whitney goes to court to revise their legal parenting plan. Travis has lost his housing and he's splitting time between living in his RV and and in shelters. By this point, he has left the Washington National Guard and has been working construction jobs. But he's having trouble at work. Even though Travis still has a good relationship with the girls, Whitney doesn't want the girls to be sleeping in those conditions and successfully petitions to have his overnight visitations removed. He's limited to eight hours every other weekend and three hours on Fridays. And Travis can only take the girls within the boundaries of the Wenatchee Valley in Washington, where their home is located. The revised order also requires Travis to seek mental health treatment and domestic violence anger management counseling. But he allegedly doesn't. And even though he and Whitney verbally agree to the revised arrangements, Travis refuses to sign the new parenting plan. Even so, he's allowed to keep seeing Peyton, Evie and Olivia. And on Friday, May 30, at 5pm, Travis picks the girls up at Whitney's home for a scheduled visit. But something isn't right. One of Whitney's neighbors sees Travis arrive and is shocked by his appearance. Normally, Travis is clean cut, but the neighbor notices Travis has lost a lot of weight and his hair has gotten long and he has a beard. Not only that, but Travis is distracted by something. During his 10 minute conversation with the neighbor, Travis asks him how he's doing three different times. It's like his mind is somewhere else. But the pickup itself goes without incident and Whitney has no reason to suspect that Travis won't bring the girls back like he always does. However, by 8pm he's still not back with them, which is a violation of his visitation limits. Whitney tries calling Travis, but the calls go straight to voicemail. And this is extremely unusual. Travis has never done anything like this before. Once Whitney realizes something's wrong, she doesn't waste any time. At 9:34pm, Whitney arrives at the Wenatchee Police Department to deliver news no parent ever wants. Her daughters are missing.
- [10:55]
D
Limu Emu and Doug. Limu and I always tell you to customize your car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. But now we want you to feel it. Cue the emu music.
- [11:05]
B
Limu, save yourself money today day. Increase your wealth.
- [11:11]
A
Customize and save.
- [11:13]
D
We say that may have been too much feeling. Only pay for what you need@liberty mutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings Very unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Co. Affiliates excludes Massachusetts.
- [11:28]
A
The night of May 30, 2025, Whitney Decker informs police that her daughters Peyton, Evie and Olivia are missing. Whitney tells the officer on duty, Corporal Gonzalez, that her ex husband, Travis Decker, drives a white truck and recently got a ticket for driving without insurance. Gonzalez is able to get more specifics in the department's database and sees that an automatic license plate reader caught the truck going north over the Wenatchee Bridge around 5:41pm after he'd picked up the girls. Based on the direction the truck is traveling, Gonzalez suspects suspects that Travis was heading for a campground or hotel. But a search of all nearby campgrounds, hotels and motels turns up empty. It's clear that this could be a dangerous situation, so Corporal Gonzalez consults with the Washington State Patrol Missing and Endangered Person Unit about releasing an Amber Alert. However, because there's no current evidence that the girls are at risk of bodily injury or death, it doesn't meet the qualifications of an Amber Alert. Instead, the police put out an attempt to locate alert, which goes out to law enforcement, but not to individual cell phones like an Amber Alert does. Meanwhile, Whitney posts about what happened on social media and both the local police and community do everything they can to find the girls. But nobody can find them or Travis. The next morning on May 31, 2025, the girls don't show up at a 5K running event they were planning to do. And on the morning of June 1, Travis doesn't show up for work. At this point, it's obvious to police that he's not planning on bringing the girls back. So on June 2, they issue a warrant for Travis's arrest for three counts of custodial interference in the first degree. After that, the search for Travis intensifies, with the county Sheriff's office pitching in along with even more volunteers. Just before 4pm that day, a deputy finds Travis's empty car around Rock Island Campground outside of Leavenworth, Washington. And then they make a heartbreaking discovery. Between 75 and 100 yards away from the car, police find the bodies of three small girls, each with a plastic bag tied over their head and their tiny wrists bound with zip ties. The girls are identified as Peyton, Evelyn and Olivia Decker, but Travis Decker is nowhere to be found. Autopsies performed on the girls confirm that the cause of each of their deaths was asphyxiation and that this was a homicide. DNA testing on the zip ties and plastic bags links Travis to the crimes. And police announce that once he's arrested, he'll be charged with first degree murder and kidnapping. But finding him won't be easy. With his military background, he has extensive wilderness survival skills. And there's evidence that he might be making a run for it. When investigators look into Travis's Internet search history, they find that he'd been trying to research how to move to Canada four days before he disappeared with the girls. Even with the U.S. marshals leading the investigation, Travis proves to be elusive. Dozens of tips are called in. People reported seeing him in Washington State and in Idaho. But unfortunately, those tips don't go anywhere. And the search continues. And on September 18, 2025, nearly four months after Travis Stecker disappeared with his girls, human remains are found in the remote woods of the Cascade Mountains in Washington, just south of the campsite where the girls bodies had been discovered. A week later, DNA testing reveals that the remains belonged to Travis Decker. As of this recording, there aren't many more answers than that. The remains are partial and so decomposed that the coroner said performing an autopsy would be impossible. And because no autopsy could be performed, we'll probably never know when or how he died. This is a horrific, painful tragedy, one that no parent should ever have to go through. But according to Whitney Decker's lawyer, Whitney hopes two positive things can come from this nightmare. She'd like to see the Amber Alert system adjusted and to see serious reform to how we care for our veterans mental health. She believes that if Travis were only able to get the care he sought and truly needed, then he, along with Peyton, Evelyn and Olivia, would all still be happy and alive. Today's second case is out of Orlando, Florida and involves the tragic death of an Orange County Sheriff's officer. On October 14, 2024, just after 2 in the afternoon, deputies responded to a 911 call at the home of one of their own, 39 year old Elohilda Shea. The call came from Ellie's husband and former fellow officer, Anthony Shea. Officers arrived to find Ellie in the primary bedroom with a gunshot wound to her head. On the surface, it appeared that Ellie had attempted suicide. She was rushed to the hospital, but ER doctors weren't able to save her. At the hospital, Anthony played the part of a worried partner. But it may have all just been a front because just four days after Ellie died, he was arrested for her murder. And just last month, he was denied bond for the final time. As he awaits trial in 2026. Let's get into it. Ellie Shea joined the Orange county Sheriff's office in 2011 and worked her way up to lieutenant. She's known for her infectiously bubbly personality, and her colleagues say she lit up every room with her beautiful spirit and kind smile. Ellie's seen as a mentor, a teacher, an advocate, protector, cheerleader, and just an overall inspiration to women who wanted to be leaders like her. She's married to a fellow officer, Anthony Shea, who joined the Sheriff's office in 2006, five years before Ellie. During their relationship, they have two daughters, Lana, who was 7 at the time of her mother's death, and Raquel, nicknamed Rocky, who was 2. But there are a lot of issues with their marriage. In August 2024, Anthony allegedly gives Ellie what she thinks are vitamins but are actually sleeping pills. When she wakes up, she finds Anthony masturbating in front of the girls. Sources don't say if the girls are awake or not, but Ellie is horrified. And that same month, Anthony resigns from the sheriff's office as a result of an internal affairs investigation which revealed he had been involved in an extramarital affair while on duty. Allegedly, Anthony wants to try and fix things, but Ellie is done. She wants a divorce and asks Anthony to move out. But by October 14, 2024, he's still living there. And that afternoon, he calls 911 in a panic, saying Ellie is dead from a gunshot wound to the head. When the deputies arrive at the scene, Anthony is at the house. He tells them that Ellie had been depressed and overwhelmed by the whole affair in Scotland scandal. That day, Ellie had supposedly called in sick for work. And Anthony shows officers a text he'd gotten from Ellie's phone that says, I can't do this anymore. Please understand. It's too much, what you did to me. I can't take any more. Take the girls for a drive. Give me space, please. Anthony says he wanted to do what she asked, so he'd taken the girls to buy some groceries. And when he got back home, he'd found her on the bed in a porch pool of blood, with a gun on her chest. But when detectives start investigating, they find a lot of inconsistencies. Anthony tells them that Ellie had attempted suicide before and had suicidal thoughts that had come from a past trauma. But when they speak with Ellie's close colleagues and friends, none of them said she'd ever been anything close to suicidal. Several people close to her even said that she was looking forward to to her new chapter in her life after her divorce from Anthony. Investigators keep digging into Anthony's past and find an order of protection that had been filed by his first wife, Nancy, in 2012. Nancy claimed that Anthony threatened to get 10 men to rape her. And while that incident seemed to be completely separate from what had happened to Ellie, police find one tragic constant. The mention of sexual assault. Because when police searched Ellie's phone, they see that she had googled I'm a cop and my husband sexually assaulted me just 45 minutes before her death. And that's not the only suspicious aspect that comes up in the phone records. Investigators are able to quickly figure out that Anthony likely used Ellie's phone to text himself that message, asking him to take the girls out for a drive. Because three seconds after that text was sent, Anthony unknowingly started a 54 minute voice recording on Ellie's phone. There aren't any sounds of gunshots in the recording, but Anthony's voice is. He tells his daughters that Ellie is asleep just moments before he opens the door to the room and sees Ellie's body. Not only that, but the recording allegedly shows that Anthony waited 50 seconds between going into the room and and calling 911. On October 18, 2024, four days after Ellie's death, Anthony is arrested and charged with first degree murder. Anthony Shea's trial is set for February 2026. He's initially held in custody without bond and was denied it again after a hearing just last month. Regardless of what the outcome is here, two young girls lost their mother and our hearts go out to them. We'll be monitoring this one closely to see what the jury decides and if there are any updates between now and then, as always, we'll bring you all of the major developments. What did you think of today's cases? Drop your thoughts and theories in the comments. See you next time. If you haven't already, subscribe to our YouTube channel at Crimehouse daily and follow us on social media rimehouse247 for real time updates. Because the pursuit of justice never stops.