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- [00:01]
A
This episode is sponsored by Bantam Books, a division of the Random House group. In seven days, Jett Mason will be dead. She was violently attacked by an unseen intruder on Halloween night, and now she will have to solve her own murder before time runs out. Don't miss the new twisty thriller from the number one New York Times bestselling author of A Good Girl's Guide to Murder. Now a hit Netflix series Freida McFadden calls not quite Dead Yet, a rollercoaster ride of page turning, suspense and knockout twists. If you're going to read just one more book this year, let it be this one, Not Quite Dead yet by Holly Jackson is available wherever books are sold. Lemonade. This series contains descriptions of sexual and physical violence. Throughout. Listener discretion is advised. Previously on Stolen Voices of Dole Valley. In episodes one and two, we've only just begun to scratch the surface of an investigation that spans more than 50 years. We now believe that it's possible that Jamie Grissom's disappearance and Barbara Derry's murder could be related. But back in the early 1970s, Jamie's disappearance wasn't even being investigated as a kidnapping, let alone a potential murder.
- [01:40]
B
They've lost the report that was given. And I think up here, if the.
- [01:45]
A
Story dies, nobody's going to be on the lookout. And after Barbara's body had been found at the old abandoned grist mill, it wasn't long before her case went cold.
- [01:57]
C
Of course, then we didn't have DNA, we didn't have any of this kind of stuff. So we opened the investigation, obviously, on Barbara Darie, but it ended up going nowhere.
- [02:10]
A
Before we get started, I need you to know something about me. When a survivor of a horrific crime entrusts me to tell their story, that faith is not something I take lightly. And I'm going to be honest. In cases like these, I commit a cardinal sin in journalism. I get emotionally involved with the people I'm writing about. Especially when it comes to victims and survivors of crime whose stories have been buried not only within the darkness of time, but also undeservedly, in the shadows of shame and judgment. Bringing to light who they are and what they went through is why I do what I do. It's important to me to bring these stories to you. Because if I'm good at what I do, I know you'll care about them, too. And making you care about them is why this series is at times graphic and uncomfortable. Today, you will hear Norma Jean Countryman's story. Now, when Norma entrusted me to tell her story, in this podcast, she made one request that I would share with her any information about her case that I learned along the way. Even though it's been 50 years, it's upsetting to Norma that there are still things about what happened to her that she doesn't know, either because she wasn't told or given access to documents related to her case, which included a series of color crime scene photos taken of Norma back in 1974. According to Norma, she made a request to the Clark County Sheriff's Office for a copy of these photos, but that request was denied. Eventually, I would get a copy of those photos, which were horrific. And before I sent them, I asked her again, did she really want to see them?
- [04:07]
D
I'm not saying that they won't affect me. They will. They definitely will. But again, it's been in my face a lot and it's just something that needs to be done. And I having not seen them since I was 15, I want to see them. I don't want it ever to go away because it's very powerful and I need to stay focused on making sure that we finish this, that he is held accountable for everybody.
- [04:40]
A
Detailing exactly what happened to Norma in 1974 is my way as a storyteller of showing Norma that not only do I see her and what she went through, but I believe her. And Norma needs you to see and believe her too. Because back then, when it mattered most, she wasn't believed.
- [05:00]
D
For a long time. I blamed myself because I couldn't make him believe me. And now I see it wasn't up to me to make him believe me. It was up to him to investigate, to take what I said at face value and leave his personal opinions aside and do his job. And if he had done his job, those three women would be alive and whole today.
- [05:24]
A
I'm your host, Carolyn Osorio. You're listening to Stolen Voices of dole valley. Episode 3 the what Ifs it was the early morning hours of July 18, 1974, when Jim Ballew pulled onto the road that led up to the Tukes Mountain Maintenance Facility. Ballou was usually the first employee to arrive at Tukes, a location utilized by the Clark County Parks and Recreation Department for storage and equipment repair. As he drove down the long driveway, Ballou noticed that the park's metal gate was open, which was weird. It was locked at night to keep out traffic. That thought was short lived when he pulled into the parking lot and saw a little figure hunched on the stoop of the office door. It was a girl whose ankles and wrists were bound.
- [06:24]
E
Mr. Ballou drove up and he came up and he said hi. And I started crying and he asked me, what's the matter?
- [06:32]
A
This is audio of Norma, which would be recorded just a couple hours later after Ballou found her on the stoop.
- [06:39]
E
And I showed him my wrist and he opened up the door and put his lunch pail up and tried to start untying him. It hurt so bad. He finally got a knife and cut it up, cut it off. He cut the ones off my wrist coming to my ankles and then helped me into the office. And I sat down. I was pretty well shook up. I couldn't really answer his questions, so I called the police.
- [07:01]
A
Ballou called the Clark County Sheriff's Office. Deputy James Pillsbury was dispatched out to Tukes Mountain. When he arrived, Ballou handed Pillsbury the rope he'd cut from Norma's wrists and ankles, after which the deputy asked Norma to describe what happened. Norma explained that the day before, at around 5:30, she'd been sitting against a white post on the side of the road smoking a cigarette when a blue van pulled up.
- [07:36]
E
And the guy asked me what I was doing And I told him I was just sitting there watching people goodbye. And he said, is it a hobby? And I said, sort of. And he said, strange hobby. He asked me if I wanted to go for a ride and I said no, I don't usually go for rides with strange people. And besides, I had to get home.
- [07:53]
A
According to Norma, she started walking home, not realizing the stranger had crept out of his van and walked up behind her. He put a knife to her throat and forced her into the back of the van.
- [08:07]
E
He laid me down on my back and they told me to turn over on my stomach and I wouldn't do it. So he took my glasses off.
- [08:13]
A
Without Norma's prescription glasses, everything was blurry when he began to bind her wrists and ankles. Once she was immobilized in the back of the van, her abductor got behind the wheel and started driving. Norma had no idea he was taking her to the secluded Tuke's Mountain, where he would tie her between two trees like a human hammock.
- [08:41]
E
They carried me in the woods and set me up against a tree. And then he went back to the van and he got a long rope and he tied my bra onto it, stuck it in my mouth and put it around a big tree and tied it so I couldn't talk, I couldn't move. Then he went back to the van again and got another rope and he threaded it between my knees and the rope that was connecting my ankles and wrists, and he tied it around another tree and pulled it tight so I could hardly breathe. Then he. He hit me real hard for I almost blacked out. And he told me that he was going to wait out there and I didn't know how long he was going to wait and if I made any fuss that he'd come back and what he just gave me was a sample was being mild compared to what I would get. And then he took off.
- [09:24]
A
But the stranger told Normal he'd be back. This episode is sponsored by Bantam Books, a division of the Random House group. In seven days, Jett Mason will be dead. She was violently attacked by an unseen intruder on Halloween night, and now she will have to solve her own murder before time runs out. Don't miss the new twisty thriller from the number one New York Times best selling author of A Good Girl's Guide to Murder. Now a hit Netflix series Freida McFadden calls not quite Dead Yet, a rollercoaster ride of page turning, suspense and knockout twists. If you're going to read just one more book this year, let it be this one. Not Quite Dead yet by Holly Jackson, is available wherever books are sold. Coyotes and wolves have been known to chew off their own limbs to escape a hunter's steel trap. Instinctively, Norma knew that her only chance of survival was to chew through her bindings, which at the time felt impossible. The stranger had lashed her head against the tree in an agonizing position. She slid the side of her face into the bark, began using her teeth like a saw to gnaw through the rope one strand at a time.
- [10:57]
E
So I started to break threads that were connecting my ankles and my feet and they finally broke and I couldn't get the rope off my ankles or my wrists. So I just stood up, started hopping the opposite way that he brought me in.
- [11:10]
A
Norma hopped out of the forest and kept going, making her way through an open field. Field it was slow going, jump, stop, jump, stop, until she got to a barbed wire fence. She then fell to her knees and shimmied her body underneath.
- [11:30]
E
But I remember once when I was in the field and almost down to the other fence, it sounded like somebody was going to do words really quietly, like he was looking for something, like trying to hide something.
- [11:43]
A
Norma knew it was the stranger. Fear washed over her as she silently waited, not moving a muscle from where she was laying in the pasture. There was just a little daylight left when she heard his van revving up again in the Distance. And then everything was quiet and she knew he was gone. Norma got up again and began hopping until she was faced with another barbed wire fence. And she attempted to use the metal barbs to try to cut through her bindings.
- [12:14]
E
It hurt. Too bad. I cut up my wrist. So I stopped and I laid down and thought I could roll underneath the barbed wire. And it was. By then it was getting real dark, and my pants got stuck in the barbed wire, so I had to pull free of that. And then I rolled over it.
- [12:32]
A
The adrenaline that had been pumped through her body crashed. It was at that point, totally spent, lying alone and feeling scared and helpless on the grass. Norma accepted she was so tired, she literally was unable to lift herself up, let alone bunny hop another step.
- [12:56]
E
And I fell asleep just before dawn. When I woke up, it was really light. And so I got up and I hopped through a bunch of stickers and reads and came against the other side of the big, long brown building and hopped around that and up to the front. I looked in the window of the door, the clock, and it was 6:30.
- [13:19]
A
That was the story that Norma told Deputy Pillsbury in the office of the maintenance facility. And as she did so, Pillsbury sized up her injuries. The white of one of her eyes was blood red where she said the stranger had punched her. And she had rope burns running up both sides of her face. And her upper lip was ragged where she said she chewed through her bindings. Her wrists and ankles had deep wounds. Pillsbury asked Norma to take him to the two trees where she'd been tied and had left behind her cut bra that the assailant had gagged her with, as well as the rope that he tied around her head and that she'd chewed through. When they got to the two trees, there was no rope or cut bra. Norma explained that the kidnapper must have taken the rope and the bra with him. When he came back and didn't find her, she pointed to the crushed ground cover where her body had been strung between the two trees. Now, a lot has changed since the 1970s. In today's world, police officers receive training on how survivors of horrific assaults can sometimes disassociate or depersonalize themselves from what just happened as a coping mechanism, appearing calm, cool and collected even after a post traumatic stress inducing event. But in the 1970s, Deputy Pillsbury didn't have that training. He had his gut, which was telling him that he didn't believe Norma's story, which is why he asked her to give a formal interview that he would refer to as an interrogation.
- [14:59]
C
This is Deputy James E. Pillsbury conducting an interrogation of Norma Jean Country Month concerning an alleged abduction that took place in the area of Richfield, Washington.
- [15:11]
A
Now, Took's Mountain is in the jurisdiction of the Clark County Sheriff's Office. However, that morning when he sat down with Norma, he was accompanied by an Officer Townsend from the Ridgefield Police Department because that was the city Norma claimed she'd been abducted from.
- [15:26]
C
Taking place to Clark County Courthouse, Vancouver, Washington. The date today is July 18, 1974 and time is about 9:20am so it's.
- [15:39]
A
A couple hours after Jim Ballou found Norma.
- [15:43]
C
I cut a start from the beginning and tell us everything that occurred from the start until I started talking with you this morning. Okay.
- [15:53]
A
Norma went over her story again, which you heard earlier, but here she is giving an incredible description of the suspect.
- [16:02]
E
He was about 5, 9, weighed about 150 to 60 pounds. He was kind of slim and had light brown hair. Not light brown, about medium brown hair. It was kind of long in the back that came only about to his ears. He had a bushy mustache, brown, bushy mustache and kind of deep set, hollow looking eyes.
- [16:25]
A
Norma also gave an incredibly detailed description of the van inside and out.
- [16:31]
E
It was a light blue van. I think it was a Chevy, but I'm not sure. And it had passenger and driver side windows and then the two windows in the back on the back doors and there was no windows in between that had two sliding doors on the passenger side that opened up and how he took me out of the van. The inside of the van was blue, including the floor and the seats were darker blue, blue in the floor and the dashboard was just a little bit lighter blue than the seats, but not as light as the van. He had about four or five fishing tackle boxes in it and one long fishing pole up on the driver's side kind of hooked up on the top. He was drinking beer because he had a sack and I think he had two six packs in it. He had a bunch of them down by the door on the driver's side where he'd emptied them out. The cans. Beer was buckhorn.
- [17:22]
A
Norma described the knife he'd held to her throat.
- [17:26]
E
It's about 8 to 10 inches long and it had a blade about 6 inches on it and the handle was white with black lines through it kind of with ridges. It was like a hunting knife.
- [17:39]
A
After all this incredible detail, Pillsbury asked his final question.
- [17:45]
C
When you took me back to the woods there for allegedly tied up, are you positive that was the location?
- [17:53]
E
That you showed me, I'm definitely positive because there was a branch sticking out that I hooked the ropes that was on my wrist around seeing if I could break it, and we couldn't. And there was scuff marks and the two trees that you tied my legs to.
- [18:07]
C
At this time, the interview will be terminated. The time is 10:22am.
- [18:18]
A
Now, if you'll recall when Pillsbury began recording the interview, he refers to it as an interrogation. And he ends the interview with a question. Is she sure that the place she took him to in the woods was where she was allegedly tied up? His demeanor gives the impression that he was highly suspicious of her story.
- [18:38]
C
It's what I could feel that there were things that she was not truthful with me about.
- [18:43]
A
Deputy Pillsbury considered Norma's calm demeanor, her impressive recollection of the items inside the van, down to three different shades of blue in the interior of the vehicle, and a fishing pole with multiple tackle boxes, even though early on she would say he took her glasses. But in looking for the truth, Deputy Pillsbury concedes today that back then, he never questioned his own biases.
- [19:08]
C
There's literally two problems. One was my inexperience. Part of it is my nativity. I know at the time, my idea was to try to trace everything that happened to her, because one of the things you try to do is you determine how much is actually correct and try to build a case. You know, take the person through what they tell you, look for any inconsistencies, and make sure that everything they're telling you is the truth. So I know that she felt I was treating her not so much as a victim, but she had things that she was not telling me the exact truth.
- [19:55]
A
According to Norma, as she reflects back on the interview with. With Detective Pillsbury, he would point blank tell her he thought she'd made up the kidnapping story.
- [20:05]
D
He didn't believe my story. He felt that I had just been out with friends and I'd been out too late, and I was past my curfew. And so they. Somebody came up with this crazy idea to dump me in the trees and then make an anonymous phone call to the police. That way I wouldn't get in trouble for breaking curfew. I couldn't even tell him, I don't have friends. He stopped listening to me, and he told me, I don't believe you. This is what I think happened.
- [20:31]
A
We don't have a record of that moment in the interrogation, but what we do know is that because Pillsbury thought Norma was lying, about something. He wanted her to take a polygraph test, which she did two days later. In deputy Pillsbury's report, he writes, quote, the scope of the inquiry was to confirm the victim's story and to determine if the victim was a willing participant.
- [20:55]
C
At first, most people look at a polygraph as the begin, all end, all of whether or not a person is lying, when in fact, generally, the polygraph operator, at least when I was working, was a skilled interrogator and would get through to any kind of questioning. In this particular case, I knew that she was not telling me the truth about something, but I didn't know what, and that's why I had her take a polygraph.
- [21:32]
A
The polygrapher who conducted the test concluded, quote, my charts indicate there is a question as to whether Norma was forced into the car. Pillsbury confronted Norma with the results of the polygraph, and it was then that. That she admitted that one detail in the story hadn't been the truth.
- [21:52]
D
And I will admit no hesitation whatsoever. I did lie about getting into the van. I said that he forced me into the van.
- [21:59]
A
Norma says that she lied to police about willingly getting into the van because she didn't want her mother finding out she'd gotten into a vehicle with a stranger.
- [22:09]
D
Because I didn't want a disappointment either.
- [22:10]
A
My mother.
- [22:12]
D
I would have done anything for my mother. And I knew I shouldn't get in that van. He was just going to give me a ride home. It would just be okay. We were in a small town.
- [22:19]
E
Look what could happen.
- [22:21]
A
As for why she had gotten into the van in the first place, I.
- [22:25]
D
Was looking for acceptance and love. And he was young, he was good looking, he was charming. And I longed for somebody to see me and to like me. I wanted him to see me. And that's what put me in that van that day.
- [22:46]
A
And in retrospect, Norma thinks she was trying to escape a troubled life at home.
- [22:55]
D
I come from a very blended family. Very. My mother had two kids. Then she met and married my dad.
- [23:02]
A
Together they had so much.
- [23:03]
D
Five kids. Then he left her for another woman who had four kids. And together they had three more. So I have 13 brothers and sisters. This is how twisted our family was. But it gets worse.
- [23:15]
E
It gets.
- [23:17]
A
Well, why?
- [23:18]
D
Well, we were sexually abused. By who? Out of six girls, I know that three of us were.
- [23:23]
A
By a family member.
- [23:25]
D
By the family member. By the ultimate family member, the dad.
- [23:31]
A
Norma says that at some point she started acting out and her father took her to live in a children's home. But she never breathed A word to anyone about the sexual abuse.
- [23:43]
D
Dad, I don't want to live here anymore. I don't, I don't want to be here. And most of it was because of what it was doing to me, but I couldn't say that. I mean, I lived in a children's home for a year at my, had weekly therapy sessions and nobody knew that the little girl that they were talking to that was in so much pain and anger, they, they never even suspected, they never even asked. It wasn't. The first thing that came to their mind is why is she so upset? Why is she so angry? Why is she so hurt? Nobody ever. So after the summer was over and I told Dad, I don't, I don't want to be here. I want to live with my mom. So he sent me to live with my mom. And it was at that point that I figured out I can say what I want, I can ask for what I want and maybe get it. I don't have to be just all meek and wild and slump shouldered and just do what everybody says.
- [24:43]
A
Standing up to her father and telling him to stop was a monumental shift in Norma's sense of self. But she still didn't feel safe to tell anyone about the sexual abuse. And psychologically, she believes that childhood trauma is what led her to be sitting on the side of the road on that hot summer day in 1974.
- [25:05]
D
I guess maybe it's because I was sexually abused for three years in my childhood. I am such a prude about that. I don't want to talk about anything to do with my body, to do with my province, to do with my period. Anything like that was always. I kept it inside, I didn't want it. And so I couldn't say, well, my daddy's touching me. It never would have occurred to me that I was able to say that. But that is a part of what put me out there that day. And if it hadn't been for my father, I would not have gotten in that vein that day.
- [25:42]
A
That day Norma was sitting on the side of the road, people watching, and she smoked a cigarette.
- [25:48]
D
It was about 4:30 because cars were coming out of Ridgefield. So that means that pwt, the plant had shift change and it was kind of a people watching thing for me. I've always been a watcher because I've always felt outside.
- [26:08]
A
At the time, Norma had no clue about the disappearance of Jamie Grissom in December of 1971 or the murder of Barbara Derry two months later. She had no idea that three more girls had gone missing. 14 year old Diane Gilchrist on May 29, 1974. 18 year old Gloria Knudsen went missing just two days later on May 31. And 20 year old Krista Blake had gone missing just a week before Norma's abduction. In fact, a police report would later say that a witness had seen Krista climbing into a light blue Ford Econoline van, just like the one that was pulling up to Norma as she was people watching on the side of the road.
- [26:54]
D
So I'd been sitting there about 15 minutes maybe. I was, I was finishing my cigarette and I was actually getting ready to get up and leave and the cars had dwindled out. There was not a steady stream any longer and so there'd been nobody for a few minutes. Crushed out my cigarette, put my lighter in my cigarette pack and was actually preparing to stand up and make my way to the path when I saw a blue van come out of town. He was heading towards the freeway and he did that whole brake check double look thing, you know, saw me there and then back and he continued on after the brake check and went around a little bit of curve. But I could see that he was slowing down and in that moment I thought he's going to turn around and come back. I probably should just get up and walk away right now. And then he came back and I just sat there. Little to do with my childhood. But he started talking to me. The windows were rolled down in the van, he started talking to me and I couldn't hear him so I stood up and walked up to the door, the passenger side door, and he started a conversation. What are you doing? Do you want to go for a ride? Stuff like that.
- [28:15]
A
The driver was older. He looked to be in his early 20s, but he was cute. His brownish blonde, sun bleached hair was below the ears and he had a nice tan. But it was his eyes that captivated Norma's attention. The stranger's startling pale blue eyes pulled her in. After he flashed a charismatic grin that generously spread across his face, they made small talk. For Norma it was harmless. She was enjoying a bit of attention from a grown up. Something she was desperate for. The stranger offered her a ride, which she would decline. But he was persistent, asking her again if he could at least give her a ride home. Pushing aside her mother's admonishments that she never accepted a ride with a stranger. But this was felt good. She wanted more, if only for a few miles to her house. As they chatted, the stranger told Norma his name was Ben. Norma told Ben that they were coming up on her turn, and instead of heading toward her home, he kept going. Not long after he'd passed Norma's stop, he pulled over, saying he had to go to the bathroom. Afterward, he lifted the hood of the van as if he were checking out a mechanical problem. Then he opened the cargo door and got behind Norma's bucket seat, came back.
- [29:42]
D
Around and got in the van behind me. That's when he put the knife to my throat. And that was the moment I felt threatened. And even then, it wasn't real. Even then, I was. The words I said to him, you're not really going to do this. Wasn't until he had me in the back of the van and was tying me up.
- [30:05]
A
Norma realized too late it had all been a ruse when he pulled a knife on her and dragged her into the back of his van, where he kept a spool of rope. Norma described the rope as a combination of jute and packing twine. Most people would say it looked just like regular rope, nothing special. But for the stranger, it was an integral part of his modus operandi, or M.O. he was a sexual sadist who loved torturing his victims. He used this rope to tie Norma and then drove to Tuke's Mountain, where he carried her into the woods and dropped her to the forest floor.
- [30:46]
D
He had the rope, the twine, and he had my bra, and he fashioned it again into some kind of a gag. He put that in my mouth and then tied it around my head. And then he put the rope in my mouth to kind of help hold it in. And he tied that rope around the tree, and my head was pretty much straight against the tree, and I was still hogtied. Once he tied my head to the tree, he threaded the rope between the rope that was between my ankles and my wrists and my knees, threaded it in there. And then he pulled me towards the other tree. I wasn't suspended off the ground, but, like, my shoulders were no longer touching the tree behind me, and my back wasn't touching anything. So my. My bottom was on the ground, but my legs were kind of elevated a little bit. And he tied that rope around the tree, and he left me kind of suspended there. All of a sudden, he just hits me in the face, hits me in the eye. I don't know if it was with his fist, but I seriously blacked out for a few seconds. It was the kind of thing where you could see stars circling around your head. That's how hard it was. And I kind of swam Back up from this little bit of a blackout. And then he left.
- [32:14]
A
Not long after, the stranger left Norma alone in the woods, but she knew he'd be back.
- [32:21]
D
And I'm suspended between these two trees, and it's uncomfortable. And I turned my head so that I could get a little more comfort, I guess, get my body closer to the tree, to the ground. And it was hurting. It was hurting my neck. It was hurting my throat. My arms were still tied behind my back. And so the twisting was uncomfortable. And so I tried. Kept trying to move my head to get it comfortable so that it wasn't hurting me. And my teeth started scraping against the rope that he had. And at that time, my teeth were overlapped a little bit, so there was, like an edge there. And I just kept scraping and scraping because it was uncomfortable and I needed to make it more comfortable. And when the last of the twine snapped and my head rolled off the tree down into the ground, the first thought that came to me was, if he comes back and finds me like this, he really will kill me.
- [33:25]
A
As you know, Norma would survive the night and be found by the park employee James Ballou, the following morning. Then, after being interviewed and polygraphed, Deputy Pillsbury didn't believe her story.
- [33:38]
F
Michelle Bart, and I am the president and founder of the National Women's Coalition against Violence and Exploitation.
- [33:46]
A
Michelle has a lot of experience support and advocating for trauma victims, including having worked with Norma personally.
- [33:55]
F
The question that you're asking is, why do trauma victims all act differently? Why does anybody act differently? When you get news that somebody's died, why do you act differently? If you take a Tylenol and I take the Tylenol for a headache, it may work on one of us and not on the other. So for us to judge why anybody does what they do, unless you've walked in their own shoes.
- [34:27]
A
Norma believed that day it was her duty to remember every detail, and that was her focus so she could accurately share this information with the police so they would catch the stranger in the blue van. But she was dismissed. She wasn't believed.
- [34:44]
F
They were teenagers and young women back then, and so people tend not to listen to the children. And so I don't think things have changed drastically. I think, though, that if someone's accusing somebody of something, we need to believe certain survivors. We need to believe the victims. And I think back then, there may have been different obstacles, if you will. But, I mean, trauma is trauma, and, you know, not to, you know. And I know Norma so not to have believed her back then. I'm glad she's talking today, but look at how many years it has to revolve in order for her to be.
- [35:36]
D
Able to be heard.
- [35:38]
F
Why did it take so long?
- [35:51]
A
During the interrogation with police, Norma had even been brave enough to tell Deputy Pillsbury what, until that morning, she'd been unable to tell anyone else that she'd been raped by her father when she was 11 years old, to try to get him to understand the trauma she had already faced in her young life and that she was telling the truth. But it didn't seem to make a difference. She had lied about willingly getting into the van, and as a result, he didn't believe her story that had been the focus of the investigation. Norma not being believed would have incalculable consequences.
- [36:29]
C
The thing that kills me, like I said before, is had I had a couple more years of experience, life would have been a lot different, and maybe a couple ladies would be still alive. And you can't live on what ifs.
- [36:46]
A
We won't dwell on the what ifs, but let's focus on the facts. The day Norma was found, Pillsbury failed to ask James Ballew or any of the other parks employees who started showing up that morning any questions about who had access to the Tukes Mountain maintenance facility that was run by the Clark County Parks Department. And Ballou never told Deputy Pillsbury that when he arrived at work that morning, he thought it was odd that the metal gate, which should have still been locked from the night before, was open.
- [37:21]
D
He didn't ask the employees who were whispering amongst themselves.
- [37:25]
A
Deputy Pillsbury would write a final report on the case before handing over the investigation to a detective. He says, quote, reporting officer, referring to himself, asked Norma why she had not gone to the police about being raped before. Countrymen said she had been raped by her real father when she was just 11 years old and did not want this information to get to the police. The reporting officer talked with the victim for approximately one hour, but could not get her to change her story. Reporting officer requests that the investigation be taken over by the detective, as Ryder feels he has done as much initial investigation as possible, end quote.
- [38:08]
C
My biggest regret is that I passed that stuff on to detectives. A simple thing like, if I'd gone up to that place in the next couple of days in the parking lot after the place opened, I would have seen that van in the parking lot, and I would have seen those fishing poles in there, and I would have seen everything else. So how many times do you think I drove by that place and haven't had that run through my brain because if I had, a couple more ladies would be alive.
- [38:48]
A
According to a police report, Deputy Pillsbury referred the case to the detectives and his request was approved. But even though the investigation into Norma's case was referred to detectives, it doesn't appear that Norma's story was followed up. On the day after Norma's abduction and assault, the Colombian newspaper ran a story about Norma's alleged abduction at Tukes Mountain. And a man named Frank Lottie read the article. Frank had been near the entrance to Tukes Mountain the night Norma had been abducted. And he'd had a bizarre interaction with a man in a van. So he called the sheriff's office to share his story. A police report detailed his call. Frank lived near the park and said he went for a walk the night Norma had said she'd been abducted. He was walking the fence line just west of the entrance to the park when he saw a brown colored sweater lying on the roadway near the gated entrance. Frank picked up the sweater just as a van was exiting the entrance driveway of the park. The man in the van immediately pulled up next to him. Despite it being an odd situation, the driver appeared very calm as he asked him what he'd found. Frank showed him the sweater. The driver then asked if he could have it and he gave it to him. Then the man in the van just drove off. And Frank wasn't the only witness to come forward. A young mother who also read the article about Norma called the sheriff's office with information about a blue van she'd seen near the Tuke's maintenance facility a.
- [40:34]
B
Day or so later came out in the Columbia. And the story of this 15 year old girl saying that she had been tied to a tree and whatnot. And nobody believed her. They thought that she was out with her boyfriend. And so I thought, well, that poor.
- [40:52]
A
Girl, that's Willa Stewart.
- [40:55]
B
If that actually happened, that would be horrible to have no one at all believe you. So I called the sheriff's office and I says no, I think that little girl's telling the truth. There was a van there at the.
- [41:08]
A
Park the day Norma was kidnapped. Willa had taken her young children to the Louisville park which was about a 10 minute drive from Tukes Mountain. This was something she did often.
- [41:20]
B
They had a nice little swimming pool there and my boys were real small and my sister and her kids and two of my sister in laws and their kids. We met at Lewisville park when the weather was good in the summer. And while we were there all of us young mothers would be sitting around sunbathing and whatnot, talking.
- [41:40]
A
During these visits, Willa and her family would often be approached by men who were working at the park, picking up litter. She noticed they always came to the park in the same pretty blue van.
- [41:53]
B
And these young men would come up in a van and. And they were picking up papers and whatnot in the park, cleaning it up. And we just thought they were nice people. They were very friendly. They came and talked to us all the time.
- [42:06]
A
On the very same day that Norma was abducted, Willa left the Louisville park at around 7pm that evening. She didn't go straight home. She decided to take her boys to go visit their grandparents who lived near Took's Mountain. And as she was driving past the gate that led to the maintenance facility, she noticed a blue van.
- [42:27]
B
When we passed Took's Mountain, to the left is a. A office building. It sits way back in the trees. You can barely see it if you look close. And it has a gate that's closed. And it was late in the evening and there was a van sitting there at the doorway, entrance to the gate. And I thought being very familiar with that area, that was strange. There would be no reason for anyone to be there that late at night. I thought they were probably robbing the place. So I stopped there and. And looked at the van for a little while and kind of remembered things about it. And my boys were kind of concerned about being there.
- [43:04]
A
And so why were the boys concerned about being there?
- [43:08]
B
But the older boy was always very much protective. Every little thing he thought might be a threat, he would start. Let's go, Mom. Let's go. Let's get out of here.
- [43:17]
A
Did you actually go up to the van?
- [43:19]
B
No, I didn't get out of my car at all. And it was right at the entrance to the gate, so it just was not a place where I had ever seen anything parked noted mostly because it was pretty, a real pretty shade of blue.
- [43:34]
A
After reading the article, Willa called the sheriff's office that same day to tell them she believed that very pretty blue van could be related to Norma's abduction and assault. She didn't hear back. A couple of weeks, weeks later, Willa pulled into the Louisville park for another day at the swimming hole. When she noticed the van as the men who picked up garbage at the park piled in and out of was then that she made the connection. It was the same pretty blue van she'd seen parked in front of Tukes Mountain the day Norma had been abducted.
- [44:09]
B
I drove through the Front gate. There is a maintenance building right there, and that van was parked right at it. And there were a bunch of young men standing around the door, talking. And there was a payphone there at that time, right. Not very far from them. And I thought, well, that's the same van. And I called the sheriff's office again.
- [44:32]
A
Willa believed the van, even though it didn't have any signage related to the Clark County Parks Department, was still somehow connected to the maintenance crew.
- [44:42]
B
The van that I saw at Took's Mountain is parked right here in Louisville Park. And, well, you know, it's not rocket science if you put that together. The park's headquarters is where the van was parked. So it had to have been related to Louisville park, because I know from.
- [44:59]
A
The transcripts that I read and the police reports that I read that you were really scared to even make that call.
- [45:05]
B
Yes, because they were standing, like, oh, maybe 40, 50ft from me. They were all standing there talking, and they were watching me. And.
- [45:13]
A
And was it the same guys that you talked to a couple of weeks beforehand?
- [45:18]
B
You mean one of the guys picking up litter?
- [45:22]
A
Yeah. Was it the same group of men that were.
- [45:25]
B
Yeah, yeah, it was all the young employees there.
- [45:28]
A
Despite her fear, Willa walks up to the payphone and calls the sheriff's office for a second time about the blue van. The first call, she detailed seeing the van at Tukes Mountain the night that Norma had been abducted. And now she was seeing it again at Lewisville Park. Willa figured the police were on their way and didn't stick around to see if they showed up. And when she didn't get a call back from the police, she just assumed that there wasn't anything to the blue van.
- [45:57]
B
They didn't interview me. I just figured that either it blew over and I was mistaken or something. I. You know, I. I was pretty young and just didn't know exactly what was going on.
- [46:08]
A
Well, it seems to me like you knew exactly what was going on now that you know what happened. I mean, how did you feel when you found out?
- [46:16]
B
Well, yeah, it was very obvious that, you know, there weren't many vans around in those years, and. And especially a pretty one. It was blue, really blue. So I pretty well knew what was going on without anybody even having to tell me. Well, I knew that that was the van and that was the guy. I just knew.
- [46:36]
A
When Willis saw the van at the park, she put two and two together. She recognized the driver of the van as one of the working crew she'd seen often at the park. With the other workers, he stood out. He was good looking with longish brownish blonde hair. And she'd spoken to him at the Louisville park enough times that he knew her name. You knew that it was the good looking one, the guy that you didn't know who it was. Yeah. What made you know that, if you can remember?
- [47:03]
B
Do you know? I'm not sure. Just a vibe that I had. Mostly probably because of the way he looked at you. We would all be there in bathing suits and it was hot and he would just look at right through your eyes. He had these eyes that you can't describe it. It was almost eerie. They were so all piercing.
- [47:32]
A
After Norma's abduction, she and her mother would go to several car dealerships to try to find the exact model Based on her research. She told police the van was a 1972-74 Ford Econoline van. The color was called Wind Blue. Code Wind B. This is a very light color of blue. Despite both Frank Latte and Willa Esteb coming forward to the Sheriff's office, the only report I've seen regarding Frank and Willa's tips was dated four days after Norma was found at Tukes Mountain. It was coded as a supplemental report written by Deputy Pillsbury, essentially saying he talked to Frank Latte, who confirmed this strange interaction he'd had with the man driving a light colored van near the entrance of Tukes Mountain. In this same report, Deputy Pillsbury also added Willa Esteb's tip that she confirmed seeing a van on the evening of Norma's abduction at approximately 6pm Pillsbury's report ends with quote, Chief Pease stated that he will contact the necessary subjects in Ridgefield and forward a report to this office. Officer Townsend did not make a report on what he did, end quote. It appears, based on the reports that I've read, that no follow up took place with Frank Latte by detectives after he came forward. And according to the reports that I've received from from the Clark County Sheriff's Office during this time period, nobody went back to speak with employees at the Parks Department either after the initial call when Deputy Pillsbury was dispatched out to Tukes Mountain, or after Willa's supplemental call when she'd seen the blue van again at Lewisville Park. If they had, they would have learned that only Parks Department employees had keys to the locked gate, which was secured against after hours traffic.
- [49:45]
C
One of the things I never asked at the time is Tuke's Mountain was locked up and as a result, somebody would have to have keys to get into it. And as a person who worked there, they would have said keys.
- [50:02]
A
And when they found Norma, her hands had been bound in hemp baling twine, the same sort of twine that was stored at various park properties for use by the staff. They would have also learned that on July 11, 1974, a week before Norma's abduction, eight employees had been furnished with keys to all the Parks and Rec properties, which would allow for after hours passage through the locked gate systems. And that out of eight Parks and Rec employees, only one drove a blue 1973 Ford Econoline van. After Norma's abduction and assault, she would take a leave of absence from school. Not only was she dealing with the trauma of what had happened to her, but also the fallout of not being believed. What she didn't know was that she'd given the police everything they needed to find find her abductor. And so had Willa. It probably would have meant a lot to her to know that out of all the people that didn't believe her, that there was someone out there like you who not only believing her, but went the extra mile and put yourself in danger with your own kids saying when, you know, when you called, yeah.
- [51:17]
B
I just want her to know that somebody believed her.
- [51:20]
A
And why was that important to you?
- [51:23]
E
Well, she me told it was.
- [51:27]
B
Excuse me. It's actually affected my whole life. It has. That somebody could take a 15 year old child and terrorize her tired to a tree abuser. And what kind of a freak could do that? And then the people that she should have trusted didn't believe her. How horrible.
- [51:49]
A
You know, it's interesting how you could be on with the rest of your life and yet it's affected your entire life. Yeah.
- [51:56]
B
Yeah, I thought about it a lot. And there's other girls out there. I know there are. I just know there are that have never been found.
- [52:06]
A
I want to circle back to the beginning of this episode where I told you about finding Norma's crime scene photos and how at first, despite. Despite my promise, I didn't want to share them with her. Seeing 15 year old Norma how small and vulnerable she looked, it was painful to see. From the photos, it was clear to me that she'd been through a traumatic event physically, emotionally and psychologically. But even more gut wrenching was the knowledge that she hadn't been believed. I have found myself throughout this entire process wanting to not only protect Norma, but to fight for her. And I've learned that what Norma wants most of all is for me to share her story with you accurately and without holding back. In my attempts to understand what had happened to her, I'd ordered some rope, I thought met the descriptions in the reports, but I wasn't sure. So I asked Norma what at the same time felt like a horrendous thing to ask if the rope I'd bought was the same kind that had been used to bind and gag her five decades later. Handing the rope to Norma and watching her reaction was brutal.
- [53:30]
D
It just takes me back to that moment in the woods.
- [53:36]
A
Norma physically shrank in her chair. Her voice became very soft. And in that moment, it was almost as if I could see her as a little girl again.
- [53:48]
D
I didn't even think about this or what it was when he was tying me up and when he was driving me around in the van. But holding this in my hands and smelling it and remembering it just. It takes me back to those two trees and the feeling that I had when the rope around my head finally broke and my head rolled off and what I needed to do next, knowing that if he came back and found me like that. And so I just did what I had to do. When I was chewing on the rope, it was very painful. It was painful because I was also biting my lips. I was rubbing my face against a tree, and the rope was burning the side of my face. The smell is. It's overwhelming. I just. I can't.
- [54:41]
A
For Norma, the rope has become an indelible tie to the killer and his future victims.
- [54:47]
D
And so that's what I lived my life with, was that guilt. And I couldn't make him believe me. And so two women were dead and the other woman was a wreck. If only I had been able to make him believe me. Until I find out that he didn't even. He didn't even bother. He didn't even bother to do any kind of investigating after that.
- [55:11]
A
50 years, and you're still dealing with this. You're still dealing with the psychological trauma of being tied to the investigation, being tied to the case, how it's changed.
- [55:21]
D
Your life, and how I'm tied to. Even deceased. I am tied to everyone that is his victim, that they know of, and that is possibly his victim. I feel like we're sisters. It never goes away.
- [55:36]
A
Because Norma wasn't believed, a serial killer continued hunting young women in Clark County.
- [55:44]
D
And if he had done his job, those three women would be alive and hunting whole today.
- [55:51]
A
Next time on Stolen Voices of Dole Valley. Another young woman like Norma will survive a remarkably similar abduction, just barely.
- [56:01]
C
She, well, literally crawled out of her grave. It was just a miracle that she survived.
- [56:09]
A
If you have information about the case, please call the Clark County Sheriff's Office tip line at at 564-397-2847. For more on Stolen Voices of Dole Valley, including pictures or to contact the show, find us on social at Stolen Voices Pod or Visit our website stolenvoicespod.com and if you like the show, please give us a five star rating and a review. It really helps us get discovered. Of course. Tell your friends and be sure to follow us so you don't miss an episode. You can also support us by subscribing to Lemonada Premium, available right now in your podcast player. Lemonada Premium unlocks exclusive bonus episodes like my interview with Norma Countryman, where she shares more of her story. Stolen Voices of Dole Valley is researched, written and hosted by me, Carolyn Osorio Production, sound design and mixing by Trent Sell produced for Pie in the Sky Media by Brandon Morgan. My personal thanks to Ben Kiebrick for his thoughtful and inspired edits. A special thanks to Dave Colley, Amy Donaldson, Andrea Smarten, Ryan Meeks and Jenny Ament. Main musical score composed by Alison Layton Brown with Lemonada Media executive producers Jessica Cordova, Kramer and Stephanie Wittleswax and for KSL Podcasts Executive producer Cheryl Worsley. Stolen Voices of Dole Valley is a production of popular Pie in the Sky Media, KSL Podcasts and Lemonada Media.