26 | This is the Captain Speaking

Summary

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Up and Vanished, Ep. 26 – "This is the Captain Speaking"

Date: January 31, 2026
Host: Payne Lindsey | Tenderfoot TV

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Episode Overview

This unusually raw and unfiltered episode departs from Up and Vanished’s regular format. Host Payne Lindsey shares a series of candid phone calls between an anonymous source and members of the family at the center of the Joseph Balderas disappearance case in Nome, Alaska. Rather than editorializing or providing commentary, Payne allows the family to speak in their own words, capturing their distress, grievances, and frustrations as a true crime podcast investigates their role in two unresolved disappearances.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Intense Impact of the Podcast Investigation (01:34 – 07:39)

• Family members express outrage and distress about becoming subjects of speculation and online abuse following the release of Payne Lindsey's investigative podcast.
• Allegations swirl on various online platforms, accusing them of being involved in Joseph’s disappearance and branding them as members of a "mafia."
• The family describes feeling “dragged through the dirt,” harassed, and publicly defamed.

"There's a stupid podcast person who like does investigative stuff on missing people and he started doing this podcast about Joseph. Well, it's turned into this ridiculously crazy deal… They're just dragging all of us through the dirt."
– Family Member 2 (01:34)

2. Rumors, Misinformation, and Online Hostility (06:07 – 11:23)

• The family is upset by how unfounded rumors are amplified, including false claims of suicide notes, relationships, and drug use.
• Discussion about the complex network of family members, alibis, and the pain caused by internet gossip.

"There's so many rumors out there, so hurtful. And it's really bad. It's really bad. You know, we haven't been sleeping very much because the stuff they're saying is really bad."
– Family Member 3 (05:03)

• They describe being harassed in messaging apps, having their pictures taken from Facebook and reposted without permission, and feeling powerless to stop the spread.

3. Frustration with Legal Limitations and Media Practices (12:00 – 23:59)

• The family consulted lawyers regarding defamation, but were told they would not likely win under free speech protections; legal costs are prohibitively high.

"The lawyer wants 10 grand up front to even start. And he said we wouldn't win anyway because of the freedom of speech rules. He says anybody can say anything they want about anybody else these days."
– Family Member 1 (14:02)

• Family expresses regret regarding interviews provided to law enforcement years earlier, which are now accessible to Payne and allegedly used in the podcast without their consent.
• They accuse the podcast and its followers of exploiting their pain for entertainment and profit, stating they feel like “targets” due to their local influence.

4. Transparency in the Investigation and Defensive Stance (23:59 – 33:37)

• Claims that law enforcement thoroughly cleared family members, and all alibis were verified. The family participated voluntarily in interviews at the time of disappearance.
• Persistent allegations center around missing evidence, such as Joseph’s credit card being used post-disappearance and contradictory statements about the last time he was seen.

"Why'd you lie to the investigator about the day you saw the truck?"
– Interviewer (25:29)
"I didn't lie to the investigator… That's eight years ago. You know, how am I supposed to remember exact details from eight years ago…?"
– Family Member 1 (25:33)

• Admissions are made regarding past minor drug use, but these are framed as irrelevant to the disappearance.

5. Personal Consequences: Harassment and Withdrawal from Public Life (39:02 – 41:16)

• The family details how constant harassment has forced members to shut down social media accounts, increase privacy settings, and live in fear of further intrusion.
• They believe their silence is the best response, hoping that lack of engagement will gradually reduce public interest and speculation.

"We've deleted every single thing we can find of this guy. Blocked him on all of our social medias we've made. All our social media is private. Jake and Gwen have actually canceled all their Facebook stuff because this guy was harassing them so bad… So there's, you know, this guy's kind of scaring them."
– Family Member 1 (39:02)

6. Unresolved Questions and Frustration with Podcast's Narration (24:03 – 38:59)

• The family disputes rumors that someone in the family used Joseph’s credit card and that a family member lied to police, but frequently notes faulty memories due to the time elapsed.
• They express anger that alternative explanations (like animal predation) are minimized or omitted in the podcast narrative in favor of more sensational theories implicating them.

7. Themes of Pain, Alienation, and the Powerlessness vs. Media (Throughout)

• The emotional toll of being accused and persistently gossiped about is a central theme, with repeated statements about sleeplessness, stress, and frustration over being misrepresented.
• The family frames themselves as victims of an entertainment machine, painting Payne Lindsey and similar podcasters as “bloggers” profiting from sensationalism, and failing to understand local dynamics or the realities of rural Alaska.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Media Exploitation:

  "He's just doing this to get his podcast going so he makes money off the stupid podcast. He's just... He's a piece of. It's horrible. It's just bad." – Family Member 1 (15:32)

• Legal Barriers:

  "The lawyer wants 10 grand up front to even start. And he said we wouldn't win anyway because of the freedom of speech rules." – Family Member 1 (14:02)

• On Being Cleared:

  "Even though the FBI, the Alaska State troopers, everybody cleared everybody in our family a long time ago… they cleared us all because we all had alibis… That's why the case was closed, because there's no evidence of anything." – Family Member 1 (17:25)

• Frustration with Coverage:

  "He’s just slandering us and lying to everybody about everybody. Oh, my gosh." – Family Member 1 (14:41)

• Harassment’s Toll:

  "Chrissy's just stressed out all the time because this guy… is constantly calling and harassing him. He's… trying to get him to do. Jake won't answer… I think he's going to actually go to the known police and file a retraining order." – Family Member 1 (28:53)

• Refusal to Engage Further:

  "We just shut up about it. It'll just go away. And that's… starting to do that finally because he has no new stuff to go off of, and it's just…" – Family Member 1 (28:53)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:12] – Payne Lindsey introduces the episode and his decision not to comment but present raw calls.
• [01:34 – 07:39] – Family members describe escalating rumors and personal attacks traced to podcast and online speculation.
• [12:00 – 15:32] – Detailed grievances about defamation, failure of legal system to protect them, and specific examples.
• [23:59 – 25:33] – Direct questions about the evidence, missing credit card, and truthfulness during police interviews.
• [28:48 – 30:43] – Why the family isn’t trying to clear their reputation more publicly; financial and emotional burden.
• [39:02 – 41:16] – Impact on family’s privacy and final statements about why they refuse to further engage with podcast or its listeners.

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Tone and Language

The tone throughout is defensive, stressed, frequently exasperated, and deeply personal. The speakers are clearly hurt by the public suspicion, feel unjustly targeted, and are openly angry at Payne Lindsey’s methods and at the true crime audience’s appetite for sensationalism.

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Summary

This episode of Up and Vanished is a raw, firsthand window into how true crime investigations—especially those presented in serial podcast format—can impact families who become suspects in the public eye. The family fiercely contests accusations against them, details the emotional and practical fallout of online speculation and harassment, and voices their sense of powerlessness against high-profile media figures. Payne Lindsey delivers the calls without commentary, letting listeners draw their own conclusions from the unresolved pain and conflict that marks the ongoing mystery of Joseph Balderas’s disappearance.

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Transcript

[Narrator]

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[Family Member 1]

Hey, up and Vanished listeners.

[Interviewer]

We want to hear from you.

[Payne Lindsay]

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[Interviewer]

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[Payne Lindsay]

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[Interviewer]

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[Payne Lindsay]

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[Interviewer]

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[Family Member 1]

Thanks again.

[Interviewer]

Now, here's the show.

[Narrator]

Up and Vanished in the Midnight sun is released every Thursday and brought to you absolutely free. But for ad, free listening and exclusive bonuses, subscribe to Tenderfoot [e-mail] or on Apple Podcasts. Up and Vanished in the Midnight sun is intended for mature audiences and may include topics that can be upsetting such as emotional, physical and sexual violence, rape and murder. The names of survivors have been changed for anonymity purposes. Testimony shared by guests of the show is their own and does not reflect the views of Tenderfoot TV or Odyssey. Thank you so much for listening.

[Payne Lindsay]

Hey guys, it's Payne here. I'm on the road recording this from my phone. Actually, today's episode is going to be a little bit different. You're just going to hear the raw phone calls from our anonymous source with Kirk and Bonnie. These calls were obtained 100% legally in one party consent states. I'm holding my own comment on this until the next episode.

[Family Member 2]

There's a stupid podcast person who like does investigative stuff on missing people and he started doing this podcast about Joseph. Well, it's turned into this ridiculously crazy deal where they're on this app and everybody's talking about they're just dragging all of us through the dirt. The Pascoas of Jake, saying that we all did it to him and that we're all murderers and part of the mafia and that Graham's a mafia person and we should all lose our job. I mean, it's bad. It's all over the Internet. They've taken pictures from our Facebook interviews from that time and they're posting all this stuff, using it against us and using our pictures without our permission. Everything saying that we're the one who made Joseph disappear.

[Family Member 3]

That's.

[Family Member 2]

I don't know what we're gonna do about it yet. Graham's thinking about maybe a lawyer to sue the guy for. What do they call that? Defamation and character and harassment. Everything else. Because he's just. He doesn't know anything. This guy doesn't even know anything. It's just making all this stuff up and dragging everybody through the dirt about it. He's got pictures of our family and this whole podcast and everything that he stole it off of Facebook. I mean, like pictures of us flying looking for Joseph. Family pictures.

[Family Member 3]

We shot our bill of sale from when we sold the airplane, which.

[Family Member 2]

Yeah, I don't know how you get that.

[Family Member 3]

I mean, I'm sure it's public information, but what does that have to do with anything? Yeah, he's. He's got all of our pictures of us flying looking for Joseph, but he's.

[Family Member 2]

Saying that we're the ones who killed Joseph and we're the ones who are to blame for the whole thing. And that's why they haven't found him, because we're hiding him and we're all part of the Scoia mafia and everything. It's crazy.

[Family Member 3]

They're saying there are people saying that Graham is the matriarch of this whole mafia family. And when Kevin died, I guess there was this chat. People are talking about this whole case and one of the things they said was when Kevin died, there was a suicide note. And in that suicide note was Kevin.

[Family Member 2]

Saying that he killed Joseph, which is total bs. I mean, they're just making up a whole bunch of stuff and for entertainment. They don't care what it's doing to all of us. Oh, his heart blew up. He had a heart. Massive heart failure. And dude and Jake are the ones that found. And Russell were the ones who found Kevin. There's no suicide note there.

[Family Member 1]

Oh.

[Family Member 2]

I mean, they're.

[Family Member 3]

They're talking about Kim and Chris being drugs. Did Chrissy had an affair with Jeff? It's just this long, drawn out thing where we're just. We're so stressed about this whole thing, especially because. Because Jake was his roommate. And so they. Therefore they think he did it or he did something.

[Family Member 2]

Yeah, in Graham's house. They lived in the same house. Graham's old house is where Jake was staying and so was Joseph. Each had a room. But the police cleared everything already. You know, everybody has aliber where everybody was. It was just he went missing.

[Family Member 3]

There's so many rumors out there, so hurtful. And it's really bad. It's really bad. You know, we haven't been sleeping very.

[Family Member 2]

Much because they're just stuff they're saying is really bad.

[Family Member 3]

It's so bad that I. Yesterday I told Graham, I said.

[Family Member 2]

This corporation slavery. Yeah, of course, all of it.

[Family Member 3]

One thing he said was Kevin was bragging about how he was an ex cop and he knows how to get rid of evidence. When he got to Joseph's truck, he dusted off Joseph's footprint.

[Family Member 2]

She didn't even go down there. And that happened.

[Family Member 3]

Well, Kevin and I were together when we went that first day, we went to the ranger to help look for him, and he did nothing of that sort. He would need a strike. The thing that they're saying is that he brushed away Joseph's footprints. It's just. It's so dumb. And there, you know, people are talking about, well, all the SCAs have pretty prominent jobs in. In Gnome. Like, Graham is the vice president of cor and dudes in Security. Lonnie is in charge of this investigation, and Kim and Creaser at kware and all these. All these displays need to be put on leave until they come up with, you know, whatever.

[Family Member 2]

They already closed the case. He's a missing person. There's no. Everybody was cleared because we all had alibis where everybody was.

[Family Member 1]

We were at camp.

[Family Member 2]

All of us. We were all at camp building that addition that day. We saw him drive by.

[Family Member 3]

Yeah.

[Family Member 2]

And then he went missing a day later, and we never saw actually who was in that truck. Remember, we were all wondering why he didn't stop saying, say hi. Yeah, we're working on the building, on the new edition. Yeah. But this guy doesn't know any of us. He's just making it. I mean, this is entertainment for him. This is what his podcast does. He finds things that make stories out of them, and he just slanders people he knows absolutely nothing about. He's taking pictures from our Facebook and posting them on this thing, saying, this.

[Family Member 1]

Is who this is.

[Family Member 2]

That's who this is. And. And, you know, our pictures are all over this guy's thing now, which I think that's illegal. I don't think you can take people's pictures and use them without their consent. Maybe on camp, but I don't think so. And then these people get together on this app and they discuss the podcast, and you don't know who they are because they're all like, they're not real names or anonymous. And they're the ones talking a whole bunch of stuff about this podcast. And some of them are known people, and it's just ridiculous.

[Family Member 3]

It's been really bad. Jake's. Jake.

[Family Member 2]

Jake's pretty upset. No, you could.

[Family Member 3]

I haven't done it.

[Family Member 2]

But.

[Family Member 3]

It just makes me so mad that, you know, podcast, they used dad Spirit and posted that on the podcast.

[Family Member 2]

Remember that cop interviewed us at our house to just ask us what we were, how we were helping, and all that stuff. And it was like that investigator guy, he came in on an interview with him on the couch at the house, and then later he asked if he could use that. And we sell him. No, we don't want it used. We don't want to have any. We don't want you to use our interviews. Well, he obviously, whoever that cop guy was, must have used them because they're out there online and they've got it.

[Family Member 3]

So because, you know, Joseph is missing, and then that girl Florence. Is missing also, has been missing. Not a trace of her. So this guy that does the podcast, it's like, well, those two people are missing, and absolutely nothing has come up. Your cases, there's got to be, like.

[Family Member 2]

A serial killer and nobody saying anything.

[Family Member 1]

Which there very may well be.

[Family Member 2]

I mean, there's been a lot of people gone missing at home, but it's so bad.

[Family Member 3]

I don't know.

[Family Member 2]

I'm sure he just started, like, right.

[Family Member 3]

A few months ago podcast because there's been sue. People looking for Florence. So because there's no answers, he decided.

[Family Member 2]

To make a podcast about it just recently and started this whole thing up for entertainment, for viewing, for viewers. So he has viewers on his podcast.

[Family Member 3]

I kind of think that Joseph's sister Selena is also behind this because they, you know, never been to Alaska, never stepped through that on the tour anywhere, so just quite busy and doesn't understand that first day he found 29 bears in that area. In that area. But Selena, Joseph's sister. Thanks there. No, that can't be it. That can't be it. There's nobody that did something to him.

[Family Member 2]

Does something, and of course, we were all close to him, so we're the prime suspect. Thing is, sometimes they do. Sometimes they bury him and you. And, you know, it's such a big area. Who knows where he was buried? We just couldn't find it. I'm sure he's out there buried somewhere. We just don't know where. They do it immediately. They bury him immediately.

[Family Member 3]

Yeah, they do. Especially if they had just eaten.

[Family Member 2]

They're gonna bury it, come back to it later.

[Family Member 3]

Back to it later.

[Family Member 2]

That's what they do. But, yeah, it's. I don't know, it's wild. She'll send you the guy's name so you can look it up. And I don't know what that app is, though, about that app, but you.

[Family Member 3]

Don'T want to read the app. I told Julia, I said, you just need to stop reading that.

[Family Member 2]

I don't.

[Family Member 3]

I don't want to waste any More time and heartache on this because it's. It's so bad.

[Family Member 2]

I think they're trying to get a rise out of us to see what we'll do to see if we'll respond to them or.

[Family Member 3]

Trying to call Jake. Harassing Jake. Jake's getting all kinds of harassing messages from people saying he's a piece of. Where is Joseph? Where'd you. What you do with him? It's. It's really bad.

[Family Member 2]

And this just started like a month ago. Somebody saw a podcast of this person, of this guy talking about the missing people and Gnome, and then it got spun off onto Joseph and it's gone crazy ever since then. So. So now everybody's sharing it and Gnome on Gnome Post or whatever, they're talking about it. So now everybody's into it, looking at it. It's become the latest gossip, I guess. But she'll send you the guy's picture name or whatever so you can, if you want to look it up. I'm not too worried about it because I know what we all did and I know we just helped and we helped look for them and we spent a lot of time and money doing it. This guy's just an idiot. I think he should be sued for lying and for trying to scare people. That's not right. I think we should. He should be sued for it. Especially nowadays. You probably could win a lawsuit like that. He probably doesn't have any money, though. That's probably the deal. I don't know how you get paid.

[Family Member 1]

For podcasts, probably by viewers or something.

[Family Member 2]

But he's been sued before for doing these same kind of things about cases they knew nothing about, just to have an entertaining channel with viewers. Crazy. What's going on with that?

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[Family Member 1]

This guy's. We talked to a lawyer about suing him for defamation of character, slander, and stealing our photos and everything else. And the lawyer wants 10 grand up front to even start. And he said we wouldn't win anyway because of the freedom of speech rules. He says anybody can say anything they want about anybody else these days.

[Family Member 2]

They can't do anything about it.

[Family Member 1]

So we can't afford the lawyer. We can't do anything. But he's kind of stopped doing this stuff because we haven't responded to anything. I think that's what he's wanting us to do, is go after him and respond to keep his podcast going, and we're not. So he's kind of stopped going on with it. So maybe eventually he's going to be over with it because he doesn't have any truth on anything.

[Family Member 2]

He's just lying through this.

[Family Member 1]

He's just slandering us and lying to everybody about everybody. Oh, my gosh. He's saying that. That we're tracking him on. On Alaska Airlines, where he goes, that. I'm looking at the manifest before he goes, which I have. No, I can't look at the manifest. I have no idea who's on our flights. I'm not allowed to. Nope. All I see is numbers. I don't see the names. I just see numbers and that's it.

[Family Member 2]

I can't do that.

[Family Member 1]

I'm not allowed to. Just a crew, but not passengers, so. Oh, man. He's saying it's just nuts. What, all the stuff he's put on there. No, I refuse to give the time of day until he's been telling me and other people are looking at it, are. But I won't go through any of it because I won't give him the time of day because I know he's all. It's all lies because I know what our family did. I know what we did. He's just doing this to get his podcast going so he makes money off the stupid podcast.

[Family Member 2]

He's just.

[Family Member 1]

He's a piece of. It's horrible. It's just bad. Well, you know, we didn't do anything to it. We were trying to help. We're trying to help the guy, help the family. When you were there through the whole thing, too, you remember what we did for that guy and his family? Oh, yeah. So long ago. It's crazy. I don't know. I don't remember. I don't remember why. Idiot took a break on doing podcasts, I guess. Well, he stopped for, like, us two weeks or something to. I don't know if he's taking a break or what. And then I don't know when he starts it up again. But Jake's having. Probably gonna have to change his number because he keeps harassing Chrissy and Jake on the phone constantly trying to get him, calling him, trying to get him to interview. And, you know, we're not giving this idiot the time of day. So he's threatening to come up and. And start trouble and all this. All this stuff. And so they've. He's probably gonna end up changing his phone number, put a restraining order on him. This guy's crazy. He's not a cop. He's not even a. A real investigator. He's just a blogger. Money off these things that he does to people. And oh yeah, he spent 10 years harassing this other family in Alaska of a missing case I think was over in Tok somewhere or something. And he was assured that this guy murdered this guy and he harassed him just like he's doing with. With up there. Went after this guy, did all the same kind of stuff. They sued him, everything. And then 10 years later, the real killer came out and said, no, this guy had nothing to do with it.

[Interviewer]

I did.

[Family Member 1]

Was in Alaska. Was another missing person's case up in Alaska that he was working on for a long time, and then it ended up coming out. It was. Had nothing to do with the people that he was blaming for it. And the real guy stood up and went to jail for it. And these people sued him for defamation of character and everything else because he just makes money off of all his lies. When he has no evidence and no nothing to support any of it. His. His viewers just sit there and eat it up and he makes money on it and he gets away with it. It's just crazy because I think it would make me too mad to know that there's some idiot out there who's totally lying about us and there's nothing I can do about it because of freedom of speech. I do. But that's what he's wanting from our family. He's wanting us to take the bait and go after him because that keeps his podcast going and that keeps all this money coming in for him. So we've all made the decision up there, you know, that we're not gonna go out, we're not gonna acknowledge this guy. We're not gonna, you know, go in there and start writing a bunch of stuff because that's what he wants. That's what he's edging to Do. He's trying to get us to. To take the bait and go after him. So because he's got tons of lawyers, he's got lots of money, he can do this all day long. I mean, we tried to get a lawyer, and it was over $10,000 just to retain the guy. And then the guy says, yeah, you guys won't win because it's not illegal what he's doing. He can say whatever he wants about somebody. It's not illegal. So it's like, well, can't really do a lawyer because it doesn't do any good. You can say whatever you want about somebody days and can't do anything about it. Yeah, we were up in. Up in. We were. We all got together and talked about it. We got a lawyer on the phone and on a zoom meeting with a lawyer, and there's all of us with a lawyer. He's really only going after Chrissy and Jake. And then because he thinks those two are the ones that have done this whole thing. Even though the FBI, the Alaska State troopers, everybody cleared everybody in our family a long time ago after all those interviews with us, they cleared us all because we all had alibis of what we were doing, where we all were doing. It had nothing to do with us. And that's why the case was closed, because there's no evidence of anything. He probably got taken out by a bear somewhere. But this guy won't agree with that. I don't know why somebody would want to hurt him. He was such a nice person. I mean, you met him, you knew him. He was a nice guy. I don't know why anybody would want to do anything to him. It just doesn't make any sense. You know, to me, what makes sense is he's running in the. He's running on a ridge with no gun, no bear spray, and he's in the most populated bear area around, and he goes missing. I mean, that happens all the time with. With bears and stuff. I just didn't why anybody would want to hurt him or what he would have done to somebody. The reason they're doing it is because there's a lot of people in that are very jealous of the Pascoa family because they're successful. They're a successful native family. All their brothers, you know, are successful, Carol's successful. They're all got good jobs, and people have nothing better to do a gnome except gospel about everybody else. And that thread that everybody's on, whatever they call that thread, nobody knows who it is because you're in There as a fake name. So it could be anybody there that say, oh, yeah, I can say whatever I want now and spread gossip because nobody knows it's me on this site. I think that's what's happening, that people are just nothing better to do but gossip. There's one person in Gnome, and they live out by Snake river, but she's the only one who stood up for the family and said stuff to us and said stuff on that deal for us and to help us that she's the only one. Everybody else is just gossip, gossip, gossip. We went through our Facebooks and we cleaned out so many people that we don't ever talk to. I mean, people somehow knew when we came up to Nome to go hunting, they saw us at the airport. All of a sudden they were. There was talk on that thing wherever that. What I met upset about is that guy took a photo of me and Bonnie getting on the flight in La Dakota, Gnome to say, hey, we're heading up to Nome. You know, a picture we did, and he turned it into, oh, they knew I was coming to Nome, and he has the manifest. So he saw me coming and warned everybody I was coming to know. He took a picture of us off Facebook and put it on his webcast, I guess. Pain. Yeah, the pain, dude. He used our picture off our Facebook, which I don't know how he can take our photos off Facebook when they're private. I think that was before we blocked them all. Blocked everything we blocked. I found him and blocked him. I've blocked all his businesses that he works with, media businesses. I blocked everything. So you can't get into any. Everybody has. We've all blocked everything about him. Cannot get into our Facebooks. Now everybody's made their Facebook private, which a lot of people didn't have done before. But he turned that around like we knew he was coming to know him and warned the town he was coming. It's like, I don't know who this guy is. I don't even know what he looks like, for one thing. I don't even know where he lives. And I cannot access anything of the manifest at Alaska Airlines. I. All I get on my iPad is the number of passengers in a numerical form. 175 is all I see of the people. I can't see the names. I'd have to log on at the counter to do what the CA CSAs do. And I don't have that login information. I'm not even allowed to touch those computers. So he. He was saying that he. He said, which he claimed he did, that he went to Alaska Airlines to tell them that I was in the manifest telling Gnome that this guy was coming up and that he was going to get me in trouble. And he was looking at Tom, too, about doing the same thing and blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, he never did because Alaska Airlines never said a thing to me about it. They never called me about. They never emailed me about it. And then he said he turned it all over to the faa, which. The FAA can't do anything about it. And I'm not worried about it. That's why I don't. It's. It's. It is. What pisses me off is this guy's making money off ruining people's reputation for his own gain. And that's what's wrong. And that's what we can't do anything about. We gotta let it run its course and be done because people are already starting to get tired of it because he has no new information, because we're not giving him new information. We're not. We're not going after him. We're not saying a word. So it's just kind of going dead. And I think he's given up, hopefully.

[Interviewer]

You told me there was never anything recovered from Joseph.

[Family Member 1]

Nope, there wasn't.

[Interviewer]

How was his credit card used two weeks after he went missing?

[Family Member 1]

I have no idea. Maybe his family had it. Was that in the podcast or something? Oh, see, I haven't watched any of these podcasts, so I don't know any of this stuff. I never heard that one before. But maybe his family had it or something. No, I mean, when they came up to search for him, maybe they added stuff. I don't know. Yeah, I have no idea. I never even heard that. Even back then, they never mentioned that. I don't know. Maybe someone had his cart. Maybe someone stole his card. Yeah, I have no idea on that one. I always wondered if he was in witness protection or something.

[Interviewer]

You dropped this bomb on me that the family was involved. You were interviewed eight years ago and never mentioned it to me.

[Family Member 1]

We never heard about it till just recently. This guy popped up out of nowhere and started doing. He started with that girl who went missing on the beach also. We did that eight years ago. Now, the reason they interviewed us eight years ago when it happened is because we were all friends with Joseph and he was friends with our family. So we agreed to do interviews to make sure that we all were good and that we weren't involved in any of it, which we weren't and that's why we chose to voluntarily do the interviews with the FBI and the police.

[Interviewer]

Why'd you lie to the investigator about the day you saw the truck?

[Family Member 1]

I didn't lie to the investigator. Okay. We saw a blue car go by down there. I don't know if it was Saturday or Sunday. There were two blue cars, I remember, of the same kind in. No, there were two of those exact vehicles in Gnome. And I know when Kevin and I were working on the building, we saw that one car go by and we waved and we think. Thought it was him. I don't know if there's another one that went by on Sunday because we were working at camp that whole weekend. That's eight years ago. You know, how am I supposed to remember exact details from eight years ago when we don't. Haven't been dealing with it? It's been eight years. You know what I mean? We know. We had nothing to do with him going missing because we were busy that weekend. We were working. We didn't even see him. That we can't accept for the car drive by. Well, join the rest of us, because we're all confused too, because we don't understand why all of a sudden, eight years later, this guy decides he's gonna get on a missing person's case and then try to ruin everybody's life for no reason when there's. There is no evidence of anything. Which was already done and cleared way before eight years ago. We were all cleared. And we did all this voluntarily. We didn't even have to do these interviews. We did it all voluntarily to help try to find him. That's why we did it. And the. And the. Actually, the. The interviews we did were supposed to be. What do they call it? Or you can't reread them or whatever. What do they call that where you're not incognito? But they weren't supposed to be public made public. They were supposed to be private interviews. That's why we agreed to do that. And somehow whoever that idiot was who interviewed us leaked them out to this guy. And this guy's got them all without our permission. So that might actually be illegal. I don't know.

[Interviewer]

So you guys weren't involved in any way?

[Family Member 1]

No, of course not. Why would. Why would we even want to hurt Joseph? He was our friend. He was a friend of the family. Why would we want to hurt him for any reason whatsoever? We helped his family. We treated his family like family. When they came up here, we spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars flying around looking for him, trying to do stuff to help. Help at least any way we could. I mean, you know, our family, you know, we're not people that would do anything bad like that. We'd have no reason to do something like that. Nobody would.

[Interviewer]

Why did Jake lie to the cops?

[Family Member 1]

He was very scared because he lived with Joseph and he was young and he was scared. You know, they were doing some. Probably doing some pot and stuff in there. And I think he was. Which he even said later. He was just really scared that everything was gonna get pinned on him because he was a roommate. And that's why he originally lied, but told the truth after that and he was even cleared.

[Interviewer]

Was he involved with drugs?

[Family Member 1]

He smoked pot when he was up there. But yeah, he. He hasn't done drugs. He hasn't done pot, I don't think in a really long time. But when he was a teenager, he did a little bit.

[Interviewer]

Why aren't you guys protesting and trying to say your side of the story?

[Family Member 1]

Well, we really want to, and we would love to go after this guy and prove that he's a fraud, which a lot of other people have already done. But you can't. We can't afford it. We can't afford the lawyer. I mean, Carol was gonna paid for most of it and she can't even afford this lawyer to do what we need to do. This guy is huge. He's got massive backing behind him. He makes millions off his podcast sitting on the east coast and he comes over and he just does missing persons cases because he wants to be. It's think he's an investigator and he tries to do all this stuff and he's never even proven anything in any of his podcast stories about anything. He's never done anything to prove that he's right. He's always been wrong on everything and he just ruins people's lives. But we don't have the money to fight it. It costs too much. Lawyers are way too much money. And it would do it ball up in court so long and we just. Nobody can afford to do it. So we just agreed. Well, you know, none of us have anything to hide. Our family did nothing. So let him say what he wants. You know, if we don't go after him and we don't sit there and keep this whole thing going, which is what he wants to do, because that keeps his listeners listening and it keeps the money flowing. We just shut up about it. It'll just go away. And that's. It's starting to do that finally because he has no new stuff to go off of, and it's just his ruining. Chrissy's just stressed out all the time because this guy's. This guy's constantly calling and harassing him. He's. He constantly calls Jake all the time trying to get him to do. Jake won't answer it. We blocked all his numbers, but he'll start calling from different numbers. So I think he's going to actually go to the known police and file a retraining order on the number and the guy.

[Interviewer]

Why did you guys not say anything to me about this before?

[Family Member 1]

Well, you're pretty young and it didn't involve you in any of it. So we didn't feel like it was necessary for. To put you through something you didn't have to go through because, you know, we just wanted to tell the cops what our family was doing. So we were in the clear because.

[Family Member 2]

We knew we were.

[Family Member 1]

And that's why we chose to do the interviews with them. We didn't have to do anything because they weren't. They weren't worried about you. You were just a kid. You know, he just wanted to talk to his immediate friends and family, which we kind of were, so. And then they did, and they cleared everybody. And then that was the end of it. That's been the end of it for all these years until this guy, it pops out of nowhere and, you know, brings all this stuff up and twists everything and starts, you know, he's. He's falsely accusing everybody with no evidence. He puts out zero evidence because he has not. He's just going off what he thinks and what he believes. He doesn't know. Gnome. He doesn't know. And he's a family. He doesn't know about the wildlife in. He doesn't know how things work in the bush. No, he has no clue. He lives in the freaking east coast somewhere.

[Interviewer]

You guys both know if a bear kills something, they leave evidence.

[Family Member 1]

Not always. They bury him pretty quick. That's why we searched so much, because we were trying to find something. But we're not knowing where he ran exactly. You know, it's a huge area. It's hard to search that even though we had so many people searching, it's just. We didn't find anything. And that's the crazy part about it, is that there's nothing.

[Interviewer]

I thought him and Chrissy were together at one point.

[Family Member 1]

No, they were never together. They were just close friends. But that guy, that girl he was having the affair with, the husband after Joseph died, just lost his marbles. He was A teacher at the school, he totally lost his marbles. I think they got divorced and he left. He just left? No, he just went nuts. He went crazy. But this guy's not saying anything about them or looking into that. Even though maybe it's nothing, but he's not looking into that. Why? Why? Just. Oh, why Just the Pascoists, because they're successful. Because, you know, they're in positions of. Of high. Not high power, but in big positions around gnome with, you know, Carol and you know Tom and you know, Captain Alaska and. And dude being in law enforcement. So, you know, this other guy is just a teacher or whatever. So he's not. It's not a big. Big enough story, I guess, to go down that rabbit hole, even though maybe there's nothing there. I don't know anything about it, but I know that Joseph was messing around with that girl.

[Interviewer]

Did Kevin mess with tracks?

[Family Member 1]

Yeah, I know when we drove down there that one time and saw his car, we parked on the road and we were walking around his car and it was unlocked. So, yeah, that may have messed up tracks and stuff, but at that point, none of us were thinking that, you know, something had. Bad, bad had happened to him. No afterwards. Because once he didn't show back up Monday for work. And then they reported him missing and then we all started. I don't remember how many days it was before we started the store search. We drove down to where he had said he was going to be, and we could see his truck right there. And so we walked around obviously looking. They may have been at the same time, I'm not sure. But, you know, we went down there and looked. We looked around that car that one time, and I do remember unlocked, but there was just nothing. Nothing of his. There was nothing there. I mean, the cops went down, went over that whole car anyway. They went through everything. But we didn't mess with anything. We wouldn't have. We wouldn't have known that it was going to be a criminal case anyway. At that point, we're just trying to figure out where he went. Yeah, I wish we could fight this guy. I wish I could get on there in my own words and be like, hey, you know what, you dumbass, You. I can't look at past your manifest. I don't know you. I don't know where you live. I don't even know what you look like like, much less anything. Why would I be looking for you coming to know him. I could care less where you're going, and I cannot look at that. I Would get fired if I could look at people's manifests. I can't do that. I have no way to do that. Even on my company material, I'm not allowed to. We can't see that. But that would just give him more ammo to keep going after stuff. Oh, there's no way. And I think that's why Alaska never said anything to me. If he even said anything to them, I think he's lying about it. I think he's just saying it to try to get a rise out of us. They track stuff very. They're very good on security. They would have texted me right away and be like, hey, do you know what's going on with this? Is this guy? You know, I've heard a word in months from them about any of it, so I don't think he even went to a lot. I think he put it on there, trying to keep the story going.

[Interviewer]

Were you guys aware that they were investigating possible foul play?

[Family Member 1]

Oh, yeah, they put it right out there. That's why they came. The cops got involved right away because they were. They. He went missing. We couldn't find him. So of course they get involved. They have to go down these routes because we did that. We weren't required to. They didn't ask us to. We did them voluntarily.

[Interviewer]

There's a felony charge if you know about foul play and don't say anything. Is that a possibility?

[Family Member 1]

No, it isn't, because they've already cleared us and put us out of the system because we all approved where we were. I have flight manifests of where I was during the whole time when I was flying at Ryanair. All that's documented. So I'm clear. Bonnie was working up here.

[Family Member 2]

In here.

[Family Member 1]

That's clear. Jake has. He was working. They know where he was. They know where everybody was. And that's why we did all this stuff. So they knew. Hey, we. We saw him drive by. I don't remember what days it was, but we saw him drive by while we were working at camp that weekend, and he did not stop, which we thought was odd. And we made sure that. We told them that. It's like Joseph should have stopped to say hi, and he didn't. He roared on by and that's. That's it. We. We can't say, yes, it was him in the car because we can't tell, but it kind of looked like him. But he went by so fast, it's hard to see who was in that car. Maybe it was somebody totally different. Maybe somebody did take him out and kill him and bury him, and they were trying to get his car down. Who knows? I mean, nobody knows. If no one comes forth and says anything, no one's ever gonna know. That's. But nobody in our family would have. Would have had any reason to do anything to harm him. He was our friend. He was a family friend.

[Interviewer]

Why would Jake lied to the troopers?

[Family Member 1]

I think maybe because they were doing, you know, some illegal drugs in the house that they all lived in. And maybe he was scared, something with that. I don't know. He was young and, you know, not as mature, obviously, as he is now, and. And so maybe that's why he just was scared about it. But he told the truth later, and it was all clear. I mean, you should call him and ask him, come talk about it. He'll be open with you about. He's a grown man now. He'll tell you everything. I'll tell you exactly why. I mean, it'd be better than, you know, thinking that, you know, I mean, having you think something. Jake's trying to hide something. Just, you know, don't be a man about him. Call him up and ask him. He'll tell you. So tell exactly everything that happened. Whole thing doesn't make sense because people just don't disappear off the face of the earth like that. And maybe they already looked into all that stuff in the original investigation and didn't do anything about it because there wasn't. They figured it out. I don't know. Maybe this guy is not putting his whole truth out there. If he's saying, well, there's someone who does this credit card, well, maybe he's not finishing off the story that, well, the cops found out that this card had been taken and it was being used and it was canceled. You know, maybe he's just trying to spin the story to say somebody in Gnome, you know, did something to him and using his cards. Who knows? But I'm sure they. I'm sure the FBI turned over every single leaf in this whole thing already. I'm sure that's why it's a closed case now, because there was no evidence of anything. Found nothing.

[Interviewer]

The whole family is choosing not to talk to Payne.

[Family Member 1]

Yeah, that's why we haven't said a word about it on anything. That's why we've deleted every single thing we can find of this guy. Blocked him on all of our social medias we've made. All our social media is private. Jake and Gwen have actually canceled all their Facebook stuff because this guy was harassing them. So bad he was taking pictures of their kids off of their Facebook. So there's, you know, this guy's kind of scaring them. So they closed all their accounts, man, we've shut down. I, I, we looked up the guy's name.

[Interviewer]

If nobody did anything wrong, why is everybody so scared?

[Family Member 1]

We're not just, we're not scared. We're just trying to not let him into our lives and ruin what we have. That's, We' didn't do anything. So why let him into all of our private stuff? That is none of his business. That he's profiting off stealing stuff off our Facebooks and using it. That's what they said. They were using them on that, on that app. No, he's pulled a bunch of stuff and used it in those podcasts. You probably saw it. He doesn't, I mean, I haven't watched it. Is it a video or is it only, I don't know. The podcast have pictures and videos on them or not? It's on this other app then where these things are showing up then. But he's on that app and he's putting things on that app so people start talking about it. I think that's where some of our pictures have ended up on that, whatever that site is. But since then we've, you know, we've blocked everything. So because he has no business getting into our stuff. It's, it's, this is, this is our life. He has no business prying into, you know what I mean? We don't go pray into his personal life. You don't pray into his Facebook. You know, he's doing this as a business and making money off of, off off his lies and off his stories. Because he's a podcaster. This is how these podcasters make money. They, that's the same thing with politics. People do the same thing with politics. They slam other people. They drag dirt, supposed dirt up to try to ruin someone's reputation. Then later they find out, oh, it was all wrong. They just did it for political reasons. So this guy does it for money. He makes a millions of dollars off this stuff.

[Narrator]

Up and Vanished in the Midnight sun is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with Odyssey. Your host is Payne Lindsay. The show is written by Payne Lindsay with additional assistance from Mike Rooney. Executive producers are Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay. Lead producer is Mike Rooney along with producers Dylan Harrington and Cooper Skinner. Editing by Mike Rooney and Cooper Skinner with additional editing by Dylan Harrington. Supervising producer is Tracy Kaplan. Additional Production by Victoria McKenzie, Alice Kanique, Glenn and Eric Quintana. Artwork by Rob Sheridan Original music by Makeup and Vanity set mixed and mastered by Cooper Skinner. Thank you to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at uta, Beck Media and Marketing and the Nord Group. Special thanks to all of the families and community members that spoke to the team. Additional information and resources can be found in our show Notes. For more podcasts like up and Banished, search Tenderfoot TV on your favorite podcast app or visit us@Tenderfoot TV. Thanks for listening.