Any of the students suspecting that the gun might have been a cap gun or that it held blanks were likewise enlightened to the true or of the scenario.
Nothing could possibly prepare you for this, and yet in schools all across this country, we've been attempting to for decades now.
[Music]
Hi Cassie. Hi Caitlyn. Hi creepy people. Hello! I said hello instead of Lou. I noticed it, but I was just going to like breeze past it.
I messed up. It's fine. I messed up. It's okay. What are you going to do? I can't win them all. Yeah. I know not everybody can be quite as graceful as a moll who just, you know, yanked.
Oh yeah, I forgot about that already. Yeah. Good. Oh yeah. I mean, I didn't do that. Anyways. I am in the corner of shame. You need the cone hat.
Yeah. What is that? A dumps cap. Or yeah, a dumps cap. I've heard it called like, "Dun's Hat, DUNSCAP." Either way, put it on your head. You'd dance.
Yeah. If you're new to our creepy corner of the world, this is PNW Haunts and Homicides, where we chat about true crime, the paranormal, and all things creepy in the Pacific Northwest.
We do tarot reading at the end of every episode for a little deeper insight and do our topic of the day and stick around if you're into that.
And if you don't, then I'm just wondering, like, how have we not converted you? You know? Yeah.
I could use some feedback on that, I guess. Maybe. I don't know. We don't want that. It's nice. It's fine.
Alright, so the one good thing I can say about this case or story is that there's not a single instance of harmed animals. Yay!
Yep. That I'm aware of. That's awesome. Great episode, Caitlin. Alright, let's wrap. She's like, "And we're out."
Yeah, anyways. I'm just gonna brush past. I'm just gonna get ready and do it.
I actually have a little bit about an animal death thing, but it's like not. It's like kind of funny.
Oh, I can tell it at the end or I can tell it now if you want.
I was gonna say, I do have something for at the end. So I don't know. You might need something funny at the end. And mine is not gonna be funny.
And mine's like quick and it related to what we were just talking about. Okay, well, I say, let's do it.
Okay. This might be surprising, but I recently recommended a book to somebody that had an animal death in it.
Cassie. And I was like, wow, I've come a long way, but it was kind of like a funny animal death.
It's hard to explain. The book is called Night Bitch and it's hilarious. So if anyone wants to read it.
Okay, that sounds really familiar.
Alright, but anyway, there is an animal death in it, but it's also kind of funny. So it's okay.
Alright, do you say so? It's like how I can tolerate it. If it's just like, you know, a little comedy from what makes sense?
A little comedy thrown in. Yeah, yeah, sort of our format. That makes, I guess, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was it.
Alright, alright.
We'll save mine for the end. It's not funny, but it will hopefully be the pickup that we need at the end.
Okay. Yay. So something to look forward to.
Number 27th 2006 was a Wednesday in Colorado. Well, everywhere for that matter, but that's where our story takes place.
Not in like the other side of the world where they have different days. They're like a whole day away.
That's the thing I said. Alright. Emily Keys was a 16 and a half year old teenage girl living in Bailey, Colorado.
Attending Platte Canyon High School. While she and her peers attended classes that morning, it seemed like a pretty typical day.
But obviously I'm alluding to the fact that it wasn't. No. I know. I'm like, I'm really trying to make it lighter and there's just not a...
Okay. However, my research indicates that some seemingly benign, though perhaps strange happenings were taking place in very close proximity to the high school. Yeah. Okay.
Yeah.
That's according to surveillance footage that I'm sure was only reviewed in hindsight. At 842 AM, a man pulled into the parking lot of the school.
Just two minutes later, at 844, his vehicle leaves.
Roughly only two more minutes go by when at 846 AM, the same vehicle inexplicably returns to the law and remains in a different parking spot for about 11 minutes before leaving again.
Okay.
The Jeep would return to the same spot at 944 AM. Security cameras would show that he remained there and even mingled with some students bustling about for approximately 20 minutes.
A male student reported that he had asked about a list of female students.
Ew. Okay. This is like not a high school age, dude. Did you say that already? Yeah. You know, I haven't actually... You haven't revealed.
It's illicitly stated, but that is correct. Your intuition is on point. I mean, like if he was a high school, he would be inside the school, right?
Right. Yeah. It's a rebel skipping school hanging out in the parking lot. Yeah.
A weird choice. That right. I mean, it's a thing you could do, but I'm not sure why you would. Yeah. You're going to get caught. That's a good way to get caught.
Right. That's like, you know, like devil-made cares sort of attitude. Like, I'm going to get caught, you know. I don't know.
I'm totally picturing grease right now. Yeah.
It was at 10.43 a.m. that he exited his vehicle. And roughly an hour later is when he would enter the school wearing a black hoodie, carrying a Glock 22 pistol, along with a Smith & Wesson 357 revolver into Camo backpack.
It's too many guns. It's a few too many if you're trying to enter a public school. Yeah. I would argue. Yeah.
He briefly wandered the nearly empty halls before entering room 206. Sandra Smith's honors English within the English pod.
At the time, Mrs. Smith was instructing a college prep English class and some students were working in the computer lab next door.
Bailey Colorado, where the Canyon Platt High School was located, was only about 45 minutes away from where the deadly Columbine shooting happened some years prior.
But surely nothing so horrific could happen in a small rural Colorado town's high school, right? I hope not.
I mean, there were roughly 3500 people living there. They didn't even have a movie theater. Oh, wow. So like really a small town. Super small. Yeah.
When Mrs. Smith noticed the presence of a strange man in his 50s in her classroom, she questioned him and the two began arguing, leading some students to believe he might have been a disgruntled parent.
I mean, yeah, I guess that would be a logical kind of. Yeah. Who comes in and argues with the teacher? Like, right. You know, I mean, first of all, Karen, not a great move as a parent either. But yeah, this guy was definitely not a parent.
When he pulled out a handgun and ordered the students up to the front of the classroom, they were seemingly quickly corrected. I don't think that any of them continued to believe that that was a parent.
Yeah. I mean, I guess possible, but like probably not. It seems a lot less likely in my instance. I'm sure.
Still, the gravity of the situation wasn't immediately apparent to everyone, even in relatively close proximity within the English pod.
So this kind of reminds me of like the dual classes that we had when we were in high school, where it was like you'd have English and social studies.
And it was technically like two classrooms and they took the like that like pull out separator. And they opened it up and you'd have two teachers and they would rotate.
I literally never understood that it's really weird. Like what I still don't get what what was happening, but whatever it's very strange. I feel like that might be something that like we sort of just internalized as like that was our high school experience.
But like I don't think that's super normal. I don't. I don't. Yeah. Yeah. It seems weird to me. But anyways.
So this was multiple classes that were going on that were, you know, within the English pod. And because it's such a small town, the layout of some of this school.
I don't I'll get to it here in a little bit. There's some important details about kind of how how this all plays out related to the layout.
So okay. Some account state that at one point students in the computer lab tried to re-enter the classroom, noticing the lights were off, prompting the gunman to fire a warning shot into the ceiling.
Any of the students suspecting that the gun might have been a cap gun or that it held blanks were likewise enlightened to the true horror of the scenario.
Nothing could possibly prepare you for this. And yet in schools all across this country.
We've been attempting to for decades now literally decades. It's pretty wild. Yeah. Remember those drills we used to do or they call it I can't remember.
Active shooter drills. Yeah. And we're going to talk about that. That's like. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. This is a little bit different of a situation. I will tell you that. So it's not going to be exactly what you expect. Fortunately or unfortunately, I there's no good way to look at this.
I think the gunman ordered some of the female students, all of the male students and the teacher to leave.
He reportedly released taller and heavier frame students as well as Burnett girls from the classroom.
Oh, yeah. That got real creepy real fast.
The teacher initially resisted, but he threatened both the students and teacher. So she and the other reluctant students eventually left.
What do you want to know what choice you have? He was said to have fired a shot into the air forcing them to flee to the administrative office.
There are two distinct instances where he's described as firing a warning shot as it's you'll hear it referred to, I think.
And I'm sort of lacking a better term for that. But and it's unclear to me if the multiple descriptions from witness accounts are actually describing the same occurrence.
Or if he really did fire multiple times.
And I have reviewed some of the official reports that have been released on this, but I just think in the chaos of this situation, even an official report.
Like these are things that are happening before law enforcement arrives. Everybody is going to have different experiences as a witness.
So I'm just putting that out there because I think that was something I really felt like I wanted to nail down and be sure that I knew like certain details of the timeline that I don't think I don't think it's possible necessarily.
Even the official report, I feel like given that level of chaos.
I'm just not sure that we could ever really know that for sure. Yeah. And that's well, I guess she still can't. I was like unless they found bullets later and like counted them up. But like still, I would you know when they were shot.
Yeah. Yeah. I just think, you know, I mean that could certainly help. But I do feel like that still like you say like it, it just.
It's tricky. It's like one of those things you think they like would figure out on like Dexter how it happened, but like in real life, they probably wouldn't figure that out as easily.
Right. They couldn't say for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I kind of think so.
It's a bit of uncertainty that perhaps official reports might claim to neatly resolve. But I feel like if it's the only bit that remains uncertain in the retelling today, it's crucial.
It's a mere modicum of the discomfort that the students and staff present that day would have felt.
Because there was part of me that realized as I'm researching this, I am trying to research this to make myself feel better because I need to understand it.
And I want to know that I know the details of this event and I know the details of this timeline and the fact that I feel like in certain respects, there's just no way that I can know that it bothers me.
And I thought, I think maybe I need to sit in that discomfort.
You know, yeah. I don't know if that makes sense, but yeah.
You need to do some journaling, Caitlin. I'm not going to do journaling. I will sit in my discomfort over that though. I just thought I felt like that was important.
You know what? What?
I sit in my discomfort every time you tell me a story.
That's true.
Yeah, same Z's. Yeah. Yeah.
Although it's getting better for me at least. You're like, it'll never be better for me. Thanks a lot. I got to find a real scary one for you next.
Don't help her. Do not help her.
You've been a really scary suggestions. Or if you have a really scary story, you want to write into us or email us, pnwhauntsandhomicides@gmail.com.
And you can be a part of our creepy people chronicles.
Just saying. We help me scare Caitlin.
I am not behind this mission. This this this campaign is not sponsored by Caitlin 2024.
I'm going to cut out everything she says because I have full control.
I'm going to splice together saying like, I agree with you guys.
My God, she has so much power. You guys it's gone to her head. I can just make an AI voice for you. Right?
That's true. Yeah. We don't even need her anymore.
I knew this day would come. I'd be replaced by the bots.
The retreating teacher and students made their way to safety as well as to seek assistance for those left behind.
The code white was issued upon learning of the active shooter. The school went into immediate lockdown.
Apparently teachers knew exactly what that meant, though students did not.
Code white. Interesting.
Another student named Taylor would share in interviews years later that her reaction at the time when they were hearing what in hindsight was clearly gunshots.
It was to almost sort of joke about it. Like that's not a gun shot. It's a door slamming.
Everyone reacts differently in these situations clearly evidenced by the girl that was immediately hysterically crying.
Which kind of breaks my heart because it's like, damn, she knew this sound.
Hopefully she just knew that because dad was like, you know, a hunter recreationally.
Yeah, I wonder if she just like had the intuition or yeah.
Our brains and other biological responses do their damnedest keep us alive somehow.
Taylor was 15 years old at the time of the shooting and throughout her high school career would prove to be something of a high achiever
as the president of the student council and a member of the debate team.
I'd be remiss if I didn't share a portion of my research. So I'll mention that dire trip played some of the 9-1-1 call where we hear the voice of the teacher.
Oh. They played that in their episode as many other sources did.
Reportedly, the gunman threatened that if anyone were to return to the classroom, he had enough explosives to blow up the school.
Jesus.
It feels like I was just telling you a story about a bombing.
Yeah. And yet here we are again. It's so intense.
Yeah.
But there is a little bit of good news.
Okay.
Taylor, likely as many of her peers did, had a sibling also attending the school.
A younger brother.
Hmm.
Which I realized doesn't seem like particularly good news on the surface necessarily.
But despite how that might sound, that's one bright spot in this case because the junior high aged students attended classes in an adjoining.
Building.
Because it's a really small town.
Yeah.
They don't have a movie theater.
So it's like literally all of the youth practically of this entire town is on this campus.
Oh gosh. That's really scary too.
Yes.
The high school and middle school were connected by the cafeteria.
The younger kids had been evacuated by crossing the parking lot and hiking them all through the woods.
Whoa.
Yeah.
Like get away.
Yes.
Wow.
I mean, which thank God that they, you know, were able to do that because at this point they're literally thinking there's not only a gunman but potentially a bomb.
Yeah.
And I can't even imagine that's such a scary situation.
Wow.
How young was like the youngest kid, do you know?
I mean, I don't know if their middle school went down to like sixth grade or if it was seventh grade.
But I mean, yeah, you're talking about like potentially sixth seventh graders.
Like, these are young kids like 11, 12.
Having to flee from school.
That's crazy.
So, you know, that's a huge piece.
The most students wouldn't receive that level of clarifying information until much later.
So, if you had a younger sibling in the middle school, you know, that's such a huge, like you've got to be worried about your sibling, I would think.
Yeah.
And I have to say that this might have been the most troubling aspect of the idea of violence in an academic setting.
But I'm really looking back.
I could have been stabbed in college years later walking to my car on one of the mini nights when the street lights were out for some reason on an isolated campus on the outskirts of Portland proper.
And that never really struck fear in my heart, which maybe it should have.
Probably.
Yeah.
Sometimes it is just a hat rack.
At least not the way that the idea of something happening on our high school campus in the couple of years that my brother and I attended high school together dead.
I'd like to say that it was because I was worried for my parents, like grappling with loss of two children potentially.
I think I knew then and I know still that it was because I would scorch earth from every end of the fucking planet if anything ever happened to my brother.
I just would be like completely ruined.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm sure my mom would be sad too.
Yeah.
Taylor said it didn't feel real until they were taking role in the gym and she was realizing that some people were clearly not present or their names weren't being called.
It was actually her mother taking role as she worked at the front desk of the school.
I don't think any high schooler has ever been happy happier or happy at all to have a parent working on their own campus.
Yeah.
I'm sure seeing her mom's face with all of the confusion and fear of the morning was such.
I just can't even imagine what a relief that would have been in the moment.
So we know that the youngest children present on the campus at the time of the lockdown were whisked away to safety.
The lockdown was also able to do the same for many of their slightly more senior students attending classes on the high school side of campus.
We know we're getting a lot of kids evacuated.
So we know that in all of this chaos, the family of Emily Keys was notified of the situation taking place at the school.
Her father was shocked to learn that the classroom where the incident was unfolding was none other than her current class on that day at that very time.
He drove to the school but couldn't get very close to the building.
Emily's mother drove straight to the police station and that's where she would learn that her daughter was indeed identified as one of the current hostages.
Emily's father asked for someone to text her and within a short time a singular reply was received.
I love you guys.
However, additional text messages were unanswered. The gunman turned off all the lights in the classroom as he repositioned his bag to the middle of the room.
He threatened that none of them should touch the backpack as it held explosives.
It was at this time that he systematically took each of the individual girls to the back of the classroom alone.
All that the others could do was stand in quiet, horrified shock as they heard tell-tale signs of their fellow classmates or deal.
The sound of zippers, belts, and other clothing being ripped as some of the girls begged him to stop.
Each individual victim only silenced by the gunman's threats of violence.
Details of the sexual assaults have not been revealed due to the fact that the victims were minors at the time of the horrific crimes.
I'm okay with that.
At 1215, a single female hostage was released from the classroom and was eventually escorted outside of the building.
Slowly, law enforcement began to get a more well-rounded picture of the situation inside room 206.
The sexual assaults taking place as well as the gunman seemingly singular focus on Emily upon learning her last name.
The man who would fly into fits of rage throughout the ordeal was unemployed and unhoused at the time.
His name was Dwayne Morrison.
Later, reflection would reveal he appeared to not only drift away from those once close to him but also in all probability reality.
He was living in his vehicle on the grounds of a national forest.
Meanwhile, also struggling with bipolar one and trauma, his overall condition was marked by hallucinations.
Law enforcement responded quickly once alerted to the situation on the campus.
Whereas officers responding to the shooting at Columbine had been criticized for remaining outside as the deadly events unfolded, these officers knew they would be taking a proactive approach.
Both law enforcement and school staff, along with students, had the benefit of hindsight from that horrific event.
I actually watched an interview with a couple of the guys that were on the SWAT team in Colorado.
They talked about how after Columbine, the turnover with SWAT was really crazy for a while.
The team that they had at least the time of this interview, they talked about how they all kind of once they got this cork group together, they decided we're going to do this differently.
We're not going to have another Columbine, which all they can do, all they can control is how they respond.
But I mean, my God, it was a little bit heartbreaking to see these guys who look like Navy SEALS either in or on the verge of tears.
An alert system was adopted in order to provide vital information to law enforcement entering the facility.
A green card slid underneath a classroom's door, signaled that the occupants were currently safe and un-injured.
I viewed this slideshow about preparing for active shooter scenarios.
It's now woefully outdated, but it was kind of of this era actually a few years after this shooting even.
I'm not totally sure what the current procedures today look like in all aspects, but I will mention a few key points of the response plan, kind of general talking points from the PowerPoint regarding an active shooter.
I think there's a few things that have changed with time as has our understanding of these crimes.
The PowerPoint was developed to explain key terms, informing the response of those involved in a school shooting or other violent type of attack.
So here are some of the bullet points.
In addition to locking or otherwise attempting to secure the space being occupied, the initial slide I'll describe advises turning off the lights, TVs or other sources of noise,
keeping students quiet and away from door and windows.
The next section discusses the system with red and green cards.
So I want to say just before I forget this initial section that I'm kind of reading through, there might be some things that have changed.
So please don't take this as sort of the gospel in current day and I'm going to point out a couple of things that I know specifically have changed.
So with the red and green cards, if injured people are present or immediate medical care is needed, use the red card only.
Slide it under the door and put it in the window. No other colored cards should be used.
When the green versus red card system was being used by putting a green card out at the onset of the event, teachers were actually flagging their classroom and being occupied.
Just going to say that.
So I think this one's a pretty obvious example, but I have a couple of other ones that I'll circle back and kind of explain where the common knowledge I guess or recommendation, it's a little bit changed.
Importantly for law enforcement status may change in the room.
Medical emergency occurs following display of green card, for example. So maybe when you threw the card out there, nobody was hurt. And now somebody is.
Now you have two cards indicating two opposite things outside the door to law enforcement. So if you've got two different cards out there, there's like, well, what the fuck are they supposed to think?
I would assume the worst, hopefully. Yeah, yeah, I mean, but that just is confusing and yeah, obviously these are things that are going to be leaked to the general public at large.
There's no way for them to keep that information out of the hands of somebody who might perpetrate the crime.
Other concerns of note related to the previous multi color card system. Schools within the same county often had different card systems.
Not great. No. The event will be a multi agency response.
Okay, if somebody shows up to a school with a gun, you're going to have potentially, you know, your state, please look what all different forms of law enforcement that are responding, SWAT team, whatever.
The card system used in this county should be the same system used in any other county.
Basically, the point is you need to establish consistency. Whatever it is, it needs to be clear so that anybody who walks in is going to understand.
Yeah. If you have a substitute teacher and like they teach all over the state, that could be so confusing.
The enforcement is also only concerned with the red card anyway. They're like, please don't point us towards classrooms where everybody's okay.
We'll go ahead and we'll clear the rooms. Yeah. But like if there's somebody that needs attention, like maybe flag that everything else is not great.
That makes more sense.
I've been related to the card system, but important to note and my research indicates that this is based on current guidelines.
Do not worry about closing the window blinds or shades.
Law enforcement has never liked this action taken by schools. It eliminates sight into the room by law enforcement snipers, while also limiting vision out of the classroom at your surroundings.
If a hostage situation occurs, suspects are more apt to pull shades down to limit law enforcement's ability to see inside the room and assess the situation.
It can be much quicker for law enforcement to pick out the room with possible trouble inside without this interference.
That makes sense to me. Yeah. Back to our case at hand.
As law enforcement approached the classroom, the gunman held one of his captives at gunpoint using the young girl as a human shield.
He was cornered, but with innocent civilians, he was carefully keeping in close proximity.
Law enforcement had very few options.
Worseening the situation was the threat he leveled, supposedly having three pounds of C4 in his backpack.
Jeez.
Which is a lot of f*ckin' C4.
Because I have none.
Right. That's like what I was basing it off of, too.
Yeah.
Do you know how big of an explosion that would be?
I really am not sure. I think they fully anticipated that that would take out the entire school.
So relatively large.
Yeah. I'm just not well versed enough in a lot of things that I would need to know to be able to like even effectively research that.
You didn't Google how much C4 it would take to blow up a school?
Well, schools are all different sizes.
I know, but that would be like a little bit of a red flag.
Right. If you Google that.
Yeah. Yes, it sure would. Thanks for the suggestion, Cassie.
You're welcome.
God.
Law enforcement was left with few options but to retreat.
At least temporarily to regroup as they tried to formulate a response strategy that would ensure everyone's safe return help.
At least that was the hope.
Given the threat of explosives being present on the campus, it was paramount that the responding law enforcement preserved the lives of as many of the innocent inhabitants as possible.
Please call in the bomb squad and begin evacuating the other students and staff from the school.
Gradually, additional female students held in room 206 were released by their capture.
Room by room, the rest of the students and staff in the building were evacuated.
So I arrived at approximately 130 p.m. and tried to begin negotiations, but he really would never speak to them.
So police set explosive charges around the door in case they needed to force entry.
Snipers were nearby, but with daylight fading, there wasn't much hope that they would be able to assist all that much.
And when they attempted with a fiber optic camera on a robot, they inserted that under the door.
That was all but useless.
Unless you find enraging the hostage taker useful.
Yeah, did do that because apparently he noticed it.
No shit.
So.
But I mean, they got to try.
Right.
What do you do?
I mean, it's tough.
It's really tough.
I mean, and I think I didn't come across really anything that had much in the way of criticism as far as like how their response to this.
To this event, how it all played out.
I mean, my God, they weren't just standing outside.
So.
Yeah.
Emily had been used as a communicator with law enforcement and was instructed to tell the police that this would be over at 4 p.m.
So they just have to wait.
They feared this would be when his explosives would detonate.
At 335, they breached the room using the charges set around the classroom door and flashbangs.
These devices would later be determined to have performed as indented.
He was positioned against the back wall of the classroom.
Emily's head was in his left hand.
And his gun in his right positioned at her temple.
One other hostage was able to flee the room and was escorted by SWAT to safety.
As SWAT advanced, he raised his gun.
Emily attempted to take a step forward and was swiftly shot by Morrison.
So I was able to see SWAT open fire on him, but he also shot himself in the right side of his head effectively ending the ordeal.
He was ultimately pronounced dead at the scene at 3.57 p.m.
Emily still had a pulse when police arrived at her side.
They tried intubating her as well as administrating CPR before she was airlifted to St. Anthony's Central Hospital.
Though she was rapidly airlifted to the hospital, she was pronounced dead at 4.32 p.m.
Emily's twin brother wasn't in school that day because he'd been on a school field trip.
I feel like bearing witness to this tragedy is trauma as is being connected to any of the victims.
But if being away from campus on that day could spare him even a modicum of pain, I hope that it did, even if it was temporary.
I just... I can't.
Like all of that just to kill yourself then. Like I never understand that.
What the fuck is the point?
It's really pointless and... it's gonna get worse.
By 4.34, law enforcement sweep for explosives had begun, but it wasn't long before it became apparent that none had ever been placed in the facility by the gunman.
Still, there would be far more order to unearth as his personal effects were processed.
In his backpack, they would find duct tape, handcuffs, knives, a stung-gun, rope, scissors, as well as copious rounds of ammunition.
Jesus.
Other contents of the bag were equally disturbing though in a different manner.
He had massage oil and sex toys.
Oh.
By 615, the search was over for explosives.
He'd been scoping out the school at least as early as the day before.
But it hadn't been to that end. He wasn't planning on blowing up the school.
The day after the shooting, his family received his suicide note detailing the abuse of his father, his depression, and suicidal ideation.
It also provided instructions for how to divvy up his remaining property, leaving his guns to his nephew.
Oh my god.
The note didn't detail the plans of the shooting or the assaults, only his suicide, but urged them not to feel guilty or responsible.
But his brother, obviously this is the day after, he already knew what he had done, and he couldn't bring himself to read the letter before handing it over to ATF.
No.
Which I mean, how could you?
Yeah.
I mean, part of me thinks I would be so morbidly curious and I would want to know what this person has to say.
And part of me is like, I just don't know how I could read that and not lose it.
I could understand both.
Yeah.
There's no good way to handle that.
I mean, like his family, like there just as much victims as anyone, he had no specific feud or issue with the high school.
But he did, however, with a motorcycle shop in Littleton, Colorado.
The very same town where the Columbine shooting had occurred a handful of years prior, just possibly one of the creepiest facts of this case.
He'd become enraged when he purchased a motorcycle and came to find that additional accessories he'd apparently wanted were not included.
Okay. Thus began a pattern of escalating threats and harassment just about a month before the hostage crisis.
With Emily's belongings, law enforcement found a business card for that motorcycle shop.
The school was closed for the rest of the week after the horrific events.
Thousands of motorcyclists rode from Columbine to Platte Canyon in honor of the victims of school violence and numerous memorials were established along the highway.
The school reopened the following Monday with counseling stations available.
Only 10 of the 460 students attending the school were absent on that day.
I don't know how you go back.
I don't think that a lot of these people would have had much choice.
Yeah. I know.
Not another school.
Unless you just have the means to pick up and move away.
Yeah.
I mean, I know, like, yeah, you have to, but I should.
Yeah.
I do have some other information about what it was like at the high school after that.
I'm going to save because this already is going to be a really long episode.
And I do have a really important update on a previous episode.
Okay.
That I want to put out there.
But I do have some information that I'm going to just put together.
We'll go ahead and we're going to share that with the Patreon.
And that will be some information that's really interesting about just some things that didn't quite fit neatly into the case.
And I mean, my god, we're going to be like two hour episodes like I'm in Christine.
So, um, which I don't know.
Maybe people wouldn't be mad about that.
But, um, I would.
Yeah.
I had to add to that.
Yeah.
Exactly.
Efforts for increasing safety in the wake of the deadly Columbine shooting had been abandoned in favor of funding programs aimed at higher test scores.
So, okay.
You can't have higher test scores if all the kids are dead.
Yeah.
Hate to stay the obvious.
Perhaps a little bit crass, but still somehow not everyone is as bitter and blunt as I am, including Emily's family.
And this is a quote and, um,
and they just like the sweetest people.
Well, because it's not law enforcement per se that was deciding not to spend the tax dollars on that.
For some, it may be difficult to accept the right actions at the right time by the right people may not have the right outcome.
When what we hoped for didn't happen.
Some may want to find fault.
But there is no fault to be found in the command decisions when given the information and behavior presented.
There is no fault to be found in the courage and speed of their response.
From our family, there is only respect.
The best people did the best of things.
The outcome could have been far more grave.
We as a family know this and appreciate this.
Real life doesn't always have a happy ending.
And, um, usually not.
Usually not.
No.
I'm such an ugly grider too.
These are just humans that have a capacity for grace that I cannot begin to fathom.
So that was exorbed from the keys family statement regarding the March 27th, 2007 release of the CBI report on the
Platkanian hostage crisis that claimed their daughter and sister.
The, I love you guys.
Foundation was started by Emily's parents to focus on school and community safety programs, benefiting tens of thousands of schools and other agencies in the U.S. Canada and elsewhere abroad.
And I think that's a good thing.
I think that's a good thing.
Wow.
The AR-15 belonged to a relative of Morrison.
The weapon had been reported stolen by Morrison.
The family member refused to cooperate or provide any additional information to authorities.
I feel graciously decided to leave it out.
Interesting.
I wonder why they didn't cover it.
I wonder why they didn't report it stolen in the first place.
Yeah.
But I think that family has probably been through enough.
Yeah.
I mean, they didn't do it.
No.
But I do think that there are situations where it's like we need to be a little bit more accountable, especially when we're talking about he didn't steal your Stanley Cup.
Yeah.
But that wasn't the only weapon that Morrison purchased from a third party.
Purchased, stole, hard to say.
Only to report as stolen on the very same day.
So he actually reported more than one weapon as stolen.
So he bought them and then reported them as stolen.
Yep.
Or stole them and then reported them stolen.
In fact, there were reportedly a total of up to 15 weapons that he claimed were stolen in a residential robbery collecting over $10,000 from insurance.
What?
That's a look insurance.
If I ever heard it.
Yeah.
It's funny.
You should say that.
In my notes, it says seems suspicious, right? I guess maybe only in hindsight.
Yeah.
Those insurance adjusters will get you every time.
I don't have.
I don't even know.
I know that there just are no.
How?
And again, I mean, I can't.
I feel like I can't make this clear enough.
But like, his family is not at fault here in any way.
But like, maybe I'm going to sound like a crazy liberal here.
But like, why is it legal for somebody to own 15 guns?
Why is that necessary?
Yeah.
And why can't you get them in short?
Like, why?
I mean, the insurance piece of it almost makes sense to me more than just like the volume is a little ridiculous.
I guess.
I don't know.
There's a lot about this situation. It seems weird to focus in on that specifically.
Yeah.
There's plenty to be upset about here.
But I'm going to do some tarot.
And then maybe I can share my update.
Yeah.
Let's do the tarot.
Because I'm.
Yeah.
I'm so sad.
I know.
Emily.
But you know, everybody commented on how incredibly calm and collected that she was.
It was really important to her that she tried to do everything that she could to help in that situation.
She was the one who tried at least to speak to the hostage negotiator.
I mean, my God.
What an incredible human.
Yeah.
That's just so insane that he was mad at her, what her dad or her parents that owned the motor shop or they don't own that they don't even own it.
He was just what.
It really doesn't make a lot of sense.
Why did he go after her?
I think he thought she was associated somehow.
Oh, okay.
There's no reason why she would have really been like affiliated with the motorcycle shop.
I don't know if the owner of the shop like had the last name.
Weird.
Whatever, whatever connection there.
Like maybe even just allegedly is.
It doesn't make any fucking sense.
Yeah.
And like they were the owners of the motorcycle shop so he was like getting their daughter.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Nope.
Not better, not worse.
Wow.
Right?
I mean, not better, it is worse.
You know, but like it's one of those things where it's like, how do you even decide?
Like, but there's no rationalizing something that crazy.
Like someone who's mentally ill, obviously, they're all rational people.
And that's not an excuse, but whoa.
Okay.
Well, let's seriously though, can we do a tarot?
Tarot, tarot.
Okay.
Do you love true crime, but are looking for something different?
Do you like learning about cases so off the wall?
They can't possibly be true.
Do you love history?
But want to hear about what they didn't teach you in school?
Do you like laughing awkwardly about cases that are bizarre and a little strange?
Then we have the podcast for you.
Join me, Lindsay.
And me, Madison, for Yeild Crime.
Where we discuss the funny, strange, and obscure crimes of Yesteryear.
Listen, every Wednesday, wherever you get your podcasts.
And we'll see you next time with another tale.
Hazel, this crime.
Do you want to shuffle?
Do you want me to shuffle?
I did do some shuffling.
Look at that.
I mean, I could move my microphone.
I mean, then you'd have to move it again.
It's a whole thing, you know?
Okay.
She fingered it good.
Sorry, I can help it.
Oh, boy.
Okay.
This is, I think this is eight of ones in the reverse.
Okay.
Oh.
Oh, boy.
Are those...
Pigeons?
I don't know what kind of bird those are.
The book is in the box.
If you are so curious.
Oh, yeah.
I always want to know.
Yeah.
I feel like sometimes it's like crucial to the story.
Yeah.
It does.
Sometimes it ends up being information we want and need.
All right.
So the eight of ones are keywords are action, excitement,
new experiences and urgency.
Holy fuck.
Okay.
Yeah.
It does not get better from here because I don't like what I'm seeing.
Okay.
When the eight of ones appears, you can expect your life to speed up big time.
Oh, my God.
This card suggests lots of action and excitement coming your way.
This is the Carpe Diem card.
What does that mean?
I can't remember.
It's kind of like seized the day.
Oh, yeah.
X.
Whatever you've put into motion now takes off at a rapid pace.
The eight may also indicate a whirlwind trip.
Yeah.
I feel like it kind of like didn't go as he planned really either.
Did we kind of really talk about that?
What do you mean?
I don't know because he buried the guns and stuff and like I feel like maybe he was planning to leave with...
I, you know, it's unclear.
Yeah.
But yeah, I think that's a fair consideration at least.
Yeah.
I think, yeah.
Anyhow, all that stuff in his backpack.
Yeah.
Well, some of that may or may not have been used.
Yeah.
Oh.
When the eight of ones appears reversed, you may feel overwhelmed by the activity around you.
Unexpected changes can throw you off balance.
You may be required to travel or relocate, though, although you'd rather not.
I evacuate.
This card says, "Stop, world.
I want to get off."
In a reading about money, this card may mean money goes out faster than it comes in.
Or you may need to make financial decisions quickly.
In a reading about your job, the reversed eight indicates an exceptionally busy period when you have to work harder than usual.
During this stressful time, you may feel unequal to the task.
Perhaps you'll do lots of work related traveling now.
Oh.
That makes me think of the teacher.
Yeah, I think of the teacher and then like the SWAT team, you know?
Yeah.
And they do have to travel.
Yeah.
It's a pretty large overall area that they serve and their own call.
And I know like the money part was talking about money, but I think it could just be anything.
Like you need to make decisions quickly because like, it's going down.
Yeah.
I agree.
In a reading about love, a relationship seems to be happening too fast and you feel out of control.
Sometimes this card can indicate an illicit, passionate affair.
And I don't like any of that in relation to this case.
Yeah.
I mean, we know what happened.
Yeah.
Do you want to, is there anything in our little book?
Yeah, weirdly enough.
I turned right to it eight of ones.
Is that what it was?
Yeah.
Okay.
It's a V-A-U-X, bow, bow, yeah, bow swifts.
I don't know what those are.
Swifts, swifts.
Because we don't know.
We're not always talking about Taylor Swift ever.
Yeah.
I mean, not always.
Sometimes we're talking about what's his butt.
Her play friend.
Oh, I was like, Mr. Swift.
Yeah.
Okay.
This says, speed, action, change, swiftness.
And it's happening too fast.
Chaos.
Progress.
Which is like, maybe there was some progress made in like how it was handled and stuff.
I mean, even you said they acted faster than they did at Columbine.
Yeah.
And I do think that the, I love you guys.
Foundation is that's, that's something that like that's the type of progress that we only
make as a society.
When we're faced with something truly ugly like this, I think.
That's so crazy that she got out of text like that was.
Yeah.
Well, and this was something that I didn't explicitly include in kind of the body of the
episode.
But at one point, the students that were in the classroom, they were told to get out their
phones and, you know, like, basically like, you know, reach out to your families and, oh,
my God.
It's like such like mental torture.
Yeah.
So presumably, that's at the point when, you know, Emily was able to text back the number that
reached out to her on behalf of her father.
God.
So, but she, you know, as awful as every bit of this scenario is, she did, she did leave
this world knowing that immediately his instinct was to do, however possible, to reach out to
her father.
And that's both really powerful in a beautiful way, but also really sad.
Yeah.
Was there more in the little, there's a story and it's like a page.
So it's not, it's not very long.
Okay.
In the cold, autumn sky, thousands of swiss generate heat through entropy, entropy and proximity.
What's entropy?
And it's energy that's created by motion, I think.
I may not be explaining that totally correctly.
It's fucking science, baby.
Yeah.
That's why I'm not sure.
So they're generating heat through like flying around each other, basically.
Yeah.
They whirl and circle, drawing geometries to complex detrace.
They are a cloud of particles.
Ooh, we're talking about science.
Oh, why?
Yeah, I guess the words asked me to say science, but it's still sciencey.
Yeah.
They are cloud of particles, somehow not colliding as the phases of their waveforms intertwine.
Oh, wow.
Ooh, that's like kind of like bombing.
Yeah.
But I mean, I think if you think about it in almost more of just a strictly metaphysical type
of way or metaphorical, maybe as the right word, it's more, it just speaks to how people's lives can be intertwined in these sort of like inextricable ways.
Yeah.
And I just had a vision of like a bunch of kids like running around like trying not to collide with each other.
Right.
That's kind of what I think.
Like chaos.
And yeah, I know the birds kind of like are freaking me out too.
Yeah.
Okay.
If it's--
Oh, cool, cool.
[SIGHS]
Their motion is both random and coordinated.
A system too complex to understand appears as chaos.
But to the swifts, it is understood instinctually.
Their chaos is their vivacity.
Mm.
The entropy is a collective airborne dance.
This is a celebration of movement itself of the passage south of the quest for warmer winds.
Interesting.
Yeah, totally just like the visual of like all the birds, like chaotically flying around is.
Yeah.
Crazy.
That's kind of intense.
Yeah.
Wow.
Okay, can we not do like another school shooting ever again?
I mean, one of them--
So realistically, this wasn't a school shooting. It's a hostage crisis.
Yeah.
It happened to take place in a high school.
Yeah.
She said it was like almost school shooting.
Yeah.
Like I don't think that was--
They were put a van.
Yeah.
You know, and it's interesting because I don't--
I don't think that was ever really the intention.
But yeah, that's, of course, a thousand percent.
That's immediately where your head goes to, of course.
Yeah.
Of course.
All right.
Are you ready for an update?
Oh, yes, I am.
Yeah.
Okay.
This will be hopefully kind of short and sweet.
Do you remember?
There was a case that actually I asked both you and Chris.
He said, "Are you guys comfortable with me covering this?"
I don't remember.
Do you remember me asking you at all?
Or do you just not remember the case?
I don't think I remember at all.
Really?
Yeah.
I feel like for you, it was just such like a non-thing.
I was like, "Yeah, do it. I don't care."
Yeah.
That's what I'm exactly like for you, it was like, "Why would I try to stop you?"
And I'm like, "Well, I don't know.
I had concerns about like, is this unsafe?"
Oh.
And obviously, I covered it.
So, yeah.
Nobody tried to stop me.
Now I kind of vaguely remember.
And I was just like, "I trust you that you know what's..."
Yeah.
So we talked about a case from Anchorage, Alaska.
And it was the really horrific, brutal murder of Shelley Connolly.
And her case went unsolved for nearly five decades.
And then it was linked to a man in Gresham, Oregon.
And he used genetic genealogy to track his ass down.
So I'm going to give you a few kind of bullet points here.
So, let me pull up my article with the update, because I may read some excerpts of it really quick.
And we are talking about Donald McQuade, who killed a 16-year-old girl in 1978.
He was indicted in October of 2019, once they tracked his suddenly not so happy ass down.
And then in March of 2020, Alaska started allowing bail hearings for prisoners during COVID,
and kind of based on special circumstances.
Donald was released, and then in the summer of 2021, Shelley's mother, Judy, passed away before seeing the end of the trial.
When we released our episode in February of 2022, we assumed he would either die because of his advanced cancer.
If having to battle COVID, that he contracted in custody didn't.
So now we have an update, and this is super recent. This article is dated as of yesterday.
Oh, it's like lunchtime, breaking news. You heard it here first.
Yeah, and to be honest, I didn't think we would get an update in this case.
So I certainly haven't actively been looking, but the good news.
Ultimately, an Anchorage jury found the Oregon man guilty of first and second-degree murder.
And this is a quote, "We hope that Shelley's loved ones are able to obtain some closure in light of this sentence."
The state asked the court to impose a 50-year sentence because it appropriately considers the seriousness and severity of this crime,
as well as Mr. McQuade's advanced age.
The Department of Law thanks the Alaska State Troopers, the Alaska Scientific Crime Detection Lab,
and the Gresham Police Department for their partnership and dedication throughout the life of this case.
Meanwhile, the defense proposed a shorter sentence of 20 years. 20 years will likely mean life in prison for Mr. McQuade, the defense said.
On Friday, Judge Andrew Peterson followed the state's recommendation of 50 years in confinement.
"Quite frankly, I think that's really on the lower end," Peterson said.
"If we were here 20, 30, 40 years ago, we would be looking at a much higher sentence.
At Friday's sentencing, family members of Connolly pushed for McQuade to receive the maximum sentence,
sharing in victim letters that McQuade lacked any remorse."
McQuade responded that he remains innocent.
"Okay."
So, wow.
He's got about 50 years to go ahead and keep on claiming he's innocent.
"Now I hope he lives a lot longer."
"Yeah."
"Did they cure his cancer?"
"No idea. I'm not sure. It doesn't include anything in terms of a medical update. I'm sure that's a hippy thing."
"Yeah. This is a young girl that he brutally killed on the side of Suward Highway in Alaska."
"I remember no."
"Yeah."
"I guess I'm not too worried about our safety anymore, either."
"Yeah. That's good. Me neither. I wasn't really to begin with."
"Yeah. Once I found out that he had advanced stage cancer and that he had also been struggling with COVID, I was a little less concerned.
But, you know, I mean, this is, we live here."
"Yeah."
"So, to me, I felt selfish and potentially irresponsible to not talk to you guys like, "Hey, just FYI."
"That doesn't make sense. Thank you for thinking of me."
"Of course. I love you, but I still..."
"Are we done?"
"We're done."
"I'm still sorry."
"Let's go. Have a creepy ass day. See you next Tuesday."
"I think we'll be here. I don't know."
"She might be running like 10 minutes behind me still. I might be late."
"Molly, late."
"Oh no!"
"I'm not going to be late."
"Also, what about a substitute tissue?"
"I was trying to combine teacher and issues."
"Substitute issue."
"How about a tissue for your issues?"
Substitute Teacher. pnwhauntsandhomicides.com