The Susan Powell Case Files | Beaches & Airplanes | Bonus Episode 11 AI transcript and summary - episode of podcast Cold

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Episode: The Susan Powell Case Files | Beaches & Airplanes | Bonus Episode 11

Author: KSL Podcasts | Wondery
Duration: 00:34:08

Episode Shownotes

Susan Cox Powell disappeared 15 years ago. The day after she turned up missing, her four-year-old son Charlie Powell spoke to a detective from the West Valley City, Utah police department. Charlie told the detective his mommy had joined him, his little brother Braden and their dad, Susan’s husband Josh

Powell, on a camping trip. But Charlie also said Susan didn’t come home. She stayed “where the crystals are.” In this special bonus episode, we explore what Charlie was trying to tell us about Susan’s fate. We also speak with forensic interview specialist Brianna Martinez about how the approach to interviewing kids has changed over the last 15 years. For years, investigative reporter Dave Cawley has been studying thousands of police documents, journals, videos and diary entries. He tracked down new sources, followed new leads and traced Josh Powell's trail from West Valley City, Utah, through Idaho, Oregon, Nevada and on to Washington State, where Powell killed himself and his two sons. Cold is the most complete retelling of the Susan Powell story ever. Join Dave Cawley in his search for truth.Share your thoughts: Instagram Facebook Reddit Bluesky

Summary

In this bonus episode, investigative reporter Dave Cawley examines the crucial statements made by Charlie Powell regarding his mother Susan's disappearance. His mention of 'where the crystals are' raises significant questions about child testimony and interviewing methods. Expert Brianna Martinez discusses the challenges of engaging with young children during forensic interviews, emphasizing the value of open-ended questions and the dangers of leading questions which can misguide narratives. The episode also reflects on the complexities of family dynamics and potential coaching, highlighting the importance of understanding children's cognitive development in these sensitive contexts.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (The Susan Powell Case Files | Beaches & Airplanes | Bonus Episode 11) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:00 Speaker_00
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00:00:14 Speaker_00
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00:00:29 Speaker_07
This podcast includes discussion of domestic abuse and other forms of violence. While not explicit, it's probably a good idea to use discretion when listening.

00:00:39 Speaker_07
And if you or someone you know is experiencing abuse at the hands of a loved one, help is available. In the United States, you can visit thehotline.org to be connected with free resources in your area.

00:00:55 Speaker_07
15 years have passed since the last time anyone saw Susan Cox Powell. The Facebook groups that once buzzed with tens of thousands of members, all clamoring for answers, are pretty quiet these days.

00:01:08 Speaker_07
Every once in a while, someone new to Susan's story will join and post a question, asking if this or that place has ever been searched. The comments will inevitably turn into a discussion of abandoned mines, caves, or crystals.

00:01:23 Speaker_12
There was flowers and crystals that was colorful. That was what?

00:01:29 Speaker_11
That was colorful. Colorful? Yeah. Yeah?

00:01:34 Speaker_07
I understand why many people think crystals are the clue that will lead us to the discovery of Susan's remains. It goes back to what Susan's son Charlie said during this police interview the day after Susan came up missing.

00:01:47 Speaker_12
My mom thinks we're a crystal. Where what are?

00:01:53 Speaker_10
Where crystals are. The crystals? Crystals? Is that what you're saying? Crystals? Yeah.

00:02:01 Speaker_07
But I've seen people take this way too literally, assuming Charlie, at four years old, had encyclopedic knowledge of places with crystal in their name, or picturing underground caverns with walls sparkling with gemstones.

00:02:15 Speaker_07
I think the truth of what Charlie was trying to say is much more simple. Maybe it's been a while since you listened to Susan's story. Let me refresh your memory about the basics.

00:02:27 Speaker_07
Susan's husband, Josh Powell, took the couple's two sons, Charlie and Brayden, camping in the middle of the night, in the middle of winter, in the middle of a snowstorm, on the night Susan was last seen.

00:02:41 Speaker_09
We did a little campfire. So you have the campfire, what do you do, it's a campfire? Just hung out for a few minutes, had a marshmallow or two, and that's about it.

00:03:03 Speaker_07
Josh said he'd mixed the days up in his head, thinking it was a Saturday night into Sunday instead of a Sunday night into Monday. When the boys didn't show up for daycare on Monday morning, the daycare provider sounded the alarm.

00:03:15 Speaker_07
At the same time Josh was telling this story to police in West Valley City, Utah, Charlie was corroborating it.

00:03:23 Speaker_11
Well, what did you do last night? Go camping.

00:03:28 Speaker_07
Charlie said camping is where you make s'mores.

00:03:31 Speaker_12
You hold the marshmallows over a fire with a stick.

00:03:38 Speaker_07
The detective wanted to know if Charlie's mom, Susan, was there when they roasted these marshmallows.

00:03:43 Speaker_11
Who were you camping with?

00:03:45 Speaker_12
My dad and my mom and my little brother.

00:03:52 Speaker_11
Dad, your mom and your brother? Yeah.

00:03:57 Speaker_07
She asked who came home, and that's when Charlie said Susan stayed behind with the crystals.

00:04:03 Speaker_10
Your mom stayed where the crystals are? Yeah. Is that what you said? Yeah.

00:04:08 Speaker_07
Josh didn't know Charlie was being interviewed, not until the lead detective on the case, Ellis Maxwell, confronted Josh with what Charlie had said.

00:04:18 Speaker_04
One of our detectives just interviewed your children and your children are telling our detectives that mom went with you guys last night and that she didn't come back. She did not come with us.

00:04:36 Speaker_07
two conflicting stories. Someone wasn't telling the truth. It's easy to assume Charlie's story is the accurate one, because why would he lie?

00:04:47 Speaker_07
But the problem with cherry-picking pieces out of Charlie's interview is it ignores the other things he said that didn't make any sense, like when he said he had gone on an airplane to go camping or to the beach on the way home.

00:05:00 Speaker_11
You went to an airplane yesterday?

00:05:09 Speaker_07
Josh did not take his sons on an airplane the night he likely murdered Susan. And the family lived in landlocked Utah, hundreds of miles from the ocean. So what beach could Charlie have been thinking of?

00:05:22 Speaker_07
I've uncovered clues deep within a trove of Powell family photos and home videos that could help solve that riddle.

00:05:30 Speaker_03
Charlie, where's Mommy?

00:05:33 Speaker_02
Mommy's gone.

00:05:35 Speaker_03
She went over there, huh? Say bye-bye, Mommy.

00:05:38 Speaker_02
Bye-bye, Mommy.

00:05:41 Speaker_07
This is a special bonus episode of Cold Season 1, Beaches and Airplanes. From KSL Podcasts, I'm Dave Cauley. Getting reliable information out of preschool-aged kids is tricky, especially when they've experienced abuse or witnessed traumatic events.

00:06:09 Speaker_01
It's a scary situation for kids.

00:06:11 Speaker_01
Maybe they have only talked to one other person about this or they're not ready to talk about it and someone just found out and now they're being brought here to talk to a stranger about everything that's happened, right?

00:06:23 Speaker_07
That's Brianna Martinez. She's a forensic interviewer with the Weber Morgan Children's Justice Center in northern Utah.

00:06:30 Speaker_07
Children's Justice Centers, or CJCs for short, are kid-friendly spaces where specially trained interviewers, like Brianna, can assist with investigations into crimes like child abuse or domestic violence.

00:06:43 Speaker_07
They are also called Children's Advocacy Centers in other parts of the country.

00:06:47 Speaker_01
It's just a safe place for kids to come to kind of talk about what has happened to them. It's not a police department or Child Protective Services building, just a safe place for them to talk.

00:07:00 Speaker_07
Brianna was not personally involved with the interview of Charlie Powell 15 years ago, but I wanted to get her perspective to help us understand what goes on behind the scenes with that kind of investigation. Here's my interview with Brianna.

00:07:14 Speaker_07
So why not bring a kid who has been through, let's say, abuse to a police station?

00:07:20 Speaker_07
I mean, I think most people would imagine you as an investigator, say a detective, you bring the person in, you sit them down in the cold, sterile interview room and ask them questions. Why does that not work so well with kids?

00:07:33 Speaker_01
It's intimidating, first off. And a lot of kids have trauma. I mean, they've been through a lot of things.

00:07:39 Speaker_01
Some kids may have had trauma with police officers in the past or child protective services in the past, and that can bring up some previous trauma for them that could be scary.

00:07:49 Speaker_01
I mean, some kids even think they might be going to jail because they're going to the police station.

00:07:54 Speaker_01
So this is just like a neutral place for them to come where they know that they're not in any trouble and they're just able to kind of talk about what's happened to them.

00:08:01 Speaker_07
Building rapport. You sit down with a kid. I imagine you're meeting them for the first time pretty much every time. And you need to establish that they're safe, that anything that they tell you is not gonna come back to harm them.

00:08:19 Speaker_07
How do you go about building that rapport with somebody you're interviewing?

00:08:24 Speaker_01
So when they get here, I'll go out to the waiting room and I'll introduce them. I'll let them know that my job is to talk to kids. Then we go in the room and we'll go over some of the rules for the interview.

00:08:35 Speaker_01
We'll tell them, like, if I ask you a question and you know the answer, then tell me. If you don't know the answer, don't guess or make things up. If there's something that you don't want to talk about, tell me that you don't want to talk about it."

00:08:47 Speaker_01
And then we'll ask him to promise to tell the truth. And then we move on to our rapport building section where, you know, we just spend some time getting to know the kid.

00:08:55 Speaker_01
Talk to them about things that they like to do, things that make them happy, something that's made them sad, and let them know, like, you can talk about good things and bad things that have happened to you.

00:09:05 Speaker_01
And in that portion of the interview, you're kind of gauging where this kid is at in terms of talking to you, right? You can kind of see, like, this kid's pretty standoffish. They seem pretty reluctant.

00:09:16 Speaker_01
So I'm going to spend some more time talking about the things that they like to do. See, you know, make them more comfortable. After that portion, we'll go through an episodic memory practice.

00:09:27 Speaker_01
They kind of refer to that as like the dress rehearsal of an interview, where we'll talk to them about a really good day that they've had recently. For example, Christmas, right? Tell me everything that happened on Christmas.

00:09:39 Speaker_01
And you'll kind of work through that event. Like, okay, so you open presents. Tell me everything about opening presents. And then you'll move on throughout the day. And then that's when we'll transition over to the disclosure portion of the interview.

00:09:51 Speaker_07
When you say episodic memory, I think I can understand what you mean by that, but you're basically asking about one specific episode, something that's happened, right?

00:10:01 Speaker_01
Yeah.

00:10:01 Speaker_07
And I imagine older kids, you know, teenagers, preteens, they're probably pretty good at that. Younger kids, do you find that they struggle with, you know, times, places, stuff like that when you ask about episodic kinds of things?

00:10:16 Speaker_01
Specifics, yeah. They'll struggle with a time something happened or a specific date, but the details of the episode they can give you.

00:10:25 Speaker_01
So they can tell you, you know, where it happened, what happened, who was there, and they can walk you through that whole episode. But if I say, what day did that happen on?

00:10:36 Speaker_01
Tuesday, Thursday, last week, yesterday, you know, so they struggle with time like that, but they're able to tell you about the episode of Christmas. Although they may not know what day of the month Christmas is on.

00:10:47 Speaker_07
Understood. Part of the reason I asked that is I'm thinking about, you know, an investigator, you're probably very focused on some of those kinds of details. And the way a child's mind works, that just may not be there, right?

00:11:01 Speaker_07
So you really have to kind of think about how you approach those conversations. And I think what you're describing with episodic memory makes sense. You're asking the child to describe it in their language, in the way that they understand it.

00:11:12 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yeah. And there are other ways to get that, you know, day and time specifically. And sometimes kids will say it, they just say it in their own way. You know, for example, they'll say, well, it happened, we had just gotten the brand new blue couch.

00:11:27 Speaker_01
So that's not a day or a time, but you can go and talk to other people and say, what day did you get that blue couch? Right? So you're able to find out the day in another way. The kid is just not able to tell you that specific day that it happened.

00:11:40 Speaker_07
What are some of the considerations, concerns specific to kids versus any other kind of interview?

00:11:46 Speaker_01
So when talking to kids just in a general day-to-day conversation, it's a lot different than the way that you talk to kids in a forensic interview. For example, when you're talking to a kid just about their day, you say, how was school?

00:12:00 Speaker_01
Did you go to school? Did you do math? Those are not the types of questions that we always ask in forensic interviews. So you're focusing more on those open-ended questions. Tell me everything that happened today. Oh, you said you went to math.

00:12:14 Speaker_01
Tell me everything that happened in math. And talking to kids obviously is a little bit different than talking to adults because they're not on the developmental area that we're at as adults, right? They haven't gotten there yet.

00:12:26 Speaker_01
And so you kind of have to talk the way that they talk. You know, you have to use the words that they use and you just have to kind of match their level when you're talking to them.

00:12:35 Speaker_07
You mentioned open-ended questions. I want to get a little more into that.

00:12:40 Speaker_07
So if I, you know, sat down with a kid and I wanted to know specifically about an event and I need a very, you know, say I'm a detective and I have a very specific question about evidence I want to ask them. And I drill on that and the kid goes, hmm.

00:12:58 Speaker_07
versus, like you're saying, you kind of invite them to tell a story, it sounds like. From your experience, how are the differences in responses from kids based on those two different approaches?

00:13:10 Speaker_01
Well, the research shows that you get three to five times more accurate information from a child when you're asking those open-ended questions than when you're not.

00:13:19 Speaker_01
And with a kid saying, like, oh, I don't know, that's their answer, and that's kind of what you have to take when you're in a forensic interview with a kid.

00:13:26 Speaker_01
So what you want to do is ask those open-ended questions, which is like, tell me everything that happened. OK, you said this, and then what happened? What's the very next thing that happened? The very next thing.

00:13:36 Speaker_01
And when you walk them through that episode of the event that they're talking about, most of the time they're able to give you the information that you're looking for as a detective, right? When you go in and you say, did this happen? Did this happen?

00:13:50 Speaker_01
Did this happen? You're not getting that full story, as you say. You're getting those bits and pieces of information that the child is giving you because of the way that you're asking those questions.

00:14:00 Speaker_01
Whereas when you say, tell me everything that happened from this point to this point, they're going to go through and narrate that whole entire event for you.

00:14:08 Speaker_07
Is there a risk if you ask those really direct questions of, especially I'm thinking like a younger child, that they tell you what they think you want to hear?

00:14:15 Speaker_01
Yeah. So, I mean, there's a difference between direct questions and leading questions. So for example, a direct question is, what shoes are you wearing? What color is the car? A leading question is, you're wearing a brown shirt, right?

00:14:32 Speaker_01
So when you ask those leading questions, kids are going to be like, well, is that what you want me to say? Yes or no? Like, oh yeah, I am. I'm wearing a brown shirt, right? Whereas you say, tell me everything about the clothes that you're wearing.

00:14:45 Speaker_01
Well, I have a brown shirt on, I have brown shoes on, things like that.

00:14:49 Speaker_01
When you ask those leading questions, it's hard later on because it's like, is that kid saying that because that's actually what happened or are they saying that because I said that and I implied that that was something that was happening?

00:15:00 Speaker_01
So you want to avoid those leading questions and instead open it up and say, tell me everything about your clothes.

00:15:06 Speaker_07
Right. You have to be really careful doing what you do.

00:15:09 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yeah, you have to be pretty careful.

00:15:12 Speaker_07
Do you ever find that, and especially with younger kids, I'm thinking about the way, you know, even with my own relatives, nieces, nephews, you know, you talk to them and it's like, what are they talking about? You know, they're using

00:15:29 Speaker_07
whatever they're picturing in their mind and they're telling you, you're thinking that doesn't make any sense. Like, does that happen a lot in these kinds of interviews where they're maybe describing something that on the surface, you don't follow?

00:15:42 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yeah, there are times where they'll say things that you're like, I'm not understanding. And so that's why you ask those follow-up questions and try to get more information from them.

00:15:54 Speaker_01
But you know, you do the best that you can and the child is doing the best that they can. So you really just have to accept where they are at developmentally. And they just may not be able to put it into words.

00:16:05 Speaker_01
And so you try to do those follow-up questions and you try to get more information from them. But at the end of the day, whatever they can tell you is whatever they can tell you.

00:16:13 Speaker_01
And as a forensic interviewer, sometimes you just have to accept what they tell you.

00:16:16 Speaker_07
That's what it is. In the case of Charlie Powell's interview, he had told the story to the best of his ability. It wasn't his fault that that didn't lead police to Susan.

00:16:29 Speaker_07
But what Charlie said the next time he met police definitely raised suspicion Josh Powell had something to hide.

00:16:49 Speaker_07
Looking back, with the benefit of hindsight, I believe Josh Powell was being honest when he said Susan didn't go with him on the camping trip the night of her disappearance.

00:16:59 Speaker_03
She was not with us.

00:17:01 Speaker_09
And if my kids said that... So your kids lie then? Do your kids lie? Sometimes they do.

00:17:08 Speaker_07
It's likely whatever happened to Susan occurred before Josh took Charlie and Braden out to the desert. Police weren't able to arrest Josh back in December of 2009 because they didn't have hard evidence to prove Susan was dead.

00:17:24 Speaker_07
You might recall Josh packed his boys into his minivan a little over a week later and moved to Washington State.

00:17:31 Speaker_07
West Valley police wanted another crack at interviewing Charlie though, so they worked with the Pierce County Sheriff's Office in Washington to get a warrant.

00:17:39 Speaker_07
It authorized deputies to seize Charlie and Brayden away from Josh so they could be interviewed at a children's advocacy center in Tacoma.

00:17:48 Speaker_07
The same detective who had first interviewed Charlie in Utah also conducted the second interview three months later in March of 2010. But the result was less than ideal.

00:18:01 Speaker_11
Charlie, has anybody talked to you about your mom? No. I don't know where she is. She got lost somewhere. She got lost somewhere? Tell me about your mom getting lost.

00:18:21 Speaker_12
I don't know where she got lost.

00:18:24 Speaker_11
I didn't see where she got lost. You didn't see where she got lost?

00:18:30 Speaker_07
Charlie squirms in a video recording of this interview. He tries to change the subject. The detective keeps turning back to the topic of camping and Susan's disappearance. Charlie becomes agitated.

00:18:42 Speaker_12
We can't talk about Susan or camping. I always keep things as secrets.

00:18:52 Speaker_11
Did somebody tell you to keep a secret? No, only my brain did. Your brain did? What else did your brain tell you about the secret?

00:19:05 Speaker_12
My brain won't tell me to say that.

00:19:15 Speaker_07
It seemed likely Josh had coached Charlie during those three months to keep him from saying anything incriminating. Let's go back to my conversation with Brianna.

00:19:27 Speaker_07
What about when somebody you're interviewing maybe seems evasive, like they either don't want to talk or they definitely don't want to talk about the thing that you're there to talk to them about? How do you handle that?

00:19:43 Speaker_01
You know, in my experience, I've dealt with reluctance a lot. But, you know, we just remind them. My job is to talk to kids about things that have happened to them. I talk to lots of kids about things that have happened to them.

00:19:54 Speaker_01
And we kind of dive into that reluctance a little bit more when I can sense that it's happening or when they straight up tell me, like, I'm not comfortable talking about this. You know, tell me more about not feeling comfortable.

00:20:06 Speaker_01
Tell me what you think will happen if you talk about what's happened. Is there anything that I can do to make you feel more comfortable? And there have been times where kids are like, no, not ready. Nope, don't want to talk about it.

00:20:18 Speaker_01
And you go through that reluctance with them and sometimes they're just not ready, you know?

00:20:24 Speaker_01
And when that's happened in my experience and kids are just not ready, I let them know, like, if there's a time that you do feel comfortable and you do want to talk to me again, you know, tell someone that you trust and we can talk again.

00:20:36 Speaker_01
So I leave that door open for them. And I have had kids come back that said, you know, I'm ready to talk about what's happened.

00:20:43 Speaker_07
I've read though that second interviews are generally not the recommended approach. Is that right?

00:20:49 Speaker_01
Yeah, it depends. You know, in situations like that where we haven't gotten a disclosure from the child and they're telling me straight up, I'm not ready to talk about this right now.

00:21:01 Speaker_01
We haven't talked about anything, you know, and so it doesn't matter if they come back again because there's nothing that's happened. You know, it's like we're starting fresh again.

00:21:09 Speaker_01
But yeah, there are instances where we will get a disclosure from a child and the detective or CPS will want more information.

00:21:18 Speaker_01
And so we really have to think about it and work through it and see, like, what information is it that you're looking from from this child and can we get it somewhere else? Because they've come in and they've told me everything that they can think of.

00:21:32 Speaker_01
Is it really worth going through a whole other interview just to get that one little piece of information?

00:21:38 Speaker_01
Another example, though, is kids will come in, make a disclosure, tell me that they've told everything, go home, live their life, and then they're like, oh wait, I forgot to tell this lady something. I want to go back and talk to her.

00:21:52 Speaker_01
So if that's the case, and that does happen, and we've talked about it, and we decide that a second interview will be beneficial for the child, I'll bring them in, I'll talk to them about the information that they want to give me, and then I'll ask them about it.

00:22:05 Speaker_01
You know, what made you want to tell me about this now? Like, what kept you from telling me about it last time we talked? And we'll just work through those things.

00:22:14 Speaker_07
One of the things I read was in a second interview, it's preferred to have the same person do the second interview. Is that right?

00:22:20 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yep.

00:22:21 Speaker_07
What's the reasoning behind that?

00:22:23 Speaker_01
The reason is, is I've already built rapport with the kid. I've already talked to them. And a lot of times when second interviews happen, they happen relatively close to the first interview.

00:22:34 Speaker_01
Not always, obviously, but most of the time they happen relatively close. So when it happens close like that, kids usually remember you. You've already talked to them. You know, you've already built rapport with them. They remember your face.

00:22:45 Speaker_01
They kind of know what's going to be happening already, so.

00:22:49 Speaker_07
In a situation like that, I'm imagining, you know, in a short timeframe, let's say it's even the same investigation. What about the risk of having coaching?

00:23:01 Speaker_07
You know, if they go back into, let's say, a home environment where, you know, a parent or caregiver or whatever says, what did you say to that person? And don't say this, don't say that.

00:23:11 Speaker_07
Can you tell when they maybe come back for a second interview that, hey, something's gone on?

00:23:17 Speaker_01
You can tell that something has, especially if their disclosure from their first interview to the second interview is completely different.

00:23:26 Speaker_01
You know, sometimes kids will come in and say this and this and this happened, and then the next time they'll come in and it's like talking to a brand new kid.

00:23:34 Speaker_01
So when that happens, you know, you really have to kind of dive into it and ask those follow-up questions. You know, if this is their disclosure now, you need to go in and ask, like, tell me more about that.

00:23:43 Speaker_01
Get those details and then say, so I'm a little bit confused. Last time we talked, you told me about this. You know, tell me about that and see their explanation of why it changed from this day to this day, right?

00:23:57 Speaker_01
And then talk to law enforcement and CPS and say, like, compare those two interviews because they are different, and then they have to continue their investigation.

00:24:06 Speaker_07
And it's their job to figure out what's going on.

00:24:08 Speaker_01
Yeah.

00:24:08 Speaker_07
Yeah. Wow, that's tricky. The interview that I'm focused on happened in 2009, 2024, 15 years. This field has changed a lot in that time. Is that fair to say?

00:24:20 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yeah, it has changed a lot.

00:24:22 Speaker_07
a lot of focus on kind of learning scientific approach to this. And I imagine that's still going on.

00:24:32 Speaker_01
Yeah, yeah, there's research going on all the time. I'm constantly learning new things. But yeah, things have changed a lot. You know, I haven't been around that long. I don't know what it was like back then.

00:24:44 Speaker_01
I have heard stories, I have listened to interviews, and they are different. There was a lot more of those direct questions or leading questions back then because they didn't know what they didn't know.

00:24:54 Speaker_01
And now we know that those open-ended questions are going to get you more accurate information from the child, and so we really rely on those open-ended questions from those kids.

00:25:08 Speaker_07
At the start of this episode, you heard a clip of Josh asking Charlie, where's mommy? And Charlie responding, mommy's gone. That video was recorded in April of 2008, about a year and a half before Susan disappeared.

00:25:23 Speaker_07
Josh had taken Charlie and Braden to visit Susan at her work on that day.

00:25:29 Speaker_10
Show me where are the ducks. Where do we need to go? Over that way? Oh, you want us to go this way?

00:25:37 Speaker_07
Susan skipped her lunch so she could spend time with her boys. They went to a large pond right outside the Wells Fargo call center where she worked. That pond is always crowded with seagulls, geese, and ducks.

00:25:49 Speaker_11
Say, come here ducks. Is anyone brave enough to get this big piece?

00:26:01 Speaker_03
Good job Charlie, you've attracted them.

00:26:06 Speaker_07
Josh's eyes are glued to the video camera. He shoots clips of the boys from several angles, while also criticizing Susan's duck feeding technique.

00:26:16 Speaker_03
Don't crumble it Susan.

00:26:19 Speaker_07
There are a lot of little moments like this in Josh and Susan's home videos, where Josh talks down to her. But it can be subtle, like in this next clip.

00:26:29 Speaker_07
Josh turns the camera over to Susan, so she can get a shot of Josh walking hand-in-hand with the boys over a small wooden bridge.

00:26:36 Speaker_03
The boys don't cooperate. They're tired, and not all that interested in being movie props.

00:26:48 Speaker_07
Susan points the camera at Braden as he fidgets with the plastic bread bag.

00:26:53 Speaker_08
Oh, he gives up. All right. Get down on this level, you know. I gotta go.

00:27:01 Speaker_07
From the outside, you probably wouldn't pick up on Josh's constant, low-level nagging of Susan as anything serious. But I think it reveals a lack of respect and affection. And that's when he knows he's being recorded. Susan's lunch break is over.

00:27:18 Speaker_07
She heads back into the office as Josh loads the kids into their car seats. He starts the engine, then points the camera at Charlie.

00:27:27 Speaker_03
Charlie, where's mommy?

00:27:28 Speaker_02
Mommy's gone.

00:27:32 Speaker_03
She went over there, huh? Say bye bye, mommy.

00:27:34 Speaker_02
Bye bye, mommy.

00:27:38 Speaker_03
Where's she going?

00:27:39 Speaker_02
I'm going to that.

00:27:43 Speaker_03
To that building?

00:27:45 Speaker_07
Josh starts driving away from Susan's office.

00:27:49 Speaker_03
Is it work? Does mommy work in that building? What does mommy do for work? Upstairs?

00:28:02 Speaker_07
Susan's work sat in an office park right next to Salt Lake City International Airport. Sometimes, after visiting Susan, Josh would drive over to a spot at the south end of the airport, right off the end of one of the runways.

00:28:16 Speaker_03
Alright, we're gonna go see if we can look at the airplanes for a minute and then you get to go home to take a nap. Okay, Charlie?

00:28:22 Speaker_02
I don't want to take a nap.

00:28:25 Speaker_03
You don't?

00:28:33 Speaker_07
When they reach the airport in this video clip, Josh leaves Brayden unaccompanied in the minivan so he and Charlie can go watch the airplanes.

00:28:42 Speaker_03
Tell me what you think of that airplane. Come here. Look at me and tell me what you think of it. Come on.

00:28:49 Speaker_12
I hope it goes.

00:28:54 Speaker_03
Do you like this place? Are you glad that you get to come to the airport?

00:29:00 Speaker_07
I presented a theory in the finale episode of Cold Season 1. I suggested Josh might have left Susan's body near her work on that Sunday night in 2009, before heading out on the camping trip with Charlie and Brayden.

00:29:15 Speaker_07
This home video, and others like it, reinforce my belief Charlie associated his mom's workplace with airplanes. During that first interview with the detective, Charlie said he had flown on a plane, both on his way to go camping and on the return.

00:29:32 Speaker_11
We went home in a airplane. Oh. What about when you went last night camping? When you were all done, what did you do? We went to a beach when he was all done.

00:29:50 Speaker_07
To my knowledge, the only real beach Charlie had visited before Susan disappeared was along the Puget Sound in Tacoma. And that's obviously not where he was the night his mom vanished.

00:30:02 Speaker_07
Instead, I believe Charlie's beach was probably the pond outside Susan's work. And that lines up with what Josh said he did on his way home from the camping trip.

00:30:13 Speaker_04
I thought she was at work. You went to her work, right?

00:30:32 Speaker_07
But there's a two-hour gap in Josh's timetable that afternoon.

00:30:36 Speaker_05
From when he left this first voicemail for Susan around 3.30... To when he left her a second message, claiming to be in the parking lot outside her office.

00:31:04 Speaker_07
Josh wanted to convince police he thought Susan was at work. We can safely assume that was a ruse and he knew she was dead. It was after dark by the time of that second voicemail.

00:31:17 Speaker_07
So I doubt Charlie would have been able to tell where he was from the backseat of the minivan. But maybe he saw the pond, his beach, earlier than Josh would like us to believe.

00:31:29 Speaker_07
What if Josh was there during the daylight, during those two hours between 3.30 and 5.30? Maybe Josh went to see if anyone had yet found Susan's body at whatever place he had left her the night before.

00:31:44 Speaker_07
Upon seeing she was undisturbed, concealed under a blanket of fresh snow, Josh decided he could still pull off his plot. But he didn't consider Charlie, who tried to tell us the following day where his mom was.

00:32:14 Speaker_07
Whatever Charlie might have known about Susan's death, he never developed the ability or opportunity to share it better than this. As we know, Josh killed his sons and himself on February 5th, 2012.

00:32:31 Speaker_07
Charlie would be 19 going on 20 if he were alive today. I sometimes wonder what kind of young man he would have become.

00:32:40 Speaker_07
Whether he would have escaped his father's poisonous influence and found the words to truly tell us where the flowers and the crystals grow. Cold is researched and written by me, Dave Cauley.

00:32:57 Speaker_07
Audio production and sound design on this episode by Andreas Martin. Mixing and mastering by Ben Kebrick. Michael Bonmiller composed our main theme with additional guitar stuff by, well, you know. Cold is a production of KSL Podcasts.

00:33:13 Speaker_07
Our executive producer is Cheryl Worsley. Special thanks to Paul Anderson of Workhouse Media and Dave Beesing of Sound That Brands. And as always, thank you for listening.

00:33:37 Speaker_06
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00:33:47 Speaker_06
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00:33:58 Speaker_06
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