Deep Dive
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T started posting. She started posting on Facebook a lot. Posting that she went to Kent, Washington. She claims that she got left in Seattle. She said that she got left by Paul. Paul left her. But then she posted again the very next day with Paul. If you look at it, they took off around the time that Ashley went missing. You know, that seems really weird. So this Chris guy calls. He calls me. He says, "Sam, I don't know you."
He said, "But I'm an honest man and I got a conscience. I gotta tell you, Paul and T killed Ashley." He said, "And I don't know you, son, but they're gonna try to frame you." She told me on text messages, she said, "Ashley is with Paul Venezuela in Shelby, Montana in his hotel room in this number. She has blonde hair now." So we called the cops, called the FBI and the BIA, and they flew down there. The girl that's with him with blonde hair, Tashina.
Maybe it was some kind of sick game that she wanted to play. There's a reason why she's doing that. There's something that she's obviously hiding. Hey, nobody set you up. Nobody set you up. I only called to say, "Hey, cuz, have you seen Ashley?" From Tinderfoot TV in Atlanta, this is "Up and Vanished,"
I'm your host, Payne Lindsey. When I first reached out to T on Facebook, she blocked me. But a few days later, when I arrived in Whitefish, Montana, magically I became unblocked. So I called her. Hello? Hey. Hello? Hey, T, it's Payne. Who is this? This is Payne. Can you hear me? What do you want? I just wanted to chat.
She hung up. Well, that ended quickly. So I called her back. Hey, can you hear me? Yeah, right here. Turn your camera on.
I turned on my camera, and we could now see each other face to face. Can you see me? Cool. So what's up? That night, the day Sam, when I asked him, you know, what happened, he told me that she freaked out on him. Doug said they tied her up and that he choked her out. She's referring to a guy named Doug. This is Sam McDonald's son. And I said, well, why didn't you tell the cops that? And he said, because I'm already a suspect. And that's when I didn't even know I was a suspect.
Yeah. So what exactly did Doug tell you then? Choked her out? What do you mean, choked her out? What does that mean? Yeah.
I think Sam was jealous. I think Sam got jealous because she was dating Paul. That's exactly what I think and I think that they must have got into an argument over it because she must have said, go drop me off with B-Dog or something like that and then he probably flipped out. She's like 80 pounds soaking wet, right? I mean, his hands, Sam's little hands choking her and his son there. I mean, I want to go do some fucked up shit to them but I got a daughter now.
I can't. Do you mean that he choked her to death or what are you saying? I don't, that's what I'm thinking. That's what I'm thinking. I mean, she disappeared that same day when he's trying to say that he fell asleep. When was the last time that you saw Ashley? I never seen Ashley. The last time I seen her was in 2016, about in November. I went and sold her dad a bundle, a bindle at a Easter. When's the last time the cops interviewed you about Ashley?
When I did the lie detector test. When was that? That was in 2018. I'm pretty sure my cousin Kat went with me and I went up there and I did that test because I thought, you know, we could, you know, show, you know, everybody it. But it was just for them. It was for their shit and not for me. What were the results of it? Like what happened? He didn't even tell me. He just told me go. And I just left.
Said, "All right, you're done." And I was like, "All right." So if you were me, who would you talk to next? I'm gonna talk to Paul. I'm gonna tell you right now, though, you're not gonna get very far with him. Why? It's pretty hard to break. He's not an interview man. Does he have something to say or no? I don't know. I'm tired of it. I want it to be over. I'm tired of getting blamed.
My uncle Roy died thinking I killed his daughter. I mean, I'm genuinely only trying to help. Only I will do, I'll do this. Only if you can get somebody to go look in that lake. That's the only way I'm going to do it. And tear that house apart. I don't care. I don't know. That's the only way I'm going to do it. I only seen her that time in November. I had no idea. I have, um,
I have people that are not going to ready to vouch for me for when he kicked me off in Seattle. Paul threw me off on the freeway while I was pregnant. And I didn't even ever been, I've never been in Seattle. I even told the cops that fed, you know, every drug I sold, how much. And I said, put me in jail for something I didn't do. Don't put me in jail for something I didn't do.
We need to sit down with her, shake hands, get it all out. Like, show me your Facebook messages. Show me everything. Prove it, and I'll help you. Those are some pretty big accusations that she made, though. They are. T kept saying that Sam choked Ashley out, and that she heard this from Sam's own son, Doug. But she was beyond unclear as to whether this was supposedly her cause of death. Is she saying that Sam killed Ashley by choking her? Or that Sam choked her one time?
Either way, not good. She was very vague about the overall context of this statement. I don't like the way she's just throwing that out there. Tell me what that statement means. Or at least tell me what it means to you. T also admits that Paul, V-Dawg, was dating Ashley. The last time that T saw Ashley was in November 2016. Ashley went missing about six months later, in June 2017.
She appeared to be pretty upset about the whole thing. Genuinely. I think. Honestly, I can't tell anymore. Sam cried about Ashley too. My question for the both of them is where exactly are these tears coming from? My general first impression of T is that she does want to help. Or at least that she wants me to think that she does. Either way, I'm rolling with it. I asked her to think back on those days in June 2017, around the time that Ashley went missing. Did anything stand out to her?
She was with Paul in Seattle and was apparently left stranded there. If that story's true, it appears Paul would have left Seattle back for Montana right before she went missing from the divide where Sam fell asleep in his car. It was also Paul who was supposedly picking up Ashley that morning. And if what T's telling me is true, then Paul does not have an alibi. In a way, this trip she took to Seattle is her alibi. And it's something she brings up on her own. She clearly thinks it's important too.
A few days went by and I eventually called T again. This time we talked for a bit longer. T's referring to the trip her and Paul took to Seattle, around the time that Ashley went missing.
For clarity here, the day Sam claims Ashley was supposed to be picked up by Paul, V-Dog, was the morning of June 11th. I mapped it out. It's about a 10-hour drive from Seattle to Shelby, Montana, which is where Ashley was last seen by Sam before he passed out in his car.
So if Paul left T in Seattle on June 9th or 10th, technically speaking, he'd have plenty of time to get to Shelby, Montana. By 10 a.m. on June 11th, at least. I'm just saying it's possible. He went somewhere that day. But another thing is he had his son with him, Junior. Really? So, yes, he had his son. So if he picked him, picked her up.
It's still possible. Browning or Cutbank are only about 45 minutes away from Divide Mountain.
I'm not advocating, just saying. It's possible. It sounds like it's still possible though, right? To get there? Yeah. Oh, hell yeah. I've been to Seattle with him when he drives nonstop. I never liked to go with him and he begged me to go with him that time. He really did. He begged me. I never went with him on, you know, his trips. I never went with him and this time, that time, he begged me to go with him. Maybe I was supposed to be throwing off.
So why did he leave you there? What?
- Like, he was calling me names like he doesn't even talk. Like, he literally picked this fight out of nowhere. I was confused. And he was pissing me off. So I started punching him. - And then what'd he do? Just get up and drive away or what? - Yeah. At least I had my phone. Yeah. - This is a confusing, if not extremely strange story about being left in Seattle. When was the next time you saw Paul after he left you? - Um...
Maybe he showed up that morning, I think the morning of the 14th. And then we waited until he got paid and we waited. And then when his money came in, he went and did his business and came back. And then we left like on the 16th or either that morning on the 15th, one of the two. But I was so tired.
Before he left you in Seattle, did you guys ever at any point talk about Ashley? Did she ever come up? No, I never, nothing. I didn't know about her. I didn't, I swear. I had no fucking clue. Did Paul ever tell you the last time he saw her? It was the day they broke up. That's what he told me. Which day was that? I don't know. He didn't say a date. Like around when though? Before she went missing, I guess.
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Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. So Paul leaves Seattle on June 9th or 10th. Ashley goes missing on June 11th, when she was supposed to be picked up by Paul, according to Sam at least. Then Paul turns back up in Seattle around the 14th or 15th.
T and I kept in touch over the next few weeks, mostly texts, sometimes phone calls. It seemed like after our first call together, it ignited some fire inside her to try to figure out what happened to Ashley. Is she finally facing the music, trying to clear her name and figure out what happened to her cousin Ashley? Or is she just keeping me close? Like I said before, either way, I'm rolling with it.
As you've all learned in previous episodes, when it comes to law enforcement on a reservation, it's a complete jurisdictional nightmare. Multiple agencies who don't seem to communicate well, and just a lot of nothing getting done. The agency with the most authority is the FBI. So I reached out to them. This is Special Agent Craig Overby with the FBI. People on the reservations, you know, go missing all the time, but sometimes the person might be missing for two hours, and it's...
Anything from a teenage runaway to a child that's walked off, most of the time these are quickly resolved. As time goes on and we assess it, we start to become worried that, what do we have here? As you assess it and collect the facts, sometimes they do step up to, hey, we have a concern that this person may have been kidnapped, may have been murdered, has just totally disappeared. There's kind of a continuum as you receive this information about a missing person.
It's a complex issue. And, you know, the FBI does investigate homicides on the reservation. Sometimes the person's not missing. We just respond to, you know, a homicide case that occurs. That's kind of infrequent. There are cases where a person goes missing. And then over time, as we investigate, we start to become suspicious that maybe the person's a victim of a homicide.
Sometimes a missing person might be someone who has broken off contact with their family and they've moved to Los Angeles or Salt Lake and they're living on the streets there because they have a mental health issue or a drug issue. We've looked at missing persons like that and actually located the person and they're like, "Yeah, I'm not really missing. I just don't want any contact with my family or I don't want to go back to the reservation," or that kind of thing.
For instance, I worked a case where a lady's vehicle was abandoned on the reservation. She was a non-native. And we started looking at the case and we immediately became suspicious that she was the victim of foul play. We did an investigation and over time we never recovered the victim's body. But we determined that she was the victim of a homicide from her domestic partner.
who had, based on the circumstantial evidence that we collected, you know, we determined that she'd been murdered by her partner. He concealed her body, abandoned her vehicle on the reservation. After several years, there was enough evidence that we were able to actually make a case. And the person was convicted in state court in Montana, even though the body was never found.
You have to collect a lot of circumstantial evidence to prove to a jury that this person did murder this person and conceal their body.
Why does the FBI get involved in these cases at all on the reservations? In certain reservations across the country, the states don't have jurisdiction. So the tribes on the reservations are basically sovereign governments within the United States. For instance, a reservation in Montana or Arizona or New Mexico, they may be a sovereign nation separate from the state. The state has no criminal jurisdiction.
when it involves a Native American victim or a Native American subject and it occurs within the exterior boundaries of the reservation. Then the federal government has criminal jurisdiction in those cases. These are generally serious cases such as murder or sexual assault or serious physical assault. The FBI basically has a partnership with the Bureau of Indian Affairs or the tribal law enforcement on the reservations and we investigate those cases jointly.
The FBI can bring in its resources and team that up with the local police, the tribal police, and then these cases are tried in federal court, not state courts. The FBI has jurisdiction on about 200 reservations involving 574 tribes across the country.
I mean, compared to other cases that don't occur on a reservation, do you have to approach that differently? Any country jurisdiction that worked by the FBI, it's a very unique experience. For instance, if a homicide happens in New York City, it's under the jurisdiction of the New York police and they'll go into New York courts. So the FBI generally wouldn't get involved in a case like that. Say a child is kidnapped anywhere in the United States.
especially a child of 10 or years, the FBI is going to get involved in that. If a kidnapping occurs across state lines, the FBI may get involved in that. When a homicide or a kidnapping or serious violent cases occur within the boundaries of the reservation, then the FBI, in conjunction with the BIA and tribal police, has jurisdiction to investigate it.
You know, our agents that are assigned to reservations, they develop close working relationships with their tribal law enforcement partners. Over time, they become really familiar with the communities they work in. Every reservation is different, just like every state in the United States is different. So you kind of learn the area that you work. But at the end of the day, the police work, the law enforcement that goes into it would be just like anywhere else in the country. You learn how to talk to people. You learn the area. You learn the culture.
In your experience here with Ashley Loring's case, do you think that she walked off on her own or do you think that she's a victim of foul play? I had to be careful about commenting on the case itself. I wanted to be careful not to do anything or say anything that would jeopardize the investigation, but...
As time goes on and you don't hear from a person, in any case, I think we would become more and more concerned about what happened there. We're dealing with very rural, vast areas, especially in places like Montana, New Mexico, and Arizona, with often harsh weather conditions.
I've had several tragic cases where a young person, teenager, early 20s, gets highly intoxicated and walks out from freezing weather or very hot weather, and they die. And then, you know, search efforts made, but the body's not found for sometimes days, sometimes weeks, and sometimes years.
There's other cases, too, where a person may just leave the reservation with friends, move to another state, it's not heard from, and then later on we find out this person, they're not deceased, but they're just living out of state. But then there's several times, though, when a person is murdered and their body's concealed, and we just can't find them.
Sometimes we have an idea about what happened. Sometimes we can make a case, we get enough evidence to prove what happened. But sometimes we may have a suspicion, but we just don't have enough case to present it to prosecutors, you know, because we just don't have enough facts to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that, you know, a homicide occurred. What does it take to solve a case like Ashley's at this stage? A lot of times it's going to take that person coming forward to say, hey, you know, this is what happened.
This is where the body was concealed. We go out and recover the body. Or they give us the specific facts that we can follow up and prove, kind of core law, that this is what actually happened. A lot of these cases, reservations often are in small rural communities where everybody knows everybody. A lot of relatives. There's a lot of history in these small communities. And a lot of times there are rumors that are floating around that kind of complicate the issue. You know, we get tips, and a lot of times they're just rumors.
A lot of times you have to chase false leads or dead-end leads, and you have to wade through speculation and rumors about what happened. If you have the right person comes forward and they give you facts that you can corroborate, that can make you successful. But a lot of times it could take months or years.
Besides waiting for that golden person to come forward with the key piece of information that can help solve it, what can be proactively done either by your agency or even somebody like a journalist like myself? You know, that's tough. That's where the term cold case comes in. Sometimes you run every lead to ground, talk to every person that you can pick up to talk to. You collect all the evidence that you can collect and you still hit people
that dead end where nothing new is coming in. One of the things we do, and I think it's a good thing that journalism does, is it keeps the light on these cases. It keeps interest in the case. The community knows that we're still actively looking at it. We want to solve what happened to this missing person. We want to bring resolution to the family. People often say, why don't people cooperate? But, you know, if you had a close family member that you knew did something wrong or a close friend that you knew did something wrong,
It's a real struggle to cooperate. If you had a close brother or cousin that you knew did something wrong, would you rush to the police? You would really think about it. I think it's just human nature.
Those are small, tight-knit communities where everybody knows everybody. And it's very difficult. You are known as the person who calls someone to go to prison. It's hard to live in a small community and sometimes talk to outsiders. There are some investigations where you might be tempted to use deception to get the facts you want, but you'll later be known, "Hey, this person will trick you," or "This person will be dishonest with you." In a small community especially, word will get around that this is a person not to be trusted.
Your reputation will follow you. People talk and you'll quickly develop a reputation. Be yourself and be honest and be a person worthy of trust. Treat people fairly and with honesty, people will be more likely to talk to you. That takes time.
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I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad. I'm like, stop f***ing around. She's like, I can't. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. It's like doubling and tripling and it's all these girls. With a diagnosis, the state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back. Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah.
No, it's hysteria. It's all in your head. It's not physical. Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since The Witches of Salem? Or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here. Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical.
Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. With all this finger-pointing going around between T and Sam, it was time that I met with Sam again. This ain't Mary Lake. See, there's all kinds of stories. I don't know what the hell to believe anymore. That divide that you took Ashley to, how far is it from here?
Sam agreed to take me there in person so we can go play-by-play from what he remembers that morning. I don't trust nobody.
We had your camera there, right? Huh? Yeah. You had the camera there. Yeah. But, you know... Okay, well, okay, right here is where I pulled over right here. And then go back this way a little bit. Yeah, I still get teary-eyed. We parked right up here. Okay. Yeah, let's walk over here. She got out and sat out here for a little bit.
I know I pulled up like right here, and I'm pretty sure she might have sat right here. Like this, I remember her sitting like this. She was looking around. Why'd she get out of the car? I don't know. Just to look around, I guess. It was just like this. So you pulled up and you were waiting for V-Dog to pick her up, right? Yeah. She said pull over, so we came here. And then she sat here. She kind of walked around a bit and then sat here.
Where is it at?
Since you can't see this, I'll do my best to describe it for you.
There's a long gravel car path that veers off from the main road. And as you start to drive down it, you round a bend and you're no longer visible. Sam pulled off here with Ashley that morning. When Sam stopped the car, Ashley got out and walked around for a moment. She sat on a log, which I'm actually sitting on right now. When she got back in the car with Sam, she asked him about a cabin on the mountain way off in the distance. I could see that cabin way out there. It was far. And honestly, I was pretty curious about it too.
But with a huge cliff between here and the mountain, it seems near impossible to get to. This area was eventually searched, and there were no signs of Ashley here. So all signs are pointing towards the fact that she left this place. That was the last thing we talked about, and I pulled my chair back, and I leaned back, and I fell fucking asleep. When you fell asleep, where was she at? She was sitting next to me. We talked about the cabin in the car.
She didn't say nothing when she got out here. She was just looking around. Where was the car at? Right there. On the road or on the grass? We pulled up on the grass. We parked like right here. I was in a blue Monte Carlo. I parked about right here because I remember I could see where she was sitting. You could see the cabin from here. Yep. I laid my seat back and I fell asleep. Just take me through. You wake up, you're right here. What do you see?
Sam did this for about 45 minutes.
And during that time period, he saw some other people out there way off in the distance. -I remember seeing people moving around out here. There was two pickups. One was a blue one, I'm pretty sure blue or maroon, and a brown one. I don't know. I don't know who they were or if they seen us or what. You know, but I remember seeing people moving around out here. It was daytime. It was 10:00 in the morning, you know? It was just like this.
No. Everybody gets wood, you know? There's 15,000 Indians here. It's all fucked up. Why would the feds tell me to not talk to Browning cops? Blackfeet cops. They're paid off. Period. They told me that. You know, why would they say that? Are they lying to me? And that's why I ain't scared to say what I gotta say.
They already got a hit on me anyway, so I don't give a fuck. Who's got a hit on you? Paul and them. So I don't give a fuck, you know? How do you know that? I worry about people I talk about that they could kill too, you know? Do you think that Paul really has a hit on you or are you just worried about that? I already got a hit on us, but he wants me alive. Why does he want you alive? I don't know. I've been thinking about it. He wants me and my son alive. Why would he want it?
Sam still seemed pretty paranoid. People planting evidence at his house. The Blackfeet cops being involved. And he even believes that Paul has a hit out on him. Not sure exactly what to make of all this. When we got back to Sam's house, he started talking about Ashley again.
She told me one day, it was like the fourth day, she said, "Sam, do you believe women's intuition?" I said, "I don't know why." And she said, "I think you got me pregnant that first day, that first night." And I think back, you know, and I think, "Fuck, if they killed her, they killed my kid too."
Up and Vanish is a production of Tenderfoot TV. Created, hosted, and edited by Payne Lindsey. Executive producers are Payne Lindsey and Donald Albright. Original score by Makeup and Vanity Set. Our theme song is Ophelia by Ezra Rose. Sound design, mixing, and mastering by Cooper Skinner. Additional production by Cooper Skinner, Eric Quintana, and myself, Mike Rooney.
Our cover art is by Trevor Eiler. Special thanks to Grace Royer and Oren Rosenbaum at UTA. Ryan Nord, Jesse Nord, and Matthew Papa at The Nord Group, Station 16, Beck Media and Marketing, as well as Chris Cochran and the team at Cadence 13. Visit us on social media at Up and Vantage, or you can visit us at upandvantage.com where you can join in on our discussion board.
If you're enjoying Up and Vintage, tell a friend, family member, or co-worker about it. And don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening. Is your vehicle stopping like it should? Does it squeal or grind when you brake? Don't miss out on summer brake deals at O'Reilly Auto Parts. It's Madeline Barron from In the Dark.
I've spent the past four years investigating a crime. When you're driving down this road, I plan on killing somebody. A four-year investigation, hundreds of interviews, thousands of documents, all in an effort to see what the U.S. military has kept from the public for years. Did you think that a war crime had been committed? I don't have any opinion on that. Season three of In the Dark is available now, wherever you get your podcasts.