10 | Mile 44

0:00You're listening to a Tenderfoot TV podcast.

0:09Cold mornings, holiday to-dos, and all the hustle. I just want my wardrobe to be simple. Pieces that look sharp, feel amazing, and that I'll actually reach for every day. That's why I turn to Quince. And the bonus? Their pieces make gifting completely effortless. This season, Quince keeps it smart and simple. $50 Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like a little everyday luxury, and wool coats that are both stylish and durable. Their denim fits perfectly and is insanely comfortable, and all without the high-end price. By working with ethical factories and top artisans, Quince delivers premium quality while cutting out the middlemen, so you get luxury pieces without the luxury markup.

0:49I'll be honest, I've been living in their cashmere sweaters. They're so soft, they look good, they hold up beautifully, even through all the holiday chaos. Quince also has amazing options for home, bath, kitchen, and travel. If you're looking for a great one-stop shop for gifting, I'm telling you Quince is where it's at. Give and get timeless holiday staples that last this season with Quince. Go to quince.com slash upandvanished for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's quince, Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash upandvanished. Free shipping and 365-day returns.

1:29Quince.com slash upandvanished.

1:34Welcome to Radio Rental. The scariest stories you've ever heard in your life. All told by real people. And off we go. This wasn't a human being that I saw. There's something here in this house. Something not of this world. There was a woman moving through the hall. I stepped back and I was completely alone. Radio Rental is available now. Listen for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

2:29physical, and sexual violence, rape, and murder. The names of survivors have been changed for anonymity purposes. Testimony shared by guests of the show is their own and does not reflect the views of Tenderfoot TV or Odyssey. Thank you so much for listening.

2:49Do you have any suggestions for people I should speak with about what happened to it? Well, we have a former employee that left. Her name is Christine Piscoya. She was the one who last saw him, supposedly. She sensed there was something wrong with him, too. Did she tell you that? No. Really? Really. I talked to her for a long time. She said he was perfectly normal. When did she tell you that she sensed that something was wrong? As soon as he disappeared. Did she say anything more about that? What she told me, they went out for any night at the bar. He came down to the beach Saturday afternoon.

3:41She said he seemed different. She told me that she got a sense that something was wrong. What did she tell you this? I don't know.

3:54Joseph and I had many conversations about her. I warned him, Joseph, I know you want to be friends with her. You tell me there's nothing more but friendship. You better not play the game, because she will fall hard. He said, no, Camille, she's just my good friend. I said, then don't play her.

4:19DUDAN' Dской

4:50Andy Klamzer was hired by Joseph's family in the summer of 2016 to investigate his disappearance. Joseph met Christine at the Nome Court where she worked. She left the court, but they remained friends and would socialize frequently. It was a little murky to me about whether or not Joseph and Christine had a relationship at one time. He conducted over a dozen interviews, starting with some of Joseph's co-workers. Are you aware of any women that Joseph had been involved with in Nome, even if it was just a casual one-night thing? I suspect that he was involved with Christine, but that was just a suspicion.

5:33I think something's going on between those two. They spent too much time together. Multiple people had speculated Joseph and Christine had some sort of romantic relationship, at least at one point in time. They may have been involved at one time. It sounded like they probably did, but they were no longer involved. It switched to just being close friends. They socialized frequently. Andy asked Christine herself about her relationship with Joseph. So were you and Joseph ever in a romantic relationship? No, we were just friends. Okay. Do you remember Joseph ever talking about anyone that he was having problems with and known?

6:14He never said anything, but I don't think he's the type of person to have someone be mad at him because if there was an issue, he would ask him about it. I don't think he was that type of person to have anybody mad at him. What are your gut instincts about what you think happened to him? I don't know. I mean, I still have hope that he's somewhere. and I just don't want, I just have a feeling that he is somewhere, he's got to be somewhere because he can't just up and leave. And I haven't given up on, I haven't lost hope.

6:59I think about him every day and keep wondering if today's the day that somebody will call me and tell me that he's found or something, but I don't know. Joseph's last communications on his cell phone leading up to his disappearance are a crucial piece of evidence in this case. We have his cell phone records, but Sprint was unable to provide the contents of his phone's text messages. All we can see are the times and the phone numbers. There are numerous texts back and forth between Joseph and Christine, Friday and Saturday, leading all the way up to the moment he drops off the grid. Because Joseph's cell phone is also missing along with him, Our only hope in finding out what him and Christine were talking about in those final moments is if Christine provided those messages herself.

7:47But the day after Joseph went missing, Christine completely restored her iPhone. My brother had picked up my phone because I was in one of the races. He was wanting to record it, so he flipped up and took a picture or recorded it or something. And then my brother's a jackass who likes to fuck with things. And so he punched in my password and disabled my phone. And so I had been trying my passwords that I thought I changed it to. And by the time I got to trying to get it, it would lock me out in an hour. And then it finally said connect to iTunes. It was making me wait an hour, wait 60 minutes or, you know, wait this long.

8:25All the versions of this story that Christine told police, the first private investigator and Andy Clamser are so damn convoluted. Her brother wanted to film something on her phone. So did he? because you can do that without unlocking it. And did she pass her phone to her brother? If so, why not just unlock it for him? Regardless of why or how Christine restored her phone, this was extremely detrimental to the investigation. And so I just reset it to a new phone. And then when I tried to look how to back up, you know, from a previous, it wouldn't give me that option. And so I had to restore it as a new phone.

9:03Have you heard any rumors about what might have happened to him? I don't know. They were saying maybe he could have been eaten by a bear. Maybe he could have fallen. I don't know.

9:18Joseph's truck was found on Monday, June 27, 2016, after he didn't show up for work in the morning. His truck was found at the Mile 44 marker of a road called Gnome Council Road. Mile 44 is pretty far out there, a decent trek from Gnome proper. at least a 45-minute to one-hour drive from the beach in Nome, where Joseph was allegedly last seen with Christine. Joseph's truck itself is one of the only physical pieces of evidence we have left to analyze. Law enforcement has the ability to seize vehicles and process them for fingerprints. But the Alaska State troopers dropped the ball on that one. That was not done.

9:58They basically just didn't explore any of that. I think they became wedded to the theory that he was a victim of an accident. There are multiple sightings of his truck, but some of these sightings appear contradictory. Let's start with the very first sighting. Around 3 p.m. on Saturday, a witness said they saw the truck with a man standing behind the open driver's door. They saw a man standing by the driver's door. The first private investigator that went out interviewed the witness. Tell me your story. I was coming from my camp at Council, so it was like Saturday afternoon, 3 o 'clock or so. Truck was parked there, kind of in an unusual spot, so I slowed down just to see if anybody needed help.

10:45I slowed down, looked over at him. And you saw somebody standing next to the truck? Yes, he was standing right next to the truck when I went by. I should tell you, somebody was standing next to the truck. Because I don't know him from a car. So, was this actually Joseph? Or could it have been someone else? He said that he couldn't identify the person that he saw standing there. It was just too fast and he was behind the door. A man with dark hair. That's about all they could provide. So, there's that. Was he leaning against it or 10 feet away from it? or what do you mean? The driver's door was open.

11:25He's standing two or three feet away from the car. And so the door is partially blocking him, but I can still see him standing there and something in his hands, looking down at his hands. Whoever it was, the driver's door was open. He was standing behind the driver's door, looking down at something in his hands. And he didn't even look up, didn't wave me down or anything. So I figured he was all right. And away I went. This man claimed to have seen Joseph's truck at 3 p.m. on Saturday. But if Joseph left the beach at 3 p.m. in Nome, and it takes nearly an hour to get out there, how could this even be possible?

12:00Either he's mixed up on the time, someone is mistaken or lying about when Joseph actually left town, or this wasn't Joseph at all, and it was somebody else standing by his truck. On Sunday, several people said that they drove by and saw the truck various times during the day Sunday. Trooper Sergeant Cross saw the truck at 1 o 'clock. According to the Alaska State Troopers report, Sergeant Cross saw Joseph's truck early in the afternoon on Sunday, June 26. At this point in time, Joseph had been out of communication with everyone for nearly 24 hours. He was specific that he saw it at 1 p.m. This is a very rural area.

12:46This is a gravel road in the middle of nowhere. If you know the way cops operate, he's going to remember it. I think that's a very credible observation. The first private investigator interviewed as many witnesses as he could. He found a convoy of two vehicles that had seen Joseph's truck at the same time on Sunday. They were brothers, in separate vehicles, driving their families to a wedding. This might be our most credible account. June 24th of 2016 was a Friday, the 25th was a Saturday, the 26th was a Sunday, and the following Monday would have been the 27th, okay? Right, okay. All right. You are coming back from council on what day?

13:29The 26th. Sunday, the 26th. Our family friend was getting married that day, so we were coming back in early. Louie and I were in the same vehicle coming back, and we left council at 10 o 'clock in the morning. Does Council have a mile marker? It does. What is it? It's right around 74, 75. That's right in there. So to get to 44, you'd have to travel 30 miles? Yep. Do you think you left right at 10? It was very close to 10. I remember looking at the clock. From Council to mile 44, about how long does that take? I would say probably 40 to 45 miles, I would say. We push the speed limit pretty good because, you know, I've been driving on it since I was 15.

14:09So, I mean, we go a lot faster than just the average person would driving on that road. We're talking about leaving just right about 10 on the dot. And we're talking 40 to 45 minutes to hit mile marker 44. Dan, you believe it's between 1040 and 1045 or 1040 and 1050? 1040, 1045. The reason it stood out, I mean, he was right on the edge of the road. When you're going to go park off the road and go do something, You pull off a lot further than he was. He wasn't pulled off very far at all. Hasty parking job. So at 10.45 a.m. on Sunday, June 26, Joseph's truck was at mile 44. It was sticking out in the road at a bizarre angle, as if it was parked there in a hurry.

14:57The angle in which it was positioned, it almost appears as if the truck was coming from the opposite direction. Saturday the 25th we drove down to council and I can't remember seeing it there but I can't say that I did. Can't say whether it was there or not but it seems like when we were all driving down on Saturday afternoon if it was there it seems like we would have seen it. If he's hurt an ankle break a leg whatever he's going to be on that ridge a helicopter in 20 minutes is going to find him. A helicopter in 20 minutes is going to cover more than he can cover in hours of running. Ruling out foul play, I don't think he got lost.

15:42And if he's in that area, it'd have to be like an animal attack, I guess, you know? And man, I just really don't see that either, you know? There's going to be something. In every one of his pictures, he's wearing a hat. When you get mauled by a bear, your hat's going to fly off. Yeah. There's going to be something. And when they kill and eat stuff, it's a mess. Yeah. I mean, bears swiping away, there's going to be parts and pieces that the bear is not interested in. Yeah, they're not that efficient. They're like wolves. They'll leave half of a carcass. So wherever the bear got them at, there'd be some kind of evidence, you know, laying there.

16:22I guess that's my problem with the bear deal. There's tons of bears. That area was searched so good, and there's so many things that don't make sense. It just feels like a foul play deal to me. Nothing makes sense. Either he doesn't want to be found, or someone doesn't want him to be found. I know the helicopter pilot. He's awesome. He worked that whole ridge over, back and forth, five foot off the ground, 20 foot off the ground. There's a piece missing somewhere. If it's a girlfriend that had an argument with him on the phone, another girl in his life that's in Nome that isn't his technical girlfriend, a roommate that had a fight with him, or something.

17:09Things get botched, investigations. Just simple stuff wasn't followed up on. Zanya Ivanov. A lady watched her walk down the street and get into a cop car and drive away. She called it into the cops twice. Maybe I better not say anything more to the cops. She just got into a cop car the night she went missing. I... I'd just work everybody over. OK. The search for Joseph Balderas was the largest operation the city of Nome had ever conducted. His truck was found less than 40 yards from a natural stream, visible from the road. If he actually went out there to go fishing, how far could he have possibly wandered away from his truck?

17:54There's not a single trace of him anywhere.

18:17ability. Discover the stylish and efficient Camry and Corolla, both available with all-wheel drive, or go with the RAV4 or Grand Highlander. Versatile, adventurous, and ready to take you and your family wherever the road leads. Need muscle? Take it up a notch with the Tacoma or Tundra, built tough and always ready for the long haul. And no matter which Toyota you choose, you'll find smart financing and lease options available to qualified customers, making it easier than ever to get behind the wheel of the Toyota you've been waiting for. But don't wait. These year-end savings won't last. Shop the entire Toyota lineup and find a great deal today on buyatoyota.com.

19:02Toyota, let's go places. It's NBA tip-off week and FanDuel is your home for live betting. So even if you miss the start of the game or want to ride the hot hand, FanDuel has live bets on everything from who will score next to fourth quarter comebacks. Plus, you can even combine your live bets into a same-game parlay for a shot at a bigger payout. However you want to play, now is the perfect time to join. Because FanDuel is giving new customers$300 in bonus bets if your first$5 bet wins. So just visit fanduel.com slash sports fan to sign up today. Play your game with FanDuel, official sports betting partner of the NBA.

19:41Must be 21 plus and present in Virginia. First online real money wager only. $5 first deposit required. A bonus issue does not withdrawable. Bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

19:59There was such an exhaustive search for Joseph with helicopters, with people on the ground, with dogs. Maybe there was foul play involved. After everything and after all the things that I've heard and seen, I think the most likely things are that it was human involvement. Somebody either intentionally or accidentally killed him, and we didn't look in the right place. On a conference call, the first private investigator recalled a bizarre incident that occurred while they were out searching. Kevin Piscoya, he is Christine's uncle, 20-year veteran of the Air Force Base. He retired from it after 20 years, came back to Nome.

20:40He worked at the Nome Police Department for a very short period of time, about three months, for whatever reason, did not work there anymore. Kevin Pascoya, he's not talked about that much, but I think because he's an ex-cop. But he did some fuck shit. Kevin Pascoya, an ex-cop in Gnome and the uncle of Christine, exhibited some weird behavior. Kevin Pascoya went around in a side-by-side and ran over all the tracks. They screamed, they yelled, what are you doing? Why did you do that? Footprints and you just ran over them. That's bizarre behavior for somebody that has law enforcement training. Took his ATV down it and just ripped up the trail and ruined the scent.

21:24They were all like, why the fuck did you just do that? The cops don't really question him, I think, because he's an ex-cop. He might just be a bad, a dumb dummy. Yeah, a dumb dummy. Yeah, for sure. You don't even have to have law enforcement training. Just a normal person knows that if you're following a foot track, you don't go run over it. A normal person knows that. But for a cop that has been trained in the collection, preservation of evidence, that's really abnormal. He is Christine's uncle, which Christine is important because she's the last person that we know saw Joseph alive. A few months after Joseph went missing.

22:02Andy Klamser interviewed one of his co-workers in them. I actually went to lunch with him the Friday before he went missing. The actual Friday before that weekend? And why I remember that is we had a visiting judge here who'd been coming here off and on for several months filling in while Joseph's boss was out on sick leave. I remember that we went to lunch Friday and I remember at that lunch being annoyed with Joseph for looking at his cell phone while we were at lunch with the judge I thought that was very rude and it was kind of unlike Joseph he had enough people skills to know that was rude but he he kept doing it and then finally he said oh my roommate he went over on the internet usage and he was annoyed with that he must have got some notification from his internet provider saying that his roommate had used it all up and he was really annoyed by that he had rented a house that was right downtown and within the last four or months before he disappeared, had a new roommate, a local young man.

23:06I understand from friends that there had been a little bit of tension between the two. The roommate was younger and there was some partying. Joseph wasn't comfortable with that. Just a few days after he went missing, she made contact with Joseph's roommate, a man named Jake. She was desperately trying to gather all the facts and build out some sort of timeline. So she texted his roommate, Jake, about the last time he remembers seeing Joseph. I texted him what's on Monday, June 27th at 1120 at night. I'll read you what I typed. It says, hi, Jake. Search and rescue needs to double check what day and time did you last see him?

23:45What did Jake tell you? Jake responded, it was about one o 'clock

24:06If the roommate, Jake, saw Joseph in town at the house on Sunday, that changes everything. Could I take a picture of the text? The roommate was interviewed right away, told the troopers he was gone Saturday night with friends, but that he saw Joseph the next morning walking down the hallway in the house. Sunday morning, after Joseph had stopped responding to anyone. He's the only person who claims to have seen Joseph on Sunday. Joseph's last text to his fiancée was around 10 a.m. on Saturday. So did Joseph drive back to his house in Nome, then go back out again the next day? And if so, why wouldn't he respond to his fiancée, Megan?