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podcasts. Music

0:21

Sometime around the end of August

0:23

of 2019, 41-year-old

0:26

Joshua Simiski left his father's home

0:28

in Tacoma, Washington, headed

0:30

for Port Angeles, about two hours away.

0:33

Josh stayed there for a period of several

0:35

weeks and told his family that he was on

0:37

a spiritual

0:38

journey. So he was

0:40

going through this like spiritual,

0:43

trying to go through a spiritual awakening,

0:45

he calls it. But I think it was more

0:48

than that. Josh met a woman during

0:50

his time in Port Angeles and things

0:52

got weird. The last known communication

0:55

from Josh was a voicemail that he left

0:57

for his father on October 6. Hey

0:59

Pops, Josh. I think

1:01

I just gave away my truck. I know I did. You'll

1:03

see. It's been crazy, but yeah, now

1:05

I need a getaway car. Josh

1:08

had not only given his car away, but

1:10

he had also given away all of his other possessions

1:13

and money. He had left behind a handwritten

1:15

note saying he was giving everything to a

1:17

woman he had recently

1:18

met. When I went out

1:20

there to report him missing,

1:23

the woman who was mentioned

1:25

by name by him approached

1:28

me and gave me a small

1:32

note paper that appeared

1:34

to be his writing to me that

1:37

he had given everything away.

1:39

Was this truly what Josh wanted?

1:41

Or was something more sinister going on?

1:44

That letter was written. That's not

1:46

his handwriting. I think she's a liar.

1:49

I think she's a thief. And I think she has

1:51

a lot more to say than what

1:53

she's saying. I don't know what that is,

1:56

but I just don't trust her.

1:58

It's

1:58

just based on her character. Alright, I think

2:01

she's a horrible person, and

2:03

I think she has more to do with this

2:06

than she's anxious.

2:08

And that's just the beginning of this bizarre

2:10

mystery. Josh and Miski seemed

2:12

to disappear and reappear multiple times.

2:15

With sightings that seemed possibly credible.

2:18

But was that really Josh that people were seeing around

2:20

town,

2:20

or a case of mistaken identity?

2:24

When she says she saw Josh

2:26

enter the store, and she

2:28

had his likeness on Facebook,

2:31

missing persons. Post from

2:33

just days before. And she

2:36

confronted him with the post, with

2:38

his picture, and said, this is you,

2:40

this says you're missing. He

2:43

said, that is me, but

2:45

I'm not missing, I just don't want to

2:47

be found.

2:48

Join us as we work to untangle this

2:50

mystery. Could Josh still be out there

2:53

on his spiritual journey? Does he simply

2:55

not want to be found? Or was

2:57

Josh the victim of manipulation and

2:59

foul play? And who was the woman

3:02

at the center of this strange tale?

3:05

We knew each other in another life. Okay.

3:07

But he was with you? Yes.

3:10

Okay. Absolutely why did you marry me? And

3:12

he was with you just before his spirit.

3:16

And you told me that you saw that

3:18

he walked out into the woods with your dog. And

3:20

that his dog appeared next to you? Yes. Okay.

3:24

Twice. And that you didn't see Josh

3:26

after he went into the woods. Has you guys

3:28

ever talked about him giving you

3:30

all of his things?

3:32

I've talked about offering

3:35

it for my handling marriage. Do you realize

3:37

how important this case is? I really don't. I'm

3:40

here, honey. Okay. Do you understand how this looks?

3:42

I'm Marissa, and from Wundery, this

3:45

is episode 413 of The Vanished, part

3:48

one of Joshua Simiskey's story, The

3:51

Journey.

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That's A-N-G-I dot com.

4:50

The story of Josh Simiski's disappearance

4:52

is a bizarre tale that at times

4:55

seems to defy logic. Josh

4:57

was a father who had his fair share of struggles

4:59

in relationships with unhappy endings.

5:02

At 41 years old, Josh was trying to find

5:05

himself in ways that some may see as

5:07

unconventional. And that's how Josh

5:09

ended up in Port Angeles, Washington in

5:12

the late summer and early fall of 2019. The

5:15

final confirmed sighting of Josh was in

5:17

Olympic National Park, which we

5:19

will delve into deeply later on. But

5:22

for Josh's brother, Lauren, it wasn't

5:24

surprising that Josh would be visiting a national

5:27

park. He always loved the outdoors.

5:29

Josh was much older than Lauren and

5:32

was somewhat of a father figure in his life.

5:34

Lauren told us more about Josh.

5:37

He was my best friend growing

5:40

up. My brother's the one who taught me everything

5:42

because our dad was never around. So

5:44

he was like my dad.

5:47

There's a pretty big age difference between us. He's

5:49

a really good person. He was caring

5:52

and kind and always looking out

5:54

for everybody, even at the expense

5:56

of himself.

5:57

Anything outdoors, fishing.

6:00

We'd always go fishing and hiking

6:02

and he would take me when we were younger He'd

6:05

take me out and

6:06

teach me survival skills

6:08

and

6:09

we'd go we go hiking out into

6:11

the mountains He'd get us lost

6:15

and I'm doing air quotes

6:17

So he would act like we were lost to get

6:19

me to stay and then

6:21

it always ended up being fun Like

6:23

if you had a man my brother I

6:25

don't understand how somebody

6:27

could take it to where it got taken

6:29

to I know we can't prove it But

6:32

if you could even have met him for

6:34

a minute Like I don't understand how somebody could

6:37

hurt my brother or want to

6:39

hurt somebody who is such a

6:41

caring person

6:43

As the years went on Josh's love for the

6:45

outdoors morphed into other interests like

6:47

holistic medicine and shamanism

6:50

He just loved to be outdoors and

6:53

you know drum circles and

6:55

he's kind of a hippie He

6:57

was big into like learning about

7:00

spiritual healing and

7:03

Horistic medicine he studied it constantly

7:08

when he got sober and

7:10

started working like you

7:13

know to heal himself in his mind

7:15

and

7:15

To work on the reasons what made him

7:18

want to use that always led back

7:20

to like finding holistic approach

7:22

for him and then

7:24

and then it was shamanism and

7:27

He was a firm believer in like the

7:29

microdosing EMT

7:32

he did that Probably

7:35

for years before up until

7:37

he went missing as far as I'm aware He

7:39

did that to cope with his depression in

7:42

his anxiety and and

7:43

I mean he didn't do it to the point where

7:46

he was like hallucinating

7:48

and doing that he literally was microdosing

7:52

for medicinal purposes like stuff that

7:54

he had learned from shaman

7:57

that he had met that had gone on

7:59

a

7:59

Shaman's excursion through

8:02

South America.

8:04

That guy came back and was teaching

8:06

him how to use

8:08

ayahuasca medicinally

8:11

and spiritually and

8:13

Josh got really into

8:15

that.

8:16

In the lead up to Josh's disappearance he had

8:18

been staying at his father's house in Tacoma,

8:21

Washington along with his daughter

8:23

and his fiancé, Lauren.

8:25

But as the summer of 2019 was coming

8:27

to a close. Josh and Lauren

8:30

left Tacoma. We spoke to Josh's

8:32

father, Jared, and he told us more

8:34

about this time.

8:36

Josh left my house

8:39

with his fiancé to go

8:41

to Port Angeles to sort

8:43

out their relationship and issues

8:46

that he was having personally. He

8:49

was gone from my presence

8:51

for several weeks. I'm going to say three

8:53

weeks but I'm just kind of guessing

8:55

there. He seemed to be in good spirits.

8:59

When I saw him last

9:01

I had his 15 year

9:03

old daughter here at my house.

9:06

He had left her with me with a note giving

9:08

me guardianship of the

9:10

child. They left

9:13

and they went out towards Port

9:15

Angeles and they stayed at one of

9:17

the parks on the Hood Canal there. I

9:20

met up with them at one of the parks on the

9:22

Hood Canal there and I brought his

9:24

daughters with me. We

9:27

stayed with them for the day and I met them

9:29

in a different park after

9:32

that and spent a day with

9:34

them. They seemed like they were getting along.

9:36

They seemed like they were

9:39

in good spirits and

9:41

things maybe were getting better. That's

9:44

how it appeared to me. But that was

9:46

the last time I saw him was

9:48

there at that park.

9:50

Jared didn't have any reason to suspect that

9:52

anything was amiss. He certainly never

9:55

expected his son to disappear but

9:57

things took a strange turn on October

9:59

6th, 2015. 2019 and it was the

10:01

first inkling Jared had that something

10:03

wasn't right. He told us that he went out

10:06

shopping that day with Josh's daughter

10:08

and returned home to find a weird message

10:10

on his voicemail.

10:12

I took her out on the

10:14

day that he disappeared to buy

10:17

some shoes. And I was doing

10:19

that when he called and left me

10:21

a voicemail. It wasn't

10:24

until an hour later when I got home that

10:26

I listened to the voicemail and

10:28

it was a very bizarre thing.

10:31

He said that he had given away

10:33

everything, including his

10:35

vehicle and his wallet and his

10:38

phone. And he was calling

10:40

me from the phone of, uh,

10:42

of someone at the park where

10:45

he was and asking me to come pick him up.

10:49

Now I'm in Tacoma. He was in

10:52

Port Angeles and I was already

10:54

an hour later than that.

10:57

And because of the nature of the call, I

10:59

was alarmed enough that I called

11:01

the police to ask that to

11:04

go to the park and make sure that he was

11:06

okay. At that point, I

11:08

think officer Johnson was

11:11

either there or heard about it and had already

11:13

met Joshua

11:15

and know who he was on site. And

11:18

he was the one who went to the park in 15

11:21

minutes later was able to confirm

11:23

that no one at the park would admit to

11:25

that. He'd seen him at all.

11:28

He couldn't be found. No one

11:31

knew anything. That was the first

11:34

stuff that I learned. It took me

11:36

a little while to get out of the house because

11:39

I had his daughter here and, and

11:41

didn't know whether to bring her or leave her.

11:44

So I ended up leaving her home and

11:47

driving out to Port Angeles

11:49

from Tacoma. And I didn't arrive

11:51

there until nine or 10 at

11:53

night. And I just started

11:56

hoofing it around. I went to the

11:58

park where he said he was. was going to be,

12:00

I talked to the

12:03

folks hanging around at the park. They

12:06

said they knew Josh and his fiance

12:10

and they told me the same thing

12:12

they told Officer Johnson, that they

12:14

hadn't seen him.

12:16

Jared had a starting place to look for Josh

12:19

because he had mentioned in his voicemail that he was

12:21

at the pier in Port Angeles. Josh

12:23

had called his father from someone else's phone.

12:26

In the message, Josh said that he had given

12:28

all of his belongings away and that

12:30

included his cell phone. Here is

12:33

Josh's voicemail in its entirety.

12:36

Hey Pods, Josh. I'm

12:40

humping PA

12:41

at the pier and

12:45

I think I just gave away my truck.

12:48

I know I did. You'll

12:50

see. It's

12:54

been crazy but yeah, now I need a getaway.

12:56

Well, just, I don't

13:01

know,

13:03

her friends are wanting

13:05

me to go. Anyway, I'm

13:07

going to tell you again right now. I'm going to keep bugging you until you answer.

13:10

I'll be back.

13:12

If you had any trouble understanding that,

13:14

Josh said that he was at the pier in Port Angeles.

13:17

He gave away his truck. It's been crazy

13:19

and now he needed a getaway car. Then

13:22

he says, her friends are wanting me

13:24

to go. He ends the message by

13:26

saying he would keep calling his dad until

13:28

he answered. After this time, you

13:30

can still hear people talking. Almost

13:33

as if Josh thought that he had hung up the phone

13:35

but it kept recording. It can be

13:37

difficult to make out the rest but we'll play

13:39

it for you so you can hear it for yourself.

14:02

No, I just... Okay.

14:08

Watch. Let's

14:17

go like that again and just check out. Gosh,

14:21

hey. I'm

14:30

sorry. Okay.

14:38

Okay. Okay.

14:46

You know, maybe side bar or not.

14:50

We don't have a lot

14:52

of people. We're

14:54

talking about a group. Police

14:58

were able to obtain surveillance

15:00

footage of Josh from the pier that day. The

15:02

short clip that we received from the Port Angeles Police Department shows

15:04

Josh walking alone. He's wearing a plaid

15:06

shirt that looks to be black and white or another dark color

15:09

and white. Pants, maybe jeans, and boots. Which

15:14

becomes important later on so hang on to that

15:16

thought. And then

15:18

Josh walks across the slotted dress

15:20

and he's wearing a black shirt. And then he's wearing

15:22

a black shirt. And

15:26

then Josh walks across the screen and

15:28

is no longer in view. Jared

15:31

learned that Josh had given all of his belongings

15:33

away to a woman named Susan Brown.

15:35

And she had a note penned allegedly by

15:37

Josh. Saying that he was giving

15:40

all of his belongings to her and the lower Elwha

15:42

tribe. Josh hadn't known Susan

15:44

Brown before his brief stay in Port Angeles.

15:47

Jared had no idea why Josh would have entrusted

15:50

her with all of his possessions. It

15:52

was all very odd and somewhat alarming.

15:56

He had given everything to Susan

15:59

Brown and the lower Eilwa tribe,

16:02

I decided to go out to the tribal

16:05

casino and see

16:07

if someone in security out there

16:09

would talk to me and I could

16:12

ask them if there was some conceivable

16:14

reason why my son would get everything

16:17

that he had to the tribe that

16:20

they could be aware of. I was just shooting

16:22

in the dark, of course. I met one security

16:26

guard at the casino and he

16:29

was a contact, I believe,

16:31

for the Port Angeles police

16:33

thereafter, but I know

16:35

of nothing that came from that. After

16:38

failing to find anything and knowing I

16:41

left his daughter home alone, I

16:43

searched around for a little longer,

16:46

not knowing what to do, and

16:48

I ended up coming home. Then

16:50

I went out again, I

16:53

think it might have been two days later on

16:55

the night, and that's when I put in the

16:57

missing persons report at

16:59

the police station.

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20:32

Audible.com slash MIA. Jared

20:39

had called in a welfare check on October

20:41

6th, the day of the voicemail. He

20:44

called the police again on the 9th to let

20:46

them know that he still couldn't find Josh.

20:48

He wanted to see if they had any updates

20:51

and unfortunately they didn't. On

20:53

the 10th, Jared walked into the Port Angeles

20:55

Police Department and reported his son missing.

20:57

And it was while Jared was in Port

21:00

Angeles to report Josh missing that

21:02

he had an encounter with Susan Brown, the

21:04

woman who Josh had given all of his things

21:06

to.

21:08

When I went out there to report

21:10

him missing, the woman,

21:13

Susan Brown, who was mentioned

21:15

by name by him,

21:18

approached me and gave me a small

21:22

note paper that appeared

21:24

to be his writing to me

21:27

saying the same thing that he had told

21:29

me verbally in the voicemail. That

21:32

he has given everything to Susan

21:34

Brown and the lower Elwha tribe and

21:36

it had his signature on it. The

21:39

only odd thing about it was that it was post

21:42

dated to the 11th, which

21:45

was my hand. Other than that,

21:47

it appeared authentic to me. And

21:50

because I had confirmed

21:53

his voice on the voicemail

21:55

saying the very same thing, I didn't

21:58

really have cause to doubt.

22:00

Susan Brown told me that

22:04

she thought after he had disappeared

22:06

the other night, like two nights before,

22:10

she thought he had come to her

22:12

RV, removed some clothing

22:15

items, some stuff that he had left

22:17

behind. She thought that

22:19

he had been there maybe and got that.

22:22

I'm not sure if she mentioned his

22:24

wallet specifically or not. I

22:27

had no evidence of anything else.

22:29

Before we move forward, it's important

22:32

to note here that not everyone agrees

22:34

with Jared that the note was written in Josh's

22:36

handwriting.

22:37

Some people believe that the note looks like it

22:39

was written by someone else and signed by

22:42

Josh and others

22:43

believe that both the note and the signature

22:45

don't look like Josh's handwriting.

22:48

And we'd also like to briefly mention here that

22:50

while Josh's note said that he was leaving all

22:52

of his belongings to Susan Brown in

22:54

the Lower El Wah tribe, it was Susan Brown's

22:56

Susan Brown who seemed to have all of his items.

22:59

And as far as we're aware, nothing was ever

23:01

given to the tribe by Susan or Josh.

23:04

Josh had called his father from someone

23:06

else's phone because he had given his own away.

23:10

Jared explained that he had the number in his phone and

23:12

hoped the owner of that phone would have some information.

23:15

So the police checked into that.

23:18

I know Susan Brown gave

23:20

the police the name of the individual

23:23

whose phone he used to call

23:25

me because of course we had

23:27

that number in my phone. So they

23:29

were able to trace that number and find

23:31

out who that was but that didn't seem

23:33

to lead them anywhere.

23:35

After the police department had opened up

23:37

a missing report on Josh,

23:39

almost immediately they had a promising

23:42

lead. Within 15

23:44

minutes of making the report

23:47

with the police, they had

23:49

a report from a park

23:51

ranger who had picked up

23:54

Joshua out around Lake

23:56

Crescent walking down

23:58

the middle of Highway barefooted

24:01

in the rain in October. He

24:03

had the dash cam so

24:06

it was possible to identify Josh

24:08

on the dash cam and you could

24:10

hear their interactions.

24:13

Josh had an encounter with park rangers

24:15

within Olympic National Park on the morning

24:17

after he left that voicemail for Jared.

24:20

That would have been October 7th 2019 around 7.30

24:24

a.m. We were able to obtain

24:26

footage from the body cams the officers

24:28

were wearing that morning. Here's the audio

24:31

from the first one.

24:33

That's it. Josh what? Josh

24:35

what?

24:37

Okay I'd like to

24:39

get you somewhere where you're not in the middle of the road.

24:47

We're gonna talk again.

24:51

According to the Rangers they were dispatched

24:53

to the area after a call came in

24:55

about a male subject walking in the eastbound

24:58

lane with no shoes on. They found

25:00

Josh on highway 101 around mile

25:02

post 226 by Crescent

25:05

Lake. This was many miles away

25:07

from where Josh had called his father from the pier

25:09

in Port Angeles, about 22 miles

25:11

in fact. If Josh had walked there

25:14

it would have taken about eight hours. How

25:17

Josh had made it to this location remains

25:19

a mystery to this very day. He told

25:21

the Rangers that he didn't want to ride or any

25:24

help from them whatsoever. The road

25:26

was becoming narrow, logging trucks

25:28

were honking at Josh and the Rangers were

25:30

concerned that he would get hit. The

25:32

two Rangers continued to follow Josh for

25:34

approximately 45 minutes before

25:37

eventually convincing him to let them give him

25:39

a ride somewhere.

25:40

Josh told them that he wanted to go to the lower

25:42

Elwha reservation. They observed

25:45

that Josh seemed agitated and

25:47

he also told the Rangers that he had given away

25:49

all of his belongings. They offered

25:51

him a ride there but he told them

25:53

just to drop him off at the Shadow Mountain gas

25:55

station and general store. They

25:57

told Josh that he could catch a bus from that location.

26:00

location, but then witnessed him just

26:02

continue walking barefoot, wearing

26:04

a white and black plaid jacket or shirt,

26:06

jeans, and no shoes. They

26:09

noted the temperature that day ranged from 48 to 58

26:12

degrees. Here is the audio

26:14

from the footage documenting their second encounter

26:16

with Josh when he agreed to take them up

26:18

on their offer for a ride.

26:21

Well

26:24

the bus stop, you

26:27

don't have to pay, they won't refuse

26:29

you on the bus. Yeah, if you held the bus

26:31

down, they let you on even if you

26:33

don't have money. And they'll bring you to lower

26:35

Elwa. Well yeah,

26:37

let's do that then. Yeah, good. Okay.

26:40

Do you mind if we just check to give

26:42

you a quick pat down to make sure you don't have any weapons? Weapons,

26:45

that's what we're worried about. We don't care about

26:47

everything that you might have, okay bud? I'm

26:51

not anyway.

26:57

Good. I was getting worried

26:59

man, these logging truckers, they're just

27:01

so big. They pick up the whole lane,

27:04

hit that white line and scared

27:06

me a couple times. I don't doubt

27:08

it. I'm the driver for quite a bit. We'll

27:11

put them in mind. Let's go

27:15

up on the passenger side

27:17

of the Tahoe.

27:32

You

27:49

can see it now, the situation right now.

27:51

Yep. Yep.

27:55

Thank you. Okay.

28:01

Oh, thank God.

28:04

Turn off the recording.

28:08

With

28:08

this information that Josh had been dropped

28:10

off at the Shadow Mountain gas station and general

28:12

store by park rangers, Jared

28:14

headed there to see if he could find Josh or

28:17

anyone who may have seen him in that area. At

28:19

this point he was a few days behind

28:21

Josh's last sighting there, but maybe

28:24

he was still in the area.

28:26

He managed to get Josh to come

28:29

get in the truck with him while he

28:31

drove back to town, but

28:33

he only would stay

28:36

in the truck with him till he got to the

28:38

first public place, which was the RV

28:40

park country store. He insisted

28:43

on getting out there. That was

28:45

not all the way back into town.

28:47

That was miles still from Port

28:50

Angeles. But that was the last

28:52

place that I heard that he had

28:54

been. And so that was the

28:56

next place I went. I went

28:59

out to that resort and I asked

29:01

people in the store if they'd seen anything

29:04

and I asked some of the residents in

29:06

the RV park. If they had

29:08

seen anything and everything

29:10

was negative and I wandered around in

29:12

the woods nearby there thinking

29:15

that if he had collapsed and died

29:18

from exposure or something in the vicinity.

29:21

But, you know, I mean, in those woods

29:23

and the undergrowth out there, you could fall

29:26

down in a ditch a few feet from the highway

29:28

and never be seen again. I mean,

29:31

it's just dense overgrowth.

29:34

Jared didn't find any trace of Josh at

29:36

Shadow Mountain, which is an RV park

29:38

with a little gas station convenience store

29:40

that sells food and camping supplies.

29:43

But just as Jared was ready to give up without

29:45

any further leads to hunt down or

29:47

new directions to seek out, he

29:49

encountered a woman who believed that she had seen

29:52

Josh alive the day before. And

29:54

at this point, it had been several days since

29:56

Josh was last seen by the park rangers

29:58

when they dropped him off.

30:01

I wandered around for a while and then as

30:03

I left, I saw a woman waiting

30:05

at the bus stop. And so I asked

30:07

her if she had seen, I

30:10

showed her the picture and said, did

30:12

you see him? And she says, I

30:15

saw him yesterday. I

30:17

saw him at the Goodwill in

30:20

Port Angeles. So I offered

30:22

to give her a ride to town and she told

30:24

me a little bit about seeing

30:27

him by Susan

30:29

Brown's trailer, RV at

30:31

the Goodwill store in Port

30:33

Angeles. And she

30:35

saw him talking to somebody else that

30:38

she was familiar with. And

30:40

they were talking about him getting a ride to

30:42

Squim. Now all of this is

30:45

unsubstantiated. I took

30:47

a local PI that

30:50

Janie had hired, Josh's mom,

30:52

and I got this woman from the trailer

30:54

park and another gal friend

30:56

of hers to have

30:59

an interview. It was unproductive

31:01

because you couldn't pinpoint anything

31:03

that seemed to have anything to do

31:06

with what we were talking about. They were talking about

31:08

drugs and all of the evil

31:11

people in the area and you couldn't trust the

31:13

cops and you couldn't, you know, and

31:15

this guy that he was talking to, Susan's

31:18

trailer, was a drug dealer, but

31:22

she knew who they were and

31:24

she said that that was him talking to that guy

31:27

by ride to Squim. And that's

31:29

as far as I got with my poking

31:32

around.

31:34

Now this is a strange thing about Josh's

31:36

disappearance. There seems to be many

31:38

people who believe that they saw him after he

31:41

walked away from the park ranger's barefoot.

31:43

Jared told us about a very credible sighting

31:45

of Josh in a business about 30 miles

31:48

east from where Josh was dropped off by the park

31:50

rangers on the 7th and about 16

31:52

miles east of Port Angeles.

31:56

I heard a report

31:58

several days later that he

32:00

had been identified visually by

32:02

a girl that knew him

32:05

or knew of him from Port Angeles.

32:08

She was at the Papa Murphy store

32:11

in Squim, applying for a job.

32:14

When she says she saw Josh

32:16

enter the store and she had

32:18

his likeness on Facebook,

32:21

missing persons post from

32:23

just days before and she

32:25

confronted him with the post with

32:28

his picture and said, this is you.

32:31

This says you're missing. And she

32:33

said, he said, that

32:35

is me, but I'm not missing. I just

32:38

don't want to be found. And he left

32:40

the store and that interaction

32:42

was confirmed by the store owner and

32:45

his son. There was no video.

32:47

They didn't have a store camera to confirm

32:49

that it was him, but Officer

32:51

Johnson interviewed that girl

32:54

because he knew her. And he

32:56

said he found her statement

32:58

to be honest on her part.

33:01

And he's the one that told me the interaction

33:04

had been witnessed by the

33:06

store owner. So yes,

33:08

I give it a certain amount of credence.

33:11

I mean, it's not positive, but it sounds

33:14

pretty likely to me. And

33:16

the police records that we obtained,

33:18

it states that witnesses saw Josh or a

33:21

person that they believed was Josh and

33:23

the Papa Murphy's on October 21st, 2019, 14 days after

33:25

the park

33:28

rangers last saw him. It goes

33:30

on to say that Josh stated that he wasn't missing.

33:33

He just didn't want to be in contact with

33:35

anyone. They showed photos of Josh

33:37

to the manager and the manager's son who

33:40

had both been there when the man was in the shop.

33:42

And they both confirmed that was the guy they had

33:44

seen. Unfortunately, they didn't

33:47

have cameras at the time to know for sure

33:49

if that was really Josh or a case

33:51

of mistaken identity. There

33:53

was another sighting of Josh that we found in police

33:55

records. This one happened several

33:58

days prior to the Papa Murphy sighting.

34:00

and this one sounded pretty credible too.

34:03

Two women called in they were co-workers

34:05

who believed they had seen him on October 16th

34:08

in the county courthouse parking lot in Port

34:10

Angeles. It was around lunch time

34:12

that day when they saw a white male approximately 5

34:15

foot 10 who appeared to be in his

34:17

40s with a salt

34:18

and pepper beard.

34:19

He had on a blue and gray plaid flannel

34:22

jeans a khaki and army green backpack

34:24

and a beanie hat. This did sound

34:26

a lot like Josh who was in his 40s

34:29

about 5 foot 8 last seen in

34:31

a plaid shirt and jeans. We

34:33

know that Josh was barefoot when Rangers saw

34:35

him so they asked the women if the man had shoes

34:37

on. They

34:38

couldn't remember his shoes or if he had

34:41

shoes but

34:42

said they thought that would have stood out to them

34:44

if he had been barefoot. They said the man

34:46

asked them if he was in Kingston. They

34:49

told him that this was Port Angeles and

34:51

he just said okay and repeated

34:53

Port Angeles. They saw him

34:55

walk away and didn't think anything of it

34:58

until later when they saw a post on social

35:00

media about Josh being missing and they

35:02

recognized him. Someone else thought

35:04

that they had seen Josh at a Safeway and

35:06

another person at a pawn shop but

35:08

the last known and confirmed sighting of Josh

35:11

was when the park rangers dropped him off on October

35:13

7th, 2019. After

35:16

the Papa Murphy sighting, Jared went out

35:18

to that area to place missing posters

35:20

around and someone did contact

35:22

him believing that they had seen Josh

35:24

in that area as well.

35:27

I went out there and leafletted in Squim

35:30

one time. I did get a response

35:33

from a gas station worker. A

35:35

worker from the Arco station

35:37

in Squim called me and said, I

35:39

saw your son here. I

35:42

confronted him because I said, I have

35:45

your picture because I had left a

35:47

flyer there at the station. I'd

35:49

left flyers all over town and public

35:52

places and asked store employees

35:54

specifically to put it where they could see

35:57

him and look at it and then break it down.

36:00

rooms and whatever so that they could

36:02

have familiarized ourselves. And this

36:04

fellow called me within

36:06

a day or two and said, your

36:08

son was in here and I confronted him

36:11

out at the pump. I told him, you're this, you're

36:13

this missing person and you

36:16

need to call your dad or something.

36:18

I was never happy when people said,

36:21

you know, they saw him and confronted

36:23

him because, you know, if he's

36:25

hiding, that would just send

36:27

him further underground, I figured. So he

36:30

had a description of a vehicle and

36:32

he had a description of an associate.

36:35

When the detective interviewed him,

36:38

he gave him a description of a

36:40

very distinctive looking individual

36:43

who he thought he would be able to spot

36:46

if he saw her, but it never came

36:48

to anything and he was never able to

36:51

even examine the security

36:53

footage. Then he said he

36:55

saw him again and we

36:57

did get to see some security

36:59

footage from another day, few days later that

37:02

he said he thought was him and it clearly

37:05

was not. So, you know, it

37:07

puts into question whether or not

37:09

he was seeing Josh or not. That kind

37:11

of evidence is with nothing

37:13

but the last sighting that I

37:16

think of is having real

37:19

merit is the Papa

37:21

Murphy's.

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39:29

Was Josh out there just wanting to do his

39:31

own thing without contact from loved ones?

39:34

Or was something else going on here?

39:36

There may be some important clues hidden in Josh's

39:38

background and also the events that occurred

39:41

in the weeks leading up to his disappearance.

39:43

Who had he met in Port Angeles? Where

39:46

had his fiancé gone? They had made

39:48

the trip to Port Angeles together, after

39:50

all. We're going to turn the clock back

39:52

now and start at the very beginning. Who

39:55

was Josh Simiski? We

39:57

also spoke to

39:58

Josh's mother Janie.

39:59

Janie explained that before she had Josh,

40:02

she had given another child up for adoption,

40:05

which shaped who she later became as a parent

40:07

to Josh and her other children.

40:10

I have five children. One of them I

40:12

didn't raise, the oldest one I

40:14

had in out of wedlock in 1972.

40:18

I

40:21

didn't tell my family. I was going to college

40:23

and got into drinking a little bit

40:25

and ended up pregnant. And then

40:28

I never met him. His name's

40:30

Jeremy. And then I met

40:33

him again,

40:34

probably about 20 years ago. After

40:36

I got married, I had

40:38

Joshua as my first born son.

40:41

Joshua's date of birth is June

40:43

the 23rd, 1978. Having given the first one away,

40:47

Joshua

40:51

was really important to me to be

40:53

able to give birth

40:55

and

40:56

be able to keep him. We

40:58

spent

40:58

a lot of time together. He didn't get baby fat

41:01

at first. I think he was probably

41:03

six months old before I ever let him

41:05

get baby fat. And that was by

41:07

family. Josh, even

41:09

as a younger kid in elementary,

41:12

he would be at the cemetery quite often. Meditating

41:16

as he would be out in nature. He loved to go

41:18

to nature. He loved to climb

41:20

trees and

41:22

camping in the wilderness. He loved

41:24

taking his siblings

41:26

and going out to the outdoors

41:29

and going camping, going fishing. All

41:31

his siblings have memories of going fishing

41:33

with him and making a fire

41:36

pit and cooking oil dinners.

41:39

And

41:39

Josh was really good at being

41:42

with the kids. And I think playing

41:44

the father role almost, even though he wasn't

41:46

that much older than him. But Josh

41:49

loved being with his siblings. And he

41:51

also was into shamanism.

41:55

I literally at times, I

41:57

worked three full-time jobs.

41:59

my

42:00

husband moved in with

42:03

an RN that I was working with on one of

42:05

the jobs. She had nine kids

42:08

and me and my four kids moved

42:10

in there. Most of the time, honestly,

42:12

I worked. So my

42:14

relationship with my kids, with

42:16

their biggest memories according to them,

42:19

is me coming home

42:21

at midnight or one o'clock or three

42:23

o'clock in the morning and get them all up

42:25

and the only place in that area

42:28

would go to KFC.

42:30

In the middle of the night, they'd

42:32

get a KFC

42:34

and we'd go on a midnight picnic and

42:36

things like that.

42:37

I did a lot of those kinds of things. If

42:39

I wasn't working, I was with my kids. Then

42:42

after, especially after I left my

42:44

husband, it went out

42:46

and did make it on my own. That's

42:48

why I also started my own companies.

42:51

I didn't have to work so many jobs

42:53

for other people.

42:55

Janie told us that she worked a lot during Josh's

42:58

childhood and that her relationship

43:00

with Jared didn't last. Jared

43:02

has regrets about how things turned out after

43:04

he and Janie split up.

43:07

His mother and I had been married for a

43:09

couple of years, I think by the time we

43:12

had him. So

43:15

it was an exciting time. I liked being

43:18

a father. We were very much

43:20

alike. I

43:23

always thought that he and I would homestead

43:26

a place together. I guess

43:28

because of my estrangement from his mom

43:30

and the fact that I moved up here from

43:33

Utah, when clearly

43:35

I should outfire a thing and just stayed

43:37

there as close as I

43:39

could to my kids. Clearly, that

43:42

would have been the responsible thing to do. It

43:44

was only because of my hurt. I

43:46

would say he seemed fairly

43:49

normal to my eye.

43:52

He was with his mom and I don't

43:54

have much knowledge about what went on, but I

43:57

thought, you know, I didn't think there was anything wrong.

44:00

or upsetting with him until

44:02

he was in sixth grade,

44:05

I think, when there appeared to

44:07

be some evidence of

44:09

genuine social struggles at school.

44:12

A group of students came around the

44:14

house and were chanting

44:17

his name and calling him

44:19

out in some way. Apparently,

44:22

at one point, his

44:24

mom had given me a handgun

44:27

early in our relationship and

44:29

I found it out in

44:31

the playhouse one morning. When

44:34

I went out there to look around

44:36

and see what was up there, I found that gun

44:38

out there. I was alarmed

44:41

by that and it would appear

44:43

to be the social problems

44:45

that he was having at school.

44:48

After Janie had given her first child

44:50

up for adoption and before she and Jared

44:52

got together and had children, she

44:54

had struggled with addiction and had gotten into

44:56

some legal trouble. Janie explained

44:58

how she turned her past into a positive

45:01

direction for herself and her family.

45:04

I'm a recovering addict, alcoholic.

45:07

I dealt with a lot of mental health issues

45:09

myself. I dealt with the alcoholism.

45:12

To be really honest, I even, to

45:14

support my drug habit, I got into crimes.

45:18

After I had Janie, I kind

45:20

of went bonkers and gave him away.

45:22

I had him in 1972 and

45:25

by 1974, it went from

45:27

alcohol to drugs and I

45:29

was doing crimes. I had actually, one

45:32

thing I did, which was stupid,

45:34

was rob the paste and liquor store.

45:36

I actually ended up in prison over

45:38

that. I did two years in prison.

45:41

It was 1974 that I went to prison

45:43

and

45:45

changed and I was a 22-year-old

45:47

man. In 1997, I

45:50

incorporated the

45:52

Drug and Alcohol Rehab Mental Health Facility.

45:55

I ran my own. My

45:57

kids helped me quite a bit from the time,

45:59

I'm dealing with adults now, so they had

46:02

to be 19, but times

46:04

going by and they're getting older. And my

46:06

kids all worked with me

46:08

running the drug and alcohol and mental

46:10

health treatment programs. We've all

46:12

had our problems again too, you

46:14

know, but we've stayed with each other

46:16

through it all.

46:17

We don't walk away from one another.

46:20

I totally disagree with the concept

46:22

of tough love.

46:24

My kids, I think, have had a hard life, but I think

46:26

they've also learned, you know,

46:29

a lot of things.

46:31

Janie mentioned that her children helped her out at

46:33

her rehab facility, but that they had

46:35

their own problems too. Josh's

46:37

brother, Lauren, explained this for us further

46:40

from his own personal experiences

46:42

with addiction.

46:44

Most of all of my mom's

46:46

kids, we were all at one

46:49

point addicts. I was a really

46:52

heavy heroin addict.

46:54

Since I was 13, I started

46:57

using meth and heroin when I was 13.

46:59

I've done most of my adult life incarcerated

47:03

in Utah State Prison. He

47:05

didn't really use drugs unless I was around because

47:08

he didn't know anybody. He knew where to

47:10

get popped, but he got into

47:12

heroin because of me, but he had done

47:14

like pain pills and stuff.

47:16

When me and him were using

47:18

and homeless, he would walk around downtown

47:21

Salt Lake. We'd go to the store

47:23

with what money we had left over after

47:25

we bought enough heroin out to be sick,

47:27

and he would take, you know, hygiene and

47:29

snacks and little snack bags

47:32

to the people that didn't like care

47:34

for themselves, that were homeless down

47:36

by

47:36

where we were homeless. He'd walk around

47:39

checking on all the older people who couldn't

47:41

get around, and

47:42

that's the kind of person he was all the time,

47:45

in his addiction, when he was sober.

47:47

That's what I'm hoping people will

47:49

see.

47:49

Those are the kind of stories I hope get

47:52

out about my brother. That kind of

47:54

person that he was.

47:56

Josh's father believes that it was an opiate

47:58

prescription after a surgery. that had

48:00

sent Josh's life into a tailspin.

48:03

I was living up here, so it's

48:06

hard for me to be able to shed

48:08

much light on his adult life

48:10

and behavior. But when I saw

48:13

him, which was, you know, I get down there

48:15

at least three times a year, and I would spend

48:18

time with he and his family,

48:20

and he appeared to be

48:23

well in the normal range to me.

48:26

When he had his knees scoped, they

48:28

put him on opiates. And

48:30

when he ran out of his prescriptions,

48:33

his little brother said, oh, I can pick

48:36

you up. And his little brother

48:38

put him on heroin. That's how that went.

48:41

So yeah, I would say that was probably the

48:43

end of his normal adulthood when

48:45

his brother decided to help him

48:47

out with hard drugs.

48:50

Over the years, Josh had a few long-term

48:52

relationships and eventually became a father.

48:55

But he struggled to find his place in life.

48:58

He had periods of sobriety. And part

49:00

of the reason he was going on a spiritual journey

49:02

was because he wanted to be free from the substances

49:05

that were controlling his life. Prior

49:07

to Josh's move to Tacoma with his father,

49:10

he was living on a property owned by Janie in

49:12

Utah. Here's Janie again.

49:16

Prior to moving to Washington, he'd

49:18

been staying in a cabin that I

49:20

had. So I provided him a

49:22

place to stay. And then he was working

49:25

with turkey plants and things

49:27

like that. And then I had another son

49:29

that was just getting ready to come home and

49:32

wanted to stay at the cabin. And Josh

49:34

said he could go stay with his dad

49:36

out there in Washington,

49:39

but not at Port Angeles. And so I called

49:41

and talked to his dad.

49:43

Josh had a girlfriend at the time.

49:45

And he had one of

49:47

his children at the

49:50

time.

49:51

Josh's father Jared told us more about

49:53

when Josh, one of his children and fiancé

49:56

Lauren came to live with him in Tacoma.

49:59

living with me here in town.

50:01

He was still struggling with drug issues.

50:04

He was doing things here that

50:07

they upset me because I knew he

50:09

was still using drugs. And

50:11

that didn't sit well with me. My

50:13

neighbor next door who's rather

50:15

OCD and kind of a problem for

50:18

me himself. And actually I'm estranged

50:20

from this neighbor because of the way he treated Lauren,

50:23

actually the first time he met

50:25

Lauren, she greeted him with

50:28

good morning. And he greeted her

50:30

with, fuck you. I've

50:33

been done with him ever since. I mean, I don't

50:36

have any time for somebody who treats a stranger

50:38

that way. So, uh, I

50:40

just don't talk to the fellow back. He

50:43

had, I think inflamed

50:45

some of the other neighbors against

50:48

Joshua. Joshua wasn't

50:50

sleeping at night. So Joshua

50:52

did things like go walk down

50:54

the road and go to the 7-11. And

50:57

he was up all hours of the night

51:00

hunting night crawlers, which

51:02

was a thing he did because, you

51:04

know, he knew about hunting night crawlers for fishing

51:06

and he liked fishing and he liked hunting

51:09

night crawlers. So oftentimes

51:11

at night, he was out in my front yard

51:14

next to Jason's house, hunting

51:16

night crawlers in the middle of the night. This

51:18

made Jason paranoid. He

51:21

talked to my other neighbors and talked about

51:23

his paranoia. And my other neighbors

51:25

said, yeah, well, I see Josh walking

51:28

up and down the street in the middle of the night and that

51:30

makes me paranoid too. And, and

51:32

they were upset and I was upset.

51:35

And I told him, look, I can't do this. They

51:37

said they understood and they,

51:40

uh, they were going to go get their stuff

51:42

together. He had been with me

51:44

for, I'm going to say three

51:47

months at that time. I

51:50

believed it was alcohol

51:52

at first, but I'm not very knowledgeable.

51:55

My neighbor, Jason, that I'm

51:58

estranged from Jason. is

52:00

a recovered drug user.

52:03

And Jason has assured me that

52:05

he recognized Josh's behavior

52:08

from the start as being drug affected.

52:11

But I myself have never

52:13

been involved with those kinds of drugs.

52:16

And unless there's a real change

52:19

in behavior, I wouldn't

52:21

know that it was that. He

52:24

told me it was alcohol and

52:26

fighting with his fiance Lauren

52:29

that inflamed Jason. He

52:32

clearly had a real thing about

52:34

my son that was a problem

52:36

for me. I had concerns

52:39

about my son, but nothing like Jason

52:41

did. I wouldn't have pushed him out quite

52:43

when I did because, you know,

52:46

I mean, he's my son. I'm trying to see

52:48

him through to the other side, not push

52:50

him out. I kind of blame

52:53

Jason for my own behavior about

52:55

pushing him out.

52:57

Jared knew from conversations with Josh

52:59

that he was looking for a way to stay off of drugs

53:02

for good. And he had found a solution

53:04

that many others may see as unconventional.

53:07

He had put a lot of thought into this and felt

53:09

that it was a good path for him.

53:12

I knew that he was on a quest

53:14

to get off of some

53:16

drugs. He had talked to me

53:19

about going cold turkey. He didn't want

53:21

to be on stuff that they

53:23

put you on to get you off of drugs.

53:26

Anyway, he didn't want to become addicted

53:28

and dependent on other medication.

53:30

I was going to be supportive of that,

53:33

but his mom kept sending

53:35

him money against my advice

53:38

and he would always go buy

53:40

drugs. And so that's

53:43

when we parted ways. But I

53:45

know that his intent, at least

53:47

part of him, wanted to get off of

53:49

that. And he was exploring the option

53:52

of the ayahuasca. And

53:54

he wanted to have

53:56

the experience with the shaman and

53:59

pursue that. as a cure. He

54:01

was a very intelligent fellow. He was

54:04

acquiring the components

54:06

of the ayahuasca to try

54:09

and make it himself, but he did not have

54:11

them all. And he had one

54:14

of the roots or vines in a formula

54:16

that he productally could make tea out

54:19

of, and I think he was micro-dosing with that.

54:21

So that was a component

54:24

that I didn't know what the ramifications

54:26

would be, and I didn't know enough about ayahuasca

54:29

to be supportive or not. So

54:31

there was that component. And

54:33

so what I thought was that

54:35

he was in a process of a vision

54:38

quest. They went out to Port Angeles,

54:41

and apparently his mom sent them

54:43

money that they bought kayaks with,

54:45

and the kayaks were stolen the next day.

54:47

And then he was having, you know,

54:50

relationships with Susan Brown and

54:52

that other person. I didn't know anything about

54:54

any of that. He talked about getting clean

54:56

and doing it cold turkey instead

54:59

of using methadone. You know, I tried

55:01

to be supportive, but my

55:03

being supportive meant that I cut him

55:06

off from funding and insisted

55:08

on buying everything for

55:10

him for myself. I

55:13

took him to buy things. I wouldn't give

55:15

him money for anything. He was pretty

55:17

discouraged about the fact that I wouldn't even

55:19

trust him with cigarette money. About

55:22

two weeks into that, his mom sent

55:24

him, started sending money again,

55:26

and things never got better after

55:28

that. He was actively trying

55:31

to have the ayahuasca

55:33

experience, and his mom

55:35

sent him the money to go to somebody

55:37

up in around Anacortes

55:40

to do that. It turned out

55:42

to be some kind of logistical problem.

55:45

They got to the area, but there was some

55:47

issue that kept him from participating,

55:50

I think, at that one opportunity.

55:52

But he was trying to get all the components

55:55

to do it himself. And

55:57

like I say, I know he got

55:59

some

55:59

of the divine

56:02

stuff, he had a bag of that

56:04

here and he had that

56:06

with him when he was gone and

56:09

I don't know what effect that component

56:11

would have had by itself

56:14

but he was microdosing with that as

56:16

a tea when he was gone

56:18

from here. He's intelligent enough

56:21

that if he could have got the materials, he

56:23

could have made the substance himself.

56:26

Whether or not it would have been a good idea as

56:29

anybody's guess but I don't think

56:31

he actually was ever able to avail

56:34

himself of a guided experience

56:37

with Guy Woska.

56:40

It was all of this that had led Josh to Port

56:42

Angeles and meeting Susan Brown,

56:44

the woman that he had decided to give all of his

56:46

belongings

56:46

away to.

56:48

And as the police began investigating

56:50

and attempting to figure out what had happened to

56:52

Josh after he had arrived in Port Angeles,

56:55

the more bizarre the story became. Janie

56:58

told us that she did send Josh money as Jared

57:00

mentioned and as the investigation progressed,

57:03

Josh's money and other belongings began

57:05

to look like a potential motive. Janie

57:08

told us how she learned that her son was missing.

57:10

So

57:11

I had been sending Joshua

57:14

while he was there in Washington.

57:17

He did have bills too and then him and

57:19

Lauren moved out there. I'd

57:21

been sending Joshua probably

57:24

about $3,000 a month to help

57:26

him and Lauren out there

57:28

in Washington and I was able to do that.

57:30

I had my own company. Josh

57:33

and I talked every day,

57:34

two or three times a day, three

57:36

months prior to Josh disappearing.

57:39

I have 4,800 texts from Josh.

57:43

I don't know if he drained or any of those

57:45

things. I don't know what else.

57:47

I haven't been involved in drugs personally

57:49

since

57:50

the 60s and mid

57:52

70s. So

57:53

running a drug now called rehab, I'm familiar

57:56

today but I don't think he got into heroin

57:58

or you

57:59

know, I think it was.

57:59

was more along the lines of your

58:02

psychotrophics. But he could

58:05

have. About

58:05

midnight I get a phone

58:08

call from my ex-husband

58:10

telling me that he'd gotten an effig from

58:12

our son and that

58:15

told me about an effig by asking to forward

58:17

it to me, text it to me,

58:19

which he did.

58:21

And he said, I don't know what to do about it.

58:23

He said he called

58:24

him back that got no answer but

58:26

he'd given his phone away too. He said in the message

58:29

he was on somebody else's phone. He said he gave the

58:31

car. He gave

58:32

his money, his bank account,

58:34

his phone and everything. But

58:37

now Susan wanted

58:39

friends, wanted him gone.

58:41

We went out there shortly after we

58:44

found out. Of

58:45

course I didn't go back to sleep that night of

58:46

course and tried to call him and text

58:49

him and things. And I actually

58:51

think

58:51

that trying to contact him I think Susan

58:54

had

58:54

a couple of times text me back

58:57

or called me from his phone.

59:00

Susan Brown,

59:01

the gal who

59:02

supposedly had these letters

59:04

signed by him that he was giving her in

59:07

the tribe all of his possessions

59:10

and going on a spiritual

59:12

journey.

59:13

Josh got sick and tired of being

59:15

with his family, doesn't love his family

59:18

and he left to go get

59:20

another life

59:22

is what their story is. I think

59:25

they they need to get rid of him

59:27

to keep his stuff and somehow

59:30

benefit. I don't know what to make of it. I don't

59:32

think this is anything

59:33

that's went on his own journey. I think

59:36

Susan's friends turkey

59:38

man they used him. The phone

59:40

number that Josh has called came to Jared

59:42

on. That was a homeless person

59:45

at Port Angeles there. And

59:47

everyone I talked to out there

59:49

I went out there I met him. We walked

59:51

up here we got

59:52

and we told him who we were and who we were looking

59:54

for and they said we got involved

59:57

in Susan Brown. He's

59:58

shitting their left.

59:59

And then, they warned him, everybody tried to tell him that's

1:00:02

kind of the cartel over the

1:00:05

homeless. And then, Port Angeles

1:00:07

police almost act like I'm

1:00:09

crazy, like that can't be true.

1:00:12

That doesn't happen.

1:00:14

After Josh's family had showed up in Port

1:00:16

Angeles, Susan Brown turned over

1:00:18

a note supposedly written by Josh. There's

1:00:21

a photo of the note in the police records that we

1:00:23

received. It's written on a small piece

1:00:25

of paper from a pocket-sized notebook.

1:00:28

And it states, I, Joshua Vance Semiskey,

1:00:31

do hereby offer all of my rights, possessions

1:00:34

and resources to Susan Brown and the Lower

1:00:36

Elwha tribe as a voluntary gift.

1:00:39

It signed Joshua V. Semiskey,

1:00:41

with his social security number in parentheses

1:00:43

below, and then dated 10-11-19. The

1:00:47

strange thing about the date, though, is

1:00:49

that it was after Josh was last seen on the 7th.

1:00:52

And Jared told us that when Susan showed him the note,

1:00:54

it wasn't even October 11th yet. Josh's

1:00:57

brother, Lauren, explained that all of this really

1:00:59

caught him off guard. It all sounded

1:01:01

so outlandish to him.

1:01:04

Well, when we couldn't get a hold of him,

1:01:06

and then Josh had been talking

1:01:09

to Mom about Susan, and

1:01:12

before we knew anything was like wrong,

1:01:14

when he was calling, he was telling Mom that

1:01:17

I'm in love with this lady and I'm gonna marry her.

1:01:19

And she was right there going along

1:01:22

with it and talking it up with Mom. And

1:01:24

then all of a sudden, it was like three

1:01:27

or four days apart from the...

1:01:30

They were getting married and they

1:01:32

were doing all this stuff and they were gonna

1:01:34

start their lives together.

1:01:36

And her messaging that Josh

1:01:38

was going on a spiritual...

1:01:39

I'm like, you just told us you guys are

1:01:41

getting married this week,

1:01:43

but four days later, she calls

1:01:46

us. He

1:01:47

decided he had to go on this spiritual

1:01:50

quest and do all of this stuff

1:01:52

and he doesn't know when he's gonna be back

1:01:54

and blah, blah, blah.

1:01:56

We didn't even know anything. We

1:01:58

knew he wasn't answering the phone.

1:01:59

we were worried

1:02:01

and then she was like, but he left

1:02:02

a note and she starts

1:02:05

taking pictures

1:02:07

of the writing and his handwriting

1:02:09

in the notebook. That was the thing is

1:02:11

he was like, I'm giving all

1:02:14

of

1:02:14

my worldly possessions to

1:02:17

Susan Brown in the Elwha tribe.

1:02:19

And she was just like messaging

1:02:21

us, he's doing this and this is what he did

1:02:24

here and he

1:02:25

left all this stuff to me and I got

1:02:27

his truck. Like it didn't sound

1:02:29

weird, you know,

1:02:31

major red flag. My brother

1:02:33

had not even been working

1:02:36

or doing anything. My mom was sending

1:02:38

him a few thousand dollars a month to live

1:02:40

on, you

1:02:41

know, and then she's like, he

1:02:43

just left me all of your money, Janie,

1:02:45

you know, that's what it sounded like, I'm

1:02:48

like, excuse me?

1:02:49

And I'm not saying that my brother might not

1:02:52

have entertained the idea of doing that,

1:02:54

absolutely. It

1:02:56

is something I could have seen

1:02:58

my brother doing. However, I know

1:03:01

for a fact there is no way in hell he

1:03:04

did not call his

1:03:06

kids and his mom,

1:03:09

he called no one, he's just gone.

1:03:12

But anyone who knows my

1:03:14

brother or sees him or is around him for more

1:03:16

than a

1:03:17

few days knows those

1:03:19

lines of communication are never broken.

1:03:21

Like there's no way he would just take

1:03:23

off, not tell mom, not

1:03:25

tell his kids, not be like, I'll

1:03:28

be back when I'm done doing this. He would be

1:03:30

so excited that he was going to do something like that,

1:03:32

he would have told everyone. And

1:03:34

then yeah, gone off grid, but he would have

1:03:36

said bye to tell everyone what he was doing.

1:03:39

Especially something like that, that he is

1:03:41

so passionate about.

1:03:43

By this point in the story, you're likely

1:03:46

wondering what happened to Josh's fiance,

1:03:48

Lauren. She had been staying with Josh

1:03:50

at his father's house and they had gone to Port Angeles

1:03:52

together.

1:03:53

When the Port Angeles police began investigating,

1:03:56

they were attempting to find Lauren too. She

1:03:59

seemed like a key person.

1:03:59

in this case. Not that they

1:04:02

suspected that she was involved, but

1:04:04

she had to know more about what had transpired

1:04:06

and might be able to point them in the right direction.

1:04:09

According to reports, on October 10th,

1:04:12

the day that Jared reported Josh missing,

1:04:14

they were looking for both Lauren and Susan

1:04:16

Brown but hadn't found them yet. On

1:04:18

October 12th, Lauren called 911

1:04:21

to report that Susan Brown had coerced Josh

1:04:23

into signing over everything they owned to her.

1:04:26

An October 15th report states

1:04:28

that Lauren's mother had commented on Facebook

1:04:30

that some of the items from Josh's vehicle had been

1:04:33

donated to a local shelter. The shelter

1:04:35

was having a coat drive at the time and

1:04:37

someone had dropped off coats. One

1:04:39

of the coats had a phone inside of a pocket.

1:04:42

The director of the shelter was able to call the last

1:04:44

number on that phone, which was Lauren's

1:04:46

mother. Lauren had spoken to her mother

1:04:48

not long before this and let her know

1:04:51

that her belongings had been inside Josh's vehicle. But

1:04:54

she didn't know where it was so that she could retrieve

1:04:56

her things. She was kind of stuck

1:04:58

out there without her phone, clothing and other

1:05:00

items and was staying in a shelter at night.

1:05:03

Investigators did eventually interview Lauren

1:05:06

and you'll get to hear that interview in part two

1:05:08

of our series. About a week after

1:05:10

Josh had disappeared, his father was able

1:05:12

to provide investigators with a phone number

1:05:15

for Susan Brown. She explained

1:05:17

to them that she hadn't seen Josh since October

1:05:19

4th, three days before park rangers picked

1:05:22

him up walking barefoot down a road within

1:05:24

Olympic National Park. She said

1:05:27

that the last

1:05:29

time she saw him was on a property owned by

1:05:31

a friend or acquaintance on the lower

1:05:33

Elwha reservation. She went on

1:05:36

to say that Josh had proposed to her and made

1:05:38

an offering to the tribe for her hand in marriage. And

1:05:41

that was why she was in possession of all of his

1:05:43

belongings. Though she would later state

1:05:45

that she wasn't an actual tribal member

1:05:47

and had a strange explanation for this,

1:05:50

which you will get to hear in her interview in

1:05:52

part two. Susan told the investigator

1:05:55

that when Josh left, he didn't take his

1:05:57

wallet so she had kept it inside of her motor

1:05:59

home for Josh.

1:05:59

Josh.

1:06:00

A few days after he had left, Susan believed

1:06:03

that he returned to the motorhome, changed

1:06:05

his clothes and took his wallet with him. She

1:06:07

also claimed that Lauren had been by her motorhome

1:06:10

around the same time, so perhaps she

1:06:12

had taken the wallet. Josh's wallet

1:06:14

would later surface in another bizarre twist,

1:06:16

but Josh never did. You'll learn

1:06:19

more about the wallet next week. Investigators

1:06:22

called Susan back the following day to ask

1:06:24

her some more questions. They started

1:06:26

with that note again. She said

1:06:28

that she believed that he had written it on October

1:06:30

3rd or 4th, but there was no explanation

1:06:33

for why it was dated October 11th. She

1:06:36

said that Josh was writing several notes in his

1:06:38

little notebook, keeping some type of diary.

1:06:41

She went on to add that she still had not heard from

1:06:43

Josh, but was driving his vehicle. Susan

1:06:46

turned over Josh's notebook to his father, and

1:06:48

there was one page that seemed concerning.

1:06:51

It said that Josh had sent a message to Troy,

1:06:53

and that he might have messed everything up. According

1:06:56

to Susan, she knew who Troy was and inquired

1:06:58

about this, and she said that Troy

1:07:01

had not heard from Josh. There

1:07:03

are no further mentions of someone named Troy

1:07:05

in the police records. On a Facebook

1:07:08

post of the Port Angeles police made about

1:07:10

Josh, Susan wrote the

1:07:11

following

1:07:13

comment, After Joshua and I spent weeks together,

1:07:15

I really believe that Joshua is on a personal

1:07:17

self-healing journey, and he will be back

1:07:20

when he has his answers. I am waiting

1:07:22

for him. I love him with every ounce

1:07:24

of my being. He has asked my hand

1:07:26

in marriage many times. My answer,

1:07:28

yes.

1:07:30

My life is on hold for him. I pray

1:07:32

to see his beautiful face, hear his beautiful

1:07:34

voice every second of my day. I have

1:07:37

searched all possible places for clues,

1:07:39

only to find unproven hearsay that

1:07:41

I followed and no truth from sources.

1:07:44

In a second comment from a different account,

1:07:46

she said, I'm not the bad guy here.

1:07:49

I miss him so much. I don't know how much

1:07:51

more I can take. Just trying to abide

1:07:53

by notes left. That's all. You

1:07:55

were to be married. I spend any

1:07:57

waking moment looking for anything that can lead

1:07:59

me to him.

1:08:01

In Jesus name, I pray for his safe

1:08:03

return.

1:08:04

One piece of information that jumped out to investigators

1:08:07

was that just days before Josh had disappeared,

1:08:10

his mother, Janie had

1:08:10

deposited $2,500 into his

1:08:13

bank account and there was a second Zelle

1:08:15

deposit for $500. After

1:08:17

Josh was gone, someone was using his debit

1:08:20

card. They had purchased a generator,

1:08:22

tires, and other items, eventually

1:08:24

draining the account, leaving it with a negative

1:08:27

balance.

1:08:28

And it wasn't Josh making those purchases, it

1:08:30

was Susan Brown. But had Josh

1:08:32

really signed his things over to Susan, was

1:08:35

this fraud or simply Susan carrying

1:08:37

out Josh's wishes?

1:08:39

Was she abiding by his notes

1:08:40

as she stated in her Facebook comment?

1:08:43

And this is where we will pick up Josh's story

1:08:45

next week. Was Josh really out there

1:08:47

on some spiritual journey wanting to be away

1:08:50

from his family? Or did something sinister

1:08:52

happen to him in October of 2019? Was

1:08:55

Josh an easy target for people who wanted

1:08:57

his money and belongings? Was he vulnerable

1:09:00

or were they just following his wishes? If

1:09:02

you have any information regarding the

1:09:04

disappearance of Joshua Simiskey, please

1:09:06

contact the Clown County Sheriff's Department

1:09:09

at 360-417-2262.

1:09:15

I feel like Susan Brown

1:09:18

was drugging in.

1:09:19

This is just

1:09:21

me with my thoughts and

1:09:23

how I feel about the situation. I don't

1:09:25

know this for a fact. I

1:09:28

feel like there's something

1:09:30

weird went on. Something happened.

1:09:32

And he's been

1:09:35

seen around town supposedly.

1:09:37

And I've heard a

1:09:40

lot of pierce day about, you know, I've

1:09:42

seen him and this is I don't, I

1:09:44

don't listen to any of it. What

1:09:46

was the last time you saw him?

1:09:49

The last time I saw him, he picked me up.

1:09:51

I think it was October 2nd or

1:09:53

3rd, something like

1:09:56

that. And he picked me up and

1:09:58

he took me to Walmart. and bought me a phone

1:10:01

and that was the last time I saw him and then

1:10:04

he sent me some messages on

1:10:06

Facebook and he

1:10:08

said you know that I want you

1:10:10

back I love you and he said I need

1:10:12

to get away from Susan. Was

1:10:14

this before or after the letter

1:10:17

that was written? I think it was before. Okay. I

1:10:20

think because the letter was written

1:10:22

a week before he went

1:10:25

missing. Okay. It was dated on the

1:10:27

11th when he went missing like

1:10:29

a week before that.

1:10:57

That brings us to the end of episode 413. I'd

1:11:01

like to thank everyone who spoke with us for this

1:11:03

series. If you have a missing loved one

1:11:05

that you'd like to have featured on the show, there's

1:11:07

a case submission form at thevanishedpodcast.com.

1:11:10

If you'd like to join in on the discussion, there's a page

1:11:13

and discussion group on Facebook. You can

1:11:15

find us on Twitter at the Vanished Pod and

1:11:17

also on Instagram. If you like our show,

1:11:19

please give us a five-star rating and review. You

1:11:22

can also

1:11:22

support the show by contributing on Patreon

1:11:24

where you can get early and ad-free episodes. Be

1:11:27

sure to tune in next week for part two of

1:11:29

Josh Simiski's story. Thanks

1:11:31

for listening. Bye.

1:12:07

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1:12:10

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