Photo 509 /// Part 1 /// 256 | Forensic Files

[Music] thank you welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always ladies and gentlemen the leader of the band the band movement
he is the captain if I see a creep in you better believe I'll be repoing repo in your van that is it's good to be seen
and it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a friend [Music]
this week oh yeah we are drinking Brew Free or Die blood orange IPA by 21st Amendment Brewery garage grade trumpets
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round grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime foreign should never have happened at all too
smart and hard-working young women had a goal a dream to travel over the ocean to
another country and volunteer their time and efforts helping some of that country's youth
but as soon as they arrived so far from their home things were not as planned instead of teaching they were left with
too much time on their hands so they were free to roam a foreign town and the surrounding areas
plans aside they decided to embark on a little Adventure spending a day dedicated to a long
touristy hike into the jungle but something out there happened something unexpected
in life we often choose our own Adventures but after we set out we are not always in control
what happened to the two women who set out for a hike in the jungle what can we learn from the phone calls
they made and what can we make of the mysterious photographs they left behind welcome to another episode of True Crime
garage this is the Strange Case of the Dutch hikers and missing photo 509 [Music]
[Music] Chris Kramer's age 21 she's a blue-eyed redhead with an outgoing personality and a strong sense
of fun Chris enjoyed acting and planned to attend graduate school for art history in the fall of 2014.
Chris met her flatmate lizanne froon age 22 a six foot tall athlete when the two
worked in a cafe in the city of amsford in their native country of the Netherlands
lizanne played volleyball in college and was into more extreme sports like skydiving Alpine skiing and
Mountaineering lisanne majored in applied psychology and enjoyed photography in early 2014 the two were on break from
their studies and enrolled in a program providing volunteer social workers for children in Panama the two saved their
money for six months to pay for the trip both took a crash course in Spanish it is not believed that either of them had
ever traveled to Panama before on this trip they spent two weeks traveling the country before heading to the town where
the school where they were to work is located so Chris and lisanne arrive in the town
of bocate but the two had a rude awakening due to some kind of mix-up the program was not
to commence for another week according to Chris's diary the assistant director of the school was not very nice about
the situation she wrote that he or she was rude and unfriendly the women found themselves with a week
of downtime on their hands although they arrived before they were expected it does seem that the living accommodations
for the women were ready they were directed to a room in the home of a local family near the campus of the
school the women decided to make the most of their situation and explore the local offerings
so the flying garage ship goes to the country of Panama in Central America for this case Panama is basically a narrow
strip of land between the countries of Costa Rica and Colombia the country is so narrow that the Panama
Canal was constructed directly across the country to provide a Waterway connecting the Atlantic and the Pacific
Oceans Panama features beautiful beaches but the majority of the country is extremely
mountainous and heavily forested the town of bocate is a small town of about 19 000 people and it's about 40 miles
from the Costa Rican border bokate is 3 900 feet above sea level and has a tropical climate with heavy rainy
Seasons that start in April and average temperatures of mid 80s during the day to Mid 60s at night the area is subject
to sudden tropical downpours at any time bocate is populated by a large number of
expat Europeans and North Americans who live there as well as the native panamanians
the town is a popular spot for tourists with its friendly European feel temperate climate wildlife and bird
viewing and multiple businesses catering to teristas on the edge of town is a Trailhead at
the beginning of a four kilometer jungle path leading to the Continental Divide this is a hydrological divide that
separates the watersheds that drain into the Pacific Ocean from those that drain
into the Atlantic or Caribbean an invisible line running along the higher points of the continents that often
attract sightseeing interest from adventures and excursionists the bokate area also has an active volcano baru and
a national park surrounding it according to Media covering this case Panama is one of the safest countries in Latin
America although as we will see it certainly has its share of violent crime we have quite a bit of information on
this case that we normally would not have access to this thanks to the Daily Beast news site the daily beasts managed
to obtain secretly leaked copies of the official case files used by investigators
those archives contained data recovered from the electronic devices the women had with them this includes a camera and
two phones we also have some DNA analysis Kris Kramer's diary and and much more now the day in question
Captain is Tuesday April 1st 2014. and it's a typical hot sunny day that's right and there are some there's some
confusion about what Chris and lizanne did that day we now know from Witnesses accounts including a taxi driver who
drove them to the trailhead that Chris and lizanne started off their hike around 10 a.m the trail is described as
a mud slick root choked footpath called the pianista or piano player because it climbs in a series of ladder-like steps
reminiscent of a keyboard This is up from the tourist town of bocate to the Continental Divide does this have a
hikers rating do we know I don't know well sometimes Trails will have ratings as like how how
difficult they are so at the viewing at the top of the penis uh Trail uh where the Continental Divide is located
is called the Mirador and it's about a three hour Trek from the trailhead it's worth noting that on a clear Day from
the mirror door hikers can see all the way back to back down to book a day so once reaching the Mirador Chris and
lizanne likely were able to see the town that they came from in the distance right so most tourists go up to the
mirror door snap a few selfies then they come straight back down the same path back into town
the tricky thing here though Captain is we know that Chris and lizanne actually had lined up a guide for this same hike
and a tour of a strawberry farm but this was scheduled for the following day okay for whatever reason they decide to
change their plans you know they booked a guide for the trip which especially if you're in a different
country a foreign country always book a guide for these excursions you don't really know what you're
getting into until you're out there right right but they booked a guide and but that's for the following day yeah so
they decided to go without the guide on this exact same hike right it is mentioned that the pianista trail is not
considered to be very dangerous and given their age I mean they're 21 22 years old they're they're young one's an
athlete right and it's likely that the healthy strong and adventurous young women felt they were up to the
challenging marked trail hike to the top we do know from computer searches that Chris and lisanne researched the trail
prior to starting off and we know that the two were what they were wearing that day so both were wearing shorts and tank
tops hiking boots and they had one small backpack between them is it common for people to go to the trail and get a
guide there that's a good question and I think you could actually do the way that
I've heard this described is that you could do both you could book a guide in advance or show up now the problem with
showing up and booking a guide there you're kind of at their Mercy if they're actually there or not right or how much
they want to charge it's like the people that go to the gym and they haven't scheduled anything with a personal
trainer and they're hoping to see one just kind of loafing around looking for work now I guess from the trail head to
the top it's about two and a half to three hours to make that Trek we need to discuss lisanne's camera okay because
this is going to be extremely important to this case this is a Canon PowerShot SX 270. this features a zoom lens and a
built-in flash we won't go through the photos in detail just yet because it would it would just get confusing at
this point but we know the women made Fairly good time to the mirror door they took selfies at the top like most people
do and the two in these pictures are smiling they appear to be enjoying themselves right you know this you can
see they're in the sunshine with the breathtaking view in the background but goofing around right so these selfies
were taken around midday so they left bocate around 11 I'm sorry 10 a.m so it makes sense that it would be around 1pm
that they reached the summit this time was determined based on the position of the sun in these photos from
the top to be clear the pianista trail is not a loop okay it's the same pathway up and then the same pathway back down
right so logic would dictate that after the two women reached the Crest at the Divide they would then proceed back down
the trail likely planning to return to town before Darkness fell right but based on the pictures later we're gonna
see instead of heading back down the trail that they went up they're actually going to cross over
heading in the opposite direction yeah so they're they're going away from the town of bucatay and this is curious for
several reasons because we don't know if this happened on accident or if this was
deliberate right you know they could have been out there and said hey this is fun we're having a good time let's uh
let's continue on but so far in these pictures we only have the two individuals yes and the other thing
that's tricky about this move too is when we say could it have been accidental that they're heading away
from where they wanted to go that's tricky because we know that the girls studied the trail before going out
on the hike right and it's you know so I'm not I'm not going to pretend that I'm uh extremely experienced hiker but
I've been on Hikes before and some of them are a loop you know you just kind of keep going and you end up back where
you started at some point right but this one is not that situation it's straight
up straight back they get to their point and they continued on for some reason either accidental or deliberately yeah
you wonder how many people were on that trail that day because if we don't have other individuals in
the pictures it makes it seem especially on a Tuesday makes it seem like maybe there wasn't so many people out and it
it's possible you get to the end point and then you go wait do we just head back down or do we just keep going this
way and it Loops back around but if there's a bunch of people on the trail you'd think they could just follow them
yeah and it could have been an accident if they didn't know the trail or you know I don't know why they wouldn't have
seen that in advance but there are no markers at the top telling people to go back down the way that they came
so you know if you're you're sitting there listening and you're wondering well how
do you guys know that they're going away from the direction that they likely intended to go well that's not our words
that's from the investigators later investigators would view photos that were taken on their camera and they
would say hey because of the foliage and because of the geographical features visible in these photos
this is not on that same Trail this is on the other side of the divide and more specifically they would state that this
appears to be about an hour's walk from the top yes it's so strange to me that they're going to continue on a trail and
not head back well so these photos at this time they show that the women were making their way downhill into a more
heavily forested and wild mountainous region this is called the Bocas del Toro or mouths of the bull this network of
trails is not maintained by Rangers and not used by guides affiliated with the national park in fact these treacherous
overgrown and unmarked Trails aren't intended to be used by tourists but are used almost exclusively by indigenous
peoples living deep within the forest and mountain range particularly the Nobi tribe
these Trails can get dangerously Steep and overgrown yet we know that this is the way that the women went
and again was this purely an accident given that there were no markers to tell people to go back down the way they came
in or was this deliberate you know just curiosity or wanting to continue their already fun adventure right or are they
being led this way yes so there are reports that a local dog accompanied the women on their hike this
Husky mixed name blue lived at the home where Chris and lizanne were staying blue returned without the women but no
one thought much of it until the next day Wednesday April 2nd the host at their home laid out
breakfast for the girls and she left for work but then the women failed to keep their appointment with the guide that
they had hired so looking for the women the guide checked their accommodations and noted
that it didn't appear that they had slept there the night before and he could tell that they also did not show
up for breakfast that morning he notified the teachers at the school and he and a teacher went to the police
station they actually went twice once at 7 30 pm and then again at 9 30 PM reporting the two women missing
the problem was of course since they didn't really know anyone you know Chris and lizanne they didn't know anyone they
didn't tell anyone where they were going there were dozens of popular trails in the area so the fire department and
private search parties made up of local guides and volunteers they hunted for the women in the area around the buru
volcano since the volcano is the most popular hiking attraction in the region but having no idea where or even exactly
when the girls went off Searchers had an almost impossible task of trying to track their movements
now Rumors in town indicated that the women actually returned from hiking so we have rumors of eyewitnesses possibly
seeing them return from their hike but we have no evidence of this as far as the photos go correct and actually this
was rumors that were only going on the day that they went missing or the day after they these were rumors that
were quickly uh disregarded to be not true and so as a result of these rumors and
official search didn't take place for several days for the two women this would be five days after the women
set off on their hike Panama's national service for civil protection came in and
took over the search for Chris and lizanne the agency was initially reluctant to get involved
the belief Captain was that the women likely left town to go party somewhere oh yeah that's yeah so they go hiking on
a trail and they they decide to not head back they said they decide to go on more of a
difficult Trail just keep going further and further into the Wilderness and then
they decide to go somewhere to party not that exact Theory but um somewhat okay so more likely their
theory is that they made it back from the dream they came back to town and then went off took off went off and
decided hey let's go party instead of volunteer our time at this uh at this spot but no eyewitnesses
that say they drove them anywhere well keep in mind they actually have nothing to do during this whole time so they
don't really have any other than a place to stay they don't really have anything
to be accounted for right but what I'm saying is you would think that there would be at least a
taxi crab driver that said oh I picked up two women from the trails and drove them somewhere well that's that's what's
leading to the confusion you have you have these rumors of they return to town of people that said hey I saw the two
women so on and so forth so it will take five days after the women set off on their hike for an actual search to get
involved so this starts on April 6th when they started the official search the national service for civil
protection they actually called off the small private searches that were going on beforehand this is typical big
government agency moving in and saying hey we're going to take care of this we're going to handle this ourselves
right so this is actually in my opinion uh quite a shame because it's not making
use of local guides uh the so you know the searches failed to utilize the expertise of those who knew the area and
terrain the best now what it did offer however is they flooded the jungle with hundreds of
Searchers right scouring the area for any sign of the two missing women now after 10 days of searching using dogs
helicopters and ground teams this failed to turn up anything any leads at all they they ended the
searches after 10 days so needless to say Chris and lizanne's parents they were frantic the women both checked in
with their parents daily using the what's app but both their communication stopped on that day on April 1st the
ferns and the Kramers quickly mobilized to establish a reward which quickly grew
to thirty thousand dollars they flooded Panama with a missing and Panama poster featuring both girls
both sets of parents flew to bukite in early April to look for their daughters and a Dutch Search Group arrived to
scour the trails joined by Red Cross volunteers in early May a specially trained Dutch
search team arrived and brought in 10 rescue and cadaver dogs but efforts were hampered by heavy rains and Relentless
heat and after nine days the team went home empty-handed as did the parents Dutch investigators looking into the
situation declared that it was very unlikely that Chris and lizanne simply disappeared from one of the trails since
no trace of them was located investigators came under Fire for what many Saw as a botched search critics and
authorities should have utilized satellite thermal imaging the blame game was in full force and it's not clear
whether authorities did anything wrong or if the Searchers and the searches were just off their mark
foreign [Music] [Music] we're back cheers mates cheers to you captain all right we're gonna get into some
weird stuff now Captain because in June of 2014 this is roughly about two months
after the two women disappeared a Nobi tribe woman walked into the bucatay police station with lisanne's
turquoise backpack the woman claimed to have found the pack while she was tending to her rice paddy
about 12 hours by foot on the other side of the Continental Divide on the banks of the powerful River locals call the
calibra so the pack was wedged into a mess of Flotsam on the bank The Nobby woman said
she was really sure that that it was not there the day before okay now local authorities who took control of the
backpack made no fingerprint records in the case so when examiners from the Dutch forensic Institute later
they discovered 30 unidentified fingerprints on the contents of the backpack but there was no way to figure
out who these fingerprints belong to right it seems likely though that members of
the tribe probably went through the backpack before they turned it over to the police you know curious about what
could be inside my understanding is that the woman that turned it in she had actually heard of
the case and thought that it could be evidence regarding the two missing women the interesting thing to me though is
we're talking two months later in the jungle we're talking about it's found on the banks of this powerful calibra river
right and it doesn't look that distraught to me right it it seems to be I would I know we're just looking at
pictures but I would argue it almost seems to be like pristine condition right well cared for almost like it
hadn't been in the jungle that entire time at all and there's contents in the backpack do you want to go through that
real quick yeah and we should point out before we get into what was in the backpack or found in the backpack that
these items were not considered to be water damaged and neither was the backpack right so here's what was found
in the backpack and there are some photos that are still available online of the contents of the backpack the list
that I found that seems to be the most accurate states that there were two pairs of sunglasses two cell phones
these Zan's camera which was inside its padded case lizanne's passport 83 dollars in cash
and I want to be clear about the cash statement the the dollar amount that's by most uh early reports okay so you
will find reports out there that will state a different dollar amount other early reports state that a key was found
in the backpack as well but later reports do not mention this key now keep in mind a key is awfully small the
pictures that I found online I couldn't see I couldn't visibly see a key and there were two brawls in the backpack
and an empty bottle of water or a half empty bottle of water depending on which report you read well now if you look at
this the Brawl on the lower half of the picture right here right okay so do you notice that in one
of the pictures of the girls doesn't look like that's the brawl she is wearing the day of the hike right
okay I'm trying to look for another picture to see okay so do you want to get into the brawl the the bras now
sure the the reason why I ask if you want to do that now that was something that is is often
discussed online and the the thing that you point out there is interesting because
the brawls that were found in the backpack you know they they were likely wearing both of these the day that they
went out on their hike right and it's obvious that one of them that was found was being wore by Lee Zan that day
so you know there has been a lot of speculation as to why they would take them off why that they would place them
in the backpack it's likely that it's just as something as simple as they got hot right and they place them in the
backpack I think to me though what what's interesting about the contents of the backpack is you know we're left
wondering what happened to these women right does finding this backpack offer any clues well we're going to get into
the cell phones and the camera eventually but before we do that just the finding of the backpack itself
it doesn't appear to me obviously that they were that something terrible took place because they were
robbed or intended to be robbed you know and I say that because I think all of the items found inside this backpack to
me would be items that an intended robber would want to take from these two women right then it makes you wonder
did they put down the book bag somewhere and why were they leaving that behind for maybe
somebody to find or did they put it down because they were going to go swimming what's going on with this book bag or
did they pass away and it was simply left behind right but again if you think there's something tragic that happened
it doesn't look like this book bag went through anything any tragic scene you know I mean like so this backpack's
found two months later and I think one of the more interesting theories that I found online regarding
the bra or the bras was that they could have been removed to possibly filter water
I would have never thought of that on my own but I found that that very interesting right the more important
thing though here Captain I believe would be the location where the backpack was found because this is a long way
from the Mirador where the we know the girls were alive and well according to the early pictures
so to get to where the backpack was found the women would have crossed treacherous terrain navigating overgrown
Pathways and Crossing three steep Deep River gorges they have these things out there called
monkey Bridges so it's known that had they passed these three River Gorges they would have used these monkey
Bridges okay so they would have had to have walked for hours and hours deeper and deeper
into the jungle if they were the ones that brought the backpack to where it was later found
but then again keep in mind we also have the tribal woman who's saying I'm convinced that backpack wasn't there
the day before I found it today and I'm bringing it to you to the police today and Reporting this as being found along
the banks of the calibra is it possible that an animal would pick up this book bag and move it I think it would be
possible the the problem I have with that theory is the condition of the backpack itself and the I think what's
most likely is that possibly the river carried the backpack to this location because it was found amongst debris that
would have been thought to have been carried by the river well again we might just be way off on our assessment of the
damage to this book bag right because we're only seeing pictures but the thing that's tricky about the river
taking it there too I I would expect a certain amount of damage to the backpack in that situation as well
but to be clear the only statement that we have that this backpack was found where it's
reported to have been found is by the woman that turned it into the police department and to the police station
other than her word we have nothing else to go on it could have actually been found or located anywhere for all we
know now by the end of June they did find some remains and then eventually using
DNA testing this showed that these remains did belong to Chris and lizanne within two months native Searchers
retrieved a total of 33 skeletal fragments and one larger piece of well-preserved skin
all were linked to the missing women using DNA testing this sounds like a lot of bones but this was not skulls and
intact femurs lying around right 28 of the recovered bones were small metatarsals from lisanne's left foot
which was found still in its tied hiking boot and sock behind a tree near the river
when the foot was removed from the boot a Dutch medical examiner determined that
the bones were broken the largest bones found were a part of lisanne's left femur bone and left tibia and Chris's
partial pelvis bone one of Chris's rib bones the number 10 Rib was also found no larger bones were ever located and
the bones that were found they were found out in the open with the exception of lizanne's boot all right so when you
find these bones they're they're all broken we don't have a bone that's not broken
pretty much they're they're fragments The Only Exception may be the the rib bone and what else have they found as
far as evidence well eventually they would find one of Chris's blue boots this is found empty now initial reports
were that the the Nobi tribe also found Chris's cut off denim shorts there seems to be no agreement as to
where and how these shorts were found the Nobby says that they were buttoned and zipped and folded and placed on a
rock next to the river high above the water line yeah one guy involved in the search denies this saying that Searchers
found the shorts clearly washed up in the river he's still in the river right trapped in some floating debris the
problem with the with the natives and the volunteers finding the bones and these personal items of course is that
we don't know for sure where they were actually found only a general area because they're located and then them
brought to the attention of others right but it is interesting that the backpack
remains and the clothes and the shoes were found they all seem to be have been found
along the river within just a few kilometers of each other well it seems almost as if the book bag was organized
some way and then what these shorts being folded or the claim that they were folded you started thinking well
where they purposely put down there for a reason but then again we have the other witness saying they were actually
in the river right now all of these items being found along the river they are all within a few kilometers of each
other it's estimated that about six hours worth of walking distance would be between the backpack and the other items
despite the scattered nature of the findings everyone agrees that the general area where the women's last
known resting place was about two thousand twenty three hundred feet above sea level and the upper cloud forest
near the headwaters of the calibra this is nowhere near where anyone would expect Chris and lizanne to have gone
so let's Circle back how they would expect them to keep heading off the trail right so let's Circle back here captain
and kind of sum up what we've gone through here because there's a lot of a lot of stuff going on a lot of stuff
going on so we have Chris and lizanne there in their early 20s 21 22. they travel to Panama and they're actually in
Panama for a little bit of time uh about two weeks before they're supposed to go
and volunteer their time at this town of bucate right and again I don't know if there's any importance to this but
they're supposed to start teaching a week earlier yeah so they show up expecting to teach and they're like hey
you're here a week early but we have your accommodations you can sleep here and you can eat here while you wait out
this week before you volunteer your time the thing that's tricky here man is that
we know the outcome we don't know everything that happened out there and we're gonna dive into some more things
that might point to what could have happened right to the women or or or who came across them or whatever
but the thing here is they had a whole week of nothing to do had this not occurred maybe none of this
would have happened at all we have we have two young women with a week to kill and they decide to go out on this this
hiking trip which as we discussed is not considered to be that challenging of a hike right the only problem is there
seems to be one big problem you hike up to the top of the summit you turn around
and you come back down it seems to me if you don't turn around and you continue on the other side we're talking about a
much different hike a much more challenging hike and could this be as simple as that you get up to the top you
have two individuals let's say there's nobody there's no guide you got two individuals and one saying
ah I think I remember the website said keep going and the other girl says no no I think we're just supposed to turn
around and then they just go oh you're probably right and they just keep going and is that the mistake but even even
then I think you're looking at a couple hours of going in the next Direction three hours at some point
you're going to be going we went the wrong direction we need to turn back but even if you go three hours in the
wrong direction you're only about six hours from being home or being at the starting point
actually you know what's what's difficult with this case is what we just stated about there was
no official quote unquote official search for these two women until about five days after it's believed that they
that we know that they went out on this hike right and the reason for that is simply these rumors and you gotta factor
in several other things okay had that guide not shown up the next day and said hey I'm supposed to take these women on
a hike where are they oh I'm gonna go to their accommodations well it doesn't look like they slept
here oh they sent out breakfast for him this morning they're not here they didn't eat breakfast right so now I'm
wondering where the hell these girls are so he gets in touch with the school they
go out and they start looking had he not come forward who knows how long it would have been
until there was some kind of search initiated for these two women and it's very likely that given that
they weren't going to the volcano they weren't searching in the proper area on that second day that they were gone
by the time the official search starts five days later the problem I think we have here Captain is these two they're
they're going to be referred to in town as the slang term would be the Dutch women
right we have two Dutch women that went missing well I think that the problem we have here is
they're not from this area if if it's only two days that they've been missing what pictures are you going to walk
around town with going hey have you seen these women have you seen these women no what you're going to hear from the
locals is yeah I saw two Dutch women yesterday yeah I saw two Dutch women two days ago I gave them a ride to over here
what were their names oh I don't know right but they're Dutch right so what I'm getting at is
that's what's going to be difficult about initiating this official search and then once the official search
happens they find nothing they find nothing for it's like 25 days of heavy searching right and a lot of
people including their parents right including Dutch Searchers right dogs helicopters everything you can
think of was used in this 25-day time period they come up empty-handed they find nothing and it's not until two
months later that this backpack is discovered turned into you from a Nobi tribe woman that seems to magically
disappeared out of nowhere I mean even based on what she states yes exactly and it wasn't until that backpack is found
that the backpack actually inspires additional searches which ends up finding these remains these fragmented
remains of the two women so unfortunately we learn much later on in this story that lizanne and Chris
they're no longer with us not only did they disappear out on the trail sometime that day we don't know
how they died right and we don't know what the hell happened to them over the course of this time and and furthermore
how long were they alive during the course of them being missing well it looks like we have some kind of
broken foot broken ankle which then leads to the severed foot and the shoe right and then then we have a rib bone
right and those are the main two points that we know neither one of these girls are are alive
yeah and so I think here one we're going to have to use the bones to try to figure out what possibly could have
happened and that's very likely that we have a broken foot broken ankle situation with the one
but regarding the contents and regarding the backpack itself again I keep coming back to that because
it's tricky because we have we have a couple of situations that we can kind of put together in our heads here right the
water bottle does that suggest that that they were two things the early reports state that
it was half full right later reports state that it was an empty water bottle if I'm lost in the jungle I'm I'm making
a point to save that water bottle whether it's full or empty and I'd wonder if that water was tested that's
what I'm getting at yeah because you know is it rain water is it from a river are they drinking from a river are they
filling up that water bottle with water from River water that could in turn make
them sick right and make make their already dire situation more dire so I I don't know if that water was
tested my guess would be I don't have a clue because I don't understand why we have different varying accounts of there
was water in the bottle there was no water in the bottle right but it seems like every case we cover there's
something I mean that's very important thing I mean if we knew that that was just bottled water
well then you'd think that yeah even though that they didn't find that stuff for months but you would think that if
whatever happened to them happened quickly right it happened quickly they didn't find themselves in a situation
where they were just camped somewhere going through water and again the other the other thing too
is the the valuables that were found in that backpack indicates that they weren't they didn't come across somebody
that was like hey give me all your stuff and ended up attacking them for their valuables well maybe
unless unless the perpetrator then discarded the backpack he said you you have all this stuff and I need a bag to
carry it so give me the book bag you'd think that individual would take the cash at the very least
right but maybe that person put down that bag for whatever reason and somebody saw it
grabbed it and it's gone they when they came back for the bag it's gone and then
if that if that situation is not what played out then we have a situation too of their sunglasses cell phones camera
passport it's almost like whatever happened to the two women out there that they were at least rational
enough before whatever went down that they were storing their valuables in their backpack for safe keeping or safe
travels well they're taking a lot of pictures but uh but again I I don't see any
evidence the other thing I'm looking for in some of these pictures is most of the time it's one of the girls
taking a picture of the other girl every now and then there's a selfie but what I'm trying to see is if somebody's
making a reaction or kind of looking at somebody that's off camera that might not be the one taking the
picture right I've been trying to see if I ca I haven't been able to see anything
maybe if you can see something go to our website and hit us up on the blog yeah so there's there's some issues with
these pictures uh but regarding the the items found like I said estimated six hours walking distance between the
backpack and the other items from what I could find Captain it seems like everyone agrees
that the the general area is quite far from where it would be expected that the two women would have gone we do have a
Dutch medical examiner expert who examined the bone fragments and states that they weren't able to
determine the the cause of death of either of the two women now mind you to be clear like we said earlier it's
just fragments of most of these bones 33 bones yeah fragments or not that's still
a lot they're not able to determine the cause of death for either of the two women
so let's talk about the two phones found in lisanne's backpack right one was Chris's iPhone 4 the other was lisanne's
uh Samsung Galaxy S3 The Logical question is obviously if the women had phones on them why on Earth
would they not have called for help or texted someone their coordinates or use the compass app to navigate their way
back to the town right the short answer is this is because there's no cell service in the jungle
but with the phones later being found investigators were able to reconstruct some attempted calls made by Chris and
lizanne what we can see on the call logs is chilling the log from Chris's phone shows the
first call to 112 or 112 which is the equivalent of 9-1-1 in the Netherlands came at 4 39 pm on April 1st this is the
day that the women hiked the penesta so let's say let's say this is maybe 30 minutes or an
hour after they should have returned safely to town okay um so here's the thing at this time of
year in Panama there's roughly about 12 hours daily of night time okay so by 4 39 PM it would have likely started to
possibly get a little darker within the forest where we believe the women to be at this time
it seems likely that by this time the two knew that they should have been able to make their way back to town by now
and realize that they needed help all right so again we could then maybe assume that they just
somebody got it wrong and they kept going so that now somebody tries to make an attempt to one one two now of course
this call does not go through to anyone another call to 112 was attempted on lisanne's Samsung at 4 51 PM just 12
minutes later again this call is unsuccessful we can see from the phone records that
at the time these calls were attempted Chris's iPhone battery was half charged and uh lizanne's Samsung battery was
about half charged as well we can only imagine what the first night in the jungle would be like for these
two young women it appears unlikely that the two were equipped with any kind of survival or camping gear or even extra
clothing right now temperatures would drop to the 50s uh at night in the cloud forest at that elevation with the women
in just tank tops you have to wonder is is something like hypothermia a concern the other tricky thing too is we I'd say
maybe if it's lower but I mean 50 degrees isn't that that cold well I'm I'm factoring in the possibility of
these pop-up rainstorms that we talked about that the area true good point you know frequently has
the other thing too which we haven't even got to yet is the strange creatures and animals in the jungle they have
there they have howler monkeys you know we're in Ohio we don't have any monkeys that uh we're not supposed to
anyway I remember when there was a monkey loosened Minerva Park a couple years ago yeah crazy Marcel there's
actually not a monkey at all that's like three times in my lifetime that there's
been a monkey on the loose in some kind of neighborhood and then turns out there
was never after after further investigation oh we looked into it more we we find no monkey
business going on so this jungle has monkeys poisonous snakes insects and you have to imagine you know
it's going to be pitch black out there at night these two must have been genuinely terrified would be my guess
well they waited until 6 58 a.m the next morning April 2nd this is when we would
see another 112 call from lisanne's phone at 10 53 a.m she made another attempt this time trying 9-1-1 well there's a as
well as one one two yeah and Chris tries to make a temp in in between that at 8 14. and again
she did the same at 1 56 p.m so with this last call the phone log shows that the cell was able to make contact with
the GMS Network right but still no call came in to emergency lines Chris also tried 112 that day like you
said at 8 14 a.m and strangely uh most likely accidentally took a screenshot uh with her phone okay at 4 13 pm on
Thursday April 3rd this the the next day there was an earthquake in the region some reports have it as being moderately
strong about a six on the scale is it possible that the earthquake caused one or both of them to fall is
one thing you got to wonder about causing a disastrous injury or injuries fall on them yes could they have been
killed by like in a Mudslide yeah or injured in a Mudslide uh or were they already incapacitated for whatever
reason by this play either way by this time Chris and lisanne were likely getting desperate
they were no doubt starving dehydrated possibly ill from drinking tainted river water like we pointed out possibly
injured their phones were also probably on low battery by this point we know from the logs and this is incredibly
smart that the women were were smart enough to turn their phones off between call
attempts you know to preserve likely to preserve the battery life of their phones
the last call attempt was made on April 3rd at 9 32 a.m to 9-1-1 from Chris's iPhone after this we only have records
of signal checks where the women would turn or one of the women would turn the phones on to see if
there was service but by most reports no further calls were attempted there were many of these checks in total
from both phones on the fourth or 5th of April there is some discrepancy though and we have lisanne's Samsung it finally
ran out of battery so her phone is dead and would record no more information signal checks continue to occur on
Chris's iPhone on April 4th at 10 16 and 142 and April 5th at 10 50 and 137 and on April 6 at 10 26 and 137 right do you
know do you is that kind of resonating here so we have the fourth the fifth and the
sixth all of these attempts are occurring within the same hours right in the 10 o'clock hour and then again in
the one o'clock hour right and that continues for three straight days but but yeah so then you question is it
just the phone doing it automatically or are they doing it that's interesting but then also it says
11 down here where it says 11 7 7 7 signal checks is that like somebody putting in something to check a signal
that's kind of confusing to me well here's what I think that means and I I can't say that I know that for certain
my my guess is that they're simply turning on the phone to see if the they have any bars right right that may do I
happen to have service now right but oh I don't have service so I'm gonna power off the phone but this is
also like you don't know how look I don't know how old these phones were too at the time but I have had
issues well it's an iPhone 4 and a Samsung Galaxy S3 right by what I'm saying is is the iPhone 5 out now is
this an old older phone and what I mean by that is that I've had phones that uh the battery is dead
quote-unquote it's stop phone shuts off right and like an hour later or something it'll just pop up on and then
die again and then pop back on and die again and I've had I've just had these weird
things anybody that has had an iPhone uh five or six has experienced this problem
so if their battery goes dead a lot one thing that's crazy here and I don't know
what we can surmise from this but we have the afternoon check phone check on April 5th and then the two phone checks
on April 6. Chris's phone was switched on but no pin was entered so then there's a break in the phone usage until
Friday April 11th when again the phone was switched on with no pin entered this was the last usage of Chris's iPhone
which switched off or died on April 11th at 11 56 a.m now a few reports say that
emergency calls were attempted from the iPhone many more times in these few days
no pin needed but that has not been verified yeah very strange stuff with this these phone records and you have to
wonder man what does this all mean you know we we can see from the signal checks that at least one of the women
continue to power on Chris's phone at the same time roughly the same time each day around 10 37 a.m and 1 35 to 140
each afternoon likely to check for a signal this occurred until up until April 6th right so
five days right and we can see here's the thing that I wonder about we can see in another photo of the women before
they set off hiking that one of them is wearing a watch so is it possible that whoever it was was relying on that on
the watch for time right maybe even setting an alarm to check a signal at these times every day for three days but
yeah good possibility but why I I I I'm what's lost on me is why is that the choice of time of day
yeah unless they don't have their phones in somebody else's checking right so I mean could something
could something as simple as they thought they heard other people in the area the first day they were lost at
that time that they thought well maybe we'll try our phones for whatever reason right and then they thought well maybe
is this the most busy time of the hiking area and so we'll try when we think there are other people around I I don't
know the the reasoning behind it but there seems to be some reasoning behind it because they continue to follow that
same behavior that pattern of behavior for three days like I said or it's a possibility that the phone is doing some
kind of random check around that time so the other thing too is we have Chris's phone that's turned on
for several days but then no pin is entered so this makes it seem likely that someone other than Chris may have
been using the phone yeah but could be it could have been using an app as far as like a flashlight app or something
well that that could be a possibility I wonder if the phone would log that information
yeah I would think that it would but but also you would think that there would be some pictures on these phones
and I couldn't find really much mention of that well but what I'm saying here is
that we seem to have a decent log of information about what the phone was doing or or what people were doing with
the phone and if it would log that information as to what utilities or what apps were attempted to be used during
these times I think we would have that information so without that thought that you're
using it to attempt to use utilities or some some app you have to wonder what possibilities
are left if it's not Chris using that phone because there's no pin entered did Chris was she injured and finally became
unconscious or passed away and then left only lisanne with the with both phones and she didn't know Chris's pen and was
still attempting to use it or you know could you have a combination of both do you have a situation where where
Chris might be injured and unable to remember how to use her phone or unable to remember her
pin due to the stress that she's occurred in the in the days that she's been missing yeah or did some piece of
[ __ ] do something to him and he's just staring at their phone and it doesn't know how to use it
doesn't know really what to do with it my thought though is what we're seeing early on is the use of the pin and we're
seeing that the the women or one of them is at least smart enough to power off the phones to preserve the battery life
of both of the phones and so what I'm wondering is if at some point did somebody go
hey I'm going to preserve this battery life even further because I know on the iPhone I'm not familiar with Samsung but
I know on the iPhone you can make an emergency call without even putting in the PIN
so therefore you're you're saving yourself some steps possibly saving yourself is much better battery life as
you possibly can right and so I wonder if they just decided on a shortcut after a while the scariest thing to me though
is regardless of of how that's being operated or why it's being operated in that manner we have the situation where
the phone is being powered on a signal is being checked for emergency calls are being attempted up until April 6th well
then what what happened did did one or both of the girls have they expired by the
end of April 6th because the phone is not used then for five more days right I don't if they are lost or injured and
they are conscious even just one of them the behavior the pattern of behavior is
them constantly trying the phones or using the phones in an attempt to get rescue rescue efforts to themselves
then why for five days did no one use the phone I'm wondering did someone else turn the
phone on on April 11th yeah possibly or again it's just some kind of glitch like
they checked the phone multiple times try to turn it on and it was just not turning
on and then for whatever reason the phone turned on on the 11th any chance you think that it could have
occurred or took on water damage and then dried out very powerful for some reason five days later and then it was
operable again [Music] thank you guys so much for listening thank you for telling a friend we'll see
you in the garage tomorrow until then be good be kind and don't let it [Music]

Photo 509 /// Part 1 /// 256

Part 1 of 2

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

2014, Panama - Whatever happened, should never have happened. Two smart, hardworking women traveled to another country. Looking for adventure they decided to take a long touristy hike out into the jungle from which they never returned. There have been many horrifying theories as to what may have taken place out there. This week we explore the very scary evidence left behind as we try to figure out what happened to Kris Kremers and Lisanne Froon. Beer of the Week - Brew Free or Die (Blood Orange IPA) Garage Grade - 5 out of 5

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Brief Summary

Dutch hikers Chris and Lisanne went missing in Panama, leading to a complex investigation and tragic discoveries about their fate.

Key points

A Week of Downtime. Chris and Lisanne find themselves with unexpected free time before their volunteer work.
The Strange Case of the Dutch Hikers. Exploring the mysterious disappearance of two young women in Panama.
The Hike Begins. Chris and Lisanne set off on a hike that would change everything.
Search Efforts Intensify. After days of searching, the parents mobilize to find their daughters.
Discovery of the Backpack. A woman from the Nobi tribe finds Lisanne's turquoise backpack two months after the disappearance.
Skeletal Remains Found. DNA testing confirms that remains found belong to Chris and Lisanne.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

What can we learn from the phone calls they made?

Questioning the women's actions

4:04WatchNov 24, 2022

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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