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This program is about unsolved mysteries.

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Whenever possible, the actual family members and police

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officials have participated in recreating the events.

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What you are about to see is not a news broadcast.

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Kansas City, Missouri.

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It started as a small fire at a construction site,

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and suddenly it exploded with unrestrained fury,

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instantly killing six firemen.

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Later investigators discovered that the blaze had been

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deliberately set, meaning the deaths were in reality

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cold-blooded murders.

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Imagine the eerie feeling of stepping off a train

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and coming face to face with a total stranger who looks

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exactly like you, in effect, your mirror image.

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That is precisely what happened to a soldier named Ken Palmer

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during World War II.

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Some 50 years later, he's still searching for his own body.

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On a small plane loaded with marijuana,

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crashed in the Virginia countryside,

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it blew the lid off one of the East Coast's biggest drug

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lines.

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Authorities began to close in on the mastermind,

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a charismatic pilot named Wallace Thrasher,

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only to hear he had apparently died in Central America.

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But reports of the drug lord's death

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may have been a clever hoax.

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Officials now believe that Wallace Thrasher got away,

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Scott Friedman, and his wife,

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Wallace Thrasher got away, Scott Friedman.

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Join me for another fascinating edition

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of Unsolved Mysteries.

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MUSIC

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Tonight, a woman named Pam Page is missing.

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For more than four years, her family's endured the agony

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of not knowing what happened to her.

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In 1977, Pam and her husband, Rob, left Arkansas

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and eventually moved to a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona,

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where they opened a video rental business.

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Despite one shaky period in 1987, Pam and Rob seemed happy.

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In fact, on July 7th, 1989, Pam went back to Arkansas

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for a family reunion and told everyone that things were great.

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MUSIC

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Two weeks later, however, on July 22nd, 1989,

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Rob Page said he noticed that his wife was behaving strangely.

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During the middle of the night, on the early morning hours

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of Saturday, Mr. Page awoke and discovered

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that his wife was not in bed.

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He went downstairs and discovered her on the sofa.

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Honey, what are you doing?

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I just couldn't sleep. My back really hurts.

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She was going through family photographs and she was crying.

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I'll just leave for a little while.

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She told him that her back was bothering her

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and that she didn't feel well.

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And Mr. Page said that he encouraged her to go see a doctor

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in the morning and he returned back to bed.

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Mr. Page said he got up at 7 or 8 o'clock in the morning,

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went downstairs and found his wife

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assorting through clothing.

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Sorting through some clothes for goodwill.

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I've been wanting to do this for a while.

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It's almost 8 o'clock.

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Are you going to go down to the shop?

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I really don't feel very good.

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Well, you only to open up for you?

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Would you?

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Yeah, sure.

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Well, that would be good.

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Okay. Well, I got the keys.

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Okay, thanks.

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Right.

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He did leave the home.

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Stated he had trouble starting his vehicle

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because he has an ignition switch problem.

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Worked on his truck for a little bit, got us started,

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and went up and opened up the video store.

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Rob Page said that 8 hours later,

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he came home to an empty house and a letter from Pam.

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Rob, by the time you read this,

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I'll be a long way from here.

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I have thought this thing out

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and have been planning this for several months.

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The letter stated that Pam had left town

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with a woman named Sarah.

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Rob Page claimed he was embarrassed

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because he thought his wife had left him for a woman.

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He did not call Arkansas to tell Pam's family.

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Four days later, however,

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Pam's older sister Trina did call Rob.

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She was Trina.

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I was calling to see how Pam was doing.

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She's gone.

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What do you mean she's gone?

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Well, I came home on Saturday and she left me a letter.

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It seemed out of character to me for her not to let anyone

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know where she was at.

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But I didn't think about that at first.

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I just had one thing on mind,

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was getting my word to somebody that she was missing.

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By the time you read this, I will be a long way from here.

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One by one, the members of Pam's family called Rob

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and listened as he read the letter.

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To each and every one, something seemed odd.

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Rob told him the police had taken a report,

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but Pam's father wanted to see the letter anyway.

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I'm leaving because I'm not happy.

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He asked Rob to fax it to Arkansas.

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I thought living back home would make me happy.

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It walked.

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When I received that faxed letter,

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I knew that something was bad wrong.

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For one thing, I looked at the signature.

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I had birthday cards and letters and so on from Pam.

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And the signature wasn't her signature.

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Finally, Pam's sister, Jimmy, called the police in Arizona

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that they had never heard of the case.

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The family was stunned.

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I knew from that second that she was dead.

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It scared me because I didn't know if we would find her body

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or if we would know what happened to her.

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But I knew she was dead.

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I was sure of that.

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She wouldn't leave under no circumstances.

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She would have let mama know they were too close.

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Rob page told detectives that on the day of Pam's disappearance,

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he left home around 8 AM.

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Later, he went to several auto parts stores,

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looking without success for an ignition switch for his truck.

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In the parking lot of one store, the truck finally gave out.

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Rob said he called home, got no answer,

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and assumed Pam had gone to the video shop after all.

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He phoned for a taxi to take him home.

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I need a taxi.

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Rob said he never went into the house, only the garage.

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He got apart for his truck, hopped on his bike,

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and went back to the store.

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When the truck finally started, he drove home and found the letter.

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The letter stated that Pam had taken all their money,

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$60,000 in cash, out of the safe at the video store.

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Rob page said he went straight to the store,

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and indeed, the cash was gone.

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The letter also said that Pam had left the couple's Corvette

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at a Winchell's donut shop.

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Rob page claimed he drove to every Winchells in the area,

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until finally the next day he located the Corvette.

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Soon, however, police began to question the details of Rob's story.

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None of the employees at the last auto parts store remembered Rob,

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or anyone, asking about an ignition switch.

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In addition, Rob page had said his truck, which was very distinctive,

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was parked at the store for nearly four hours that afternoon.

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None of the employees ever recall seeing that truck,

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being out front of the store, anyone ever working on it,

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and one particular employee stated if that truck had been out

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in front of his business, he would have known it.

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The police also found it curious that the donut shop

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or Pam had allegedly parked the Corvette.

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The shop which had taken Rob page several hours to locate

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was right across the street from the auto parts store.

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However, police did verify Rob's claim that a cab took him home

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from that location on July 22, 1989.

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Next, investigators turned their attention to the letter

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and the traveling companion named Sarah.

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Rob said he had never met Sarah, but had heard Pam talk about her.

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Mr. Page felt that his wife had met Sarah at the video store.

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From checking with the video store, the customers by the name of Sarah,

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we were not able to find a woman by that name who knew Mrs. Page.

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Finally, three weeks after Pam page disappeared,

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the Arizona State Crime Lab verified that the signature on the letter

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was almost certainly not Pam's.

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Mr. Page refused to believe me and was adamant that his wife

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had in fact signed the letter.

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After continuing your question, Mr. Page, about the signature on the letter,

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he admitted to me that he in fact did sign that letter.

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Rob Page now became a suspect and suddenly he began to tell a very different story.

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Mr. Page stated that the Thursday preceding his wife's disappearance,

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that while he was on the family's home computer,

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he discovered a letter that he claims his wife had authored

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in which in essence that she was going to be leaving him.

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I was working on the computer just now and I found something very interesting.

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What did you find?

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Mr. Page stated he confronted his wife about that letter.

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I'm sorry you found this. I wrote this a long time ago.

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Oh, then you weren't planning to leave me, huh?

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No, I wasn't. I wrote this when I was upset.

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Oh, then you're not going to take our money and run off, huh?

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Rob, why do you have to blow everything out of proportion?

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Let's talk about this when you've cooled down.

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Come back here. We're not finished.

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On Thursday, he went to the video store,

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opened it up and stayed at the store until about noon

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and then he returned home to check on his wife.

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Rob now told police that when he came home from the video store,

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he found the house in disarray.

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Pam?

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Rob said that all of Pam's clothes except the items she had set aside for goodwill were gone.

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All the family pictures and one of their dogs, a Dockstunt named Reron, were missing.

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Pam's credit cards and house keys were on the kitchen table,

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but Rob said he couldn't find her driver's license.

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Rob Page said he went downstairs and added four innocuous sentences to the letter in the computer,

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printed it out and signed Pam's name.

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Then Rob drove the Corvette to Winchills,

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went to the payphone across the street and called a taxi.

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Mr. Page stated that he fabricated some of the things he did

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and acted out some of the things that he did

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because no one would ever believe him that his wife had in fact left him had he not done this.

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Due to Mr. Page's inconsistent statements throughout this investigation

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and as well as his suspicious circumstances surrounding the disappearance of his wife,

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he was offered a polygraph examination on several occasions

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to eliminate him as a suspect in his wife's disappearance

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and he declined to take a polygraph on each occasion that it was offered.

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Despite the suspicions about Rob Page,

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there was no evidence that he had done anything wrong except change his story.

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No charges were filed and the investigation sputtered to a halt.

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This is a picture of your sister Pam.

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Frustrated, Pam's sister Jimmy Rice decided to visit Carol Paite,

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a psychic in Little Rock, Arkansas,

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who has worked with the police there for ten years.

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Carol had never been to Arizona and knew nothing about the pages.

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She had only a photograph of Pam to go on.

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That's very good. Thank you.

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I just handed her a picture, she put her hand on it and started describing Pam's...

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front room. And, you know, unless you've ever been there,

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she didn't know if Pam lived in a trailer apartment or whatever,

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but to describe the downstairs and how you go up the stairs and the balcony

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and going into a bedroom. You knew she was actually seeing all this.

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I saw her with a man in what appeared to be her house and she was arguing with him.

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The argument goes up the stairs, she's going up the stairs,

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she's going down the hallway. He knocks her to the floor, he's trying to strangle her.

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He grabs a pillow and all of a sudden she's quiet.

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Then a female comes, she assists him on placing her in the trunk.

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Now I'm seeing them pull out of the garage and they're driving.

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The name Coolidge comes into my mind and 2-4-1.

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Then I'm seeing a factory and it's gray in color.

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It appears to be to my left and there's a railroad track parallel

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and then crossing over the railroad track onto a small road.

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Then he pulls over on the side of the road and removes the body and begins to dig.

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When he apparently it is deep enough, he places her in the grave and then drives away.

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Janna Thorson, an Arizona newspaper reporter covering the case, was in touch with Pam's family in Arkansas.

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She decided to check out Carol Pay's three strongest clues, the factory, the numbers 2-4-1 and the name Coolidge.

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Incredibly, Thorson did find a gray factory building near railroad tracks right in Peoria, Arizona.

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Nearby was assigned with the numbers 2-4-1.

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One of the routes between the Page Home and a friend's house passed both of these sites and ended at a street named Coolidge.

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There is no way of knowing if Carol Pay's information means anything until we know whether Pam Page met with foul play or chose to disappear.

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From the beginning, Rob Pay just maintained that he believes his wife is alive.

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In a letter to Unsolved Mysteries, he declined a request for an interview but said that if we air this story, he hoped Pam would be found.

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Pam Page would today be 36 years old. She has red hair and is 5 feet 8 inches tall.

247
00:16:35,600 --> 00:16:43,600
It was just after Thanksgiving, 1988, firemen raced to extinguish two small blazes burning at the edge of the city.

248
00:16:43,600 --> 00:16:51,600
It was a most routine of calls. Then in the blink of an eye, one of the fires exploded with unprecedented fury.

249
00:17:04,600 --> 00:17:15,600
He could have retired several years ago but he loved it so much that he just stayed.

250
00:17:15,600 --> 00:17:22,600
He wasn't even supposed to have been working. He was filling in for somebody else.

251
00:17:22,600 --> 00:17:29,600
I'd rather have him go this way than to lay in a coma or be sick because that would never be Jim Kilvitt.

252
00:17:30,600 --> 00:17:34,600
He didn't want to fly an airplane because he didn't want to risk his life on an airplane.

253
00:17:34,600 --> 00:17:38,600
I said, but you risk your life every day being a fireman.

254
00:17:38,600 --> 00:17:42,600
He said, well, he's in control when he's at the fire department.

255
00:17:44,600 --> 00:17:56,600
Michael Oldham, Robert McConaughey, James Kilvinton, Jean Herd,

256
00:17:57,600 --> 00:18:03,600
Thomas Fry, Gerald Hallerman.

257
00:18:05,600 --> 00:18:12,600
They were among Kansas City's best. Six firefighters with more than 100 years of service between them.

258
00:18:12,600 --> 00:18:15,600
All have been married, all had children.

259
00:18:15,600 --> 00:18:20,600
Underlying the tragedy is the ugly fact that the fires have been deliberately set.

260
00:18:20,600 --> 00:18:25,600
And arson means that the deaths are nothing less than cold-blooded murders.

261
00:18:25,600 --> 00:18:30,600
In spite of a massive investigation, no charges have been filed, no convictions won.

262
00:18:30,600 --> 00:18:36,600
Today the case remains Kansas City's most notorious unsolved crime.

263
00:18:38,600 --> 00:18:41,600
The first minutes gave no hint of what was to come.

264
00:18:41,600 --> 00:18:51,600
At about 3.40 a.m. on November 29, 1988, two security guards at a highway construction site discovered a pickup truck in flames.

265
00:18:52,600 --> 00:18:54,600
Yes, I want to report a fire.

266
00:18:54,600 --> 00:18:56,600
71 Highway, southbound length.

267
00:18:56,600 --> 00:19:01,600
Some 500 yards away, a second blaze crackled around a storage trail.

268
00:19:01,600 --> 00:19:05,600
Look, there's some explosives there that are burning near the fire.

269
00:19:05,600 --> 00:19:07,600
OK, we'll get somebody to store it.

270
00:19:07,600 --> 00:19:09,600
The dispatch went to station 41.

271
00:19:10,600 --> 00:19:13,600
Pumper 41 is a pickup truck.

272
00:19:13,600 --> 00:19:20,600
Captain Jim Kilvinton and fireman Robert McConaughey and Mike Oldham were out the door in just over 90 seconds.

273
00:19:20,600 --> 00:19:26,600
Pumper 41, a pickup truck, 8-7, south 71 Highway on the west side of the highway.

274
00:19:29,600 --> 00:19:32,600
Pumper 41 used portion information to the calling party.

275
00:19:32,600 --> 00:19:35,600
There may be explosives stored in that construction site.

276
00:19:35,600 --> 00:19:38,600
The pickup truck may be in the construction site.

277
00:19:38,600 --> 00:19:40,600
41's clear.

278
00:19:40,600 --> 00:19:48,600
As Pumper 41 whipped through town, Jim Kilvinton's wife, Cecilia, heard the dispatch over the police scanner she kept at work.

279
00:19:50,600 --> 00:19:58,600
I just didn't think anything about it at the time because it's just going to a regular track fire down on the highway.

280
00:19:58,600 --> 00:20:04,600
I just thought of some teenagers truck, and they said they caught it on fire for insurance reasons.

281
00:20:13,600 --> 00:20:14,600
Hi.

282
00:20:14,600 --> 00:20:15,600
Yeah, we're the ones that called.

283
00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:16,600
Yeah.

284
00:20:16,600 --> 00:20:17,600
Captain, talk to the captain.

285
00:20:17,600 --> 00:20:18,600
Are you the captain?

286
00:20:18,600 --> 00:20:19,600
I'm glad you're here.

287
00:20:19,600 --> 00:20:21,600
Well, we'll be using one small screen.

288
00:20:21,600 --> 00:20:24,600
Thanks for getting here so quickly that the truck's totaled.

289
00:20:24,600 --> 00:20:26,600
But there is a fire on the other side of the highway.

290
00:20:26,600 --> 00:20:27,600
Yes, I think there's explosives in there.

291
00:20:27,600 --> 00:20:28,600
On the other side of the highway.

292
00:20:28,600 --> 00:20:29,600
Yes, sir.

293
00:20:29,600 --> 00:20:35,600
From the onset, arson seemed probable, given two fires that were apparently started simultaneously.

294
00:20:35,600 --> 00:20:38,600
Send another Pumper company.

295
00:20:38,600 --> 00:20:45,600
The highway construction site, a frequent target of vanills, lay some 10 miles from downtown Kansas City.

296
00:20:45,600 --> 00:20:49,600
The burning trailer was located here, perched on a hillside.

297
00:20:49,600 --> 00:20:58,600
Roughly 500 yards of the northwest across a highway was the pickup truck.

298
00:20:58,600 --> 00:21:02,600
Kilvinton and his crew soon had the truck blaze under control.

299
00:21:02,600 --> 00:21:08,600
However, fire still burned unchecked through the trailer.

300
00:21:08,600 --> 00:21:15,600
Within minutes, Captain Gerald Halleran, along with fireman Thomas Fry and Gene Herd, arrived from station 30.

301
00:21:15,600 --> 00:21:19,600
Pumper 30 is tonight, sir.

302
00:21:19,600 --> 00:21:20,600
Hey, Gene, how you doing?

303
00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:21,600
Jim, where we got?

304
00:21:21,600 --> 00:21:26,600
Well, Gerald, looks like we've got a pickup down here that we pretty well got under control.

305
00:21:26,600 --> 00:21:28,600
Why don't you go up on top of the hill and handle that?

306
00:21:28,600 --> 00:21:32,600
Halleran and his men headed up the hill to work the trailer fire.

307
00:21:32,600 --> 00:21:41,600
Pumper 41 stayed behind to wrap up the first blaze.

308
00:21:41,600 --> 00:21:51,600
To Captain Halleran, a check of the area suggested that the explosives had been properly stored and clearly marked metal sheds known as bunkers.

309
00:21:51,600 --> 00:21:55,600
Just the fact that the bunker was there, in fact, there was two bunkers there.

310
00:21:55,600 --> 00:21:57,600
That's what that Captain believed.

311
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:03,600
That's what the explosives was, and this trailer was just a regular normal construction trailer with tools and equipment in it.

312
00:22:03,600 --> 00:22:10,600
And therefore, there was no danger that he was going to put that fire out and it'd be done for the night.

313
00:22:10,600 --> 00:22:23,600
Roughly eight minutes later, Captain Kilvinton and his crew joined the others at the trailer.

314
00:22:23,600 --> 00:22:27,600
At 408 AM, the battalion chief pulled into the construction site.

315
00:22:27,600 --> 00:22:35,600
He was a quarter mile from the flames, just minutes from one of the worst tragedies in Kansas City history.

316
00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:38,600
Battalion chief, you guys are...

317
00:22:38,600 --> 00:22:41,600
We're the security guards. We're the ones that reported the fire.

318
00:22:41,600 --> 00:22:43,600
Tell me a bit about it. We just got on the scene.

319
00:22:43,600 --> 00:22:46,600
Well, my truck was on fire and they came and took care of that.

320
00:22:46,600 --> 00:22:49,600
And I think the firefighters went over to the site across the street and...

321
00:22:49,600 --> 00:22:54,600
Down around the trailers down there. We understand there's some explosives there in a bunker.

322
00:22:54,600 --> 00:22:58,600
Yeah, and we think that there's some in the trailers over there as well.

323
00:22:58,600 --> 00:23:00,600
The trailers that are on fire?

324
00:23:00,600 --> 00:23:01,600
Yeah.

325
00:23:01,600 --> 00:23:03,600
Let's get them out of there, John.

326
00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:05,600
107...

327
00:23:20,600 --> 00:23:24,600
It was just the loudest noise I'd ever heard.

328
00:23:24,600 --> 00:23:30,600
It just kind of went through you. It was just so loud. I can't describe it. I'm serious.

329
00:23:30,600 --> 00:23:36,600
It was just incredible. And we live about 12 miles away from where the explosion was.

330
00:23:39,600 --> 00:23:46,600
Knocked me out of bed and I got up and looked to the east and I saw a big, big ball of fire.

331
00:23:46,600 --> 00:23:52,600
And I said to myself, I'm...Gerald's going to have to go to that because that's his district.

332
00:23:52,600 --> 00:23:57,600
And I just knew he had to go. I knew he'd be there.

333
00:23:58,600 --> 00:24:02,600
We're on a family step, Patrick.

334
00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:04,600
Little sound.

335
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:11,600
Explosions. This is where we pulled up in here. Get us all kinds of ambulances and at least a couple, three more companies.

336
00:24:14,600 --> 00:24:18,600
Fifteen companies of Kansas City firefighters rushed to aid their comrades.

337
00:24:18,600 --> 00:24:24,600
But safety considerations forced them to wait, frustrated, on the sidelines.

338
00:24:25,600 --> 00:24:28,600
They feared that there were more explosives up there on the hill.

339
00:24:28,600 --> 00:24:34,600
And it was still dark. From the sounds of the explosions, they were pretty sure that nobody had survived.

340
00:24:34,600 --> 00:24:44,600
And so we made the decision that we were going to wait until daylight because we didn't want to go up there and stumble around on more explosives and get more people injured and killed.

341
00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:55,600
40 minutes after the initial blast, a second explosion did indeed rip through the site.

342
00:24:56,600 --> 00:25:04,600
Pumper 41 or Pumper 30, answer. Pumper 41 or Pumper 30?

343
00:25:04,600 --> 00:25:13,600
Pumper 30, Pumper 41, answer. Pumper 30, Pumper 41, please answer.

344
00:25:13,600 --> 00:25:20,600
I knew something had happened. Why couldn't he get to his radio? Or any back into the radio?

345
00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:28,600
I said everything will be okay. I just sort of blocked it out of my mind.

346
00:25:28,600 --> 00:25:33,600
Then she come through, there were about five after six, come through the door.

347
00:25:33,600 --> 00:25:40,600
He says they're gone, but legally they cannot pronounce them gone until the coroner gets there.

348
00:25:40,600 --> 00:25:45,600
I said no way, they're still alive. He said no, they're gone.

349
00:25:46,600 --> 00:26:03,600
His captain came to the door and when he came in and I said, don't tell me it isn't true. And I just started crying.

350
00:26:04,600 --> 00:26:16,600
Daylight revealed a stark landscape. In the dismal aftermath, agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms

351
00:26:16,600 --> 00:26:21,600
joined Kansas City Police to sift the wreckage for clues.

352
00:26:21,600 --> 00:26:28,600
It was evident that nobody could have survived that. It was just totally devastated.

353
00:26:28,600 --> 00:26:36,600
I don't think any of the group that went up there was expecting what we found.

354
00:26:36,600 --> 00:26:40,600
I don't think anybody had any idea that it was that bad.

355
00:26:40,600 --> 00:26:45,600
I'd been in Vietnam and seen B-52 strikes, what the aftermath of those were.

356
00:26:45,600 --> 00:26:49,600
And these craters were much larger than 2,000 pound bombs leave.

357
00:26:50,600 --> 00:26:56,600
And as we found the firefighters, we came to the last one.

358
00:26:56,600 --> 00:26:59,600
He was laying there and his radio was still on.

359
00:26:59,600 --> 00:27:05,600
And you could hear the voice of the dispatcher still coming out over the radio, calling.

360
00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:11,600
And it just kind of shattered the stillness of it. It's just a very surreal looking scene.

361
00:27:12,600 --> 00:27:18,600
A public outcry erupted, following the revelation that arson had led to the firefighters' deaths.

362
00:27:18,600 --> 00:27:24,600
Angry residents inundated the police department with literally hundreds of leads.

363
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:31,600
The tips have ranged anywhere from someone out trying to steal, someone out just for fun,

364
00:27:31,600 --> 00:27:35,600
someone out just because they like to set fires, wanting to see what would happen.

365
00:27:35,600 --> 00:27:40,600
But as time went by, the police were trying to find out what was going on.

366
00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:45,600
But as time wore on, these leads soon wore out.

367
00:27:47,600 --> 00:27:51,600
Meanwhile, federal agents pursued the investigation from a different angle.

368
00:27:51,600 --> 00:27:56,600
The highway project had long been the focus of a bitter labor dispute.

369
00:27:56,600 --> 00:28:05,600
We know that there was labor unrest and it primarily dealt with Union versus non-union companies.

370
00:28:05,600 --> 00:28:10,600
We learned that there were a number of violent acts directed at non-union companies.

371
00:28:10,600 --> 00:28:13,600
They were putting acid into company equipment.

372
00:28:13,600 --> 00:28:16,600
They were putting a dirt into the diesel lines.

373
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:22,600
And there were a number of incidents where fire was used to destroy equipment.

374
00:28:22,600 --> 00:28:28,600
And if you take away the tragedy of that night of the six firefighters dying,

375
00:28:28,600 --> 00:28:32,600
we can look at some of these previous incidents being very similar to what happened that night.

376
00:28:32,600 --> 00:28:39,600
You had equipment damaged and then in this instance, you had a security guard's truck set on fire also.

377
00:28:42,600 --> 00:28:47,600
The untimely deaths of the six firemen reverberated across the entire country.

378
00:28:47,600 --> 00:28:53,600
Firefighters from every state joined in memorial services at Kansas City's Arrowhead Stadium.

379
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:59,600
To this day, surviving family members have been the focus of unflagging community support.

380
00:29:00,600 --> 00:29:07,600
We were all very proud of our husbands and we were proud of the people in Kansas City because they gave us such support.

381
00:29:07,600 --> 00:29:13,600
Everyone was back of us and we weren't alone.

382
00:29:16,600 --> 00:29:21,600
I guess I feel like if I knew who did it, we'd know why they did it.

383
00:29:21,600 --> 00:29:25,600
And I don't think they were trying to kill six firemen,

384
00:29:25,600 --> 00:29:32,600
but somebody was trying to do something to somebody and six men are gone.

385
00:29:32,600 --> 00:29:34,600
And that's hard to deal with.

386
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:37,600
Today, I think about this case tomorrow.

387
00:29:37,600 --> 00:29:41,600
I'll think about this case and I'll think about it until it's resolved.

388
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:41,600
When we return, the case of the enigmatic Wallace Thrasher, Deb and Air Country Gentlemen, an alleged drug lord.

389
00:30:52,600 --> 00:31:00,600
On October 17th, 1984, Virginia State Troopers converged on an eerie scene.

390
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:10,600
A small airplane had crashed in a remote mountain wilderness.

391
00:31:10,600 --> 00:31:16,600
Still strapped in the cockpit was a body charred beyond recognition.

392
00:31:16,600 --> 00:31:20,600
But it was a plane's cargo that riveted the attention of police.

393
00:31:20,600 --> 00:31:30,600
In smoldering heaps strewn over the crash site was 1200 pounds of high-grade marijuana, street value more than one billion dollars.

394
00:31:30,600 --> 00:31:34,600
For the authorities, the crash was something of a godsend.

395
00:31:34,600 --> 00:31:40,600
Eventually they would connect both the plane and the dead pilot to Wallace Thrasher, the Bland County, Virginia,

396
00:31:40,600 --> 00:31:47,600
one of the most successful and most flagrant drug runners in the eastern United States.

397
00:31:47,600 --> 00:31:51,600
Back in high school, when he belonged to the Key Club and the Latin Club,

398
00:31:51,600 --> 00:31:55,600
Wallace Thrasher hardly seemed the type to end up peddling drugs.

399
00:31:55,600 --> 00:32:02,600
He played on the football team and earned the nickname Squirrel for his ability to outrun trouble.

400
00:32:02,600 --> 00:32:06,600
But somewhere along the way, Wallace Thrasher went wrong.

401
00:32:06,600 --> 00:32:10,600
Today is whereabouts of the subject of unending speculation.

402
00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:14,600
Former associates insist Thrasher died in Central America,

403
00:32:14,600 --> 00:32:22,600
but authorities suspect that the Squirrel is once again on the run.

404
00:32:22,600 --> 00:32:32,600
From the late 70s to the early 80s, Thrasher's operation flew tons of marijuana and cocaine into the western region of Virginia.

405
00:32:32,600 --> 00:32:40,600
Distributors then smuggled the drugs north to Chicago, Detroit and other big cities.

406
00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:50,600
Thrasher often piloted the planes himself, and many of his neighbors seemed to regard him as a kind of local hero.

407
00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:56,600
Here in western Virginia for probably 200 years, kind of these swashbuckling pirate,

408
00:32:56,600 --> 00:32:59,600
book-and-ear type people out here were the local moonshiners.

409
00:32:59,600 --> 00:33:03,600
And to some extent, dope pilots are the modern-day moonshiners.

410
00:33:03,600 --> 00:33:09,600
It takes the same kind of talents to smuggle dope in by air as it does to run a load of moonshine.

411
00:33:09,600 --> 00:33:13,600
He was a tight person. He wasn't afraid to let everybody know what he was doing.

412
00:33:13,600 --> 00:33:21,600
Basically, everybody had contact with him at the airport and in areas where he was doing his drug business, he was transporting drugs.

413
00:33:22,600 --> 00:33:30,600
The rewards of Wally's Thrasher's life of crime were on display for everyone to see.

414
00:33:30,600 --> 00:33:36,600
He and his wife owned a 10-acre country estate and surrounded themselves with luxury.

415
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:47,600
Wally Thrasher was a very charming fellow, very generous to his associates and the people who lived around him.

416
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:53,600
He spent money very freely, so there are a great many people who will tell you kind things about him.

417
00:33:55,600 --> 00:34:00,600
For nearly a decade, Wally's Thrasher managed to stay two steps ahead of the law

418
00:34:00,600 --> 00:34:06,600
until that fateful night when one of his pilots slammed an airplane full of marijuana into a mountainside.

419
00:34:07,600 --> 00:34:17,600
It would take two weeks of painstaking investigation to turn up undeniable proof that Thrasher owned the plane.

420
00:34:17,600 --> 00:34:23,600
Detectives were planning to move in until this article appeared in the local paper.

421
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:26,600
Wally's Thrasher was dead.

422
00:34:27,600 --> 00:34:29,600
Can I help you gentlemen?

423
00:34:29,600 --> 00:34:34,600
Soon after, Virginia authorities tried to speak directly with Thrasher's wife.

424
00:34:34,600 --> 00:34:36,600
No, I'm afraid now is not a good time.

425
00:34:36,600 --> 00:34:38,600
Well, we read that Wally's Thrasher died.

426
00:34:38,600 --> 00:34:39,600
That's correct.

427
00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:41,600
Exactly how did he die?

428
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:43,600
In a plane crash, he was a pilot.

429
00:34:43,600 --> 00:34:44,600
And where did he die?

430
00:34:44,600 --> 00:34:45,600
In Jamaica.

431
00:34:45,600 --> 00:34:46,600
When did this happen?

432
00:34:46,600 --> 00:34:47,600
November 5th.

433
00:34:47,600 --> 00:34:49,600
Gentlemen, I'm sorry. I have to go.

434
00:34:49,600 --> 00:34:50,600
Goodbye.

435
00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:51,600
Thank you.

436
00:34:51,600 --> 00:34:54,600
The investigators departed unimpressed.

437
00:34:54,600 --> 00:35:01,600
Later, Mrs. Thrasher produced this death certificate as proof of her husband's fatal crash in Jamaica.

438
00:35:01,600 --> 00:35:08,600
Still suspicious, police sought to verify the information.

439
00:35:08,600 --> 00:35:16,600
The investigation revealed that the death certificate was fraudulent and there was no evidence from any witnesses

440
00:35:16,600 --> 00:35:24,600
or anyone in Jamaica that knew of any such crash.

441
00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:33,600
The disclosures convinced authorities that Wally's Thrasher was still alive and as a result, they filed charges against him.

442
00:35:33,600 --> 00:35:39,600
But with Thrasher's whereabouts unknown, his wife was again questioned by the authorities.

443
00:35:39,600 --> 00:35:43,600
Eventually, she agreed to tell investigators what she knew.

444
00:35:44,600 --> 00:35:53,600
She began with a night of the crash and confirmed that there had been a second pilot on board the aircraft.

445
00:35:53,600 --> 00:35:59,600
Although severely injured, the pilot was able to drag himself to a pay phone.

446
00:35:59,600 --> 00:36:08,600
Thrasher picked him up at the very moment police were racing to the crash scene.

447
00:36:08,600 --> 00:36:10,600
What happened?

448
00:36:10,600 --> 00:36:12,600
Oh, my God.

449
00:36:12,600 --> 00:36:14,600
We've got to get him to hospital.

450
00:36:14,600 --> 00:36:20,600
Almost immediately, Wally's Thrasher began to assess the damage to his operation.

451
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:21,600
What happened?

452
00:36:21,600 --> 00:36:24,600
We were trying to come in low under the cloud cover. It was just too low, man.

453
00:36:24,600 --> 00:36:35,600
Thrasher was well aware that the plane could be traced back to him, that it was just a matter of time before the authorities would be knocking at his door.

454
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:37,600
I think we got real problems.

455
00:36:37,600 --> 00:36:39,600
We've got to get him to hospital.

456
00:36:39,600 --> 00:36:48,600
Later, Thrasher spirited the injured pilot to an out of state hospital and dropped from sight himself.

457
00:36:48,600 --> 00:36:57,600
Mrs. Thrasher went on to tell police that about two weeks after the crash, her husband stuffed a quarter of a million dollars in cash into a travel bag

458
00:36:58,600 --> 00:37:03,600
and departed for the Central American country of Belize.

459
00:37:03,600 --> 00:37:10,600
Thrasher had said that he planned to buy a load of marijuana and return to the United States.

460
00:37:10,600 --> 00:37:19,600
But some believe Thrasher never intended to come home and that the $250,000 was a down payment on a new life.

461
00:37:19,600 --> 00:37:24,600
Hello?

462
00:37:24,600 --> 00:37:35,600
About a week later, Mrs. Thrasher received a call from two of their Confederates down in Belize, advising her that Mr. Thrasher had been killed on takeoff in a massive crash.

463
00:37:35,600 --> 00:37:37,600
My God!

464
00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:47,600
The fire had been so intense that literally the plane was burned down to the outline of a plane on the ground and that there would be very little for them to send back and no reason for her to come down.

465
00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:48,600
My God!

466
00:37:48,600 --> 00:38:01,600
Mrs. Thrasher contacted her attorney with the basic problem of how to handle her husband's estate, how would she inherit things, how would she spend money, take money from accounts and so forth.

467
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:08,600
In the end, Thrasher's wife admitted she bought the fake death certificate and concocted the tale of a Jamaican plane crash.

468
00:38:08,600 --> 00:38:17,600
She had feared that her property would be confiscated if authorities learned her husband was on a drug run when he died.

469
00:38:17,600 --> 00:38:27,600
But even the crash in Belize started to seem like a fabrication after one of Wallace Thrasher's former associates showed up in May of 1986.

470
00:38:27,600 --> 00:38:30,600
So, what did you find?

471
00:38:30,600 --> 00:38:36,600
Well, I went to Belize to the spot where the plane went down and apparently the fire was really bad.

472
00:38:36,600 --> 00:38:43,600
So the guys just bulldozed whatever was left into a hole and the fire was so bad there wasn't much.

473
00:38:43,600 --> 00:38:46,600
I did get some proof though.

474
00:38:51,600 --> 00:38:53,600
It's a wedding ring.

475
00:38:53,600 --> 00:38:57,600
I got that from one of the guys that I was there when he crashed.

476
00:38:57,600 --> 00:39:03,600
The ring was in perfect condition. The inscription as sharp as the day it had been engraved.

477
00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:07,600
For detectives, that was part of the problem.

478
00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:11,600
Mrs. Thrasher did advise me it was definitely Wallace Thrasher's wedding ring.

479
00:39:11,600 --> 00:39:27,600
We find it kind of tough to believe that an aircraft could go in with that amount of fuel, cause that amount of destruction to the point where literally the substructure of the plane was melted and the ring itself would still be in that kind of condition.

480
00:39:33,600 --> 00:39:40,600
A decade has passed since Wallace Thrasher left for Belize with a change of clothes and a quarter of a million dollars.

481
00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:49,600
Did he perish in a fiery crash in the jungles of Central America or did the squirrel once again dash to freedom?

482
00:39:49,600 --> 00:39:59,600
I think that at the time that Mr. Thrasher disappeared he was facing a lot of different problems and it may have been an opportunity for him to, as they say, exit stage left.

483
00:40:00,600 --> 00:40:10,600
We know that he was having problems within his own organization. He knew that if he got caught this time, it wouldn't be a matter of 18 months at a country club.

484
00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:17,600
It would be some serious prison time. So I think it was an excellent time for him to make that decision if he was going to make it.

485
00:40:18,600 --> 00:40:29,600
This photograph shows Wallace Thrasher at about the age of 36. He has graying hair, an athletic build and stands 5 feet 10 inches tall.

486
00:40:34,600 --> 00:40:42,600
Next, the amazing encounter of two lookalikes, identical strangers who may in fact be long lost blood relatives.

487
00:40:48,600 --> 00:41:03,600
One of the odds is somewhere in the world is another person who looks exactly like you. One in a million, one in 50 million, the chances of actually standing nose to nose with your double seem beyond calculation.

488
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:15,600
And yet around 50 years ago, that is precisely what happened to a young soldier named Ken Palmer, tonight with your help he hopes to beat the odds again.

489
00:41:18,600 --> 00:41:29,600
In December of 1943, Ken Palmer was a newly commissioned 2nd Lieutenant in the Army Air Corps, on his way from Texas to Wisconsin.

490
00:41:29,600 --> 00:41:37,600
During a momentary stop to change trains in Cincinnati, Ohio, Ken had the most remarkable encounter of his life.

491
00:41:38,600 --> 00:41:44,600
Ken sensed that someone was staring at him. A quick glance told him why.

492
00:41:45,600 --> 00:41:51,600
Incredibly, improbably, Ken Palmer had found his exact double.

493
00:41:52,600 --> 00:41:59,600
I was amazed. And both of us saw it and both of us reacted so much to it.

494
00:42:00,600 --> 00:42:07,600
Both of us sat down our bags and stared. And until I got hold of myself and extended my hand, he didn't move.

495
00:42:08,600 --> 00:42:23,600
He was just frozen, looking at himself in a different uniform.

496
00:42:24,600 --> 00:42:30,600
I'm Ken Palmer. My name is Palmer.

497
00:42:31,600 --> 00:42:35,600
My first thought, of course, was that he's closely related.

498
00:42:36,600 --> 00:42:42,600
Look, my father is from Brownsville, Minnesota, just across from the cross Wisconsin. Do you know Brownsville?

499
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:45,600
No, I have no family there.

500
00:42:45,600 --> 00:42:56,600
We began to exchange our father's names, our grandfather's names, where we lived, things of this nature. And that didn't get it.

501
00:42:57,600 --> 00:42:59,600
My grandfather's from Brownsville.

502
00:42:59,600 --> 00:43:09,600
Surprisingly, the two men could not find a single relative in common. But when Ken began to recount an old family legend, he was stung by the stranger's response.

503
00:43:09,600 --> 00:43:13,600
My family often talks of this lost treasure in India.

504
00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:21,600
Two Palmer brothers were at a party in the court of St. James. They cut the cue off a court official.

505
00:43:21,600 --> 00:43:24,600
Yeah, that's right. They had to flee England. I mean, that's the story.

506
00:43:24,600 --> 00:43:34,600
Well, not alone did he know about it. He added details that I checked out with Dad later and they were accurate. Things that I didn't know.

507
00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:45,600
So it was perfectly obvious that we were related and yet we couldn't understand how we could be.

508
00:43:47,600 --> 00:43:49,600
This is my train. I've got to go.

509
00:43:49,600 --> 00:43:51,600
Look, do you have a pen?

510
00:43:53,600 --> 00:43:54,600
Yeah, I don't know.

511
00:43:54,600 --> 00:43:59,600
You write down your name and address. When I get back home, I'm going to contact you.

512
00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:05,600
This is good. This is good. Do.

513
00:44:05,600 --> 00:44:06,600
I will.

514
00:44:06,600 --> 00:44:10,600
I took his name and address, stuffed it in my pocket.

515
00:44:10,600 --> 00:44:15,600
I'll write it. Goodbye. Goodbye.

516
00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:19,600
I picked up my luggage and scooted off from my train.

517
00:44:20,600 --> 00:44:34,600
If I'd had the sense that God gave geese, I would have stopped right then and we would have spent some time together.

518
00:44:36,600 --> 00:44:45,600
When I got on the train and settled, I reached in my pocket to get that slip of paper. It wasn't there.

519
00:44:50,600 --> 00:44:55,600
It all fell apart at that moment. I was devastated.

520
00:44:57,600 --> 00:45:03,600
Ken Palmer never saw his double again and all attempts to find the man have been unsuccessful.

521
00:45:07,600 --> 00:45:10,600
These pictures of Ken Palmer were taken in the 1940s.

522
00:45:12,600 --> 00:45:17,600
The man he met at the train station so long ago was virtually identical.

523
00:45:19,600 --> 00:45:24,600
Like Ken, his last name was Palmer. His first name may have been Robert or James.

524
00:45:26,600 --> 00:45:30,600
Ken believes the man lived in the eastern United States, possibly New Jersey.

525
00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:38,600
At the time, Ken's double was either a technical or staff sergeant in the Army Air Corps.

526
00:45:41,600 --> 00:45:46,600
I would like very much to find him and or part of his family.

527
00:45:47,600 --> 00:45:58,600
Doug, how many times are you going to walk across the station and see that double out of all the people in the United States?

528
00:45:58,600 --> 00:46:04,600
Out of everybody that could happen?

529
00:46:04,600 --> 00:46:15,600
That split second timing when in this great crowd and all these people, we walk into one another and we set down our bags and stare at one another.

530
00:46:16,600 --> 00:46:18,600
Magical moment.

531
00:46:29,600 --> 00:46:37,600
Join me next Friday. Perhaps you hold the key. Perhaps you may be able to help solve a mystery.

532
00:47:16,600 --> 00:47:18,600
You