The Skeleton Key Chronicles

23 hours ago

On September 25th, 1981, a 58-year-old woman was walking a familiar trail in the Great Smoky Mountains with two friends when she suddenly picked up her pace, disappeared around a bend, and was never seen again. Her name was Thelma Pauline “Polly” Melton, and 45 years later, there are still some pretty puzzling details surrounding her disappearance.

Polly and her husband, Bob, spent their summers in an Airstream trailer near Bryson City, North Carolina. She knew the area well and had walked the Deep Creek Trail many times. That afternoon, she'd already started preparing spaghetti sauce for dinner before heading out with her friends, Trula Gudger and Pauline Cannon. Bob, who had health problems, stayed behind at the trailer.

As the three women walked along the trail, Polly suddenly began moving faster than usual. Her friends found this particularly surprising because Polly was a larger woman who generally walked at a slower pace. She continued ahead, rounded a bend, and disappeared from view. The women figured she'd simply gone back to the campground, but when they returned about half an hour later, Polly was nowhere to be found.

Search crews spent days combing the area, eventually bringing in more than 150 people and nine search dogs. One of the dogs showed interest near a fallen tree, although investigators were unable to determine whether the location had any connection to Polly's disappearance. She had left behind her purse, identification, money, and medication, and she was wearing ordinary walking shoes on a trail she knew extremely well.

There were also a couple of details that investigators found worth looking into. The day before she disappeared, Polly used the telephone at the senior nutrition center where she volunteered. According to her supervisor, using the telephone there was unusual for Polly, and investigators were never able to establish whom she'd called.

Then, in April 1982, a check made payable to Polly was cashed in Birmingham, Alabama. Investigators looked into the transaction, but it never established whether Polly had actually been there or who had cashed the check.

Bob's health took a serious turn that very same night, and he spent the remainder of his life in a nursing home. Her family continued looking for answers, and her father reportedly held out hope that she would return for the rest of his life.

September marked 45 years since Polly disappeared along the Deep Creek Trail, and her case has recently received renewed attention through anniversary coverage and a new podcast episode. To this day The National Park Service still lists her disappearance as an unresolved investigation.

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The Skeleton Key Chronicles

1 day ago

When 18-year-old Caleb Ray Diehl disappeared from Nocona, Texas, in March 2015, the pickup truck he had borrowed from longtime family friend Ricky Dale Howard turned up two days later inside Howard's locked shop. Caleb was nowhere to be found, the keys had been returned to their usual place, and investigators discovered something particularly curious inside the vehicle. Three hundred dollars in cash had been secured to the steering wheel with a zip tie.

Caleb had just celebrated his 18th birthday and was finishing high school. He'd known local businessman Ricky Dale Howard most of his life, and their families were close enough to vacation together. Caleb had worked odd jobs for Howard since middle school, so when his own vehicle needed repairs, Howard loaned him one of his pickup trucks. On March 30th, Caleb left his mother's house around 5 p.m., telling his sister he was going to see a friend. He never returned, and the friend later told his family they hadn't made plans to meet.

Two days later, Howard contacted Caleb's mother to say the borrowed pickup had turned up at his business. The shop had been locked, and according to Nocona's police chief, Howard was the only other person with access. Investigators also traced Caleb's final cellphone signal to Howard's property. Howard told police he'd found a damaged phone on the floor of his shop and thrown it away. He had also destroyed the SIM card from his own phone before investigators could examine it. A search of his property uncovered several burned computers in a fire pit.

As investigators looked into Howard's background, they found that concerns about his conduct involving young people went back years. During an unrelated federal investigation in 2001, five young men had accused him of misconduct dating to their teenage years. Those allegations added another dimension to the questions surrounding his relationship with Caleb, especially given how closely their families had been connected.

Then, in 2017, Caleb's mother discovered something that suggested her son may have been gathering information about Howard before his own disappearance. Tucked away in a bathroom cabinet were an alarm clock fitted with a concealed camera, handwritten polygraph questions, and a recording of Howard practicing those questions. Caleb's family came to believe he may have been collecting evidence concerning Howard's conduct toward him and possibly other young people.

The discovery gave investigators another reason to examine Howard's past. Forensic specialists eventually recovered photographs from computers connected to him, establishing that Howard had exploited Caleb when he was still a minor. In 2021, Howard pleaded guilty to a federal charge involving a child and received a 30-year sentence.

But even with that conviction, Caleb's disappearance remains unresolved. Howard has never been charged in connection with Caleb going missing, and investigators have never established what happened to him after he left his mother's house that March evening.

More than eleven years later, Caleb Ray Diehl is still missing. His family continues searching for answers about what happened to him, how Howard's pickup ended up back at his shop, and whether the materials discovered in 2017 might help explain the circumstances surrounding his disappearance.

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The Skeleton Key Chronicles

2 days ago

I'm finally getting around to checking out this new three-part documentary, which takes a closer look at Richard “Marc” Evonitz and two women who have joined forces to investigate his past and explore possible connections to other unsolved cases. What's particularly fascinating about their partnership is that one of these women was once married to Evonitz, while the other helped investigators uncover a side of him that his former wife never knew existed.

For anyone who prefers to go into a documentary without knowing much about the case, this is probably a good place to stop reading. Otherwise, here's a little background on the two women and how their stories eventually came together.

In June 2002, 15-year-old Kara Robinson found herself in a situation that would eventually help investigators solve several cases dating back to the 1990s. After spending approximately 18 hours with Evonitz, Kara managed to escape, bringing with her an extraordinary amount of information about him and his surroundings. She had paid attention to everything from the layout of his apartment to details about his belongings, and that information helped authorities identify him.

Investigators subsequently connected Evonitz to three young girls who had disappeared in Virginia during the 1990s. Sixteen-year-old Sofia Silva disappeared in September 1996, followed by sisters Kristin and Kati Lisk, ages 15 and 12, in May 1997. Evidence recovered during the investigation established Evonitz's connection to those cases, although he passed away before he could be brought to trial.

But there's another woman whose connection to Evonitz goes back even further. Bonnie Lou Gower married him in 1988, when she was just 17 years old. Their marriage lasted nearly a decade, and Bonnie was completely unaware of the history investigators would eventually uncover. In fact, Sofia Silva's disappearance occurred while they were still married, giving Bonnie a perspective on those years that few others could offer.

More than twenty years later, Bonnie began sharing her experiences online, where her story eventually caught Kara's attention. The two women connected and realized that, between them, they had information about Evonitz's history that might be useful in examining other unsolved cases.

Bonnie had firsthand knowledge of his travels, habits, and activities during their marriage, while Kara had spent years learning about the investigation that followed her escape. Together, they've begun revisiting old photographs, records, and timelines, looking for possible connections that may have been overlooked.

Their partnership is the focus of a new three-part documentary from Investigation Discovery that premiered October 7th and is also available through HBO Max. The series follows their efforts to retrace Evonitz's movements, speak with people connected to the original investigation, and examine whether other unresolved cases could be connected to him.

I'm particularly curious about the information Bonnie may be able to contribute from the years they were married. There are still questions about Evonitz's movements and activities, and the possibility that these two women could help fill in some of those gaps is what caught my attention in the first place.

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