Murder in a Parking Garage

[Music] So Lieutenant Lynn, tell me about, you know, getting the call that night and what did you get exactly as far as the call. The caller's information stated that this will be the parking garage where his the victim's phone was relocated. So this is the parking garage right here? This is the parking garage to my life, yes. And what level was the car park then? The car was parked on the second level. So like right about there? Yeah, it's right. You can kind of see it right behind these traffic lights essentially. So when I hindered the garage, I saw a black Honda Civic. I saw a body, a person sitting in the driver's city. At first I thought it was this person taking a nap, but because the position of their head I could see there's some discoloration around the neck area. So I decided to knock on the window, there was no response. So I radioed. He was likely deceased. So this is one of the Intel campus we have in the city. This is one of their several parking garages. They have surveillance cameras throughout the garages. I took a closer look and that's when I realized they were painted over. Like dripping paint, still like a drip. Do look like it was a spray paint. We locked down the garage and I request detect the response. He had been identified as Kenneth Fandridge and he was a contractor at Intel. Doing union pipe fitting. He looked like he had passed peacefully. His hands were placed in his lab. We thought that was strange, but are you operating as if this is a homicide possibly murder already? Oh, we always do. Yeah. That night we actually had a patrol officer in the Intel Command Center where they have all their hundreds of cameras. They kept texting me little clips. All of a sudden we have some random person we have no idea who it is that's going around spray painting about a half a dozen or so cameras in this parking garage. Look at him just coming around the corner like that. He's obviously in disguise. He's wearing a black mask covering most of his face, the safety glasses, and in the hard hat. So obviously he's trying to conceal his identity. He does a pretty good job of spray painting, really kind of obscuring enough of the camera. You see a lot of movement happening all of a sudden. Then you see a lot of lights. A lot of lights. What's going on in there during that when you see those lights flashing? That's when the person is murdering Kenneth. So it was really initially like this big who done it for us, a big mystery. I mean had you ever seen anything like that? Not in real life now. This was straight out of the movies. Not only moralist reports, murder in the parking garage. How would you two characterize this case when you first got it? What did you think? You know I just thought that it's a wild case. Detective Stephanie Winter and Devon Riego of the Hillsboro Oregon Police Department had never encountered a crime scene like the one they encountered in January 2023. It was in the evening after 9. So we all got a page on our department's cell phone saying that there was death at Intel? Intel, the giant tech company known for its innovative computer chips, had several large production facilities in Hillsboro, Oregon, outside Portland. It didn't make sense. There was minimal blood within the car. The deceased was Kenneth Kenny Fandrich, age 56, a contract pipe fitter at the plant. His wife, Tanya, had reported him missing when he was late getting home. Like many couples, they shared their locations on their phones. Tanya tracked him to the Intel parking lot. She was already there at the garage when police arrived with body cameras rolling. Four time later, she learned that her husband was dead. The Hillsboro Police mobile command post was stationed at the scene and that was where detectives first talked to Tanya. That night, you brought Tanya Fandrich right in here. What did she seem like to you? She was very monotone and the way she was speaking. Detective Diana Mesh was first to interview Tanya. She seemed very out of her body. She didn't react as much as you would think somebody would, but had to kind of pull a lot of the answers out of her. Detective Mesh learned more about why Tanya had been at the scene. They had some issues in the past with their marriage. Now, they would check in on each other more often. Do alarm bells sort of go off here? Yeah, there was some suspicion. We always look at the people closest to the disease. But Mesh knew better than to draw conclusions right away. Everybody griefs differently. It just was different than other victims I've seen. There was a lot to process for Tanya and investigators. The scene did not appear violent. His lunch bag, his lunch, his keys, his phone, all set neatly next to him in the passenger seat. My first thought was, how are we going to figure this out? Their first clues would come from those surveillance cameras. So, he will pop up right here next to that column that we're seeing right here in the corner. It's kind of way through your camera and then just pops up. The detectives discovered a man wearing a hard hat and red mirror tinted glasses had actually spray painted those cameras around 7am earlier that same day. His movements undetected by intel security. I want to say about six or seven cameras. But there were also cameras that had not been sprayed and investigators locked in on images of a vehicle they believed belong to the suspect. Looking at early afternoon now and then we see this marine van come in the parking garage and no front plate on the car. It was an older Maroon color Dodge van. They tracked the van's movements camera by camera before it disappeared under a layer of blue spray paint. Moments later they could just make out the van pulling into a parking spot. So, right here you can see that the van is this shadow right in here. Okay, right. And then this vehicle right here is actually Kenneth Van der Ches Black Honda Civic. It was 3.21pm. Just after Kenny had finished his shift, here he is on video walking back through the garage. And then very hard to see behind the blue spray paint. You can see a little bit of movement right here in the thing and that is Kenneth walking back to his car. You just kind of have to watch the kind of shadows essentially what's going on between the two vehicles. You start seeing the headlights flash a couple times like you know somebody be unlocking their car. Detectives say the headlights on Kenny's Honda flashed as he unlocked his car with his key fob. That's when they believe the masked man grabbed Fandrich still holding on to his keys. Then you see a lot of light. A lot of light. Detectives say that's Kenny desperately pushing his key fob as the masked man dragged him into that maroon van. What do you think that's what's going on in there during that when you see those lights flashing? We think that's when the person in the van is murdering Kenneth. Detectives say Kenny was killed inside that maroon dodge van before the killer staged Kenny's body in his black Honda. That meant the van itself would be a critical piece of evidence. The actual murder scene. There could have been clothing and she knows what else in that minivan. But finding the van would be a challenge. they couldn't see the license plate. flights or the driver. The results of the autopsy would reveal Kenny Fandrich had died from blunt and compressive trauma of his neck. His neck had been broken. But who would want to kill Kenny Fandrich? It was really initially like this big who'd done it for us, a big mystery. A mystery they hope might be solved when Intel security staff told investigators about another incident, additional video images from the garage recorded a month earlier. We learned that, hey, about a month prior, we reported our cameras being spray-painted as well. That incident was investigated, a criminal mischief call. But they never figured out who it was. It was a man dressed in a charge of the helmet, black glasses, a mask, and to like, well, that's a clue. Investigators were 100% certain it was the same person wearing different glasses. And they say these new images revealed an unusual clue. We had this distinctive forehead crease that we could see in this photo. That little bit of forehead that you see. Just a little bit of forehead. That's what we got. It's a very odd clue right there. It is. But for us, it was a big, a big deal. And the detectives had one other big deal. Something Tanya Fandrich had told them the night her husband died, a stalker who had been harassing her husband, and she had proof, a video from their own home security camera. I just see the person kind of crawl and move around a bit underneath the trailer right there. So this is the car port at the Fandrich's house out in Oregon City. In the early hours of the investigation into the murder of Kenny Fandrich, his wife Tanya told detectives her husband had a stalker, seen here on the couple's home security cameras in their car port. Here's some sort of utility trailer right here. And you'll notice right under the trailer, you actually see the person kind of crawl and move around a bit underneath the trailer right there. Tanya told detectives the stalker was her old boss, Stephen Milner. Dr. Stephen Milner was a well-to-do veterinarian, worth millions. She had worked with him in his clinic as a vet tech. You ready for your close-up doggy? Huh? I'm Miley. You ready? Crazy dogs. So Dr. Milner was how you two met, right? Yes. Yes. Friends, Cheryl Cokett and Darlin Robinson were longtime clients of the vet. What was he like? He was a vet. He was wonderful. He was very compassionate, caring, kind. He was a great vet. Cheryl even took part in a video Dr. Milner made for his clinic, which had aired on the local news. Hi, Cheryl. Hi, Dr. Milner. Hi, Princess. If I can do an alternative thing that doesn't require medication, you know, drugs and chemicals, that's really nice. She's a happy girl. It's the kind of vet that gets down at the level of the dog like on the floor with them. Yeah. On the floor. And both Cheryl and Darlin knew Tanya, at least by sight. She was there for I think 19 years and she was the one who would come out and get us to take us back to the room and kind of do the intake on the animals. Just a sweet, nice lady, very, you know, kind of quiet, but super friendly and very caring. We've soon learned about a complicated relationship between Tanya and Dr. Milner. Tanya told investigators she and Dr. Milner had once had an affair. It began in early 2017. At the time, Milner was separated. And Tanya said her relationship with Kenny hit a rough patch. Did you notice any interactions between her and Dr. Milner? It was completely professional. He comes in, she goes out of the room. He was the boss. Oh, yeah. But Darlin thought she noticed something. There came a point where my brain just kind of went, I wonder if there's, you know, something going on because just looks they would give each other. Milner and Tanya tried to keep the affair quiet, say investigators. Dr. Milner even gave her a secret name, Kiki. One of the nicknames was Kiki Essex. Prosecutor Mahaley Streeblow worked on the case. It's one of those that's like, you know, the name of your first pet and then the street that you grew up on. But the couples affair was exposed after a few months. In July 2017, when they attended a wedding together, prosecutor John Gerhard. There were employees from the veterinary clinic that were there. She was under the impression that Kenneth was out of town for work. Tanya indicated that they had both been drinking and that they were engaging in more physical intimacy in front of the employees during that wedding. As the night ended, Tanya went home with Dr. Milner. One whole Kenneth was not out of town for work. And Tanya didn't return home that night. Kenny went to Milner's house and that's how they got caught. Kenny didn't confront or make a big scene at the house. He kind of left the house and then started calling to try to figure out what's going on. According to Tanya, she ended the affair soon after they were caught. After that, the relationship with Tanya and Steve Milner kind of stopped. And that's when Kenny said Dr. Milner started harassing him. When Kenny came to me, he was terrified. Michael Fuller was Kenny's attorney. The stalking issue had basically consumed his life. Fuller says Milner started with harassing calls, then escalated from there. Milner literally coming onto his property in the middle of the night, following him to work, threatening him, most type of things. Tanya eventually left Milner's clinic. But Milner continued to track Kenny. Detectives found plenty of evidence of exactly how he did it. Tanya actually provided this to us and this is one of the actual tracking devices that Steve and Milner had placed on one of their vehicles. Is this the device? So this is the device. I believe this to be the battery pack and what they had done and put it in this case with the magnets and then put it up underneath their vehicle. In August 2019, roughly two years after Tanya said she ended the affair. Kenny applied for an order of protection against Milner. But detectives would learn, the harassment continued. And the vets infatuation with Tanya deepened. He wanted Tanya and he wasn't going to stop. Within days of Kenny Fadrich's death, investigators set their sights on a suspect, veterinarian Dr. Stephen Milner. Detectives learned he was obsessed with Tanya. There were love notes. So one of them was the one absolute rock solid truth is that I love you. I have never loved anyone that way. I am consumed by your soul. He wrote letters like that for years. Even after Tanya had said the affair was over. Detectives also learned more about Tanya's relationship with her husband Kenny. It was a tumultuous relationship, alcohol came into play between them. They were often, as you can say, hot and cold. They argued a lot. Kenny had been charged with domestic violence years before. But the charges were not pursued and the couple reconciled. Then in August 2021, years after Tanya says she ended the affair with Milner. The couple had another fight. This time, she was arrested. The next day, something surprising happened. Somebody posted her bail. She had $25,000 bail. When she leaves the jail, Stephen Milner is in the parking lot waiting for her. Tanya told investigators she ended up staying with the doctor for a couple of days before returning to Kenny. She insisted nothing romantic happened. Milner was just helping her out as a friend. To this day, none of us can figure out how Stephen Milner actually found out she had been arrested that night. That case was later dismissed and the couple reunited again. But Milner's campaign of harassment continued. What do you think his end goal was? What did he think he could do and their marriage and then end up happily ever after was Tonya? Exactly. Exactly. We think that that's what his plan was. He wanted Kenneth out of the picture, so he could be that white knight to save Tonya. In March of 2022, just 10 months before Kenny's murder, Milner followed Kenny from Oregon City all the way to Hillsboro, a 45 minute drive. Kenny spotted him and called the police and Milner was pulled over as body cameras captured the interaction. "Hi, I'm Sir Edward, so's the police. Do you know why we're stopping you today? Yeah, I'm trying to get hold of this guy that's following him." The responding officer learned from dispatch that there was history between the two men. "What's your role in the whole thing?" "She's been a friend of mine for 20 years." Milner told police he believed Tonya was in danger because she had allegedly told him Kenny was abusive. "I'm the only person who gives a f*** and I'm not a lot of good f***." "So, here's my advice to you. Okay, this is very, very strong advice. Leave them alone. He wants nothing to do with you. She wants nothing to do with you. If you show up at their house, if you contact them, anything like that, you're going to go to jail. Thank you." After that traffic stop, Kenny filed for a new order for protection. The original one had expired years earlier. "Kenny was absolutely in fear of his life." And two weeks later, he was so stressed out, he told police he crashed his car. "My wife and I have been fighting today. Sorry. I thought she was at her boss's house where I've caught her chin, you know what I'm saying? Sorry. And I was driving over there. He's just like right down the road and I lost control of my car. Kenny's attorney says his client had every reason to be stressed out. Kenny told me that, Milner said, "Hey, I'm a veterinarian. I've done surgeries and I have the tools to chop you up into little pieces." In August of 2022, after Kenny found another tracking device under his car, Milner was criminally charged and was awaiting trial. "It was pretty clear to me that Milner was not in his right mind." Just a month later, Kenny filed a civil suit, seeking hundreds of thousands of dollars for invasion of privacy and inflection of emotional distress, allegedly brought on by Milner stalking harassment and trespass. Five months later, Kenny Fandrich was dead. Just days after the murder, detectives were convinced that Stephen Milner was that man behind the mask, but they needed more evidence. "We need to get eyes on Stephen Milner because we know there was some sort of violent confrontation. We want to see if he had any injuries." Not wanting to tip him off, investigators asked him to come in for a check-in about the stalking case. "We arranged a meeting for Stephen to come in to sign some paperwork. Detective Winter was inside of a reception desk." "And your goal, sitting there at the receptionist desk, sort of, is an undercover, right?" "I wanted to see if he had any injury to himself. He walks in, he looks extremely nervous." Another person in the office noticed something. She says, "Hey, he's got makeup on his face." "Makeup investigators say Milner used to cover up a scratch on his nose." "Bingo, you're thinking we got our guy?" "Yep, at that point, I thought this is him, this is our guy that did this." And it's later, after Milner walked out the door. "Hi sir, I'm Debbie Davis, the sheriff's office. We're being recorded about my camera, so everything's going to be out there. Have you recorded you understand that?" "Yes." "Okay, sounds good. Right now you're being detained." On January 31st, 2023, four days after Kenny Fandrich was found dead, Stephen Milner was taken into custody. And within days, charged with second-degree murder and stalking. With Milner in custody, detectives Rigo and Winter were quickly able to connect one important clue from those surveillance camera images. That unusual crease in the masked man's forehead. There's that very prominent forehead crease that he couldn't hide if he tried. There's no amount of makeup hiding that crease. "Do you feel at this point? You've got a pretty solid case?" "We had a lot of circumstances like putting the puzzle together, but we were just at the tip of the iceberg of what we still need to find out." More puzzle pieces would be found in Milner's house. Drink up, baby. Fantasy Football Happy Hours here to get you wins and have some laughs. Matthew Barry here and my podcast, Fantasy Football Happy Hour, has the sleepers bust and start sit advice you need to win your league. We're diving into the tape, we're crunching the numbers to bring you sleepers. Bust weekly start sit advice, whether you're defending a title or desperately avoiding last place, I've got you covered every single weekday. The bar is open. It's Fantasy Football Happy Hour with Matthew Barry, wherever you get your podcasts. It was shocking that somebody this successful, a doctor, now suspect in a murder. With Dr. Stephen Milner now in police custody, Hillsboro Detective Stephanie Winter and Devin Rigo set out to find evidence that could prove Milner was at the scene when Kenny Fandrich was murdered. "As soon as he's arrested, we're getting search warrants for his DNA to be taken. We're getting search warrants for his house as well." And detectives weren't quite prepared for what they found at his home. We found a cardboard cut out behind a mirror of Stephen Milner's face placed on a very oiled masculine man with a dog paw tattoo over his heart. Very odd memorabilia to have in your bedroom. Yes. I would say so. And there was more. In the night stand in Stephen's Master Bedroom is a bunch of items that we kind of refer to as a shrine to Tanya. There was a framed picture of Tanya. There were love notes, there were women's underwear, just like very like personal keepsakes from their relationship together. "That's more than just collecting a few love notes and cards." "Especially from someone who hadn't been in a relationship with you for several years at this time period." To build their case, investigators needed to connect the maroon-colored minivan. Seen in the Intel parking garage, parked next to Kenny's car, to Milner. But as far as investigators could determine, "Right now you're in to 10." Milner usually drove the white Toyota SUV he'd been in when he was arrested. Initially we didn't know what evidence this car could provide us. So they ordered an FBI forensic analysis of the SUV's computer, hoping it might provide some clues about Milner's movements before and after Kenny's murder. So essentially the computer that's in the car retains a lot of information. And luckily one of those things is like GPS data points. Where was that bit of information? Is that a computer that's pulled out on top of you? Yeah, so that's part of the front dash and then it was just a little motherboard type thing that had a chip in it. Within weeks they got a call from their digital expert. She said you guys need to look at the Home Depot in Oregon City. He's there a lot the day of the murder. Home Depot just 15 minutes down the road from Milner's house. How central did this place become towards a piecing together the evidence that you had? Like this was essentially like center stage of the investigation. The detectives asked Home Depot security personnel if there had been suspicious activity in the lot recently. Amazingly they said yes. Two cars, a maroon minivan and a blue sedan had been flagged for parking there for long periods of time with only temporary paper license plates. And we learned that there had been a lot of calls created in the past couple months with a suspicious blue car and a marine minivan. For the second time in a matter of weeks parking lot security cameras and the images they recorded would provide investigators with key clues. In this clip from January 27th, 2023, the day of Kenny's murder, detective say you can see Milner's white SUV pull up and park. Within minutes, the driver, believed to be Stephen Milner, gets into the Maroon minivan. Another camera then captured the minivan, exiting the parking lot. What was he doing with the cars? So essentially, this was like his staging location. So he would drive his personal car here, and then either pick up the blue sedan or the Roon minivan and then drive that out to Hillsboro. What do you call them? Burner cars. Burner cars. We are everybody kind of more familiar with a burner phone, where you have a phone that's not of trace to you, but you can use it for what you need, get rid of it. So essentially, he did the same thing, but with a car. Investigators believed Milner may have been using those burner cars to secretly follow Kenny to work, even after law enforcement had told him to stop. You're very close to going to jail today for stocking, okay? Like very, very close. They also learned Home Depot security cameras had images of the driver of those cars shopping in the store about a month before Kenny was murdered. He parked right in front of Home Depot. He went in and then we saw him come to the self checkout area and he had bought a pair of like safety glasses. Was his face visible in that surveillance? - It was. - Oh, yeah, yeah. There was no doubt it was Stephen Milner. And those glasses he bought, detectives say you can see them in his right hand as he exited the store. The receipt said they had a red mirror tint. Detective Winter had an idea. We just happened to be sitting near one of the aisles and I was like, I'm going to go see where they sell the glasses. And then a couple boxes down was a yellow hard hat that looked very similar to the one that he was wearing in all of the intel grudge surveillance. The detectives were convinced this was where Milner had gotten his disguise to kill Kenny. You have all of this, but you were missing one big piece of evidence. What was it? We were at this point still missing a maroon minivan. Why is the minivan so important? Because it's the minivan that we believe was really our main crime scene. We thought there was going to be forensic evidence in that minivan. So we really wanted to get that minivan to help really put the icing on this case. Detective Rigo was laser focused on tracking down that maroon minivan. And he got an incredibly lucky break. When those suspicious burner cars had been flagged, the VIN number was also recorded. Rigo searched it and found out that VIN had been found abandoned just a few days after the murder. The highway people had towed it off the side of the I-5 in North Portland. It had been dumped. It had been dumped there. So I called the tow company, hey, do you have this car? No, sorry. We sold it to a scrap metal company. Detective Rigo knew the clock was ticking to retrieve what he believed was the crime scene and all of the key evidence it held. So mean another detective drive as quick as we can to North Portland. But they were too late. When he asked about the minivan, the scrapyard showed Rigo this video. This is that maroon minivan police believe Milner drove to the Intel garage to kill Kenny. Just moments before it was pulverized by the metal jaws of the scrapyard claw. I was able to watch one of my key pieces of evidence be crushed and taken away. Before your very eyes-- Before my very eyes. Exactly a week too late. [MUSIC PLAYING] On January 13, 2025, Stephen Milner went on trial, charged with stalking and murdering Kenny Fandrich. Washington County prosecutors, John Gerhardt and Myheli Streblo knew they faced a challenge without that maroon minivan, where they believed Stephen Milner murdered Kenny. All the evidence that was inside the van was lost with it. The biggest disappointment for us is there was likely a lot of forensic evidence. But prosecutors had some forensic evidence. They said put Stephen Milner at the scene. DNA from swabs taken of Kenny Fandrich's hands. I remember getting an email of the results and immediately opening it and being like, oh my gosh, this is it. Stephen Milner's DNA was on Kenneth Fandrich's hands. Now you really felt like you had your case made? Yes, because there's no way he could explain the way why his DNA would have been on Kenneth's body. Stephen Milner would have an explanation for that. To everyone's surprise, Milner took the stand. Admitting he did spray paint the cameras and was in the Intel garage waiting for Kenny, he presented what detectives believed was a far-fetched explanation. He was trying to save Tanya. There were no cameras in court, but there is audio of Milner telling prosecutor John Gerhard why he was in the Intel lot that day. I was trying to get him arrested for driving while I was drunk or driving with a license. Why was he a warm response to the leak? To the worse or the traffic ones? I was trying to keep Tanya from getting killed. He had this delusional belief that he needed to protect Tanya Fandridge. The defense case seemed to kind of get the jury to maybe feel sympathetic to Milner. And Milner insisted it was Kenny who attacked him. After Kenny spotted Stephen Milner inside the Marin Minivan. Stephen essentially said, well, I knew I was caught so I opened the door to kind of confront him and then kind of attacked me. Basically fought for a little bit. There was pushing and shoving. Eventually I was able to kind of push him up against the car and then shoving him into the car. Prosecutor John Gerhard challenged Milner's self-defense story. Is that push that causes him to fall into a seat? He hit up against the car and then kind of tripped at the same time and I kept pushing him. His testimony just didn't line up with the physical evidence at the scene. To my knowledge, bumping your head on the car door is not going to break your neck. After six hours of deliberations, the jury found Stephen Milner guilty of murdering Kenny Fandridge and multiple stalking charges. [VIDEO PLAYBACK] [VIDEO PLAYBACK] Cameras were allowed for Stephen Milner's sentencing hearing, which took place on February 18, 2025. [VIDEO PLAYBACK] [VIDEO PLAYBACK] Tanya, who asked not to be shown on camera, gave a powerful statement directed at Stephen Milner. Prosecutor Mahaley Streeblow read us her words. All you had to do was stop. Hear me clearly when I say, you are vengeful, deceptive, manipulating, self-serving, aggressive, heat-full, line predator. And all you had to do was stop. Stephen Milner was sentenced to life in prison with a possibility of parole after 25 years. Milner did not respond to our request for an interview. This case highlights the very worst case scenario takes stalking seriously. Kenny's attorney, Michael Fuller, says what happened highlights the limits of the system that is supposed to protect victims of stalking. Kenny called the police. When that didn't work, he got a lawyer. Kenny did everything he could under the legal system, and it didn't help him at all. After Kenny's death, Fuller filed a wrongful death suit on behalf of Kenny's estate, asking for damages of several million dollars. Fuller believes Milner made millions from real estate investments and the sale of his business. In the wrongful death case, my goals are to extract as much money as we can out of Milner. If the estate recovered any money for Kenny, it would go to his wife. For Milner's former veterinary clients, Cheryl and Darlin, it was hard to reconcile the doctor they knew with a now convicted murderer. - I could not believe that it was the same guy. I just believe that he ended up going through some type of psychosis. And I think that at some point, he snapped. - I think it really gets down to like, you never know what anybody is capable of. You never know what monster might be inside. - Almost a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde situation. - Absolutely. - He had everything to live for. You know, he could do anything he wanted to do. And this is where it ended up. It's real sad. - In November 2025, a $1.2 million settlement was reached between Steven Milner and the estate of Kenny Vandridge. - Paramount plus is your streaming home for another unbelievable season of the NFL on CBS. - And here he goes. - Every Sunday. - Touchdown. - The most anticipated games. - Amar going deep. - Oh, what a catch. - Football's biggest stars. - That's old fashioned Josh Allen football. - And all the unforgettable moments. - There it is. - This is history. - Sign up for Paramount Plus today. Instream the NFL on CBS all season long. - See you Sunday.