320. The Masked Killer - The Murder of Kenneth Fandrich

All right, you guys, we're getting into an ad and it is Shopify. So I'm going to let Garrett take this one away. Big fan of Shopify. Love Shopify. If you are looking into starting a business, if you have a business, if you love business, you need to check out Shopify. I love Shopify. If you're selling anything online, you need to be using Shopify. They're amazing. Honestly, no matter what size you are, they're absolutely amazing. Some of the biggest brands in the world are using them because they're easy to use and they have every single feature you could need. They have a big one that we all know, ShopPay. I mean, the easiest checkout on the market that is literally draining my bank account, ShopPay. And of course, they work with Shopify. I just love how intuitive it is. Like if there's something you want to sell online, you can go into Shopify and you can figure it out within minutes. It is so intuitive. If you're ready to hear the of your first sell today, head over to Shopify.com slash husband to start your free trial today. Again, you guys. If you've ever just wanted to sell anything big, small, any company out there that is selling something, head over to Shopify.com slash husband and check it out. That's right. Start your free trial at Shopify.com slash husband, Shopify.com slash husband. Hey, I've got the campaign brief ready, built from last quarter's data and the competitive landscape. Approved. Oh, agents, where would we be without you? Somewhere with a lot more tabs open. Create your first Monday agent in minutes at monday.com. You're listening to an Ono Media podcast. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the podcast. This is Murder With My Husband. I'm Peyton Moreland. And I'm Garrett Moreland. And he's the husband. And I'm the husband. Happy Monday. Welcome back. Glad to be here. Thank you for watching. Thank you for listening. Thank you for supporting us. Thank you for your five-star review. Thank you for being great, honestly. Yeah, I have a couple things I want to go over. So, no announcements, right? Any announcements? No. If you're watching on Netflix, I apologize for my appearance. Babe, Peyton looks great. No, Peyton looks great. I just woke up, okay? You look great, babe. You do. Thank you. Go ahead. What do you got to say? If you guys want to hear some good rants, keep listening. If you don't and you're like, Garrett's really annoying. I hate the husband. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Then you can fast forward a few minutes. Okay, if you haven't fast forwarded, what? I'm pretty sure like our last couple of episodes, you've been in your work uniform. I'm sure I have. Look at the flower on his pants from bagels. I have been working from 4 a.m. to like 6 p.m. every single day. My head's going to explode, but I'm here. Okay, go ahead. Because I love to cram. Oh. What? No, you don't. Okay, I have a couple rants. A couple hot takes, a couple rants. So, if you're ready for this, let's get into it. Number one. Okay, I'm going to prefer. I'm going to prefer this with, I am from the West Coast. I grew up on the West Coast. Okay? Number one, the West Coast is very soft compared to the East Coast. I think that like Southern hospitality, we kind of have it, but it's just like. We are. Look, and I'm just going to, the only reason I say this is because if you're sick of the bagel shop, just give me a second. I won't, there's other stuff I'm going to talk about, but we get some customers that get. I guess, okay, like we're a bagel shop, but we're trying to get people in and out fast. We're trying to make good bagels. We're trying, obviously not to be mean to people, but we're just like, Hey, what can get for your order? Awesome. Thank you so much. We'll call your name in a second. Right? I don't know how many people have ever been to the East Coast and gotten bagels in like New York, Boston, just anywhere. I'll just say New York, because I feel like that's a good starting point. You go, you go in a bagel shop. What do you want? Cool. Bye. Like it's very. Very boom, boom, boom, boom. And you're waiting a second, depending on what bagel shop it is. I've been to a lot of bagel shops in New York. Anyways, all I'm saying is that the West Coast is a little soft and that's okay, but it seems like we, I'll use we because I'm included, expect a lot more hospitality and have a lot more entitlement when it comes to walking into establishments, which is totally fine. That's okay. But people in the East Coast are just like, give me my food. Done. You know what I'm saying? I, you're saying it's totally fine. And I think it's okay to like, want to chat and stuff. I think that wanting to be talkative and, and, you know, have that hospitality is fine. I think what's not fine is not having an understanding that like the food industry is hard. Is insane. It's, it's, I didn't know until I started working into it. Okay. So I'm sure I'm at fault for this. It is the craziest industry. See, I worked at a movie theater growing up when I was young and yeah, equal. No, I just feel like it sucks to get yelled at. Yeah. It sucks to get yelled at when like, you're just trying to do your job. We're just trying our best. And we had 130 customers in 50 minutes today. And it was insane. That's like a customer every 30 seconds that we're trying to get bagels to. And it was just crazy. And I'm sure there's probably a couple people maybe that felt like we were being rude. I don't know. I'm sorry. We're just, we're trying our hardest. We're trying to get people their food fast. They're not waiting. And I think between the loudness and waiting sometimes 10 minutes for your bagels, which we try not to obviously, but sometimes we run out and we bake them fresh. I think people just get offended and they're like bad customer service. And you know what? I don't have to tell you, sorry. Okay. I do think it's just the speed at which you guys try to move people in and out. But that's my thing. I'm like, well, when a line is wrapped around the corner. When there's like 80 people and it's wrapped around the corner, we're just trying to move. You got to move them in and out. You don't want to wait in line for 50 minutes. And so anyways, it's been crazy. Thank you for supporting. If you've come. It's a good problem. Also, I'm sorry to those. Someone tried to take a picture with me the other day and I was in the ovens because it was just absolutely crazy. And I think they ended up leaving. And. I'm sorry. Come back. I'll take a picture. Today was just the craziest it's been since we opened. I'm rambling. I'm exhausted. But thank you for coming. And we're going to keep making bagels. And we hope it's a great experience for everyone who comes because obviously that's the goal. We want it to be a good experience. We want you to get great bagels. We want it to be fun in there. If it's not fun in there, it's probably because there's so many people right now. But I mean, I've worked two Saturdays and I've had a ball. It is fun. It just gets insane. I get to. It is like very fast moving. It's very fast moving. It can get loud in there. But if you're OK, just kind of relax and just. Enjoying the vibe. Enjoying the vibe. Not being stressed. It's amazing. I promise. I get to talk to people. I take pictures with people and it's still like moving pretty fast. I think it's just when people are in a hurry, then that's when it can get frustrating. And I get that, too. I mean, there's validity to not wanting to wait 10 minutes for a bagel. But usually most people don't. Most people. We're like, we try to go like two to four minutes. Well, it's also like, you know, there's other bagel shops that have frozen bagels so they can pop them in the toaster real quick. I mean, don't do frozen bagels. Yeah. And so ours have to like boil and go in the oven. Yeah, it's crazy. I mean, we also have got to meet a lot of listeners coming into the bagel shop and it's always been just like an amazing, fun experience. So thank you to those who have come in and supported and that we've got to meet. It has been like unreal and always such a fun experience with you. Guys, she's right. Thank you for helping us. Thank you for watching and supporting another. It's not really a hot take. I don't think. But another something else I want to say, I think pizza is the best food in the world. Like I truly besides bagels, I truly think I could eat pizza every day for the rest of my life. I think I was born in the wrong state. It does sound like you were probably. I think I should have grown up in New York. All I love is pizza and bagels. And fast. And just in and out. In fast moving craziness. Like I thrive off of it. Yeah. Anyways, if you are from New York or you live in New York, I think I was supposed to be born in New York, but I'm not. I was born in California. So opposite ends of the earth. I think they messed up. I think they flip flopped on accident. You know, your family's very fast moving, though. So it's not that shocking that you're similar. That's true. I'm wired because I'm so tired. So let's go. Get into this week's case. Our sources for this episode are cbsnews.com, mirror.co.uk, kptv.com, medium.com, organlife.com, sackbee.com, coin.com, moviedelic.com, people.com, holmansfuneralservice.com, washingtoncountyda.org, and wweek.com. We're all human. We all make mistakes from time to time. Some of them might be bigger than others, but mistakes can also be character building. It's. We learn and grow, especially when we take ownership and accountability for those mistakes and we accept the challenge to do better, learn from it, just be better in the future. Can those mistakes still have a profound impact on us and they keep us up at night? Sure. But sometimes it's not even the mistake itself that haunts us. It's who we made those mistakes with. And today I want you to meet 56 year old. Kenneth Kenny Fandrich. Well, we're going to call him Kenny, who in 2023, so a little more recently, is living with his wife of 30 years, Tanya Fandrich, just outside of Portland, Oregon. Now, Kenny had spent much of his life in Oregon. He was born in 1967 and grew up in what was described as a loving household with his parents and two brothers. Now, everyone said that Kenny had an incredible sense of humor, but also had this really kind and gentle nature about him. This is something that showed from a young age. He loved animals, but Kenny also had some skills and qualities that a lot of other people don't. He had this unique desire for adventure. So after graduating from high school, Kenny moved to Alaska, where he got his diving certification and began working as an underwater welder. Oh, I've heard so much about underwater welders, and I'm sure you guys all have too. It's like a popular. It's pretty amazing, honestly. He worked on commercial fishing boats as an underwater welder. They make good money. Which I do, again, think this does explain someone very well. It was an incredibly difficult job, not just because of the skills needed to do it, but Kenny was braving freezing cold temperatures in those Alaskan waters. He was also braving freezing cold temperatures in those Alaskan waters to get the job done. But being outdoors was Kenny's calling. He loved anything that connected him more with nature, whether that was fishing, skiing, snowboarding, hunting, or even just sitting out by the fire on a cold night next to his pets, which this is important to get to know Kenny. He fostered and adopted a lot of pets. He had six dogs at one point, but then life in Alaska brought Kenny another unexpected surprise. It was where a friend introduced him to Tanya, his eventual wife. She worked at his local bank in Dutch Harbor. For their first date, they met up in Tanya's hometown for ice cream, over a thousand miles away in Anchorage, Alaska. Now, the two bonded over how much they loved animals and the great outdoors. And after that, the rest was history, okay? Kenny and Tanya fell in love, and they got married in 19. 1993. And then three years later, in 1996, that was when the couple decided to pick up and move back to Kenny's home state of Oregon. Now, the plan was for Kenny to move home and start a piping business with his father. So the couple bought a house along the Willamette River. This is about 12 miles south of Portland. Now, they never had kids, but out in the country, they were just raising their dogs, two cats, a pair of goats, and even for a brief period, a baby raccoon. Now, Tanya, she got a job working at a local veterinarian's office, and Kenny built his business and eventually joined the union as more and more work came in. And this is kind of how things carried on for the next 27 years for this couple. And by 2023, Kenny was working on a giant project for Intel. Now, Kenny was installing the piping that kept the heavy machinery cool. So it was a long contract that he had been committed to for some time. And by then, he'd built a solid reputation as being reliable and hardworking. Now, on the morning of January 27th, 2023, Kenny took off for another day on the job, and he spent the day toiling away. And since it was a Friday, he was probably looking forward to the weekend, a few days of rest back home with his wife and their animals. Now, that afternoon, he clocked out a little after 3 p.m. He grabbed his things and headed back for his Honda Civic in the parking lot. A few security cameras actually catch work and walking to his car around 3 21 p.m but then a few hours passed and kenny still hadn't made it home from work and that was when tanya began to worry now tanya had tried to call kenny a few times that day with no answer she was really starting to think something was wrong her first instinct was to track kenny on her find my app and as soon as she did she saw kenny was still at work and remember this is a very large site that he is working at so she notices his dot is particularly in the parking garage of this work site and when she realized that his dot hadn't moved for quite a while tanya contacted the hillsborough police and asked them to do a well-informed search for kenny and she was able to do so and she was able to do so in a very and at the same time she began making the drive over to the intel campus herself now by the time police get there it's about 9 p.m and when police arrived at the second level of the parking structure just like tanya had said you know i'm tracking my husband his dot hasn't moved can you please meet me there they found kenny's black honda civics still parked in its parking spot and when they walk up to the car they see someone slumped over in the driver's seat now at first the detectives are like oh you know her husband's probably just taking a nap probably just passed out forgot to call his wife his lunch bag his keys his phone are all sitting in the seat next to him the passenger seat but as police get closer and they knock on the window trying to wake him up they realize there is some discoloration around his neck and they think his head is sort of torn twisted at an angle and his hands are kind of folded weirdly in his lap okay and he's not waking up to them knocking on the window so instead of opening the car door right then and there they call for backup and the backup arrived around the same time as tanya did and if you're like why didn't she just drive over her over there herself it might be because as it seems like she didn't even arrive until the backup arrived so she was probably farther away from the campus than police were yeah she was worried so she wanted them to get there faster now once backup arrives they examine the vehicle and they get the door open uh to examine her husband having to see that yeah horrible and they determined that kenny was actually dead in his driver's seat all right we're gonna take a look at some of the footage from the video that we just saw so if you want to take a look at some of the footage from the video that we just saw i'm gonna take a look at some of the footage sometimes i like it sometimes i don't something i've been a big fan of for a long time is hungry root oh me and hungry root we're in a long-term relationship love hungry root i love honestly i think the thing one of the things i love most about hungry root is seeing what snacks come my favorite snack is that i want that is that i can like pick a recipe and then just click like add and it just puts in everything that i need i can take it out if i already have it at home it just makes shopping so much easier and honestly that impressed me initially but it's also why i've stayed with it it just makes everything easy not to mention they you know screen out over 200 additives all of their meat and seafood is high quality with no hormones or antibiotics you're going to love hungry root as much as we do for a limited time get 40 off your first order plus get a free item in every box for life you guys did you hear that you get money off and a free item if you use our code go to hungryroot.com slash husband and use code husband if you haven't checked it out just just go browse around that's hungryroot.com slash husband code husband to get 40 off your first box and a free item of your choice for life all right you guys we are getting into an ad and i want you to think about how wild it is that we work and then wait then get paid like that's the deal we accepted meanwhile you can literally get anything else instantly earning has been changing that though for over a decade you can get up to 150 a day of money you've already earned up to a thousand dollars between paychecks tips are optional and standard transfers take one to two business days with no mandatory fees expedited transfers start at 399 and cap at 599 5 million people have already made the switch again like peyton and i said would have loved something like this i mean it's pretty crazy i'm not gonna we have something that like this world is pretty instant access we can get food delivered we can get things next day shipping but then but we all wait for our paycheck we just end up waiting for our paychecks that we like genuinely work hard for and peyton and garrett podcast oh yeah but that is where earning comes in they really make it way better download earning on the app store or google play spelled like earning money without the g type in murder with my husband or podcast when you sign up it'll really help you out and i'll see you in the next video bye bye help the show earning is a financial technology company not a bank access limits are based on your earnings and risk factors standard cash outs take one or two business days with no mandatory fees now of course tanya his wife of over 30 years was absolutely devastated but the question now was what had happened to him there was no blood inside kenny's car and to be fair he's a pretty big tough guy he was like six feet tall 195 pounds so police are like this solo man is leaving work and gets attacked and killed in his car which was why the police's first instinct was actually to see if he died of natural causes in the car was this a heart attack now the following day detectives had the results of kenny's autopsy and the results were actually way more shocking it appeared kenny was a victim of foul play after all the coroner wrote that he had died from quote blunt compression trauma to his neck blunt compression is that just strangulation yeah okay but it's a little bit more extreme his neck had been broken with so much force that it severed his spine there was extreme pressure on his neck which meant obviously this was not a natural death the man on the neck that they had originally seen was real kenny was attacked violently at his place of work investigators they obviously begin looking for clues around the crime scene one of the first things they do is examine that cctv footage that i told you existed around the parking garage now it turns out earlier that day at 7 a.m something unusual was happening around the parking deck a man with a hard hat a mask and a mask and a mask and a mask and a mask and these red tinted sunglasses was seen walking around spray painting the security cameras he did this to about six to eight of the cameras to be exact and the only thing that can really be made out about the person is that they're white they are masculine presenting and they have a distinct crease or wrinkle in their forehead which is like i mean it's kind of me i did a video the other day and i was like oh my god i'm so sorry i'm so sorry i'm so sorry i'm so sorry i'm so sorry on instagram the whole time i was talking like this i have i think i have a distinct crease anyways i'm just like that's what they notice yeah out of all things i don't know it's got some forehead wrinkles yeah now this person would move around the garage strategically hiding behind pillars shielding their face before spray painting another camera it's literally like oceans 11 up in this this this guy walking around so to the detectives it looked like this person was familiar with the parking deck and where all the cameras were located but there's something else seen on the footage before kenny was killed between some of the blue spray paint the cameras show a maroon minivan parked right next to kenny's car of course it's some maroon minivan so they notice this minivan parked next to his car right before kenny was spotted entering the garage at 3 21 p.m which might i say like whoever is spray painting these cameras isn't doing a very good job because we're still seeing through the spray paint and kind of getting a glimpse of what's happening so at 3 21 kenny's walking from work into the garage and there is a maroon minivan parked right next to his honda civic and then a few minutes later the lights on kenny's car start flashing almost like he's hitting the fob like the lock button maybe over and over again and then shortly after this the maroon van pulls out of the parking spot and leaves the parking garage so we obviously don't see like what's happening we just see the cars parked and the lights going off so police wonder did the person pull kenny into the maroon car and attack him and honda civic once he was dead did the attack happen in the honda civic except there was no blood so they're like i don't know who would even want to hurt kenny well it turns out tanya already knew the answer to that question so as soon as like police are investigating this as foul play she offers up something and she had given detectives her theory during an interview the night of kenny's murder like right after they found him i think if i like got killed would you even would there be any thoughts on like who wanted to kill garrett like there's no one that wants to kill me i could be wrong maybe the guy that i kicked out of the bagel shop today i did i kicked someone out of the bagel shop it's a story for another time i'm sorry i don't i wouldn't think like a listener or like someone from the bagel shop i would try to think of someone like more connected to you but i don't think anyone has a reason to kill you that i'm saying like i don't know if i could like pinpoint a person yeah i don't think i know anyone that wants but i could be like he has a couple ex-girlfriends who blocked me for no reason okay but like it doesn't warrant a kill babe it doesn't warrant someone killing you immediately throw them under the bus from like 16 years ago that's crazy i'd be like the elementary school girlfriend yeah her name like i really i don't know i don't think i know anyone that would want to kill you too oh kill me yeah no i don't know anyone that's a good thing i won't make a list for you okay so she reveals something pretty huge to the hillsborough police she says hey kenny actually had a stalker a very dangerous one that had been following him for years and this person had been harassing and threatening kenny he had even placed a tracker on kenny's car he had snuck around their property under the cover of night and tanya told police this stalker is all because of her oh okay no keep going so she's like this person isn't stalking kenny because of him it's it's my fault so let me rewind the clock a bit back to the year 2000 this is 23 years earlier this is about four years after kenny and tanya moved to oregon that was when tanya accepted a new job working at the milner veterinary hospital in oregon city now at this time this clinic was brand new so there was a lot of room to grow and the opportunity was perfect for tanya who like kenny was a huge animal lover and its main veterinarian the owner of the company steven milner quickly became this celebrated person in the community once he opened this place his animal hospital was seen as one of the best in the area and steven's bedside manner was unmatched not only would he sit with and console those who had lost or were losing a pet but he also would sit with and console those who had lost or were losing a pet he would send them thoughtful handwritten notes after the fact one woman said that on the fourth of july she ran into steven who offered to run to his office to get a sedative for her dog who was freaked out by the fireworks another client said steven made a donation in her late pet's name to oregon state university it was just these little details that really made the locals fall in love with steven even his receptionist said he was the best boss she ever had he was professional he was kind and generous and for the next two decades he continued to run one of the best animal hospitals in town with tanya by his side okay so technically if you knew steven you definitely knew tanya but in 2017 things got a little more complicated between the tanya and steven go from co-workers to something more romantic that year tanya and kenny were apparently going through some difficult times tanya said kenny was often away at job sites for days or weeks at a time and when they were together they were drinking a lot she said kenny had struggled with infidelity through their relationship a few times too and by 2017 she reached a point where she was lonely and she was seeking attention from someone else and coincidentally her boss steven milner was newly separated from his wife okay so earlier that year tanya and steven started sneaking around together steven even had a nickname for tanya one of those your dog's first name and then your street name which for her equaled kiki essex which is who he start like he starts referring to tanya as kiki his girlfriend kiki to keep things under the radar now a few people at the office obviously start catching on they're like sensing that something is going on between the two of them but that got confirmed when many of them attended a wedding together that summer tanya went alone that night she told people kenny's out of town again and after a few drinks and a couple of slow dances steven and tanya in public are getting a little too cozy now before the night was over it was clear that tanya and steven were having a good time and they were to everyone that they were definitely hooking up apparently it was even clear to kenny who wasn't even at the wedding this night. Now, I don't know who tipped him off or if he just had a hunch, but as the hours ticked by and Tanya didn't come home from the wedding, Kenny suspected that she was at Stevens. So he drove over there and basically caught them mid-affair. Also, this is crazy. So you're telling me he then goes and kills Kenny? No, I'm just telling you how he got a stalker. No, I know, but I'm just jumping ahead because I assume he kills Kenny, and that's nuts. Yeah. So Kenny catches them, okay? But rather than make it this huge deal, he kind of leaves. Like, he leaves it pretty calm. He doesn't say much. And then afterwards, as he's talking to Tanya, and they're talking about their relationship, what they want to do moving forward, Tanya says she realized that she had made a huge mistake. She ended this five-month fling. She and Kenny tried hard to work through this. They didn't want to lose each other. But little did she know, this was the beginning of something much, much worse. Okay. So in late 2017, after calling it quits with Steven, the couple received a strange letter. It read, quote, I should do everyone a favor and go back to drinking myself into my own demise. Hmm. Much like. Why? Okay, Shakespeare. Uh-huh. Like, that's just a little dramatic. Now, while the letter was anonymous, Tanya was pretty certain that Steven was behind it. Now, at this point, Tanya talks to Kenny about quitting. She's like, this just seems weird. I'm going to leave. But after putting in nearly two decades at this job, she just didn't want to walk away so easily. But unfortunately, things only escalated from there. She was hoping that they could both just, like, call it quits, continue back at work. But over the next year or so, more threatening letters came, and then those turned into mysteriously weird phone calls. And one day, Tanya even got a call from Steven's sister. She said she was concerned about the domestic violence Tanya was experiencing in her marriage to Kenny. And Steven's sister is like, Steven told me everything. And not only was Tanya completely confused about this because there was no domestic violence, it also is starting to really freak her out that he just can't do anything. He just can't leave her alone. Steven was making up lies about her and getting other people, even his own family, involved. So that is when she was like, enough is enough. Tanya left the animal hospital realizing that might be the only solution to get Steven to leave her and Kenny alone. But that wasn't the case. The letters, the threats, they kept coming. And in September of 2018, things got even spookier. I think we talk about this a lot. Do you really never just know somebody? No. Like, do you just truly never know who someone actually is? Yeah. Like, the fact that she can be sleeping with him and then all of a sudden he just. Is being this weird? Is just being this insane? Because I'm sure if you were to ask her, she'd be like, I had no idea. Like, he was insane. Well, and not. She had been working with him. For years. For years. I'm saying, do you just never truly know somebody? No. Guess not. I also think, going back to love makes people do weirdo, things sometimes. So, at this point, it has been over a year since she had ended their affair. But one evening, when Tanya and Kenny got back to their house, they pulled into the driveway to see Stephen Milner there. It has been over a year since she ended things. She has quit her job. He was wearing a blue hoodie and lying underneath Kenny's Dodge Ram, which was parked in the driveway. And when they pulled in, they could see he was attaching a small black box to the bottom of Kenny's truck. Now, the second Stephen saw them pull up, he runs away. Obviously, the couple is terrified. They call the local bomb squad. They're like, did this guy just put a bomb underneath my husband's truck? That's insane. But it wasn't a bomb. It was a GPS tracking device, which. Crazy. is still creepy. Now, after that, Stephen was called in to speak with the police. Because when Tanya and Kenny explain the situation, they're like, no. Like, it's been a year. We want absolutely nothing to do with him. So, the police call him and they're like, hey, you've got to leave this couple alone. And he's like, no, no, no. She's still. She's lying. We're still having an affair. And I'm just trying to keep tabs on Kenny so we don't get caught. Okay. Now, Tanya's like, no, it's a lie. Like, that's not true. But the problem was, everyone who knew Stephen, which this is so ironic since you just said this, had a hard time believing that he would be this crazy. Speaking of this, yeah, nah. Story for another time. Another story for another time. But, again, the amount of people that pretend to be nice and innocent and sweet out there when they're really not, there's a lot. Like, in secret or crazy. There is a lot of people who are secretly not good people. Yeah. Crazy. But do make an effort, whether that's manipulation or coping mechanisms or personality disorders, to come off a certain way. But on the outside, they make themselves seem like these saints. I've seen it firsthand multiple times. Happened to me recently. I mean, here's the thing. Like, I can name someone from growing up who I'm like, that person around town, would have been known as, like, a really good person. But, like, it was all a facade. Oh, yeah, for sure. Like, when you truly get to know them, you start to see the mask slip a little bit. Yeah. And I feel like maybe everyone kind of has that, has seen that in someone. I mean. Now, this is what's happening with Stephen. As I mentioned, Stephen had an incredible reputation in the area. Everyone who knew him loved him, whether they sent their pets to him or not. Because not only was he a vet, he was a dad to two kids from his first marriage. He was an active member of the community. He sponsored fundraisers, charity runs. He even once set up a hygiene station for the unhoused. But the truth was, Stephen was really good at masking his dark side. Turns out, he actually did have a history. He had been investigated back in 1996 by the Oregon Veterinary Medical Examining Board. For, quote, unprofessional or dishonorable conduct. And why? Well, he had put down two dogs without their owner's consent. So he just decided the dogs were too sick and did it without talking to the owners. Now, there was another incident in 2019 where Stephen also showed his true colors. He was collecting bottles and cans through his clinic, planned to use those proceeds from the bottle drop, to donate to charity. But when he showed up at the drop spot, they told him he had exceeded the allowed size for a bottle deposit. He not only lost his temper, he ended up shoving one of their employees and then went on local television to rant about it. He also doxxed one of the employees by posting her information online and encouraging everyone he knew to harass and threaten her. So again, he's coming off as, well, he's a nice person, but even in the times of going to a charity, his real true colors do show. Like, it's very obvious this charity is just for looks if this is how you're acting when you're going there. All right, you guys, we are getting into an ad and I'm gonna hit you with it again. It is Skims. And let me tell you something. Oftentimes when I talk to my IRL friends, because you guys are all my friends, but when I talk to my IRL friends, and they're talking about, oh, I'm looking for new sweats or loungewear, or I'm just looking for a new bra, I point them to Skims. I really do. And not because Skims is a sponsor, but because I love all of Skims products. I love it so much. I bought a ton of their maternity stuff. And then when they came out with their everyday cotton, and that ended up being my favorite fabric, I had to go buy every cut I love. I would recommend Skims to any friend, which is why I'm, I'm recommending it to you. - By the way, I have their underwear too. Amazing. Best underwear in the world. So you would seriously, I'm not kidding when I say that. Love their underwear. It's amazing. - Shops, Skims, cotton, and get underwear for your little boys. And all of my favorite pieces at Skims.com. After you place your order, be sure to let them know we sent you. Select podcast in the survey, and be sure to select our show in the dropdown menu that follows. Again, guys, just hop on Skims, shop around, it's quality pieces. And then after you check out, don't forget to let them know that we sent you. All right, you guys, this episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you could wake up tomorrow and be better at one thing, what would that be? - What would it be? What'd you pick? - Probably handling my anxiety better. That'd be nice. - Yeah, that's a good one. - That would be great. - I don't know what mine would be to be honest. I have to think about the one. So I need BetterHelp. I need to talk to someone about it to figure out what might be better. Mine would be. Well, I mean, isn't this question just, tied directly to why you would go to therapy if there's like one thing you want to work on or be better at that's where better help comes in pain and i are both big fans of better help um talking to someone is important there's so much to talk about even if you don't think there is anything to talk about talk to someone you never know honestly sometimes yourself you don't even know what's going on in your own brain so talk about it also it can be as simple as i want to be better at watering my plants literally a therapist can help you with that this is true better is a feeling defined by you and for better help it's a better help therapist who really gets you it's a focus on global emotional well-being with thousands of therapists and millions of members in over 100 countries it's progress sign up and get 10 off at betterhelp.com husband that's better h-e-l-p.com husband now that same year 2019 you again this stalking and stuff has been going on for over a year now steven sold his hospital to a national chain and finally retired but now all of that free time he had was then used for something else it was to obsess further over his former lover tanya bro go get a life man i know it's been years he sold the hospital he's retired like go go play golf go do something like his individual life he's retired like go play golf go do something like his individual life he's retired his individual life he's retired like go play golf go do something like his individual life he's retired never been broken up with i don't know i don't understand how this happens to so many people like it sucks i know that probably sucked but like the obsession that some people have crazy it's also embarrassing but it's crazy yeah like dude go do something man i don't know there there's a podcast right now about clayton the bachelor who was accused of he went through a she was never actually pregnant but took it so far and there's a podcast on it right now it's insane like some people are nuts and it's like not just nuts in like private yes but nuts like in public like i don't i don't get it like i truly like lying in court and genuinely delusionally believing it i truly can't comprehend it it anyway also it's like do all of us have that potential no or is that just like a weird thing no i think it's a weird thing i hope so no this girl's done it to like five other guys so it's just a hobby for her yeah now he's in love with tanya still he's obsessed with her and he's decided to make her husband kenny's life a living hell he absolutely hates this guy now while tanya was receiving endless love letters from steven penny was getting scarier threats so at the same time he's like writing tanya being like i love you come back to me he's also threatening her husband in june of 2019 kenny found steven outside his house again this time screaming and saying he was going to destroy his work tools now by august kenny was applying for an order of protection against steven kenny told the police that steven was getting more aggressive terrifying each day showing up to his house and this time the police take it a little more seriously a sheriff's deputy personally served steven with the restraining order but two months later kenny was found outside his house again this time screaming and saying he was going to destroy kenny doesn't try to renew the order you actually like have to go in and actively do this and he doesn't and it's not because the threats had stopped it's because they had actually gotten worse and so he was like hey maybe if i drop it it'll get better steven actually told the couple if they didn't drop the restraining order he would bankrupt them with legal fees and tanya discouraged kenny from going to the police again because she was terrified that steven's threats weren't idle she was scared of him and meanwhile tanya got a job at another animal hospital but then steven started showing up there too he would leave her notes on her car he would hang around in the parking lot waiting for her to get off her shift and leave and at one point he even showed up with a dog to the animal clinic and is like oh tanya needs to treat this dog now cut to december 2020 it has been three years since tanya called off their six-month flight to the animal hospital and steven is still at the restaurant he is still obsessing over her by this point kenny and tanya had set up security cameras outside their home that month one of them caught steven army crawling around in their yard gosh dude tanya called 9-1-1 what the actual steven left but this time the deputies don't even take a report because he's gone which like okay i'm sorry but yeah it's almost a comical it's not because we know where this story is going the fact that someone's army crawling around at this point i call i would i'm not gonna say anything i would do bad like nah i don't do that at my house i would literally be like this guy is so unwell i'd be in jail like this is so far beyond like i'm pretty sure if i caught someone army crawling in my this is obsession this is stalking they'd be buried currently in one of the holes in our side yards we have these huge eight foot holes right now because we're planting some trees i actually went out there the other day and i was like is there a body in here no you could put a body in there you have no idea i know i just brought up holes the movie but i went out there the other day and thought about it again i was like those poor boys had to dig holes like this don't come army crawling in my yard you will end up in one of those dude army crawling through someone's yard what are those things called those suits gill guillotine no oh ghillie suits yes i don't know why imagine if he had a ghillie suit on that would have been even worse guillotine oh my gosh i need to go the guillotine's the thing they cut yeah cut your head off i need to go to sleep okay so steven's army crawling through the yard tanya's calling 911 police are not i mean it's just not good again we've talked about it before stalking is one of the most dangerous things because there's not much police do now of course all of this is definitely to take a toll on kenny and tanya's marriage i mean things weren't even perfect to begin with considering the infidelity and then add on like they're trying to heal from this and trying to stay together and move on but then he's just constantly still around that makes it really really hard to heal and put things you know in the past from the past in the past so for kenny the stress of all of this led to drinking the fights between kenny and tanya's marriage and tanya get a little more intense and in august of 2021 it led to one really out of control event between the couple that month during a fight tanya slashed kenny's ear and kenny called the police tanya was arrested for assault she spent the night in jail but the next day she learned someone had paid her bail twenty five thousand dollar bail by the way by who not kenny not her husband stephen milner had learned about her arrest and bailed her out and he was waiting for her outside in the parking lot once she was released now this is surprising to tanya because she's like how did he even know how did he even know i got arrested well this led them to believe that stephen had definitely installed trail cameras around their property the same time it doesn't it doesn't stop it gets worse and worse that's how he learned she'd been arrested and stephen had been watching everything going on around their home and what's even more disturbing is tanya actually ends up staying with stephen for a couple of days after she was released now i know this is like everyone's screaming right now everyone's throwing their hands up and you're valid you're valid okay outside looking in this is crazy inside looking in this is crazy i'm assuming that tanya and kenny's marriage was in a really rough spot right now her ex-affair partner bails her out becomes her knight in shining armor rescuing her out of jail tanya has just spent the night in jail and her brain twisted brain in the absolute nuance of this complicated situation is like yeah i'll just stay with him for a couple days i wonder and i know that sounds crazy i just think it's it's probably not as crazy when you're the one living it but it's still crazy it's pretty nuts i'm not gonna lie it's pretty crazy not the judge but no i do think it's it's judge worthy like i think it's judge worthy but i also think the human psyche especially when you're dealing with something as complicated as an affair doesn't make much sense like i think people do very odd things okay in that name i'm not justifying it i'm just saying that i can see the i can see a world where she stayed with him for a couple days now obviously i don't know she insists a few days later later when she goes home to kenny keep in mind kenny called the cops on her and got her arrested okay valid valid now when she goes home a few days later she's like i've been at stevens nothing romantic happened he just paid my bill got me out of jail and i'm sure kenny's like steven the one in the ghillie suit army crawling around our home not suit but army crawling around our home she had to explain that but when she goes home to kenny like a few days after getting out of jail steven has just paid 25 000 to bail her out of jail oh no and then she's like we realized it was only like 10 so it was like 2500 maybe but it was a 25 000 bail you can pay 25 i mean you can pay the yeah i mean i guess maybe he did yeah he probably did this is an act of getting his girl back he could have he very well could have um now when steven's like what you're going back to kenny like you've been with me for a couple days i've fought in his mind fought so hard for this and you're gonna go back to you're gonna go back to kenny this makes him even more enraged like you've just taken a crazy person and lit a fire under them now in march of 2022 he takes things to a whole new level the month before steven had snuck around and installed another gps tracker on kenny's car this time without getting caught and then on march 1st steven began following kenny closely behind on a 45 minute drive from oregon city to hillsborough where he worked and this was after steven had recently threatened to quote chop kenny into a million pieces and make sure it takes days to do it okay so when kenny realized steven was following him to work he pulled over and called the police shockingly this time steven didn't flee he was approached by an officer who caught their interaction on body cam footage and in it steven tells the officer he's just worried and following kenny because he's been abusive towards tanya he's doing all of this for her safety the police don't buy it they're like listen this guy's taken a restraining order out on you before tanya herself has told us she wants nothing to do with you they tell steven stay the heck out of my gosh they should have cut his feet off or something kenny knows this is not enough so immediately after that incident kenny goes back to the police and he's like that's it i'm filing another protection i'm i'm filing another order of protection against steven and by that point kenny was so afraid for his life he could like it was less about the drama of all this he was struggling on a day-to-day basis to the point where he even got into a car accident about two weeks after filing that order and he was like i'm gonna go to the police i'm gonna go to the police and he tells people he's just distracted like he's genuinely worried for his life honestly it's so sad it's horrible none of this stopped steven milner in august of 2022 he puts another tracker on kenny's car i don't understand like we talk about it so much and it's so hard stalking is so hard with the justice system like proving it and it's just it's a difficult one do you just you throw them in jail forever like yeah like the do you throw them in jail i don't know probably i've heard so many crazy stalking stories that now i'm like look if you're stalking someone it's so scary like they need to send them all to an island or something like you just you can't live in society being that nuts it's like a like a hide and seek island they just stalk each other yeah they can just all go stalk each other or something so this time he actually is caught and he's criminally charged for violating the protective order a month later kenny also files a civil suit against steven for invasion of privacy and emotional distress really though he just pokes the bear because in october of 2022 steven's plotting his most nefarious plan yet he buys a new car on craigslist under a fake name he uses it to continue stalking kenny and on december 13th he goes to kenny's place of work and he spray paints about a dozen or so cameras in the parking garage and then in january of 2023 steven buys a second car using a false identity one of them happens to be a maroon minivan and by january 27th kenny is found dead in his car so sad so open and shut at this point let's go back to the night of the murder now tanya's like i know who did it i know who did this it's my fault like obviously steven milner is screaming guilty now it's just a matter of gathering more than circumstantial evidence confirming he's the man behind the mask on that surveillance footage so what did he think he wasn't gonna get back with her after killing him also like buying a car with a fake name is so easy to trace a maroon minivan you couldn't have gotten something a little less what i said i said of course it's a maroon minivan so just a few days after the murderer on january 31st police call steven in they're like hey you need to sign some paperwork they place a detective at the front their real goal is to see whether or not he has any injuries on his body now one of the first things she sees is not only is steven extremely nervous when signing this paperwork he shows up to the police station to the front desk wearing makeup and he didn't do a very good job because they can see a huge scratch on his nose and a pretty gnarly black eye underneath that makeup so just as he's about to walk out the front door of the station after thinking he was just signing paperwork deputies stop him and they arrest him and something else they notice about steven he needs botox no but he has the same exact forehead crease as the masked man in that footage now a few days later steven is formally charged with second degree murder and stalking second degree because in the state of oregon first degree only applies to crimes committed against someone under 14 a police officer or another protected role is that currently true yeah or if it's committed to cover up another crime so in oregon you can only get first degree murder if the crime is committed what again somewhere under 14 insane idiot made that law a police officer a protected role or if it is committed to cover up a different crime attorneys assemble because who made that who avengers hello okay honestly who's whose idea was that if i get a dm from one of you guys and you try to um justify it justify this i'm gonna be just absolutely distraught because there is no way you can explain to me why they did that but there is no way that you agree with that there's no way no i mean i can see like where they were going with it like this is the worst of the worst but i'm just in my mind i'm like you killed someone yeah granted i premeditated murder correct if it's premeditated if you planned it i don't you killed someone i'm not talking about manslaughter i'm not talking about other instances of passion like premeditated murder if you planned it it's also like game over i probably should have looked this up but like low-key you're telling me if there was a mass killing in oregon and none of the victims were under the age of 14 they would just be like oh second degree murder yeah i need explanations i'm gonna explain thank you i'm sure that's happening i'm sure there's an answer i just didn't know yeah but um one thing about true crime like one of the discoveries i've made while doing this podcast is that holy cow some states have some weird laws like some specific states you would think these laws are so outdated they are and you're just like what so police at this point still build their case against him now shortly after the charges are filed police secure a search warrant okay you're you're you're entering a stalker's home they find some pretty weird things first of all there is a framed picture of tanya next to steven's bed there were a few keepsakes from the short time they were together they find women's underwear love notes he had written her and even though their relationship had only lasted a few months the letters made it seem like he and tanya had been in this romantic relationship for years like love bombing they also found a giant cardboard cutout of steven himself well actually it was a cutout of his face pasted on to a very ripped and oiled male body with a dog paw tattoo over his heart which like but what police really needed obviously was access to the maroon van while doing this they order a forensic analysis on his suv like his other car and it shows that he's made a lot of trips to home depot of course and those trips increased as it got closer to the time of kenny's murder including several trips on the day of the murder so detectives take a little trip over to the store they ask about any unusual activity and shockingly one of the security people's like yeah there were two cars in the lot that had been flagged after being left there for a while one was a blue car and the other a maroon minivan so they check the security footage and sure enough they see a white suv identical to stevens pull into the home depot parking lot a guy gets out of the driver's seat and into the maroon minivan and drives away so this is where he was storing his getaway car he bought a pair of safety glasses that was the same pair seen like the red tint yeah he also found the hard hat here's the problem though the cars like the blue car and the maroon car are no longer in the parking lot they discover they've been sent to a scrapyard they head over employees tell them it's too late exactly one week ago the car was smashed to pieces okay as was there one hope of maybe finding a crime scene but the search for more evidence isn't a total wash turns out kenny's hands were covered in dna from fighting back and all of the dna on his hands belong to stephen miller so this is a pretty solid piece of evidence so they go to trial he pleads not guilty he says he believed he was rescuing tanya from an abusive marriage and that he went there to confront kenny and when he confronted him kenny attacked him and so he killed him in self-defense okay i mean despite the fact that they know for sure that he spray painted the cameras yeah and got a fake car to go confront him he also said he eventually broke his neck stephen miller was found guilty of second degree murder stalking and violating his protective order he was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years so he did get possibility of parole in november of 2025 stephen also agreed to a 1.2 million dollar settlement with kenny's estate and while the harassment threats and intimidation might have stopped so did the life tanya once knew i mean this was her husband someone who she had been with for decades this is the only person who knew what she had been through i mean tanya's paying for her mistakes at a very high price yeah and despite the mistakes she made no one deserves that we deserve a second chance an opportunity to move on and grow but sometimes it's not the mistake itself that sets us back it's the person tied to that mistake that forces us to keep reliving it over and over and over again just ruining your life one day at a time and that is the murder of kenneth vandrick poor guy i mean that sucks i mean i know it sucks for her too but i mean kenny got killed so yeah once again affects so many people and stephen's a freaking psycho and i i think the obvious way to go here is to feel a lot of anger and blame towards um tanya i mean she didn't come and this is the thing while i understand um where that is coming from again like gary just said one person killed kenny and that was stephen millman so let's hold him responsible and acknowledge that everyone makes mistakes and like i said everyone deserves a second chance stephen's a nut he's probably loving prison he has a chance of parole in 25 years 25 years i mean yeah he'll be old yeah he can't he can't come after me i got it oh i can handle him there's just an 89 year old crawling in tanya's front lawn come get me anyways all right you guys that was our episode for this week and we will see you next time with another one i love it i hate it goodbye tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just $20 at bj's dot com slash mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months open soon limited time offer new members only bj's home of the save