Random Facts Surrounding The Unsolved Keddie Cabin Murders (13 items)

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  (#1) Sue Sharp Had Just Moved To Keddie, California, With Her 5 Children

  In late 1980, 36-year-old Sue Sharp moved with her five children - Johnny, 15; Shelia, 14; Tina, 12; Rick, 10; and Greg, 5 - to a 3-bedroom resort cabin in Keddie, California. Sue, a recent divorcée, was beginning to date again. The family was getting to know the neighbors and make friends in the rural Sierra Nevada community. 

  Even though they were scraping by on a small income, everything seemed to be going well for Sue and her children.
   
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  (#2) The Sharp Children Had Friends Over That Night, But Only One Lived

  On April 11, 1981, the two youngest boys of the Sharp family, Greg and Rick, invited their neighborhood friend Justin Smartt, 12, over for a sleepover. Johnny, the eldest, had his friend, 17-year-old Dana Wingate, over as well. The youngest girl, Tina, had just come home from a playdate with friends.

  Sheila spent the night at a sleepover with the Seabolts, the neighbors who lived next door in Cabin 27, and was not present when the unknown assailants entered her family’s cabin.
   
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  (#3) The Family's Surviving Daughter Found The Three Bodies

  When 14-year-old Sheila Sharp came home from a sleepover on the morning of April 12th, she saw the scene from the front door: Sue, Johnny, and Dana were lying on the living room floor, dead. Shelia then raced back to her friend's cabin next door - where she spent the previous night - to find help. 

  The Seabolts went to the back of the cabin where the boys were sleeping. Greg, Rick, and Justin were unharmed, and the neighbors notified the police. Inside Cabin 28, blood covered the carpet and couch. The bodies had multiple wounds, and investigators determined the victims suffered blunt force trauma. 

  Sue was partially covered with a sheet, and the rest of the room was in a state of disarray, with cushions pulled from the couch and side tables knocked to the ground. There was no sign of Sue's daughter, Tina.
   
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  (#4) Based On The Crime Scene, Investigators Suspected Multiple Assailants

  At Cabin 28, police noted that there was no sign of forced entry. Based on the scene of the crime, Plumas County investigators also determined that there was likely more than one assailant and that the crimes were committed over a period of time. 

  Sue was intricately bound by her legs, ankles, and wrists with medical tape and electrical cord, which was knotted so tightly she would have been unable to move. She was gagged with a bandana and her own underwear. Police also found Johnny and Dana with their ankles bound together.

  Forensics showed that the killers used multiple weapons and at least two different hammers. The perpetrators hit Johnny with a rifle, which has yet to be recovered. Investigators recovered several knives from the scene, including a kitchen knife. While all the victims had lacerations, it appeared that the assailants only strangled the eldest male, Dana.
   
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  (#5) Tina Sharp Was Missing For Years

  Hours after the three bodies were discovered inside the cabin, authorities realized that 12-year-old Tina Sharp was missing. Investigators believed that the assailants had taken Tina from the cabin still alive. The police, in conjunction with the FBI, conducted extensive searches for Tina, but there were no leads. 

  In 1984, on the third anniversary of the murders, a hunter uncovered fragments of a human skull approximately 30 miles from the Sharp’s cabin. An anonymous tip made to the Butte County Sheriff’s Office suggested investigators should check to see if the fragment belonged to Tina. 

  The call prompted a more thorough search of the area, and authorities found additional bone fragments. After they tested their findings, they confirmed that the skeleton belonged to Tina Sharp. The anonymous call was never documented, and in 2013, the old tape was recovered from evidence during a fresh look at the case. 
   
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  (#6) The Three Youngest Boys Survived, Even Though They Were In The House

  Sue, Johnny, Dana, and Tina were not alone in the house at the time of the intrusion. The two youngest boys, Greg and Rick, were sleeping in their bedroom through the entire ordeal with their neighborhood friend from Cabin 26, Justin Smartt. 

  Sheila and her friend's family discovered the boys in the morning. After Shelia returned to the Seabolts, the parents knocked on the boys' window, and the trio answered, completely unharmed.

  The Seabolts then made the children climb out of the house through the bedroom window to spare them the horrifying sight in the living room, but the boys soon learned what happened. They reported that they hadn't been disturbed at all, except for Justin, who told investigators he had gotten up once in the night. 
   
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  (#7) One Survivor May Have Seen Part Of The Crime

  12-year-old Justin Smartt, who stayed at the Sharp’s cabin the night the intruders entered, claimed he got up during the night and witnessed some of the events. He told police in a disjointed statement that he saw Sue on a boat that looked like the cabin's living room and that Johnny and Dana had just arrived home. He maintained that the two older boys tried to fight the attackers, but they were eventually bound and beaten.

  He also stated that Tina awoke at the noise and that he saw who took her. Given Justin's age and his somewhat confusing version of events, police did not take his report as fact. Authorities dismissed it as a dream, or at least as a partial dream, that he remembered after the fact.

  Later, a Los Angeles-based psychologist examined Justin under hypnosis. The boy provided a description of the two alleged assailants, which authorities used to make a composite sketch.
   
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  (#8) There Were Two Primary Suspects

  Sue reportedly was romantically involved with various men, and while many were questioned, none were pinpointed as major suspects. Instead, police turned their gaze towards Marty Smartt and his friend Severin John Boubede, also known as "Bo." Both men lived close to the Sharps, in Cabin 26, and Sue was friends with Marty's long-abused wife, Marilyn. 

  Having left an abusive marriage herself, Sue encouraged Marilyn to leave Marty. He didn't like Sue's interference, and people believe that he enlisted an ex-con and possible mobster, Boubede, to kill her.

  Additionally, Marty was Justin Smartt's step-father, which investigators theorized may be why the boys' room was never disturbed. A few months after the murders, Marty moved to Reno, Nevada, and allegedly left his wife an incriminating letter. However, neither Smartt nor Boubede were arrested.
   
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  (#9) New Details Emerged Surrounding The Crime

  Sheila Sharp, who found the bodies that April morning in 1981, has never stopped trying to find her mother, sister, and brother's killers. A new investigator of the crime, Sheriff Greg Hagwood, was schoolmates with Johnny and Dana before their deaths. He reopened the case, and recently, new evidence has come to light.

  In 2013, authorities discovered a letter that Marty Smartt wrote to his wife after she left him. In it, he says that he "paid the price of [his ex-wife's] love" and "bought it with four people’s lives."

  The investigative team also discovered a hammer in a pond near the Keddie property which could potentially be the weapon the intruders used. It matches the description of a hammer that Smartt told investigators he lost.

  The sheriff also found an envelope in police files that contained the 1984 recording of the 911 call in which the anonymous caller suggests that the skull fragment belongs to Tina Sharp. Police believe that this person may have been involved in the killings and is having the audio analyzed. 
   
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  (#10) A Therapist Told Authorities That Smartt Admitted To Killing Sue Sharp

  Sheriff Hagwood employed the services of private investigator Mike Gamberg to help with the case. The PI tracked down a therapist in Reno to whom Marty Smartt allegedly made a confession. The therapist told officials that he had contacted the police when Smartt initially admitted to the murder of Sue Sharp. 

  The therapist - a counselor at a Veteran’s Hospital - maintained Smartt’s confession occurred only weeks after the deaths at Cabin 28. Reportedly, Smartt also admitted culpability in Tina’s death and explained he attacked her to leave no witnesses. Smartt allegedly stated that his primary target was Sue because she interfered with his marriage. 

  Throughout his sessions, Smartt claimed to suffer from PTSD and mentioned that a Plumas County official, Sheriff Doug Thomas, was a good friend and former Keddie neighbor of his. 
   
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  (#11) The Case Has Given Rise To A Huge Number Of Conspiracy Theories

  Because the Keddie Cabin case has been unsolved for so long, it has generated a number of conspiracy theories. Marty Smartt was close friends with the local sheriff, and skeptics suggest that authorities worked to conceal Smartt's involvement in the crime. Later investigations show that the police work on the case was wrought with error and that authorities didn't follow every lead. Additionally, not all evidence was properly documented, such as Smartt's letter to Marilyn and the 911 recording. 

  Organized crime unit officials came to the crime scene, which added fuel to the conspiracy theory fire. People speculate that perhaps Boubede killed Sue for a mob-related reason, given his connections to the Chicago and Vegas mafias.

  Another favored accomplice is Dee Lake, who lived at the address that made the phone call to police about Tina's skull fragment. Lake was also a former vet like Smartt and reportedly drove his buddy to Reno following Smartt’s split with Marilyn. 
   
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  (#12) Cabin 28 Was Demolished

  As of 2017, Plumas County - where Keddie is located - is home to less than 19,000 people, and the mark the Sharp family's murders left on the community is massive. The Keddie cabins were originally meant for low-income families, and the killings made people afraid for their already difficult lives. 

  What was once a pleasant place to live became a news reporter and rumor-filled nightmare. Stories circulated that the Sharps knew the killer, which reportedly bred distrust among neighbors.

  One other family lived in the cabin after the homicides, but when they left, the property was completely abandoned. In 2004, Cabin 28 was leveled as the Sierra Nevada community tried to move forward from the brutality that occurred there. Only approximately 79 households still live in Keddie, according to a 2017 census. 
   
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  (#13) The Two Main Suspects Are Dead

  The public still doesn't know who is responsible for the 1981 Keddie Cabin murders. Law enforcement has never made an arrest, and the two most likely suspects - Smartt and Boubede - were released after initial questioning. 

  Both the prime suspects passed prior to Sheriff Hagwood’s 2013 investigation. Boubede died of natural causes in 1988, and Smartt passed in 2006. The remaining Sharp family members seek justice to this day but have admitted they don't have much hope that the case will ever officially be solved.
   

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