In boxcars and rail yards, places a lot of us pass without a second glance, men were being murdered. Many were unhoused. Many were transient. Many were dismissed.

This week’s episode of Same Crime, Different Time examines the case of Robert Joseph Silveria Jr., known as the Boxcar Killer, whose crimes began in Oregon and spread across multiple states. It’s a story about violence, but also about visibility and the cost of indifference.

In November 1988, Deborah Lee Atrops vanished after an ordinary evening in Washington County, Oregon. She was 30 years old. A bookkeeper. A new mother. A woman navigating the complicated end of a marriage and trying to build a future for herself and her daughter.

Two days later, her body was found in the trunk of her car on a quiet dead-end road.

For decades, Deborah’s case sat unresolved. She was a name in a file, a question without an answer. Law enforcement suspected who was responsible, but the evidence wasn’t there.

Until it was. Listen to find out more.

In 1975, in a Soviet town defined by factory work and strict silence, Vladimir Sarenpya began a spree of violence that the state tried to hide.

This week on Same Crime, Different Time, we’re going behind the Iron Curtain to explore a case of “The Ripper” you’ve likely never heard of, who may have started in tiny Coos Bay, Oregon. We discuss the victims, the chilling “signature” left at the crime scenes, and how a regime that claimed serial killers didn’t exist eventually had to face the truth.

The Brother Jonathan struck an uncharted reef near Point St. George off Crescent City, California, on July 30, 1865. The wreck is one of the deadliest maritime disasters on the Pacific Coast in the nineteenth century. Today, the story of the Brother Jonathan: the ship, the disaster, the salvage, and the strange afterlife of a shipwreck that has become both legend and litigation.

This week on Same Crime, Different Time, we head deep into Oregon’s Molalla Forest. It’s the site of one of the state’s most chilling serial murder cases. Dayton Leroy Rogers targeted some of Portland’s most vulnerable women, and hid his violence beneath the pines.

I revisit this case with new context, including insights from my book Murder & Mayhem in the Willamette Valley. This episode is about truth, justice, and remembering the women the headlines tried to erase.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts.

The double life of Robert Lee Yates , the Spokane serial killer who hid behind the façade of family, career, and community honor while murdering at least 13 women throughout the 1970s–1990s. Drawing exclusively from newspapers, court filings, and documented reports, this episode traces his timeline, victims, investigative missteps, and the complex social dynamics that shaped the case. It’s a story of vulnerability, unnoticed danger, and how a man living an “ordinary” life became one of Washington’s most prolific killers.

SOURCES:

“Robert Lee Yates” — public profile / overview. Wikipedia+1

“Spokane Serial Killer’s Guilty Pleas Kept in Place,” Courthouse News, on his 2000 plea and 408-year sentence. Courthouse News

“Spokane Serial Kill Lab Results In,” CBS News, April 2000, detailing evidence linking Yates to multiple murders. CBS News

“Decades of Killing Yield 408-Year Sentence,” Los Angeles Times, Oct 2000, coverage of sentencing, first confessions. Los Angeles Times, Murderpedia

“Death Sentence Upheld for Spokane Serial Killer,” summarizes Pierce County death sentence upheld, legal appeals dismissed. Courthouse News, Washington Courts

Radford University criminal psychology profile; background details, timeline of charges, and military service. Maamodt, Maamodt

“The Horrific Crimes Of Robert Lee Yates, The Spokane Serial Killer Who Murdered 16 People,” a recent retrospective summary. All That’s Interesting

Oregon isn’t just forests and craft beer. It’s also home to whispered rituals, mysterious architecture, and a few cults that slipped under the national radar.

This week on Same Crime, Different Time, we explore: A rumored Bigfoot-worshipping group at Cultus Lake The eerie Temple of Oculus Anubis An Oregon-linked Mother God cult La Luz del Mundo’s Oregon branch

Why here? Why these groups? And what turns belief into control? Grab your hiking boots and your boundary-setting skills. This one gets weird.

This week on Same Crime, Different Time, we’re doing something a little special. We’re stepping back into the pages of my own book, Murder & Mayhem in the Willamette Valley, to revisit one of the most chilling figures in Oregon’s early criminal history: Norman “Snake” Brooks.

Brooks earned his nickname not for stealth, but for the venom he left in his wake.

In the chapter we read today, we explore the crimes that rattled the Willamette Valley, and the complicated legacy Snake left behind. Whether you’ve read the book or this is your first introduction, Brooks’s story is a haunting reminder that the past isn’t as quiet as we like to think.

You can listen to the full episode and hear the chapter in my own voice, right here. Thank you, as always, for supporting Oregon history and the stories that shaped it… even the ones that make us shiver.