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February 21, 2012 in City
Burglary suspect unravels homicide
Confession puts cops on trail to teen’s body
The discovery earlier this month of a homicide victim in a shallow North Idaho grave was the tragic confirmation of a burglary suspect’s unexpected confession, setting in motion Bonner County’s first murder investigation in years.
Bonner County Sheriff Daryl Wheeler said once the body was found, detectives essentially worked a murder investigation backward to piece together what they think happened to 19-year-old Michael Wyatt Smith, who had been reported missing months earlier and hadn’t been seen since. Investigators now believe that Smith was shot twice because of a love triangle between a juvenile girl and the married man now being charged with killing him.
“It’s a terrible conclusion to that missing person report,” Wheeler said.
The mystery began unfolding on the first Friday in January when a burglary suspect named Christopher R. Garlin walked into the sheriff’s department with disturbing news: He’d been part of an earlier killing. The victim’s name was Mike.
“We had to determine whether there was a missing person named Mike,” Wheeler said. “We worked on it all that weekend.”
On Monday, Jan. 9, detectives found the missing person report filed Sept. 15 for Smith, who had disappeared a couple days before from Hope, Idaho, a small resort destination east of Sandpoint. With that, “We confirmed that (the killing) was a high probability,” Wheeler said.
Garlin already had been under investigation with three others for a burglary that occurred just after Christmas at a pawn shop in Ponderay, Idaho, in which more than 30 guns were stolen.
Along with local police, the burglary earned the attention of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which started gathering evidence to present to a grand jury this coming June, Bonner County Prosecutor Louis Marshall said.
Along with Garlin, the other suspects in that burglary were 19-year-old Austin B. Thrasher, his 22-year-old wife, Jennifer S. Dunnagan-Thrasher, and another person who is not believed to be involved in the killing, Marshall said.
“Once Garlin came in and indicated there was a homicide … the sheriff’s office filed burglary charges against them so we could keep the community safe and keep them in custody,” Wheeler said.
Deputies arrested the Thrasher couple on Jan. 9 and Garlin the next day on the burglary charges. Then the questioning about Smith began.
Detectives started piecing together what they believe happened. They also started issuing search warrants for buildings, cars, computers and vehicles.
“In all, we executed 17 search warrants,” Wheeler said. Asked if detectives obtained circumstantial evidence from the crime, he replied: “Absolutely.”
They learned Smith had come to North Idaho to be part of a program to help young men with drug or alcohol addictions, Wheeler said.
On Sept. 13, the three suspects picked up Smith from transitional housing on the Hope peninsula owned by Carl Olding, who founded Elk Mountain Academy, located just over the Idaho border in Montana. It caters to young men recovering from alcohol and drug abuse, according to its website.
Olding said Smith never attended Elk Mountain Academy, but would not confirm whether Smith stayed at any other facility that he owns. He declined further comment.
Wheeler said investigators believe the suspects told Smith they were going to a party at Thrasher’s grandfather’s home in the woods east of Cocolalla Lake. Once there, it’s believed that Austin Thrasher took Smith into the woods and shot him twice sometime after midnight, Wheeler said.
“We believe it was their intention all along to take him to a location … and commit homicide,” Wheeler said. “We believe the motive was jealousy over a juvenile girl.”
Authorities believe Austin Thrasher and Smith had been having romantic relations with the same juvenile girl, Wheeler said. “From our investigation, it doesn’t appear (Dunnagan-Thrasher) was aware of this relationship” at the time of the killing.
After shooting Smith, investigators believe, the three suspects moved his body to a location that was unknown until earlier this month – when detectives got their second big break. This time it came from Dunnagan-Thrasher, who apparently learned of her husband’s involvement with the juvenile girl while she was in jail.
But Wheeler said he doesn’t know whether that was her motivation for coming forward. On the advice of her attorney, Wheeler said, Dunnagan-Thrasher agreed to show detectives where Smith was buried.
On Feb. 2, she led detectives north and east of Sandpoint, about six miles up Rapid Lightning Road near Wellington Road, “and pointed where Mr. Smith was buried,” Wheeler said.
Detectives went out the next day and exhumed the body. After the coroner confirmed the identity of the body, detectives called Smith’s family in California, who could not be reached for comment.
Austin Thrasher is being held on a $500,000 bond for the charge of first-degree murder. Dunnagan-Thrasher and Garlin are being held on $50,000 bonds and are charged as accessories. All three are due in court Friday for a preliminary hearing.
“The detectives spent time explaining the case to the family and how it developed. They were very thankful,” Wheeler said. “Our hearts and prayers go out to the family. This should never happen to anybody.”
Wheeler credited the work of the Ponderay Police Department, federal agents and especially his own detectives.
Once the report of the killing came in, “There were a lot of nights our detectives didn’t sleep knowing Michael is out there and we couldn’t find him,” Wheeler said. “Our detectives were just tenacious and weren’t going to give up until we found where Michael was laying at rest.”
Trial begins in 1992 robbery, homicide 
SpokaneLiberal on February 21 at 6:29 a.m.
Yes officer, it was you all and the feds that deserve all the credit. I mean I know you all took days to even figure out who the victim might be, and sure someone walked right into your office and confessed and told you all about the crime that up until then you had no idea about. But yes the credit is all yours.
rosehips on February 21 at 8:17 a.m.
What a tragic story.
This really caught my eye:
“Olding said Smith never attended Elk Mountain Academy, but would not confirm whether Smith stayed at any other facility that he owns. He declined further comment.”
What other facility might he have attended and why is it a secret?
I lived next to one of these young man’s academies in the woods. It was sort of like a prison camp but without convicted prisoners. A couple of times one of the attendees snuck out and came to my door. It was Christmas time and the kid just wanted to use the phone to call his girlfriend back home. I gave him my phone. Then he came back with a letter but no envelope or postage and asked me to mail it. I did.
I don’t know if what I did compromised the objective of the school, but I think it would have been courteous for the owners to have introduced themselves to me and explained that they were housing young men with emotional problems and substance abuse on the property next door to me. That always bothered me.
RedCedar on February 21 at 9:08 a.m.
That’s an interesting anecdote, rosehips. Thank you for that. It may not be germane to the murder, but it’s one of those things “that makes you go hmmm”. I’ll admit I have a bias against outfits that set up a compound in the woods and bring a lot of outsiders in who pay money for some sort of training, no matter what it is, and I also am dubious of operations that charge parents a lot of money to straighten out their wayward kids. A quick scan of google turns up a lot of information about Elk Mountain Academy and its owner, including that they charged around $3375/mo back in 1999, and that in 2007 they had a counselor who was fired and prosecuted for child-molesting. There are apparently also a number of related operations run by the same people.
I’m sure that if you’re running some kind of Christian Betty Ford clinic for alcoholic (rich) boys, you’re going to have a certain amount of trouble. That’s the nature of boys. I’m not sure that trying to keep it all secret, not talking to the neighbors, denying that a kid who was picked up there lives there, refusing to answer a reporter’s question, and so on does anything to reduce suspicions.
There’s something about the wilderness mystique of North Idaho, and Idahoan’s “live and let live” attitude towards neighbors who might be doing strange things, so long as they keep it on their own property, that attracts a certain “type”, that ranges widely between Bo Gritz’ “Almost Heaven” survivalists, to various fundamentalist Christian isolationists home-schooling their kids until the Second Coming, to New-Agers waiting for the Mothership, to the infamous white separatists of “Reverend” Butler. I have to wonder what sort of family it is that cannot deal with a son’s alcoholism within their own family structure but can afford upwards of $3000/mo to send him off to an “academy” in what to them must be the wilderness to deal with it. If nothing else, it’s a glimpse into a different world.
It’s funny. When I was a kid, there were pages of ads in the back of National Geographic for summer camps that rich people could send their kids to. There were a few that were basically “fat camps”, but mostly they just touted the usual summer camp activities — swimming, horseback riding, canoeing, archery, etc. Now when I look in the back of National Geographic there are still just as many pages of ads for camps, but they are all for straightening out delinquent, addicted, unhappy, or otherwise troublesome kids. It’s like no one will send their kid to camp these days unless it’s some sort of re-education program designed to straighten them out.
rosehips on February 21 at 9:27 a.m.
Red, the amounts you quote are the same as I heard that the families of the boy’s next to me were charged each month. And the time period is about the same.
It seemed like a racket to me. And I won’t go into details about what I felt about the owners but to know they made that much money and contributed so little to some of the things neighbors in remote locations share, seemed odd to me. Oh well, they really never bothered me and I never bothered them. At least we had that. :)
Sensiblesal on February 21 at 9:52 a.m.
There’s a number of camp/academys throughout the West that offer a service many familes pay lots of money for. This is usually a “last resort” to get a kid on track only after parents have tried everything. And I’m talking about kids abusing drugs, getting arrested, vandalizing property, assaulting parents, teachers and siblings not to mention raising cain another five times a week.
I personally have seen many success stories simply because a kid needed change and was placed into a program run by highly trained educators/counselors/doctors.
A simutaneous side effect after a kid is “exported” is a more manageable home so parents can have time with other kids. And or themselves.
Careful with the broad brush on academies & families that use them. I agree they should be friendly to the neighbors but there must be instances when they are not as it’s best for the kid, the academy and the neighbor.
This is a sad sad story with the victim and suspects so young.
letthetruthbetold on February 21 at 10:26 a.m.
First, our hearts go out to the Smith family.
Good for you, Thomas C Louse, for painting a bullseye on a kid who turned 18 just three weeks before this tragedy occured. Since you’ve already gone thus far, how about including the rest of the story? You failed to mention that right after Austin Thrasher shot this poor kid Mike, he then turned the gun on Chris Garlin and threatened to kill him, his family, friends and even his puppy if he ever told.
Chris, a champion ACADECA student, is well known and liked in his community. He was a member of the team who won the Academic Decathlon at both the State and National levels. But he wasn’t smart about who he kept company with, and essentially became a victim himself.
Austin Thrasher kept a close eye on Chris Garlin at all times to make sure that he didn’t tell, and even took him to another state after the murder. Chris was menaced and bullied into his involvement in the burglary when they returned. It wasn’t until Thrasher was finally arrested with a carfull of stolen goods that Chris felt safe enough to report the murder. Since Chris didn’t know where the grave was, authorities managed to keep him protected until they could use his information to get Jennifer Thrasher to lead them to it. So who protects him now or do we just wait for the ‘accomplice’ to mysteriously die in jail?
rosehips on February 21 at 10:36 a.m.
Sensiblesal, I have no doubt that many of these academies are effective for changing these young men around. I never once had a problem with any of them.
I can’t say that about all of my neighbors. :)
I imagine putting young men in survival settings and denying them contact with the outside world can be good. I’m sure many men have benefited from this last resort effort to turning their lives around. Too bad more poor youth don’t have access to this type of treatment.
rosehips on February 21 at 10:37 a.m.
truthbetold, thanks for the info about Chris. I think he was very brave to come forward. I hope that he will be protected.
brianrbreen on February 21 at 11:37 a.m.
Holly cow a burglary suspect?
brianrbreen on February 21 at 11:40 a.m.
They must do it differently in Bonner County.
brianrbreen on February 21 at 12:11 p.m.
@TomClouse
I’m totally confused by your story. Does this mean that Investigators from Bonner County and Pondray PD with the help of the Feds were able to put a Murder case together based on some low-level property crime? By actually investigating it, using it, and doing the interviews/interrogations of a Burglary suspect. Gee… how does that work?
I’m just wondering, I always thought those rotten Burglars knew more about what was going on than most people. But I guess they don’t in some areas.