Sirens | A Southern True Crime Podcast · The Sirens Network

Southern Noir Book Club | Brian & Cameron Santana: A Murder on Campus

·1 hr 1 min·4 clips

Raven Rollins interviews Brian Santana (professor) and Cameron Santana (former cop) about their book 'A Murder on Campus', which investigates the 1973 unsolved rape and murder of 19-year-old UNC Asheville drama student Virginia Ginger Olson. The authors detail their investigation into the prime suspect, John Rivas Jr., a wealthy documentary filmmaker who evaded identification for decades, and discuss the challenges of pursuing justice through degraded evidence, bureaucratic obstruction, and a 50-year-old cold case. The episode explores the tension between political influence, institutional memory loss, and the enduring human need to name and remember victims.

As heard by us

A plainspoken campus-murder story that keeps the victim, not the spectacle, at the center.

The piece keeps Virginia Ginger Olson, a 19-year-old UNC Asheville student, at the center and treats her killing as public memory rather than spectacle. It returns to her final morning in April 1973 with a plainspoken focus on records, names, and local history.

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Why you'd press play

For a campus murder case told with record-chasing grit.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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