Murder At Land Between The Lakes

Murder At Land Between The Lakes takes its name from one case and its reach from many. In 1980, sisters Carla Atkins and Vickie Stout were murdered in Dover, Tennessee, and found at Land Between the Lakes. The killing is still unsolved, and it remains the show's anchor. Even an episode about a different case stops to mark the anniversary and ask whether this could be the year for justice, passing along that Trish Gordon told the hosts she is more hopeful than ever. Around that anchor, hosts Amelia Courtney and Lainey Sullivan have built a running file of missing and unsolved cases across Tennessee. The titles show the range: 'Where Is Shelia Bradford', 'Who killed Cole Richard?', 'The Mysterious Death of Diane Minor', 'MISSING: Nicky Avent'. The method is steady. The two hosts rebuild timelines, compare what each has read, and check each other as they go. In the Diane Minor episode, the conversation turns on how many people knew she had gone quiet and how no one called police to ask for a wellness check. They also relay what they understand about her daughter, Cherry, telling coworkers that her mother had simply moved to Colorado. The Marlena Childress case gets two episodes inside a season the hosts call Unsolved. Amelia frames the first through her own memory of being ten years old in South Fulton, Tennessee, in April 1987, when four-year-old Marlena vanished from her front yard. She names that day as the start of her interest in true crime. The episodes walk through reported sightings, including two beauticians in Memphis who believed an upset girl in their salon was Marlena, and a claimed sighting at Horseshoe Lake, Illinois. When a message suggests Marlena might be living well under a new name, the hosts say outright that it seems unlikely. The sources are named at the close: Union City Messenger reporting, an Unsolved Mysteries episode, protected sources, and family and law enforcement involved in 1987. 'Where Is Shelia Bradford' carries a family member's first-hand account, and the Cole Richard episode includes someone recalling calling him again and again as each call went to voicemail. The Nicky Avent entry breaks format entirely: a mini-episode with no intro or outro, an urgent appeal for a man Amelia went to high school with who went missing from Hickman, Kentucky. His wife, Lakeisha, helped her piece together the lead-up to his disappearance. The hosts call their aim being a voice for the voiceless, and the episodes are built around it, with specific names, specific places, and a standing request for someone to pick up the phone. A newcomer could start with the two Marlena Childress episodes, which show the whole approach in one case: personal memory, sighting reports, and named sources.