Detectives' true crime podcast helps dig up breakthrough in case that haunted family: ‘drew audible gasp'
What started as a way for a pair of two Illinois detectives to crowdsource tips to solve decades-old cold cases ended in a shocking discovery.
Detectives Andrew Houghton and Matt Vartanian were looking to breathe new life into unsolved cases by launching the true-crime podcast, "Somebody Knows Something," in October 2024 at the request of Elgin Police Department Chief Ana Lalley. Their goal centered around using modern investigative technology to potentially bring closure to local families.
"We both kind of looked at each other and said, 'No, I'm not really sure that's for us'," Vartanian told Fox News Digital. "Then we took a step back, were open-minded in our thinking and objective, and thought that this could be a really good vehicle to utilize investigative processes within law enforcement."
The pair combed through open cold cases within their area, zeroing in on the disappearance of 23-year-old Karen Schepers in 1983.
"Our thought was, depending on whatever case we started with or if we did multiple cases, there may be people that are outside of Illinois and outside of our region that might have known about some of these cases," Vartanian said. "So it was the right thing to be able to get that information out there to be able to get answers for the victims and families."
Schepers was enjoying a night of celebratory drinks with coworkers at P.M. Bentley's in Carpentersville, Illinois – located 45 miles outside Chicago. Schepers was the last of the group to leave the bar at approximately 1 a.m. on April 16, 1983, and neither she nor her 1980 Toyota Celica were ever seen again, according to the Elgin Police Department.
Even though the community had countless theories of what may have happened to Schepers, including the possibility something happened to her on the way home or when she arrived at her destination, the case ran cold.
Schepers' disappearance remained an open investigation for 41 years, and was briefly revisited by the Illinois State Police in the late 1980s and again by investigators in 2010.
"In 2008 [and] 2009, we did a bunch of billboards for that case and tried to generate media interest," Houghton told Fox News Digital. "A lot of DNA was put into the national databases that were kind of new on the scene at that time, so that was the new technology then."
Despite the multiple attempts to solve what happened to Schepers, detectives were unable to follow any major leads, until the department launched "Somebody Knows Something."
"When we started to look at the Karen Schepers case, we realized that we could put everything out there because we had no idea what happened to her," Vartanian said. "Whether it was an accident or if it was something intentional, and then anything in between. There was so much time that had gone by, we knew that there was a lot of content that could be there."
With permission from her family, Houghton and Vartanian began digging for new information regarding Schepers, using a mix of old-fashioned police work while leaning on updated technology.
"This was very much an old-fashioned 'talk to people, get in a car, go knock on doors, go drive around' type of investigation," Houghton said. "Investigations for any of our cases are still like that, but this was much more like that in the fact that we had to go look and see what roads existed in 1983? What bodies of water existed in 1983? Because it's very different now than it was then."
The pair hit the pavement, talking to locals in the area who knew Schepers to paint a picture of her final moments on the morning she went missing. Houghton and Vartanian worked to determine what route Schepers took home, along with researching the weather conditions and other details that may have contributed to her disappearance.
As the detectives were pouring over print media, they discovered the nearby Fox River was flooded at the time of Schepers' disappearance – a key break in the case that prompted them to call in expert divers to search the body of water.
"Interestingly enough, we would get a lot of tips from people that were saying, 'There's no way she's in the river'," Houghton said. "'It's too shallow, I fish there, I boat there.' However, there are different parts where the river might be two feet deep or one foot deep, and there are other spots where it's [up to] 15 feet deep, so it really depended on where you were looking."
On March 24, 2025, the Elgin Police Department called in Chaos Divers, a non-profit team of independent divers specializing in underwater recovery, to search the river.
In a dramatic end to a four-decades-long mystery, Schepers and her vehicle were found.
"As we each heard the news that her car was found, time stopped while we drew an audible gasp," Schepers' family said in a statement. "When it started back up again, our lives took a new path that finally included the answer to 'Where is Karen?' This question has been haunting all who knew Karen for many years."
The divers were able to recover Schepers' vehicle while keeping the structure intact, allowing investigators to use dental records to identify her skeletal remains.
"With this case, it was a bit of a unicorn in the fact that we had no idea what happened to her," Houghton said. "Don't be afraid to fail, don't be afraid of looking foolish. Because at the end of the day, the goal is to find this person and we did that in this case. If we do this five more times and this is the only time it works out, so be it. But if you do this five or 10 times, and you find one case or solve one case, it's totally worth doing that for that family."
Houghton and Vartanian are already planning on the next case to revive in the second season of their podcast, telling Fox News Digital it will likely be a homicide investigation.
Houghton and Vartanian were able to provide her 90-year-old mother with two items recovered from her vehicle – her sapphire birthstone ring and class of 1977 high school graduation tassel – providing a sense of closure for Schepers' loved ones as the mystery surrounding her disappearance finally comes to a close.
"We hope for continued success on each and every cold case," Schepers' family said. "Miracles do happen."
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