The Keddie Murders: Secrets, Suspects, and Missing Pieces

A Fresh Start Turns to Horror in Cabin 28

In the early '80s, Sue Sharp was ready to embrace a fresh start, leaving behind a turbulent marriage and relocating to the serene woods of California with her five kids. But little did she know, the quiet life she'd hoped for was about to turn into a chilling nightmare. Imagine pulling into your new home, Cabin 28—once the dwelling of a local sheriff—only to have it become the epicenter of one of the most horrifying mysteries in the area. Just five months after getting settled in, Sue’s hopeful life would spiral into darkness when a tragic night turned their home into a crime scene. As screams echoed in the stillness, lives would forever be altered, leaving unanswered questions and a haunting search for justice.

Originally, Sue, fifteen-year-old John, fourteen-year-old Sheila, twelve-year-old Tina, ten-year-old Ricky, and five-year-old Greg all moved into a trailer together. But about a year later, Sue managed to move them into a cabin in Keddie, giving the family much more space to live in.  

And it was in a good neighborhood, too. Before the Sharps moved in, Cabin 28 was actually the home of the local sheriff, and now it was going to be the place where Sue was going to raise her children.  

The Night Everything Changed

Five months went by, and Sue’s cabin was alive with the hustle and bustle of young teenagers and growing boys. Ricky and Greg had their twelve-year-old friend and neighbor, Justin Eason over for the night. John also had his seventeen-year-old friend Dana Wingate over too, but the girls were out. Sheila was staying over at a friend’s, but Tina was only across the street at Cabin 27. She ended up staying there until about ten o’clock that night before coming home.  

Sue had also been invited out by the neighbors over at Cabin 26. They were Justin Eason’s mother Marilynn and his stepfather Martin Smartt. Martin was an army vet who now worked as a chef in one of the local bars. He also had an army friend over for that weekend named Severin John Boubede, or Bo as he liked to go by. It was Martin’s night off, so he, Marilynn, and Bo decided to go down to the bar that Martin worked at and get some drinks.  

They stopped on the way to invite Sue to join them, but she still had the young boys in the house and decided against it. The Smartt party then left for the bar, but that was, unfortunately, the last time that anyone remembers seeing Sue Sharp alive.  

When her daughter, Sheila Sharp, arrived home the following morning, she was hit by a terrible smell. She couldn’t tell what it was, but, concerned, she walked through the house until she got to the living room. There she found her older brother John and his friend Dana, tied up on the floor and covered in blood. Beside them was a yellow blanket, draped over what seemed to be another body.  

Terrified, Sheila then ran out of the house, screaming and shouting for help. She ended up returning to the cabin that she’d stayed in the night before, and the family there rushed back to the scene.  

Remarkably, the young boys and their friend Justin Eason were unharmed. They were pulled through a bedroom window to safety while the rest of the neighborhood waited for the police to arrive.  

The Plumas County Sheriff’s Office was the first to respond, but the investigation quickly devolved into complete chaos.  

Inside they found the remains of John, Dana, and Sue. Each of them had been bound with medical tape and electrical cords from around the cabin. Sue had been lying under the blanket, wearing only a robe and naked from the waist down. Her underwear had been stuffed into her mouth to gag her.  

Both she and John had been beaten with the same hammer before being stabbed to death. Both suffered multiple stab wounds to the chest and neck, and it was these stabbings that would ultimately kill them.  

Dana had been beaten with a different hammer. He had then been strangled and ended up dying from asphyxiation.  

Inside the cabin, the investigators found two kitchen knives, one of which had been bent out of shape because of the brute force used behind the attacks. They also found one of the hammers that they believed had been used to subdue the victims.  

Scattered around the house and leading to twelve-year-old Tina’s bedroom were pools of blood and splatter. Tina’s bed was also covered in drops of blood.  

It was only then that the investigators realized that there was potentially one more victim in this case, even though at that point, Justin Eason had been trying to tell them for hours that Tina Sharp was actually missing.  

A wild manhunt ensued, where law enforcement and volunteers scoured the neighborhood. With what had happened to her mother and, now that Tina herself was missing, the investigators feared that the motive behind the killings and kidnapping was sexual. It was possible that the people who had done this had taken Tina to keep her alive and abuse her even longer.  

This fear fueled the search for Tina, and it also spurred on the investigation, but right in the forefront of everyone’s minds was one simple question.  

Why had the youngest children been left alive and unharmed?  

Not only that, but all three boys, the two Sharp sons and their friend Justin Eason, claimed that they had slept through the night and not heard the brutal murders happening in the room right beside theirs. Stranger still, the next-door neighbors on the other side of the cabin remembered hearing screams at around 1:30 in the morning. The sound was so loud that they ended up getting up to investigate themselves, but when they didn’t hear the sound again, they went back to sleep.  

Was it possible that the boys really did sleep through screams that were loud enough to wake the neighbors? Or was it possible that there was something else going on?

A Bizarre Investigation and Suspicions of Cover-Up

An interview with Justin Eason’s stepfather, Martin Smartt, certainly made the investigators think so. He told the detectives that both he and his friend Bo suffered from PTSD from their time in Vietnam.  

In the investigators’ eyes, that was one strike against him already, but then Martin admitted that he and Bo had actually left the house not once but twice that night. They first went with Marilynn to get drinks at the bar that Martin worked at, but they left when they thought that the music was too loud. They all then went home. Marilyn went to bed and Martin called the bar to complain about the music to the manager. He and Bo then went back to the bar, leaving Marilyn behind.  

Finding his behavior suspicious, the investigators called all three down to the station to conduct interviews. There, Marilyn told them that she and Martin had separated only days after the murders because he was violent and abusive, and he had a vicious temper.  

That was another strike for Martin, and to put the final nail in the coffin, the investigators had him do a polygraph test. This was where the case would turn again and, almost unbelievably, it would turn in Martin’s favor.  

Martin passed the polygraph and was then cleared of all suspicions. He was then allowed to leave town, and he never came back.  

In the months that followed, someone stepped forward with another, constantly changing version of events: Justin Eason. He’d first claimed to have slept through the night and not have heard anything, but then he told investigators that during that night, he’d had a strange dream.  

In it, he claimed to have witnessed the murders of Sue, John, and Dana. In this dream, he said that he hid behind the door as two men tied up John and Dana and killed them. Tina had then interrupted the killers at work, and they rushed her out of the back door as she called for help. Never to be seen again.  

Justin then worked with an artist to come up with composite sketches of these men. The artist was a friend of the sheriff’s and wasn’t actually a qualified artist or the one the department usually used to draw up witness sketches.  

When the true state of the investigation came to light, the Plumas County authorities were furious. Not only had the investigators mishandled information, but they had also let their prime suspect get away simply because he’d passed a polygraph test.  

By then, Bo had moved to Chicago, where he was later caught in a scam that involved stealing money from police officers, but he would die before facing any jail time.  

Martin, however, was very much alive but had moved out of town. On the way out, he’d stopped in Nevada to send Marilyn a letter. In it, he wrote: “I’ve paid the price of your love & now I’ve bought it with four people’s lives.”  

This letter was never admitted into evidence.  

With their lead suspects gone, the investigators had nothing to work with. No new leads turned up anything substantial, and twelve-year-old Tina remained missing.  

Chilling Discoveries and Lingering Questions

That was until 1984, when a bottle collector discovered what appeared to be the upper part of a skull about thirty miles out from Keddie. Months later, an anonymous caller left a tip claiming that the skull belonged to Tina Sharp. DNA testing revealed that the caller had been telling the truth. The identity of this caller was never determined, and the call wasn’t officially documented. It wasn’t discovered until years later, when another detective found it in the bottom of an evidence box.  

Martin Smartt remained a free man and died in 2000. Shortly after that, the therapist that he usually worked with came forward to the Plumas County Sheriff’s Office and said that Martin had admitted to him that he’d killed Sue and Tina Sharp.

Conclusion: The Haunting Mystery of Cabin 28

The murders in Cabin 28 remain one of the most chilling unsolved cases in American true crime history. The twists and turns of the investigation—marked by botched procedures, suspicious behavior, and lingering doubts—paint a picture not just of a brutal crime but of systemic failure to deliver justice. For the Sharp family and the small community of Keddie, the scars of that night in 1981 have never healed.

This case is a reminder of the devastating human impact of violence and the ripple effects of an unsolved tragedy. Questions about Martin Smartt, Bo, and the role of law enforcement in the investigation continue to swirl, leaving a legacy of frustration and heartbreak. Even decades later, the mystery feels tantalizingly close to resolution, yet maddeningly out of reach.

What truly happened in Cabin 28 that night? Why were some children spared while others were brutally killed? And how did critical pieces of evidence—like Martin’s ominous letter—go unexamined for so long?

For those of us captivated by true crime, this case serves as both a warning and a challenge: to look beyond the sensational details and demand accountability, not just from the perpetrators but from the systems meant to protect victims and deliver justice. The haunting echoes of Cabin 28 demand not just answers but remembrance—of Sue, Tina, John, and Dana, whose lives were cruelly taken and whose stories deserve to be told with dignity.

The mystery of Cabin 28 lingers, but so too does the hope that one day, the truth will finally emerge, bringing justice and closure to a case that has haunted us for over four decades.