Cabin 28: The Keddie Murders That Remain Unsolved

On the night of April 11–12, 1981, three people were brutally murdered at Cabin 28 of the Keddie Resort in Keddie, California. The violence was discovered the following morning by a teenager who would be forever marked by what she found inside.

Sue Sharp, 36, was discovered in the living room bound with medical tape and electrical cords, her body bearing signs of knife wounds and blunt-force trauma. Her 15-year-old son, John Steven Sharp, lay nearby with his throat slashed and severe head injuries. A third victim, 17-year-old Dana Hall Wingate—John's friend—was found manually strangled, also bearing multiple hammer blows to the head. All three had been bound at the scene.

But the discovery was only the beginning of the tragedy. Sue's 12-year-old daughter, Tina Louise Sharp, was missing. She has never been found.

## The Discovery

On the morning of April 12, 1981, at approximately 10:00 a.m., Sue's 14-year-old daughter Sheila Sharp returned to Cabin 28 after spending the night at a friend's house. The scene that greeted her would define her life. A neighbor, Jamie Seabolt, arrived moments later and made the horrific discovery complete. He managed to remove three younger children from an adjacent bedroom through a window—Sue's sons Rick and Greg Sharp, along with their friend Justin Smartt—all unharmed but traumatized witnesses to proximity with unimaginable violence.

## The Crime Scene

Investigators found victims bound with medical tape and electrical cords. Two knives and a hammer lay at the scene. Blood evidence indicated the living room as the primary murder location. The brutality was methodical: the blunt-force trauma to John and Dana's heads suggested the use of one or more hammers. A crucial piece of evidence lay on the floor between the two boys—a pellet, likely from a Daisy 880 pellet gun, with part of its sights broken off and discovered elsewhere in the living room.

## Suspects and Theories

Investigators have long focused on two men: Martin "Marty" Smartt and Severin John "Bo" Boubede. According to Plumas County Sheriff's special investigator Mike Gamberg, evidence suggests these men intended to harm Sue Sharp, and that John, Tina, and Dana "got in the way" of that primary objective. This theory would explain why some victims were spared while others were not.

In 2016, nearly 35 years after the murders, Gamberg recovered a hammer matching the description of one owned by Smartt and reported missing around the time of the crimes—a potential breakthrough in an investigation that had grown cold.

Justin Smartt, the young survivor found in the bedroom, gave conflicting accounts of that night. Under hypnosis, he claimed to recall seeing Sue with two men, a detail that may point toward the investigators' theory.

## An Unsolved Legacy

Despite decades of investigation and renewed efforts by dedicated investigators, the Keddie murders remain officially unsolved. No one has been prosecuted. Tina Sharp's fate has never been determined. The case stands as a haunting reminder of unsolved violence—one that continues to trouble those who have studied it and the community forever changed by that April night in 1981.

## Sources

https://www.lassennews.com/keddie-murders-revisited-following-the-clues

https://pushinguplilies.com/cabin-28-the-keddie-murders/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keddie_murders

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N46sJaXqBuM