About This Episode
What is this episode about?
"The Devil's Audition - Part Three" from The Devil Within closes out a three-part series on the disappearance of aspiring actress Valerie McDonald, who vanished from San Francisco in November 1980 after Michael Hennessey offered her a role in a Dustin Hoffman movie that did not exist. This final chapter, subtitled "The Body by the River," follows what happened after Hennessey and John Gordon Abbott fled north toward Canada, where Hennessey died in a shootout with police, and Valerie's identification turned up among the fugitives' belongings while she herself remained missing.
The episode details the October 3, 1991 discovery of partial human remains near the Kettle River in Ferry County, Washington, roughly a mile from the Canadian border — remains that went unidentified for nearly a decade. It was not until January 2001 that dental records confirmed the Kettle River Jane Doe was Valerie McDonald. The episode weighs the geographic overlap between where she was found and the direction Hennessey and Abbott traveled, while stressing that no one has ever been convicted of her murder. It also revisits Phillip Arthur Thompson, later convicted of murdering twenty-one-year-old Betty Cloer, and reconsiders long-circulated claims linking Valerie's case to the Tower Apartments and a Satanic-cult theory, concluding there is no reliable evidence supporting ritual murder.
Hosts and release
Branden Morgan hosts The Devil Within, a filmic true crime and supernatural podcast covering unsolved mysteries, legends and documented crimes. This episode, catalogued under Part Three and connected to the broader theme of The Devil, runs 21 minutes and was released on October 16, 2026.
