Idaho’s Most Heinous Killing Spree Showcased In True Crime Series
The true story of what is undeniably Idaho's most deranged murder spree is streaming on Investigation Discovery and Discovery + right now. A small community just outside of Coeur d'Alene was visited by a serial killer in 2005 who kidnapped two kids and murdered four Idaho residents before his arrest.
I'm a true crime junkie. These types of crime shows are on my television nightly, and over the weekend I watched a two-hour special on the ID channel called, "The Groene Family Massacre," which is a series produced by People Magazine. I had never heard about this case involving a family terrorized by a ruthless murderer who would later be tied to three other kidnappings and deaths in California and Washington State.
People Magazine Investigates is the name of the series featuring this terrible story that played out on the evening of May 15, 2005, at a property known as Wolf Lodge located 10 miles outside Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Kootenai County law enforcement and the Federal Bureau of Investigations teamed up to track down a sex offender, kidnapper, and murderer named Joseph Edward Duncan, who would later confess to seven murders in total.
Duncan's killing spree lasted from 1996 to 2005, and the lives of two adults and a teen in Idaho, a 10-year-old California boy, and two Seattle sisters (ages 11 and 9) were viciously cut short in the process. The only survivor of his was Shasta Groene, who was just eight years of age when she was kidnapped by Duncan and was the only Groene family member to live to tell the story.
The story is told in season six, episode one, of the People Magazine series which is streaming now. Duncan died on death row of a brain tumor just a couple of years ago.