Cary Stayner By: Bentley Hammet

On February 12, 1999 Carole Sund, her daughter Juli 15, and their 16 year old foreign exchange student Silvina Pelesso left home to vacation at the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Yosemite.

They rented a 1999 Pontiac Gran Prix. Stopped In Stockton for Juli’s Cheerleading competition held at the University of the Pacific. They continued on and arrived early February 14th at at the Cedar Lodge in the city of El Portal where they had reserve a room for three.

On February 15th they hiked through Yosemite’s National Park. According to the Hotel, that evening they rented movies from the Lodge’s guest service counter and spent the night in their room. They were never seen alive again. On February 16th the inn staff cleaned the room. There was no evidence of violence.

The three ladies were scheduled to meet Mr. Sund at the San Francisco airport where they would accompany him to Pheonix, Arizona. He first assumed they had flown ahead. After having no contact with his wife for his entire first day in Arizona, he called the police. Yosemite security began to search the park, assuming that the three had gotten lost in the park.

FBI found Carole Sund’s wallet in Modesto, 4 weeks later. FBI agents were puzzled as to how it got there. FBI was now treating this case as a murder. With no leads, and no evidence, The FBI began to fear for the worst.

On March 18th, a hiker discovered the site of a burned out 1995 red pontiac hidden off a main road in the Stanislaus Forest area. The license Plate matched the license plate on the Sund’s rental car. FBI agents arrived and discovered two charred bodies, later idenified as the bodies of Carole Sund and Silvina Pelosso. Juli was still nowhere to be found.

On March 25, the badly deomposed body of Juli Sund was found near Lake Pedro in Tuolumme County. Her throat was cut.

Suspects Task force arrested several known sex offenders, drug users, and ex-convicts with a record of violence between Modesto and Sonoma. The killer had to of known the area well due to where the bodies were found.

Michael larwick, 42, drug user. Eugene Dykes, 32, Larwick’s half brother Billy Joe Strange, 39, parolee who worked at the Cedar Lodge Darell Gray Stephens, 55. Rachel Lou Campbell, 36 Many others were brought in and questioned.

Cary Stayner was brought in for routine questioning due to the fact that he worked at the Cedar Lodge and then let go. He was observed as friendly and clean cut. Law officials didn’t think twice about letting him go.

Stayner Strikes again A few months later, a concerned friend calls police regarding the whereabouts of his friend Joie Ruth Armstrong. Her gruesomely decapitated body was found the morning of July 22 in a campground near her home in the Foresta community. Investigators determined that she had probably been murdered the evening of July 21.

Cary Stayner was detained and brought in for an interrogation. They searched his truck and seized his back pack. Both contained evidence leading him to the both crimes. On an interview with KNTV stayner shocked thousands. “I am guilty. I did murder Carole Sund, Juli Sunda Silvina Pelosso and Joie Armstrong..none of the women were sexually abused in any way.

Trial Stayner pled not guilty as reason of insanity. For reason’s found in his past Brother was kidnapped and sexual abused before being reunited with his family after 7 years. Suicide attempt in 1997 Request for child porn in exchange for information about his murders. He was convicted of Murder in the 1st degree and was sentenced to life in prison in 2001 He was given the death penalty in 2002 He is now serving his time in San Quentin Penitentiary.