Out of the Woods: A Girl, a Killer, and a Lifelong Struggle to Find the Way Home

In prison, Jet would sexually harass other inmates and threaten to rape them in their sleep. However, he was evaluated, and it was determined he did not need to stay in prison. Once free, he would have to register as a sex offender, which he never did. Jet became involved with a wealthy pediatrician who advocated for him in prison and spent thousands of dollars trying to get him out. He eventually posted $15,000 for Jet’s bail.

At the campsite, Jet spoke to Shasta and Dylan about a woman named Dee, who he often called during their time at the camp, and who was involved in helping Jet hide a previous crime by loaning him her car. Shasta couldn’t make sense of how anyone would want to be friends or lovers with Jet. After prison, Jet missed his parole appointment and disappeared to Kansas, where he stayed with his half-sister. He was later found and arrested again. During that time, he had killed three children, but nobody would know about it until much later.

Jet was responsible for abusing and murdering a boy named Anthony, whose case was unsolved for years until Jet told Shasta and Dylan about what he did to the boy. Shasta later relayed the information to the police, who were able to charge Jet and bring justice to Anthony’s family. Jet described how he found Anthony among a group of unattended boys and tricked them into helping him find his “lost cat.” He then threatened the boys with a knife and took Anthony, sexually abusing him through the night before murdering him by bludgeoning him with a rock. Shasta believes that Jet wanted vengeance on the world for the way sex offenders are seen and treated, and that Anthony was a victim of convenience.

Shasta recalls how Jet would have her and Dylan dress up in various costumes as he filmed them, only to have them undress in front of the camera and dance around. Shasta always tried to keep Jet’s attention on herself for her brother’s sake and would say whatever she thought Jet wanted to hear. Shasta continued watching out for Dylan, but noticed he was becoming increasingly quiet and depressed with each passing day.

Later, at multiple times in her life, Shasta requested to view footage of the good times she had with Dylan at the campsite, when they were just playing and being kids, but she was always denied. She felt that seeing those happier memories would help her heal.

Shasta kept trying to cheer Dylan up by reminding him of everything they would see and do when they got home, but it stopped working the more time passed. At one point, Shasta and Dylan woke up in the Jeep with the exhaust running, and Shasta managed to get the door open so they didn’t suffocate. Jet later admitted that he’d tried to kill them, but claimed he was doing so out of mercy and not wanting them to suffer a more gruesome death. Jet had the children perform a wishing ritual in front of the fire, in which he wished for forgiveness and they wished to go home. Jet felt that he was owed another chance. Around the same time, he wrote to his mother about being influenced by a demon that was made stronger by the flaws in the criminal justice system.

For the next couple of years after her rescue, Shasta was repeatedly arrested for theft, selling drugs, having physical altercations with her father, and running away. Selling drugs gave her the money she needed to buy drugs of her own. Eventually, Shasta’s lawyer told her that she would need to go to a juvenile correction facility or risk actual prison time, and Shasta felt that it might be for the best anyway. She was sent to the Idaho Juvenile Corrections Center, and on the long ride there, she went through the painful process of substance withdrawal. She thought about Jet, whose only goal was forgiveness, and how he believed that he found it in Shasta.

Shasta’s time at the facility turned out to be much more fruitful than her time at Vista. The counsellors there seemed to actually care and to understand what the girls had been through. The classes were stimulating, and group therapy sessions revealed truths Shasta had long hidden. The girls were also more supportive, and none accused Shasta of lying.

When a girl named Stephanie, who had molested her brother, joined the house Shasta was living in, she was alarmed at first, but the other girls encouraged her to bond with Stephanie. They saw it as a chance for both Shasta and Stephanie to heal. Shasta soon started to see it the same way, as she and Stephanie both dealt with their issues in similar ways. Additionally, Stephanie felt genuine remorse for her actions, unlike Jet, and did not try to pass off blame.

During one group-therapy session, the girls were asked to draw something they liked as children. Their counsellor urged them to see their innocent selves in the drawings and to forgive what they had done to move forward. Shasta started to realize that for her to move forward, she would need to forgive Jet.

Almost a decade after Dylan’s death, Shasta finally talked about it in the correction facility. She told the other girls during group therapy about how the day Dylan was killed, he had finally caught a chipmunk and the two of them celebrated as they thought they would be going home. Jet actually seemed like he was going to keep his promise and began packing up the camp. He offered Dylan a beer, and at that moment, shot him through the cooler. Dylan put his hand on his stomach where he was shot and looked down in shock, and Shasta couldn’t process what was happening. Jet then shot Dylan again as he begged him not to, and parts of Dylan landed everywhere, including on Shasta.

Shasta could not look at Jet or come to grips with what she was witnessing, but she knew her brother was gone. Jet forced Shasta to help him take Dylan’s body to the edge of the cliff and tasked Shasta with pouring gasoline on it. Shasta watched as Dylan’s body burned to ash. She and Jet got in the truck the next day to go home, and Shasta’s facade toward Jet was no longer there. She refused his advances and made it clear she hated him, and Jet tried to tell her it was an accident. When Shasta was finished telling her story, the other girls in the group affirmed that Dylan’s death was not her fault, and for the first time, she started to believe it, too.

About a week before Shasta was rescued, Jet took Dylan and left Shasta alone at the camp for three days, chained to a tree without food or water. Just as she was becoming certain she would die, they returned, but Shasta noticed that Dylan had changed. He seemed vacant and disturbed, wouldn’t talk, and had a terrible injury in his neck. Jet lied and said he was hit by a car, but Shasta later saw what became known as the infamous “cabin video” on Jet’s laptop, and he forced her to watch it all.

In the video, Jet and Dylan are naked in a barn. Jet masturbates as he ties Dylan by the neck and hangs him from the rafters, strangling him until he nearly dies before releasing him. Jet repeats this action while performing other torturous acts, simultaneously reciting the Lord’s Prayer. He tells Dylan he is doing the devil’s work and screams out to God, asking God why he isn’t stopping Jet from hurting Dylan.

After her rescue, Shasta discovered a letter Dylan wrote to her when he was at the cabin, which detailed his love for her and how much he missed her. When Shasta was at the correction facility, she and her father reached a place of mutual understanding when Steve admitted his failures as a parent, and Shasta apologized for many of her actions against him. Shasta also found that the forgiveness she needed to have toward Jet was not for him, nor was it to erase or excuse his crimes; instead, forgiving Jet would allow Shasta to forgive herself regarding Dylan’s death, and to begin to move on.

The day before Shasta was rescued, Jet attempted to kill her. He drove down the mountain to get cell reception and called the pediatrician and confessed all of his crimes to him. The man didn’t believe Jet at first but had a realization mid-conversation and broke off their romantic relationship. Jet turned on Shasta afterwards and told her he would have to kill her to avoid being caught. Jet told her she could choose between being shot or strangled. Shasta chose being strangled, and just as Jet tightened the rope around her neck, Shasta heard her mother’s voice telling her to survive. Jet released the rope, claiming to have seen God in Shasta’s eyes and told her she was the only person who ever supported him. As a result, he could not kill her.

Shasta’s adult life would prove to be difficult, as her trauma continued to follow her. She went through several chaotic relationships before finding the man she married and having her five sons. In 2019, her father was found frozen and unresponsive in his RV, dying later in hospital, and Shasta never had a chance to repair her relationship with him in the way she hoped to. In 2021, Jet died of brain cancer after months of suffering and disabling disease in prison. Shasta found comfort in knowing his death was not easy though she never got the chance to tell him how strong she had become. Even with that strength, Shasta still wakes up fearing the loss of those she loves. A statement she made for the press includes Shasta’s hope for all the families affected by Jet’s crimes and how she will never let their stories be forgotten.