The Knotek Sisters: Episode 2: Yes, Shelly Dear!

Previously on The Secret Sits, we have begun exploring the lives of the Knotek sisters; Tori, Nikki and Sami and the control their mother asserted over every aspect of their lives.  Shelly’s best friend Kathy has just been found dead in the laundry room of Shelly’s house, and that is where we find ourselves while we pick up our story today.

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Transcript

 [Underscore Music]

Previously on The Secret Sits, we have begun exploring the lives of the Knotek sisters; Tori, Nikki and Sami and the control their mother asserted over every aspect of their lives.  Shelly’s best friend Kathy has just been found dead in the laundry room of Shelly’s house, and that is where we find ourselves while we pick up our story today.

[Theme Music Start]

Welcome to The Secret Sits, I’m your host John Dodson.  Join us every Thursday as we uncover the Secrets behind the world’s most fascinating true crime cases.  You can find all episodes of The Secret Sits for free on Apple Podcast, Spotify or where ever you get your podcasts.  And if you like what you are hearing, reach out to us on Instagram and Facebook @The Secret Sits Podcast or on Twitter @SecretSitsPod. Now, on with our story.

[Theme Music Play Out]

[Under Score Music]

Kathy Loreno’s disappearance needed a cover story.

The scent that permeated the air around the little farm house was full of the stench of burning tires and diesel oil.  The smell of what Dave used to burn Kathy’s body until it had all but disappeared.  He had also used a backhoe to peel the top layer of soil from the earth where the fire had happened.

Shelly’s mood had brightened a few days after Kathy’s death.  She spun a tail that Kathy had left town to live with her new boyfriend Rocky.  So she gathered the family on the porch for a family meeting.

“You remember my friend Rocky? Remember how he was so interested in Kathy?  And you all liked him?” Shelly stared at the family for a response, but none of the kids remembered any of this.  You see, this was Shelly’s MO, she would make people believe that they were crazy for not remembering things, that never happened and then she would implant a false memory of her choosing. 

But a story needs details to make it plausible. Shelly used a blurry photo of a woman next to a semi-truck and if someone was told was Kathy, they may believe it. Next, Shelly had Nikki forge cards and letters with Kathy’s signature.  She wrote brief messages about how much fun Kathy was having on the road.  Shelly would praise Nikki when the signature looked authentic enough.  Shelly would never touch the cards or letters though and would wipe them clean after Nikki was done with them and then she would seal them into Ziploc baggies. Shelly then made Dave drive all the way to Canada to mail the letters back to Kathy’s family.

Even as this plan was already set into motion, Shelly started getting quiet a few weeks into Kathy’s disappearance.  She knew that she needed a backup plan.  Shelly held another family meeting and during this meeting she looked directly at Shane and said, “If you tell anyone, we’ll pin it all on you, Shane.”  Of course Shane was taken aback by this statement and he proclaimed that he had nothing to do with it and that he would never say anything against his family.

After the family meeting Shane and Nikki agreed that they should tell and that they should have taken Kathy to the hospital that frightful night.  And whenever Shane wasn’t around Shelly would say, “Shane’s going to tell, He’s going to bring us all down.”

Shane knew it was only a matter of time.  He had two choices, tell someone or run away.

In these weeks following Kathy’s death Shelly now wanted to know if Kathy’s family would even have any interest in her, they had not paid any attention to Kathy for the whole 5 years she had lived with the family.  So Shelly called up Kathy’s family and invited them over to the house to visit, which the family abruptly turned down.  So as far as her family was concerned, they were in the clear, Shelly thought.

But now Shelly turned her sights on the next imaginary problem, the house across the street.  A family with three small boys who were not doing well financially.  The family was on assistance programs and barley able to keep up with their house.  “We need to find out what’s going on over there, you need to go over there and listen.” Shelly said to Nikki and Shane.

So Nikki and Shane did as they were told and went on a reconnaissance mission, they came back and reported nothing unusual, garbage pilling up in the back yard, a freezer on the porch but not much else.  They had listened just outside the house’s windows, but couldn’t really hear anything happening inside the house.

Shelly looked at Nikki and said, “The Crawlspace” and Nikki protested but she knew it was fruitless to argue with her mother, so that summer she spent a good portion of her time hidden in the crawl space beneath the neighbor’s house, observing nothing the entire time.  After reporting this Shelly had a new mission for Nikki, “Next time they leave the house you have to follow them.”  So Nikki tailed the family to the grocery store, the post office and the welfare office in South Bend, watching them as they did the mundane tasks of life like any other normal family.

Nikki reported back to Shelly once again that the family knew nothing.  Shelly replied with, “you don’t know that for a fact, Nikki.”  She then made Shane go steal things from their property and spray pepper spray on their door handles.  They typical Shelly behavior that everyone just went along with at this point.

For more than a year after Kathy’s death Shelly kept up these bizarre antics.  And with Kathy now gone and Dave working all of the time the punishment of the two oldest children, Nikki and Shane, was ramped back up.  Sami lived in another world, one mostly free of punishment.  She was popular but quiet and she was the only one that always had nice new cloths for school.

All the while Shelly would repeat her mantra, Shane is going to tell. Dave, however; did not share Shelly’s concerns over Shane, he thought of him as a good kid.  So Shelly, who could never be wrong, needed proof, proof that Shane was NOT good as Dave said.

One time Dave came home and Shelly met him at the door, her face red with supposed tears and she held up a pair of bloody panties.  “I found them in the wood shed, Dave!  Shane must have hidden them there, they’re Tori’s, Shane is abusing our baby!  You have to do something!” Shelly said flatly. Nikki and Sami knew it wasn’t true, but they also knew their mother.  That night Dave beat Shane badly and it renewed Shane’s intention of running away as soon as possible.

February 1995, just a couple of weeks before Nikki’s 20th birthday, Shane was gone.

A day after Shane had disappeared Shelly came into the house with a small wooded bird house that Nikki remembered Shane had built for a school project, her mother was crying and sat the bird house on the table, “look what Shane left for me, and there was a note that said, I love you mom.”  Although no one ever saw this supposed note.  And for some reason Shelly only looked for Shane a couple of times and only for a small amount of time.  This seemed strange since Shelly wouldn’t let anyone get away from her and she would typically search until she found her prey. 

Now with Kathy and Shane gone, Nikki became the prime winner of Shelly’s ire.  She was locked out of the house most of the time, either naked or with only one change of clothes, or just in her underwear, even in the freezing winter.  Nikki would hide things, like sleeping bags and changes of cloths outside of the house, but they were always gone when she went to use them, Shelly had a knack to finding things.  Nikki remembers one day while she was outside working in the yard in nothing but her underwear, her mother came at her with a knife screaming, so Nikki ran.  Shelly finally caught up to her and tackled Nikki, slicing her leg with the knife.  Nikki got up and ran into the woods and spent the night out there in the freezing cold.  The next day when she went into the house, Shelly acted as if the altercation never happened.

One afternoon Sami was doing her chores and when she went into the chicken house, she found Nikki sitting on a bail of hay, laughing and crying at the same time.  Nikki looked up at her and said, “I tried to kill myself, but I can’t even do that right.”  Then Sami saw the small cord for the hay bail that Nikki had fashioned into a noose.

At this point Sami didn’t blame Nikki for trying to end her life, Sami would do the same soon after.

Sami had stayed out late with friends and when she returned home late, she found herself locked out of the house in the cold, but she was tired of Shelly’s games and saw no way out, so she headed to the woods and found a bush with bright red berries, which she knew were poisonous and she eat as many as she could.  But this did not end her life, she just had severe vomiting and diarrhea for over a week after.

In September 1996, now more than 2 years after Kathy’s demise, Shelly applied for a job as a teacher’s aide with the South Bend School District. She felt she had the necessary patience to work with special needs children.

Lara called ever so often to check on her grandkids.  Shane in particular. Lara was concerned that she had not heard from him in some time and every single time she called Shelly had another story about him being out with his friends, teenagers you know.  But when Lara wouldn’t let up and kept calling and calling Shelly finally said, “He’s moved up to Alaska to work on a fishing boat, you know that was always his dream.”  But Lara knew this wasn’t true and of course she didn’t believe anything that came out of Shelly’s mouth. “Next time I talk to him I’ll make sure he calls you.” Shelly said, but Shane never called Lara, it appeared Shane never called anyone except Shelly.

Nikki graduated from Willapa Valley High in 1993 and she set her sights on two things, earning her a degree in Criminal Justice from Grays Harbor community college and getting the hell out of this house.  And then like a slow rolling fog, her mother started rolling over her dreams.  First Nikki’s clothes would disappear until all she had left to wear to school were her tattered sweat pants she used to work in the yard.  Next, Shelly told Nikki that she no longer had a room upstairs and told her she had to sleep on the living room floor, pointing to the spot where Kathy was made to sleep.  Then Shelly took away all of her money and transportation to class.

Nikki was trapped

Shelly put her to work in the yard, she had to be out of the house first thing in the morning and she could not come back until it was dusk out.  And Shelly would berate her work at every turn, “Is that all you did today, you lazy bitch?” Shelly would scream at her.  On the rare occasions when Shelly allowed her to sleep inside, she slept on the living room floor with a couch cushion as a pillow.  Shelly would yell at her that she needed to get a job until Nikki finally yelled back, “I can’t get a job!  Look at me! I have nothing to wear! No way to get anywhere!”

Shelly immediately put on her innocent act and said, “you should have told me you needed a car! I had no idea that was your problem”.

But Nikki was growing older and stronger and so was her resolve.  When Nikki refused to acquiesce to one of Shelly’s demands, her mom began chasing her.  Nikki ran out the back of the house and headed to the chicken coop, but her mom was fast and she caught her just as she tried to lock the door from the inside.  Shelly threw Nikki on the ground and started to beat her, but Nikki kicked her off and fought back.  This caught Shelly off guard, no one ever fought back.  Nikki stood up and screamed, “Fuck off Mom! Don’t you ever touch me again.” And she ran to the house.  As she ran in the house she passed Sami and as she ran by she said, “I just told mom to fuck off!” and she kept running out of the other door and that night she voluntarily slept in the woods.

A few days after this Shelly approached Nikki with an air of concern in her voice, “Sami doesn’t want you here anymore.  Fighting with her mother the way you’ve been doing. I’m sending you to Aunt Trish’s” This was her father’s sister whom she had only met a couple of times in her entire life.  Shelly gave her some clothes, fifty dollars cash, and drove her to the Greyhound station in Olympia.

Shelly was being the sweet and caring version of herself the whole way to the station.  “Ten Days” Shelly said, “Then you’ll come back home alright?”

Nikki was just out of her teens and had never been anywhere on her own, but it turned out Aunt Trish turned out to be the best thing to happen to Nikki in a long time.

Nikki told her Aunt simply that “Bad things happen at home.  Please don’t make me go back.”  The days turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months.  Trish and Nikki cleaned churches and houses and on weekends they tied fishing nets.  Nikki liked the work. 

Nikki never wanted to leave.

Sami understood Nikki’s absence, but Tori felt abandoned.  Nikki had been her older sister who was like a second mother to her.  The night that Nikki left for Canada Tori wrote a note asking for Jesus to bring her sister back.  She also included in the note that she believed her mother’s cruelty toward Nikki was the reason she left.

Early the next morning Tori awoke to her mother punching and slapping her in the face. “What is this?” she screamed at Tori. “You think I’m mean to your sister?”  This was the first time Shelly had ever laid a hand on Tori and she was very scared.

Not long after this a couple of gifts suddenly arrived for Tori.  They were meant to pacify the young girl, but she still didn’t understand why Nikki was gone.  “She’s no good and she doesn’t love you” was Shelly’s answer for Tori.  And then just like that, Nikki no longer existed.  Shelly did not mention her, neither did Dave.  It was like she was a ghost that faded away never to return.

Sami never brought up Nikki either, she was too scared to, because she didn’t want her family to know that she was still in touch with her big sister.

Trish tried to keep Nikki in British Columbia, but she was no match for Shelly.  Nikki headed home to Washington, but she did not return to Raymond, instead she moved into a tent adjacent to her stepfather’s job site on Whidbey Island. From this vantage point Nikki could see that Dave was living like he was destitute.  He had no money in his wallet, the two got groceries from charity food pantries, they showered every morning in the state park.  Nikki remained bitter at Dave for the punishments he had dolled out at Shelly’s request, but now Nikki just saw him as a pathetic loser.

One day Nikki asked her stepfather, “Why are you living like this?  And why are you still with mom?”

Dave didn’t think twice, he simply said, “for you, for you girls.”  

A few weeks later Nikki and Dave temporarily moved into a small condo near his job site.  Nikki thought that hot running water, was an amazing thing.  They moved back into the tent after a while and Nikki got a job in Oak Harbor at a Baskin-Robbins and then a second job cleaning motel rooms.  The motel owner gave her the use of a single wide trailer.  It was a shabby dump, but she was grateful.

For the first time in her life Nikki felt free.

Sami Jo Knotek was now receiving the brunt of Shelly and Dave’s punishments and she entered her senior year taking a “Fuck it” approach to life.  She stopped covering her bruises and she started to call out the things happening at home in classes.

“You are late with your homework” a teacher would say

“My mom threw away my paper” Sami would respond

And it went on, “You are late to class” the teacher said

“My mom made me sleep outside last night and only let me in this morning to get dressed.”

Finally, Sami was called into the school councilor who finally expressed concern over all of Sami’s accusations about her home life.  The councilor told her that they were also concerned because she had her little sister Tori at home.  The councilor said, “we are going to make arrangements to have your sister removed from the home, we are going to call your mom now.”

And in that instant Sami panicked and told the school councilor that she had made it all up.  Angering her mother was too high of a chance for her to take.

It was the summer of 1997 when Sami hatched her final plan to escape from the house of horrors, she had endured her entire life.  The only people Sami let in on her plans where her two best friends Lauren and Leah, who she knew she could trust.  Sami packed everything she owned into 5 black trash bags and left them in her room.  She also left a note for her little sister Tori under her pillow.  The family took a shopping trip to Aberdeen and while they were away Lauren broke into the house and moved out all of Sami stuff for her.  When the family returned to the house and Sami saw that the plan was in action, she told Shelly, “Lauren ran out of gas and I need to go pick her up.”  To which Shelly simply answered “Fine.”

Sami went to Lauren’s house and hid for the day, then she traveled to her boyfriend’s house and spent the night.  Sami had no idea where to go until Nikki told her to call Lara, their grandmother.  Lara gladly invited Sami to come and stay with her.  But by this time Shelly was out looking for Sami and she had already reported Sami’s car as stolen.  So Sami’s boyfriend’s mother Barb, who did not care for Shelly to begin with, volunteered to drive Sami up to Lara’s home in Bellingham in the northern end of the state.  When they arrived Sami and Lara sat with Barb and told her of all of the horrid things which had taken place at the little farm house over the years.

Sami stayed with Lara through the entire summer and like Nikki’s experience in Canada, this was one of the happiest times in Sami’s life.

Nikki was struggling with her sisters absents from her life.  She did not regret leaving because she had saved herself.  But Shelly randomly showed up trying to convince her to return home.  When that didn’t work Shelly called the local Sheriff’s office and made them go to Nikki’s house, they told her that her mother was very worried about her and that she needed to call her, which she didn’t.  Then Shelly sent Dave after her, he started by throwing a brick through the window at the ice cream shop and then anonymous call claiming that Nikki had been the perpetrator.  So Nikki came up with an idea and she called Lara with an idea to come and work with her at the nursing facility in Bellingham.

Lara, of course was thrilled by this and she also had some happy news for Nikki, “it’s funny that you should call just now”, Lara said, “Sami is here too.”

Nikki could hardly contain herself and left for Bellingham on the next greyhound.

The girls reunited, now at Lara’s place and Nikki started working at the nursing home, but not long after the administrators at the facility started receiving calls that Nikki was unkind to the elderly patients.  The state had to come in a investigate, each time.  But the Staff, patients, and their families all liked Nikki.  It was obviously one of Shelly’s schemes.  After these calls, Dave started to show up at Nikki’s work. Sometimes he would just sit in his truck in the parking lot and other times he would stand in the bushes.  Nikki was afraid that Dave was going to try to abduct her and take her back to Shelly where she would be forced to live like Kathy had.  And that was the point, Shelly was afraid that now that the girls were out of her control, Nikki could talk.

Sami was attending a church camp called Camp Firewood and Shelly had found out about it.  She sent Dave.  Sami was walking thought the camp when all of the sudden she saw a face she recognized, obscured by a ridicules disguise of sunglasses, a baseball cap and a hoody.  Dave walked up to her and she led him away for a quick talk.  It was then that Dave realized that Sami had grown up and found her voice, never the less he tried to convince her to come home to her mother.  Sami, agreed to move back home on one condition, that Shelly file her paperwork for college and have it approved before she came home.  Shelly reluctantly agreed. 

The summer came and Sami celebrated her 19th birthday with a surprise party at Planet Hollywood in Seattle.  She did move back home, but just long enough to get her life together for college.  Shelly was pretending to have cancer again and Sami simply told her that she knew she was lying.  Shelly was also blowing threw money as fast as she could.  She would get loans from local banks and not pay them back, she ran a 36-thousand-dollar line of credit under Sami’s SSN, but with Shelly’s name.  She even got the local police to let her off of several moving violations but claiming that her daughter had cancer and her life was difficult. 

All alone in the house now Tori was now it.  But it started small, the homework would go missing and Shelly would have no idea where it went.  But Tori mostly missed time with her dad.  When he was home Shelly and Dave just fought all of the time and now Shelly started the conversation around divorcing Dave.  Tori was starting to see that she was caught in the middle of a war between her parents and she was certain she would end up as collateral damage.

Sami was the middle child, but during this time in the family’s life, she was truly the middle.  Sami spoke to Nikki without Shelly knowing, Sami spoke to Tori, Sami was the middle.  One day when Shelly was out of the house Sami decided to poke around in her mother’s bedroom.  She was very cautious because she knew how her mother could spot one tiny thing that had been moved.  She peered under the bed and saw a garbage bag.  She pulled it out and it appeared to be full of dirt and shells, but then Sami realized that it was not dirt and shells, it was bones mixed with ash, Sami knew they must have belonged to Kathy Loreno.

 Sami first heard about Ron Woodworth when her mother called her dorm and mentioned her quote unquote, new friend who was helping out an old woman who owned dozens of cats but was being evicted.  Shelly finally landed a job, as a caseworker for Olympic Area Agency on Aging in Raymond.  She met Rob through Habitat for Humanity on the case with the woman with all the cats.  Shelly had brought all of the woman’s belonging to the pole building and invited her to move in, but she said she wanted a place of her own.

Tori began visiting Ron at his trailer after school and noticed how his own cats had made a mess of his home.  When Sami met Ron some time later, she described him as having quite a belly that hang over his belt like a fleshy fanny pack.  His har was thinning on top, but the rest he kept long and pulled back into a pony tail.  He was quick, sarcastic and Sami like him right away.  During one afternoon visit to Ron’s Tori was reading through some of his books on Egyptology, a subject that fascinated her.  He told her about the importance of life and the role of the hereafter. 

Later, when Shelly would insist that Ron could be suicidal, Tori would transport herself back to that conversation, “He would never do that.” Tori told her mother.

Ron Woodworth had followed his partner of 17 years, Gary Neilson, down to south bend in the summer of 1992.  In a very real way the relocation was a fresh start for Gary and Ron who had been feeling some discord in their relationship.  The relocation was offered to Ron as a take it or leave it.  Gary was the love of his life and there was no way he was going to let him go.  But after the death of Ron’s father, his behavior changed drastically.  He couldn’t even hold down a job.  By the end of 1997 Ron and Gary’s relationship was over.

By 1999 Ron’s life had spiraled out of control and he was barrowing money from friends just to try and make ends meet.  Then, some good luck happened to Ron when Shelly invited him to move in with her and Tori at her house.  She gave him Sami’s old room and he even babysat Tori occasionally.  The first time Dave had heard of Ron was when he made it home from work and Ron was already living in the house.  Shelly introduced them and told Dave not to worry because Ron was gay.  Dave could not have cared less.  Shelly could have been sleeping with him for all he cared, he just needed a couple more years and then he could leave, because all of the girls would be grown.

The honeymoon faze of Ron living in the house only lasted about two weeks.  Initially Shelly doted over Ron and he always had a “Yes, Shelly dear” in response.  Shelly would call him to dinner and no matter what the meal was Ron would say, “OOOh, it looks so good, Shelly Dear.”  But after two weeks Shelly turned back into her old self.  Shelly would yell at Ron, “I don’t want a useless fag like you talking to me Ron.  Get out of my site and stay away from my little girl, you are a bad influence.”  And then things got way, way worse.

Shelly started hitting Ron, he was no longer allowed to eat meals with Shelly and Tori and Shelly would only feed him a single piece of toast and a glass of water.  She would take him out back for punishments and Tori watched as her mother made him take handfuls of pills.  When Tori asked her mother about the pills, she said they were sleeping pill to calm him down.  But Ron was already no longer the Ron that Tori knew, he just wasn’t himself anymore.  It was like he wasn’t even there.

Shelly evicted Ron from his room and he was made to sleep on the computer room floor.  Next came revoking his bathroom privileges, she told him she didn’t want a fag using her bathroom.

On June 19th 2001, the Olympic Area Agency on Aging fired Shelly after numerous complaints and her erratic behavior and attendance record.

Shelly had manipulated Ron on every front.  He had abandoned all of his friends and family and gotten deeper and deeper into financial trouble.  In fact, he was now so alienated that he had no one in his life.

Just Shelly.

By 2001, Lara Watson retied from her career setting up operations for hospitals and nursing facilities and she wanted a new project.  When she came across the opportunity to refurbish an old monastery in Sandy, Oregon, into a bed-and-breakfast and wedding venue, she jumped at the chance.  It was early July when Nikki called Lara and told her that she wanted to move down to Oregon to look for a new job.  Lara was ecstatic.   Nikki landed a job on her first day in town and it seemed like an echo of their happy time together in Bellingham.  But things shifted that first night when Nikki and Lara were watching a crime show on cable TV.  Lara noticed when her grand-daughter got quiet, but she thought maybe she was just tired.

Then next morning Nikki went to talk to her grandmother, “I have something to tell you.” She said.

Lara could tell Nikki’s eyes were wet and red and she had been up all-night crying.

“What is it honey?” she asked

A long pause filled the room

“Mom and Dad killed Kathy” Nikki finally said.

The words caught in Lara’s throat when she repeated, “Killed”

Nikki just nodded and said, “Murdered”

Nikki let it all out she told Lara about everything that had happened, first at the Louderback House, then the Monohon Landing Road house.  Lara pulled herself together and came up with a plan, “we have to tell” she said.  Lara phoned the police chief in Sandy, Oregon.  When he came over Nikki told him the story and he called the local police in Raymond, South Bend and Old Willapa – Pacific County, Washington.

Once Nikki had confided her story to her grandmother and the police, she was still terrified.  What happens if Shelly and Dave keep getting away with this, what will happen to her little sister Tori? 

Over some drinks back in Bellingham, Nikki once again found her voice and told her entire story to her boyfriend Chad.  At first Chad thought she was having a laugh.  But Nikki told him that her grandmother and the police had everything covered, and Chad thought, bullshit.  It wasn’t that he did not believe her, but he felt that what she had done was to essentially pull the pin and toss the grenade while walking away.

“You need to go back and tell the police in person” Chad told her.

Nikki was frightened, “I can’t do that.  I can’t go back down there and just tell.”

Chad looked at her and said, “Look, either you call the police or I will.”

The next day they got into his Yukon and started for Raymond.  Around Mount Vernon, Chad’s phone rang.  He didn’t recognize the number when he answered the call, a second later he turned to Nikki and said, “It’s your mom.”  Nikki couldn’t believe it.  How had Shelly gotten Chad’s number, maybe from Sami?  Chad pulled the truck over, and the truck idled while Nikki spoke on the phone, her heart pounding like a jackhammer in her chest.

“I’m planning a trip to Disneyland” Shelly announced. “You girls and me and dad, won’t that be wonderful?”

Nikki was shaking, “Yeah, sounds great.” She replied before making up an excuse to hang up the phone.  Nikki phoned Sami next and told her that she was on her way to tell the police about Kathy’s death.  And she also dropped a bomb on her little sister, “I think mom had Shane killed.”

Chad waited outside while Nikki told the Pacific County sheriff’s deputy Jim Bergstrom what she knew about Kathy.  Bergstrom told Nikki that he had been out to Shelly’s house a few times in recent months looking for Kathy at her family’s request.  After the interview, Chad took Nikki back to Bellingham.  They broke up not long after.  It was too much baggage for their young relationship.  

Nikki felt that she had started something big, she felt she had started an earthquake.  But nothing happened. Nothing at all.  As far as Nikki knew, the deputy never followed up.  Never spoke to Sami.  Never searched the house, he never even brought Shelly in for questioning.

Well, that is what Nikki thought.  The deputy had tried to reach Sami, to verify Nikki’s story, and Sami had received all of his messages, but pointedly decided not to return his calls.  Sami had decided she would talk to police, only after her mother was in custody.

Tori, however; was still stuck at home with Shelly.  And being the only child left in the house, she became the target for her mother’s games although they were never as bad for Tori as they had been for Nikki, Shane, Kathy, Sami and Ron.  And Shelly also did not repeat punishments very often for Tori, once she had endured her mother’s torturous routines once, they were usually not repeated.  And Tori found it hard to hate her mother, because after every punishment, Shelly turned back into the doting mother, stoking Tori’s hair and expressing her eternal love for the child, she had just forced to stuff her underwear with rotting garbage.

But Tori didn’t mention Nikki anymore, no one saw Nikki, except for Sami.  That remained a bid secret.

Secrets, all three Knotek sisters new, ran in the family.

Shelly was busy pushing buttons with Ron’s family behind his back.  Shelly started to take care of Ron’s mother Catherine, running her to the doctors and even having her stay at the house while Catherine’s house was being bug bombed for fleas.  And at the same time, she was busy spending her time trashing her supposed best friend, Ron.

On November 4th 2001, Catherine phoned her younger son, Jeff and said she wanted to move to Michigan to be closer to him and closer to where her husband was buried.  She told Jeff that Ron had a felony arrest warrant out for writing bad checks.  Later, she became undecided about the move after considering the climate and not wanting to be a burden. 

Shelly began inserting herself deeper into the Woodworth’s family matters, and sent the following note to them on November 29th 2001.

“Your mom’s doing well.  I’m taking her picture this week for you all – and she’s having her hair fixed this week for the Christmas season.  I wish I could do something to help you all.  God bless you and yours.”

In December, Catherine called Jeff in Michigan about a letter Shelly had hand delivered to her from Ron in response to her giving away all of his cloths.

“You are one fucking stupid bitch.” He began “I really cannot believe that you could be so fucking incredibly stupid as to think that you had the fucking right to steal my few possessions from me.”

Shelly mailed the letter a few days later to Rob’s brother with her own addendum: “Enclosed you’ll find the letter that Ron had sent your mother.  I feel so bad about all of this.”  

Ron’s sister-in-law responded with her own assessment. “this letter was even more abusive then the last, using the F-word 22 times by Michelle’s count.  I gave Michelle permission over the phone to screen all mail to Mom from Ron and to contact adult protective services on December 3rd.”

It was now winter break so Sami was home from Evergreen.  Tori was off with friends somewhere and Ron was working out in the pole building when a Pacific County sheriff’s car pulled up to the house.  Shelly answered the door right away and Sami couldn’t hear what was happening.  The moment Shelly shut the door Sami was panicked.  “Why are they here?  It’s about Kathy isn’t it?  They know about Kathy, Mom!”

Shelly’s eyes widened and she ran to her daughter, holding her tight, “oh no, it’s just papers for Ron.  It’s nothing, I tell you.  Not about Kathy.”

Sami started to cry and went into her mother’s bedroom.  Shelly came in to comfort her.  She said that Kathy’s death had taken a terrible toll on her too.  Shelly said she could barely live with herself because she let things get out of control, she had, had lapses in judgment when she let Nikki and Shane abuse poor Kathy, resulting in her death.

But Sami couldn’t think of a single time Shane had harmed Kathy.

Shelly Knotek is now starting to spiral in her efforts to keep everyone in her life, under her control. What will happen to this beleaguered family if she is allowed to continue her supremacy?  Join us next week when we continue our story.