Episode Details

33-year-old Florence Okpealuk was last seen on West Beach in Nome, Alaska. 

Unable to get in touch with her sister, Blaire posts to Facebook asking if anyone’s seen Florence, and starts looking around town. Florence hasn’t been to work or the grocery store, and neither her ex nor her friends have seen or heard from her. Blaire feels like she’s exhausted all of her leads, when Naomi, a bartender at Board and Trade messages Blaire. Naomi says she last saw Florence on her birthday, but that a man in the bar says he saw Florence on West Beach with a miner the night she didn’t come home.  

Blaire and several family members canvass West Beach, asking anyone who will talk to them about Florence. Eventually, a man says he saw Florence leaving a nearby tent around 4 p.m. The man asks Blaire to wait a moment and rummages around inside his tent. He returns with Florence’s socks, shoes, and jacket. Bewildered, Blaire asks where Florence is and why he has her things. The man seems to clam up, but insists he did not bring Florence to West Beach, and he found her belongings outside his tent.  

An older gentleman in the tent next door tells a different version of events. He says he saw Florence with his neighbor the night before, driving down the beach on his ATV. The ATV did not return until the next morning, but his neighbor was the only rider.  

Blaire reports Florence missing at 6:15 p.m. that evening, two days after she last saw her sister.    

Payne Lindsey, host of the Up and Vanished podcast travels to Nome to investigate Florence’s disappearance. Lindsey gets in contact with Naomi, the bartender from Board and Trade, who got the tip from a patron that Florence was last seen on West Beach. Naomi says the man came to Nome as a freelance gold miner, but also drove a taxi in town for Checkers Cabs. The man resided in a tent on West Beach. Naomi only knew him as ‘Oregon John.’ 

• Joining Nancy Grace today:
• Deilah Johnson -  friend of Florence, Tribal Resources Director for the Village of Solomon, author of “One of Our Own” available at www.villageofsolomon.org; Facebook: Deilahrj; IG: @deilah_rex; TikTok: @deilahsolomonenwi
• Randolph Rice - Former Prosecutor and Current Criminal Defense & Civil Attorney at Rice, Murtha, Psoras, website: ricelawmd.com, IG, FB, X: @ricelawmd 
• Angela Arnold  - Psychiatrist, Atlanta GA, AngelaArnoldMD.com, Expert in the Treatment of Pregnant/Postpartum Women, Former Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Obstetrics and Gynecology: Emory University, Former Medical Director of The Psychiatric Ob-Gyn Clinic at Grady Memorial Hospital, Voted My Buckhead’s Best Psychiatric Practice of  2022, 2023 and 2024
• Chris McDonough - Director At the Cold Case Foundation, Former Homicide Detective,  Worked over 300 Homicides in 25 year career, Trained the first Native American Homicide Task Force; & Host of YouTube channel, "The Interview Room." Website: www.coldcasefoundation.org/chris-mcdonough 
• Payne Lindsey  - Podcast Host & Executive Producer of “Up and Vanished,” a true crime podcast about missing persons.

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