Keith and Elaine Dardeen: A Family Trying to Escape Death
10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories
Joe
4.9 • 638 Ratings
🗓️ 20 November 2025
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Dardeen family was supposed to be starting over. Keith and Elaine were packing up their lives in rural Illinois, seven months pregnant with their second child, ready to leave behind a string of unsolved murders that had terrified their community for years. They were trying to outrun the danger. Then, on November 18th, 1987, Keith didn't show up for work. What police found inside their mobile home that day became one of the most savage and inexplicable crime scenes in American history. A pregnant mother beaten into labor. A three-year-old boy murdered alongside her. A newborn killed minutes after entering the world. And Keith? He was found the next day in a field, executed and mutilated in a way that suggested someone wanted to send a message. The evidence is still there. The DNA is still waiting. And someone out there knows what happened that night in Ina.
#DardeenFamilyMurders #TrueCrimePodcast #UnsolvedMurders #TommyLynnSells #IllinoisColdCase #1987CrimeScene #ColdCaseFiles
🔔 Subscribe for True Crime Cases multiple times a week
Never miss a story. Subscribe to 10 Minute Murder for bite-sized true crime episodes delivered fresh every week.
Discount codes from show sponsors. Support 10 Minute Murder and save money at the same time:
https://hypernaturalstyle.com/discount/10MM
https://zivo.life/discount/10MM
https://bigforkbrands.com/discount/10MM
https://prepstartsnow.com/discount/10MM
📱 Follow for Behind-the-Scenes Content Get exclusive case updates, research photos, and sneak peeks of upcoming episodes:
- Instagram: @10minutemurder on IG
- TikTok: @10minutemurder on TikTok
- Facebook: 10 Minute Murder on FB
- Rate & Review: Leave a 5-star review to help other true crime fans discover the show
- Share: Send this episode to fellow true crime enthusiasts
- Join the Discussion: Tag us in your episode reactions on social media
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/10-minute-murder-bingeable-true-crime-stories--4603604/support.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | You're listening to 10-minute murder. |
| 0:07.6 | November 1987, a young family in rural Illinois was weeks away from escaping a wave of unsolved murders. |
| 0:15.8 | Keith didn't show up for work. |
| 0:18.2 | Police found his pregnant wife, his toddler son, and a newborn baby girl |
| 0:23.0 | dead in their waterbed. Keith was in a nearby field, shot and mutilated. The crime scene |
| 0:29.3 | was so brutal that detectives who worked the case still can't talk about it. 30 years later, |
| 0:34.8 | a serial killer on death row confessed, but his story has holes. |
| 0:39.6 | The evidence is still sitting in storage. |
| 0:41.7 | The DNA is still waiting. |
| 0:43.9 | And somebody out there knows exactly what happened that night. |
| 1:15.5 | Yeah. Keith and Delane Dardine were planning their escape. They lived in a mobile home just outside of Ina, Illinois, population 460. It's the kind of place where you know your neighbors, where kids ride |
| 1:22.1 | bikes until dark, where people leave their doors unlocked. At least they used to. Something had changed in |
| 1:28.9 | Southern Illinois. Between 1985 and late 1987, at least 10 people had been murdered across |
| 1:35.2 | Jefferson and Franklin counties. Could have been 15. Nobody really knew. The cases stayed unsolved. |
| 1:42.0 | Local police had leads that went nowhere. Fear started creeping |
| 1:45.9 | into conversations at the grocery store, at church, at the water plant, where Keith worked. |
| 1:52.0 | Keith felt it deeply. People close to him said he talked about the murders, about wanting |
| 1:56.4 | to get his family out, get somewhere safer, so he and Elaine decided to move back to Mount Carmel, |
| 2:02.5 | her hometown. They were packing up, making plans, looking forward to a fresh start. Elaine was |
| 2:08.9 | seven months pregnant, their second child. They already had three-year-old Peter, who was excited |
| 2:14.3 | about becoming a big brother. They'd even picked out names, Casey, if the baby was a |
| 2:19.1 | girl, Ian for a boy. The due date was January 11, 1988. They had time. They thought they had time. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Joe, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Joe and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.