The Trail Went Cold - Episode 468 - Karen Farmer Beard and Shelly Hansen

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

Tv & Film, True Crime

4.5 • 3.3K Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2026

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

January 15, 1991. Kingston, Tennessee. 35-year old Karen Farmer Beard, who happens to be seven-and-a-half months pregnant, drops off her two daughters at the residence of the parents of her ex-husband, Reece Beard. Hours later, Karen’s abandoned car is found next to a bridge located a quarter-mile away and while a woman claiming to be Karen had phoned a towing service and asked them to pick up her car, investigators believe the caller may have been an impostor. Since Karen was engaged in a heated child custody battle with Reece and alleged that he was the father of her unborn child, there is speculation that this may have been connected to her disappearance and multiple people were involved in covering the whole thing up, but no trace of Karen is ever found. November 12, 1987. Phillips, Wisconsin. After finishing her shift at a factory, 23-year old Marchelle “Shelly” Hansen vanishes without a trace and her abandoned car is found in the parking lot of a resort over ten miles away. Shelly had recently told her family that she was two-to-three months pregnant and said that the child’s father would provide her with financial support if she kept his identity a secret. Less than one year later, a local resident named John Weber is arrested for the torture and murder of his sister-in-law, as well as the torture and attempted murder of his wife, but investigators find no evidence to link him to Shelly’s disappearance, so her whereabouts and the identity of her unborn child’s father remain a mystery. If you have any information about the disappearance of Karen Farmer Beard, please contact the Roane County Sheriff’s Office at (865) 717-4700. If you have any information about the disappearance of Shelly Hansen, please contact the Price County Sheriff’s Office at (715) 339-3011. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/karen-farmer-beard https://www.newspapers.com/image/775231377/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/775231393/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/775239035/ https://archive.knoxnews.com/news/local/pregnant-womans-disappearance-remains-unsolved-ep-407130784-358316301.html/ https://charleyproject.org/case/marchelle-hansen https://www.newspapers.com/image/241224377/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/241224389/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/116548314/ https://www.wsaw.com/2024/01/05/forgotten-wisconsin-cold-cases-marchelle-hansen-single-mom-missing/ On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore a pair of unsolved missing persons cases involving pregnant women. “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	January 15th, 1991. Kingston, Tennessee. Thirty-five-year-old Karen Farmer Beard,
0:09.0	who happens to be seven and a half months pregnant, drops off her two daughters at the
0:13.2	residents of the parents of her ex-husband, Reesbeard. Hours later, Karen's abandoned car is found
0:19.6	next to a bridge a quarter mile away, how while a woman
0:22.5	claiming to be Karen phoned a towing service asking them to pick up her car, investigators believed
0:27.9	the caller may have been an imposter. Since Karen was engaged in a heated child custody battle with
0:33.7	Reese, there was speculation this may have been connected to her disappearance and that multiple people were involved in covering it up, but no trace of Karen is ever found.
0:43.7	After that, the trail went cold. I'm not going to be. I'm not. And so you're I'm going to I'm I'm going to I'm and and I'm and so and I The Trail Went Cold. I'm your host Robin Werder,
1:28.9	and today we're going to be covering a pair of unsolved missing persons cases involving pregnant
1:34.0	women, the 1991 disappearance of Karen Farmer Beard, and the 1987 disappearance of Shelly Hanson.
1:42.0	Ironically enough, about three years ago, I received separate emails requesting that I cover each
1:47.3	of these cases only two days apart, and even though they are not believed to be connected to
1:52.1	each other, they do have a number of similarities, so I thought it would be appropriate to cover
1:57.1	both of them on this episode.
1:59.7	While both victims were pregnant at the time they went missing,
2:02.5	they were not involved in relationships, and it was never conclusively confirmed who their
2:06.9	unborn child's father was. And another similarity is that each of these crimes took place in small
2:12.9	towns, and the victim's car was found abandoned. At the time she disappeared, Karen Farmer Beard was in the
2:19.8	midst of a heated child custody dispute with her ex-husband, Reesbeard, and after Karen dropped her
2:25.3	two children off at the home of Reese's parents, she vanished without a trace before her abandoned car was
2:30.9	found a quarter mile away. What was particularly odd is that on the night Karen
2:35.8	went missing, a local towing service received a call from a woman claiming to be Karen, who told
	...

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