On August 7, 2015, Payne Lindsey released the first episode in his first-ever podcast. What started as an interest in film and documentaries became an inspiration after watching Netflix’s series Making a Murderer.
In an interview with Atlanta Magazine Payne says, “Watching that show, something clicked. I said, ‘I want to do that.’”
Payne’s interest in people and storytelling expanded after taking a cross-country road trip. He and two friends traveled through 20-30 states starting from Atlanta, Georgia to the West Coast and making their way back to the East Coast. The 13-minute documentary focused on the lives of local people and trying to discover what makes them happy. Once completed, they took the film titled “Our People” on the festival circuit and won the best documentary short of 2015.
As Payne began research on his next big project, he took inspiration from Making a Murderer and Googled Georgia cold cases. That’s when he found Tara Grinstead a young woman who went missing from her home on October 22, 2005.
Authorities found her front door was locked, and her cell phone was sitting in its charger. Tara’s car was found sitting under the carport, the doors unlocked, and the front seat pushed all the way back. However, her purse and keys were missing. The last time anyone heard from Tara was Saturday night at 11 pm. She was 30 years old at the time of her disappearance.
Tara was an 11th-grade high school teacher from Ocilla, Georgia, and a former beauty queen. At the time of her disappearance, there was little to no evidence found except a single latex glove in her front yard and a broken necklace inside the home.
Family, friends, and investigators had no leads. Over the last decade, law enforcement was never able to identify a suspect, creating the largest criminal case file in Georgia’s history. When Payne came across the case, investigators and law enforcement were no closer to solving the case than they were in 2005.
Payne reached out on Websleuths asking about the case and was contacted by Maurice Godwin, a private investigator hired by the Grinstead family shortly after Tara’s disappearance. From there, Payne’s Podcast began.
Maurice shared leads, contacts, and his own theories with Payne as he collected research, reached out to Ocilla locals and gathered as much information about Tara as he could. In August of 2015, episode one of Up and Vanished launched, clocking in at 5,000 downloads in the first day.
From there, Up and Vanished (UAV) took off, quickly jumping from a small side project to Payne’s full-time job as new leads, evidence, and tips sprouted. On February 24, 2016, Ryan Alexander Duke, a former student of Tara’s, was arrested with charges against Tara’s disappearance, with another arrest on Bo Dukes made in the days following. Bo Dukes is another former student from Tara’s high school and Ryan Duke’s best friend. Though Payne doesn’t take credit for the arrests, the GBI did thank all the media for keeping the case in the spotlight.
Season one concluded with Payne conducting interviews with Brooke Sheridan, Bo Duke’s girlfriend, on details of the night Tara went missing, possible motives, and the aftermath of her disappearance. The trial for Ryan Duke and Bo Dukes is still ongoing, and Payne promises updates on the trial as he moves forward with season two.
On July 31, 2017, Payne aired the last episode. In the last few minutes, he played a recording of a conversation between him and Maurice Godwin. This is what it said:
“Payne Lindsey: Hello?
Maurice Godwin: Hey Payne, Dr. Godwin here.
Payne Lindsey: Hey, what’s up, man?
Maurice Godwin: I’ve been thinking. We did some really good work on Tara’s case. There’s another case I had in mind. I’ve been looking to it for years. Maybe you and I should take a look into it.”
There has been radio silence on the upcoming season two until recently. A teaser trailer released on the UAV website for season. Viewers see choppy video footage with voice-overs from different people.
“She’s gonna turn back up. She’s gonna come back. She just went on one of these journey’s,” says one voice. “Maybe she’s in a cult somewhere and she’s just fallen off the face of the Earth and doesn’t want anybody to find her.”
“There’s just something really, really strange about this whole deal,” says another.
“Apparently there was this one guy that seen her walking off alone into the forest.”
From the clues suggested in the trailer, listeners can expect an investigation on another missing person’s case, but with fewer clues and more speculation. With the help of Maurice Godwin, Payne will likely be investigating the cold case of Kristal Anne Reisinger in the hopes of finding more answers. Season Two was release on August 20, 2018.
