In 2008 a boy from Woodland Park Colorado[a] would go missing, only for his body to show
up seven years later somehow stuck in the chimney of an abandoned cabin[b]. Today we’re
going to be taking a deep look into the intriguing and heartbreaking mystery surrounding the
death of Joshua Maddux.
Surrounded by the beauty of Pike National Forest lay Woodlap Park, a small city[c] with
only a population of 7,500. Among those 7,500 was a true free and carefree spirit in the
form of 18 year old Joshua Maddux[d]. He was an incredibly well liked person, both from
his teachers for his good grades and from his peers for his kindness, humor, and amazing
guitar playing! Unfortunately, this would all come to a halt on May 8th, 2008. Joshua
told his sister Kate he was going for a walk alone , which in and of itself wasn’t unusual
as Joshua loved to take nature walks and hikes by himself. The family became slightly worried
when hour after hour passed and Joshua still hadn’t returned home, but these long excursions
into the forest[e] weren’t necessarily unusual for Joshua so there was no reason to panic
now. Not only that, but Joshua was 18 years old and legally an adult, and his parents
were big proponents of letting him come and go as he pleased with the faith that he would
be able to handle whatever situation he might find himself in. However, when the hours turned
to days and there was still no sign of Josh, his Father took the initiative to report him
missing to the police [f]on May 13th, just short of a full week after he had left.
Joshua’s Father called around, reaching out to Josh’s friends to see if anyone had
any information on his son, but no one had seen or heard from him since early May. Searches
for Josh began, spanning the Parkland area for any sign of him[g], but sadly as weeks
and months passed with no new information, the case of Joshua Maddux slowly began to
lose traction. Josh’s happy disposition gave the police no reason to believe that
he had been involved in any criminal activity that could have led to his disappearance,
so they listed him as a missing person and left the case open, hoping that any remaining
searches might turn up some information to bring his family closure. Kate Maddux, the
last person known to have spoken to Josh before his disappearance, said she liked to think
that he had run off to start a new life as a Musician in another town, and that one day
he would show up back on their Father’s stoop with a wife and some children ready
to meet their Grandparents and Aunts[h]. The Maddux family eventually moved, but Mike,
Josh’s Father, held onto the ownership of the house just in case Josh ever returned.
Sadly, however, that would never happen.
The years passed with no new news about Josh’s situation, that is, until in 2015 a local
builder named Chuck Murphy made a shocking discovery.[i] Back in the 1950’s, Chuck
Murphy had bought a cabin on Meadowpark Lane[j] in a large plot of land surrounded by forest.
The cabin had an interesting history, having been used as a den of illegal gambling by
it’s former owner[k]. However in the last decade it had gone mostly unused and was in
a state of abandonment and disrepair, leading to Chuck making the decision to demolish it
and thus changing his life and the lives of the Maddux family forever.
While demolishing the cabin, construction workers found a decomposing skeleton wedged
into the cabin’s chimney.[l] Through dental records[m] the police were able to identify
the body as Joshua Maddux. While this gave closure to a missing persons case that at
this point had been open for seven long years, it also raised a lot of questions. How had
Joshua ended up at the cabin? Had he been murdered and placed there? Was his death merely
an accident? Everyone only wanted to know one thing: What happened to Joshua Maddux?
With the body having been found during the demolition of the cabin, much of the evidence
that possibly could have been used to answer some questions had been destroyed or messed
with. The body itself didn’t answer many questions either, with little to no signs
of trauma, according to Teller County coroner Al Born[n], as well as no drug use. With that
in mind, the cause of death could have likely been dehydration or possibly hypothermia[o]
but they had no way of knowing for sure. With no hard answers anywhere, Joshua Maddux's
death was ruled an accident on September 28th 2015, a month after the body had been found
and seven years after he had originally gone missing. The most promising theory the police
had was that somehow Joshua must have climbed on to the roof of the cabin and fallen into
the chimney, getting himself stuck and slowly freezing or dehydrating himself to death.[p]
While this theory became mostly accepted, one individual had his own ideas. Chuck Murphy,
the owner of the cabin, found this theory incredibly hard to believe as he knew there
was a rebar cage covering the top of the chimney! [q]If this was there then there was little
to no way that Joshua could have broken it apart to fall in in the first place. This
wasn’t the only issue with the police’s theory. Joshua’s body had been found mostly
naked, wearing only a thermal shirt, with the rest of his clothes resting by the base
of the fireplace.[r] If he had fallen in then how had he taken off his clothes while apparently
stuck, and how had he managed to throw them outside of the fireplace? Not only this, but
the last time Chuck and his family had been in the cabin the fireplace had actually been
blocked by a custom built breakfast nook![s] This means someone would have had to pry off
and move the breakfast nook to even access the fireplace, so even if Joshua had somehow
been able to remove them and throw them outside the fireplace, who unblocked the entrance
to the chimney? With all of this information the coroner’s cause of death was becoming
harder and harder to believe, but if it really was murder than who could possibly have comitted
the crime? The identity of the possible murderer had left everyone stumped. Joshua had told
Kate that he was walking out alone that fateful day, nor did he have any enemies who might
want to hurt him. It seemed like there was no clear way to turn. That was until a thread
popped up on the website Reddit of all places. [t]
In 2016 an r/AskReddit thread was started, asking people who knew real life killers to
share their stories[u]. One anonymous user posted a story that seemed all too familiar
to many people. User Gentamangina[v] wrote that their good friend Josh had begun to hang
out with this or teenager named Andy[w], and heard Josh say that the two of them were planning
a trip down to New Mexico. After Josh had disappeared, the user forgot about Andy, that
is, until someone showed them two articles chronicling Andy and the murder he was charged
for. [x]Andy had apparently made good on his plans with Josh and went down to New Mexico,[y]
only to be the perpetrator of a fatal stabbing, and even claim to have stabbed another woman
and shove her in a barrel[z], not unlike Josh being shoved into the chimney. The reddit
user in question of course connected the dots about Andy and Josh and immediately went to
the police[aa] to report their hunch. However, the police were not interested. At the time
of them reporting this possible lead no body had been found and Joshua was a legal adult,
meaning the police didn’t really care enough to look into them. Apparently one of the cops
told the user that Josh was actually alive and living in the next town over, which is
obviously not true.
With all of this stacking up it’s incredibly easy to believe that Andy might have met up
with Josh at some point and led him to the Cabin, where something inevitably went down
that led to Andy murdering Josh and stowing his body away in the chimney.[ab] However
this theory comes with it’s own flaws. Up to this point Andy seems to have a penchant
for stabbing people, but Joshua’s body showed no signs of trauma[ac]. There’s also no
real proof that Andy and Joshua were friends. While the story seems to have enough circumstantial
details to make it seem real enough, everything we know about Joshua and Andy’s relationship
comes from an anonymous Reddit user who could have been making everything up for all we
know. With no actual evidence this theory remains just that: a theory. There is one
other major flaw with the murder theory. Chuck Murphy mentioned that there was a rebar cage
covering up the top of the chimney which would have prevented Joshua from falling in accidentally.[ad]
However, Murphy repeatedly described this cage differently. At one point the cage was
described as rebar, which Joshua, who at the time would have been around one hundred and
fifty pounds, would have had no chance of breaking, but he later described it as a metal
mesh, which seems like it could have been easily removed. [ae]Not only were there these
inconsistencies, but the police actually stated that they never found any such chimney covering
on the premises at all, though it is entirely possible it was hauled away for scrap by the
construction workers before the police could get to it[af]. Murphy also noted at one point
that the fireplace had a Heatilator insert, which others have since pointed out would
have stopped someone from standing up in the fireplace or somehow cramming the body in
there.
While at first glance many of these theories seem true, ranging from an accidental fall
or an intentional murder, but when you dig deeper nothing seems to make sense, and you
end up with more questions than answer. It’s currently unlikely that we’ll ever get true
confirmation on what happened to Joshua, with too much information simply left undocumented
or obscured by the active contruction that was happening at the crime scene. This unsolved
case is one of the most mysterious we’ve ever come across, and is as intriguing as
it is heartbreakingly tragic. Joshua Maddux was a genuinely good human being, with a knack
of art, music, writing, and with a truly free spirit, and the fact that anything this heinous
could happen to someone like him is awful.
This is the end of the story for now. Comment below your thoughts about the situation, or
any other stories you’d like us to make a video about. Thank you for watching and
we’ll see you in the next one.
Sources: https://www.darkhistories.com/josh-maddux-the-boy-in-the-chimney/
https://www.strangeoutdoors.com/strange-indoors/joshua-maddux http://crimesceneinvestigations.blogspot.com/2009/06/new-mexico-murder-suspect-captured-in.html
https://medium.com/true-crime-by-cat-leigh/teens-body-found-in-chimney-93104ecc932
[a]Woodland Park Colorado [b]somehow stuck in the chimney of an abandoned
cabin [c]Pike National Forest lay Woodlap Park,
a small city [d]18 year old Joshua Maddux
[e]long excursions into the forest [f]initiative to report him missing to the
police [g]spanning the Parkland area for any sign
of him [h]he would show up back on their Father’s
stoop with a wife and some children ready to meet their Grandparents and Aunts
[i]2015 a local builder named Chuck Murphy made a shocking discovery.
[j]cabin on Meadowpark Lane [k]having been used as a den of illegal gambling
by it’s former owner [l]While demolishing the cabin, construction
workers found a decomposing skeleton wedged into the cabin’s chimney.
[m]dental records [n]The body itself didn’t answer many questions
either, with little to no signs of trauma, according to Teller County coroner Al Born
[o]dehydration or possibly hypothermia [p]must have climbed on to the roof of the
cabin and fallen into the chimney, getting himself stuck and slowly freezing or dehydrating
himself to death. [q]there was a rebar cage covering the top
of the chimney! [r]wearing only a thermal shirt, with the
rest of his clothes resting by the base of the fireplace.
[s]the fireplace had actually been blocked by a custom built breakfast nook!
[t]That was until a thread popped up on the website Reddit of all places.
[u]In 2016 an r/AskReddit thread was started, asking people who knew real life killers to
share their stories [v]User Gentamangina
[w]named Andy [x]until someone showed them two articles
chronicling Andy and the murder he was charged for.
[y]to New Mexico, [z]have stabbed another woman and shove her
in a barrel [aa]went to the police
[ab]With all of this stacking up it’s incredibly easy to believe that Andy might have met up
with Josh at some point and led him to the Cabin, where something inevitably went down
that led to Andy murdering Josh and stowing his body away in the chimney.
[ac]for stabbing people, but Joshua’s body showed no signs of trauma
[ad]Murphy mentioned that there was a rebar cage covering up the top of the chimney which
would have prevented Joshua from falling in accidentally.
[ae]However, Murphy repeatedly described this cage differently. At one point the cage was
described as rebar, which Joshua, who at the time would have been around one hundred and
fifty pounds, would have had no chance of breaking, but he later described it as a metal
mesh, which seems like it could have been easily removed.
[af], but the police actually stated that they never found any such chimney covering
on the premises at all, though it is entirely possible it was hauled away for scrap by the
construction workers before the police could get to it