MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF: Lauren Agee

And I'm Britt.

And the story I have for you today is about a young woman whose death was assumed to be an accident, but her mother believes that the facts point to something more sinister. This is the story of Lauren Ag. For those of us who aren't into wakeboarding, the name Wakefest might not mean much. But for those in the sport or people who maybe even live in Tennessee, your ears probably just perked up a little bit, because Wakefest is this weekend long wakeboarding event where hundreds of people come to party on houseboats, camp out, and watch wakeboarders compete. It kind of feels like spring break in the middle of Tennessee at Center Hill Lake, where Wakefest is taking place. But sometime around 434 45, on Sunday, July 26, 2015, a man and his adult son aren't there to party or even to watch the wake borders. They are there to fish, and they're making their way across the lake in their boat toward a more secluded spot. But according to the Without Warning podcast, as they pull into a small cove, they notice something in the water. At first, they think that maybe someone just threw something into the lake, like trash or whatever. But as they get closer, they realize how wrong they are, because floating on the surface, face down, just off the shore, is a young woman's body. Now, at first, the father is basically like, we have to get her out of there. Dude is ready to jump in the water, but his son is actually an EMT, and he can already tell that it's too late. So he knows that the last thing they should do is disturb anything. So he convinces them to turn the boat around and head back to the marina to get help.

They don't have cell phones.

I don't know if they don't have them or maybe if they just didn't bring them or even what the reception situation out there is like. But basically, once they get back to the marina, they meet up with Ryan Melanson and Chris Yarchuk, who are off duty officers working security at a dockside bar for Wakefest, and they decide to go out and just kind of assess the situation. So this group heads back out, and they quickly find the young woman's body still floating in the COVID Those officers notice that she has some trauma to the back of her head and shoulder, although with her still in the water, they can't really tell how bad it is or even what it's from. But they can't just pull her out because they don't have jurisdiction here. So they call out the local authorities, the sheriff's department, and the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, or TWRA. Now, while all of this is going on, officers Melanson and Yarchuk notice a canoe paddling toward the scene. And inside are two young guys. And when they get closer, they start yelling, asking if that's their friend in the water who's been missing. Now, as far as anyone there at the scene knows, there hasn't been a missing person's report filed. But these guys pulling up are clearly missing.

So did they just see the commotion in the COVID and put two and two together?

Well, maybe. But the way Melanson and Yarchuk talk about this encounter with the without warning podcast, they seem to have a feeling that these guys know something.

Like they knew the body was already there.

That's the implication. So they bring these two guys onto their pontoon boat, and they start questioning them. And again, they're out of their jurisdiction, but they're still police officers, and so they're trying to kind of assist here while the others deal with the body that's in the water. So they learn that these two guys are Aaron Lilly and Chris stout, and they're looking for this young woman who'd been in their group that weekend, 21 year old Lauren AG. The officers have Aaron and Chris describe her, and right away, they're confident that that's who they have in the water. But when they relay this to Aaron and Chris, the two don't seem surprised or honestly, even sad.

I mean, maybe they're in shock, totally.

But to the officers, this doesn't seem like shock or just processing their feelings. To be fair, Chris just met Lauren that weekend, and it does seem like Aaron only knows Lauren through his girlfriend Hannah, who's like a childhood friend of Lauren's.

So it could just be like the distance of, oh, like, we don't really know her.

We aren't.

Extremely sad. But also, it is shocking that this person in your group is face down in the water here.

Right? You were just spent time with her. And what's also not helping is that Aaron's been trying, or at least seeming to try to control the conversation since they first stepped foot on the boat, telling Chris basically to keep his mouth shut, like, he'll do all the talking.

Oh, don't love that.

Yeah. And as he does, Officer Yarchuk realizes that he actually is sort of familiar with Aaron and Chris and some of the friends that they've been hanging out with. He had actually seen them around throughout the weekend while he was working. And he'd even met Lauren the night before. Or I guess, technically it was, like, that morning, because it was, like, 02:00 in the morning. And he'd actually seen her with Chris and Aaron. And the three were climbing into a canoe with a second girl, and the four of them paddled out to where they were camping, which was on top of this outcropping across from the marina. And I'm not talking about, like, this cute little outcropping over the water. There was a 90 foot cliff on one side and about a 35 or 45 foot drop on the other.

That does not sound safe.

It's not. And there's actually even a video that's later found on Lauren's cell phone that shows them paddling out to this campsite on Friday night. And someone in the background calls it a death trap. So officer Yarchuk goes with Aaron to this campsite to get Lauren's id. This could help the police positively identify her and get all of Lauren's personal information so they can make the right notifications. And so he gets to see firsthand how dangerous this campsite is. I mean, there's a tent up there and this giant hammock that is strung along the cliff's edge between two trees. Now, while Yarchuk is at the campsite with Aaron, Officer Melanson is still on the boat with Chris. He's just kind of making small talk with him, waiting for the other two to get back. And then at some point, he notices that Chris is staring at the gun on his hip. So he's like, hey, buddy, what are you thinking? And Chris's response is chilling. He says, I'm thinking how I'm going to get that gun off your hip and get off this boat.

What?

And at first, he thinks he's joking.

Yeah, what a funny joke.

Yeah, good one. But Chris actually repeats it again. And the officer realizes, okay, this dude isn't kidding. He wants off this boat in a bad way. Now, obviously, he doesn't make any kind of move for it. Nothing happens. The other two come back, and then they all drive that boat to the marina. And it's here where they meet up with Hannah Palmer, who is Aaron's girlfriend. And like I said, one of, like, childhood friends. Like, she's known her for a long time, and she's actually the fourth member of this group who was camping on that cliff Saturday night. And just a side note, she and Lauren had actually come to Wakefest together. Now, officer Milanson and Yarchuk are just kind of taking mental notes of this group as they all continue to talk. They're also taking digital notes, too, because according to an episode of Crime Watch Daily with Chris Hansen from 2017, Yarchuk's recording some of these conversations on his phone. Now, Hannah tells him, when the group woke up that morning, lauren just wasn't there. Hannah and Aaron had slept in a tent, and then Chris and Lauren slept in a hammock together. Now, if you have researched this case like I have, you might have read court documents that disclose that there was indeed a tent at the campsite, but there were also two hammocks listed. So why exactly they needed to share one. I don't know or really understand. I'm trying not to read too much into that, because Lauren actually did have a boyfriend who wasn't at Wakefest. And like I said, she just met Chris that weekend, so she'd even told a friend that she had no romantic interest in him. Also, you're not fooling around in a hammock, so forget that. Anyways, according to a 2020 episode from 2017, Hannah says that she became worried because Lauren's flip flops, purse, and phone were still there at the campsite. And she's known Lauren for years, so she knows that Lauren would never have left that stuff behind. Hannah tells officer Yarch that she woke up Chris, and he told her that Lauren had gotten up a while ago. But he also says that he didn't feel her get up.

Then how did he know she got up?

Good question. I am not super clear on that. Like, it's not super clear at all from anything. But from what I gather, I think Chris might have woken up and then just noticed that she wasn't there. And then he went back to sleep. And then when Hannah wakes him up later, he realizes she's still not back, which makes sense.

So he knows she got up at some point. He just doesn't know when. But if you've ever been in a hammock, even, like, a big one, I'm sorry. There's no way you wouldn't feel someone else getting out. Like, they're so awkward and clumsy to get in and out of those things.

I know.

Granted, most of the time, I'm with my five year old daughter, who doesn't get the concept, but still, they're kind of tricky.

I agree. But the thing to know is that they'd all been drinking the night before and even into the early morning hours. So I think it's possible that if he