On May 1st 2022, 18 year old high school senior Tyler Schaeffer went missing in the small town of Beulah, North Dakota. Tyler was last seen at 3:00 a.m. that morning walking past the Congregational Church.
The Beulah Police, with the assistance of neighboring Law Enforcement agencies, searched for Tyler for ten days. On May 11, Tyler’s body was found in the Knife River.
There were two blizzards near the beginning of May in North Dakota, which caused local rivers to have much higher water levels and much stronger currents than normal. These conditions could have led to the drowning of Tyler, but an autopsy has not been performed yet to determine the cause of death.
What I want the local Beulah Police to be aware of, something that most small-towns are not aware of, is that for the past 20-25 years there has been a pattern in the upper Midwest, of young males in their late teens and early twenties being abducted late at night while walking home, murdered, and placed in water to make it appear like a drowning.
This pattern was first discovered by New York City detectives Kevin Gannon and Anthony Duarte, as well as Dr. Lee Gilbertson, a criminal justice professor and gang expert at St. Cloud State University. Because of graffiti found at several of the first crime scenes, the murders were called the “Smiley Face Killings”.
Most Law Enforcement agencies did not know about this cluster of similar deaths until much later after the fact, and many deaths were recorded as “drownings”, though in hindsight most of the details and evidence were not consistent with an accidental drowning, such as the victim not passing near water, or having no intention of going swimming that night or any other night.
Please note that two of the most common inconsistencies with the death being declared a drowning, are 1) The young male had been missing for more than several days, but the condition of the body at autopsy indicates that it had been in the water far less time than the person was missing, and 2) The body is found in a location that had already been searched multiple times after the person first went missing. Both of these are indications that the death occurred elsewhere, and the body was placed in water to hide evidence of the actual time, place, and cause of death.
A short, not entirely complete explanation of the “Smiley Face Killings” is given in this link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smiley_face_murder_theory
Here is the Dickinson Press newspaper article https://www.thedickinsonpress.com/news/body-of-missing-beulah-teen-located-in-knife-river
Looking at the photo of Tyler Schaeffer, who was healthy, happy, and just graduating from high school, his death does not make any sense.
This same thing happened to the son of another local woman from Bowman, North Dakota, Bjorn Norderhaug, who was just graduating from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa https://youtu.be/o5FHwJI1OtI
Another good, current, insightful source of information related to both the “Smiley Face Killings” and many other deaths of young males declared as drowning under suspicious circumstances, is former California Law Enforcement detective, missing persons researcher, and founder of Canadian-American Missing Persons Project, David Paulides.
David Paulides routinely assists Law Enforcement, Search And Rescue, and families of missing persons. Here is David Paulides’ contact page https://www.canammissing.com/contact_us.html
I hope that Law Enforcement will take heed, and not be too quick to declare this an accidental drowning.
Dickinson58601 
I wonder why they aint done a autopsy yet! I really hope they are through and do a toxicology.
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In reply to Kim Meeks,
I believe that the Dickinson Press newspaper article stated that the body was being taken to Bismarck for an autopsy. I believe this process could take a week or two for laboratory analysis of blood and tissue.
I tried to ask regular local people what they think, based on what information was in newspaper articles. I assumed that a young man just graduating from high school, out late at night on a Saturday, had probably been at a party. People may have been drinking alcohol, but if Tyler had been drinking, was he intoxicated enough to fall in the Knife River and drown? The people that I spoke to, think that Tyler’s death is suspicious, that it is unlikely he just fell in and drowned.
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An autopsy has been done. What a horrible article to read.
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In reply to Gina Campbell,
The Dickinson Press May 12 newspaper article states, “Schaeffer’s body has been transported to Bismarck, where his cause of death will be determined by the North Dakota Forensic Examiners Office. The autopsy should be completed and the findings released within approximately two weeks, Senn said.”
Autopsy not complete until approximately two weeks from May 12.
If anybody is going to point out that this seems suspicious considering all of the circumstances, the time to do it is immediately. If anyone can provide evidence that this was not a drowning, the time to do it is right now.
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That one lady DID say some horrific things, and she mentioned she hoped he drowned, amongst other deplorable things. I think that is also sus
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In reply to Anon,
If anybody has any information, now is the time to tell it. Police accept anonymous information, plus there are ways to not be identified.
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Look into the Andrew Sadek death. His involved a law enforcement cover up.
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In reply to Rusty Shackleford,
I was a little familiar with the Andrew Sadek case in North Dakota from 2014, where 21 year old Andrew went missing from a North Dakota college, and was found two months later in the Red River. After Andrew’s body was found, and it was revealed that he had been persuaded by Law Enforcement to work as an undercover informant to avoid his own criminal prosecution for selling marijuana, it looked like Andrew had been murdered because he was acting as an informant. This article explains everything that happened https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Andrew_Sadek
In 2012 when 30 year old Eric Haider went missing from a jobsite in Dickinson, North Dakota, and was found approximately two years later buried at the jobsite, by a private detective agency hired by his parents, people from across North Dakota who were familiar with the Andrew Sadek case began contacting Eric Haider’s parents.
It was found out without any doubt, that Andrew Sadek had been caught selling marijuana on his college campus in Whapeton, North Dakota by Law Enforcement. Law Enforcement made a deal with Andrew, that he would not be criminally prosecuted, if he agreed to purchase marijuana from dealers, and act as a confidential informant. After Andrew went missing on approximately May 1, 2014, Law Enforcement told his parents that they would search the Red River when its water level dropped in about one month. Law Enforcement never did search the Red River, it was an unrelated training exercise two months later that accidentally found Andrew’s body, submerged wearing a backpack full of rocks, with a bullet hole in his head. Law Enforcement wanted to rule this a suicide, but Andrew’s parents thought that it was murder because he was acting as an informant on drug dealers.
When Eric Haider went missing in 2012 in Dickinson, Law Enforcement made a very brief attempt to dig beside the underground water line where Eric was last seen working. Eric Haider was found two years later by Discovery Investigations with the aid of cadaver dogs I believe, approximately 20 feet from where Law Enforcement had been digging, but stopped.
People began telling Eric Haider’s parents, that they believed the same thing that happened to Andrew Sadek, happened to Eric Haider, that Eric may have been acting as a confidential informant also, and he was murdered because of it.
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i just got an email about this terrible situation. i have no idea what i could have possibly subscribed to to receive the email, but im glad i did. scary stuff. i wish i could figure out what it was that i subscribed to so i can find and sign up to more stuff like it. nothing beats awareness.
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In reply to snarevox,
Former California Police Detective David Paulides, who is the founder of the Canadian-American Missing Persons Project, and writer/producer of the books/movie series “Missing 411” does weekly broadcasts on YouTube about the latest missing persons cases, and historical missing person cases, that are unexplained.
Every few months, David Paulides gives the disclaimer that he Does Not Cover missing persons cases where there is an explanation for the disappearance, such as the person having a motive to disappear to avoid debt, family problems, legal problems, criminal problems, was mentally-ill, was likely killed by wild animals, or was likely murdered. David Pualides just examines unexplained disappearances.
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Haider was found durning the 40th street reconstruction project. The investigators/police knew he was in that trench. A coworker of mine at the time witnessed the recovery of his body, Eric was crushed and compacted by the backfill equipment. Very suspicious. The whole crew was either hopelessly drugged up or knew what they were doing.
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In reply to Rusty Shackleford,
Eventually, the Dickinson Press newspaper gave some details about what the forensic examiner found during the exhumation of Eric Haider’s body, it stated that his body was found kneeling in an upright position beside the pipe that he had been working on.
I wrote an article about what had happened,( https://dickinson58601.com/2016/03/25/the-death-of-eric-haider-dickinson-north-dakota/ ), and I explained in my article that when underground utility companies backfill trenches, they don’t just go filling them in up to the top all at once, they are supposed to backfill in two-foot lifts, then run a tamper/compactor, before filling the next two-foot lift, which means that there are people walking in the trench and shoveling dirt under the bottom of the pipe, and running the tamper/compactor. How could the pipe crew be making two-foot lifts, walking the trench, running a tamper/compactor, and not see Eric, who was like 6′ tall?
The answer appeared to be, that the underground utility company wasn’t filling in two-foot lifts and compacting, not even three-foot lifts, or four-foot lifts. It didn’t surprise me that much, especially in North Dakota, where safety, work inspections, and supervision is poor, that both the equipment operators and laborers just shoved dirt in over the sides of the trench without a care in the World, which would partly explain how a person on that crew got buried alive.
However, what is more telling of a conspiracy to commit murder, is from the time that backfill began mid-afternoon, no one on that pipe crew went looking for Eric, and at about 4:00 p.m., that whole pipe crew got in their company vehicles, drove back to Bismarck, got in their personal vehicles in Bismarck, and went home. That’s not normal, even assholes go looking to see what happened to a co-worker, unless they knew exactly what happened, so no need to go looking.
The following week, when Police first interviewed the two heavy equipment operators, one of the two operators made the comment that the other operator was, “Running his machine like a scalded ape”, but after the initial interview this equipment operator didn’t want to say anything about backfill being done in a hurry.
From your comment, you said that your coworker witnessed the exhumation of Eric’s body, and that it looked like he had been run over a few times by a tamper/compactor, which indicates that the pipe crew was in the trench doing backfill compaction and would have had a hard time not noticing a body.
Besides that pipe crew acting like something was wrong with them because of their guilty and careless behavior, North Dakotans began contacting Eric Haider’s parents suggesting that Eric might have been a confidential informant, that his pipe crew found out about him being an informant, and killed him before Eric could tell anyone what the pipe crew was involved in.
I am not going to go into all of the details, but a few years after this, I was working for a similar type of company in Dickinson, where all of the heavy equipment operators appeared to be jointly using/supplying/smuggling illegal drugs. In a short time, one of these heavy equipment operators was trying to cause me problems, so I looked him up…he had been arrested in Arizona for 1st Degree Murder and Kidnapping, along with two others in a drug operation. He made a deal with the prosecutor to testify against the other two, so he did not get a long prison sentence. So yes, murderers involved in illegal drug use/supply/smuggling at work in Dickinson. Yes, work crews in Dickinson will kill an informant.
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Was there an autopsy done? What happened? Its been keeping me up at night I have family his age close to the area im worried about.
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In reply to Anon,
In the Dickinson Press newspaper article, I believe that it stated the autopsy would be completed in about two weeks. It has been a little more than three weeks now, and I can’t find any internet article or mention of the autopsy results. In my opinion, it would be better if the medical examiner took as much time as needed, rather than try to provide an analysis quickly.
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I am Tyler’s paternal aunt. A previous reply (Gina Campbell) was given by his mother. I’m sure it was horrible to read.
Something hasn’t set well with me regarding his death. Has anyone seen the autopsy report? Because Tyler’s father’s side of the family hasn’t seen a thing. Just that they did rule it a drownjng?
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In reply to JC,
I try to read the Dickinson Press newspaper every day, usually each of their articles stay up for several days, and I have never seen a follow-up article or follow-up announcement on the cause of death, further investigation, or an ongoing investigation.
I wonder, are the details of the autopsy being kept private in order to spare the family from additional suffering? This is my opinion, if a high amount of alcohol or drugs were detected, this would give the community and friends something to think about, asking themselves, was someone responsible for this, how can this be avoided in the future, does this community need to be more guarded about the availability of drugs and alcohol to their children?
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