After days of unexplained disappearance, the two former husbands of the victim became suspects and were subsequently investigated by authorities.
Mysterious Vanishing
At the age of 34, Paige Birgfeld had gone through two marriages and had three children. She divorced her second husband in 2006 and subsequently lived with her children in Grand Junction, Colorado (USA).
On June 28, 2007, Paige Birgfeld disappeared suddenly, leaving her children with a babysitter. That day, before leaving home, Paige said she would be back in the evening. Her family tried to contact her but to no avail. This was unusual for someone as punctual as Paige. Paige’s 8-year-old daughter, Jess Dixon, left many desperate voicemails begging her mother to come home.
Finally, after two days with no word from Paige, Jess and the babysitter went to the police station to report her disappearance.
Investigators began to look into Paige’s most recent husband, Rob Dixon. The two were married from 1998 to 2006, during which they had three children and had a complicated relationship.
Paige met Rob, a successful businessman, in 1997. A year later, they got married. Rob was once wealthy, but his lavish spending habits and failed investments left him nearly bankrupt, making life difficult for the family.
Paige had to take on multiple jobs such as teaching dance classes for children and working as a kitchenware sales agent to support her children and pay bills.
The relationship between Rob and Paige became increasingly strained. One night in 2004, Paige called the police for help. She said she and her husband had argued, and Rob had told her that one day when she came home from work, she would find him and the children dead. Rob threatened to harm the children and then commit suicide.
Nothing serious happened afterward. But 12 months later, Paige accused her husband of assault. Rob denied any physical violence and only admitted to minor harassment.
When the two divorced in September 2006, Rob declared bankruptcy and moved to Philadelphia.
Rob claimed he was in Philadelphia, over 3,200 km away from their old home, on the day Paige disappeared. Rob’s alibi was verified, leading to his removal from the list of suspects.
The Final Appointment
Now, authorities turned their attention back to Paige’s first husband, Ron Beigler, whom she was married to from 1995 to 1997.
Ron was Paige’s high school sweetheart. Their marriage quickly fell apart because Paige wanted children while Ron did not.
However, they remained friends and rekindled their relationship after she divorced Dixon. Ron was one of the last people to see Paige alive around 7:00 PM on June 28, 2007, the day she disappeared.
Earlier, they had arranged to go camping at a spot about a four-hour drive from her home. On their way back around 9:00 PM, Paige called Ron, had a brief conversation, and promised to call him back later. Mobile phone records showed that at that time, Paige was only a few kilometers away from her home.
Ron did not receive a call back from Paige that night. He tried contacting her the next day but got no response. By the following day, Ron called her home, and Paige’s daughter informed him that she had not returned since the evening of June 28.
Despite being the last person to see and talk to Paige, Ron was quickly cleared by the police as phone records proved he was in Denver when she went missing.
The Burned Car
After several days of unexplained disappearance, the two former husbands of the victim Paige Birgfeld became suspects. However, both were subsequently removed from the suspect list after authorities verified their alibi.
On July 1, 2007, three days after Paige Birgfeld was reported missing, police were informed by the public about a red Ford Focus engulfed in flames in an empty parking lot. That was the car Paige had been driving on the night of her disappearance.
Authorities determined it was an intentional arson attack as nothing else around the car was burnt. Additionally, they found an accelerant on the driver’s side passenger seat inside the car, where the fire originated.
The perpetrator was believed to have done this to destroy evidence, including hair, DNA, and fingerprints. Police suspected Paige had been abducted, possibly with her life at risk.
The front driver’s seat of the car had been pushed back, indicating a tall person had sat behind the wheel. Meanwhile, Paige was only 1.6 meters tall and wouldn’t have been able to reach the pedals from that distance.
Police also found Paige Birgfeld’s daily planner in the car. Four days’ plans were torn out, those being June 26, 27, 28, and 29. These were the days Paige Birgfeld went missing.
Authorities, family members, and volunteers conducted futile searches across desert areas, mountain trails, and marshlands.
Shocking Secret
A few days after Paige’s car was found burned, a motorist driving on the highway out of town experienced a flat tire. When he stopped to fix it, he found Paige’s checkbook. Along the same road, authorities subsequently found her medical card, insurance card, and other personal items scattered about 24 km from where Paige’s car was discovered. Police concluded the victim seemed to be trying to leave clues indicating where she might have gone.
Among those items was a business card, which led investigators to a shocking discovery. It’s Paige Birgfeld’s other mysterious life as a former stripper and now a prostitute.
It turned out Paige led a double life. She was known as a dance teacher and a savvy entrepreneur who managed four different business ventures. However, one of those involved running a prostitution operation.
In suggestive online ads, Paige used the alias “Carrie,” a high-priced call girl. She hinted that clients could pay for “additional services” such as nude massages. She earned $1,000 to $1,200 per session, sometimes up to $2,500.
When this truth was revealed, Paige’s family and friends were utterly shocked.
The Final Calls
When the truth about Paige Birgfeld being a prostitute was revealed, her family and friends were deeply shocked. They only knew Paige was having financial problems and had to juggle between 4-5 different jobs. They were convinced Paige had to do this to support her children and provide for her family. Paige was drowning in debt, paying nearly $6,000/month in mortgage for the house she lived in with her children. She had to support three kids while her ex-husband provided very little financial assistance.
From here, investigators learned Paige had a separate cell phone for her prostitution. Speculating she might have been murdered by one of her clients, they focused on investigating everyone who contacted her on the night of her disappearance.
Paige received numerous calls that day, and her final call took place around 9 p.m. on June 28, 2007. Many of these callers were clients seeking sexual services. Police later identified at least seven suspects. Three of the men on this list drove a white vehicle – a car investigators determined to be linked to the suspect.
Each person was investigated and interrogated. But one by one, these individuals were all eliminated from the suspect list, except for one man named Lester Ralph Jones (55 years old). Lester was a client of Paige and was the one who attempted to meet Paige on the day before she went missing. He had a criminal history including sexual assault and kidnapping.
The Unpleasant Guest
According to Linderholm – a masseuse who had worked with Paige, Lester made Paige uncomfortable. Linderholm recounted that Paige once convinced her to go to Lester’s house in her place.
Linderholm said she immediately felt scared when she stepped through the door and met Lester. “He’s very tall,” Linderholm said. According to Linderhold, the first thing Lester said to her upon meeting was, “I want to have sex.”
“I looked at him and said: ‘Then perhaps you should call a different service because I won’t do that. I only receive massage requests from you,'” Linderholm told the police. “I really didn’t want to touch him,” Linderholm said.
One of the key findings police made was that the front driver’s seat of the car had been pushed back quite a bit, indicating the last person to drive this car was very tall. Paige was about 1.6 meters tall, and she wouldn’t have been able to reach the pedals from that distance. Coincidentally, Lester stood at 1.95 meters tall.
Additionally, investigators found out that Lester worked as a mechanic at an auto shop located across the parking lot where Paige’s car was burned. The owner of this auto shop said Lester was a good, honest, hardworking employee, very liked by customers. “Lester has a sense of humor, and he can easily talk to customers, making them feel comfortable.”
On July 5, 2007, investigators contacted Lester. The man said he was willing to talk to the police. Shortly after, an interview was conducted.
Key Clues
During a 2.5-hour interrogation afterward, Lester fully cooperated. He allowed the police to take his fingerprints, provide DNA, and hand over the keys to his pickup truck—a white Dodge truck. However, Lester denied knowing where Paige Birgfeld was or what happened to her.
Authorities discovered that before her disappearance, Paige received a series of calls from an unknown man who called her from a TracFone prepaid phone. This phone only made 5 calls in its entire history, all to Paige’s office phone, and received the last call from her personal mobile. It was activated on the same morning Paige had a scheduled appointment with Lester.
Lester denied ever owning the TracFone. But during searches of Lester’s home and workplace, investigators found a bra, a man’s wig, and a gasoline can. They also found condoms, aphrodisiacs, and a TracFone box in the trash.
From this box, investigators found the store that sold the TracFone. Surveillance cameras at the store captured images of the buyer. Clearly, the man in the video was Lester, wearing an outfit identical to the one he wore during the previous interrogation. But to the surprise of the police, he still vehemently denied it was him.
Investigators brought in scent dogs to the site of Paige’s burned car. They not only detected Lester’s scent but also knew there had been a dead body in the backseat.
Believing Paige had been murdered by Lester, authorities still couldn’t prosecute without finding a body, given the sensitive nature of Paige’s work. Consequently, the case went cold.
The Clear Truth
A turning point came five years later when a long-distance hiker stumbled upon a skeletal remains fragment in a creek bed under a dry stream, amidst rocks, weeds, and bushes. This location was about 8 km away from where Paige’s personal belongings were found near the highway.
Authorities identified the remains as Paige’s after matching dental records. Cracked cheekbones indicated Paige may have been struck at the time of her death. Some duct tape found around the area where the skull was located suggested she may have been bound and gagged.
At this point, despite only having circumstantial evidence, police believed they could charge Lester. In November 2014, over 7 years after Paige’s disappearance, Lester was arrested and charged with murder and kidnapping. His trial began in July 2016, 9 years after Paige went missing.
The prosecutor accused Lester of becoming angry for not being able to see Paige again after their previous encounter. With a history of violence against women, having been accused of sexual assault and kidnapping before, Lester planned to abduct and murder Paige.
Due to a lack of direct evidence, the prosecution faced difficulties in convicting Lester. By the end of 2016, nearly a decade after Paige was last seen, the jury reached a verdict, finding Lester guilty of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
