 It was April of 2014 when Chris Kremers and LaZanne Froot, two young girls from the Netherlands, set out on a journey that was half-vacation and half-mission trip. The girls have been planning a trip to Panama, where they hope to do some hiking and touring as well as help out some of the less fortunate locals, particularly kids, teaching them arts and crafts as well as learning some Spanish themselves. The girls set out on a scenic hike on April 1st, but less than a day later, the two would disappear. As they were hiking through the Panama jungle, something happened to the two girls that is yet to be fully understood. Months after the victims vanished, investigators came across several key pieces of evidence that left them scratching their heads. As more tips and leads began to pour in, detectives came across a camera that belonged to the two victims, and the photos they found on the camera are disturbing to say the least. Chris Kremers and LaZanne Froot are the last people you would ever expect to become caught up in a national park disappearance. Most of us have probably heard of the various Missing 411 stories that have been shared in recent years, but Chris and LaZanne didn't fit the bill of hikers that would typically go missing. After all, the girls have been planning this trip for more than six months, having their every move mapped out inch by inch, but somehow tragedy struck and investigators are still working to understand what happened. Chris and LaZanne have been staying with the host family in the days leading up to the first major leg of their journey. The two left their host family's home on April 1, 2014 to take that family's dog on a walk near some of the scenic forests in the area, passing by the Baru Volcano in Boké Panama as they walked. The two victims had come from Amherst Fort Netherlands, so a trip to Panama was unlike anything else they'd ever done in their lives, and they'd been looking forward to it for many months. At this point, the girls had already been in Panama for about two weeks, but this was the first major expedition that they would be taking part in on their own. When they returned from this hike, they were expected to stay in Panama for another four weeks before heading back home. Throughout the upcoming few weeks, their plan was to begin volunteering at a local school and teaching various kids at the school things such as arts and crafts. Unfortunately, their trip didn't go to play. They headed out from their host family's home at around 11 a.m. on April 1, and the girls would never be seen again. Before we keep going with today's case, I wanted to show you guys an amazing new mobile game called June's Journey. 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So, if you're ready to dive head first into a captivating murder mystery and help June solve the mysterious case surrounding her sister, just click the link below to download June's Journey. Thanks to June's Journey for sponsoring today's video. Chris and LaZan had spoken about their trip and their upcoming hike on Facebook. In one of their posts, the girls mentioned that they planned on heading to a local village for a tour of the town. Around this time, the girls stopped by a local restaurant to have brunch, and while there, they met two Dutchmen here before heading out on their hike. The girls were particularly excited to have met these two men, being Dutch speaking people themselves, whereas everyone else in the area only spoke Spanish, at least for the most part. Needless to say, the girls were just happy to have someone to talk to in their native tongue. There weren't really any other updates from the girls after this post on Facebook. They'd planned to spend the rest of the afternoon hiking, planning to return to their host family later that evening. It doesn't seem that the host family was very concerned about the girls' safety. They'd rightfully assumed everything would be just fine. The path the girls planned on taking was known for being relatively safe, and nothing bad had ever really happened here before. After all, the host family let the girls take their family dog with them. It seemed safe to assume that if the family had any fears about the girl's journey, the dog wouldn't have been allowed to go. But as the afternoon sun began to fade and evening crept in, there was no sign of the girl's return. Before long, the family dog had wandered back home alone, and the host family assumed that the girls would follow behind, but they didn't. Before long, the family realized that something wasn't right. The girls were nowhere to be found. The family searched the area surrounding their home, but they didn't find even the slightest piece of evidence. They decided to wait until morning before calling the police, hoping that the girls would turn up overnight, but they never did. It was April 2nd before any alarms were raised about the girl's sudden disappearance. Both Chris and LaZan were scheduled to take a private tour of a local coffee farm in Bouquet, but they never showed up for their appointment. Their host family knew at this point that enough was enough, and it was time to call investigators to bring the girls home. It wouldn't be until the following morning, April 3rd, that detectives pulled out all of their resources and began an extensive search for the missing girls. A police helicopter was brought in and an aerial search was conducted, but investigators didn't find much of anything. Many locals worked together and volunteered to search more lightly-wooded areas nearby, as well as the local village, but there was still no sign of the girls. It would be April 6th before authorities and the girl's family really began to panic. Police knew that the girls left home that day with a bit of food and water, but certainly not enough to sustain them for the five days that they had been missing. Fearing the absolute worst, Chris and LaZan's families decided to fly down to Panama themselves to help out in the search for their missing daughters, bringing a Dutch detective along with them to help out with the investigation. The families, as well as countless investigators, police dogs and volunteers searched the nearby forests for a total of 10 days. Eventually, these days turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months. A search was conducted nearly every day for a total of 10 weeks, but there was no sign of Chris or LaZan. Literally nothing, not a single shred of evidence. In all reality, it seemed as if the girls had never even entered the woods that day. But then, a breakthrough came. As the police search was winding down, and investigators felt as though they'd reached a dead end, a local woman who'd been helping search for the girls turned in a blue backpack. When investigators searched the bag, they found that it contained two pairs of sunglasses, $83 in cash, LaZan's passport, a water bottle, and two bras. But most importantly, police also found a camera inside the bag, as well as both of the girls' cell phones. Police were first interested in the cell phones. After all, if the girls had really come into trouble along their journey, they would have almost certainly tried to call someone. As it would turn out, they were right, but the results of their investigation were far more heartbreaking than anyone could have expected. As they looked through the call logs of the girls' phones, they found that the girls had made at least 77 attempts to call the police, but they had no service out here in the wilderness, so their calls never rang through to rescuers. Only one call is believed to have gotten through, but this call lasted less than two seconds before the phone lost service again and the call was dropped. Using these call logs, police were able to come up with a clearer picture about what may have taken place on the day the girls headed out on their hike. According to the logs, the girls had placed their first emergency call just hours after setting out from the host family's home. We don't know the specific timeline, but the girls had very clearly gotten into trouble just shortly after their journey began. Remember, their hike started out on April 1st. This is important because as far as I can tell, all of their emergency call attempts took place on this date. The phones appear to have either been turned off later that day or on April 2nd. I wasn't able to confirm the specific time that the phones were finally shut down, but five days later on April 6th, Chris's phone was turned on once again and several attempts were made to unlock the phone using the wrong pin code, resulting in the phone finally locking itself permanently. By April 11th, both phones had run out of battery, but while all of this information is pretty shocking to put it lightly, it pales in comparison to what was found on the girls' camera. When police searched the contents of the camera, they found a batch of photos that was taken on April 1st, the day the hike began. It showed all the usual photos of the beautiful natural scenery as well as several photos of the girls enjoying their time on their hike. There wasn't anything suspicious found in any of these initial photos, but as police continued looking through the camera, they found a second batch of photos taken seven days later on April 8th. This batch of photos was taken in the middle of the night between one and four a.m. The photos showed the girls' belongings spread out on a patch of rocks, neatly separated and divided up with intent and purpose. The images also showed candy wrappers, plastic bags, piles of dirt, and even a mirror, though it doesn't seem like this mirror was ever recovered. But one photo in particular was incredibly shocking to detectives. The photos seemed to show the back of Chris' head with her hair in a mess. Now, several articles claim that a small amount of blood could be seen in this photo as well, but try as I might, I'm just not able to see anything like this in the photo. If you see it, be sure to let me know in the comments, but I think this information may have been made up or maybe I'm just blind. After finding these shocking and disturbing photos, police decided that this was more than enough evidence to continue with their investigation. They headed down to where the backpack was found by the search and rescue volunteer. The path led them down to a nearby river, and oddly enough, the bag was found in the very center of the river, wedged in between a few rocks. As detectives refocused their search efforts to this area, they soon found a neatly folded pile of clothing next to the banks of the river. About two months later, as the searches continued, they also found a pelvic bone and a boot with a foot still wedged inside. Now, this is the part of the story that I find particularly fascinating. According to investigators, this river is known to flood quite often. In fact, the river has been nicknamed the grinder because of its frequent flooding and the tremendous difficulty to cross the river. One investigator admitted that finding the backpack and the pelvic bone was nothing more than a stroke of luck. They claimed that within a matter of hours, these two items would have been washed down the river during regular flooding, never to be seen again. Now, I've never heard anyone else mention this in any of the articles that I've read, so I have to pose the question. If this river frequently floods and all of the items found in it were found purely by sheer luck, then why was there a neatly folded pile of Chris's clothes next to the river? After all, if flooding is such a serious issue, shouldn't these clothes have been washed away in the days or weeks that the girls had now been missing? To me, this suggests that by some crazy miracle, the girls may have survived out there much longer than anyone expected, crossing the river within a few hours or even a day or so of police finding the clothes, or at the very least, maybe someone else had found the clothes and placed them next to the river more recently, suggesting that they may be in some way involved in the girls' disappearance. Now, there are several theories online about the girls potentially being followed into the woods that day in meeting with foul play, but I'll be the first to admit that this theory sounds like a bit of a stretch, but in reality, how else would the clothes have ended up there neatly folded in a stack? As more time passed by, more and more bones were found along the banks of the riverbed. In the end, officers found a total of 33 bones scattered around the river. After a careful analysis of the bones, they learned that they belonged to both Chris and LaZanne, proving that they both eventually lost their lives in the forest. At this point, I think it's pretty safe to assume that most of us are beginning to believe that the girls had simply gotten lost in the forest that day and maybe eventually slipped and fell or succumbed to the elements. This theory is easy enough to pass off as being true, but you have to remember some of the strange pieces of evidence that were found on the girls' phones and camera. If you remember, the girls were known to have been traveling with only enough food and water to last them through the afternoon comfortably. After all, it was a pretty simple hike that they were taking part in and they expected to be home by dinner. As far as we know, the girls left for their hike that day equipped with nothing more than a couple candy bars and a couple water bottles, with this taking place on April 1st. So if this is true, and it is, what about the photos that were taken on the girls' camera on April 8th between one and 4 a.m.? The girls couldn't have still had food and water by this point. So how had they managed to survive in the wilderness for seven days with limited sustenance? Now, it could be assumed that they may have been drinking water from the river where their bones were found, but that still doesn't explain the strange photos. One theory that I've seen shared around online is that the girls may have simply been taking the photos so that they could see better in the dark. The camera's flash would have helped to light their way so that they could continue moving through the forest. But if this is true, why take the aforementioned photo of all their belongings neatly scattered out on that large rock? I don't know about you, but even in the dark, I think it would be pretty easy to feel the difference between a candy wrapper and a water bottle. They wouldn't have needed the flash to light their way. This has led some people to believe that the evidence that was found of the girls was tampered with, and that someone discovered the scene of their demise long before police did, possibly the person who committed the crime. But if you ask me, there just isn't enough evidence here to convince me that a crime actually took place. One really interesting detail that's glossed over by most articles and videos is that Chris's pelvic bone was cracked when investigators found it. They have no way of knowing if this took place before or after Chris lost her life. But I've got a theory that could help explain the whole case, so let me know in the comments if you agree. My theory is that the girls headed out that day, very ill-equipped to handle the elements in the unfortunate possibility of them getting lost, which they obviously did. It's possible that at some point along the journey, Chris slipped and fell. Several people who are familiar with the area revealed that there are some very large boulders in the surrounding area, some that are larger than houses. These boulders would have been easy enough to slip and fall down, especially after dark when you can't even see your own hand in front of your face. In fact, one of these final photos that the girls took with their camera shows a cliff edge that would fit this bill. Considering both of the girls' remains were found near or in the river, this fall would have likely taken place near the aforementioned river. If we assume that this is what happened and that this happened at night, Chris likely would have fallen some unknown distance down onto the river rocks below, resulting in the broken hip. With Chris now injured, Lizaan may have been using the camera's flash to try to navigate her way down to Chris. When she arrived at Chris' side, they may have used the camera's flash to determine the extent of Chris' injuries and maybe even try to determine if Chris was still alive at this point, but really, we have no reason to believe that she was. Lizaan may have also used the camera to see the contents of their bag to try to determine if they had anything with them that they could have used to help save Chris' life or even to treat any potential injuries. My honest guess here would be that Chris did in fact lose her life during that fall. The reason I say this is because five days later, Chris' phone was attempted to be accessed so many times with the wrong passcode that it permanently locked itself. Whoever was trying to use the phone clearly didn't know Chris' password and Lizaan would fit this bill. Lizaan may have wandered off further down the river in hopes of trying to find help. She may have even noticed that she had stumbled into some decent cell phone reception on Chris' phone so she tried to use the phone to make a call but she could never get it unlocked. Eventually, she too succumbed to the elements. Mind you, this is all just a theory based on the evidence that police have found. I've heard a few other people chime in about what they believe may or may not have happened so I just thought I'd add my own two cents to the case even though I try hard to keep my opinions out of cases like this. In the end, the disappearance of Chris Kremers and Lizaan Froon is still technically unsolved and under investigation. But police haven't released any further updates since January of 2015. There are many people out there who firmly believe that the girls met with foul play and that's definitely a possibility so let me know which version of events you believe in the comments. There's a team of private investigators and authors who are still actively pursuing this case. In fact, they traveled to Panama in June of 2023 to try to collect more evidence but ultimately ran out of time before finding anything too meaningful. They plan on returning to the forest next year in hopes of searching a dam that's located at the end of the river where Chris and Lizaan disappear. Their belief is that whatever happened to the girls the answers will be found in the filters of that dam. My sincere hope is that however the girls lost their lives that their suffering wasn't too great and that their families have been able to heal in the time that's passed since their disappearance. It's so heartbreaking to know that these girls just wanted to head out on a once in a lifetime journey to explore the jungles of Panama and help the less fortunate but tragically their once in a lifetime journey proved to be their last. Thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of True Crime Stories. If you wanna see more true crime documentaries like this be sure to hit the like button and subscribe. If you'd like to help support the channel the best way you can do that is simply by leaving a comment below. Any comment at all. It helps out the channel a lot more than you may realize. If you wanna help out financially you can do that by clicking the blue join button below or by picking up a True Crime Stories mug like the one you see on the desk behind me from tieknots.com. But with that, my name is Tie Knots and I'll catch you guys in the next video.