.png)
Killer in the family podcast
A true crime podcast exploring men who kill their families.
Killer in the family podcast
Episode 57 - The Keller Family
VOTE for Killer in the family in this year’s True Crime Awards Listener’s Choice category – it only takes 2 minutes – thank you! True Crime Awards 2025 - Listeners' Choice
In April 2012 41 year old Lynnette Keller and her 18 year old daughter Kaylene were shot and killed by husband and father Peter Keller in East Seattle. After killing his family Peter set fire to the house and then absconded to an underground bunker he had spent years building in the nearby mountains. A proclaimed survivalist Keller wanted to live without the burden of his wife and daughter and took his own life when police found his bunker days later.
This is the story of the Keller Family.
Information and support
· Samaritans UK Contact Us | Samaritans
· National Domestic Violence Helpline UK 0808 2000 247
· Advocacy After Fatal Domestic Abuse (AAFDA) Home - AAFDA
· Women’s Aid Home - Women's Aid
· National Domestic Abuse Helpline UK 0808 2000 247
· Mental health support USA Mental Health America | Homepage | Mental Health America
· Domestic abuse helpline USA 1.800.799.SAFE Domestic Violence Support | National Domestic Violence Hotline
References
Lynnettee Keller Obituary (2012) - Portland, OR - The Oregonian
Camp Keller Murders // 371 - Going West: True Crime - Apple Podcast
Lynnette Louise Rocha Keller (1970-2012) - Find a Grave Memorial
Who is Peter Keller, the vlogger who murdered his family?
Few answers in North Bend bunker killer Peter Keller's homemade video | Snoqualmie Valley Record
Peter Keller, killer of wife, daughter said: ‘I can always shoot myself’ | The Seattle Times
Credits
Hosted and created by Clare Laxton @ladylaxton
Produced by: Clare Laxton
Killer in the family podcast (buzzsprout.com)
Music from Pixabay.
Killer in the family podcast is a total labour of love. If you'd like to support me please buy me a coffee or tea!
https://www.buymeacoffee.com/clarelaxton
Hi there and welcome to Killer in the Family podcast. I'm your host, claire Laxton. Welcome to episode 57 of Kill it In the Family, and we have a really horrific case to talk about today. I mean, as we do every week, but you know, this one is a. This one is a bad one. Before we started, though, I wanted to let you know that the True Crime Awards have come around again. You'll remember that last year, I was shortlisted in the Rookie of the Year category. Now, obviously, I can't enter that category this year because I'm not a rookie anymore, but I can ask all of you amazing listeners to vote for Killer in the Family in the Listener's Choice category. I'll put a link in the episode notes and on my socials as well. It will just take a couple of minutes and I really appreciate any votes that you can give me. Right, let's get into this episode.
Speaker 1:In April 2012, 41-year-old Lynette Keller and her 18-year-old daughter Kayleen were shot and killed by husband and father Peter Keller in East Seattle. After killing his family, peter set fire to their house and then absconded to an underground bunker he had spent years building in the nearby mountains. Proclaimed survivalist, keller wanted to live without the burden of his wife and daughter and took his own life when police found his bunker days later. This is the story of the Keller family. This is going to be a tough listen team and I know I do really say that every week, but this one it really is and, as usual, all the sources I've used for the episode are in the episode notes, as well as all links to information and support if you need it.
Speaker 1:So let's start by talking about Lynette and Kayleen. So Lynette Louise Rocker was born on the 28th of May 1970 in Pomona in California. She was just 41 years old when she was killed by her husband. Lynette actually grew up with a twin brother who was called Jean, and she also had a sister, kimberly, and her parents were Albert and Lupe. Along with her family, she spent most of her childhood in Laguna Hills in California. Now, I always think of the MTV reality series the Hills and Laguna Beach when I hear that name, like early noughties MTV vibes. If that's you as well, let me know. Now, she obviously spent her childhood in California and then she actually moved north to Oregon with her family in California and then she actually moved north to Oregon with her family. So Oregon's about 900 miles north of Laguna Hill. So quite far I couldn't find out why the family moved, but it's obviously quite a big change and a big distance and I can imagine like from California to Oregon is quite a big change as well. Anyway, lynette graduated from Aloha High School in 1989 and then moved to Washington later on. Now this always confuses me because I don't live in the States, so for those of my listeners who are in the States, apologies for this, but Lynette moved to Washington State, which is about 350 miles north of Oregon. It's not Washington DC, which is on the east coast of America and much further away. So just to clarify that for you because it always confuses me. And Seattle is close to where Lynette moved to Now.
Speaker 1:Lynette was well loved by her family and friends. She was fun, loving and just a great person to be around. In later life she also nurtured a really powerful YouTube community, doing something she loved which was crafting and scrapbooking. She absolutely loved art and was really creative with it as well, and I'll talk about a bit about this later. But she had lots of fans and people who really loved her YouTube channel.
Speaker 1:Now, according to the Going West podcast episode about this case, lynette was friends with a man called Peter Keller in high school, but after graduating they sort of lost touch. They reconnected and formed a friendship and at the start it wasn't anything necessarily romantic. But her sister, kimberly, persuaded Lynette to give Keller a chance and they went on a date. So Peter Keller was born in Washington in 1970, I think. Now there was one source I found that said 1967, but I'm pretty sure he was a similar age to Lynette because they met in high school. So let's stick with 1970. But I just wanted to flag that there was a bit of discrepancy there. He had a pretty ordinary childhood by all accounts, and had dreams of being married and having a family. He grew up to be a computer repair technician and at the time of the murders Keller worked in a computer repair shop. He was also very outdoorsy, as I imagine lots of people were growing up in Washington state. He hiked, hunted and fished and also had a huge collection of guns. Now, when they first started dating, the Going West podcast episode talks about how Keller started bringing up marriage and kids, sort of just a few months in. At this point Lynette was, you know, maybe like 19 years old or so, so she wasn't even sure that she wanted to get married or have kids, but when Keller proposed just a short while later, she said yes and they got married and, in 1993, welcomed a baby girl into their lives.
Speaker 1:Hayley Nicole Keller was born on the 28th of June 1993 in Portland in Oregon and later moved with her mum and dad to Washington State. She graduated from Mount Sai High School in 2011 and was just 18 years old when she was killed by her father. Kayleen was said to be a great student who loved nature and the environment and loved spending time outside with her friends and her dog too. When she was killed, she was at college and she also was really interested in computer gaming. She was said to be really loving and fun, like her mom, and also a great baker. The Going West podcast episode talks about how she had a part-time job testing video games which sounds pretty cool if that's what you're into and had also just started dating a boy called Carson Brammer, and Carson talked about playing Skyrim and other computer games together and he just obviously loved spending time with her, which really breaks my heart that Kayleen was killed like just at that point where she was starting the next stage of her life, and so lots of the information that we've just talked about Lynette and Kayleen is from their various obituaries, and on one of the online obituaries there was space for people to write comments.
Speaker 1:So I'm going to read through some of the comments, as I think it'll give you a really good idea about how much they were loved, and it'll also show you how much people love Lynette's YouTube channel on crafting and scrapbooking. So our first comment said, quote I can't believe it's been a year since you and Kayleen were taken from us. You are still greatly missed on YouTube. I'm sure you're in a better place looking down on us and encouraging us only as you can To your family. I'm sure you're still struggling to cope with the loss of Lynn and Kayleen. I wish you peace, love and comfort as you continue to weep for your dear family members.
Speaker 1:Another quote said I'm remembering Lynette from so many years ago. It's been far too long. She was a great hostess for our girls' nights get-togethers so sweet and fun. Kayleen was just a toddler then, but as adorable as you could get. Another comment talked about Lynette's scrapbooking work and her creativity. Quote I will miss you so much. You brought so much talent and joy to the scrapbooking community. You will never be forgotten. Thank you for all your kind words and inspiration you gave us. You had a heart of gold that can never be replaced. Rip, our sweet friend.
Speaker 1:And here's a final quote from the online obituary Quote oh, lyn, how I'd give to hear your voice saying to me hey, chika, my heart feels heavy and I can't stop thinking of you or Kayleen. How I miss my best friend. It's just too much to handle at times. I have your last voicemail. You left Saturday. I keep going back to your videos hoping you're there with a new one. I miss you so much, my friend, and I think these comments and quotes just show you how much Lynette and Kayleen touch people's lives and how much they were loved as well. There are so many more comments on there that show them love. I've just picked out a few. There are so many more and the obituary is linked in the episode notes as well if you want to read some more as well. Now, in contrast, on one of Peter Keller's survivalist videos more on that later someone commented, quote I used to work with him. He was weird but not murderous. High praise indeed for Peter Keller there Now, before they were killed, the Keller family were living a relatively normal, happy family life in a town called North Bend in Washington.
Speaker 1:North Bend's near Seattle. It's a relatively small town of about 8,000 people and, according to the Seattle Times, lynette's twin brother, gene, said quote the family never saw any signs of trouble in the Keller marriage. He said Peter Keller was a quiet individual who had a loving relationship with his daughter. So, like so many other families that we talk about on the podcast, people saw them as a sort of relatively normal, you know, happy, happy family just living out a normal life. And as with all lives and marriages, the Kellers had their ups and downs. But it might be one event that changed the family dynamic quite drastically. Lynette actually injured her back at work and was no longer able to work at all. So she stayed at home and Keller was the main breadwinner for the family.
Speaker 1:Now, as we've spoken about before, lynette at this point turned her passion for crafting and scrapbooking and created her own popular YouTube channel. Although she wasn't working, she was bringing in a bit of money to the family through her crafting and also through disability benefits, though apparently Keller was very tight with money and from this point forward controlled the family finances very tightly, friends and relatives also said. From this point, keller started being a bit more reserved socially and would keep to himself more and more. Some said that he might be depressed, but others said that it was just the normal stresses of family life and financial pressures. To me here it feels like we have someone in Keller who is maybe feeling those financial pressures, maybe even starting to resent his wife and daughter for them, because he needs to keep them and support them, and maybe is turning to others online for escapism and support In something that would completely shock and surprise friends and neighbours. After the murders, while Lynette had her own YouTube channel on crafting and scrapbooking, her husband was also hosting his own YouTube videos Not about something as lovely as crafting, though.
Speaker 1:Apparently, since 2004, keller had been uploading videos about survivalism and vlogging about creating his own underground bunker. Now let's talk about survivalism, which you might know as sort of a doomsday prepper or like a prepper sort of movement, but it's basically a movement which proactively prepares for disasters and focuses on being self-reliant in cases of emergency. It emphasises things such as stockpiling supplies and preparing with survival skills, and some survivalists or preppers will also create a bunker or like a space away from their home that they can retreat to when the sort of end comes. I guess, and like any movement, there is scope for extremism within survivalism, with some people taking it to the extreme and starting to be really paranoid about what might happen to them. For Keller, although he bought into the survivalist movement fully, there seemed to be something about, you know, doing something more exciting rather than his boring little life and having to look after his wife and daughter. That was his escapism, online and elsewhere. Whatever his motivations, keller definitely seemed to be planning something and, unbeknownst to everyone around him, since 2004, keller had been building his own underground bunker in the mountains of Washington state. So this is going to be a tough listen team.
Speaker 1:On Sunday 22nd April 2012, neighbours on a street in North Bend heard an explosion coming from a house. Then they saw flames coming out from the Keller's home. Emergency services were called and battled their way through the flames. Firefighters fought the blaze and managed to get it under control, and emergency services went in and managed to get it under control, and emergency services went in. Sadly, they found the two dead bodies of 41-year-old Lynette Keller and 18-year-old Kayleen Keller. The family cat and dog had also been killed and left in the house.
Speaker 1:Now, lynette and Kayleen were taken out of the house and police immediately started looking for Peter Keller. He wasn't in the house. Where was he? They tried contacting him as next of kin but couldn't get hold of him. Does this sound familiar, by the way? A bit like Robert Fisher who we talked about in episode 50, which happened 11 years before this case. On searching the house, police found gas canisters placed strategically around the house. There was also a pipe bomb that hadn't exploded. The origin of the fire was traced back to the stove, which had another gas canister on. It was clear that the fire was no accident. Police started to suspect that Lynette and Kayleen weren't killed by the fire, and this was confirmed a couple of days later when the medical examiner concluded that both Lynette and Kayleen were killed by a gunshot wound to the head. They had both been shot at point-blank range. They had been murdered and had not died in the fire.
Speaker 1:At this point, keller became a person of interest and police started their investigation into the murders of Lynette and Kayleen's family. Friends and community and neighbours were reeling from the devastation that Keller had left. He was out in the Washington mountains living his survivalist life. As I mentioned earlier in the episode, after he had killed his wife and daughter, police found out that Keller had been building an underground bunker and stockpiling food and other things for eight years, totally unbeknownst to his family and friends. I'm going to tell you a bit about this bunker and, as you know, keller also posted vlogs on YouTube about his survivalist ways. You can still see a few of them online. I've watched them so you don't have to and I haven't put a link to them in the episode notes, but if you really want to see them, you can. In one video he takes the camera into the bunker and sort of talks about it, and I'm going to try and describe the bunker to you too, so you have an idea of where he was holed up.
Speaker 1:So, as I said, the bunker was in the Washington mountains near somewhere called Rattlesnake Ridge, which is just a really short drive from North Bend. The entrance to the bunker was sort of like a wooden hatch, quite small, that was hidden with like trees and branches. It was really camouflaged, it was difficult to see. And then inside the hatch there's like a small wooden ladder which leaves down onto two floors of the bunker. And on the video and in photos you can see that the bunker is quite narrow and long and the walls of it are like flanked with like wooden panels, like quite highly polished like wooden panels. So there isn't the sort of bare earth or soil that you would expect, just these like varnished wooden panels.
Speaker 1:Keller had also built lots of shelves into the bunker and they all had provisions on them. In one photo there was like loads and loads of bottles of Coca-Cola on one shelf, and there was also a shelf with loads of boxes of ammunition as well. Now, as we said, keller was like a gun enthusiast and he had loads of guns at home and in the bunker. He armed himself with like at least 13 guns that I saw in some photos. Plenty of bullets too. There were also things like hiking boots, cleaning products, lots of petrol and fuel and food stocks throughout the bunker.
Speaker 1:Keller had also managed to put in a wood-fired stove which had a chimney that sort of stuck out the top, so like protruded the ground underneath, and this bunker was the product of eight years of work from Keller. In one of his videos he talked about how he would try and make like two trips a week to bring supplies. So it was clearly something that not only was he dedicated to, but something that he kept completely hidden from his family and everyone he knew, and considering how tight he was with money for the family and how he seemed to really resent that you know Lynette and Kay he had to support Lynette and Kayleen. Keller spent tens of thousands of pounds on this bunker, like so much money, and it's one of those classic, you know, quite selfish and narcissistic personality traits where you know someone is very controlling with finances for the rest of the family, but when it comes to them, they're very happy to spend lots of money on themselves. So I just think that's a really interesting aspect of his personality.
Speaker 1:Now, after he killed his wife and daughter and set his house on fire, keller headed out to the bunker to start his life in exile, and while he was holed up in the bunker, the police were actually starting to put the pieces of their investigation together. As we talked about before, although there were gas canisters throughout the house and an exploded pipe bomb, although there were gas canisters throughout the house and an exploded pipe bomb, this unexploded pipe bomb meant that the house wasn't completely destroyed and there was lots of evidence that hadn't been lost, as Keller had intended. Inside the house the police found loads of evidence of Keller's hidden life as a survivalist, as well as information and photos about his secret bunker. There were photographs and documents that police analysed and gave them an idea of where Keller's bunker was Now. According to a CBS article, they also had received a couple of reports from hikers that they had seen Keller's pickup truck near Rattlestate Ridge. So they sort of had an idea or thought that they knew where they had gone.
Speaker 1:But they continued their investigation and they discovered that he'd taken about $6,200 out of his bank account a few days before he killed Lynette and Kayleen and apparently when he left work that week he told his co-workers that he might not be back and like might not see them again, which obviously would have seemed really weird. So like most family annihilators, he seemingly carefully planned the murder of his family and his escape. So police and the sheriff's office obviously sort of had an idea where they thought he might be. So they continued their search. They sent experienced trackers to the area around rattlesnake ridge. They found boot prints which they thought were keller's, which meant that they thought that they were in like the right place. And on friday that week, five days after he killed his wife and daughter, and after hours of hiking through the mountains, police believe that they've found him. Ironically, it was the smoke coming from his wood burner stove that he'd installed in his bunker that alerted police to his position, because actually I don't think they would have found the entrance to his bunker otherwise because it was so massively camouflaged.
Speaker 1:And now at this point, swat who are special weapons and tactics officers surrounded where they thought the bunker was. So we're here on that Friday, a few days after he killed his wife and daughter, we've got SWAT team sort of in position around, you know, in the mountains around this where they think this bunker is. They called for him to come out of the bunker. He didn't come out. They then pumped in tear gas. He didn't come out. After 22 hours of this standoff, they sent in explosives along the top of the bunker. He didn't out. Swat officers then entered the bunker, running hot. Inside they found the dead body of Peter Keller, killed by a self-inflicted gunshot wound, with a handgun next to him, and one thing that really remains to discuss today is why Keller did what he did.
Speaker 1:So let's go back to the sort of four types of family annihilator that research has identified. There's the self-righteous one that wants to take revenge, so has probably been abusive and controlling in the past. There's the disappointed annihilator who believes that his family has let him down and sees his family as simply an extension of his own needs, desires, hopes and aspirations. There's the anomic annihilator who's pressured by financial stresses. And there's the paranoid annihilator, who believes that there's an external threat, which may be real or imagined, that will destroy the family and therefore killing his family as a way of protecting them. And, as I've talked about before, I think there's another type, which is the escapee annihilator, who kills their whole family instead of getting a divorce. And on initial thinking, I was sort of you know, veering towards Keller being a paranoid annihilator. He was clearly paranoid about you know, the world ending, believing in survivalism and prepping for many, many years, and therefore we could think that he killed his family to protect him.
Speaker 1:But I think his own videos demonstrate something completely different. In one of his videos, he talked about how, when he moves to the bunker, he won't need to worry about Lynette and Kayleen anymore. He talked of a more exciting life, maybe like robbing banks and pharmacies instead of working for a living. He said he was frustrated with life and, to be honest, just seemed a bit bored and resentful. Therefore, I don't think he was a paranoid annihilator, scared of an external threat and only concerned of protecting his family.
Speaker 1:I think he was a disappointed annihilator. He thought, for whatever reason, that his family had let him down. He was disappointed in how his life turned out and probably also resentful of them for maybe draining his money and his life as well. And from all his videos, all I can say is that he seemed to gravitate towards survivalism as a way of escaping his life. And while he can be called a disappointed annihilator, to me it's him who's disappointing. He had a wonderful wife, a wife who, despite a serious injury and setback in her life, made something positive from it, bringing her crafting and scrapbooking to a community who loved her. He had a wonderful daughter who was just starting to broaden her horizons after graduating high school and had a whole life ahead of her. To me, it's him who's disappointing, disappointing and ungrateful for the life that he had and to those that he resented. I just feel really like. I just feel so heartbroken that Lynette and Kayleen lost their lives at the hand of such a small, resentful, disappointing little man. This episode is dedicated to Lynette and Kayleen, to the joy that Lynette brought to her crafting community, friends and family, and to the love and smiles that Kayleen brought to her family, friends and boyfriend. Their lives were taken too soon and we remember them.
Speaker 1:This has been Killer in the Family podcast, written and produced by me, claire Laxton. I'll be back next week with a new episode. Don't forget to send me any comments or questions to my insta at killer in the family pod or through a text via a link in the episode notes. Do let me know any stories you'd like me to cover as well. Also, don't forget that you can buy me a coffee if you like the podcast and help support it's running. The link is in the episode notes and thank you so much for all your support so far. Until then, I've been Claire Laxton. This is Killer in the Family podcast. No-transcript.
