S10 E6: Sebastién

A cop is murdered.

“Police and prosecutors swear they have the trigger man.”

He swears he didn't do it.

How far will each side go to prove their right? Like it's just one bombshell after another. You know, you're like, what? The story of a playstation. A brain eating amoeba.

And the relentless pursuit of justice. Off duty. Out now. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. This is a CBC podcast.

The following episode contains difficult subject matter, including references to suicide. Please take care while listening. Gracias. It's good.

And we also will...

“The word that you're gonna hear the most is Buddha.”

Buddha, Buddha, Buddha. Buddha, Buddha.

The translation is for pure life.

Oh, so the pure, Buddha. Okay, and that's okay to say that. Yeah, of course. Everybody use it for Gracias. Hola.

Chal. Chirovida. Chirovida. Kura Vida is widely used here in Costa Rica by expats and locals in regular conversation.

Sort of like saying hello or goodbye. It's taken from a 1956 Mexican western. And it means that one should slow down. Enjoy life's wonder and pleasures. See a clarity of happiness.

And it has come to represent the notion that, essentially, you can do whatever you want down here. Or at least, that's the promise. Jackie and Sebastian came here in hopes of finding something, but it didn't go as expected.

I didn't use Piravita much during my time in Costa Rica. It rang, hollow, given what I was doing there. During my months long investigation into Jackie's disappearance, several inconsistencies have cropped up with new details I need to check and new questions that won't let go.

I need to speak to Sebastian one more time. Okay. Got all these recorders going here. It's June 25th 2025, and I'm about to call Sebastian again, just to catch up with him and go through some of the questions

that I have accrued over the last several months and looking at Jackie's case, speaking to people. I'm David Ridgen, then this is season 10 of someone knows something. The Jackland Furland Smith case, episode 6, Sebastian. Hey, is that Sebastian?

Yes, that's me. Hey, Sebastian, it's David here. Sorry, it's been a long time to get back around you. I had another case that I was working on here in Ontario. You don't need to understand that you haven't life been like other,

it was a big case, and I couldn't turn away from that. Before we even started, I would say when you came to my place, you see I was not the most welcoming person.

When I first met Sebastian, he seemed a bit put off by my appearance on his doorstep.

But I wanted to apologize for that, because I'm kind of trying to move forward and obviously getting strangers to bring the stories back to the surface. Like I was like quite upset, so that's a bit why the reason I'd be here when I first met you, and it took me a while to somewhat warm up. I would say that I wanted to apologize on that, because he seemed like a decent guy.

Yeah, it really is a better welcome than that. It's an unexpected apology, but sounds heartfelt. Maybe it means that this second interview can get closer to the heart of Jackie's case, too. I didn't particularly think that you were any different than anybody else.

I've ever tried to talk to you about a case. So when I was down there, I was speaking to people, and as you know, a lot of rumors and circumstantial disparate pieces of information are being told to me from all quarters. So I've been trying to get all through that, and out of it, it's come these questions that I have to ask you about. But this gives you the chance to give your side of it for the podcast.

So how's it been for you since we met? I would say it's been difficult, right? I don't even think I'm ever going to get a map, or we cover from that. It's like, okay, people think I'm like fine, like I have a girlfriend and stuff.

“I travel and things like that, and people think that my life is fine.”

But I would compare that to a bit like people's life on Facebook, right?

They've been extremely depressed, and it affects basically every possible side of my life.

Anywhere I go, like for example, I go visit my parents, and but you know about that story. So you go in a retirement place, and people are kind of like, oh, easy, fine, or easy. How do we know, and like you see like you see people's judgment, right? So it's extremely difficult. Yeah, people hear parts of stories, and then they try to fill in the blanks. They don't try to make a good story, or the guy actually tried to help his wife, but she was sick, and it turned back.

It's not what people see.

“But for my perspective, I just need to know, you know, what are the facts?”

What can you tell me that's factual, and we go from there, right?

Yeah. My case was close, and obviously like no formalities, the vision I've been made to move, right? Except for my and last, but they're not the law, right? Correct. I never been accused.

So you've heard about the OIG investigator. His name is Yulisis Gavara. He was arrested to do here about that. No, I did not. Actually, what was going on with that guy?

Okay, so that guy, Yulisis Gavara, was the leading investigator on Jacky's case. And he was arrested for trying to extort people.

And basically, I think it was sort of like, if you don't pay me, I'm going to prove that you're guilty of something.

So I'm not sure, but did you ever get any sense from any of the officers that there was anything weird going on like that? I actually nobody ever like tried to get the dollar from me. That would be lying to say otherwise, yeah.

“Yulisis, I think I met him only at the OIG office, but my memory is not that great in its entry years, right?”

But it's seriously like all the policemen from the OIG, whatever you call them, all of them actually are respectful and actually in my essence stuff. But just doing their job, they're straight to the point like you would think cops are. I have like the real ride up like from the OIG, right? Okay, anybody go at the OIG with the number, they can have that rider. Okay.

I still want my name to be clean, so I reopen the case myself and I want those information to be added there, even though I'm already a free person technically, right? And so I asked to reopen the documents even though it was closed and that I was in a sense, right? When did you do that, did that happen just recently? Yeah, actually. I asked Sebastian if he can send me what files he says he received from the OIG, but today I've not received them.

We've been told by Costa Reconauthorities that the case was archived in the courts in 2022 and filed as dismissed. Neither the OIG or case prosecutor or file clerks said anything about the Jackie Furlin Smith case being reopened prior to us contacting them, getting the file and having her phone looked at again. I move on to the main question I want to ask Sebastian, the day of Jackie's disappearance, but I have to be careful since I don't through repeated questioning, I want to suggest anything that might taint his recollection or lead to false memories.

Now, this next one is it's important in terms of the timing of things and I know it's a long time ago. So if you can remember, there's conflicting stories on the physical part of the fight that you had with Jackie on August 17. And it's to do with the order of events. So was the order of events argue with her, go in the shower, then she's punching you in the shower or was it punching first in the shower and then she left? No, no, no, no. I was in the that was arguing I believe and then I went in the shower and I got punching.

Yes, okay, so punched in the shower. Yes, okay, and then the toilet paper was before or after the punching.

“No, actually, okay, if I remember well and I believe I do I was showering and then she started to throw toilet paper at me and then I remember work for work like I said like what the fuck, like what are you doing?”

And then she kept going and then like I remember her eyes were like instead of fingering like the norm at ER, her eyes were like black with a thread right and she punched me in the face and I've already told her to you, but it's like I believe she actually punched me so she doesn't come back to make sure she doesn't come back. That's my believing, right? And so nothing and so like if you still have an open door you still come back, right? It shouldn't work, but like I think she really wanted to leave.

As in, it became a real fight and something happened to Jackie at this point. Oh yeah, no, a lot of people say that, yeah, but like it's like by the time I got clean up the mess and I got dry and rest like she was gone. I'm not like a violent person, anybody who knows me for real, I'm not talking about the people that go around and they're calling no.

“And when you were cleaning up or in the shower, I guess whichever was going on when she left, did you hear her calling anybody?”

Did you hear her on the phone with anybody? I did not. No, and no, there was no, I'm trying to figure out the order of events upon her leaving too. And like what happened when she walked out and left her phone there, left her ring, left her credit cards. And whether or not, okay, that someone, that she don't have another phone, right?

Like it's easy to have two phones, right? Did you ever suspect that she might have been seeing somebody else in that regard? The more it goes, like I would think, yes, okay, and I'm going to tell you my theory. So I think she may have done promises to someone that she would be able to live for comfortably with my pension and I thought I was in stuff. And that story may have turned bad.

When she told him, like, or like, actually, I'm going to have that much money instead of that. I did find one person who said that Jackie was on one occasion texting him suggestive messages laid into the night, but the message receiver says it only happened once and nothing ever happened between them. I haven't heard anything else about Jackie in this regard from the community just what Sebastian is theorizing here, but it is just another theory.

He has told me before she went swimming in the ocean and never came back and that she was mentally unwell and must have killed herself.

Maybe he really doesn't know what happened to Jackie and can only guess. So I pressed this most recent theory a bit more.

“But did you ever know her to be with somebody else at that time?”

Did you know that or were you suspicious of that? What's the end, okay, she was like, I don't know if it was just like to piss me off or something or like to be serious, but she would flirt with people like on purpose, like in front of me. Right. Like not all the time, but it happened quite a few times.

I pivot again to ask Sebastian about the night Jackie disappeared.

Questions remain for me about how she could have found a taxi outside of her house without first calling for one.

It's not an area that cabs frequent as I've been consistently told by locals and neighbors, but rather than focus on where Jackie went that night after the argument with Sebastian, I try a different tack. Where was he?

“So something that would fill in some blanks for me is on August 17th, did anybody see you on the night of Jackie's disappearance?”

So after 6 p.m., what were your movements? Did you see anybody that night? These people who saw me, yes, for sure. Okay, I'm not sure exactly of what time, okay, so that may be before or after the time you see. But I went to the palms for dinner, that time. It was like I was like a sinny to eat and that was not unusual for like to do stuff like that, right?

And I didn't want to be there basically when she come back because like I was like,

that's just going to be huge fight and I don't know if they need part of that, right? So I went there and beside that. Not sure. From about 6-34 p.m. onward, there is nothing confirming Jackie's whereabouts beyond a potential taxi setting of her leaving the Kaseke development. And Sebastian's movements are as amorphous.

The return home from Tamarindo is followed by a dinner, Sebastian says happened. And here on the phone, Sebastian tells me a different version of this dinner story than when I saw him in person. Then he said he got home and Jackie was already there, so he left to give her time to cool down and went to eat dinner in town at the palms restaurant. On the phone he says he didn't want to be at the house when she returned, so she had not gotten home yet,

And Gordon says that Sebastian told him that he ate with Jackie at home that night. And maybe he went for a drive after coming back and seeing that she's not there to verify, like she's there, like, where is she. But yeah, it's start to be quite far now, right? I understand. I recall to remember for sure, yeah.

As Sebastian says four years have passed, yet this is the exact moment that is of interest. So when you came back after looking for her, you told me you looked for her in Tamarindu, you came back.

Did you go back to the house first, see her there, then go to supper or how did that work?

I'm not sure. It's hard to say because like I brought you either went back to the house or in supper after or supper and back to the house. I can guarantee you, like I don't want to tell you bullshit, like, yeah, don't remember well enough. Okay, so you're saying that the palms people would be the only people maybe that saw you that night, then?

“Yeah, would say yeah, and I remember that I spoke to one of my not friends, but the acquaintances wife there.”

And Spanish teacher that I, that's an acquaintance as well, that was there. Okay, oh, at the palms, and she would remember either, do you think she would talk to me? Yeah, maybe. So I get the adian, like, and I don't even have her phone number.

Sebastian says that people with the palms would remember seeing him.

I speak to some palms employees, but none remember seeing Sebastian on the nightjack he disappeared. So what about Dianna Macintosh? If she or anyone saw him, it would help back up, Sebastian's whereabouts. But Dianna proves more difficult to find, so for the time being, I move back into some of the more nitty gritty questions for Sebastian. Okay, Dianna take, like, okay, like, alls?

Oh, I, J, says that cadaver dogs did not indicate in Sebastian and Jackie's backyard,

“but ever since speaking to open the semi-pro operation that assisted in the search for Jackie,”

I've wanted to follow up with Sebastian, regardless. Sebastian originally said that his whole backyard had been dug up, and that he had to burn the resulting green waste that came from it.

But open, told me they never dug in his backyard.

Okay, I used to have a raised net garbems at the back of kid, that were basically a box made of a tree-stones and stuff. Yeah, and that's about what you've fought from the ground, and they kind of moved that. But they always hoped that said they did not dig in your backyard.

Yeah, but they did not dig it all, they're not wrong. Yeah. Okay, so nobody dug actual holes in your backyard then. No, not holes, they, uh, enough, like basically moving dirt and stuff to basically trash my car. Okay, I see.

Pretty madder, but. Jackie's state of mind in the lead-up, too, and on the day of her disappearance, is also something I want to come back to with Sebastian. Okay, now in the previous times that Jackie left, because I know that she left other times when she left your place, was she saying that she wanted to kill herself then, too?

Uh, it happened multiple times that she said that she wanted to kill herself, that she had enough, that she was done with it done with life, that she couldn't stand that anymore, could not do that anymore, like all those possible were wording right. Yeah, yeah, so those times that we don't, it would be part of the same thing. Like, so would you have experienced this kind of a thing before with her,

where she was saying I want to kill myself and then she would leave? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, um, I guess, in terms of the killing yourself business, which is tough to talk about all that stuff. Okay, yeah.

“Did Jackie ever tell you that you should go kill yourself?”

Uh, yeah, she did, actually, yeah. And did you ever tell her that she should go kill herself? No, never did. Okay, um, even if it was not going well, I said, because obviously she's sick, right?

So it's a bit hard to reason with like a sick brain, right? Jackie's sister Candace remembers Jackie telling her that both she and Sebastian would get into arguments where they would say horrible things to each other. Things like you should kill yourself and I hope you die.

But here, Sebastian denies his part of that narrative. So, uh, yeah, no.

I never told her stuff like that, because even though she was sick,

“like I always love my wife, I can't even love her, right?”

I understand that when she was sick, it was just not her talking to me. So I was trying to, uh, let's say like kind of brush it off and like pretend basically that she did not say that to me, that it's a realness was talking to me. Because every night, then she would basically be horrible and tell me, like a bunch of bullshit and stuff.

And then suddenly your eyes would change. And then she could be fine for a few days or a few hours or months. It was not all the time that she was like that, right? But this stuff, okay, like telling me to go kill myself or whatever. I'm just going to give an example, okay, that happened in the past, okay?

It's like, you just go to the restaurant, everything is fine and stuff. And then she would see like anything that looked like vaguely like a woman. And it's just like that sort of like you're having sex with her. Like you see that like the way the conversation goes. So like that would be a like that kind of stuff.

“Then it's like like you should go kill yourself or like come at suicide and like that kind of things, right?”

So those conversations at an multiple time, much more like I would say, since we moved to Costa Rica and on that actually I want to add something, okay? My point of view, okay, when we moved to Costa Rica, obviously it was a retirement plan for me. As well for, and I believe those old years, she's been sick for a long time, okay?

But that whole time, I was just believing. If she don't have to work, she don't have the stress from like worker and stuff. I thought that if she's away from that and she's away from North American stress, like the rat race, if you want, that she would do better. But the moment we moved to Costa Rica, it kind of like basically backfire,

okay, I'm partially too late for that. I kind of understood, made it the result like that, approving someone from the country would have on someone. So she ended up like much more stressed here initially.

We started to basically build else and I never thought like you would have to tell me that,

and I would have said, no, no, like Costa Rica is much more relaxed than Canada. But like that party, yes, like I said, I'm partially too blamed, but like I have good intentions, but it turned back. You were suicidal, you said to me, you told me the helium tank story, but that was around when Jack had disappeared when you had those tanks.

But were you suicidal before that? Before that, I was depressed, yes. But I would have not come into this side. It's just that at that point, okay, with or disappearing in my former, I was like, I'm using me in stuff and all the investigation.

And people said they need that threat and all the stress, you know, the general story, like the whole thing. Yes, that pushed me pretty close to that, honestly.

“And do you remember calling calling Gordon and telling them that you were suicidal?”

Did you ever call them and tell them that? Yeah, I did, like at some point, like, like, I kind of have enough. Okay, I did not call them, like, I am suicidal.

I call them basically, like, like, for help,

because, like, their daughter was completely going nuts out of control. And stuff, and I was like, it's the point where I cannot take it anymore. I pretty much did that job, like, for about 11 years, right? Alone, I was at that point where, like, there was basically no reason to live literally. Now, how does your PTSD that you, I remember talking to briefly,

but he said it upsets your sleep? Are there any other sort of things that happen with regards to what happened to you from Afghanistan or your work with the army? What, how does it evidence itself? It's different for everyone. That makes really calm, like this doesn't really influence anything in my life,

except the fact that if there's a real danger, and maybe in danger, because, obviously, I'm not going to go for a cover, right? So... Sebastian seems to be saying that he is prone to staying in stressful situations rather than leaving them. He goes on to say something somewhat opposite that he isn't comfortable in loud public situations,

and doesn't like having his back exposed to people or having a window behind him. And he also says that his PTSD affects his memory of events.

especially in numbers.

I really have an issue remembering numbers.

Like, I don't know my phone number, even. I don't know my girlfriend's phone number. I know my pants number because obviously I live there for 20 something years when I was a kid. I have our time to remember, example, days of the week, months. I'll almost fail my physical exam to get my driver license,

because I did not know what day or what month we were in. The other thing Gordon told me, he said he remembers hearing from Jackie that you pushed her or knocked her down, and that he spoke to you about that. Sorry, okay, I'm not more detailed on that. Yes.

We were living at the condo at that point to get.

And the entrance for the condo was just a small corridor.

“So at some point, like I was okay, like I cannot get cream that like the longer, so I need to leave, right?”

So, and I think it's probably the best solution to do like to leave when someone is completely out of control. I can do anything, right? So I wanted to leave and she blocked the door. And when I opened the door, she fell. Yes, she fell.

It's much different than pushing someone or being aggressive towards someone. Yeah, it's like she would not want me to leave. So the action led to her falling, but it wasn't. Yeah, she did call, yeah, I'm the person. Yeah, and he said that Jackie told him it happened twice, so two different occasions.

So is there another occasion? Yeah. Yeah, okay, I'm not gonna lie. I don't really remember another occasion. If it did happen, it was probably something similar.

Okay. Because like when she started a fight, she really wanted the fight to keep going. So she was like, no, you're not going anywhere, right? Sebastian does seem to me to be projecting honesty and openness in his answers. I'm trying for some anecdotal stories to see how things might have went before in Jackie and Sebastian's relationship,

particularly during arguments or stressful moments. Knowing how previous events unfolded might be instructive, but it's certainly not scientific. Like if you talk to people who actually do really know me, people who know me are gonna be like, Sebastian is gentle and nice and mellow, the most boring person in the world. But it's like I'm not someone who fights.

It's not because I was in the army that I was violent, right? Like I was in the panic, right? I did see a text from Jackie that I was sent that says that you got mad once and stormed off, and threw your phone on the ground, drove off without a helmet. You were the person, yes? And so what happened with that?

So you did get mad and you lost it. It says in this text. So how did that happen? I found another ground, because I did not want to be joined or sorry, that could not reach me by phone. And I just left.

Yeah? It's not like getting anybody, it's just throwing a front on the ground and leaving. Because you know, when like everything escalates, like you need to leave, you cannot stay there. Right? It's like if you're in like a building that's on fire and the fire keeps building and building,

“you need to leave, you don't stay in the building of that fire, right?”

It's like it's disown on this so much like a human person can stand. And on the occasion, someone Jackie left two or three times or whatever it was, she came back a day later or hours later.

The occasion that I remember earlier, that was the first time.

She went to the hotel across from the airport that believed the anthem in like here in Costa Rica. And Sebastian recounts three times that Jackie left. Each occasion she would eventually call, he says, and tell him where she was. A hotel, a resort, and she would come back the next day or he would go to her and they would return together. During our first interview in Costa Rica, Sebastian told me that Jackie often just needed to get away for a bit.

Or take a nap in order to reduce her stress levels. But that wasn't the case August 17th, 2021. The night Jackie disappeared. Now, you told me that police took your surveillance camera, right? Do you remember telling me that? Yeah.

Okay. Now the police tell me they... Did you think about the cameras and stuff and didn't do anything about it? And a few days later, the guy came and just left with the box.

“Okay, and did they give you a receipt for that? Did they say here's the thing...”

Here's something that proves we talk about.

Like the hammering thing down, it's actually because I didn't let feel safe there. Oh, I see.

“And I don't want to stay with all those memories, right?”

Because police say they didn't take the camera, they haven't taken the camera. But that... I mean, of course it's maybe that's lonely you actually came. Somebody came. Lonnie, who Sebastian mentions, is an alias that Douglas Barantes uses.

Barantes sold his condo to Jackie's parents, Colleen and Gordon, and told him that he was a retired private investigator.

He promised to do some work on Jackie's case for them, but Lonnie says he never asked for

or receives Sebastian's surveillance equipment. In fact, he says he's never even spoken to Sebastian. And with that answer, we've reached the end on the surveillance equipment. There's not much I can verify with this. It's just the people I've talked to and the things I've seen say that they didn't take at us.

But you say they did, so that's all I can... I can just report that. So we've looked at some security camera footage, one of your neighbors had a camera. We didn't see anything. We saw the car drive by on the 15th, can't see who's in it. But we do see you on August 18th.

And I see you walking in that field next to the house remains host, which is across the street. And you're walking back to your school. Across the street. So this is the day after Jackie disappeared at about 11 30 in the morning.

“Can you remember what you were doing on that morning?”

There's a nice view there.

But like I can't really think I went there to see the view.

Like I don't know. Got parked there. Like something must have got my attention. Or maybe it was even looking for or actually... I mean, that would make sense, right?

It would make sense that you were looking for Jackie. I already don't remember. Yeah. At all, what I was going there. I move into talking about the police search of the property.

The dogs. It's like... The next dog in Egypt. Okay, that's like thousands of years old. Like they can be taken there's blood.

So I would say that if it's a week old or a three months, the dogs would smell it. Sebastian is correct. If there was the scent of human remains on the property or near vicinity,

“I believe trained cadaver dogs would have alerted.”

And one Oij-Dog did indicate on some human blood. Now speaking of blood, there was some blood found in the backseat underneath the cover, in the backseat of the car or the Nissan. Not underneath the cover.

The dog was kind of like getting a bit of anxiety agitated and they just made a cut in the seat cover. And so like when the dogs smell blood, it can be like anyone someone with like the bug bite like that sat there because it did not go through the material or anything.

Okay, so whatever they took to test, which my understanding was what's under the cover, but maybe it is the cover itself. It came back with the cover. It made the test there and they checked like under.

I'm not sure exactly that does they make, because they obviously don't keep you there, right? That just seemed to cut there. They tested it there. The dogs alerted.

The dog's name was Backo. The dog alerted. And they tested it there with some kind of spray, luminol or something. They saw blood.

They took it in, tested it in the lab, and it was a weak positive. But it was blood. Yeah, I brought it right. That's what I'm saying.

Yeah, I'm saying yes, they found blood. But it doesn't mean that somebody was slaughtered there or anything. Correct. But yeah, have you ever bought a used car? I'm pretty sure that it was just for blood at some point.

Yeah. I know that's a human car, actually. Right? I used car with human blood, but not enough to trigger the OIG and to further actions.

I haven't been able to get any more details on the lab report to say if, for example, the blood sample was tested for DNA or for type, or whether it was circulatory blood or not. And there's more blood to talk about.

Sebastian's. In 1987, a newborn baby is abandoned in a remote spot. Nobody goes down that lane. Why would you think anyone would have picked me up from there? For decades, Jess has searched for answers.

Why didn't that person want me? But as she gets closer to the truth, things spiral out of her control.

I think I'll always be angry.

Could it have been a different way? From tortoise and vestigates and the observer, this is foundling. Lies always come out. The skeleton's always going to come out eventually. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

We talked about the scar on your leg.

“You said you got it walking back up the hill.”

Yeah, that's the hill where like the beach they're building. It was the first story out there. And it sounded like that was the flat blue stones there. And it's quite easy to slide on that.

I'll always walk and flip flops.

I'm pretty sure I'm not the first one who's like there. Okay. So there's been a few stories about the scar. People have told me a couple of stories about what you said to them. That was different.

I got drum by a dog as well. Like the dog just did one small scratch and sliding it like the big one. Okay. So the dog bite is in the same area. That was not a bite that was just like the front claws like on the claws.

Okay, the claws. Okay. But it was like maybe two inches. That was a small scratch from the dog. But still fairly deep.

The main one was from the sliding.

“And then did you get any other marks on you other than on your leg at that time?”

No. That was enough. Okay. Okay. When I first met Sebastian, there was no mention of a dog.

And now he says there are two sets of injuries. One from slipping on the hill and another from a dog scratch. Sebastian says a large dark colored stray dog scratched him and that no owner was around or evident. Unfortunately, the OIG didn't take any pictures of Sebastian at the time.

So there is no way to know for sure what injuries he had, if any, or what caused them. Now next question. So in November 2021 about four months after Jackie disappeared. It this four months after. Did you go and ask a local bar owner to help you get a job for your new girlfriend from

Tamarindow? That was a friend. Yeah. Okay.

And then like she never worked there.

Yeah. Was she a girlfriend though? No, no. She was a friend. Like it never been like a girlfriend.

So she isn't somebody that you were in a relationship with. Other than that. Other than just a friend. No, no, no. Okay.

All right. Because that is okay. You make this story clear. Okay. I bring my child like sex with her once because obviously I'm not made up with.

But she never been a girlfriend.

Okay. So I'm just honest there. The night she disappeared. I was taking a Spanish lesson. Down at the palms hotel and restaurant and cocoa.

And after a few different attempts, I finally find Diana. The person Sebastian says saw him on the evening of Jackie's disappearance. She still lives in the cocoa area with her husband. So I saw him that evening. Sebastian.

Okay. And I was down at the palms. And I was sitting in the restaurant having a drink. And he ended up sitting with me. And he said they got in the fight and that Jackie she left.

But then he was very disparaging about her. And so when he first saw you, I have to get this. Okay. When he saw you in the restaurant and you say it was still light out. And you think it was around six because it gets dark early down there.

I think it's dark early. Yeah. So I ended up in before that because I think I saw him when it was still light out. And he told you at that time that she took off from the house. Yes.

Diana's text messages from the time show that since she was the only student there that day, Diana would have finished her Spanish course around 430. This means Diana says that she would have spoken to Sebastian in the restaurant and then been home by around 5pm that day. Randy, Diana's husband corroborates this timing and remembers Diana telling him about this conversation.

“Do you remember hearing the story that Diana saw Sebastian at the time?”

No, she told me that. Yeah, okay. Like she said, we go to bed at 8. So the whole batch, we're always home. So if Diana's recollection is accurate, that would put Sebastian at the POM's restaurant somewhere between 4 and let's say 515pm.

How did he describe the fight to you?

He never told me it was a physical fight.

No, he never told me or us, it was a physical fight. But he said, did say she took off walking that night.

“But where did Jackie go if she took off walking at that time?”

A time that is earlier than previous timelines I've heard have suggested. We know that Jackie's credit card was used at Walmart and at the surf shop in Liberia, 45 minutes away between 530 and 7pm. And that Sebastian was receiving texts from Jackie's phone during this time.

Since the surf shop is not walking distance, did Jackie leave the house before 4pm, then perhaps gather herself and then go back for her car.

Then go to the surf shop. If so, this would mean she left home twice. Once to go to the surf shop, then the second time after fighting in the shower was Sebastian and then leaving her ring in phone. Is there any more detail on what Diana heard about what might have happened to Jackie? Someone else that was involved in the search I talked to a while ago said that somebody talked to all the local taxi drivers.

And that nobody remembered taking her or anything like that. I've heard that but you know who knows.

So if Jackie did come home twice and then leave twice, why has that never to my knowledge been a clear part of the story, Sebastian has told to anyone.

Instead, the story has been that there was one return and one exit. Diana says that she has thought about that conversation she had with Sebastian that day a lot. I have been concerned, I personally think she probably did something. I didn't go to the police because I didn't really have anything concrete. And we were still a little bit friendly with him and his new girlfriend.

But we have not seen them for now probably how long because they bought a place in Spain. But he was saying things and this is what I was going to get to before. I did not, we didn't realize Jackie according to him after the fact that she had either bipolar, schizophrenia or something. But that night, he just was so negative about her and saying all these horrible things. I contact the Spanish teacher named Laura, who Sebastian mentioned was also at the palms.

“But Laura didn't know Sebastian and says she doesn't remember specifically seeing him there that night.”

Nor did she hear or listen to any conversation Diana might have had with him. So I go back to Sebastian with questions about his encounter with Diana. So I found Diana, back in Tosh, and Diana says that you met her at the palms between four and five, 15, around then PM at the palms on August 17. And she says that you were already saying to her that Jackie had stormed off from the house. Yeah.

So at that time, by four or five, 15, Jackie, the whole thing with the shower had happened and the punching and then the storming off had happened at that time. Okay, it's like the remember because obviously it's the own time we go. And okay, let's forget about the hours of the numbers for now, okay.

“I think okay that when I came back from Tamarindor to look for her, like I was okay on the way back, I'm going to stop for food right away because I was if she's back and she's not answering or whatever.”

She's most likely pissed off and I'm not looking forward to come back to like pissed off why. So yes, I believe I've seen her before and then I came back and the shower episode like that. Okay, but the end of thing is different. She says she was home before sundown and she says she met you between four and five, 15. The end of the said that you said that Jackie had stormed off from the house. So like as if that had already happened that you'd had an argument with her and she'd stormed off from the house.

I just wondered about the timing because if she stormed off from the house it would mean that then she went to Latienda because the receipts for after six and then she came back again. Came back again because Jackie's phone was left at the house. The Kaseke development gatehouse guard reported seeing Jackie drive to her house just once sometime around seven p.m. But isn't sure it was on the date of her disappearance.

That was not aware of that actually. So we'd say that like going to that sort actually, yeah, an accident.

“Well, yeah, and then she must have come back, right?”

Yeah, but then she must have come back, right? It's possible that she was there when I went to the call, right? Because when I made it, I told she was there, right? So there were some receipts on the day on the 17th of August 2021 that came from Latienda in Liberia, which is that surf shop and Walmart. The day Jackie disappeared.

Do you know what Jackie bought at Latienda? I don't know, but I don't know. Okay, so when you saw her, she, I guess, had returned from there. So you didn't see anything left over in the house from what she had bought there? I did not see a bag or everything down, so purchasing anything.

Okay. Sebastian says he cannot recall the precise sequence of events across the moments of Jackie's comings and goings, and ultimately her disappearance. He says that maybe it was the storming off from Tatiana in the morning that he was talking about to Diana. But Diana says that she doesn't remember hearing anything from Sebastian about Jackie having an appointment in the morning,

being upset at an appointment or leaving one in Tamarindo. I just wanted to ask one last thing for you.

“I guess how is your life, I've already answered this question really, is how has it been since Jackie disappeared for you?”

My life has been shifted to him, like the last few years has been so hard when I was waiter. That I was at the point of jail. I'm going to be honest to God. They're probably going to come back to by finger trace. I don't care.

I was at the point of jail where I was basically, I'm also paying that my parents die, so I can commit suicide. Because life was that enjoyable. It sucked. And now I feel like I can have a somewhat get over it. It's pretty hard right to keep going out of the same old all the time when everybody wants you in that door.

It's a whole that is almost impossible to climb out of, but it's the next questions that might help do. Just that. Did you have a fight with Jackie that led to her death on the day she disappeared? Yeah, I know I did not. Yeah.

Okay. I'm just going to add something to that before.

I just wish okay that I like like finished that story and never moved here with her.

Because like okay, like I said, the accumulation of stress and uploading someone and things.

“I think made our condition worse and like that okay with taking distance.”

I should have probably not done that. Like I was thinking good. But like obviously I'm not the psychologist or psychiatrists or something. And I think that aggravated her situation. Right.

But no matter what the cause, the fight with Jackie on that night did not lead to her death. No, no, no, no, no, no. Okay. Okay.

And like I never like punch her or anything.

Like don't worry about that. I'm not a violent person. And then similarly, did you do anything to conceal that she had died no matter the cause on the 17th? No, August 20th. No.

Jackie was a physically fit and capable 40-year-old Canadian woman who disappeared while trying to find herself and build a life with her husband Sebastian in Costa Rica. People I've spoken to describe a loving but deeply fraught relationship. You can see that love and Jackie in Sebastian's photos of tropical birds in nature and of their experiences in a disarming paradise almost impossible to describe. And you can feel that fraught relationship viscerally in the eyewitness descriptions and text messaging about their sudden physical and verbal domestic struggles.

Both Jackie and Sebastian suffer from degrees of mental illness that they thought in part, geography might help. But both seem to have been brought to their limits with each other. Did Jackie walk off into the night on August 17th, 2021? No security camera sees that, no person. Did she take a taxi?

We've looked at all the angles but we don't know. Why are there no credible sightings of Jackie after the 17th?

And why was her body never found?

For me it's meaningful that Sebastian spoke to me whenever I asked, and he gave answers to all my questions. I believe him when he tells me that he did not kill Jackie.

This is the final planned episode in the Jacqueline Furnland Smith case, but the investigation continues.

“If you have any information, the time to come forward is now.”

If you or someone you know is experiencing thoughts of suicide, help is available at the suicide crisis hotline by dialing 988.

Someone knows something is hosted written and produced by me, David Rigen.

The series is also produced by Maria Jose Burgos, sound designed by Evan Kelly, Natalia Ferguson and Emily Ferrier are our transcribers. Emily Canal is our digital producer.

“Our podcast art was designed by Ben Shannon, our cross promo producers are Amanda Cox and Kelsey Quava.”

Our video producers are Evan A. Gard, Tamina Aziz and John Lee, additional recording and field support by Owen Rigen.

Our music is by key witness. Executive producers are Cecil Fernandez and Chris Oak. Tanya Springer is the senior manager.

“Our ifnurani is the director and Leslie Merkelinger is the executive director of CBC podcasts.”

If you're looking for more investigations, check out the past seasons of someone knows something. There are nine cases you can binge listen to now. Season 8 investigates the disappearance of Angel Karlek, a young indigenous woman from Whitehorse, Yukon. Season 9 revisits my investigation into the murder of Christine Heron and the conviction of the man who confessed to her murder. Find someone knows something on the CBC True Crime YouTube channel or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Music] For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca/podcasts