Shanna "Liz" Golyar

I have blogged about over six hundred cases here at this site; I have a list of hundreds more to research and compose; I watch almost exclusively documentary shows on true crimes and I rarely read fiction books. From time to time I still run across cases that surprise even me. This is one of them.

We all have issues and quirks. Thirty-seven year old Cari Farver may have had a few more than the average person. At some point she had suffered with mental illness and it was this issue that muddied the waters when she disappeared. In November of 2012 things seemed to be going very well for Cari. She had a teenage son that many believe grounded her in many ways but Max did live with his grandparents most of the time it seems. Cari lived on the Iowa border in the town of Macedonia. Cari recently had a new man in her life, a man named David Kroupa. David lived just across the border in Omaha Nebraska. David and Cari had been dating for about two weeks when she disappeared on November 13, 2012.

According to David, he and Cari had a very casual relationship and it seemed to him that was clear to both of them. That is until the morning of November 13^th. Cari had spent the night at his home and when he left for work that morning things seemed fine and nothing had appeared to change between the two of them. Later in the morning he began receiving text messages, allegedly from Cari, who was now taking a different stance on their relationship. Suddenly she was pushing for things to get more serious. David, who had two children with his ex-girlfriend, Amy Flora, had not been extremely successful in the area of love and really did not have any desire to be anything more than casual with anyone. He had no reason to believe these text messages were not from Cari and he had no qualms in deciding very quickly that this this relationship would not go any further.

Not long later Cari's mother and son were also receiving text messages from Cari. Those messages were saying that she was leaving the area, needed to in essence “regroup” and she would stay in touch. On November 16^th, three days after she had last been seen Cari was reported missing. However, as I stated, her mental health history likely played a role in just how serious her disappearance was considered. From an investigative standpoint not only was Cari an adult with the right to “disappear” if that is what she wanted to do, despite her mental health history there was no reason to believe that she was in danger. Too add to this, they had evidence that she was still in contact with family members so from their viewpoint she was not really missing.

While Cari's family had to admit that a relapse of her mental issue could have occurred, they were suspicious from the beginning. Cari's father had been ill and it seemed unlikely that even if she was in the throws of a mental health crisis that she would have not come to see him. When he died on December 7^th and Cari never showed for the funeral, even more suspicion was cast by the family.

Meanwhile David Kroupa attempted to move on with his life but it seemed almost impossible because despite having his phone number changed he was still seemingly being harassed by Cari. From the time of her alleged disappearance until December of 2016 he would receive over 12,000 emails from Cari. He had started dating Shanna “Liz” Golyar, a woman that he had dated off and on for several years. Shanna also began receiving emails from Cari on a regular basis. In some of the emails to David it was made clear that he was being watched. Some would indicate he was in a particular place and doing something specific in which he was. This had him going to law enforcement to get a restraining order. Sometimes Kroupa would come home and see something moved or something odd and believe that Cari had been inside his home. Now, I think even David will admit that maybe some of those things were not real and in his head as he became paranoid and constantly looking over his shoulder. From his perspective however, at least at the time, he felt he was in danger and Cari was as they say, off the chain. He has admitted that his paranoia, while some would agree was warranted, had caused him significant fear and manifested into an issue with alcohol.

For David Kroupa it seems that while yes, he dated women and he admits he was not looking for any relationship to “take the next level” he was a good father to his children and very devoted to him. His relationship with their mother, Amy Flora, also appeared to be very good. This is something that can often be a thorn to a woman, but in fairness, Kroupa did not care, and he made no excuses. I found no evidence that Kroupa was anything more than upfront and honest with those he dated. While information surrounding what caused the final split with Golyar is not completely known, what is known is that it occurred in November of 2015.

Now, during all this as I mentioned Shanna was also claiming that she was getting emails and being essentially stalked by Cari. In August of 2013 there was a fire at Shanna's home that was apparently ruled as arson but there seemed to be no real suspects. It does appear that Cari was possibly a suspect, but throughout everything, no one had physically seen her or could prove she was doing any of the things that were alleged. Shanna moved around quite a bit over the next few years but always seemed to remain in the Iowa/Nebraska area.

Things took a complete turn in this entire case in December of 2015. Shanna contacted authorities and stated that while in a park in Council Bluff Iowa she had been shot in the thigh. She also identified her attacker as being Amy Flora, the mother of David Kroupa's children. Authorities went to Amy's home and it was discovered that she had been home with her son at the time of the alleged attack. It appeared to investigators that things had not gone as Shanna had planned when Amy was cleared of the shooting but it also appears that Shanna decided she needed to in essence “up her game.” That month Shanna would allege that she had received emails from Amy Flora in which Amy told her that she had attacked Cari Farver with a knife, burned her body and placed the remains in trash bags. In February of 2016 Shanna would allege she continued to get emails from Amy giving more details such as the fact that Cari was “taken to the woods.” One email also stated “After I killed Cari I contacted her mom Nancy pretendung (sic) to be Cari.” The interesting thing is that in all of these emails that were allegedly coming from Amy had the same types of misspellings. Whenever a word should have ended with “ing” it always ended in “ung.” I attempted to determine if this same misspelling was used in any other emails that would be discussed in the case but I was unable to find any information.

It appears that while investigators were already suspicious of Shanna when the incident in which she accused Amy Flora of attacking her, her behavior after helped them in their investigation even more into the disappearance of Cari Farver. David Kroupa even contacted authorities to see if he could get some information about what was going on. While he was never accused of any sort of crime or even really under extreme investigation, three women in his life were seemingly entwined with each other. First you have Cari, who while no one had physically seen her was presumably contacting both him and Shanna Golyar and causing some havoc. Then you have Amy, the mother of his children who has been accused, although apparently falsely, by Shanna as shooting her and allegedly confessing to killing Cari. But, in the middle of this was Shanna who was now under suspicion for a lot of things. Investigators could not tell Kroupa what they were discovering but they did advise him that he should keep a very close eye on Amy and his children. In fact, the lead investigator suggested that he move back in with Amy and the children.

Shanna “Liz” Golyar was finally arrested on December 22, 2016. She was charged with first degree murder and second degree arson. The murder charge related to the death of Cari Farver despite the fact that her body had never been found. The arson charge was related to the fire at Shanna's home in 2013. It is unclear if charges were ever brought against her in relation to the event that had brought her in the spotlight to begin with, her shooting. Investigators would later say that Shanna had stolen a gun from David Kroupa's home at some point and that she had used that gun to shoot herself in the thigh and then blamed Amy Flora.

Despite the fact that Cari Farver's body was never found the prosecutors felt they had enough evidence to charge and take Shanna Golyar to trial. Shanna's bench trial would begin on May 10, 2017. Prosecutors were able to prove that not only had Shanna created multiple email and Facebook accounts she had used those accounts to give the impression that Cari was still alive. The prosecutors argued that the content of the emails gave detailed information about the murder of Cari that only the perpetrator would know and they believed that was as good as a confession. One particular email mentioned a tattoo that matched on that Cari had. Many of those emails were read in the court.

Cari's car had been found and after one email detailed that Cari had been killed in her car it was searched for what was said to be the third time. This time the cover from the front passenger seat was removed and blood was found. It was tested and found to be Cari's. Shanna's fingerprints were also found on a tin of mints inside the car. Investigators would also be able to show that a memory card full of images belonging to Shanna had been found and that one of those images showed a foot that had a tattoo on it. There seemed to be little doubt this foot belonged to Cari.

Once Shanna and David Kroupa split up for good David began receiving less and less emails from “Cari” and once Shanna was arrested they stopped completely. It appeared by the pattern that Shanna had stopped pretending to be Cari and had decided instead to be Amy Flora and confess to the murder. Cari's family had also stopped receiving contact.

It appears that the defense said or did little other than claimed that the evidence did not prove she murdered anyone. It seems they were using the fact that a body had not been found as their argument because they had little recourse when it came to proving she had not composed the emails and text messages.

The trial lasted ten days before the judge went to decide on a verdict. On May 24, 2017 Shanna “Liz” Golyar was found guilty of first degree murder and second degree arson. On August 15, 2017 she was given a sentence of life without parole plus an additional fifteen to twenty years on the arson charge. The Nebraska Department of Corrections website says that she is eligible for a parole board “review” in November of 2027. I am unsure exactly what that entails.

In December of 2017 Shanna's lawyer contacted the police. He had received two emails within the last month relating to the case. The first stated “Tell Liz she has 30 days to supply the location of Cari Farver or she will pay the price. As the saying goes, an eye for an eye.” That one was dated November 4^th. On Thanksgiving another was sent and stated “IF the family of Cari Farver is unable to bury her then Shanna will have big problems. She has children. She is in jail, unable to protect them.” It appears as if this case is still under investigation.