# 2 Chilling True Crime Mysteries: Florence Lauze and Gussie Shanahan

An episode of [Lazy Chill True Crime](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1815534472), 1 Sep 2025, 17 min.

Audio: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/APO6589799700.mp3

Join me as we discuss the cases of Florence Lauze and Gussie Shanahan. 👇 Support My Work: 🛍️ Merch: https://lazy-chill-zone-shop.fourthwall.com ❤️ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/lazychillzone 👇 Youtube links: Lazy Chill True Crime Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8dVJtzeHcJgd_Z0bHrJTHQ Lazy Chill History Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LazyChillHistory Lazy Chill Zone Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LazyChillZone 👇Social Media Links: https://www.instagram.com/lazychillzone/ 👇 Podcast links: ⚡History Video Podcast on Spotify⚡: https://open.spotify.com/show/7km5pLWpYWEj1mrPpEfRUr?si=0FHYnZf-Qs2FY1GyLevfig ⚡True Crime Podcast on Spotify⚡: https://open.spotify.com/show/0klIz08pAr7wR4we0Ia4sk?si=68qZxCeAQkysXzMZrHE0Iw 🍏 True Crime Podcast on Apple 🍎: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lazy-chill-true-crime/id1815534472 2 chilling true crime mysteries, Florence Lauze, Gussie Shanahan, unsolved murders, disappearance, cold cases, mysterious deaths, Maine true crime, Ireland true crime, 1975 murder case, 2000 missing person case, dark mysteries, haunting true stories, unsolved true crime podcast, cold case files, real crime documentaries, creepy mysteries, Lazy Chill Zone true crime, missing persons, mysterious vanishings, disturbing crimes, unsolved tragedies

## Transcript

[0:00] It was a damp, foggy August morning in 1975 when a father
[0:05] and son set out early for a simple fishing trip on Sherman
[0:08] Lake in Newcastle, ME. The serenity of the water was
[0:12] shattered by a gruesome discovery.
[0:15] At about 8:00, as they prepared to cast their lines, the two
[0:19] fishermen noticed something floating near a bridge.
[0:23] Upon further investigation, they discovered the body of a young
[0:27] woman. The horrified pair ran to a
[0:29] nearby farmhouse to call the police, initially reporting what
[0:33] they assumed was a drowning. But as officers arrived, it
[0:37] became clear this was no accident, but rather the
[0:41] beginning of a mystery that would haunt Maine for decades.
[0:47] A Lincoln County Deputy Sheriff was first on the scene on that
[0:50] August 16th, 1975 morning. He noticed potential signs of
[0:55] foul play and secured the area, then called in The Maine State
[0:59] Police from Augusta. By the time state detectives
[1:03] arrived, a small crowd of onlookers had gathered in shock
[1:06] along the road. The victim's body was found face
[1:10] down by the water's edge, arms outstretched and hair fanned
[1:14] across the shallow lake. She was mostly clothed, and she
[1:18] still wore some jewelry, including a silver bracelet and
[1:22] a small pendant. However, despite these
[1:25] identifying features, no ID was found with her, so her name
[1:29] remained a mystery at the time. As officers pulled the body from
[1:34] the water, the cause of death became grimly apparent.
[1:38] A dark ligature mark encircled her neck, and bruises were
[1:41] visible all over her body. The state medical examiner
[1:46] determined she had been in the water less than 24 hours,
[1:50] suggesting the slaying likely occurred the night before.
[1:54] The perp had made little effort to conceal the crime scene, and
[1:57] the young woman had simply been dumped in the lake.
[2:02] In the days after the discovery, the victim still had no name.
[2:05] Investigators canvassed the area, interviewing locals and
[2:09] checking with hotels, campsites and police agencies for any
[2:14] missing person matching her description.
[2:17] Some even theorized she might have been a seasonal waitress or
[2:20] other summer worker passing through.
[2:23] Despite these efforts, no one could identify the young woman.
[2:27] Growing desperate, authorities took a very rare step.
[2:31] They released a post mortem photograph of her face to the
[2:34] media and asked them to broadcast it on the local news
[2:38] and put it in papers. Remarkably, this gamble paid off
[2:42] very quickly. This photograph was published in
[2:47] a Boston newspaper and caught the attention of a family in
[2:50] Massachusetts who immediately recognized the woman. 10 days
[2:55] after the body was found, the young woman was finally
[2:58] identified as 19 year old Florence Lowe's of Brockton, MA.
[3:05] Investigators confirmed the identification through
[3:07] photographs, dental records, and jewelry she had been wearing.
[3:12] Florence's family hadn't even realized she was missing at the
[3:15] time. Her mother had spoken with her
[3:18] only about a week before the tragedy, so no missing person
[3:22] report had ever been filed. Florence was recently divorced
[3:26] from her marriage to Richard Paul Lowe's and had moved back
[3:29] to Brockton, where she was living with a roommate.
[3:34] She had worked as a nurse's aide, but by that summer she was
[3:38] between jobs. Importantly, Florence had strong
[3:41] ties to Maine, and her father lived in the area near where her
[3:45] body was found. Investigators learned that on
[3:48] August 15th, 1975, Florence left Brockton intending to travel N
[3:54] to visit him. With no car, she likely
[3:59] hitchhiked the roughly 150 mile journey.
[4:02] Sherman Lake lies just off US Route One, a major coastal
[4:07] highway, so the hitchhiking theory neatly explained how a
[4:10] Massachusetts traveler could end up there.
[4:13] Tragically, Florence never made it to her father's house.
[4:18] At some point on her journey, she crossed paths with the
[4:21] perpetrator. Once Florence's identity was
[4:26] known, law enforcement in both Maine and Massachusetts retraced
[4:30] her steps and searched for suspects.
[4:33] Maine State Police detectives teamed up with Brockton Police
[4:36] and Massachusetts State Police, following leads in both states.
[4:41] Investigators interviewed people in Brockton who had seen
[4:44] Florence before she left, hoping to learn if she mentioned any
[4:47] travel plans or companions. They looked at everyone in her
[4:51] life, including her estranged husband, for anyone with a
[4:55] possible motive. Initial news reports even
[4:59] indicated that detectives had a few promising leads in
[5:01] Massachusetts. Despite this early momentum, no
[5:07] perpetrator was ever identified. By September 1975, officials
[5:13] acknowledged that the investigation had stalled, with
[5:15] no new developments. By 1977, two years after the
[5:21] crime, police admitted they were still no closer to an
[5:24] explanation than on the day Florence's body was found.
[5:31] Over the years, several theories have surfaced about what
[5:34] happened to Florence Lowe's. The most widely held belief is
[5:38] that she fell prey to a dangerous stranger while hitch
[5:40] hiking. Accepting a ride from the wrong
[5:43] person carried obvious risks, and many suspect that Florence
[5:47] was picked up by someone who then turned violent.
[5:51] Her state of undress suggested a possible indecent assault,
[5:54] though the autopsy couldn't prove it one way or the other.
[5:58] Perhaps a passing motorist or truck driver offered her a ride,
[6:02] then assaulted her before dumping her body.
[6:05] If Florence was slain by a random predator, possibly even a
[6:09] serial offender, solving the case would be incredibly
[6:13] difficult. Further, there's no indication
[6:16] that there was any biological evidence of any kind from the
[6:19] offender left at the scene. Given that this was well before
[6:23] the era of the forensic usage of DNA, it's possible that such
[6:27] evidence simply wasn't even collected.
[6:32] While the very obvious and blatant forms of biological
[6:35] evidence did tend to be collected at this time, less
[6:38] obvious forms often didn't. For instance, if there were skin
[6:43] cells from the perpetrator under Florence's nails, this likely
[6:47] would have gone unnoticed at the time.
[6:51] Another theory is that the attacker wasn't an out of towner
[6:54] at all, but someone who knew the local area or even knew Florence
[6:59] personally. Locals noted that a stranger
[7:02] unfamiliar with Newcastle might not easily find the desolate
[7:06] location where she was dumped, especially in the dark.
[7:10] This fuels suspicion that whoever left her body there knew
[7:14] the area well. Indeed, rumors in Newcastle have
[7:17] long speculated that a local person was responsible.
[7:21] Perhaps Florence accepted a ride from someone she thought she
[7:24] could trust, maybe even an acquaintance, who then betrayed
[7:29] her in the worst way. Investigators have never
[7:32] publicly identified a suspect, and no evidence has confirmed
[7:36] this local perpetrator theory. Still, the idea lingers, leaving
[7:41] many to wonder if the perp was closer to home than anyone
[7:44] realized. Decades later, Florence's
[7:49] slaying remains unsolved. With seemingly little to go on,
[7:54] the case remains open and Maine's Cold Case Unit continues
[7:58] to review it periodically in hopes of a breakthrough.
[8:02] Unfortunately, we're now 50 years out from this horrific
[8:05] tragedy and as time ticks by, it becomes less and less likely
[8:10] that the perpetrator will ever face justice.
[8:16] Hey everyone, Jimmy here with the usual reminder to like and
[8:19] subscribe and hit the notification bell.
[8:22] Also, I've just launched the Lazy Chill History Video podcast
[8:26] where I'm slowly rolling out all my content from my History
[8:30] channel. I've included the link in the
[8:32] description, so make sure to like and follow over there as
[8:35] well. On a cold Friday night in
[8:40] February 2020, year old Angus Shanahan, who went by Gussie,
[8:46] walked out of a Limerick pub and vanished into the darkness
[8:50] without a trace. He left behind 1/2 finished
[8:53] bottle of beer on a doorstep and stepped into a narrow laneway,
[8:58] appearing to vanish into thin air.
[9:01] What began as an ordinary evening out quickly transformed
[9:04] into one of Ireland's most baffling missing person cases.
[9:09] It would take 18 years for any trace of Gussy to surface, and
[9:13] even then, the discovery raised as many questions as it
[9:17] answered. This is the story of Gussie
[9:20] Shanahan's disappearance, a night out gone terribly wrong,
[9:25] and the theories that still swirl around a case that remains
[9:28] unsolved. February 11th 2000 began like
[9:34] any other day for Gussie Shanahan.
[9:37] He finished his shift at the Dell Computer plant in
[9:40] Castletroy that afternoon and headed into Limerick City to
[9:43] kick off the weekend. Gussie stopped by the bank where
[9:48] his father worked to repay a small loan and mentioned his
[9:52] plans for the night ahead. He then grabbed a quick bite to
[9:56] eat and met up with two close friends to begin the evening.
[10:02] Also as a quick aside, Limerick had an incredibly seedy
[10:06] reputation at this time and was known for a significant amount
[10:10] of knifing incidents. My understanding is the
[10:13] reputation of the city hasn't improved much and it's basically
[10:17] the Glasgow of Ireland, but I digress.
[10:22] The trio headed to Cooper's Bar on Saint Joseph's Street, a pub
[10:26] near his friend's apartment. They had a couple of drinks and
[10:30] Gussie was in high spirits chatting with other patrons.
[10:35] By around 9:30, both of his friends had gone back to their
[10:38] apartment, leaving Gussie at the bar on his own.
[10:42] He lingered a while longer and even tried calling a few other
[10:45] friends to join him, but no one was available at that hour.
[10:51] Sometime close to 1030, Gussie left the pub alone, and security
[10:55] cameras captured him crossing the street toward his friend's
[10:57] building. After leaving the pub, a
[11:00] neighbor sitting in a parked car saw Gussie walk up to the
[11:03] apartment door, raise his hand as if to knock, then hesitate
[11:08] and turn away. He set down the beer bottle he
[11:11] was carrying, put on his jacket and headed off toward a dimly
[11:15] lit alley. Nobody ever saw him come out the
[11:19] other side of that alley and that was the last confirmed
[11:22] sighting of him. When the Shanahans hadn't heard
[11:27] from Gussie by the end of that weekend, they grew alarmed.
[11:30] By Monday morning, February 14th, Bob Shanahan checked his
[11:34] son's bank records and saw no activity since Friday.
[11:38] When Gussie also failed to show up for work that day, the family
[11:42] filed a missing person report and alerted the cops, and a full
[11:46] scale search operation was soon launched in Limerick.
[11:51] Police, family and volunteers scoured the city and surrounding
[11:54] areas for any sign of the missing young man.
[11:58] They retraced Gussie's last known route through the downtown
[12:01] streets and even searched the River Shannon, fearing he might
[12:05] have ended up in the water. Despite exhaustive efforts, no
[12:11] clues turned up. There were no signs of a
[12:14] struggle in the alley where he was last seen, and none of
[12:17] Gussie's belongings were ever found.
[12:21] For the Shanahan family, the pain of not knowing was immense.
[12:25] Gussie's mother, Nancy, was so heartbroken by her son's
[12:28] disappearance that she suffered a stroke, and she died in 2016
[12:34] without ever knowing her son's fate.
[12:37] Despite this, Bob and Gussie's siblings vowed to continue the
[12:41] search for Nancy as much As for Gussie.
[12:45] They kept his story in the public eye through media appeals
[12:48] and persisted in contacting anyone who might help.
[12:52] But now let's step back in time to 2001, because it turns out a
[12:57] John Doe case hadn't been properly connected to Gussie's
[13:00] disappearance. On October 28th, 2001, about 20
[13:07] months after Gussie disappeared, a search team discovered partial
[13:11] skeletal remains on Key Island in the Shannon Estuary.
[13:16] A few bone fragments were recovered, but at the time they
[13:19] couldn't be identified. Early DNA tests failed to link
[13:23] the remains to any known missing person, so the fragments were
[13:27] stored as unidentified and largely forgotten.
[13:33] For 17 years, those bones sat in storage while the Shanahans
[13:38] continued to agonize over Gussie's fate.
[13:41] Finally, in late 2018, advancements in DNA technology
[13:46] provided an answer. A re examination of the Key
[13:50] Island bones matched them to Gussie Shanahan and in October
[13:54] 2018 the family received official confirmation.
[14:01] In November 2018, the Shanahan's were at last able to hold a
[14:05] funeral for Gussie. They laid his remains to rest
[14:08] beside his late mother Nancy, as the family had always hoped to
[14:12] do. This partial closure also
[14:15] prompted law enforcement to take a fresh look at the case.
[14:19] The authorities opened a complete review of the
[14:21] investigation's original files and appealed again for
[14:24] information, treating the case with renewed urgency.
[14:28] After 18 years of painful uncertainty, there was finally a
[14:33] concrete development. But the question of how Gussie
[14:36] ended up in the river remained unanswered.
[14:42] With confirmation of Gussie's death, the focus turned to how
[14:45] it happened. One theory is that his death was
[14:48] a tragic accident. Perhaps Gussie, while walking
[14:52] alone, wandered toward the river and fell in by mistake.
[14:58] However, his family and others doubt this.
[15:01] He was last seen walking away from the water and didn't appear
[15:05] to be overly intoxicated, which makes an abrupt, accidental
[15:09] drowning seem unlikely. Moreover, intensive searches
[15:14] along the Shannon at the time found no trace of him, casting
[15:18] doubt on the idea that he simply slipped into the river that
[15:21] night. Likewise, his family noted that
[15:24] Gussie had no personal problems that might have prompted him to
[15:27] do something to himself. The leading theory, which
[15:32] Gussie's family strongly believes, is that he met with
[15:36] foul play early on. Suspicions arose that he may
[15:39] have crossed paths with dangerous individuals after
[15:42] leaving the pub. Information later emerged
[15:46] suggesting Gussie might have ended up at a house party or
[15:49] gathering in the company of people with violent reputations.
[15:54] The family believes something went terribly wrong, perhaps an
[15:57] argument or assault, and that Gussie was slain and his body
[16:02] dumped into the river when the heat cooled down.
[16:07] Over the years, the Shanahan's have received tips supporting
[16:11] this theory. In one instance, an anonymous
[16:14] caller told Bob Shanahan that Gussie quote ended up in the
[16:19] water that night because he was put there, implying others were
[16:23] responsible. Over the years, there has even
[16:27] been speculation about a broader pattern.
[16:30] Coincidentally, two other young men employed at Dell and
[16:33] Limerick vanished in the years around Gussie's disappearance,
[16:37] though there's been no official connection between the cases.
[16:43] To date, no one has been charged in connection with Gussie
[16:45] Shanahan's disappearance, though his family and the authorities
[16:49] continue to cling to the hope that this Irish cold case will
[16:52] be closed.

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them.