Author reveals details in Kirkland parents' 1978 death aboard their boat | Photos

Author Larry Edwards does not believe his parents died the way his brother said they did.

Neither do his sisters, nor the FBI.

More than 30 years ago, the Kirkland couple’s mysterious deaths were front page news – a sensationalized story with some inaccuracies. But Edwards, an award-winning journalist himself, reveals new information in his recently published nonfiction book “Dare I Call it Murder? – A Memoir of Violent Loss.”

Written from his own perspective, Larry Edwards delivers evidence from the official FBI investigation report, while noting extreme inconsistencies in “witness” accounts throughout nearly 300 pages of how Loren and Jody (Joanne) Edwards died aboard their sailboat in the South Pacific Ocean in 1978.

The couple, along with their children Gary Edwards and Kerry Edwards, and family friend Lori Huey Oskam started their journey to French Polynesia in 1977. As a Kirkland carpenter for 25 years, it was Loren Edwards’s dream to build the bright yellow Spellbound (with “Kirkland, Washington” on the stern), and go on an adventure with his family.

Larry Edwards, who grew up in the Juanita neighborhood and graduated from Lake Washington High School in 1967, had planned to go on the trip but reconsidered when his brother came aboard. The two often argued.

However, a few months later, Larry Edwards received a call: His father was dead and his sister had a bleeding, fractured skull with a concussion. Later, he discovered his step-mother, whom he considered a mother, was also dead. He immediately flew to Tahiti.

Gary Edwards, who attended Redmond High School, told the FBI, and numerous reporters that his dad fell and hit his head on one of the spokes of the steering wheel – a conflicting story from what he told radio dispatch. His mother later committed suicide because of her husband’s death, he said.

By Gary Edwards’s account, he, Oskam and Kerry Edwards buried the bodies at sea because it could have been a week before they got to land and the bodies would decompose by that time – an assertion the author later debunks after obtaining a copy of the FBI report.

Kerry Edwards claimed to only know what her brother told her, and she couldn’t remember how she attained a head injury.

Oskam said she was asleep the whole time and only knew of Gary Edward’s story. Skeptical, investigators named Gary Edwards the prime suspect but he was never charged, despite compelling testimony.

Another peculiar fact the author noted: Gary Edwards signed a movie contract before he returned to the U.S., after his parents’ death.

The U.S. attorney never prosecuted Gary Edwards due, in part, to the lack of forensic evidence – the bodies were dumped over the side of the boat – and he did not want to risk incurring jeopardy, Larry Edwards said.

Larry Edwards continued to have hope, as there is no statute of limitations for murder. But he had even more questions after Kerry Edwards got her memory back.

“My sister [alleged] under oath that my brother assaulted and raped her,” said San Diego resident Larry Edwards in an email, “and her subsequent comments to me directly contradict many things she and my brother said in the days and weeks following our parents’ deaths.”

The conflicting information compelled Larry Edwards and his two other sisters, who were not on the Spellbound, to file a slayer petition in probate court in 1980, more than two years after their parents’ deaths.

But Gary Edwards never defended himself in court, telling the media he was innocent and that the “tragedy must be put behind us.”

“My intent was my brother and sister [Kerry] would testify and deny my allegations but my brother did not contest it,” Larry Edwards said.

After years of unanswered questions on the case, which is now “cold,” the author was able to meet with an anonymous FBI agent in 2002 – 26 years after his parents’ deaths.

He recounts the meeting in his book:

“’Kerry told me that she and Gary had been having sex,’ [the FBI agent] said. ‘It probably began before they left San Diego. Possibly even earlier than that, when Gary returned from the Army.’”

The book details the meeting in which the FBI agent said Kerry Edwards confided in him and claimed she had a sexual relationship with Gary Edwards, her half-brother, and the reason he allegedly sexually assaulted her that fatal night was because she wanted to stop the “sexual tryst.”

“He came to her one night and wanted to have sex and she refused and [allegedly] said ‘this is over, we’re not doing this anymore,’” said Larry Edwards, which is further detailed in his book. “This is when she said he attacked and raped her. Her moaning and cries awoke my parents and, shortly after, they were dead.”

After being at the forefront of the FBI investigation, writing 35-years-worth of journal entries, filing the slayer petition in probate court, and combing through his parents’ journals, the countless news articles and the official FBI report, today Larry Edwards still wholeheartedly believes there is missing information that only his brother and sister know.

“The reality is I don’t know if [Gary] killed my parents and I would like to believe he didn’t but when you look at all the evidence, it’s hard to believe they died the way he claims they did,” Edwards said in an interview. “[My book] leaves it up to the reader to make the decision.”

Larry Edwards said whenever he’s tried to speak with his brother about what happened, he’s been met with sarcasm or he’s simply ignored. The two have not seen each other since a 2007 family funeral.

“I have no idea if my brother knows about this book,” Larry Edwards said.

The Reporter attempted to contact Gary Edwards but received no reply.

The author emphasized the importance of delivering all of the facts in his story because other published stories, such as a true crime book written by Ann Rule and an online book that his niece wrote, simply “made things worse.” But the author has more hopes for the book than just to “set the record straight.”

Larry Edwards, along with many others who experience violent death, suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, only realizing it about five years ago.

“I’ve bottled this up for years. I never talked about it,” Larry Edwards said. “A lot of my friends, my wife’s family, had no idea. I’m not sure I understood it completely. But these are intense emotions and they never really go away.”

He said that by sharing his story, it helps release built up tension. “Sometimes I think ‘Why did I say or do that?’” Larry Edwards said. “I can trace it back to the anger I still feel over what happened to my parents and their death and what I perceive as a lack of justice for them.

“My goal is that other people who’ve had a similar tragedy in their life understand they are not alone and that there are people out there who will help them.”

For information, visit www.dareicallitmurder.com or www.facebook.com/LarryEdwardsBook.