Mike Gamberg : Special Investigator or Glorified Websleuth?

The 2013-2019 investigation under Special Investigator Mike Gamberg is something that deserves more discussion. It's been one of the most perplexing aspects of this case to me. The c.2016 media attention pushed the following narrative: Former PCSO investigator, Mike Gamberg, brought out of retirement to work the case. He was previously warned to stay away from the case when the murders occurred, by the former "corrupt" sheriff. Later fired by same sheriff. Leads were ignored. An obvious suspect was ignored and let go due to some coverup. Gamberg investigated and uncovered all this damning circumstantial evidence which led him to his suspects.

This ^ is what comes to the public's mind when this case is mentioned. For those of us who have followed the case prior to 2013, we know how inaccurate this is, there is an entire backstory left out.

There is no other way to say it besides there was nothing original conducted during his investigation. He didn't independently uncover these things. Didn't dive into the case files, follow every lead, rule others in or out, didn't go where the evidence led. Every single thing that has come out of his mouth can be traced back to Keddie 28. Yes, an investigator spent 6 years repeating claims made by a forum administrator and following leads provided by this forum administrator. Claims & theories created years prior from only a small fraction of the case files,  those that publicly available at the time and practically zero investigative files. A theory that in all actually originated during the making of the documentary. It's unfortunately just evolved to the absolute mess it is today. Timing is crucial regarding all this.

Gamberg came into this already convinced it was Marty & Bo. He allowed this to give him tunnel vision and solely focus on them. His "investigation" was a continuation of the hard work done by the documentary creators. I believe he felt they were onto something and rode those coattails thinking he could solve the case. 2013-2014 Josh was stepping away from the case, Dmac took over the forum (that's a whole other story). This shift put Dmac in position as the self proclaimed "expert" of the case and Gamberg buddied up to him.

We can and will provide documentation showing every major claim of this case was not developed through a thorough, legitimate investigation. It all originated on the forums before Gamberg repeated these claims in print and on tv. You can read Gamberg's 2013+ case report and see exactly where he started his investigation and it never went anywhere else. He spoke with Princess who filled him in on all the forum had uncovered, Princess led him directly to Dmac. Information, theories and deductions were exchanged and ran with. It's all very messy, hard to explain and even harder to believe. But the trail is there.

Gamberg's own official reports even include quotes from k28 posts. His case binders include pages of printouts of posts and discussions from the forum. Claims made by people years later in a documentary or while speculating on a forum made their way into official reports! This was presented as evidence of certain people's guilt! And the most unbelievable part, when these claims didn't match the original case files later uncovered, instead of seeing the obvious - that people's memory fades with time or they exaggerate, even make up memories - he decided it was proof the original case file was falsified. What!?!

Why would any trained investigator do this? I think the answer is easy. He isn't an experienced investigator. Never worked a cold case. How many other homicides has Plumas County had while he was there? Not many I'm not sure. And for certain none of them were like this one. Most homicides were likely cut and dry. IMO, his investigation is no different than if any of us, anyone who watched the documentary and followed the early forums became SI when this case was reopened. Harsh, but I believe that's what this boils down to.

Instead of relying on the work of the prior investigators he relied on the work of websleuths. As we've pointed out before, the claim of being warned off the case by former Sheriff Doug Thomas, not true. Impossible to be true as he was fired from PCSO 2-3 weeks before the homicides occurred. For the second time. Laziness, poor report writing, insubordination, excessive call offs due to work related stress, taking home evidence he confiscated from a suspect. It wasn't just Doug Thomas who was unhappy with his performance, it was also his superiors. And even the DAs. It's all documented in news articles for everyone to read and form their own opinion.

He came on as SI in 2013 still holding a grudge against Doug Thomas. That's evident in his documentary interviews. What's also 100% obvious is his lack of knowledge about this case and how quickly he did a complete 180 regarding what occurred during the initial investigation. "Mike Crim DOJ worked their fingers to the bone, excellent investigator but was prevented from furthering the case because of the sheriff at the time who was more interested in making a name for himself". Only to later parrot Dmac's claim of the DOJ agents being corrupt and DTs buddies, blah blah blah. Which is it Gamberg?

He never worked this case prior to 2013 because he wasn't assigned it and didn't have the drive/desire imo. PCSO didn't have the manpower to assign someone to the case in the 90s & 00's, no doubt. But look at Ken Mains. He began investigating cold cases because he had that drive and desire to do so, not because they were assigned to him. He worked his first cases in his free time, "not on the clock", because they were just sitting there collecting dust and deserved to have someone looking into them. Gamberg or anyone else at PCSO could have done the same thing with Keddie. I don't know how someone wouldn't want to dig in.

But we know, as Dmac's pointed out so many times - Gamberg doesn't work off the clock, doesn't take his work home. He could only do so much because of the budget and hours he was paid. This during his time as SI. He took the time to organize all those files in neat binders, but I don't believe he read them unless they pertained to MMB. Read Tom Horan's conversations with Gamberg and most questions were answered with "I don't know", "I'm not sure", "I'll have to look that up". Statements which contradicted the physical evidence. But he had no problem repeating exactly the same claims Dmac had presented years earlier.

The media stories make it all sound so wonderful. But these were media sources chosen by Dmac & Gamberg, to tell the story they wanted out there. They decided they wanted to have only one big TV show present the case. Haywood and Gamberg put Dmac in charge of making this decision! WTF??! And they go with People Magazine Investigatives!?! Not who I would have picked. But then again, People simply told the story from the Investigator (& Dmac's) perspective. No independent research or interviews. Plus they got a nice magazine spread to further spread their narrative in. How about Cold Justice?? The DNA of Murder with Paul Holes, which was filming at that time? You know, some of those shows that provide funding for evidence & DNA testing? What if you learned something like this was in the works, given the greenlight & approved funding but fell through when access to the evidence was denied by the SI?? Vidocq was interested and willing to help, but fell through after being rescheduled multiple times because the SI couldn't find the time to get out there over a 6 year period. Really!?!

Everything else I said can and will be backed up with receipts showing the trail of how forum speculation somehow turned into facts & investigative discoveries.

Anyway, these old posts are what led me to write this. He was obviously speaking with Night Rider as far back as 2010. And within months of becoming SI had buddied up with Princess, discussing the same people the internet had decided we're guilty and sharing his "hit list" (of those same people lol) with her. Nothing wrong with taking into account information & tips received from "websleuths". But they need to be independently verified and determined whether or not the information is valuable. It's not ok to center the entire investigation around this information and ignore other potential leads. And it's definitely not ok to reveal confidential investigative information to these people. God, not to mention years later give access to all the case files, which were removed from the sheriff's office without permission after being let go. Then to allow people to cherry pick reports, twist them to fit a theory and post them online, slandering and abusing people with ridiculous accusations.

What was been done in this case absolutely fucking disgusts me.