VANCOUVER, Wash — Listen to Should Be Alive on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Stitcher.
In June of 2019, 17-year-old Nikki Kuhnhausen disappeared from Vancouver, Washington, after going on a late night walk. Her roommates would later tell police that Nikki had left their apartment for a walk the night of June 5, and returned a few hours later wearing the jacket of a man she had just met. She was also holding a bottle of vodka.
The roommates reported that when Nikki came back to their apartment, they tried to talk her out of leaving to meet up with the man again. But she insisted on going. Nikki left the apartment in the early morning hours of June 6, and was never seen again by her roommates or family.
After several days of no contact with her daughter, Nikki’s mom filed a missing person’s report with the Vancouver Police Department. Nikki’s family became increasingly concerned because Nikki was always responsive on social media and often talked to her mom several times a day. Friends were especially worried because Nikki was transgender. They feared that could have been a factor in her disappearance: that someone possibly targeted her because of who she was.
As detectives began investigating Nikki’s disappearance, they wrote several search warrants for her phone. The warrants revealed Nikki had been communicating on social media with a man named David Bogdanov, around the time she went missing. With a primary person of interest in the case, investigators made multiple unsuccessful attempts to locate David. But they were unaware that he had fled the country on the day Nikki disappeared.
New episodes of Should Be Alive drop every Wednesday through June 29. Listen on your favorite podcast apps including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Stitcher.