Digital Deception and Murder: The Twisted Case of Cari Farver
Single mother Cari Farver vanished without a trace on November 13, 2012. The last person to see her alive was Dave Kroupa, a man she had been casually dating for just a few weeks. That morning, she was still at Kroupa’s Omaha, Nebraska, home when he left for work. No one could have predicted that her disappearance would unravel into a years-long digital nightmare filled with obsession, deception, and cold-blooded murder.
Three days later, Farver’s mother, Nancy Raney, reported her missing after she failed to pick up her son. Around the same time, Kroupa began receiving chilling, threatening text messages—purportedly from Farver—after he rejected her sudden suggestion that they move in together. The messages soon spiraled into full-blown harassment.
Over the next three years, Kroupa was bombarded with tens of thousands of disturbing messages. “I hate you so much that I want to drive a knife in your heart,” one read. Another warned, “I will destroy your life and take your happiness.” Kroupa changed his phone number and email address multiple times, but the relentless onslaught continued.
Even more terrifying, the harassment extended to another woman Kroupa had been seeing—Shanna “Liz” Golyar. The threats soon became reality when Golyar’s home was set ablaze in August 2013, killing all four of her pets. Emails followed, allegedly from Farver, confessing to the arson.
Meanwhile, Raney received cryptic social media messages from accounts claiming to be Farver, urging her mother to stop searching for her. Yet, despite all these eerie digital breadcrumbs, Farver was nowhere to be found.
Cracking the Case: The Digital Trail That Led to the Killer
By 2015, detectives with the Pottawattamie County Sheriff’s Office took over the baffling case. Sgt. Jim Doty and his team, alongside digital forensics expert Anthony “Tony” Kava, combed through years of phone records and online activity.
It didn’t take long for them to pinpoint something shocking: Liz Golyar wasn’t just another victim of harassment—she was the one sending the messages, masquerading as Farver.
Golyar had meticulously used proxies and anonymous applications to cover her tracks, making it appear as though Farver was still alive and stalking them. Investigators uncovered over two dozen fake email addresses linked to Farver’s name, all controlled by Golyar. One of the IP addresses used to send the threats traced back to Golyar’s burned-down home—an explosive clue that blew the case wide open.
Then, in December 2015, the case took a bizarre turn. Golyar was shot in the leg. She claimed the attacker was Kroupa’s ex-wife, Amy Flora, and that Flora was the real stalker behind the threats. Investigators, however, saw through the charade. They suspected Golyar had staged the shooting to divert attention from herself.
Playing along, detectives convinced Golyar to help them catch Flora. Soon, “Flora” sent them emails confessing to murdering Farver. But digital forensics traced those emails right back to Golyar’s devices. The web of lies was finally unraveling.
The Chilling Evidence That Sealed Golyar’s Fate
A crucial breakthrough came when investigators searched Farver’s recovered vehicle. Inside, they found traces of her blood on the passenger seat—proof that something horrific had happened to her.
But the most damning piece of evidence was discovered on an old tablet Kroupa had kept. Tucked away in its memory card was a deleted image showing a decomposed human foot with a tattoo of the Chinese character for “mother.” Farver’s mother confirmed her daughter had the same tattoo. A medical examiner determined the foot belonged to a deceased person. It was the final, grisly confirmation that Farver had been murdered.
Justice Served—But Closure Remains Elusive
On August 15, 2017, Judge Timothy Burns found Liz Golyar guilty of first-degree murder. Despite her conviction, she never revealed the location of Farver’s body, leaving her family without the full closure they so desperately needed.
“Cari Farver did not voluntarily disappear and drop off the face of the earth,” Judge Burns declared. “Very sadly, she was murdered.”
With Golyar behind bars for life, investigators not only brought a killer to justice but also restored Farver’s name. For years, she had been portrayed as an unhinged stalker. The truth was far more sinister—she had been the victim of an obsessive woman willing to kill and manipulate digital footprints to cover her crime.
“I don’t think we will ever have another case like this one,” Kava later said. “The level of deception and the scale of manipulation made it one of the most complex cases we’ve ever seen.”
To this day, the whereabouts of Cari Farver’s remains remain unknown. But thanks to digital forensics and relentless detective work, the world now knows the truth: Cari was never the monster—she was the prey.
