Julia Villanueva

Just a heads up that this episode contains some explicit language.

Unknown

The views expressed in this podcast are solely those of the individuals providing them. Some names and identifying details have been changed.

Daniel Villanueva

Julia, hey. Uh, I think I might have butt-dialed you there. Sorry about that. There's some kind of app or update on my phone with these big ass buttons. I don't know how this goddamn thing works. Anyway, I hope you're okay. In our little corner of the world, things are uh pretty much the same. I'm working security on one of them. If you can believe that. I'm working on that old boat, fixing her up. You come back to Lakecastle. Come home. And we'll go out on that boat. Okay. Alright. I'll talk to you soon.

Julia Villanueva

From Sansrival, this is Lakecastle. I'm Julia Villanueva. On today's episode, what does it all mean? Episode four, The Dam Bursts. First, a word from our sponsor.

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Julia Villanueva

Let me tell you a little bit about my day job. I'm a data scientist. I work with ML systems and LLM apps on systemic AI hallucination reduction. What does that mean? I think we all know at this point that AI has an unfortunate tendency to make shit up and feed it to you with a straight face. Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's scary. My clients call me in a panic because their customer service bot is giving stock market advice based on non-existent stocks, or prescribing incorrect doses of medication, or describing them as drug cartel kingpins when they actually sell pottery. Very weird, very expensive problems. The thing is, AI hates to admit that it doesn't have the answer. It would rather spout nonsense than tell you I don't know. And it can get really, really creative. So basically, my job is to help manage the hallucinations. I say manage rather than eliminate because there's no way to make them go away. The model wants to be creative. We just have to channel that creativity and focus it towards what we want. I mentioned this because I had a dream last night, a very, very vivid dream. It started off as a memory. I mean, I think it's a memory. I was biking with my dad. I was probably about eight or nine. We were on the path that runs along the North Shore right by the lake. Um I remember the waves crashing on the rocks and the wind whipping my hair. I was singing. I always liked biking because I like to sing, but I was shy about it. And when you're going really fast, with the rhythm of the pedals under your feet, you can sing out loud without being heard very well by anyone. So my dad said, stop, and we pulled over, and there was a huge moose standing right in the path, staring at us. Its antlers were spread out, they seemed almost like wings, and a family on a bunch of bikes was already stopped by the side of the road, and they had cameras out, and they kept whispering, whoa, cool. And out of nowhere, my dad lets out this really loud, sustained, really realistic, mooing sound. The family turned to look at him like he was crazy. I think they thought the moose was going to charge and eat us, but it just stood there looking at us, and then it ran off the path and into the woods. I almost fell over laughing. I couldn't breathe. I was laughing so hard. And my dad was laughing at me, laughing at him. It was so funny. I don't know why. And when we got back on our bikes, and right then he looked at me and he said, I love you, Julia. Very matter of fact. And I felt this warmth spread through me. Like he had wrapped me up in his arms and given me a huge embrace. And that's when I woke up. And the thing is, my father never, ever, ever said those words to me. I lay there in bed so angry. Because I felt like I'd been lied to. But it was me. Lying to myself. Which meant some part of me wanted the lie. And didn't want the truth. It wanted to fill in the gaps with what it wanted. Something I never had. And why had it felt so real?

Abe Carter

The Nelson Reservoir.

Helga Grant

It has its own power sources, its own food sources.

Mary Villanueva

He did say that the construction was really intense, full force, day and night.

Julia Villanueva

What's really going on here? What is this all about? I have spent the past year pouring over records, interviews, maps. It all keeps coming back to the Nelson Dam and Reservoir. The dam sits on Lindeman-owned land, as we have heard in previous episodes. After months of trying, nobody in Lakecastle would talk to me about the current status of the reservoir. And no one would go on the record. So here are the facts. One. After making numerous public records requests, I can find no record of the Nelson Dam being inspected by Minnesota's Department of Natural Resources, or DNR, since 2015, when Lindeman bought up the land and ostensibly repaired the dam. By law, the dam is required to be inspected every five years. Two. My father used to work for the DNR. Three.

David

Normally Danny was on the north end of the property where the reservoir is.

Julia Villanueva

You'll recall from Episode Two that my father used to patrol the reservoir but was transferred away, to patrol a precarious and unsafe location, on January 8th, 2022, the night that he died in a blizzard. Four.

Mary Villanueva

I opened my mailbox and it was just sitting there.

Julia Villanueva

Shortly after my father's death, Blue Orchard sent my mother money. Unasked for. Five.

David

There was a medic onsite who attended him. There's always a medic when Mr. Lindeman is on the farm.

Julia Villanueva

According to my father's coworker, Blue Orchard concealed the fact that a medic and Lindeman himself had been on the compound on January 8th. They lied to us about my father's time of death and about his condition when he was found. Jonathan Lindeman is responsible for the integrity of the Nelson Dam. The public has no information about whether or not the dam is safe. If it breaks, it will not only incur millions of dollars in damages, but it will also take lives.

Dean Vargas

I have spoken with the property owner and his wife multiple times since this happened... ...As I mentioned, Jonathan and Cathleen have been really clear about wanting to help... Jonathan does want to make sure you are taken care of.

Julia Villanueva

If my father knew that the dam was compromised, that would be enough reason to have him silenced.  It's September 2025. I'm back in LA, trying to finish this podcast. It's taking a lot of time and energy. I haven't been sleeping very much. For the past few weeks I've been working my job during the day and then coming home and working on this podcast into the wee hours of the morning. And when I try to sleep, I just lie in bed and scroll on my phone and feel like shit. So I thought I'd try falling asleep to white noise, or pink noise or brown noise. There are a crayon box's worth of different colors of noise out there. Oh yeah, I quit my job at Butter. Yeah, I work for Butter. I used to work for Butter. I told my boss that my dad's death was making me reevaluate my life. And then I said that I felt morally compromised at work and that my job was contributing to the downfall of the species and the planet, and I could not, in good conscience, continue to work at this company. And my boss said that she really appreciated my sincerity and my thoughtfulness, and that those were wonderful qualities I had brought to this job. But that if I thought I was going to run and hide and escape from the reality of the 21st century and the lightning speed of the future, I was kidding myself. And I said, fuck you, and walked out the door. Anyway, I've been kind of stressed. So for the past week I've been falling asleep to calming music, waves lapping, rain sounds, things like that. And it's been giving me horrible nightmares about Lakecastle. And I dreamed that I was in our old family home, but it was on fire. The flames curling and sprouting up in the wind, and I was going from room to room, trying to escape them, but they were everywhere. Then all the flames became eyes, and they were watching me silently. And I started panicking and wanted to scream, but just kept holding it in. Then it was raining hard and dark, and I couldn't see, and the house started to flood all of a sudden, and I tried to run, but the ground underneath me heaved up and moved and tilted, and I was sliding back and down this muddy slope, and I kept falling and falling, and all of a sudden I was just falling into an abyss, screaming and all alone. It's been like four days now of variations on that same dream. Lindeman's algorithm really doesn't want me to go back to Lakecastle. I mean think about it. It sounds crazy, but think about it. Okay, I'm just gonna put you on speaker, okay? Um, and then I'll record because this could be useful for the podcast, I think.

Matt Larsen

Yeah, sure.

Julia Villanueva

So, um, we, Matt and I, uh we're on the phone chatting, talking about this podcast, and Matt, you were saying that you think my idea of Lakecastle has completely changed.

Matt Larsen

Yeah.

Julia Villanueva

Say more about that.

Matt Larsen

Uh well, yeah, because I've known you for a long time. You know, in in fifth grade you went around telling everyone you were gonna run away to Mongolia.

Julia Villanueva

Yeah! I was I was probably copying something I'd seen on TV.

Matt Larsen

It was like a thing you did for months.

Julia Villanueva

I thought Mongolia sounded cool.

Matt Larsen

Yeah, but you thought Lakecastle was horrible. It was this small backwards town where everyone knew everyone. And then you wanted to be somewhere cosmopolitan and diverse and forward-thinking. You did not like it here.

Julia Villanueva

I think - that's not true. That is not the whole of my experience or how I feel about Lakecastle. I think you just don't understand really what things were like for me, or why a child might react to the circumstances of their upbringing in a way that could come across as immature.

Matt Larsen

I'm just trying to understand why you're coming back to Lakecastle and positioning yourself as a spokesperson for the town.

Julia Villanueva

So you're saying I have no right to speak for Lakecastle because my family didn't work on the ore docks like yours, because I'm not white.

Matt Larsen

I don't need you to prove how American you are.

Julia Villanueva

Oh, okay.

Matt Larsen

I just I don't understand what you want to get out of all this attention. This seems really risky. Lindeman could come after you for making this podcast. Uh I mean, but that's validating in a way for this powerful person to see what you're doing.

Julia Villanueva

This whole thing is about Lakecastle. The whole point is -

Matt Larsen

Is it? Why are you making this podcast?

Julia Villanueva

People have the right to know what's going on in this town. People have a right to know if they're being fed lies and if they're in danger, and especially if a very powerful person is trying to mislead them or take advantage of them to make a profit. I am asking questions about Lindeman and Blue Orchard, which is apparently to many people a shocking thing to do.

Matt Larsen

But when you point the finger at Lindeman, you're implicating all of us. Do you get that? Everyone is connected to him, whether we want to be or not. He calls the shots.

Julia Villanueva

How can you say that? How can you just accept that as a fact of life?

Matt Larsen

That is a very privileged thing to be able to say.

Julia Villanueva

How is it privileged to be disgusted by the idea that a billionaire rules over everybody in my hometown?

Matt Larsen

Lindeman gives Lakecastle stability and a path forward, right? We we can't just unseat him without considering who or what would fill the void if he went away. It's not like we were doing just fine before he came along.

Julia Villanueva

See you're talking about him like he's a king.

Matt Larsen

I know you have a personal stake here, and that is a complicating factor.

Julia Villanueva

What is that supposed to mean?

Matt Larsen

You may never know what happened at the end of your father's life. And throwing yourself into all this work doesn't change that.

Julia Villanueva

Lakecastle is a very insular community. You don't trust outsiders. But like it or not, you need someone to shine a light on this town and help right these wrongs. That is the reason I'm doing all of this.

Matt Larsen

So what happens to us? People outside Lakecastle are so happy to be waving their banners for big change, but they don't actually care about how our lives are impacted. That's my concern. What happens to us? You know, when you lead a charge against Lindeman, you're asking us to take a hit.

Julia Villanueva

Look at what happened to my dad, Matt.

Matt Larsen

I don't know what happened to your dad. And you don't either.

Julia Villanueva

Yeah. Exactly.

Matt Larsen

I just I can't see this in terms of right and wrong the way you do.

Julia Villanueva

I hear you. I hear the resentment. My dad had what you might call “attitude problems.” Uh, he was probably living with undiagnosed bipolar disorder. He got fired a lot from a bunch of different construction jobs, which made my mom very stressed, which meant there was a lot of arguing and yelling. And that's when I would hop on my bike and speed away, singing at the top of my lungs, to drown out their angry voices that I could still hear echoing in my head. I was about nine or ten when my mom and dad got into a huge fight. My dad had refused to work a construction job for a developer, or maybe he had walked off the job. Either way, it was a foolish thing to do because we needed the money. My mom really laid into my dad and said he needed to get his head out of the clouds and come back to the real world. And he called her a cold-hearted bitch, and it just kept going from there. My dad was also drinking pretty regularly at the time. It escalated to the point where I was about to do the unthinkable, to call the cops. I had the phone in my hand. Suddenly, both my mom and my dad were united against me. Don't you dare air our dirty laundry in public. And that was the end of that. It's harder to bike in Minnesota when it's cold out. During the winter when I was 11 years old at the local library one weekend, I discovered the internet. And I spent all winter on that computer. I taught myself how to code. I hacked a bunch of email accounts and sent them a very strange message about how I was watching them. I knew everything about them, which had the illicit thrill of pulling off a heist. Forget peddling my bike. This was like launching a rocket ship into outer space. Online, I could go wherever I wanted to go. Be whoever I wanted to be. Lakecastle was so tiny from up there. I could write my own future in code. Write my ticket out of that place. My dad left me a message about a month before he died. You heard it at the top of the episode. He asked me to come back to Lakecastle. And I really wish I had. I wish I had seen him. I wish I had said goodbye.

Mary Villanueva

Honey.

Julia Villanueva

What if Dad found out something about Blue Orchard Farm?

Mary Villanueva

Julia.

Julia Villanueva

What if Dad found out that the reservoir wasn't safe? What if the Lindemans screwed with that dam? I've been looking at the records. If they tore up the land and they filled in the spillway and it rains, there's nowhere for the water to go. There's a whole community of people living on the other side of that dam. And if it breaks, they'll all drown. Dad worked for the DNR, right? What if Dad found out that Blue Orchard was negligent and he threatened to blackmail them? I didn't understand at first because it's probably just a few million dollars to fix that dam. Let's say five, ten million? That's a drop in the bucket for the Lindemans. Why would you hold on to a measly $10 million? But it makes sense. Because there are so many other things they could do with $10 million that they're not doing. There are so many other ways they could use their money to help people instead of hoarding it like a pair of dragons.

Mary Villanueva

Julia.

Julia Villanueva

We need to talk to Janice about what we're going to do about this.

Mary Villanueva

Julia, can you stop for one second? Where is the evidence for all of this?

Julia Villanueva

What?

Mary Villanueva

Where is the evidence for what you are saying?

Julia Villanueva

The whole point of a cover-up is that there is no evidence, Mom.

Mary Villanueva

Honey. Sweetie, ever since all of this happened, you have withdrawn into your thoughts. You sit on the computer. I don't know what you do. You stay up all hours in the night, you don't sleep. You have been spiraling into a dark place.

Julia Villanueva

Okay, okay. Stop.

Mary Villanueva

I also want an explanation for why your mom died.

Julia Villanueva

Mom!

Mary Villanueva

I do! And the Lindemans are horrible. They're awful. They have done awful things. They are doing awful things, but turning your dad's death into a story is not justice. He was a good person. He was a wonderful man, and everyone -

Julia Villanueva

No! He was not some heroic, amazing guy. He was overweight, he smoked, he was a loudmouth and a hothead, and he did stupid shit every once in a while, but he was a human being. He was my dad. His life meant something. He loved you. And he loved me. And Chi Chi and our house and his broken down old boat. And sometimes he was a good person, sometimes he wasn't. But he tried. He really did try. Jonathan Lindeman thinks he can take a person like dad and erase them with no consequences. Doesn't that make you feel absolutely insane? Mom, doesn't that just make you want to scream?

Mary Villanueva

Julia, please. You are not okay. You need help. I've been saying this for the past year. Not from me, but from someone professional.

Julia Villanueva

I'm gonna end the call now. I just got off the phone with our lawyer, Janice, and she advised me not to disclose what I'm about to tell you, but I'm just gonna say it anyway. Blue Orchard finally agreed to our latest counter-offer, our terms for the settlement. That's what Janice called to tell me. That we we are ready to proceed with the deal. And I told her that I'm refusing to settle out of court with the Blue Orchard, period. I am not going to accept this or any offer from them. I have decided to take this all the way to trial. The situation is now complicated, and I don't need to get into that right now. Janice is, to say the least, not pleased. And I don't blame her. She and my mom and I have had many conversations over the years about the risks of going to trial. It's not a pretty scenario. Lindeman can string this out for as long as he wants to. He can make this process as expensive and personally painful as possible. He can use all the resources he has at his disposal to retaliate and to delay this trial, possibly for years. There's a financial cost. There is a personal cost, not just for me, but for my mom as well. The settlement being offered, that amount of money is more than we've ever known. It would change our lives. But after all of this, I'm not signing an agreement that washes Lindeman's hands clean of admitting any wrongdoing. I'm not signing away my right to tell you my father's story. Or to say anything about what Lindeman is doing in Lakecastle. I can't. I can't do it. This is too important. This isn't just about me and my family and what happened to us. This is about an entire community being threatened by inaction and carelessness. The public deserves to know that this company is not acting in accordance with the law. I know this isn't a Hollywood movie. Lindeman isn't going to have some huge epiphany and publicly recant his sins on the stand. I can't force him to admit anything or to understand anything about what he has done. I know that. I can refuse to live in a world where he avoids all accountability for leaving a man to die. No pile of money can erase what happened to my father. I refuse to just go on with my life and turn my back on the truth. I refuse to pretend none of this ever happened. I am taking this to trial. If I don't fight this... who will? Sara?

Sara Novak

Hey!

Julia Villanueva

Hi! 

Sara Novak

Hi, how are you? 

Julia Villanueva

Good. Good, how are you? Uh I got your text that you wanted to talk, and yeah.

Sara Novak

Oh, yeah, I'm I'm fine. Uh I just wanted to call you because I have some news.

Julia Villanueva

Oh.

Sara Novak

Yeah. Uh my mom decided not to sell to Lindeman.

Julia Villanueva

Oh my goodness. That's huge.

Sara Novak

Yeah, well, actually after I talked to you, Matt and I talked, and I I was just thinking a lot. I I couldn't stop thinking about it. What it meant to sell the house. It meant a lot.

Julia Villanueva

Does that impact your mom's retirement?

Sara Novak

Yeah, we're not going on a cruise. Yeah, but we had to think about what was important to us.

Julia Villanueva

That's that's a really big decision.

Sara Novak

It was.

Julia Villanueva

How do you feel about it?

Sara Novak

Well, not everyone in the family agrees. It's yeah. It's a bone of contention, I guess you could say. It's not a positive outcome in everyone's mind. My siblings are actually pretty upset. Especially with me, even though my mom made the decision in the end. It's just hard for them to stomach in terms of you know what we turned down. But I looked in the mirror one day and I thought if you don't say what's on your mind right now, you'll regret it for the rest of your life. And I went over to mom's house and the two of us sat at the kitchen table and talked it over. That's how we made the decision.

Julia Villanueva

You did something that a lot of people couldn't do.

Sara Novak

I don't know the effect that this has, Julia, honestly. I mean, who knows what's gonna happen in this neighborhood or this town. But I felt like I should share that with you. I don't know if that's helpful to your podcast at all.

Julia Villanueva

Thank you. It is. It means a lot. Thank you so much. Lakecastle is produced by Isabella Dawis and Emma Lai. Directed by Desdemona Chiang. Sound design, mixing, and music by Dan Dukich. Thanks to Kathryn Fumie, Moses Villarama, Lia Rivamonte, Jenessa Iverson, Tom Reed, James Rodriguez, Karen Wiese- Thompson, Reed Sigmund, and Joel Liestman. And special thanks to Kelsey Baehrens, Sara Richardson, and Jaya Robillard. You can listen to all of our episodes and read more about what's happening in Lakecastle at www.lakecastlepodcast.com. Support for Lakecastle comes from Butter Solutions, delivering the effortless results you crave. Butter, making life smoother. Lakecastle is a production of Sans rival.