Why did police grill a 'clown,' 'cowboy' and 'hunter' about the Joel Lovelien slaying?

GRAND FORKS — The police quickly arrived to the scene: a dark, car-lined parking lot outside a rowdy bar.

This was the Broken Drum bar in Grand Forks, in the early morning hours of Oct. 28, 2007. Outside, in the lot, was Joel Lovelien, a 38-year-old local dressed like a college hockey player for the Halloween revelry inside.

Episode No. 2 — The Clown, the Cowboy and the Hunter

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Lovelien had been severely beaten. Officers tried CPR, but they could not get a good airway, and they couldn't get a pulse. An ambulance took him away. He would later be pronounced dead. For police, the job was just beginning.

As the investigation turned into a murder investigation, they rounded up witnesses at the bar and beyond. Their interest quickly zeroed in on three individuals, all easily remembered for their costume choices that night, amid an evening of customed, drunked revelry: One was dressed as a clown, another as a cowboy and a third was dressed as a hunter.

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1/12: Anna Barrett, dressed for Halloween partying as socialite reality star Paris Hilton, poses next to James Wavra, who is wearing a hunter costume. The two were some of the revelers who visited the Broken Drum bar in Grand Forks on the night of Oct. 27-28, 2007.

2/12: The front entrance of the Broken Drum bar in Grand Forks, North Dakota, Oct. 28, 2007.

3/12: Anna Barrett, dressed as socialite reality TV star Paris Hilton, stands next to Bryce Larson, who is dressed as a cowboy. The two were among the Halloween revelers at the Broken Drum bar on Oct. 27-28, 2007.

4/12: The Broken Drum Bar

5/12: The Broken Drum Bar

6/12: The Broken Drum Bar

7/12: Travis Stay — center in yellow — is show in this surveillance camera photo footage screengrab from the Broken Drum bar in Grand Forks, North Dakota, the night Joel Lovelien was killed, in the early morning hours of Oct. 28, 2007. Stay was later the prime suspect in the case.

8/12: The Broken Drum Bar

9/12: In the early morning hours of October 27, 2007, during the initial hours of the investigation, the Clown and the Cowboy were located in downtown Grand Forks and taken to the police department for questioning.

10/12: The exterior of the home of Travis Stay, where taxi driver Paul Balstad dropped him off in the early morning hours of Oct. 28, 2007, in Grand Forks, North Dakota, after noticing he was injured, dazed and covered in blood.

11/12: Joel Lovelien

12/12: Joel Lovelien

There were others there in costume that night, including a gangster, a bum, a joker, a penguin, and more. But those previous three — the clown, the cowboy and the hunter — garnered attention by police and remain, for some people in Grand Forks, suspicious in the case even though someone else was eventually charged for Lovelien's murder.

In Episode 2 of Season 8 of the podcast, Dakota Spotlight explores the immediate aftermath of the Lovelien slaying, following police as they sort through witnesses, and new information and tips flowing in throughout the early morning hours of Oct. 28, 2007. The podcast rides along as police figure out a crucial detail from the night that allowed them to sort out who might have done what, and to whom.

Joel Lovelien was beaten to death outside the Broken Drum bar in Grand Forks in the early morning hours of Oct. 28, 2007, amid a night of Halloween revelry. Nobody has ever been found guilty for his murder.

Suspicion immediately fell on a variety of costumed partiers that night, including some dressed as a lion, the joker and a hunter. Local police and prosecutors thought they had their man, the one dressed as a lion that night: Travis Stay. But Stay was found not guilty in December 2008 in a high-profile trial -- a sensational result that has made the case a staple of true crime shows, including the Dateline TV program.

Welcome to Dakota Spotlight's eighth season: "Unresolved: The Murder of Joel Lovelien." With unprecedented access to case files and evidence, prosecutors, police, witnesses and family members, Dakota Spotlight creator and host James Wolner will use his unique investigation and reporting style to pursue the case's central questions: Who killed Joel Lovelien? Why was Travis Stay found not guilty? And why does so much suspicion linger around others in this case?

• Anna Barrett: Dressed as Paris Hilton and left the Broken Drum arm in arm with James Wavra. Witnessed altercation with Travis Stay.
• Jon Deziel: Dressed as a clown. Interviewed by Grand Forks investigators the night Joel died.
• Mike Ferguson: Grand Forks Police sergeant.
• Heather Holter: Party bus passenger and Jon Deziel's girlfriend.
• Jennifer Holter: Party bus passenger and sister to Heather Holter.
• Bryce Larson: Dressed as a cowboy. Interviewed by Grand Forks investigators the night Joel died.
• Erika Lovelien: Joel Lovelien's older sister.
• Joel Lovelien: 38-years-old, a technical systems analyst for Altru Hospital. Joel went to the Broken Drum bar with his fiancée Heather Eastling, then later went outside to take the phone call. He was found beaten to death in the bar's parking lot.
• William Macki: Grand Forks Police sergeant.
• Travis Stay: A reveler at the Broken Drum bar that night who was driven home with blood on his lion costume. He was later charged with Lovelien's murder and found not guilty in December 2008.
• James Wavra: Dressed as a Hunter. Involved in a short fight with Travis Stay. Interviewed by Grand Forks investigators the night Joel died.

• Paul Balstad: A taxi driver in Grand Forks the night Lovelien was killed, he drove Travis Stay home and noticed he was dazed, had blood on him and looked like he had been in a fight.
• Heather Eastling: Joel Lovelien's fiancée.
• Keith Swartz: Discovered Lovelien in the parking lot of the Broken Drum bar.