They Opened the Tiede Family’s Christmas Gifts — Then Killed Mom and Grandma and Abducted the Daughters

The Tiede family’s snowy holiday retreat in the Utah mountains turned into a tragedy when two escaped fugitives broke in, murdered a mother and grandmother, filmed themselves opening the family’s gifts, and set the cabin on fire before abducting the two surviving daughters.

On December 22, 1990, Rolf and Kaye Tiede, their daughters Linae, 20, and Tricia, 16, and Kaye’s mother, Beth Potts, drove to their remote cabin in Oakley, Utah, for Christmas, according to CBS News. The secluded cabin sat deep in snow-covered woods. What the family didn’t know was that two men — Von Lester Taylor and Edward Steven Deli — had already broken in earlier that day.

Taylor and Deli, both in their mid-20s, had recently been released from prison for robbery and theft and were staying at a Salt Lake City halfway house. During a supervised furlough, they disappeared, hiking into the mountains armed with a .44 Magnum revolver and a .38 Special. They began breaking into cabins to steal money, food, and gifts, according to the Deseret News.

When Kaye, Beth, and Linae entered the cabin, the men confronted them at gunpoint and tied them up in a bedroom.

“My mom was saying to ’em, ‘What is it you want? Why are you here? I’ll give you anything,’” Tricia told 48 Hours. “Seconds after she said that, gunfire started — explosions everywhere. I saw my mom go down. Then I looked at my Grams and saw her get shot in the head. Blood sprayed everywhere… I heard her gasp for breath.”

By the time Rolf and Tricia arrived, Kaye and Beth were dead. Taylor then shot Rolf in the face — but the gun was loaded with birdshot, allowing him to survive.

Pretending to be dead, Rolf waited until the men doused the cabin with gasoline and set it ablaze. Despite severe injuries, he managed to crawl from the burning building, start a snowmobile, and make his way through the snow to seek help.

Meanwhile, Taylor and Deli forced Linae and Tricia to load the family’s snowmobiles and flee with them at gunpoint. “They began telling us we got to hurry and load the snowmobiles and get out of here,” Tricia recalled on 48 Hours. “My sister and I drove these awful men on the snowmobiles out of the cabin,” Linae added.

Tricia considered crashing to escape but couldn’t leave her sister behind. As they drove away, the strange scene passed their uncle, Randy Zorn, on the snowy trail.

“I saw the snowmobiles coming and thought, ‘Look, there are my nieces!’ But they had boyfriends on the back or something. They just drove by, and I thought, that’s weird. That’s not like them,” Zorn told 48 Hours. The girls stayed silent, fearing the men would harm him if they called for help.

The fugitives later abandoned the snowmobiles and forced the sisters into the family’s car as they tried to evade police.

Moments later, Rolf reached Zorn’s cabin. “His face was swollen, full of blood, his eye shut… bloodcicles frozen on him,” Zorn recalled. “He said, ‘I’ve been shot. My wife has been killed, and my daughters have been kidnapped.’”

Rolf’s escape triggered a massive manhunt. “There are two things on my mind — save the girls, and get Rolf on a Life Flight,” Zorn said.

Police eventually tracked the men down after a chase and gunfire, rescuing Linae and Tricia, who were physically unharmed.

Back at the smoldering cabin, investigators uncovered a chilling video: the killers had filmed themselves opening the family’s Christmas presents. “I expected to see a family enjoying the holidays,” lead investigator Joe Offert said. “But it was the two suspects — laughing and opening the Tiedes’ gifts.”

During court proceedings, Tricia described Deli’s reaction upon seeing her father alive: “He didn’t know my father had survived. The look on his face was priceless — he knew he’d lost. My dad survived. We won.”

Taylor pleaded guilty to two counts of capital murder and received the death penalty. Deli, who claimed he never fired the fatal shots, was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. Taylor’s conviction and sentence have been repeatedly upheld on appeal.

Both men remain incarcerated today — Taylor on Utah’s death row in Salt Lake City, and Deli serving life without parole at Central Utah Correctional Facility in Gunnison, according to Utah Department of Corrections data.

“After the cabin burned, we rebuilt it and made it even better,” Linae told 48 Hours. “My dad used to say, ‘Linae, I know lightning strikes, but it never strikes twice in the same place.’ That gave me peace. Whenever I felt afraid, I’d hear him say, ‘Linae, you’re going to be safe.’”