Everywhere you looked, there was just bodies, just human bodies.

In the winter of 2002, the most mind-blowing crime you've never heard of happened in the least likely of places.

We all know the story. Well-respected people in a small community, and boy, that's a real small community.

More than 300 human bodies were found in a tiny town called Noble.

I mean, guys, this is like a horror movie. I was like, My God, there are skeletons everywhere. There was just this signning odor. This was just overwhelming.

It all starts when a delivery man stumbles upon a dead body on a remote property.

I looked down and seen that there was bones and bodies just pushed up in a pile of debris.

Over the next few days, the police find bodies almost everywhere they look. Most of them have been there for years.

The bodies were dumped in woods and storage sheds outside the crematory. Residents of the town of Noble are in shock tonight.

What follows is one the biggest and most expensive investigations in the history of the American South, all to help families desperate to know the fates of their loved ones.

I slid to the floor holding the phone. I just couldn't believe it. Just the biggest betrayal I've ever felt in my life, not just for me, but for my husband. You couldn't wrap your head around why this... Why did this happen?

I'm Sean Raviv, a journalist based in Atlanta. For a long time, I've wondered how 300 bodies could go undiscovered for so long and what the hell you do once you found them. To find out, I talk to people who spend more time with the dead than the living.

I found a wood chipper that had bone fragments in it, what seemed to be bone fragments. And I think he was using this as a processor. A lot of times people don't know what you saw with your eyes. You saw from maggots, blowflies, spiders, all stuff.

The property where this all happened was owned by a well-respected family with an epic history. And at the center of it all, one mysterious man.

I think he could have been identified, or they could have let me know what happened to him. I think there was a cover up. I know why it happened, when it happened. I know exactly where all the bodies were. I know exactly what he did. I know everything that he did, and I know the reasons why.

Waveland and Campside Media present Noble, a new podcast that tells the story of a rural community in the south that's forced to answer one of the most primal questions we face as humans. What do the living owe the dead? You can listen to Noble wherever you get your podcasts.