Why is the Grants Pass, Oregon area so murdery, by murders?

Grants Pass sits in Oregon's far south-west corner, in Josephine County, forty minutes from Medford. Its motto, 'live rogue', comes from the Rogue River. The 11 murders in the Grants Pass area run 24 miles down the map, from Grants Pass through Wimer, Wolf Creek, Kerby and Cave Junction, in old stagecoach country. The town is named for a stop on the Sacramento to Portland route, and Wolf Creek's one landmark is a stagecoach inn on the Applegate Trail.

The dates run from January 1978 to September 2013, five decades, with 1987, 1988, 2001, 2009 and 2012 in between. Episode 670 carries the heaviest load: four victims over two days in November 1988 in Grants Pass. The rest bring two apiece, except Wolf Creek, which brings one.

Kerby and Cave Junction, a few miles apart near the California line, hold four of the eleven, in gold country that lost the county seat to Grants Pass. The woods down here are thick and the corner is wet. The next town is a winding road away.