You’ve moved to Alaska, and despite your education and skills, the only job available is exotic dancer. Not ready to give up, you take the job and enjoy the freedom and money it provides you. When a photographer who loves your look, offers you a job, you don’t hesitate. Little did you know, you wouldn’t be getting your picture taken. In fact, the only “shots” Robert Hansen took were with a rifle.
Robert Hansen was born in Estherville Iowa in 1939. His father was a Danish immigrant and worked as a baker, a skill Robert would use later in life. Robert suffered from a stutter and acne, which made him an outcast in school. The attractive girls shunned him, and he grew up hating them, wishing he would one day have his revenge.
At a young age, he took up hunting and archery. In 1957 he enlisted in the US Army Reserve and served for a year before he was discharged. He later worked as an assistant drill instructor at a police academy in Pocahontas, Iowa.
On December 7, 1960, Robert was arrested for burning down a Pocahontas County Board of Education school bus garage. Although he received a three year sentence, he only served 20 months before he was released. During this incarceration, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder with periodic schizophrenic episodes. His psychiatrist described him as having an “infantile personality” with an obsession for getting revenge against those he felt had wronged him.
He was arrested a few more times for small things like petty theft, then married in 1963 to his second wife. Together they had 2 children and in 1967 they picked up and moved to Anchorage Alaska. He opened up a successful bakery, which was frequented by police for coffee and doughnuts. He was well liked by his neighbors and even managed to set several local hunting records. He got his pilot’s license and purchased a small airplane, with the plan that he would use it when hunting in the Alaskan bush.
In 1972 he was convicted of assault and after a short six months, was placed on a work-release program. In 1976 he was convicted of larceny after he was caught stealing a chainsaw from a local department store. He was sentenced to five years in prison, and was required to receive psychiatric treatment for his bipolar disorder. Unfortunately, his sentence was later reduced by the Alaska Supreme Court, and he was released with time served.
In the mid-1970’s construction of the trans-Alaska pipeline brought masses of people to Anchorage. The city filled with construction workers and oil workers alike. Women followed too, and found work as exotic dancers or prostitutes. The majority of these new settlers had no roots, no family ties, nothing that would cause them to be missed, if they happened to disappear. In fact, when the city’s sex workers started going missing, it was hardly noticed. In fact, it wasn’t until September 12, 1982, that these disappearances really started to gain attention.
Off duty police officer John Daley and a colleague had gone moose hunting approximately 25 miles north of Anchorage in a remote area along a river. They stopped and set up camp when the weather grew too windy, and that’s when they spotted a boot, sticking out of the sand along the river’s edge. Upon closer investigation, they found it was more than just a boot. They called it in, but since this area was outside of the Anchorage city limits, they had to wait overnight for the State Troopers to arrive.
The area was so remote, it was only accessible by river boat, airplane, or 4WD vehicle. When investigators got on scene, they took photographs, before, during, and after the removal of the body from the sandy shore. The body was that of a young woman, and she had been blindfolded. Checking the area for any other evidence, they found the spent shell casing of a .223 caliber bullet. The forensic team found matching shell fragments inside the body of their victim, later identified by dental records to be 23 year old Sherry Morrow, an exotic dancer. Unfortunately, they could not link this murder to the other missing exotic dancers.
With the help of Sherry’s boyfriend, they were able to get an idea of how the killer could have lured her away. According to her boyfriend, she had been approached by an anonymous client and offered a large sum of money to pose for some nude photos. She went to the photo shoot, but never returned. Looking over the other missing women cases, they were able to identify several women who had gone missing after attending a photo shoot. Using this information, they compiled a large number of suspects, yet Robert Hansen wasn’t even been on their radar.
It wasn’t until June 13, 1983 that the case broke wide open. Running, screaming down the streets of downtown Anchorage, 17 year old Cindy Paulson was picked up by a man driving down the road. She was half naked, handcuffed, and barefoot. When she was finally questioned by police she was able to tell the story that so many sex workers had not been able to.
Cindy had been picked up by a man, soliciting her for sex. She was handcuffed to the car, and threatened with a gun. He took her to his home where he chained her up from the ceiling of his den, and from there repeated raped and tortured her. Afterward, he took her to a small local airport where she was fortunate enough to escape while he had been prepping his plane.
Cindy was taken by police back to the airport where she was able to identify the plane. A security guard on site was able to confirm her story, as he had taken down the license plate of the man who had taken her hostage. That license plate belonged to Robert Hansen.
Cindy wasn’t the only other victim though. Over the past year more bodies had been found, also with .223 caliber shell casings nearby. All this information was given to FBI profiler John Douglas, who then turned it into a criminal profile. He said the killer would have low self-esteem, and would likely suffer from a speech impediment. Both of those things matched Robert Hansen, who still suffered from a stutter.
A search of Robert’s home turned up jewelry from several of the missing women, a map of the Alaskan bush with dozens of X marks on it (which had been stored in the headboard of his bed), and a rifle that matched the bullet casings found at all the known victims body sites.
During his interrogation of Robert Hansen, Assistant District Attorney, Frank Rothschild said he and another DA were planning to wait for the spring thaw, then take tracking dogs to each of the marked spots on the map they had found, and search for bodies and bullet casings. “As I sat there watching Hansen, there was a transformation that took place that was just amazing,” says Rothschild. “His face got really red, and—literally—the hair on the back of his neck stood up. And that was when he changed, to my eye, from Bob the Baker to Bob the Serial Killer. And all of a sudden I’m looking at this guy, thinking: there’s the guy who killed all those people.”
Robert Hansen confessed to 17 murders in exchange for an easier time through the criminal process. He confessed to kidnapping, raping, torturing, and then hunting his victims in the Alaskan brush. He showed investigators 17 grave sites, 12 of which were already known to investigators. Unfortunately, there remained marks on his map that he refused to give any information on. The remains of 12 women were exhumed by police and returned to their families.
Robert requested that he be imprisoned out of state, and requested that his case be kept out of major media. Frank Rothschild’s office agreed, and Robert Hansen was sentenced to life plus 461 years. He was imprisoned at the United States Penitentiary, Lewisburg in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, but was returned to Alaska in 1988 when he was incarcerated at Lemon Creek Correctional Center in Juneau. He was later moved to Spring Creek Correctional Center in Seward, where he remained until May 2014, when he was finally transferred to the Anchorage Correctional Complex for health reasons.
Robert died on August 21, 2014 at Alaska Regional Hospital in Anchorage Alaska at the age of 75, due to undisclosed health reasons.
Known Victims:
- Lisa Futrell, 41 (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- Malai Larsen, 28 (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- Sue Luna, 23 (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- Tami Pederson, 20 (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- Angela Feddern, 24 (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- Teresa Watson (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help)
- DeLynn “Sugar” Frey (acknowledged, body discovered on August 20, 1985 by a pilot testing new tires on the sandbar of the Knik River)
- Paula Goulding (acknowledged, body found)
- Andrea “Fish” Altiery (admitted, body not found)
- Sherry Morrow, 23 (admitted, body found)
- “Eklutna Annie” (admitted, body found, true identity has never been discovered)
- Joanna Messina (admitted, body found)
- “Horseshoe Harriet” (acknowledged, body found with Hansen’s help, true identity has never been discovered)
- Roxane Easland, 24 (acknowledged, body not found)
- Ceilia “Beth” Van Zanten, 17 (denied, but suspected because of x on aviation map, body found)
- Megan Emerick, 17 (denied, but suspected because of x on aviation map, body not found)
- Mary Thill, 22 (denied, but suspected because of x on aviation map, body not found)
Robert Hansen hunted people. In a way, you could say the same of H.H. Holmes, except he built an extravagant trap.
