Robert Hansen, "The Butcher Baker"

There is nowhere in the world that compares to the vast and untouched Alaskan wilderness. Alaska has the lowest population density of all 50 states, making it an ideal spot for those seeking peace and quiet. For fishermen, game hunters and wildlife enthusiasts, it is a paradise offering endless opportunity. As serial killer Robert Hansen found, it’s also an ideal location to bury things you don’t want found.

The Knik River Valley (source: alaskavisit.com)

During the 1970s, the construction of the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline caused Alaska’s population growth to spike. More jobs resulted in greater wealth in small towns situated along pipeline’s path. While towns and cities flourished, the economic boom did not come without adverse effects. The money attracted a range of criminals - thieves, pimps and gangs infiltrated Alaska at an alarming rate. Sex workers could be found on every corner.

Serial killers see sex workers as ideal victims - they are vulnerable women who often have little or no contact with family or friends and therefore are not easily tracked. Authorities generally do not take disappearances of sex workers as seriously because often no one truly knows how long they have been missing. The sheer amount of land, along with the harsh climate, makes Alaska a nightmare for police searching for a missing person.

Alaska is the perfect place to disappear - either intentionally, or unintentionally.

The Beginnings Of A Monster

Robert Christian Hansen was born in 1939 in Estherville, Iowa, to Edna and Christian Hansen. Hansen’s childhood was a miserable one. Christian Hansen, a baker by trade, was a cruel and short-tempered man who showed his son little affection or fatherly guidance during his early years. Still, Hansen idolised his father, planning to follow in his footsteps and one day become a baker.

Hansen suffered from a debilitating stutter, the negative effects of which would stay with him for his entire life. His inability to communicate easily with his classmates resulted in him becoming painfully shy. In an attempt to avoid human contact, Hansen isolated himself as best as he could. Physically, Hansen was skinny and his face riddled with acne scars. He was continually rejected by girls, which planted within him a deep-seated resentment towards women.

Big game hunting became Hansen’s solace during his difficult childhood and teenage years. Fascinated with guns and excited by the power he felt when stalking and killing a living being, hunting gave Hansen a feeling of control he did not have in other parts of his life.

Hansen finished high school and enlisted in the U.S. Army Reserve, serving one year before being discharged. He then found work as an assistant drill sergeant at a police academy. In 1960, Hansen married a younger woman (I don’t know how much younger - Hansen was only 21 at the time though).

In December 1960, Hansen was arrested and sentenced to a maximum of three years in prison for burning down a Pocahontas County Board of Education school bus garage. While in prison, he was diagnosed with several mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder and schizophrenic episodes. While serving his sentence, his wife left him.

Hansen ended up serving 20 months, being released in late 1962. The next year, he married another woman, Darla Henrichson. The couple went on to have two children.

A Fresh Start

Hansen with a hunting trophy (source: murderpedia.com)

Hansen and his family left Iowa and moved to Anchorage, Alaska, in 1967.

I imagine that Hansen was the driver behind the move and would have been pretty pleased with his new life, so far away from the bad memories he associated with living in Iowa. For Hansen, Alaska was a dream come true - the solitude and quiet suited his introverted personality well. The ample opportunity for big game hunting, I’m sure, was an important reason for why he chose Alaska as their new home.

In Anchorage, Hansen fulfilled his goal of becoming a baker. He ran his own bakery, while Darla worked as a teacher. Life was good for Hansen and his family - the business was successful and they were well respected in town. Patrons of the bakery and neighbors viewed Hansen as quiet and reserved, but friendly. Nothing about him struck them as worrisome or suspicious.

When Hansen was not working at the bakery, he spent his time hunting. He had become highly skilled after many years of practice and was thought highly upon by other hunters.

Hansen Gets Away

Hansen was beginning to tire of game hunting, however. Despite the fact things were going well in his life, he still nursed a seething hatred towards women. Even after 14 years had gone by, thoughts of the teenage girls who had ignored and mocked him in high school continued to plague him. He convinced himself of his need for revenge.

Alaska suited this need. As mentioned previously, the state was at the height of an economic boom in the 1970s. Therefore, crime, including prostitution, was everywhere. Anchorage was no exception.

It was in 1971 that women began disappearing from Anchorage. Disappearances were largely from 4th Avenue, which was home to many seedy bars and strip clubs. After dark, sex workers began their nightly promenades up and down the street. The unforgiving Alaskan winters are hardly ideal for this kind of work, but as often is the case, desperation leaves people no choice.

Anchorage’s 4th Avenue in the 1970s (source: theimmoralminority.blogspot.com)

Initially, Hansen was clumsy in his murderous pursuits. He had not fully figured out his M.O. In 1971, he unsuccessfully attempted to abduct 18-year-old Susie Heppeard at gun point and was later charged with assault with a deadly weapon by a grand jury. Just days later, he abducted a topless dancer from downtown Anchorage and took her to a cabin on Kenai Peninsula where he raped her. With the dancer in his truck, he began driving back to Anchorage. Then he got an idea. Pulling over on the side of the road, he took out his Ruger-Mini 14 and pointed it at the woman, telling her to run.

She begged Hansen not to kill her. He agreed, once convinced she would keep quiet about him. He had her to write down the names and addresses of her family in Anchorage, threatening that if she went to the authorities, he’d hunt her and her family down and kill them all.

On Christmas Day, 1971, reports came out that the nude body of a female college student had been found in a ravine near Kenai Peninsula. Convinced that it was her abducter and rapist who had murdered the young women, the dancer came forward to the authorities with her story. She was able to identify Hansen from a series of photos. Hansen was subsequently arrested and held on $50,000 bail.

Justice was not served, however. A number of Hansen’s well-to-do friends came forward, as well as his church minister, saying there was no way Hansen was guilty of what he was being accused. Hansen was an upstanding member of the community, being accused by a topless dancer who was known to use drugs. Why should anyone believe her? No longer able to stand the false and slanderous things being said about her, the dancer dropped the charges against Hansen.

In another miscarriage of justice, Hansen was sentenced to five years in prison for the assault of Susie Heppeard. But Hansen, a manipulative and cunning man, ended up serving just three months of his sentence. Acting as the perfect inmate, he convinced prison wardens that he was not a threat to society. He attended appointments with psychiatrists, convincing them he was “cured” of his mental illness he had previously been diagnosed with. I don’t understand what was going on with the parole board - this seems lax even for the 70’s but there you go.

A New Kind Of Hunting

Dates of when the murders occurred are sketchy in this case. Sources generally refer to a 12 year period, between 1971 and 1983, when Hansen murdered at least 17 women. The majority of the murders happened in later part of this period. In the earlier part, Hansen was mainly picking up women, driving them into the wilderness and raping them, and then driving back to Anchorage where he let them go. I’m quite sure he meant to kill them if he drove them into the middle of nowhere, but he likely could not get his nerve up.

In 1976, Hansen was arrested for stealing a chainsaw from an Anchorage store. Once again, he was sentenced to five years in prison, but only served 16 months. Despite his criminal history, his reputation for being a good citizen and the ‘friendly neighborhood baker’ got him released. Unable to support their two children only on her teacher’s salary, his wife Darla relied on his income. At this point, she had no idea she was married to a monster.

Between 1978 and 1983, women were disappearing from downtown Anchorage at an alarming rate. While a few returned, the vast majority did not.

Hansen with his plane (source: youtube.com)

Hansen purchased a Piper Super Cub (a small 2 person plane) which he used to fly the women from Merrill Field airport in Anchorage to his cabin in the Knik River area of the Matanuska Valley. He would first take his victims to his home Old Harbor Avenue (located on the east side of Anchorage), where he kept his collection of guns, animal trophies and ‘souvenirs’ from victims locked away in the basement which was off bounds to his family.

Hansen’s home on Old Harbor Avenue (source: butcherbaker.net)

This room was where the torture would begin. Hansen would tie his victims up, then rape for several hours. He would then force them into his plane at gun point, flying them out to the Knik River. It was here that Hansen’s fun really began, where he had the most power and control over them. In the middle of nowhere, blindfolded and helpless, he would let them go. Their desperation and slight glimmer of hope that they might survive gave him a sick rush of pleasure. As the women stumbled and ran clumsily in circles in the forest, Hansen would stalk them with his Ruger-Mini 14 and a knife, as if they were a sheep or caribou.

This probably went on for several hours, until the victim had exhausted herself and knew she was not going to make it out alive. He would shoot her and then bury the body in a shallow grave in the Alaskan tundra. Before he left her there, he would take a piece of jewellery, perhaps a purse or driver’s licence as a trophy. He would mark with an ‘X’ on his map where the body was buried, and then leave on his plane. This went on until June 1983, when Hansen abducted the wrong girl.

Cindy Paulson

Unbeknownst to Hansen, the girl he picked up on June 13, 1983 would bring his murder spree to an end.

17-year-old Cindy Paulson was working Anchorage’s 4th Avenue that night when a man pulled up and offered her $200 for her services. The man was thin, had acne scars and a stutter when he spoke. Cindy saw nothing threatening about him, so got into the car. As she shut the passenger door, the man skilfully slipped handcuffs on her wrists and put a gun to her head.

He then drove to his house on Old Harbor Avenue. Once they arrived, he forced Cindy into the house at gunpoint and down to the basement. As he had with his previous victims, he gagged, raped and tortured Cindy for several hours. Once he was finished, he put a chain around her neck, securing her to a wooden post. Hansen then lay on a couch across from Cindy and fell asleep. In the morning, he would fly her out to the Knik River and hunt her down as he had with the others.

It didn’t work out that way, however. When morning came, Hansen took Cindy to the car and drove to Merrill Field where his airplane sat waiting. The area was deserted. Cindy sat on the floor of the car’s backseat, her hands cuffed in front of her.

Hansen got out of the car, leaving Cindy inside while he went to prepare the plane. Feeling she had nothing to lose, Cindy saw her chance to escape and she took it. She peered out of the window, noticing Hansen had his back to her, concentrating on his plane. She crawled into the driver’s seat, opened the door and ran. Hansen did not notice she was gone until it was too late.

Cindy, handcuffed and only wearing a shirt and her underwear, made it to 6th Avenue where she flagged down a passing motorist. The man, Richard Yount, drove Cindy to The Mush Inn. Once she was safely inside, he continued on to the police station, notifying them of the handcuffed and terrified young woman he had just picked up.

Police found out that Cindy had taken a cab to The Big Timber Motel. They met her in one of the rooms, where she sat crying and still handcuffed. They removed the handcuffs and took her to the police station, where she provided a description of the man who had abducted her. She also described the room she had been held captive in as having many animal trophies mounted on the wall. Cindy then directed the authorities to Merrill Field airport and identified her abductor’s plane. It was registered to Robert Hansen.

Police went to question Hansen at his home. Of course, he vehemently denied everything. Once again, even after everything Hansen had pulled, he got away with it. His friends were again willing to lie for him, saying they had been with him at the time Cindy claimed she had been abducted. The word of the well-respected family man and baker held more weight than that of a teenage sex worker with no friends or influence.

The Investigation

All the while, the nude bodies of women continued to turn up in the area around Anchorage, the Kenai Peninsula and the Knik River.

Facial reconstructions of Eklutna Annie (source: Wikipedia)

The first was that of an unidentified woman on Eklutna Road. She was dubbed “Eklutna Annie” by investigators, and had likely been killed in November/December 1979. In May of 1980, the body of Joanna Messina was found in a gravel pit near Seward, Alaska. In September 1982, Sherry Morrow’s body was discovered buried near the Knik River. A year after Morrow’s body was discovered, Paula Goulding’s body was found in the same area. Each of the women worked as topless dancers or sex workers in Anchorage (although this is not confirmed in the case of Eklutna Annie). Eklutna Annie had been stabbed to death, while bullet shell casings were found at the grave sites of Sherry Morrow and Paula Goulding.

Det. Sgt. Glenn Flothe (source: lelandhale.com)

Enter Detective Glenn Flothe of the Alaska State Troopers. Detective Flothe had been working on the cases of the missing Anchorage women from the discovery of Eklutna Annie and was convinced that a serial killer was at large in Anchorage. The bullet shell casings found alongside Morrow and Goulding’s bodies were sent to the FBI Laboratory in Washington D.C. It was confirmed that they had come from the same gun. The list of missing Anchorage women was long - Flothe was quite sure that many of them had disappeared at the hands of the same perpetrator as the other four women.

Thanks to Cindy Paulson, Flothe had a top suspect in mind: Robert Hansen. Flothe reached out to the FBI, explaining his belief that Anchorage had a serial killer. It was Special Agents John Douglas and Roy Hazelwood of the FBI’s Investigative Support Unit that responded to Flothe. Douglas asked Flothe to give them details of the murders and they would profile the killer.

Douglas predicted that the killer would be quiet and reserved, have a facial feature he was embarrassed by (for example, acne scars) and possibly a speech impediment, making it difficult for him to speak to women. It was likely he had had bad past experiences with women previously. He would be a highly-skilled hunter and would likely keep many animal trophies, as well as souvenirs from his victims. Douglas also predicted that he would detail the killings in a diary. In order to reach the remote areas where the bodies were being found, he would have to own a plane.

Hansen’s basement where he took his victims after abducting them (source: butcherbaker.net)

With the profile, the information from Cindy and previous charges filed against him, Flothe and Anchorage PD obtained a warrant to search Hansen’s home, bakery and plane. The search of Hansen’s home turned up just what they predicted it would: animal trophies, a bag of jewelry (which did not belong to Hansen’s wife) and an aviation map of Anchorage and the surrounding area, with small ‘x’ marks on it.

Confessions Of The Butcher Baker

All roads in the investigation clearly lead to Robert Hansen. When questioned again, Hansen’s friends who had provided an alibi for him the day he abducted Cindy admitted they had been lying.

A lot of credit is given to the FBI profile of Hansen which led to the search warrant being granted. In my opinion, however, Cindy Paulson is the true hero in this story.

When Hansen was questioned by detectives about the items found at his house, he could no longer deny his involvement. He confessed that between 1971 and 1983, he had murdered 17** women and left their bodies in the Alaskan wilderness. On examination of the aviation map found in Hansen’s home, Flothe came to the conclusion that each x marked a burial site. There were a total of 24 x marks on the map. While Hansen never admitted to more than 17 murders, the 24 marks on the map led investigators to believe he was almost certainly responsible for more murders than he said he was.

Hansen is known to have murdered:

Lisa Futrell (41) Malai Larsen (28), Sue Luna (23) Tami Pederson (20) Angela Feddern (24) Teresa Watson, DeLynn "Sugar" Frey, Paula Goulding, Andrea "Fish" Altiery, Sherry Morrow (23) Eklutna Annie, Joanna Messina, Horseshoe Harriet, Roxane Easland (24)

Although Hansen denied murdering these three women, authorities are convinced he was the killer of:

Ceilia "Beth" Van Zanten (17) Megan Emerick (17), Mary Thill (22)

** some sources say he admitted to murdering 14 women. I believe the number 17 is a combination of those he did admit to and three more he denied but police had solid evidence to believe he was guilty.

Aftermath

On his arrest, Hansen was charged with assault, kidnapping, several weapon offenses and theft. He was also charged with the kidnapping and rape of Cindy Paulson.

Robert Hansen’s mugshot (source: wikipedia.com)

He pleaded guilty to the murders of the four women the police had already located: Sherry Morrow, Joanna Messina, Paula Goulding, and Eklutna Annie.

Using the map, Hansen showed authorities 17 of the 24 grave sites marked on the map. 12 of the sites were previously unknown to them.

Hansen was sentenced to a total of 461 years plus life in prison. It is widely believed that the number of people killed by Robert Hansen exceeds 30. It is also unknown how many women Hansen raped but did not murder.

Hansen died on August 21, 2014. He was 75.

I don’t doubt his death was celebrated by many across Alaska who lost loved ones at the hands of this monster. I think an important message to this case (and many others) is not to trust someone just because they give off the vibe of “friendly neighborhood baker” (or whatever their profession happens to be).

Trust girls, trust women. For the most part, we know what we’re talking about.