Throughout the 70s and into the early 80s, Robert Hansen was able to kidnap and murder several women from the 4th Avenue district of Anchorage, Alaska. The Butcher Baker, as he would be known, took women out to the remote wilderness and would hunt them like wild animals. It wasn’t until one of his victims escaped that Hansen was even on the radar of investigators and eventually captured.
we start in Beautiful Alaska
Alaska, sometimes called The Last Frontier or the Land of the Midnight Sun, is a vast frontier in the North West that is known to outdoors men and women as paradise. The sprawling woods give ample opportunities for hunting, fishing, and just generally enjoying all the beauty that the world has to offer, untouched by man and civilization. At its narrowest distance, mainland Alaska sits just 55 miles from Russia. They’re separated by the Bering Strait, a stretch of sea that can be treacherous for those who underestimate it, and it is predominately where The Deadliest Catch on the Discovery Channel is filmed.
There are estimated to be over 100 volcanoes and volcanic fields in Alaska, but a US Geological Study showed that there have only been 1 or 2 eruptions since the start of the 1900s. There are more than 3000 rivers and over 3 million lakes scattered across the state. In Barrow, Alaska, during the summers, the residents have around 80 days of sunlight and in the winters 65+ days without the sun. Alaska offers some people the opportunity to just escape; from their problems or from society.
One such person was Chris McCandless. Chris was the subject of the book Into The Wild, which was later made into a movie starring Emile Hirsch. After graduating from Emory University, Chris became an adventurer. He nicknamed himself Alexander Supertramp and hitchhiked to Alaska. Once there, he ventured out into the Alaskan bush in April of 1992. He had meager supplies and planned to live off the land. While out there, he found an abandoned bus which he used as a shelter. Without proper supplies though, Chris wasn’t able to sustain himself. In September of 1992, a hunter was out and came upon the bus Chris called home. When he looked inside, he found Chris’ body, extremely malnourished, weighing only 67 pounds. His official cause of death was recorded as starvation. Chris’ story is just one of many such stories that illustrate the harsh, unforgiving environment in Alaska.
Anchorage, although not the capital of Alaska, is by far its most populated city, around 280K. The second largest is the capital, Juneau, around 32K. In Anchorage in the 70’s, Fourth Ave was considered to be the “shady or “red light” district. That’s where the strip clubs were located as well as the “no tell motels,” which charged by the hour and not by the night. There was also a thriving market for drug dealers and sex workers. Police described a triangle area between Anchorage, Hawaii, and California. The triangle was a route the women would be moved around through out, many forced into sex work. Because of these movements, when someone would go missing, there was generally very little thought given to where they went. It was almost assumed that they just made their way to another town, sometimes by choice, most times by force.
The Bodies
In July of 1980, workers for a local power plant were out in a remote area doing some work on power lines. As they were walking along the small road (calling it a road isn’t even accurate, it was more like a trail that was big enough to get a car down), they stumbled upon what looked like a body. Immediately, the workers radioed it in and the police were dispatched to check it out. Once they arrived, investigators knew they were going to have an extremely difficult time making an identification. Not only is the Alaskan bush unforgiving because of the terrain and weather, but the wildlife is also a factor. They discovered that the body had been essentially eaten by wild animals, and they didn’t have much to work with.
They assessed that the body belonged to a female because of the tattered clothing and boots that they found buried in the shallow grave. They said immediately that they suspected she was a sex worker because of the style of clothing they found. They took the remains to the coroner and he found scoring on some of the bones and made the conclusion that she had been stabbed to death. Unfortunately, they were unable to identify the victim, but assumed that she was one of the missing 4th avenue girls. Her body was found in the Eklutna region outside of Anchorage, which led investigators to name her Eklutna Annie. They brought in a specialist to do a facial reconstruction with the skull and plastered photos of that all over the place. No one has recognized the face, and to this day, Eklutna Annie’s true identity is unknown.
Also in July of 1980, there was a body found in a gravel pit near Seward, Alaska, about 150 miles south of Eklutna. Some highway maintenance workers were there when they were digging through the gravel. After digging for a bit, they discovered a body and called the police. When the police arrived, they discovered that there was a bear there, eating the body. The police killed the bear and retrieved the contents of its stomach. The body itself had been wrapped in a sleeping bag and had been dragged to the gravel pit and hastily buried. They determined that she died from a gunshot wound. Using fingerprints, they identified her as Joanna Messina. Detectives went and talked to her friends and family. They learned that Joanna had told them that she was meeting a man she had met who promised to take her on a shopping spree. No one knew his identity and never saw him. After she went to meet him, she never returned.
On September 12th 1982, some hunters were out walking along the Knik River looking for some game when they stumbled upon a shallow grave. Authorities were called in, and this time, they were able to identify the remains. 23 year old Sherry Marrow worked in Anchorage as an exotic dancer. She had been reported missing a year earlier. Investigators combed through the area trying to find any evidence they could. They used sifters, like they were panning for gold and sifted through all the soil surrounding Sherry’s body. That’s how they discovered spent shell casings buried in the dirt. The casings were .223 caliber and suggested that they would be looking for a Ruger Mini-14 hunting rifle. Sherry had been shot in the back three times, but when they looked closely, they saw that her shirt didn’t have any holes in it. This suggested that she was nude when she was killed, then the killer re-dressed her.
A year later, September 2nd 1983, another shallow grave was discovered off the banks of the Knik River. She was identified as Paula Goulding, an exotic dancer that had been reported missing out of Anchorage. Paula’s murder had been in the exact same manor as Sherry’s. She was shot and re-dressed after her death, and .223 shell casings were found. They might have been doing their best to avoid it before, but now there was no way that investigators could ignore the fact that they had a serial abductor, rapist, and murderer operating in the Anchorage area. It wasn’t a coincidence that the women they were finding were all from the same area of Anchorage, and to many in the general public, they would go unnoticed if they were missing. (This is the way the police and people talked about the victims, mainly because of their profession, they wouldn’t be missed if they were gone because most would assume they moved on to a different place.)
So, Sherry, Joanna, Paula, and Eklutna Annie were the four murders that Hansen would eventually be charged with, but there are several others he either admitted to or is suspected of.
Cecilia Van Zanten went missing on Dec 22nd 1971. Her body was discovered on Christmas Day 1971. Megan Emerick went missing on July 7 1973. Mary Kathleen Thill went missing on July 5 1975. Neither Megan or Mary’s bodies were discovered. Hansen denied killing all three of these women, but he is suspected by authorities to be responsible for their disappearances because of markings on his map. Put a pin in that map, we’ll come back to it.
Roxane Easland went missing on Jun 28 1980. Andrea Altiery went missing on Dec 2 1981. Neither Roxane or Andrea’s bodies were ever discovered. Hansen confessed to kidnapping and murdering both of them. Lisa Futrell went missing in Sept of 1980 and her body was found near the Old Knik Bridge and her body was found when Hansen gave investigators her location during his confession.
Sue Luna went missing in May of 1982. Hansen took her out to a remote area and stripped her naked and forced her to run through the woods. He gave her a head start, then hunted her as if she was a wild animal. Sue was shot to death. Her body was discovered with information Hansen gave during his confession.
It’s unknown when Robin Pelkey went missing, but it’s known that she was killed in January of 1983. Her body was discovered in April of 1984 with information from Hansen’s confession. Originally, Robin was called “Horseshoe Harriet” because her identity was unknown. In October of 2021, Robin was identified via forensic genealogy. This was done by compiling a DNA profile of the unknown victim then entering it in public genealogy databases (like 23 & Me, Ancestry DNA, etc). Using the databases, they found several relatives and were able to build a family tree and eventually identify Robin.
DeLynn Frey was discovered on Aug 20, 1985 by an airplane pilot who was out testing tires near a Knik River sandbar. Malai Larsen, Teresa Watson, Angela Feddern, and Tamera Pederson were all discovered in April of 1984 with information given by Hansen during his confession.
Cindy Paulson
In June of 1983, 19 year old Cindy Paulson got into the vehicle with a prospective customer. Cindy was a sex worker in Anchorage, and as they drove they talked and agreed on terms. When it came time for the transaction to take place, the man pulled a gun and told Cindy that if she did what he said, he wouldn’t kill her. Cindy said that the man was a smaller man, who appeared to be extremely nervous and had a stammer. His face had pock marks, which would have been from acne when he was younger. With the gun pointed at her, he brought out a set of handcuffs and put them on her. Then, he drove to the suburbs of Anchorage and pulled up to a large, blue – gray ranch style house.
He forced Cindy inside and down to the basement. Once in the basement, she looked around and there were mounted animal heads everywhere she looked. She was then taken into a smaller, hidden room in the basement that had a pole in the middle of it. She was handcuffed to the pole. For the hours that followed, she was repeatedly raped and sodomised. At a certain point, the man laid back on a couch nearby and fell asleep.
A few hours later, he woke up and made Cindy get dressed. Once dressed, he forced her into his vehicle and drove to Merrill Field airport, a small airfield used by local pilots with smaller aircraft. As they drove, the man told Cindy that they were going to fly up to his cabin in the middle of nowhere. He also bragged about having taken many women up there “for fun.” They arrived at the airfield and parked next to a small, blue and white plane. The man began to unload things from his car into the plane, and that’s when Cindy saw her chance.
When the man was walking away from the vehicle towards the plane, she pushed her way through the driver’s side door and ran towards the road. As she ran, she heard him shouting, “Stop you bitch! Stop or I’ll kill you!” She didn’t stop though, and eventually she reached the road. Once there she saw the headlights of a truck and ran towards it. The driver of the truck was on his way into work for the day, it was around 5AM. He saw Cindy running towards his truck, in handcuffs and he slammed on his breaks. He said that he saw a man chasing, but as soon as the man saw the truck, he turned and ran.
The police were called and Cindy was taken to the hospital for an examination. They found vaginal bruising and shackle marks around her neck and wrists, corroborating her story of being abducted. She was then taken to Anchorage police headquarters to be interviewed. Cindy managed to give the police detailed descriptions of her attacker’s house, car, plane, and what he looked like. They returned to the airfield with Cindy, and she pointed out the plane the man took her to. They ran the tail number and it came back to 44 year old Robert Hansen. So now… who the F*** is Robert Hansen??
Robert Hansen
Robert Hansen was born in February of 1939 in Estherville, Iowa. Growing up, Hansen’s family owned and ran a local bakery. His father, a Danish immigrant, was a strict disciplinarian. Throughout his childhood and into his adolescence, his father would punish him for any slight infraction, and from an early age, he was forced to work long hours in the family business. Even though he worked hard for them, his parents considered him to be a disappointment.
As he was growing up, once it became apparent that he was left hand dominant, his parents started to force him to use his right hand whenever he did anything. If they caught him writing with his left hand, he would face discipline. They said that his being a lefty was a “deviance.” This helped instill in him an overall feeling that he was born wrong and lacking. After his eventual confession, Hansen said that the treatment he received from his parents at a young age is what caused him to develop a stutter, which would haunt him his entire life.
In his teenage years, his stutter was definitely something that made him stand out… not in a good way. He was mocked relentlessly at school, but not only for his stutter. Hansen was painfully shy and had severe acne. He was teased and taunted mercilessly because of these things. His acne would eventually develop into pock marks and scars on his face as he got older. When he showed an interest in a girl at school, he was usually immediately rejected. He was described by almost all his classmates as a loner and a social outcast. During his confession, he talked about growing up in Iowa and said this, “I would see my friends and so forth going out on dates and so forth and had a tremendous desire to do the same thing. … From the scars and so forth on my face you can probably see, I could see why girls wouldn’t want to get close to me.”
Hansen found solace in the time he would spend alone though. He quickly developed a love of the outdoors, and became particularly adept at shooting. Whether he was using a bow or a gun, it was something he could do alone that didn’t require anyone else. He could go out into the wilderness and disappear for a while. He became an avid hunter and outdoorsman, spending much of his free time away from civilization.
When he turned 18, Hansen joined the US Army Reserve. His goal was to leave his troubled youth behind and make something of himself and find a sense of belonging. And… for a while, he did. As you can imagine, with his marksman skills, he excelled at certain times. After he served a year in the reserves, he became an assistant drill instructor in Pocahontas, Iowa. He even met a young woman there and the couple got married. The good feelings didn’t last long though.
In 1960, Hansen was 21 and back working at the family bakery. He had been feeling mistreated by the local community and sought revenge for the perceived slights. He talked to a younger employee of the bakery and convinced him to help him with his plan. His big plan? To burn down a local school bus garage. He would later say that this revenge plan was because of the way he was treated in high school. When the garage burnt down, the younger boy panicked and went to the police and confessed. On Dec 7, 1960, Hansen was arrested and given a 3 year prison sentence. He served twenty months and was released.
While he was in prison though, he spoke with a psychiatrist regularly and was diagnosed with manic depression with periodic schizophrenic episodes. In particular, they noted that Hanses had an “infantile personality” and an obsession with getting back at people he felt wronged him. While he was in prison, his wife filed for a divorce and left him.
After his release, he tried to keep his head down and met another local woman. The couple married in 1963. Over the course of the next few years, Hansen was in and out of jail a handful of times for petty theft. In 1967, fed up with life in the lower 48, Hansen and his wife moved up north to Anchorage, Alaska. Once there, they settled into a small community on the outskirts of Anchorage and had two children. Hansen opened a small bakery, named… Hansen’s Bakery. Hansen’s bakery was located just minutes from 4th Ave in Anchorage in one direction, and in the other, just minutes from Merrill Field Airport.
In 1972, Hansen was arrested twice. Once he was charged with the abduction and attempted rape of a local housewife; she was able to get away from him before he could rape her. He was arrested the second time for raping a sex worker. He pleaded no contest to a charge of assault with a deadly weapon in the abduction of the housewife, and the rape charge against the sex worker was dropped as part of a plea bargain. He was given five years in prison, but after only 6 months, Hansen was placed in a work release program and let out to live in a halfway house. In 1976, he was arrested again for stealing a chainsaw from a Fred Myers in Anchorage and was given 5 years in prison again. Shortly after his sentencing, he appealed and the Alaska Supreme Court overturned the verdict, deeming the sentence too harsh. He was released with time served. In the community, Hansen had built an image of himself as the timid, dependable, friendly guy next door, even though he had been sent to prison for serious crimes.
The Investigation & Confession
Back to Cindy Paulson….
The police have talked to Cindy and she took them to the airfield and pointed out Hansen’s plane. From there, the next step was to talk to him. Before confronting him, they looked into Hansen and went through his past criminal offenses. They felt like the offenses there would line up with someone who could have escalated to murder. They spoke with several of his friends, where they discovered that he was an accomplished big game hunter, and he actually owned several local records. They said that when he was out hunting, when the animal was in his sights, he was going to hit his target. Several of the animals he had killed were mounted in his basement.
They went to Hansen himself and questioned him about what Cindy said. They said she accused him of kidnapping and raping her and according to investigators, his response was, “What, you can rape a sex worker (he said prostitue, not sex worker.)?” After that, Hansen didn’t dial it back. He attacked Cindy’s credibility and the credibility of sex workers in general. He denied ever meeting Cindy. The police also noticed that as they were talking to him, Hansen began to stutter, just as Cindy had described her abductor. He then said that his wife and kids were out of town, and that he spent the evening that Cindy claimed she was raped with two of his friends and gave the detectives their names and numbers. They called both friends, who confirmed that Hansen was with them.
Even though his alibi checked out, detectives had an overwhelming feeling that they were lying for him. They put him under 24 hour surveillance and waited. Hansen went on with his life, with surveillance teams watching every step of the way.
Three months went by, and the body of Paula Goulding was discovered. The investigators had reached out to the FBI to try to get a profile of who they should be looking for. The offender profile said they should be looking for an avid hunter who had low self esteem. The estimated that he was self esteem issues probably came from a history of being rejected by women and that he probably had souvenirs of his murders. The profile even suggested that he might have a stutter and own a plane because of his ability to get to remote places only accessible by plane or boat. … who does all of this sound like??
With the FBI profile in hand, investigators went back and talked to Hansen’s friends. One of them said that he and Hansen would go out around the Knik River and in the Eklutna area, and the investigators knew that they had their man, they just had to link him to everything. They kept talking to the friend and went as far as to bring them to the station to talk to them. With the pressure mounting, the two men who said they were with him that night said they lied. Hansen had told the freinds that the night in question, he had gotten into an altercation with a sex worker who was now trying to extort him for money. He asked them to cover for him if anyone asked. They said they did because they didn’t want him to get in trouble with his wife, since he was a married man.
With this new information and his alibi out the window, investigators wasted no time getting search warrants for Hansen’s house, bakery, cars, and plane. They showed up at the bakery while he was working and arrested him. Hansen was cooperative and walked out without issue. At the same time, a warrant was executed at his house while his wife and children sat confused and astonished at what was going on. As they went through the house, it was exactly as Cindy had described it. In the basement, they found a soundproof hidden room with a metal pole in the middle of it. Again, it was exactly as Cindy had described.
As they looked through the house, they weren’t finding much, until they searched the bedroom and they found a map hidden in the headboard of the bed in the master bedroom. The map was of the Anchorage region, and on the map there were 21 Xs. Four of those Xs were exactly where the bodies of women had been discovered in shallow graves. They knew that the map was only circumstantial evidence and they needed the rifle to link him to the shell casings.
They moved from the main living area to the attic of the house. They moved some of the insulation around and under some of it there was jewelry laying there. One investigator was so confused by it that his initial thought was, “Why is Hansen’s wife hiding her jewelry up here?” Then it hit him, this was from the victims. Hansen was hiding this jewelry. One of the necklaces was an arrowhead, which matched the one that Sherry Morrow wore all the time.
With this discovery, the police removed all the insulation they could and eventually, they came across the .223 caliber Ruger Mini-14 rifle. They immediately sent it to the ballistics lab and the results matched the shell casings found near the bodies.
Going in to talk to Hansen, the investigators and prosecutors goal was to try to discover the identities of each X on the map. They wanted to bring home every body they could so the families could bury their loved ones. The D.A. spoke with Hansen for hours, and he said that the whole time, he’s been “mild mannered, Bob the Baker.” It was almost like he was playing a game of cat and mouse. He would give some info, then backtrack and say maybe he was remembering things wrong. The head D.A. finally snapped and said that they had his map. He told Hansen that they were going to go out there with dogs and walk the areas of every X and dig everywhere they had to in order to find every body he left out there. He said that they were going to prosecute him on each and every one and he would not get away with anything.
That’s when Hansen’s face began to get beat red. They said that his voice dropped, and he said something to the effect of “Dirty F***ing Whores.” That’s when they knew they had him. He was enraged that he was caught.
They made a deal with Hansen and they would only charge him with four of the murders; Sherry Morrow, Joanna Messina, “Eklutna Annie”, and Paula Goulding. He was also charged with the kidnapping and rape of Cindy Paulson. In exchange, Hansen had to give a full confession and help investigators locate as many of the bodies as they could. Hansen confessed to hunting and murdering women in the wilderness of Alaska. He talked about a value system he had and that in his eyes, there were “good girls” and “bad girls,” and it was okay to kill “bad girls.” He confessed to killing 17 women and only 14 bodies have been discovered.
At his sentencing, Hansen pled guilty to everything. The D.A. said that the first words out of his mouth to the court that day were, “Before you sits a monster.”
Hansen was sentenced to 461 years plus life without the possibility of parole. Hansen died at the age of 75 due to natural causes from lingering health issues.
Robert Hansen’s story has been used as the basis for film and TV. The 2103 John Cusack / Nicholas Cage movie The Frozen Ground tells the story of the Baker Butcher. Cold Case, Criminal Minds, and Law and Order SVU have all had episodes based off of Hansen as well. **Spoiler for Dexter fans who haven’t watched the newest season** In Dexter: New Blood, the main antagonist, Kurt Caldwell, known as the Runaway Killer was based on Hansen.
