WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.639 All right, welcome back to the Deep Dive. So 00:00:01.639 --> 00:00:05.820 for this one, we're pointing the compass north. 00:00:05.960 --> 00:00:07.679 And I don't mean just a little bit north. No, 00:00:07.700 --> 00:00:09.519 we're going way up. All the way up to Anchorage, 00:00:09.599 --> 00:00:13.699 Alaska. But we're not there for the beautiful 00:00:13.699 --> 00:00:16.940 scenery or the northern lights. Or the Iditarod, 00:00:16.940 --> 00:00:20.100 no. We are basically stepping into a time machine. 00:00:20.320 --> 00:00:23.679 Yeah. And we're setting the dial for a very specific 00:00:23.679 --> 00:00:26.960 and I think very volatile era. We're talking 00:00:26.960 --> 00:00:30.179 the 1970s and early 80s. It is the perfect setting 00:00:30.179 --> 00:00:32.359 for the story we're about to unpack. You really 00:00:32.359 --> 00:00:35.850 have to understand the... the whole atmosphere 00:00:35.850 --> 00:00:39.350 of Anchorage in that window of time. Right. This 00:00:39.350 --> 00:00:42.170 was the era of the Trans -Alaska Pipeline. It 00:00:42.170 --> 00:00:45.070 was, I mean, it was an absolute boom town. Money 00:00:45.070 --> 00:00:47.590 everywhere. Money was flowing like water. People 00:00:47.590 --> 00:00:50.329 were just flooding in from the lower 48. And 00:00:50.329 --> 00:00:53.420 there was this... This palpable sense of chaotic 00:00:53.420 --> 00:00:55.640 energy. It was a place where you could go to 00:00:55.640 --> 00:00:58.200 get rich or to get lost or to just completely 00:00:58.200 --> 00:01:00.500 reinvent yourself. And that idea, reinvention, 00:01:00.560 --> 00:01:02.299 that's really the anchor for this whole thing, 00:01:02.359 --> 00:01:04.099 isn't it? Absolutely. Because if you were walking 00:01:04.099 --> 00:01:05.879 down the street in Anchorage back then, you might 00:01:05.879 --> 00:01:08.700 have bumped into this guy, a guy named Bob. and 00:01:08.700 --> 00:01:10.840 bob was you know the picture of the alaskan dream 00:01:10.840 --> 00:01:14.019 he was a family man married two kids and he owned 00:01:14.019 --> 00:01:16.739 a local business a bakery which was you know 00:01:16.739 --> 00:01:19.379 a staple of the community a baker by all surface 00:01:19.379 --> 00:01:22.079 metrics he was a pillar of that society he was 00:01:22.079 --> 00:01:26.519 described as mild -mannered soft -spoken Maybe 00:01:26.519 --> 00:01:29.120 a little socially awkward, but, you know, generally 00:01:29.120 --> 00:01:31.060 well -liked by his neighbors. And he was this 00:01:31.060 --> 00:01:33.780 incredible outdoorsman. Oh, fiercely dedicated. 00:01:33.879 --> 00:01:36.180 He held multiple world records with the Pope 00:01:36.180 --> 00:01:38.099 and Young Club for bow hunting. This was the 00:01:38.099 --> 00:01:40.319 guy you'd ask for tips on, you know, tracking 00:01:40.319 --> 00:01:42.620 doll sheep or where the best fishing spots were. 00:01:42.719 --> 00:01:45.159 Right. Bob the baker. That was the whole persona. 00:01:45.480 --> 00:01:47.739 But the reason we're here today, the reason for 00:01:47.739 --> 00:01:51.340 this deep dive is the terrifying reality that 00:01:51.340 --> 00:01:54.200 lived just underneath that apron. We're talking 00:01:54.200 --> 00:01:57.439 about Robert Hansen. The man who would eventually 00:01:57.439 --> 00:02:00.180 be known not as the baker, but as the butcher 00:02:00.180 --> 00:02:03.680 baker. And that nickname, as gruesome as it is, 00:02:03.739 --> 00:02:06.799 it really only just scratches the surface. We're 00:02:06.799 --> 00:02:09.199 looking at one of the most prolific serial killers 00:02:09.199 --> 00:02:11.479 in the history of the United States, and without 00:02:11.479 --> 00:02:14.780 a doubt, the darkest chapter in Alaska's history. 00:02:15.180 --> 00:02:17.699 I mean, the numbers are just staggering. Hansen 00:02:17.699 --> 00:02:21.259 confessed to murdering 17 women. But the authorities, 00:02:21.379 --> 00:02:23.060 and all the evidence we're going to look at, 00:02:23.099 --> 00:02:25.120 they suggest the true number is... is likely 00:02:25.120 --> 00:02:28.159 much higher, possibly into the 30s. What really 00:02:28.159 --> 00:02:30.300 gets me looking through the source material for 00:02:30.300 --> 00:02:32.960 this case is the method. It's not just that he 00:02:32.960 --> 00:02:36.520 killed. It's how he did it. It feels like something 00:02:36.520 --> 00:02:38.800 a screenwriter would invent for a horror movie. 00:02:38.960 --> 00:02:41.539 But this was real. It was very real. We're talking 00:02:41.539 --> 00:02:43.879 about a modus operandi that involved a private 00:02:43.879 --> 00:02:46.860 airplane, the vast, empty wilderness of Alaska, 00:02:47.159 --> 00:02:50.889 and an... Literal hunt. It's uniquely horrifying. 00:02:51.129 --> 00:02:53.150 And we're going to unpack the psychology of a 00:02:53.150 --> 00:02:55.150 man who was, you know, professionally diagnosed 00:02:55.150 --> 00:02:57.949 as having an infantile personality, yet he had 00:02:57.949 --> 00:03:00.229 the cunning to evade capture for more than a 00:03:00.229 --> 00:03:02.050 decade. And he was doing it all in plain sight. 00:03:02.310 --> 00:03:05.509 Right in plain sight. Using the rugged nature 00:03:05.509 --> 00:03:09.569 of Alaska as both a weapon and a shield. We have 00:03:09.569 --> 00:03:11.550 a massive amount of ground to cover here. We're 00:03:11.550 --> 00:03:13.030 going to go all the way back to his roots in 00:03:13.030 --> 00:03:15.650 Iowa to see where the cracks really began to 00:03:15.650 --> 00:03:18.729 form. And we have to talk about the truly shocking 00:03:18.729 --> 00:03:22.210 judicial failures. And I mean shocking. The times 00:03:22.210 --> 00:03:24.169 he was let go when he should have been put away 00:03:24.169 --> 00:03:26.789 for years. Absolutely. And then there's the incredible 00:03:26.789 --> 00:03:30.069 survival story of Cindy Paulson, the teenage 00:03:30.069 --> 00:03:32.469 girl who finally, finally brought him down. And 00:03:32.469 --> 00:03:34.669 the investigation itself is fascinating, especially 00:03:34.669 --> 00:03:37.460 the role of criminal profiling. This case is 00:03:37.460 --> 00:03:39.360 basically a master class in behavioral science. 00:03:39.460 --> 00:03:42.599 You have a profile from the FBI that was so accurate 00:03:42.599 --> 00:03:45.000 it practically gave the detectives the guy's 00:03:45.000 --> 00:03:47.199 home address. It's one of those real truth is 00:03:47.199 --> 00:03:51.219 stranger than fiction moments. So, OK, let's 00:03:51.219 --> 00:03:52.900 start at the beginning. Before the bakery, before 00:03:52.900 --> 00:03:54.800 the pilot's license, before any of the murders. 00:03:54.919 --> 00:03:57.180 We have to go back to Iowa. We need to look at 00:03:57.180 --> 00:03:59.680 Robert Christian Hansen, born February 15th, 00:03:59.680 --> 00:04:03.300 1939, in Estherville, Iowa. When you look at 00:04:03.300 --> 00:04:05.719 the early reports, the biographical data, it 00:04:05.719 --> 00:04:08.099 just. Yeah. The trajectory seems to be set so 00:04:08.099 --> 00:04:10.379 early on. It really does. We always look for 00:04:10.379 --> 00:04:12.659 the why in these deep dives, right? Trying to 00:04:12.659 --> 00:04:15.199 find the seed of the pathology. With Hansen, 00:04:15.199 --> 00:04:17.839 the environment he grew up in was, it was rigid. 00:04:18.019 --> 00:04:19.980 To say the least. He was the son of a Danish 00:04:19.980 --> 00:04:23.240 immigrant baker, Christian Hansen. And the records 00:04:23.240 --> 00:04:27.560 describe the father as domineering, a very strict 00:04:27.560 --> 00:04:30.490 kind of old world disciplinarian. And Robert 00:04:30.490 --> 00:04:32.870 himself, he didn't exactly fit in with the, you 00:04:32.870 --> 00:04:34.930 know, the rough and tumble boys of rural Iowa 00:04:34.930 --> 00:04:38.209 in the 40s and 50s. Oh, far from it. He was at 00:04:38.209 --> 00:04:40.870 a disadvantage from day one physically and socially. 00:04:40.930 --> 00:04:44.230 He was described as painfully shy. And he had 00:04:44.230 --> 00:04:46.769 the stutter. A severe stutter, which made any 00:04:46.769 --> 00:04:49.110 communication a source of constant anxiety for 00:04:49.110 --> 00:04:52.189 him. And then, as if that wasn't enough, he hits 00:04:52.189 --> 00:04:54.649 adolescence and develops a severe cystic acne 00:04:54.649 --> 00:04:57.759 that left his face permanently scarred. We've 00:04:57.759 --> 00:04:59.459 seen this kind of narrative before in other profiles 00:04:59.459 --> 00:05:02.100 we've looked at. That combination of a really 00:05:02.100 --> 00:05:05.500 domineering father and intense social isolation 00:05:05.500 --> 00:05:08.000 at school just creates a pressure cooker. It's 00:05:08.000 --> 00:05:10.819 a textbook example. He was the classic outcast. 00:05:11.180 --> 00:05:13.939 The sources describe this deep, festering sense 00:05:13.939 --> 00:05:16.800 of rejection, especially from women. He couldn't 00:05:16.800 --> 00:05:19.160 talk to girls without stuttering. He felt ugly 00:05:19.160 --> 00:05:21.560 because of the scars. He was just a quiet loner 00:05:21.560 --> 00:05:23.490 who... Felt like the whole world was laughing 00:05:23.490 --> 00:05:26.949 at him. Exactly. And when a young man feels completely 00:05:26.949 --> 00:05:30.069 powerless in all his social interactions, he's 00:05:30.069 --> 00:05:32.209 often going to seek out a domain where he can 00:05:32.209 --> 00:05:34.790 exert absolute power. And for Robert Hansen, 00:05:34.829 --> 00:05:38.370 that domain was the woods. Precisely. He turned 00:05:38.370 --> 00:05:41.029 to hunting and archery not just as a hobby, but 00:05:41.029 --> 00:05:44.209 as a refuge. A total escape. Think about the 00:05:44.209 --> 00:05:46.449 psychology of that. In the woods, he didn't need 00:05:46.449 --> 00:05:49.170 to speak, so his stutter didn't matter. The animals 00:05:49.170 --> 00:05:52.029 didn't care about his acne scars. In the woods, 00:05:52.209 --> 00:05:54.389 he was the master of the situation. He became 00:05:54.389 --> 00:05:56.649 obsessed with it, didn't he? Yeah. He got really, 00:05:56.709 --> 00:05:58.689 really good at it. Yeah. This wasn't just some 00:05:58.689 --> 00:06:01.170 casual weekend thing for him. No, he practiced 00:06:01.170 --> 00:06:04.069 incessantly. And this is such a crucial insight 00:06:04.069 --> 00:06:07.029 for anyone listening. He established this pattern 00:06:07.029 --> 00:06:09.990 very early on of finding his self -worth and 00:06:09.990 --> 00:06:12.649 his sense of control through the act of stalking 00:06:12.649 --> 00:06:14.790 and killing. It was the one place he succeeded. 00:06:15.009 --> 00:06:17.350 The one place he felt powerful. The one place 00:06:17.350 --> 00:06:19.290 where he could dictate whether another living 00:06:19.290 --> 00:06:22.420 thing lived or died. And that transfer of power 00:06:22.420 --> 00:06:24.740 from feeling helpless in high school to feeling 00:06:24.740 --> 00:06:27.560 godlike in the forest, that is the foundation 00:06:27.560 --> 00:06:30.060 for everything that comes later. It's a coping 00:06:30.060 --> 00:06:33.160 mechanism that just... curdled into something 00:06:33.160 --> 00:06:35.740 incredibly dangerous. And we know it wasn't just, 00:06:35.800 --> 00:06:38.240 you know, teenage angst because we have the clinical 00:06:38.240 --> 00:06:40.839 data from his early adulthood. Right. During 00:06:40.839 --> 00:06:42.800 an early incarceration, which we'll get to in 00:06:42.800 --> 00:06:44.600 a second, he was diagnosed with manic depression, 00:06:44.899 --> 00:06:47.620 what we'd now call bipolar disorder. There were 00:06:47.620 --> 00:06:50.540 also notes about periodic schizophrenic episodes. 00:06:50.639 --> 00:06:52.920 But there was another diagnosis that really stands 00:06:52.920 --> 00:06:56.220 out. The one that, to me, explains the butcher 00:06:56.220 --> 00:06:59.540 baker. The infantile personality. Exactly. Let's 00:06:59.540 --> 00:07:02.240 unpack that term because it sounds almost contradictory 00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:05.500 for a guy who's capable of such organized, calculated 00:07:05.500 --> 00:07:07.800 violence. It's all about emotional maturity, 00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:11.180 or in his case, the complete lack of it. It suggests 00:07:11.180 --> 00:07:13.899 a person who processes the world like a coddler, 00:07:14.019 --> 00:07:17.660 entirely egocentric, totally unable to handle 00:07:17.660 --> 00:07:21.079 frustration. And prone to these huge rages when 00:07:21.079 --> 00:07:22.899 they don't get what they want. Disproportionate 00:07:22.899 --> 00:07:25.139 rage, exactly. The psychiatrist who examined 00:07:25.139 --> 00:07:28.319 him noted he had an obsession with getting back 00:07:28.319 --> 00:07:31.480 at people who he felt had wronged him. So if 00:07:31.480 --> 00:07:34.100 a girl in school rejected him, he didn't just 00:07:34.100 --> 00:07:36.500 feel sad or embarrassed. He felt this burning 00:07:36.500 --> 00:07:39.680 need for vengeance. Exactly right. He couldn't 00:07:39.680 --> 00:07:42.259 process rejection as a normal part of life. To 00:07:42.259 --> 00:07:44.540 him, it was a personal attack that required a 00:07:44.540 --> 00:07:47.259 counterattack. And we see this manifest violently 00:07:47.259 --> 00:07:50.319 for the very first time in 1960. This was the 00:07:50.319 --> 00:07:53.279 arson incident. Yes. He's 21 years old at this 00:07:53.279 --> 00:07:55.819 point. He burns down the Pocahontas County Board 00:07:55.819 --> 00:07:58.959 of Education's school bus garage. A school bus 00:07:58.959 --> 00:08:01.180 garage. I mean, that is such a specific, symbolic 00:08:01.180 --> 00:08:04.300 target. It was explicit revenge. He told the 00:08:04.300 --> 00:08:06.019 authorities he did it because he felt he'd been 00:08:06.019 --> 00:08:08.199 mistreated in high school. Think about that. 00:08:08.339 --> 00:08:11.040 He's 21, technically an adult, but he is still 00:08:11.040 --> 00:08:13.560 stewing over high school grudges so much that 00:08:13.560 --> 00:08:16.300 he commits a major felony. That perfectly illustrates 00:08:16.300 --> 00:08:19.240 that infantile obsession with revenge. It really 00:08:19.240 --> 00:08:21.779 does. He was arrested for that and got a three 00:08:21.779 --> 00:08:23.680 -year sentence. He ended up serving 20 months. 00:08:24.060 --> 00:08:26.220 And you would hope that, you know, prison time 00:08:26.220 --> 00:08:29.800 would be a wake -up call, but it seems like it 00:08:29.800 --> 00:08:32.379 just hardened him. It was just a pause, not a 00:08:32.379 --> 00:08:35.220 stop. It's a good way to put it. After he got 00:08:35.220 --> 00:08:37.700 out, He had a string of rennans for petty theft. 00:08:37.980 --> 00:08:40.179 His first wife divorced him while he was locked 00:08:40.179 --> 00:08:42.700 up, which, you know, likely just poured gasoline 00:08:42.700 --> 00:08:44.840 on that fire of resentment toward women. But 00:08:44.840 --> 00:08:47.080 the real turning point, the moment the trajectory 00:08:47.080 --> 00:08:50.000 shifts toward the serial killer we know, that's 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:53.320 in 1967. That's the move to Alaska. Right. He 00:08:53.320 --> 00:08:55.480 marries his second wife, a woman he met after 00:08:55.480 --> 00:08:57.700 his release, and they head north. And you have 00:08:57.700 --> 00:08:59.360 to remember what we said about Anchorage in the 00:08:59.360 --> 00:09:01.639 late 60s. It was the perfect place for a guy 00:09:01.639 --> 00:09:04.789 with a record to just... Disappear into the crowd. 00:09:04.870 --> 00:09:07.429 A clean slate. And for a while, it seemed like 00:09:07.429 --> 00:09:09.750 he did it. He made it. He opens the bakery. He 00:09:09.750 --> 00:09:11.750 starts racking up those hunting records. He's 00:09:11.750 --> 00:09:13.629 getting featured in the local newspapers for 00:09:13.629 --> 00:09:15.909 his archery skills. He's building the mask. He's 00:09:15.909 --> 00:09:18.450 building that Bob the Baker mask piece by piece. 00:09:18.870 --> 00:09:22.139 It's the classic mask of sanity. On the surface, 00:09:22.360 --> 00:09:24.620 he looked like a hyperproductive member of society. 00:09:25.320 --> 00:09:28.340 But the geography of Alaska didn't cure his pathology. 00:09:28.419 --> 00:09:30.279 It just gave him a bigger, wilder playground. 00:09:30.600 --> 00:09:32.820 The old resentments were all still there, just 00:09:32.820 --> 00:09:34.980 bubbling under the surface. And this is where 00:09:34.980 --> 00:09:36.759 the story becomes so incredibly frustrating. 00:09:36.980 --> 00:09:39.539 I think for our listeners, this next section 00:09:39.539 --> 00:09:42.620 is just, it's going to be the hardest to hear 00:09:42.620 --> 00:09:45.970 because it really highlights. how preventable 00:09:45.970 --> 00:09:48.570 these murders were. Oh, absolutely. Before the 00:09:48.570 --> 00:09:50.230 killing started in earnest, there were these 00:09:50.230 --> 00:09:53.149 massive flashing red flags. We're talking about 00:09:53.149 --> 00:09:56.809 the period between 1971 and 1976. This section 00:09:56.809 --> 00:09:59.070 of the timeline is just a scathing indictment 00:09:59.070 --> 00:10:01.690 of the judicial system of that era. In December 00:10:01.690 --> 00:10:04.730 1971, Hansen was arrested twice. And we're not 00:10:04.730 --> 00:10:06.990 talking about, you know, stealing a candy bar. 00:10:07.169 --> 00:10:08.889 Okay, let's break down those two incidents. The 00:10:08.889 --> 00:10:10.929 first one involved him abducting a housewife. 00:10:11.440 --> 00:10:13.679 He held her at gunpoint. He attempted to rape 00:10:13.679 --> 00:10:16.179 her. I mean, that is a violent predatory felony. 00:10:16.340 --> 00:10:18.120 There's no gray area there. And the second one 00:10:18.120 --> 00:10:20.539 in the same month. The second incident involved 00:10:20.539 --> 00:10:23.320 the rape of a sex worker. He was picked up and 00:10:23.320 --> 00:10:25.480 charged for both of these crimes. So you have 00:10:25.480 --> 00:10:27.740 a guy with a known history of arson and theft. 00:10:28.000 --> 00:10:30.639 Now he's arrested for abduction, attempted rape 00:10:30.639 --> 00:10:34.139 and rape. In any logical world, this man goes 00:10:34.139 --> 00:10:37.840 to prison for a long, long time. 10, 20 years. 00:10:37.960 --> 00:10:40.769 In a logical world, yes. But here's what actually 00:10:40.769 --> 00:10:44.409 happened. He pleaded no contest to assault with 00:10:44.409 --> 00:10:47.210 a deadly weapon for the abduction. And the rape 00:10:47.210 --> 00:10:49.730 charge involving the sex worker, it was dropped 00:10:49.730 --> 00:10:53.210 completely as part of a plea bargain. Gone. And 00:10:53.210 --> 00:10:55.029 for the assault charge, the one he pleaded no 00:10:55.029 --> 00:10:57.730 contest to, he was sentenced to five years. But, 00:10:57.730 --> 00:10:59.629 and this is the part that just hurts to even 00:10:59.629 --> 00:11:02.929 say, he served only six months. Six. Wait, six 00:11:02.929 --> 00:11:04.570 months? Six months. And it wasn't even, you know, 00:11:04.610 --> 00:11:07.269 a hard time. He was put on a work release program. 00:11:07.470 --> 00:11:10.509 Six months. He abducted a woman at gunpoint and 00:11:10.509 --> 00:11:13.370 he served less time than a school year. Just 00:11:13.370 --> 00:11:15.450 how does that even happen? It was a perfect storm 00:11:15.450 --> 00:11:17.970 of things. Overcrowded prisons, for one. A kind 00:11:17.970 --> 00:11:20.169 of frontier justice mentality that sometimes 00:11:20.169 --> 00:11:23.970 prioritize second chances for, you know, hardworking 00:11:23.970 --> 00:11:27.769 family men. And let's be honest, a deep bias 00:11:27.769 --> 00:11:31.429 against the victims. A huge bias. The court looked 00:11:31.429 --> 00:11:33.429 at Robert Hansen and they saw Bob the Baker. 00:11:33.789 --> 00:11:36.870 They saw a businessman, a neighbor. They did 00:11:36.870 --> 00:11:39.429 not see the monster. So they minimized the threat 00:11:39.429 --> 00:11:41.909 he posed. It's terrifying. He basically learned 00:11:41.909 --> 00:11:44.330 a lesson from this. And the lesson was, I can 00:11:44.330 --> 00:11:46.409 attack women and get a slap on the wrist. It 00:11:46.409 --> 00:11:49.250 absolutely emboldened him. And then you fast 00:11:49.250 --> 00:11:52.690 forward to 1976 and he gets caught stealing a 00:11:52.690 --> 00:11:55.389 chainsaw from a Fred Meyer store. A pretty petty 00:11:55.389 --> 00:11:57.529 crime compared to the violence, but still. Right. 00:11:57.669 --> 00:11:59.970 And he gets sentenced to five years for larceny. 00:12:00.070 --> 00:12:02.090 The court even orders him to get psychiatric 00:12:02.090 --> 00:12:04.230 treatment. So they recognize something is deeply 00:12:04.230 --> 00:12:07.389 wrong with this guy. But the Alaska Supreme Court. 00:12:07.720 --> 00:12:09.980 reviews the case, and they reduce his sentence. 00:12:10.259 --> 00:12:12.960 He's released for time served. So again and again, 00:12:13.159 --> 00:12:15.740 the system had him in its grip, and again and 00:12:15.740 --> 00:12:17.840 again, it just let him go. And authorities now 00:12:17.840 --> 00:12:19.779 believe the murders began right in the middle 00:12:19.779 --> 00:12:23.000 of all this leniency, around 1972. While the 00:12:23.000 --> 00:12:24.580 courts were letting him out on work release, 00:12:24.759 --> 00:12:27.379 he was very likely already killing. He realized 00:12:27.379 --> 00:12:29.580 that if he was careful, if he picked the right 00:12:29.580 --> 00:12:32.190 victims, nobody was going to stop him. Which 00:12:32.190 --> 00:12:34.590 brings us to the modus operandi, because once 00:12:34.590 --> 00:12:37.110 he realized he could get away with it, he escalated 00:12:37.110 --> 00:12:39.549 from these, you know, crimes of opportunity to 00:12:39.549 --> 00:12:42.529 a highly ritualized, horrifying system. This 00:12:42.529 --> 00:12:43.909 is where the plane comes in. A pilot's license, 00:12:44.090 --> 00:12:47.169 yeah. Yeah. Hansen owned a Piper PA -18 Super 00:12:47.169 --> 00:12:50.080 Cub. Now, for any aviation geeks listening, the 00:12:50.080 --> 00:12:52.960 Super Cub is a legendary bush plane. It's small. 00:12:53.100 --> 00:12:55.259 It's got a powerful engine for its weight. And 00:12:55.259 --> 00:12:57.159 most importantly, it can land almost anywhere. 00:12:57.419 --> 00:13:00.379 Exactly. It has these high -lift wings and big, 00:13:00.419 --> 00:13:03.200 fat tundra tires. It can take off and land on 00:13:03.200 --> 00:13:04.879 a dime. You don't need a runway. You just need 00:13:04.879 --> 00:13:07.659 a gravel bar, a frozen lake, a patch of flat 00:13:07.659 --> 00:13:10.100 ground. Which means he had access to parts of 00:13:10.100 --> 00:13:13.759 Alaska that were... Completely, totally inaccessible 00:13:13.759 --> 00:13:17.220 to police cruisers or any regular vehicle. Precisely. 00:13:17.299 --> 00:13:19.980 He used the plane to create this huge disconnect 00:13:19.980 --> 00:13:22.399 between the abduction site and the eventual crime 00:13:22.399 --> 00:13:25.200 scene. He would target women in Anchorage, usually 00:13:25.200 --> 00:13:28.259 sex workers, dancers, transients. Women he felt 00:13:28.259 --> 00:13:30.980 society wouldn't miss, or at least wouldn't miss 00:13:30.980 --> 00:13:33.179 immediately. That was the calculation. He would 00:13:33.179 --> 00:13:35.919 stalk them, learn their movements, and then abduct 00:13:35.919 --> 00:13:38.139 them at gunpoint, usually forcing them into his 00:13:38.139 --> 00:13:40.600 car first. But he didn't just take them to a 00:13:40.600 --> 00:13:42.759 basement, though we know he did torture victims 00:13:42.759 --> 00:13:45.879 in his home sometimes. Yeah. The endgame was 00:13:45.879 --> 00:13:48.340 always the wilderness. Always. He would drive 00:13:48.340 --> 00:13:51.000 them to Merrill Field or another small airstrip, 00:13:51.039 --> 00:13:54.139 load them into the Super Cub, and fly them out 00:13:54.139 --> 00:13:56.740 to the Nick River Valley or the Mataniska -Susitna 00:13:56.740 --> 00:14:00.399 Valley. These vast, empty places. I mean, try 00:14:00.399 --> 00:14:02.080 to put yourself in the victim's shoes for just 00:14:02.080 --> 00:14:03.960 a second. You've been abducted. You're in this 00:14:03.960 --> 00:14:06.259 tiny, noisy plane. You look out the window and 00:14:06.259 --> 00:14:09.240 all you see are mountains, glaciers, and just 00:14:09.240 --> 00:14:12.580 endless forest. You know that even if you land, 00:14:12.779 --> 00:14:15.320 there's absolutely nowhere to run. That psychological 00:14:15.320 --> 00:14:17.700 terror was a huge part of his gratification. 00:14:18.080 --> 00:14:20.759 He was isolating them completely from the world. 00:14:20.899 --> 00:14:23.179 And once he landed on some remote gravel bar 00:14:23.179 --> 00:14:25.860 or a secluded strip, that's when the game would 00:14:25.860 --> 00:14:28.759 begin. He didn't just execute them. No. He would 00:14:28.759 --> 00:14:31.080 strip them naked or partially naked, and he would 00:14:31.080 --> 00:14:33.100 tell them to run. He turned it into a sport. 00:14:33.299 --> 00:14:36.620 He hunted them. He used a Ruger Mini -14. It's 00:14:36.620 --> 00:14:40.279 a .223 caliber semi -automatic rifle. It's a 00:14:40.279 --> 00:14:43.519 serious weapon, lightweight, reliable, high capacity. 00:14:44.120 --> 00:14:47.639 It's often used for hunting small game or varmints. 00:14:47.840 --> 00:14:49.639 And that's what he saw them as. He treated these 00:14:49.639 --> 00:14:51.799 women exactly like the animals he tracked for 00:14:51.799 --> 00:14:53.919 a sport. He'd give them a head start, and then 00:14:53.919 --> 00:14:56.139 he would track them down and shoot them. It's 00:14:56.139 --> 00:14:59.220 the ultimate expression of that infantile need 00:14:59.220 --> 00:15:01.860 for control. I am the hunter, you are the prey. 00:15:02.039 --> 00:15:05.139 There's no ambiguity there. It is the most dangerous 00:15:05.139 --> 00:15:08.679 game. It satisfied every single dark impulse 00:15:08.679 --> 00:15:11.480 he had, the deep resentment of women, the desire 00:15:11.480 --> 00:15:13.500 for total dominance, and the thrill of the hunt 00:15:13.500 --> 00:15:15.360 that he was so good at. And because of where 00:15:15.360 --> 00:15:18.000 he did it, the evidence was just... swallowed 00:15:18.000 --> 00:15:20.379 by the wilderness. Swallowed up. Scavengers, 00:15:20.399 --> 00:15:22.600 bears, wolves, eagles, they would destroy the 00:15:22.600 --> 00:15:24.440 remains very quickly. The harsh weather would 00:15:24.440 --> 00:15:27.039 bleach the bones. He was dumping bodies in a 00:15:27.039 --> 00:15:29.519 landscape that's literally designed to hide secrets. 00:15:29.879 --> 00:15:32.159 And this went on for over a decade. He was living 00:15:32.159 --> 00:15:34.200 this complete double life, baking bread in the 00:15:34.200 --> 00:15:36.620 morning, hunting women in the afternoon until 00:15:36.620 --> 00:15:40.080 June 13th, 1983. The day the house of cards began 00:15:40.080 --> 00:15:43.159 to fall. And that brings us to Cindy Paulson. 00:15:43.529 --> 00:15:45.769 Cindy was 17 years old. I think it's really important 00:15:45.769 --> 00:15:48.230 to emphasize that. She was a child, essentially, 00:15:48.450 --> 00:15:50.610 even though she was working as a sex worker on 00:15:50.610 --> 00:15:52.450 the streets of Anchorage. She was vulnerable, 00:15:52.629 --> 00:15:54.649 and that's what he looked for. Hansen approached 00:15:54.649 --> 00:15:58.370 her, offered her $200 for sex, and she got into 00:15:58.370 --> 00:16:01.210 his car. But almost immediately, the dynamic 00:16:01.210 --> 00:16:04.350 shifted. You pulled the gun. He pulled a .357 00:16:04.350 --> 00:16:07.549 Magnum. The client disappeared, and the monster 00:16:07.549 --> 00:16:09.929 came out. He took her to his house in Muldoon. 00:16:10.590 --> 00:16:13.129 And what happened there is just incredibly disturbing. 00:16:13.309 --> 00:16:15.789 He chained her to a post in his den. He tortured 00:16:15.789 --> 00:16:18.070 her. He raped her repeatedly. He kept her there 00:16:18.070 --> 00:16:21.549 for hours. But then, then we see this moment 00:16:21.549 --> 00:16:24.490 of just staggering arrogance from him. After 00:16:24.490 --> 00:16:26.870 terrorizing her, Robert Hansen decides to take 00:16:26.870 --> 00:16:29.129 a nap. He went to sleep. He went to sleep on 00:16:29.129 --> 00:16:30.970 the couch while she was still chained up. It 00:16:30.970 --> 00:16:33.379 just shows how little he feared her. He saw her 00:16:33.379 --> 00:16:35.980 as an object, something totally secure in his 00:16:35.980 --> 00:16:38.399 possession. He was just resting up for the final 00:16:38.399 --> 00:16:41.460 hunt. So when he wakes up, he tells her they're 00:16:41.460 --> 00:16:44.500 going to his shack in the valley. Right. He loads 00:16:44.500 --> 00:16:46.639 her into his car to drive to the airfield. And 00:16:46.639 --> 00:16:49.440 this, this is the moment where Cindy Paulson 00:16:49.440 --> 00:16:52.440 saves her own life. She's handcuffed in the backseat 00:16:52.440 --> 00:16:55.059 of his car. They get to Merrill Field. Hansen 00:16:55.059 --> 00:16:57.980 gets out to prep the Super Cub. He's distracted, 00:16:58.240 --> 00:17:00.779 you know, moving gear around, checking the plane. 00:17:01.200 --> 00:17:03.259 He thinks she's paralyzed with fear and physically 00:17:03.259 --> 00:17:05.559 restrained. He's not worried about her at all. 00:17:05.720 --> 00:17:07.339 But she wasn't paralyzed. She was terrified, 00:17:07.420 --> 00:17:09.839 of course, but she was fighting. She somehow 00:17:09.839 --> 00:17:11.859 managed to crawl out of the back seat while his 00:17:11.859 --> 00:17:15.099 back was turned. And as she ran, she did something 00:17:15.099 --> 00:17:17.720 that criminal profilers still talk about to this 00:17:17.720 --> 00:17:20.880 day. The blue sneakers. She kicked off her blue 00:17:20.880 --> 00:17:22.980 sneakers and left them right there next to his 00:17:22.980 --> 00:17:25.039 car. Why did she do that? What was the thinking 00:17:25.039 --> 00:17:28.440 there? It was a conscious decision to leave a 00:17:28.440 --> 00:17:32.099 marker. To leave evidence. She knew that if he 00:17:32.099 --> 00:17:34.920 caught her or if she disappeared forever, those 00:17:34.920 --> 00:17:37.259 shoes would be physical proof that she had been 00:17:37.259 --> 00:17:39.700 there. It was this desperate, brilliant breadcrumb. 00:17:39.880 --> 00:17:42.519 So she's running barefoot across the tarmac, 00:17:42.680 --> 00:17:46.140 handcuffed, screaming, trying to get to 6th Avenue. 00:17:46.339 --> 00:17:49.519 Hansen spops her. He panics. The control is gone. 00:17:49.740 --> 00:17:52.259 He runs after her with the gun, but she reaches 00:17:52.259 --> 00:17:55.299 the road. She flags down a passing truck driver, 00:17:55.519 --> 00:17:58.220 a man named Robert Yount. And we have to give 00:17:58.220 --> 00:17:59.900 all the credit in the world to Robert Yount here. 00:18:00.059 --> 00:18:03.380 He sees a girl in handcuffs screaming for her 00:18:03.380 --> 00:18:07.039 life, and he slams on the brakes. He stops. He 00:18:07.039 --> 00:18:09.940 absolutely saved her life, no question. Hansen 00:18:09.940 --> 00:18:11.819 saw the truck stop, and he knew the game was 00:18:11.819 --> 00:18:15.259 up. He retreated. Yount drove Cindy to the Big 00:18:15.259 --> 00:18:17.440 Timber Motel, which was nearby, and they called 00:18:17.440 --> 00:18:20.559 the police. Okay, so you would think this is 00:18:20.559 --> 00:18:22.980 the end of the story. Police arrive. They find 00:18:22.980 --> 00:18:24.940 a handcuffed girl who says Robert Hansen kidnapped 00:18:24.940 --> 00:18:27.019 me. They see the cuffs and they go arrest him. 00:18:27.059 --> 00:18:29.319 Case closed. But that is not what happened. No. 00:18:29.400 --> 00:18:31.200 And this brings us right back to the bias we 00:18:31.200 --> 00:18:33.140 talked about earlier. The police arrived at the 00:18:33.140 --> 00:18:35.579 motel. They found Cindy. She's hysterical. She's 00:18:35.579 --> 00:18:37.220 still in the handcuffs. She tells them everything. 00:18:37.500 --> 00:18:40.359 The torture, the plane. She identifies Hansen 00:18:40.359 --> 00:18:42.319 by name. But when they go to talk to Hansen. 00:18:42.599 --> 00:18:46.519 Hansen is calm. He's cool. He's Bob the Baker. 00:18:47.240 --> 00:18:49.500 He admits he was with her, but he claims she 00:18:49.500 --> 00:18:52.039 was trying to extort him. He flips the story 00:18:52.039 --> 00:18:54.880 completely. He claims she was the unstable one. 00:18:55.099 --> 00:18:57.640 And he had an alibi. He had an alibi. A friend 00:18:57.640 --> 00:19:00.000 named John Henning, who vouched for him, said 00:19:00.000 --> 00:19:02.000 he was with him. And the police believed him 00:19:02.000 --> 00:19:04.960 over a 17 -year -old girl they found in handcuffs. 00:19:05.099 --> 00:19:07.960 They believed the respectable married business 00:19:07.960 --> 00:19:11.190 owner over the teenage sex worker. They actually 00:19:11.190 --> 00:19:13.210 let him go. They didn't search his car. They 00:19:13.210 --> 00:19:15.329 didn't search his plane. Not initially. They 00:19:15.329 --> 00:19:17.730 viewed it as a he said, she said. And they just 00:19:17.730 --> 00:19:20.170 defaulted to trusting the man with the social 00:19:20.170 --> 00:19:22.549 status. It just makes my blood boil. She did 00:19:22.549 --> 00:19:25.150 everything right. She escaped. She left the shoes 00:19:25.150 --> 00:19:27.750 as evidence. She told the truth. And because 00:19:27.750 --> 00:19:29.509 of who she was, they didn't believe her. It's 00:19:29.509 --> 00:19:32.009 a total tragedy of credibility. But thankfully, 00:19:32.109 --> 00:19:33.990 the story doesn't end there because there was 00:19:33.990 --> 00:19:36.089 a detective working in the shadows who wasn't 00:19:36.089 --> 00:19:38.910 so quick to just dismiss all of this. Detective 00:19:38.910 --> 00:19:42.750 Glenn Floth. Yeah. Alaska State Troopers. Floath 00:19:42.750 --> 00:19:44.890 was working on a totally different angle. He 00:19:44.890 --> 00:19:46.950 had been looking at several bodies that had been 00:19:46.950 --> 00:19:49.509 found out in the wilderness over the years. A 00:19:49.509 --> 00:19:52.630 woman they dubbed a Klootna Annie, found in 1980, 00:19:52.950 --> 00:19:56.410 another named Joanna Messina, and another Sherry 00:19:56.410 --> 00:19:59.210 Morrow. And Floath had a theory that these weren't 00:19:59.210 --> 00:20:02.009 just random, unrelated murders. Right. He saw 00:20:02.009 --> 00:20:04.670 the pattern, the remote locations, the way the 00:20:04.670 --> 00:20:07.269 bodies were discarded. He suspected a serial 00:20:07.269 --> 00:20:10.019 predator was at work. And when he heard about 00:20:10.019 --> 00:20:12.160 the Cindy Paulson incident, even though the Anchorage 00:20:12.160 --> 00:20:15.039 PD had basically shelved it, he saw the connection. 00:20:15.180 --> 00:20:18.700 But he needed more than just a hunch. So he called 00:20:18.700 --> 00:20:21.500 in the cavalry. He reached out to the FBI's behavioral 00:20:21.500 --> 00:20:24.440 science unit at Quantico. Specifically, he contacted 00:20:24.440 --> 00:20:27.019 Special Agent John Douglas. And for any true 00:20:27.019 --> 00:20:29.380 crime fans listening, that name is. It's legendary. 00:20:29.700 --> 00:20:32.160 Douglas is one of the fathers of modern criminal 00:20:32.160 --> 00:20:35.400 profiling. So Floth sends the case files to Quantico 00:20:35.400 --> 00:20:38.680 and asks for a profile. He does. And what John 00:20:38.680 --> 00:20:40.740 Douglas sent back was practically a photograph 00:20:40.740 --> 00:20:42.920 of Robert Hansen. I mean, it wasn't just vague 00:20:42.920 --> 00:20:46.059 guesses. No, it was chillingly specific. Douglas 00:20:46.059 --> 00:20:48.440 looked at the victimology, the geography of the 00:20:48.440 --> 00:20:52.059 body dumps, and he deduced the following. The 00:20:52.059 --> 00:20:54.640 killer would be an experienced hunter. He would 00:20:54.640 --> 00:20:56.900 have very low self -esteem, but a massive ego. 00:20:57.119 --> 00:20:59.200 He would have a history of rejection by women. 00:20:59.319 --> 00:21:01.779 He would be compelled to keep souvenirs like 00:21:01.779 --> 00:21:05.019 jewelry to relive the crimes. But there was one 00:21:05.019 --> 00:21:08.519 detail. One specific detail in that profile that 00:21:08.519 --> 00:21:12.299 made everyone's jaw just drop. The stutter. Douglas 00:21:12.299 --> 00:21:14.220 predicted the killer would have a speech impediment. 00:21:14.339 --> 00:21:16.880 How? I mean, how on earth does someone look at 00:21:16.880 --> 00:21:19.140 a crime scene photo of a shallow grave in the 00:21:19.140 --> 00:21:21.480 woods and figure out the killer's stutters? It 00:21:21.480 --> 00:21:23.420 comes down to the psychology of the attack itself. 00:21:23.869 --> 00:21:26.569 Douglas reasoned that the killer's need for absolute 00:21:26.569 --> 00:21:29.589 total dominance and the specific way he silenced 00:21:29.589 --> 00:21:32.250 his victims, it suggested a man who felt completely 00:21:32.250 --> 00:21:34.150 unable to communicate effectively in the real 00:21:34.150 --> 00:21:36.470 world. He theorized that the killer felt socially 00:21:36.470 --> 00:21:38.890 impotent and a speech impediment is a common 00:21:38.890 --> 00:21:41.390 driver of that specific type of insecurity and 00:21:41.390 --> 00:21:43.309 rage. So Floth gets this profile. He's reading 00:21:43.309 --> 00:21:45.670 down the list. Experienced hunter. Check. Owned 00:21:45.670 --> 00:21:48.210 a plane. Check. Low self -esteem. Check. Keeps 00:21:48.210 --> 00:21:51.230 souvenirs. Plausible. Stutters. It was a lightning 00:21:51.230 --> 00:21:53.960 bolt. He must have realized immediately. It's 00:21:53.960 --> 00:21:56.460 the Baker. That profile gave Fluff the ammunition 00:21:56.460 --> 00:21:58.799 he desperately needed to go to a judge and get 00:21:58.799 --> 00:22:01.460 a search warrant, despite Hansen's sterling public 00:22:01.460 --> 00:22:05.880 reputation. So on October 27, 1983, the troopers 00:22:05.880 --> 00:22:08.839 and the FBI descended on Hansen's world. They 00:22:08.839 --> 00:22:12.220 searched everything. The plane, the cars, the 00:22:12.220 --> 00:22:15.259 house, and the evidence they found was just... 00:22:15.680 --> 00:22:17.720 It was overwhelming. They found the jewelry, 00:22:17.960 --> 00:22:20.279 the souvenirs that Douglas predicted. They were 00:22:20.279 --> 00:22:23.039 hidden away in the attic, necklaces, IDs, earrings 00:22:23.039 --> 00:22:25.279 belonging to women who were known to be missing. 00:22:25.460 --> 00:22:28.369 And they found the murder weapon. the Ruger Mini 00:22:28.369 --> 00:22:30.990 -14, and ballistics eventually matched it to 00:22:30.990 --> 00:22:32.650 the bullets they'd recovered from the bodies. 00:22:32.869 --> 00:22:34.970 The case was solidifying, but then they found 00:22:34.970 --> 00:22:37.509 something else in his bedroom. Something that, 00:22:37.589 --> 00:22:40.250 to me, is the single most terrifying object in 00:22:40.250 --> 00:22:42.890 this entire case. The map. The map. Describe 00:22:42.890 --> 00:22:44.710 it for us. What did they find? Hidden behind 00:22:44.710 --> 00:22:47.029 the headboard of his bed, they found an aviation 00:22:47.029 --> 00:22:49.849 chart, a map of the area surrounding Anchorage. 00:22:50.009 --> 00:22:52.650 And on that map... Hansen had drawn little X 00:22:52.650 --> 00:22:55.529 marks, small, precise, hand -drawn Xs. How many 00:22:55.529 --> 00:22:59.190 were on there? There were 37 Xs. 37? It was a 00:22:59.190 --> 00:23:02.670 scorecard, a secret diary of death that he slept 00:23:02.670 --> 00:23:05.910 just inches away from every single night. It 00:23:05.910 --> 00:23:07.990 is the ultimate symbol of his compartmentalization. 00:23:08.490 --> 00:23:11.430 His wife slept in that bed, completely unaware 00:23:11.430 --> 00:23:14.289 that right behind her head was a document detailing 00:23:14.289 --> 00:23:17.369 the murders of dozens of women. Seeing that map 00:23:17.369 --> 00:23:19.809 must have just changed everything for the investigators. 00:23:20.650 --> 00:23:22.230 They weren't looking for a guy who killed three 00:23:22.230 --> 00:23:25.490 or four people anymore. No, it completely redefined 00:23:25.490 --> 00:23:27.690 the scale of the horror. They realized in that 00:23:27.690 --> 00:23:29.630 moment that they were dealing with a monster 00:23:29.630 --> 00:23:32.730 of historic proportions. So we really need to 00:23:32.730 --> 00:23:35.349 take some time now to talk about the women. The 00:23:35.349 --> 00:23:38.750 women represented by those exes. Because 17 confessed 00:23:38.750 --> 00:23:41.829 murders and 37 marks on a map. That's a number 00:23:41.829 --> 00:23:44.509 that can feel abstract. But each one of those 00:23:44.509 --> 00:23:47.210 was a human being with a life and a story. Absolutely. 00:23:47.230 --> 00:23:49.650 We have to humanize the statistics. Let's talk 00:23:49.650 --> 00:23:52.109 about Aklutna Annie. That's the name investigators 00:23:52.109 --> 00:23:54.509 gave to the first body they discovered back in 00:23:54.509 --> 00:23:58.089 1980 near Aklutna Road. And to this day, we still 00:23:58.089 --> 00:24:01.170 don't know her real name, do we? We don't. She 00:24:01.170 --> 00:24:04.009 is still unidentified. Hansen confessed to killing 00:24:04.009 --> 00:24:06.880 her. He claims she was his first murder victim, 00:24:07.000 --> 00:24:09.279 although the timeline on that is a bit fuzzy. 00:24:09.579 --> 00:24:11.819 He admitted to stabbing her in the back as she 00:24:11.819 --> 00:24:14.180 tried to run away from him, but she remains nameless. 00:24:14.559 --> 00:24:18.019 Just a Jane Doe in a cold grave somewhere. And 00:24:18.019 --> 00:24:20.140 then there was Sherry Morrow. Sherry was 23. 00:24:21.099 --> 00:24:24.400 Her case, it really reveals the depth of Hansen's 00:24:24.400 --> 00:24:27.779 twisted rituals. Her body was found in a shallow 00:24:27.779 --> 00:24:30.680 grave near the Nick River. She'd been hunted 00:24:30.680 --> 00:24:33.490 down and shot with the Mini -14. But when the 00:24:33.490 --> 00:24:35.289 investigators analyzed the scene, they found 00:24:35.289 --> 00:24:37.950 something very bizarre. She was fully clothed. 00:24:37.950 --> 00:24:40.049 She was fully clothed, but there were no bullet 00:24:40.049 --> 00:24:42.269 holes in her clothing. Which can only mean one 00:24:42.269 --> 00:24:44.769 thing. It means she was naked when he shot her. 00:24:44.950 --> 00:24:47.630 And then, after he killed her, Robert Hansen 00:24:47.630 --> 00:24:49.849 took the time to carefully dress her corpse before 00:24:49.849 --> 00:24:53.400 he buried her. That is... That is so deeply disturbing. 00:24:53.619 --> 00:24:55.519 It's like he was trying to fix his toy after 00:24:55.519 --> 00:24:57.700 he broke it. It just speaks to his need for control 00:24:57.700 --> 00:25:00.079 extending even beyond death. He wanted to control 00:25:00.079 --> 00:25:02.579 the final image of the victim. It's chilling. 00:25:02.819 --> 00:25:05.180 We also have to remember Paula Golding. Paula 00:25:05.180 --> 00:25:07.880 was 30 years old, and by Hansen's own account, 00:25:08.000 --> 00:25:10.599 she fought him. She didn't just run, she struggled 00:25:10.599 --> 00:25:12.700 with him. He shot her while she was fleeing. 00:25:13.240 --> 00:25:16.000 And Andrea Fish Altairi... She was nicknamed 00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:18.039 Fish because she always wore a fish necklace. 00:25:18.339 --> 00:25:21.180 That's right. And Hansen took her to the Nick 00:25:21.180 --> 00:25:24.240 Armbridge, and he kept that necklace. It was 00:25:24.240 --> 00:25:27.000 one of the items, one of the souvenirs they found 00:25:27.000 --> 00:25:29.180 in the attic stash. This is also the case of 00:25:29.180 --> 00:25:32.259 Celia Van Zanten. It's a bit different. It is. 00:25:32.440 --> 00:25:34.240 Authorities believe she might have been the... 00:25:34.279 --> 00:25:38.680 first victim way back in 1971. She froze to death. 00:25:39.099 --> 00:25:41.460 Now, Hansen always denied killing her, but there 00:25:41.460 --> 00:25:44.099 was an X on that map that matched her location 00:25:44.099 --> 00:25:46.619 perfectly. And that brings up a really important 00:25:46.619 --> 00:25:48.720 issue about his confession, doesn't it? Even 00:25:48.720 --> 00:25:50.700 when he was caught, even when he was finally 00:25:50.700 --> 00:25:52.720 talking, he was still trying to manipulate the 00:25:52.720 --> 00:25:55.400 narrative. Constantly. He steadfastly refused 00:25:55.400 --> 00:25:57.220 to admit to killing any women who weren't sex 00:25:57.220 --> 00:26:00.220 workers. For example, there were two women, Megan 00:26:00.220 --> 00:26:02.839 Emrick and Mary Phil. There were Xs on the map 00:26:02.839 --> 00:26:04.900 in the locations near Seward where they disappeared, 00:26:05.220 --> 00:26:08.259 but Hansen denied them to his dying day. Why? 00:26:08.480 --> 00:26:11.200 Why confess to 17 but draw the line at those 00:26:11.200 --> 00:26:13.500 two? It was all part of his internal justification 00:26:13.500 --> 00:26:17.339 system. In his warped, infantile mind, killing 00:26:17.339 --> 00:26:21.359 sex workers was somehow different. He could rationalize 00:26:21.359 --> 00:26:23.940 it to himself as cleaning up the streets. A form 00:26:23.940 --> 00:26:27.240 of vigilantism. Exactly. But admitting to killing 00:26:27.240 --> 00:26:30.559 innocent women, in his view, would destroy that 00:26:30.559 --> 00:26:32.880 delusion. It would force him to admit that he 00:26:32.880 --> 00:26:35.059 was just a psychopath who killed indiscriminately, 00:26:35.200 --> 00:26:38.059 not some kind of twisted moral crusader. It's 00:26:38.059 --> 00:26:40.039 a final insult to the victims and their families. 00:26:40.279 --> 00:26:42.680 Even in the end, he was picking and choosing 00:26:42.680 --> 00:26:44.960 which lives counted. It just shows that that 00:26:44.960 --> 00:26:47.799 infantile personality diagnosed decades earlier 00:26:47.799 --> 00:26:50.339 remained right until the very end. He could not 00:26:50.339 --> 00:26:52.579 accept full responsibility for the reality of 00:26:52.579 --> 00:26:54.799 what he had done. So how did the endgame finally 00:26:54.799 --> 00:26:57.140 play out? They have the map, the gun, the jewelry. 00:26:57.460 --> 00:27:00.039 They confront him with all of it. At first, he 00:27:00.039 --> 00:27:02.660 denied everything. He played the outraged citizen. 00:27:02.900 --> 00:27:05.039 How dare you accuse me? The whole performance. 00:27:05.920 --> 00:27:08.599 But the physical evidence was just insurmountable. 00:27:08.859 --> 00:27:11.299 The ballistics match on the rifle was the nail 00:27:11.299 --> 00:27:13.400 in the coffin. And when they finally laid out 00:27:13.400 --> 00:27:15.599 that map in front of him, he knew it was over. 00:27:15.799 --> 00:27:18.259 And he made a deal. He did. He pleaded guilty 00:27:18.259 --> 00:27:21.519 to four counts of first -degree homicide. Formaro, 00:27:21.759 --> 00:27:25.720 Messina, Goulding, and Eklutna Annie. He did 00:27:25.720 --> 00:27:29.319 this for two main reasons. to avoid a high -profile, 00:27:29.319 --> 00:27:32.440 humiliating public trial, and to ensure he served 00:27:32.440 --> 00:27:34.680 his time in a federal prison rather than a state 00:27:34.680 --> 00:27:37.839 prison. But the police had a condition, a very 00:27:37.839 --> 00:27:40.119 important one. A critical condition. He had to 00:27:40.119 --> 00:27:41.799 help them decipher the map. He had to physically 00:27:41.799 --> 00:27:44.339 go with the police in helicopters and point out 00:27:44.339 --> 00:27:46.559 where the bodies were buried. Just imagine that 00:27:46.559 --> 00:27:48.900 scene, sitting in a helicopter next to the man 00:27:48.900 --> 00:27:51.480 who hunted women in these same woods, watching 00:27:51.480 --> 00:27:53.259 him point down at the ground and say, There! 00:27:53.599 --> 00:27:55.819 I buried one there. It must have been a gruesome, 00:27:55.819 --> 00:27:58.440 surreal process. They did manage to recover 12 00:27:58.440 --> 00:28:01.519 bodies that way, but many were never found. The 00:28:01.519 --> 00:28:03.779 wilderness had reclaimed them forever. He was 00:28:03.779 --> 00:28:08.759 sentenced to 461 years, plus life without the 00:28:08.759 --> 00:28:11.339 possibility of parole. A sentence designed to 00:28:11.339 --> 00:28:13.660 ensure he would never, ever breathe free air 00:28:13.660 --> 00:28:16.319 again. He was sent to Lewisburg, Pennsylvania 00:28:16.319 --> 00:28:18.819 initially, but was eventually transferred back 00:28:18.819 --> 00:28:21.619 to Alaska to serve his time at Spring Creek Correctional 00:28:21.619 --> 00:28:23.869 Center in Seward. And that's where he stayed 00:28:23.869 --> 00:28:28.049 until August 24th, 2014. He died of natural causes 00:28:28.049 --> 00:28:31.730 at the age of 75. A quiet, banal end for a man 00:28:31.730 --> 00:28:34.410 who had caused such explosive, unimaginable pain. 00:28:34.609 --> 00:28:36.529 His legacy, for better or worse, lives on in 00:28:36.529 --> 00:28:38.670 pop culture. I mean, the movie The Frozen Ground 00:28:38.670 --> 00:28:41.289 with John Cusack as Hansen and Nicolas Cage as 00:28:41.289 --> 00:28:43.690 the detective brought this whole story to a global 00:28:43.690 --> 00:28:46.670 audience. It did. And you see echoes of his MO 00:28:46.670 --> 00:28:49.269 and shows like Criminal Minds and Law and Order. 00:28:49.390 --> 00:28:52.009 That idea of hunting humans just taps into a 00:28:52.009 --> 00:28:54.890 very primal, deep -seated fear. It strips away 00:28:54.890 --> 00:28:57.210 all the protections of civilization. It's the 00:28:57.210 --> 00:28:59.750 ultimate nightmare scenario. So as we wrap this 00:28:59.750 --> 00:29:01.190 up, let's try to synthesize what we've learned. 00:29:01.269 --> 00:29:02.849 What's the big takeaway from the Robert Hansen 00:29:02.849 --> 00:29:05.720 story? For me, it's a terrifying lesson on the 00:29:05.720 --> 00:29:08.440 danger of compartmentalization. Here was a man 00:29:08.440 --> 00:29:10.519 who could genuinely bake a cake for a neighbor's 00:29:10.519 --> 00:29:12.559 birthday in the morning, and then go out and 00:29:12.559 --> 00:29:15.039 murder a woman in the afternoon. And that map 00:29:15.039 --> 00:29:17.099 behind his headboard is the perfect chilling 00:29:17.099 --> 00:29:19.960 symbol of that. He built this wall between his 00:29:19.960 --> 00:29:22.140 two lives, and because he was Bob the Baker, 00:29:22.380 --> 00:29:25.339 society helped him keep that wall standing. It 00:29:25.339 --> 00:29:27.900 also just screams about the catastrophic failure 00:29:27.900 --> 00:29:30.799 of the justice system to take violence against 00:29:30.799 --> 00:29:33.960 women seriously, especially women on the margins 00:29:33.960 --> 00:29:36.359 of society. If they had just locked him up in 00:29:36.359 --> 00:29:39.660 1971 for that abduction and rape, countless lives 00:29:39.660 --> 00:29:41.660 would have been saved. All those exes would never 00:29:41.660 --> 00:29:44.180 have been drawn. The infantile personality was 00:29:44.180 --> 00:29:46.779 dangerous, yes, but the system's indifference 00:29:46.779 --> 00:29:49.319 was the catalyst that allowed it to just explode 00:29:49.319 --> 00:29:52.619 into this decade -long reign of terror. And we 00:29:52.619 --> 00:29:54.819 have to circle back one last time to Cindy Paulson. 00:29:54.920 --> 00:29:57.400 She really is the hero of this story. Without 00:29:57.400 --> 00:29:59.980 a doubt. She was 17. She was terrified. She was 00:29:59.980 --> 00:30:02.539 tortured. But she had the presence of mind to 00:30:02.539 --> 00:30:05.079 leave those sneakers behind. She had the courage 00:30:05.079 --> 00:30:08.559 to flag down that truck. Without her, the X's 00:30:08.559 --> 00:30:10.400 on that map just would have kept multiplying. 00:30:10.819 --> 00:30:14.059 She stopped a monster in his tracks. But, and 00:30:14.059 --> 00:30:15.640 this is a thought that I think I want to leave 00:30:15.640 --> 00:30:19.920 our listeners with, the map had 37 X's. We have 00:30:19.920 --> 00:30:23.500 17 confessions, 12 bodies recovered with his 00:30:23.500 --> 00:30:25.779 help. And that is the haunting reality of this 00:30:25.779 --> 00:30:28.400 case. Robert Hansen took secrets to the grave. 00:30:28.799 --> 00:30:31.140 There are almost certainly still bodies out there, 00:30:31.279 --> 00:30:33.619 lost in the vastness of the Alaskan wilderness. 00:30:34.019 --> 00:30:36.480 Women whose families are still waiting, still 00:30:36.480 --> 00:30:39.140 wondering. Who are the other exes? We may never 00:30:39.140 --> 00:30:41.500 know. It's a chilling reminder that even when 00:30:41.500 --> 00:30:44.160 justice is served, the truth isn't always fully 00:30:44.160 --> 00:30:46.759 recovered. It's a dark shadow that still hangs 00:30:46.759 --> 00:30:49.079 over that beautiful wild landscape. Thank you 00:30:49.079 --> 00:30:50.940 for joining us on this deep dive. Stay curious, 00:30:51.119 --> 00:30:53.400 look out for one another, and please stay safe. 00:30:53.440 --> 00:30:54.359 We'll see you next time.