Bob Hansen Fair Game Summary

Originally published on February 11, 2000
To big game hunter Robert Hansen, Alaska was paradise. But for his victims, it was a terrifying wilderness where no one could hear their screams. The cover summary of Bernard DuClos' book on Hansen, Fair Game, is much more than just sensationalism. It's a pretty accurate summary of the period from 1971 to 1983, when Hansen stalked the sleazy parts of Anchorage looking for victims. He is known to have killed at least 17 young women, although only 12 bodies were ever found. A recent television report, though, says the number was 37, and an FBI spokesman commented that Hansen could actually be one of the country's worst killers. He also admitted to about 30 rapes in the same period, yet never showed any sign of remorse for
From his looks, women apparently felt they had no reason to fear him; as one rape victim reported, "He sort of looked like the perfect dork." Once they got in his truck or car, though, the psychopath appeared, and the number of victims accumulated rapidly over the years. Most of the rapes were never reported, and even when Hansen was positively identified, his respectable facade always won over the prostitute's version of the story. In the vastness of Alaska, there were never any witnesses to the murders. In 1980, he shot the dog of a woman he had murdered, so that the dog wouldn't lead anybody to her shallow grave.

In 1977, the courts blew a chance to get Hansen off the street for a few years. He had stolen a chain saw, and although psychiatric reports made it clear that he was a danger to society, he served only 1 year of a 5-year sentence. He was ordered to stay on a lithium program to control mood swings from a diagnosed bipolar affective disorder, but that order was never enforced, either in prison or after his release. Just a few weeks after his early release, he killed