Speaker 1: Missing in Arizona contains graphic depictions of violence and may
Speaker 1: not be suitable for all listeners. This episode also discusses suicide.
Speaker 1: You can reach the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at
Speaker 1: nine to eighty eight from iHeartRadio and Neon thirty three.
Speaker 1: I'm John Walzac and this is Missing in Arizona, the
Speaker 1: story of a man who disappeared after allegedly killing his
Speaker 1: wife and kids, blowing up their suburban home, and escaping
Speaker 1: into the wilderness. Twenty three years later, I'm hunting Robert
Speaker 1: Fisher and I need your help, Part two without further
Speaker 1: ado Option number one escaped and is alive. This is
Speaker 1: what I believe. It's also what many lead investigators believe.
Speaker 1: In two thousand and six, less than three months before
Speaker 1: he dies, the first case detective John Kirkham tells the
Speaker 1: Arizona Republic, quote, no one believes Fisher's dead in a cave.
Speaker 1: We would have found some traits of his body by now.
Speaker 1: In twenty eleven, FBI agent Bob Caldwell says, quote, all
Speaker 1: our evidence has been that he's the kind of guy
Speaker 1: who wouldn't go kill himself. He's out there hunting, fishing, chewing,
Speaker 1: tobacco with a sore back. In twenty fourteen, then Detective
Speaker 1: Hugh Lockerbie says that Fisher is likely alive somewhere in
Speaker 1: the West where he can hunt fish and keep a
Speaker 1: low profile. The FBI keeps Fisher on its ten most
Speaker 1: Wanted lists until twenty twenty one, which makes sense only
Speaker 1: if you think he's alive. Many of the people who
Speaker 1: know fisherre best also think he's alive. Of the top
Speaker 1: thirty I interview, including friends, coworkers, and investigators, twenty believe
Speaker 1: Fisher is alive, seven think he's dead. Three are fifty
Speaker 1: to fifty. Not only do I believe Fisher is alive,
Speaker 1: but I think he premeditated the murders, planning them in detail.
Speaker 1: In advance, I interview three familicide experts. Fifty nine out
Speaker 1: of fifty nine cases David Wilson studied were premeditated. Neil
Speaker 1: Wautale tells me that premeditation is a strong element in
Speaker 1: the majority of cases. Taylor Oathouse says, quote, the overwhelming
Speaker 1: majority of familicides are premeditated. In the final months before
Speaker 1: the murders, Robert Fisher, a control freak, is rapidly losing
Speaker 1: control he's in pain popping pills. He needs surgery, but
Speaker 1: is terrified it'll paralyze him. He catches an STI likely
Speaker 1: gonnorrhea or chlamydia while cheating on Mary again. He grows paranoid,
Speaker 1: Scared Mary will find out. He starts to withdraw from church, friends,
Speaker 1: the gym, and then Mary finds out she got syphilis
Speaker 1: from him. The spark On April eighth, two thousand and one,
Speaker 1: only thirty six hours before the murders, Mary speaks to
Speaker 1: her friend Beth Anderson at church.
Speaker 2: We were standing out on one of the balconies in
Speaker 2: one of the buildings and I just said, hey, how
Speaker 2: was your week? And she just looked at me and
Speaker 2: she said not very good. And I said, oh my gosh,
Speaker 2: are you okay? Like, are you sick or what? She's like,
Speaker 2: I just can't do this anymore. I can't do this
Speaker 2: anymore with Robert. I'm going to end it. I don't
Speaker 2: care what I have to do to get out, but
Speaker 2: I am done. I am done. I was like, okay.
Speaker 2: It really kind of took me by surprise. I knew
Speaker 2: she wasn't happy for a long time, but I just said,
Speaker 2: I'll say a prayer for you. I didn't know what
Speaker 2: else to do.
Speaker 1: Beth sees Mary again the following night, around nine thirty
Speaker 1: pm at church, right before the murders.
Speaker 2: I asked her how she was doing, based on our
Speaker 2: conversation the day before, and she said, you know, I'm
Speaker 2: hanging in there. But she kind of like made a
Speaker 2: motion with her hands, like we can't talk about this
Speaker 2: right now. I mean, Bobby was nearby, not right there,
Speaker 2: but nearby, and I knew. I think it was just
Speaker 2: weighing so heavy on her. I don't know if she
Speaker 2: was afraid she would start crying or what. So I said,
Speaker 2: I get it, I get it. I said, I just
Speaker 2: want you to know I'm praying for you, and she said,
Speaker 2: thank you.
Speaker 3: I need it.
Speaker 1: Remember a few weeks earlier, Mary's friend Kim Davidson stopped
Speaker 1: by the Fisher House. Mary's hand was injured. She acted weird.
Speaker 1: Six days before the murders, Robert showed up at church
Speaker 1: looking for Mary and the kids. Mary seemed afraid of him.
Speaker 1: Beyond confiding in friends. Did Mary take any steps to
Speaker 1: leave Robert? Maybe police find a pamphlet for budget Mini
Speaker 1: storage in her abandoned forerunner. Was she thinking about moving out.
Speaker 1: Was she afraid Robert would hurt or even kill her?
Speaker 1: The night of the murders? There's a hammer in the
Speaker 1: master bedroom. Robert is OCD, a minimalist, obsessed with cleanliness
Speaker 1: and order. He doesn't normally leave anything lying around, let
Speaker 1: alone a hammer. Did Mary hide it as a defensive weapon?
Speaker 1: Did she buy a twenty five caliber pistol for protection?
Speaker 1: The caliber bullet according to one police report with which
Speaker 1: she was shot a gun Robert wasn't known to own.
Speaker 1: There's much I can't answer, However, here's what I think happened.
Speaker 1: My theory. To be clear, this is the line between
Speaker 1: facts and theory. What follows this theory informed by fact?
Speaker 1: Robert knows it's over. Mary's going to divorce him, but
Speaker 1: he thought he could salvage things. And Mary finds out
Speaker 1: he gave her syphilis. She knows he cheated again. This
Speaker 1: is the spark. She confronts Robert, and now he really knows.
Speaker 1: Game over, a final loss of control. Sixty six percent
Speaker 1: of familicides are triggered by family breakdown. Robert is about
Speaker 1: to lose his family. Soon, he'll be alone, in pain,
Speaker 1: facing surgery, possible disability, public humiliation, A failed husband, a
Speaker 1: failed father. As soon as he knows Mary's going to
Speaker 1: leave him, he starts debating what to do. In the
Speaker 1: weeks leading up to the murders, he makes a choice,
Speaker 1: burn it all down literally. He decides to kill Mary,
Speaker 1: wreak his house to explode, and critically escape, start a
Speaker 1: new life, purge the old, rise from the ashes. He
Speaker 1: chooses to kill his kids too. To him, death is mercy.
Speaker 1: They'll suffer more if they live motherless orphans of murder.
Speaker 1: The murders likely take place early on April tenth, two
Speaker 1: thousand and one, only three days before Robber's fortieth birthday,
Speaker 1: which I don't think is a coincidence. Robert plans everything
Speaker 1: meticulously he can cox a cover story and starts to
Speaker 1: act it out once he escapes. He wants people to
Speaker 1: think he died in the wild. That way, at some
Speaker 1: point they'll stop looking for him, or at least some
Speaker 1: people will. According to former FBI agent Bob Caldwell, a
Speaker 1: week or two before the murders, Robert tells his mom
Speaker 1: that he's lugging seven hundred pounds of supplies into the wilderness.
Speaker 4: Okay, seven hundred pounds of supplies. What did he take
Speaker 4: where would he have deposited it at, And being as
Speaker 4: Robert has a bad back, it's not like he was
Speaker 4: hiking over a mountain pulling all this stuff up, and
Speaker 4: it had to be somewhere he could easily get to
Speaker 4: it and deposit wherever he was going to put it,
Speaker 4: whether he could drive up to it or is a
Speaker 4: very short walk.
Speaker 1: Or he lied. He never actually transported seven hundred pounds
Speaker 1: of supplies into the woods right before the murders. No
Speaker 1: one ever found any of his belongings, let alone an
Speaker 1: easily accessible secret seven hundred pounds stash. It makes more
Speaker 1: sense to me that this is a red herring. Mom,
Speaker 1: I just drag seven hundred pounds of supplies into the wilderness, which,
Speaker 1: of course, after the murders, his mom tells police. On
Speaker 1: April ninth, at popular outdoor outfitters, Robert makes a big
Speaker 1: show of asking Ian, the eighteen year old store clerk,
Speaker 1: the last person to see him alive, how to purify water.
Speaker 1: This is only a few hours before the murders, so
Speaker 1: either Robert hasn't planned them yet unlikely, or again it's
Speaker 1: a red herring. Mister cashier, how do you purify water?
Speaker 1: Ian gets the impression that Robert is planning on camping
Speaker 1: for quite a long time. Robert tells him he's going
Speaker 1: to draw water from a cattle hole. He's worried about viruses.
Speaker 1: At seven point fifty five, he swipes his credit card.
Speaker 1: He and Brittany head home. Mary and Bobby get back
Speaker 1: around nine point forty. A neighbor hears Robert and Mary
Speaker 1: fighting around ten. At ten forty two, Robert's caught on
Speaker 1: camera at a nearby ATM. To me, this seems like
Speaker 1: part of the show. He knows he'll be filmed at
Speaker 1: the ATM. I'll circle back to this in a bit.
Speaker 1: After the ATM, no one knows if Robert goes home
Speaker 1: or flees. That's the old story, But I found two
Speaker 1: new witnesses who see Mary's for runner at the Fisher
Speaker 1: House early on April tenth, a neighbor at three thirty am,
Speaker 1: and a newspaper delivery man, Bud Wolf, at five thirty.
Speaker 1: So after the ATM, Robert returns home, though it's unclear
Speaker 1: whether or not he stops anywhere else before doing so.
Speaker 1: By the time he gets back, Mary and the kids
Speaker 1: are likely asleep. The kids usually go to bed by nine,
Speaker 1: Mary by ten. If Robert heads home directly, he's there
Speaker 1: by ten fifty pm on April ninth. At one thirty
Speaker 1: am on April tenth, his cell phone powers down. It
Speaker 1: never turns back on. My best guess is that Robert
Speaker 1: commits the murder shortly before shutting off his phone, so
Speaker 1: sometime around one am on April tenth, and then he
Speaker 1: remains at the house for at least four and a
Speaker 1: half hours. He's still there at five thirty, but gone
Speaker 1: by seven thirty. He likely flees sometime between five thirty
Speaker 1: when Bud Wolf sees Forerunner and six zh three when
Speaker 1: the sun rises. The murders are brutal, but Robert is
Speaker 1: used to gore. He has military training. As a firefighter
Speaker 1: and EMT he responded to bloody accidents and suicides, including
Speaker 1: one in which someone killed himself in a car and
Speaker 1: it burst into flames. He then worked for thirteen years
Speaker 1: in stressful hospital settings. His former coworker, John Hatfield tells
Speaker 1: me that people like Robert they have.
Speaker 5: A low anxiety level. When things need to get done.
Speaker 5: You just kind of know what you're going to do
Speaker 5: because you're trained, you're educated, you know what the process is,
Speaker 5: so it's almost reflexive. You don't have to think about it,
Speaker 5: you just can do it. It's almost like you're stepping
Speaker 5: back and even if though people may be on a
Speaker 5: verge of death, you know that you're doing what you
Speaker 5: need to do to prevent it. Through training, the anxiety
Speaker 5: level is just not there.
Speaker 1: A Fisher family friend who doesn't want to be named,
Speaker 1: tells me a story that illustrates, in a bizarre way,
Speaker 1: how calm Robert can remain under pressure. Sometime in the
Speaker 1: eighties or nineties, when hair was big and full of spray, Robert,
Speaker 1: Mary and some friends were sitting around the campfire making
Speaker 1: s'mores when Mary's hair caught on fire. Quote it wasn't
Speaker 1: like flaming, but it was on fire, and Robert stood
Speaker 1: next to her and was just looking at her. I'm like,
Speaker 1: he's a fricking fireman, what's going on with that? Like
Speaker 1: put out her hair fire, but someone else did it
Speaker 1: with their jacket, so he froze. He was just looking
Speaker 1: with interest, very cool and collected. That's it. It was
Speaker 1: really weird. It's ironic that this man so desperate to
Speaker 1: be a hero, does nothing when his wife's head literally
Speaker 1: catches on fire. All this to say, even though I
Speaker 1: doubt anyone but the most callous sociopath can murder their
Speaker 1: family and not feel anxiety. Robert is as prepared as
Speaker 1: anyone to handle stress and gore, both via his training
Speaker 1: military firefighter, EMT hospital hunter and his personality. He doesn't
Speaker 1: buckle under pressure. He remains calm under fire, observing fire,
Speaker 1: lighting fire. He can execute his plan. His family just
Speaker 1: do what has to be done. After the murders, Robert
Speaker 1: riggs the house to explode. Why please say he wants
Speaker 1: to destroy evidence. I don't buy it again, Military firefighter,
Speaker 1: EMT hospitals, Robert must know a police will immediately suspect
Speaker 1: me and be the fire won't destroy everything. If he's
Speaker 1: rational enough to successfully pull off a triple murder, blow
Speaker 1: up his house, and escape for twenty three years, he's
Speaker 1: rational enough to think these simple logical thoughts. I think
Speaker 1: he blows up the house for two reasons. First, as
Speaker 1: a violent, forceful purge, detonating the past to start over fresh,
Speaker 1: incinerating who he was so he can rise anew. According
Speaker 1: to familicide expert David Wilson, annihilators like Robert want to
Speaker 1: demonstrate power first over their family and later over the
Speaker 1: family's demise.
Speaker 6: It will be dramatic. There's an element of staging. Usually
Speaker 6: staging behavior is very important. Has rarely discussed how they
Speaker 6: want the bodies to be found in a particular way.
Speaker 6: They want to tell a story.
Speaker 1: In this case, I'm still in control. My family didn't
Speaker 1: break up. I destroyed it, but I showed mercy. Everyone
Speaker 1: was asleep when I killed them, as quickly as possible
Speaker 1: so they wouldn't suffer. And now I'm blowing up my house,
Speaker 1: burning it down, getting rid of the past, starting over,
Speaker 1: and this a fresh start. Is the second reason why
Speaker 1: I think Fisher blows up his house to destroy photos
Speaker 1: and videos that can help police find him. John List
Speaker 1: did something similar minus the fire, after killing his family
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy one. He cut his face out of
Speaker 1: every photo he could find. It's one of the reasons
Speaker 1: he successfully escaped and lived on the lamb for eighteen years.
Speaker 1: In two thousand and one, when Robert kills his family.
Speaker 1: There are no smartphones. You take pictures, you develop them.
Speaker 1: It's pricey. Choose your shots wisely. Fisher is smart. After
Speaker 1: two years of research, I've only been able to find
Speaker 1: twenty eight photos of him as an adult, and some
Speaker 1: grainy video. I'm unaware of any surviving photos or video
Speaker 1: of Fisher taken after nineteen ninety nine. Now, if my
Speaker 1: theory's correct, Fisher makes one big mistake. He leaves his
Speaker 1: fire safe locked. The safe works, it protects some photos
Speaker 1: and videos, a diabolical advertisement for the efficacy of the safe.
Speaker 1: I suppose I'll return to this in a later episode.
Speaker 1: After rigging the house to explode, Robert flees. Where does
Speaker 1: he go? I don't know, but few people think he
Speaker 1: drives immediately to the forerunner spot. When police later find it,
Speaker 1: they also find his dog Blue. Patty Blackmore, the vet
Speaker 1: who rescues Blue, and her friend Samantha Wright, who's there
Speaker 1: that day too. Think Blues alone in the woods for
Speaker 1: only a short amount of time.
Speaker 7: If he had gone without food and water for ten days,
Speaker 7: he would have been a lot sicker than he was.
Speaker 7: He was hungry, but he wasn't amazing. He'd probably been
Speaker 7: there there too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So you don't think he had been there full
Speaker 1: ten days?
Speaker 8: I don't think so, No, because he was still pretty
Speaker 8: I mean, yeah, he wasn't amazing.
Speaker 7: He looked very, very healthy. Yes, he was hungry, but
Speaker 7: not ten days, starting without the water, because he by
Speaker 7: that point he would have been dragging or dead, you know,
Speaker 7: especially without the water.
Speaker 1: If Blue is alone for only a day or two,
Speaker 1: where was he before? Does Robert hide somewhere else after
Speaker 1: the murders and then abandoned the suv and Blue? Finally,
Speaker 1: why does Robert choose this particular spot? Let me start
Speaker 1: with that. I think Robert carefully selects the Forerunner spot
Speaker 1: as part of his plan to trick law enforcement, the public,
Speaker 1: and the media into believing he walked into the the
Speaker 1: wild and died. He's supposed to go camping at this
Speaker 1: exact spot only a few days after the murders with
Speaker 1: family and friends, including John and Mary Beth Rodin.
Speaker 8: I think that was a big clue that he gave us,
Speaker 8: and no one would listen.
Speaker 9: What do you mean he had a specific spot that
Speaker 9: he wanted to go. Normally, it didn't matter too much. Okay,
Speaker 9: you picked the spot, and being John picked the spot,
Speaker 9: we go places. I knew at this particular time that
Speaker 9: this was the spot, and it's really wanted to camp
Speaker 9: with this one spot.
Speaker 8: And because I knew that was weird, I went to
Speaker 8: the police and said, hey, because of this, I know
Speaker 8: we need to look. I said it will go with
Speaker 8: you and they said, no, we can't. We're not going
Speaker 8: to do that, and that's where they found the car.
Speaker 1: Jim road In. John's brother supports this claim.
Speaker 4: Mary Beth said go look for him there.
Speaker 10: They didn't do that for ten days.
Speaker 1: Robert's friend and former co worker, Ashley's Arsty also points
Speaker 1: police in the right direction.
Speaker 2: If he's alive, and if he's in Arizona, you'll find
Speaker 2: him in northern Arizona told him a goot.
Speaker 1: Young friend and boss Lori Greenbeck says the same thing.
Speaker 1: When you knew that he was missing, did you try
Speaker 1: to tell the authorities to look in that area?
Speaker 8: We did tell them.
Speaker 1: One of Robert's friends and co workers, who doesn't want
Speaker 1: to be named, also tells police early on to look
Speaker 1: for Robert at the spot where they later find the Forerunner.
Speaker 10: Because he used it as a staging area.
Speaker 5: But in my mind it was how close it was
Speaker 5: to the reservation.
Speaker 1: I'll get back to that in a minute, but first
Speaker 1: ask yourself, why does Robert abandon the suv at a
Speaker 1: spot where he's supposed to go camping in a few days,
Speaker 1: A spot immediately pinpointed to police by multiple people. Now,
Speaker 1: initially police don't actually search it. Instead, it's located nine
Speaker 1: days later by Greg the itinerant camper. It would be
Speaker 1: easy for me to criticize the cops here, but in
Speaker 1: this case, I don't think that's fair. Arizona is huge.
Speaker 1: They have limited manpower. They can't instantly examine every single lead. Instead,
Speaker 1: focus on why Robert chooses this spot. I think he
Speaker 1: thinks police will check it quickly based on tips from
Speaker 1: people like the Rodents, the anonymous co worker, Ashley's Zarsky,
Speaker 1: and Lori Greenbeck. They'll find the forerunner and then they'll
Speaker 1: divert limited resources to this spot, thereby concentrating law enforcement
Speaker 1: in the wrong area, giving Robert more time to escape.
Speaker 1: He also chooses it because it's frustrating and time consuming
Speaker 1: to search. It's only eight hundred and ninety feet from
Speaker 1: the Ford Apache Indian Reservation stayed in local law enforcement
Speaker 1: aren't permitted to cross onto tribal land without permission. They
Speaker 1: get it, but it takes time. Furthermore, this spot is
Speaker 1: only one hundred and fifty feet from Apex Cave. Police
Speaker 1: immediately think Fisher's in the cave. Swat teams circle it.
Speaker 1: They call on a plumber who snakes in a drain camera.
Speaker 1: He's not here. They move on to other caves. He's
Speaker 1: not in any of them. All of this takes time.
Speaker 1: If you're on the run, if you want to complicate things,
Speaker 1: if you want to buy time to escape, if you
Speaker 1: want people to think you died in the wilderness. This
Speaker 1: is the perfect spot, a spot where you're supposed to
Speaker 1: go camping in a few days, a spot police will
Speaker 1: likely search quickly. They'll find the forerunner next to an
Speaker 1: Indian reservation and a cave in the middle of a
Speaker 1: two point nine million acre national forest. It's brilliant, really.
Speaker 1: Some people dispute that the forerunner's proximity to tribal land
Speaker 1: complicates the search. They're wrong. Heala County Detective Brian Havy
Speaker 1: tells me that it was, in fact an issue. Consider
Speaker 1: a different incident from twenty eighteen. Two men parachute out
Speaker 1: of a vintage World War Two plane above the reservation.
Speaker 1: Their plane crashes into the forest below. They survive, but
Speaker 1: can't find it. They put up a reward and end
Speaker 1: up in a battle with the tribe, which, according to
Speaker 1: the Arizona Republic says they're encouraging people to violate tribal
Speaker 1: and federal law. The tribe is understandably very protective of
Speaker 1: its land and sovereignty. I reach out to several officials
Speaker 1: for comment. No one responds. I file a record's request
Speaker 1: with tribal police. They deny it. Some people might say
Speaker 1: that Robert chooses the fore Runner spot not as part
Speaker 1: of an elaborate escape plan, but because he knows it,
Speaker 1: he likes it. It's peaceful, remote, beautiful. This is where
Speaker 1: he chooses to die by suicide. If he wants to escape,
Speaker 1: he could keep driving to another state, even Mexico. The
Speaker 1: border is only three hours away. So why does he
Speaker 1: stop here? The simple answer Occam's razor to die. But
Speaker 1: what about Blue? If Robert walks into the woods to die,
Speaker 1: why does Blue stay with the fore erunner not Robert? Here? Again,
Speaker 1: are Patty Blackmore at the vet and her friend Samantha Wright.
Speaker 7: If Blue is outside and Robert Fisher wandered off, I
Speaker 7: think Blue would have followed him.
Speaker 1: Do you see any scenario in which Robert Fisher goes
Speaker 1: into the wilderness and says stay and Blue does not
Speaker 1: follow him.
Speaker 7: No, it would have to be a really good dog
Speaker 7: for that.
Speaker 1: So now Robert the control freak is unsurprisingly strict with
Speaker 1: his dogs. He trains them well. You see it in
Speaker 1: home videos with his black lab Ruger.
Speaker 11: Ruger Good, get right, Boke, Okay, stay, Rugers good dash,
Speaker 11: good dog.
Speaker 1: One of Robert's friends, who doesn't want to be named,
Speaker 1: tells me a story. In the late eighties, Robert would
Speaker 1: claim pots and pants in front of Ruger, training him
Speaker 1: not to be jumpy around loud noises, not to be
Speaker 1: gun shy. That way he could bring him hunting. The
Speaker 1: friend had stunt blanks from a movie set. He gave
Speaker 1: them to Robert one Friday night in his backyard. Robert
Speaker 1: told Ruger to sit, and then he started shooting blanks.
Speaker 1: At the time, there was a football game taking place
Speaker 1: at a nearby high school. Police surrounded the house, the
Speaker 1: friend said, and Robert came close to getting shot. This
Speaker 1: incident has never been reported. In the nineties, after Ruger dies,
Speaker 1: Robert gets Blue, an Australian cattle dog. By all accounts,
Speaker 1: he also trains Blue well, but no dog can be
Speaker 1: trained to remain indefinitely within suv as their owner wanders
Speaker 1: into the woods to commit suicide. Here's a limit for
Speaker 1: an expert opinion.
Speaker 3: I consult doctor Amy Learn.
Speaker 1: A board certified veterinary behaviorist and the owner of Animal
Speaker 1: Behavior Wellness Center in Richmond, Virginia.
Speaker 3: I completed an internship and a residency, had to write
Speaker 3: a peer reviewed article and have that published, and log
Speaker 3: tons and tons of hours in animal behavior study, different
Speaker 3: topics like learning theory, psychiatry, medical neuroscience, different psychiatric medications,
Speaker 3: learn about lots and lots of different species of animals.
Speaker 3: And then here I am today.
Speaker 12: And you see a world in which Robert Fisher walks
Speaker 12: off to commit suicide and Blue just sits there by
Speaker 12: the truck and doesn't follow home.
Speaker 3: No, I can't, honestly, let's just say that this is
Speaker 3: the best trained dog in the universe ever. And he
Speaker 3: asked him to say, and he can stay for hours,
Speaker 3: and he walks off and commits suicide. At some point,
Speaker 3: that dog has to get up, he has to got
Speaker 3: to go to the bathroom, he's got to eat. He
Speaker 3: gets up, and it's been a long enough time that
Speaker 3: the owner's not there, and he's like, I think maybe
Speaker 3: I can get up, you know, looking around, like am
Speaker 3: I gonna get in trouble. No, I can get up.
Speaker 3: I don't see anybody. I'm gonna get up now. So
Speaker 3: he gets up, and then once he gets up, he
Speaker 3: doesn't remember that he should go back to his spot
Speaker 3: and sit down again. He's like, what do I do now? Okay,
Speaker 3: I ate something, I drank something. Where's my guy? Like,
Speaker 3: let's go play, let's go on a hike, let's do
Speaker 3: something else. And so he's gonna start sniffing around. And again,
Speaker 3: this isn't a search and rescue dog, but he still
Speaker 3: has a dog sense of smell, and so he can
Speaker 3: track and find out where Robert went to some degree
Speaker 3: and go there. Now again, that depends on the terrain
Speaker 3: and if he has to climb up and over or through.
Speaker 3: We all watch those old jailbreak movies where somebody just
Speaker 3: crosses the river and then the dogs never find them
Speaker 3: because they're on the other side of the river. But
Speaker 3: you know, I don't know if any of those kinds
Speaker 3: of things would have gotten in a way, but I
Speaker 3: believe that Blue could have tracked him if he was there,
Speaker 3: you know, within a mile two miles of the car,
Speaker 3: and then gone to find him and stayed with the body.
Speaker 12: Do you think that is likely that he would have
Speaker 12: tracked him if he could.
Speaker 3: I think if they have the bond that you're thinking
Speaker 3: they do and that you're describing, that he would have
Speaker 3: tracked him, because again, that's the only person being that
Speaker 3: he knows, that's his way out, that's his food provider,
Speaker 3: and he's going to be like, when are we going home?
Speaker 5: Right?
Speaker 3: Most of the time, if you think about going with
Speaker 3: your dog to a park or the woods or hiking,
Speaker 3: they're with you. They'll go run off and chase something,
Speaker 3: and they'll come back and check in with you. And
Speaker 3: most of the time that's what a hike looks like,
Speaker 3: even if you're off in the wilderness. And so for
Speaker 3: Blue to stay somewhere well his person left, or for
Speaker 3: Blue to really go off, if he wasn't chasing a
Speaker 3: rabbit or some kind of prey item, then he would
Speaker 3: have stayed or continued to check in with his person.
Speaker 12: And if his person had been nearby, or he had
Speaker 12: been able to track his person, which was Robert, even
Speaker 12: if Robert had died, it would make sense that Blue
Speaker 12: would use Robert as his base instead of the vehicle.
Speaker 3: So the vehicle, I think, so if Robert really was
Speaker 3: going to commit suicide. I think that Blue would have
Speaker 3: followed him as much as he could have, no depending
Speaker 3: on where he meandered and if Blue could go with him.
Speaker 3: And then you would see a dog sitting by the
Speaker 3: owner's body. Here, I am, here's my owner. I'm not
Speaker 3: going to leave him. I'm going to stay here.
Speaker 1: There are many examples of this. In fact, we included
Speaker 1: one earlier in this episode, the dog who stayed with
Speaker 1: its owner's bodies from fall to spring after a murder
Speaker 1: suicide in the Arizona Wilderness. Here's another. In twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: a Jack Russell terrier remained with his owner's body for
Speaker 1: two months in an isolated, rugged part of Colorado until
Speaker 1: searchers found them. Experts aside, examples aside, Let's just use
Speaker 1: common sense. Does it make more sense that Blue remains
Speaker 1: near the Forerunner as Robert walks into the wild to die,
Speaker 1: or that he stays near the Forerunner because someone picks
Speaker 1: up Robert and drives him away. If you like this show,
Speaker 1: please download our first two seasons, Missing in Alaska and
Speaker 1: Missing on nine to eleven. For updates, visit meon thirty
Speaker 1: three dot com or follow me on Twitter at John
Speaker 1: waalzac j O, n Wa l Czak. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: One of the most confounding questions of this case, why
Speaker 1: does Robert leave Blue alive? Is this an act of
Speaker 1: love from a man who just killed his family? I
Speaker 1: don't think so. First, Blue would have served as an
Speaker 1: early warning system, alerting Robert if people or vehicles approached. Second,
Speaker 1: I think Blue is part one of a three part signature,
Speaker 1: Robert telling the world. I was here One Mary's fore Runner,
Speaker 1: two Blue, three Robert's black ball cap, the one he
Speaker 1: wears the night of April ninth at the ATM. Hello, police, Here,
Speaker 1: I am on camera at an ATM, wearing this hat.
Speaker 1: It's me Robert. If you're thinking, who cares, it's just
Speaker 1: a hat, consider this. When police find the fore Runner,
Speaker 1: none of Robert's belongings are in it except the hat.
Speaker 1: No camping equipment, no guns, no clothes, nothing, just the hat.
Speaker 1: What's even more interesting is where they find it. Keela
Speaker 1: County Detective Brian Havy is the first cop to reach
Speaker 1: the Forerunner.
Speaker 10: It was an unlocked, unsecured vehicle, bare bones, nothing in it,
Speaker 10: and the only thing that I recall being in there
Speaker 10: was a ball cap on the seat, and I think
Speaker 10: it was on the back of the saint, just threshting there,
Speaker 10: you know, Pat, or in the in between the two,
Speaker 10: just reshting there like the arms. No up on the
Speaker 10: where your shoulder would be. He was sitting right there
Speaker 10: likego his place there.
Speaker 1: Like it was placed there, And it must have been,
Speaker 1: because it didn't just fall off his head neatly onto
Speaker 1: the corner of a car seat. So Robert dumps the
Speaker 1: foreerunner and Blue and the ball cap, three signatures I
Speaker 1: was here, and nothing else, none of his stuff. Question,
Speaker 1: if Robert chooses to die by suicide in the wild,
Speaker 1: does it make sense that he drags all of his
Speaker 1: stuff with him, except, of course, the black ball cap
Speaker 1: he wore at the atm. Does it make sense that,
Speaker 1: instead of just walking to a nearby hill or tree,
Speaker 1: he takes every single item with him except the hat,
Speaker 1: and no one ever find anything, and Blue stays with
Speaker 1: the forerunner. Does that make sense? Not to me? Furthermore,
Speaker 1: it makes even less sense when you consider his health.
Speaker 1: He's in pain, he needs surgery, he's popping pills. Jim Roden,
Speaker 1: his friend, tells me about a hunting trip they took
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety seven, four years before the murders.
Speaker 10: Because of his back, I carried his pack, his gear
Speaker 10: for the night back into the back country.
Speaker 1: Robert is in so much pain on this trip, Jim
Speaker 1: has to carry his pack for him. Take a guess
Speaker 1: at how much the pack weighs. Twenty five pounds. Twenty
Speaker 1: five pounds. That's nothing. So the idea that a suicidal
Speaker 1: Robert Fisher carts everything with him into the wilderness, except,
Speaker 1: of course, the black ball cap, and none of his
Speaker 1: stuff has ever found is ridiculous. So too is the
Speaker 1: idea that he morphs into a speedy little gollum, dragging
Speaker 1: everything deep into a cave. Not to mention, he seems
Speaker 1: to be addicted to opioids, which at some point will
Speaker 1: run out. Now let me circle back to the Forerunner
Speaker 1: when police find it. It's very clean. Some dirt, some
Speaker 1: pine needles, but no mud caked inside or out, even
Speaker 1: though the windows are rolled down and the weather has
Speaker 1: at points been bad sleep snow, wind, rain, no muddy footprints,
Speaker 1: no dog prints. I've been to that spot several times.
Speaker 1: Each time it was dry, my car got absolutely caked
Speaker 1: in dirt. If it was wet, it would have been
Speaker 1: caked in mud. There's no way to make it there
Speaker 1: without getting dirty, except I suppose maybe driving very slow
Speaker 1: or cleaning it once you get there, like say, if
Speaker 1: you want to remove evidence. One more question, why does
Speaker 1: Robert take the Forerunner instead of his truck. Well, the
Speaker 1: Forerunner has more cab space in which the store stuff
Speaker 1: or sleep. The fore Runner is more inconspicuous, less flashy, quieter,
Speaker 1: it gets better gas mileage. Neither vehicle is four wheel drive,
Speaker 1: so that's irrelevant. More space, less flashy, better gas mileage.
Speaker 1: Robert Fisher is spiraling out of control. His back hurts,
Speaker 1: his knee hurts. He needs surgery. He's scared it'll paralyze him.
Speaker 1: He's popping pills. He cheats on Mary, gets gonorrhea or
Speaker 1: chlamydia and syphilis, gives it to Mary. She finds out
Speaker 1: and confronts him. It's over control gone. He's about to
Speaker 1: be a divorced, middle aged cyphilid man. Pitied by the community,
Speaker 1: he decides to kill Mary and the kids to blow
Speaker 1: up his house to escape. He starts to play out
Speaker 1: a cover story. Tells his mom he lugged seven hundred
Speaker 1: pounds of supplies into the wilderness, tells the rodents that
Speaker 1: they have to go camping at this exact spot near
Speaker 1: young He tries to act normal, goes to the movies
Speaker 1: with Mary to Brittany's Honor Society event. Stops at popular
Speaker 1: outdoor outfitters where he asks an eighteen year old cashier
Speaker 1: how to purify water. He heads home, fights with Mary,
Speaker 1: drives to the atm and Mary's suv, which is caught
Speaker 1: on camera. Wears his black ball cap, also caught on camera.
Speaker 1: Goes home again. Everyone's asleep. He kills them, slits their throats,
Speaker 1: first Mary, then the kids. He shoots Mary in the
Speaker 1: head the fuck you shot, turns off his phone, cleans up,
Speaker 1: packs his stuff into Mary's Forerunner, breaks the house to explode,
Speaker 1: drives off, goes somewhere, drops off the Forerunner in the woods,
Speaker 1: cleans it up, places the black ball cap on a
Speaker 1: seat corner, dumps blue only eight hundred and ninety feet
Speaker 1: from a reservation, one hundred and fifty feet from a
Speaker 1: cave in the middle of a two point nine million
Speaker 1: acre national forest. Good luck to the cops. Someone picks
Speaker 1: him up and helps him escape. He lives. He's still
Speaker 1: alive today. This is my theory which I test on
Speaker 1: Scott Still. Lieutenant Hugh Lockerby, You've looked at this for
Speaker 1: the better part of my life, so you know more
Speaker 1: than me. If there's something wrong with my logic, I
Speaker 1: want to hear you tell me.
Speaker 13: I like your theory and trust me. We've discussed that
Speaker 13: same theory and there's nothing to really refute it. There's
Speaker 13: nothing to say that that isn't what happened. I just
Speaker 13: don't know. I can see why you would think that,
Speaker 13: and I think you are looking at through a lens
Speaker 13: that is pretty accurate because you're looking at things from
Speaker 13: a factual standpoint, and it definitely definitely could have been why.
Speaker 13: I don't know if it's I can't say it's for
Speaker 13: one hundred percent accuracy though. You just don't know right now,
Speaker 13: but it's definitely something that he could have done, and
Speaker 13: that's why he did what he did.
Speaker 1: One thing I always ask our team before these shows
Speaker 1: air is if I say something or right something written
Speaker 1: me to shreds because everybody else will a minute will
Speaker 1: come out. Do you see generally any flaws with my
Speaker 1: logic or anything. Did anything I say pop out that
Speaker 1: just doesn't make sense to you?
Speaker 13: Or yeah, I mean I'm trying to think he said
Speaker 13: a lot, So I'm trying to go back and rip
Speaker 13: it to shreds. I'm trying to figure out what I
Speaker 13: could rip you on.
Speaker 1: Nothing. He doesn't rip me to shreds now. That doesn't
Speaker 1: mean he endorses my entire theory, just that he gets
Speaker 1: my logic. In previous seasons, I resisted stating my theories.
Speaker 1: Not this time. I think Robert Fisher escaped. I think
Speaker 1: he's alive. I want to find him and I need
Speaker 1: your help. Let me leave you with this clip from
Speaker 1: my interview with Miss Honey, Britney Fisher's teacher, the second
Speaker 1: to last person to see and speak with Robert Fisher
Speaker 1: that we know of, because I think someone helped him.
Speaker 1: I'll get to that in a later episode. Here's Miss Honey.
Speaker 12: He had a.
Speaker 14: Plan, and I know he did. I feel it, and
Speaker 14: I feel like often wonder what family he has now
Speaker 14: and who his kids are now, and my senses he
Speaker 14: started over and people like that can be very manipulative,
Speaker 14: and hopefully no one else will be his next victim.
Speaker 12: End of Part two.
Speaker 1: Next time, I'm missing in Arizona.
Speaker 12: Why are you trying so hard to find me? Because
Speaker 12: this is a fascinating case.
Speaker 1: I want to solve it, and because you hurt so
Speaker 1: many people, I want to help them.
Speaker 11: All Right, come on, then ask me some real questions.
Speaker 1: You can reach us by phone at one eight three
Speaker 1: three new tips that's one eight three three six three
Speaker 1: nine eight four seven seven, by email at tips at
Speaker 1: iHeartMedia dot com, tips at iHeartMedia dot com, online at
Speaker 1: meon thirty three dot com, or on Twitter at John Waalzac,
Speaker 1: Jo n Wa l Czak. Paul Decan is our executive producer.
Speaker 1: Chris Brown is our supervising producer, Hannah Rose Snyder is
Speaker 1: our producer. Paul Gemperlin is our researcher. Ben Bolan is
Speaker 1: a consulting producer. And I'm your host and executive producer
Speaker 1: John Walzac Special thanks to Jim John and Mary Beth Rodin.
Speaker 1: Cover art by Pam Peacock Neon thirty three. Logo designed
Speaker 1: by Derek Rudy. Our intro song is Utopia by Ruby Cube.
Speaker 1: Please download the first two seasons of our show, Missing
Speaker 1: in Alaska and Missing on nine to eleven, and if
Speaker 1: you're so inclined, give us a five star rating. Missing
Speaker 1: in Arizona is a co production of iHeartRadio and Neon
Speaker 1: thirty three