In this installment of Walter J. Gilmour’s original drafts, we explore the aftermath of the Knik River investigation. An autopsy is conducted and a victim ID is made. Troopers start to wonder if this murder is connected to another series of Alaska homicides.
Walter J. Gilmour
“The autopsy of the mystery body was conducted by Dr. George Lindholm. Lindholm made a dental comparison and determined that the body was that of Sherry Morrow, who had been reported missing nearly a year before. The cause of death was a gunshot wound. Dr. Lindholm found pieces of copper jacketed bullet fragments in the victim’s chest cavity.
Sherry Morrow
“The case of the missing dancers had suddenly taken on a new importance. So much so that Lt. Patrick Kasnick was assigned to the case to provide much needed assistance to an already overworked crew of investigators.
Lt. Pat Kasnick, AST
“At the same time that dancers were disappearing in Anchorage, evidently to meet the same fate as Sherry Morrow, other women were being killed in Fairbanks. It was natural to take a look at those cases to see if there was any connection. The attempt to establish a link between the Fairbanks and Anchorage serial murders was both extensive and expensive, with our investigation relying on some of the most sophisticated computer systems available at the time.
“In our look for a link in the cases, a database inquiry was conducted; it cost $300,000 just to feed in all the information. We also used the services of an FBI psychiatrist who specialized in serial murder cases.
“In the Fairbanks serial murders, the killer tied the victim’s hands behind their backs and we thought that was a key similarity to the Anchorage murders. A high caliber weapon was also used and the Fairbanks killer blew the women’s heads off in an attempt to destroy their faces. The bodies were left close to the road, moreover, with no effort to hide them.
“The FBI psychiatrist told us there was something ritualistic about the killings, but no apparent connection between the serial murders in Fairbanks and Anchorage. The minicomputer analysis also told us “No,” there was no concrete link between the killings in the two cities. Even the autopsy results pointed in different directions.
In 1982, the Fairbanks killer was identified. His name was Thomas Richard Bunday. By grim coincidence, Sgt. Glenn Flothe, who would later play a crucial role in the Hansen investigation, was one of the initial investigators when Glinda Sodemann — a trooper’s daughter — was found in Fairbanks, shot in the face with a .357. Bunday would commit suicide before he could be brought to justice: he rammed his motorcycle into a tractor-trailer while a fugitive in Texas.
Thomas Richard Bunday
Copyright 2018. All rights reserved.
Purchase Butcher, Baker
Order my latest book, “What Happened In Craig,” HERE and HERE, true crime on Epicenter Press about Alaska’s Worst Unsolved Mass Murder.
