Butcher, Baker: The Untold Story, Part 1
February 27, 1984 Cindy Paulson was determined to be in the courtroom for Robert Hansen’s sentencing. After her escape from this man’s basement, she was on a path to rehabilitation. Drug free, with fat on her bones. No longer a shadow of herself. She reasoned that seeing him get his punishment was part of that recovery. Her temporary guardian comforted Cindy as they drove to the downtown courthouse in her Chrysler New Yorker. It was the lap of luxury, something that Cindy craved.
The courthouse brought a stark reality. The Chrysler could no longer protect Cindy. And then the bright lights of the courtroom startled her, breached her boundaries. Her paranoia — driven by a then-undiagnosed PTSD — drove her to scan the room for a safe place. No easy feat. The room was packed.
I glanced at the families of Robert Hansen’s victims, sitting in the bleacher seats. They looked at me and I looked at them but, deep inside, their grieving isn’t mine. I wanted to reach out to them, to put them at ease. I wanted them to know that I was put on earth for one reason: To catch that monster.
Cindy Paulson
She feels their eyes burrowing into her. Spies a fair-haired man, hunched over, holding back tears. A blonde woman, maybe his wife, with big hair and mouth clinched tight. Then a younger woman — maybe someone’s sister? They were all there to see this man — if you could call him that. A man who’d killed more women than Alaska could count. Cindy doesn’t notice the prosecutors. She doesn’t notice the defense attorneys. Just the families. A crowd of them.
(photo Fran Dumer, Anchorage Daily News)
Suddenly, Cindy’s eyes jump. It’s Hansen at the defense table, wearing a starched white shirt. He’s a circus animal, curled in his chair. He isn’t handcuffed. He’s almost… Free. A sudden emotion washes over her. She needs to find the exit. “I’m not going in until I know how to escape this place,” she tells herself. She’s been this way ever since she ran from him. Ever since she got away. She’s skittish. Part of her is still caged and bound.
Just as quickly, she spies an open seat. She launches herself in that direction.
As I walk toward what seems like eternity, I suddenly hear the girls’ voices again. The dead girls’ voices. They’re in my head like an echo. Run, Cindy. Run. Run. Run. He’s got a gun. Run, Cindy. Run. The last time I heard those voices, I was escaping him. I have a sudden urge to tell the families their girls are all right. That they’re in a good place. But I don’t. I can’t. My voice is locked.
Cindy Paulson
Too Close For Comfort
Cindy’s perch puts her directly behind him. The Hansen him. The Robert Hansen him. She takes her chair; he turns his head. He sees her. His instinct is to see her. If he reaches out, if he stretches, he can almost touch her. Soon the band in her head starts playing. The pieces start moving. The judge makes his grand entrance.
ALL RISE.
And then, suddenly, it’s as if everyone has disappeared. It’s just him and me. This Hansen man inching so close he could grab me. And when he leans back in the chair and looks over his shoulder? When he turns and looks me dead in the eye? At that moment, when he leans back in that chair… It’s like in the movies, when you see the monster and fall into his steel claws. I know he wants to kill me. His eyes are black and evil. Pure evil. It’s as if he could just chop me up and chew me.
Suddenly, I’m back in his basement, handcuffed, the gun in my face. My brain replays the sounds of the chains that bound me. There is nothing anyone in that courtroom can do. Not one person can stop him. Our eyes are locked and that’s what he’s telling me. There is nobody but him and me. If he could have grabbed me, if he could have choked me without repercussions, he would have. Right then. Right there.
Cindy Paulson
Cindy does the only thing she can. She runs. Sprints, really. It’s pure instinct. She ends up on the floor of a courthouse bathroom, heaving tears, unconsolable.
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Hey, you can also order my latest book, “What Happened In Craig,” HERE and HERE. True crime on Epicenter Press about Alaska’s Worst Unsolved Mass Murder.
