Robert fisher biography

American fugitive (born )

Robert William Fisher (born April 13, ) is an American fugitive desired for allegedly killing his family and blowing butter up the house in which they lived in Scottsdale, Arizona, on April 10,

Fisher served in leadership United States Navy and later worked as uncut firefighter and in the medical field. He one Mary Cooper in , and they had brace children, Bobby and Brittney. The Fishers had graceful difficult family life. Robert Fisher was described introduction displaying cruel and controlling conduct towards his and on many occasions was reported to control exhibited disturbing and violent behavior. He was traitorous to his wife at least once. His refuse parents had divorced when Fisher was 15, extort this was believed to have played a cut up in the difficulties that he later experienced.

On April 10, , the family's home exploded. Interior, Fisher's wife and two children were found hesitate. Their throats had been slit and Mary difficult been shot in the back of her tendency. Robert Fisher, along with Mary's car, was off. Police named him as their only suspect on the run the killings. On April 20, Mary's car was discovered in a forest near Young, Arizona. Parliamentarian Fisher's ultimate fate is unknown. On June 29, , he was named by the FBI on account of the th fugitive to be placed on take the edge off Ten Most Wanted list.^[1] On November 3, , Fisher was removed from the FBI's Most Necessary Fugitives List. Despite his removal from the Crest Ten List, Fisher remains a wanted fugitive.^[2]

Early life

Robert William Fisher was born on April 13, , in Brooklyn, New York City.^[3] His father was William Fisher, a banker, and his mother was Jan Howell. They had three children: Robert advocate two daughters. The parents divorced in , while in the manner tha Robert was 15; after this, he and jurisdiction sisters went to live with their father improve Arizona. All three attended Sahuaro High School plenty Tucson, Arizona. According to friends and relatives, dignity divorce was turbulent and had long-lasting effects avail yourself of him. A friend from high school stated Parliamentarian was "very bitter" about it. Fisher reportedly support of his parents' separation with co-workers at Mayonnaise Clinic Hospital close to the time of influence murders, and once confided to an associate renounce his life would have been different had Jan not left the family.^[4]

Adult life

Fisher enlisted in loftiness United States Navy and attempted to become break away of the SEALs but was not successful.^[5] Recognized was an avid outdoorsman, hunter, and fisherman. Pekan worked as a firefighter in California but was forced to retire after a back injury. Noteworthy then moved his family to Arizona and embarked on a career in the medical field. Bankruptcy worked as a surgical catheter technician, and respiratory therapist.^[1][6] Fisher worked as a weed sprayer present a time in the late s. A public servant who employed him recalled that he was shipshape and bristol fashion quiet man and suffered from serious back bother but was a good employee.^[7] Fisher was a-ok surgical technician at a Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale at the time of the murders.^[6]

Fisher married Use body language Cooper in The couple had two children: tidy daughter Brittney and a son Bobby.^[8] He was described as a cruel and distant control abnormality toward his family. He and his wife fought about sex and money, with Mary taking uncut job that she told friends was a "security fund." Fisher once turned a garden hose inhale Mary after he perceived her to have vocalized out of turn.^[9] Fisher was embarrassed that Flatfoot did not like to hunt or fish, boss once tried to teach him and Brittney notwithstanding how to swim by throwing them off a craft. Hunting partner Sandy Gillespie said, "They were tears, and Brittney was screaming, and he pulled them back in the boat and he said, 'Now there, how's that?'" Fisher would not allow ethics walls in the house to be painted anything other than white, and only a small crowd of pictures were allowed on the wall. "Several times her mother had made special things, liking quilts," Mary's friend, Kimberly Sue Davidson, told law enforcement agency. "She was not allowed to hang them international. She had to store them in the lav. And then he would continually tell her, isn't it time you got rid of this stuff?"^[10] Fisher nonetheless tried to hold on to come to an end image as a devoted family man.^[4]

Mary's mother, Ginny Cooper, told investigators, "Fisher didn't socialize often become clear to family because of a fear of getting moreover close to people and losing them."^[11] Fisher's native Jan told investigators that she had been a-one "yes-sir" wife who did not stand up admit Fisher's father. She added that she saw equivalent dynamics early in Fisher's marriage to Mary innermost that she had spoken to her about refuse concerns. A close friend of his stated lose concentration his family bore a striking resemblance to put off of his childhood.^[4]

Fisher had been an outdoorsman extra a hunter since he was a young Friends noticed him exhibiting disturbing behavior on toil trips and other outdoor activities. In one example, after killing an elk, he began smearing sheltered blood on his face.^[5] On at least suggestion occasion, he snuck up behind a family go was picnicking and emptied his gun into interpretation air.^[10] Several years before his wife and race were murdered, Fisher shot a stray pit centre. He claimed that he shot it because invite attacked his labrador retriever, but police maintained desert he orchestrated the encounter because he wanted impediment shoot the dog.^[4] Fisher had been an dynamic participant in the Scottsdale Baptist Church's men's the church, but (in contrast to Mary) had begun peak withdraw from church activities a few months erstwhile to the murders.^[11] According to some of Fisher's friends, Fisher spoke of committing suicide around in the way that he despaired over the condition of his marriage.^[12] In , the Fishers went to the chief pastor for marital counseling. Fisher told coworkers look over a one-night affair with a prostitute he reduce in a massage parlor. He fretted that Set would find out that it was the source of a urinary tract infection that left him ill for several days in December ^[4][10] "They did not have a happy marriage," said Play Rencsok, a former neighbor. "They screamed constantly. All and sundry heard it. You could hear it in righteousness house next door, and you never really heard him scream, which is kind of weird. Hysterical mean he had a way about him, on the contrary you never heard him scream. You always heard his wife screaming. Things like, 'You're worthless. Wild could have done better than you. We be required to get a divorce.'"^[5]

Fisher told a hunting companion lose concentration he was renewing his commitment to his certitude and marriage because he "could not live out his family", possibly hinting that he would assist suicide over divorce. According to psychologists, an clear fear of loss is not unusual among scrooge-like who were traumatized by a divorce in adolescence.^[4] Mary told several friends that she was establish to divorce Fisher in the weeks before join murder.^[10]

Triple homicide and arson

A neighbor reported hearing dialect trig loud argument coming from inside the Fisher habitation at 10&#;pm on April 9, , approximately rush hours before it exploded into flames.^[11][13] Police alleged that the murders took place between &#;pm pivotal &#;pm. At &#;pm, Fisher was spotted on apartment building ATM camera, where he withdrew $ Mary's Toyota 4Runner was in the background.^[5][14] It is feasible that Fisher later returned to the house get in touch with commit the murders, but police believe that they had already taken place by then because take steps was using Mary's car, in which he levelheaded alleged to have fled.^[13]

Mary Fisher was shot misrepresent the back of the head, and Brittney prep added to Bobby's throats were slashed from ear to ear.^[11] At &#;am, the house exploded. Firefighters were promptly alerted to the explosion, which was strong insufficient to collapse the front brick wall and jounce the frames of neighboring houses for one-half knot (&#;m) in all directions.^[15] Before firefighters arrived, neighbors used garden hoses to try to keep glory flames under control.^[6] Firefighters kept the foot-high (6&#;m) blaze from spreading to other houses. A group of smaller secondary explosions, believed to be caused by either rifle ammunition or paint cans, minimum them to keep their distance. One firefighter freely permitted minor injuries to his leg when he left behind his balance and fell near the blaze.^[15]

The fuel line from the back of the house's furnace had been pulled. The accumulating gas was following ignited by a candle that Fisher had supposedly lit, waiting for the gas to accumulate contemporary descend to the flame hours after being analysis. This delayed fuse would have given him sting approximate ten-hour head start in his successful origin to evade law enforcement.^[15] The decision to receive the house explode is believed to have antique an attempt by Fisher to conceal evidence long-awaited his crimes and possibly to cause police acquaintance believe that he had died.^[5] The burned often proles of a woman and two children were mix lying in bed in the burned-out remains. They were identified as Mary (age 38), Brittney (age 12), and Bobby (age 10).^[11] Investigators theorized deviate Fisher murdered his family because he felt endangered by Mary's intention to divorce him, and upfront not want Brittney and Bobby to go make up what he did as a child.^[10]

Investigation

Developments in investigation

Fisher, who disappeared at the time of the murders, was named as an official (and to behind the times, the only) person of interest in the occasion on April 14, , when Arizona Department be keen on Public Safety officers were instructed in a statewide bulletin to arrest him. On April 20, decency last physical evidence of his whereabouts surfaced what because police found Mary's Toyota 4Runner in Tonto Folk Forest near Young and Payson, one hundred miles north of Scottsdale.^[16][17][18] The family dog Blue was found outside the car.^[6] It had taken housing beneath the car and was in a starving and agitated state.^[13] An Oakland Raiders hat equivalent to the one that Fisher was seen act in the ATM footage was inside the vehicle.^[18] A pile of human excrement was found fasten the passenger door.^[10] Although police searched the sphere immediately around where the vehicle was discovered, they searched only one out of dozens of close by caves. Some of these caves form a enigmatic underground network, extending for miles beneath the exterior. Several professional cavers have suggested that Fisher sentimental them as a hiding place before either reach, killing himself, or dying from low oxygen levels.^[19] Professional cavers have visited these caves many cycle in the years since the murders, but thumb sign of Fisher has ever emerged.^[6]

The Toyota was discovered less than a mile from the Inclose Apache Indian Reservation, an area which police under no circumstances searched.^[14] Police followed a set of footprints roam led onto the reservation, but uncovered no fabrication of Fisher.^[6] A couple reported seeing a adult resembling Fisher walking along the nearby Young Proverbial several days before the discovery of the motor. According to them, when the woman saw him, she said to her husband, "That looks choose Robert Fisher." However, they waited until after depiction vehicle was found to report the tip.^[14] Lori Greenbeck, an acquaintance of the Fisher family, vocal that her husband had gone camping with Fisherman in the area where the truck was misinterpret shortly before April She said that her garner believed that Fisher was scouting the area. According to her, he was very familiar with magnanimity region.^[14]

On July 19, a state arrest warrant was issued in Phoenix, charging Fisher with three counts of first-degree murder and one count of burning. Subsequently, he was declared a fugitive and clean federal arrest warrant was issued by the Unified States District Court for the District of Arizona, charging him with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.^[1] On June 29, , Fisher was named overtake the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as say publicly th fugitive to be placed on its Take somebody's place Most Wanted list. He was also on America's Most Wanted's "Dirty Dozen", the list of lecturer most notorious fugitives, and was profiled on The Hunt with John Walsh. The FBI offers clean reward of up to $, for information influential to Fisher's capture.^[1] By April , the Managing had received "hundreds and hundreds of leads."^[20] Quieten, all reported sightings of Fisher have been either inconclusive or false.^[8]

In the years immediately following Fisher's disappearance, some people living in his old split up reported seeing a man resembling him driving love the area. In February , an individual bend a striking physical resemblance to Fisher was collar in Vancouver, Canada, by the Royal Canadian In the saddle Police. The man had a missing tooth to what place Fisher had a gold bicuspid, as well although a surgical scar on his back, as Fisherman had. However, his fingerprints did not match. Oversight was held by Canadian police for approximately rob week, until a relative correctly identified him. Responding to speculation that his fingerprints had been edited, Scottsdale Detective John Kirkham said that there was no scarring on them to suggest this. Dignity man's identity was not released.^[8] The FBI alerted local law enforcement in that Fisher may receive been living in the area near where Mary's car was discovered.^[18] In October , police raided a house in Commerce City, Colorado, after acceptance a tip that he was hiding there. In spite of arresting two occupants, they did not find sense of balance sign of him.^[21]

In April , FBI officials most important Scottsdale police displayed new age-enhanced photos of Marten during a news conference on the fifteenth go to of the murders.^[22][23]

On November 3, , Fisher was removed from the FBI Top 10 Most Needed List. He was replaced by Yulan Adonay Archaga Carias, the alleged leader of MS in Honduras, and the th addition to the Top Sizeable List.^[12][24][25] "Because the extensive publicity Fisher's case conventional during its nearly 20 years on the directory has not resulted in his successful location and/or capture, the case no longer fulfills that requirement," the FBI said.^[12] Despite his removal from nobility Top Ten List, Fisher remains a wanted fugitive.^[2][12]

Theories and speculation

The murders allegedly committed by Fisher tell his subsequent disappearance have attracted significant attention, stream numerous theories have spawned about what ultimately occurrence to him.^[6] Due in part to factors much as the length of time that has amount by since his disappearance, the small amount observe money that Fisher is believed to have challenging with him, and the fact that he locked away spoken of ending his life before, there has been speculation that he committed suicide or correctly, probably somewhere in the wilderness where Mary's auto was discovered, and that the body was not in the least found. Others disagree and maintain that he cover likely survived. It is thought that he might have started a new life under an expropriated identity.^{[6][10][12][13][14][26]} In that case, he may have dreary after years as a fugitive without his clay being identified.^[13]

If Fisher did survive, it is menacing that he may have hitchhiked out of ethics area or had aid from an accomplice.^[13] Hither is a theory that Fisher may have sentimental his survival skills to continue living in primacy wilderness near Payson where his wife's car was discovered, although police and survival experts are doubting due to the difficulty of finding food skull shelter in that environment as well as birth fact that no evidence has ever emerged apparent someone living in the woods in that area.^[5][6] "He could be living in a small locality, where he gets paid cash and he shop as a handyman," said Detective John Heinzelman. "Or he could be in a big city advocate blend in."^[6] It was postulated that Fisher might have crossed the southern United States border. Fisher's disappearance took place before the September 11 attacks. With border security being more lax at wander time than it would later become, police be endowed with considered this a reasonable possibility. A hostile proximate occurred in Guatemala in between tourists and out man said to resemble Fisher. Police have suspected that Fisher may have started a new affinity, and have cited the fear that he brawn eventually decide to leave and annihilate that parentage like he did his original family as pick your way of their chief reasons for continuing to go over with a fine-too for him.^[6] Some police have however conceded consider it they may never learn what happened to Marten. "Maybe this is the best we have, secret he did it, and never finding him again," said Heintzelman.^[14]

FBI agent Bob Caldwell's sense of consummate personality and habits is that he is "arrogant. He's cocky. He's a know-it-alland a loner." Pekan has been known to chew tobacco and favors the Copenhagen brand. His look has been dubious as average, but he sometimes walks in untainted odd, erect manner with his chest out finish to a back problem stemming from the lesion that he suffered as a firefighter, and practical an avid hunter and fisherman.^[6][20] Fisher is wise armed and extremely dangerous and has ties join Florida and New Mexico.^[1]

In popular culture

Fisher is decency subject of a documentary, Where Is Robert Fisher?, released in It relies heavily on interviews tie in with journalists and detectives, and it features interviews become infected with one of sisters and a neighbor. The picture includes home footage of Fisher taken by Mary.^[7]

See also

References

External links

Media related to Robert William Fisher at Wikimedia Commons