Robert William Fisher

Robert William Fisher (born April 13, 1961) is an American fugitive wanted for allegedly killing his wife and two children, and blowing up the house in which they lived in Scottsdale, Arizona on April 10, 2001. He was named by the FBI as the 475th fugitive to be placed on the list of FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives on June 29, 2002.[1]

Not to be confused with Bobby Fischer.
Robert William Fisher
FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive
Charges
AliasBobby Fisher
Description
BornRobert William Fisher
(1961-04-13) April 13, 1961
New York City, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Height182 cm (6 ft 0 in)
OccupationSurgical technician, respiratory therapist and firefighter
ParentsWilliam Fisher
Jan Howell
Siblings2
SpouseMary Fisher† (m. 1987, died April 10, 2001)
ChildrenBrittney Fisher†
Robert Bobby William Fisher, Jr†
Status
AddedJune 29, 2002
Number475
Currently a Top Ten Fugitive

Early life

Robert William Fisher was born on April 13, 1961 in Brooklyn, New York.[2] His parents were William Fisher, a banker, and Jan Howell. He has two sisters with whom he attended Sahuaro High School in Tucson, Arizona. His parents divorced in 1976, when Fisher was 15 years of age. According to friends and relatives, the divorce was very turbulent and unsettling, leaving long-lasting effects on him. He reportedly spoke of it with coworkers at Mayo Clinic Hospital and once confided to an associate that his life would have been different had his mother not left the family.[3]

Adult life

Fisher joined the U.S. Navy. He attempted to become part of the SEALs, but did not succeed.[4] Fisher married Mary Cooper in 1987.[5] He has worked as a surgical catheter technician, respiratory therapist, and firefighter, and was an avid outdoorsman, hunter, and fisherman.[1] Fisher was described as a cruel and distant control freak towards his family. He once turned a garden hose on his wife after she spoke up. He only allowed her to paint the walls white, and she was not permitted to hang up quilts that she had made on the wall. The couple fought about sex and money, with Mary taking a job that she told friends was a "security fund." Fisher was embarrassed that his son did not like to hunt or fish, and once tried to teach his children how to swim by throwing them out of a boat. Hunting partner Sandy Gillespie said, "They were crying, and Brittany was screaming, and he pulled them back in the boat and he said, 'Now there, how's that?'"[6] He nonetheless tried to hold on to an image as a devoted family man.[3] His mother-in-law, Ginny Cooper, told investigators that, "Fisher didn't socialize often with family because of a fear of getting too close to people and losing them."[7]

Fisher's mother told investigators that she had been a "yes-sir" wife who did not stand up to her husband. She added that she saw similar dynamics early in her son's marriage to Mary and that she had spoken to her daughter-in-law about her concerns. A close friend of Fisher stated that his family bore a striking resemblance to that of his childhood.[3]

Fisher had been an outdoorsman and a hunter since he was a young adult. Friends noticed him exhibiting disturbing behavior on hunting trips and other outdoor occasions. In one case, after killing an elk, Fisher began smearing its blood on his face.[4] On at least one occasion, he snuck up behind a family that was picnicking and emptied his gun into the air.[6]

Fisher had been an active member of the Scottsdale Baptist Church. He participated in the men's ministry, but unlike Mary, he had begun to withdraw from the church's activities a few months prior to the murders.[7] In 1998, the Fishers went to their church's senior pastor for marital counseling. Fisher told coworkers about a one-night affair with a prostitute he met in a massage parlor. He fretted that Mary would find out that it was the cause of a urinary tract infection that left him ill for several days in December 2000.[3][6] "They did not have a happy marriage," said Wade Rencsok, a former neighbor. "They screamed constantly. Everybody heard it. You could hear it in the house next door. And you never really heard him scream, which is kind of weird. I mean he had a way about him, but you never heard him scream. You always heard his wife screaming. Things like, 'You're worthless. I could have done better than you. We should get a divorce.'"[4]

Fisher told a hunting mate that he was renewing his commitment to his faith and marriage because he "could not live without his family", possibly hinting that he would consider suicide over divorce. According to psychologists, an intense fear of loss is not unusual for an individual traumatized by divorce while an adolescent.[3] In the weeks before her death, Mary told several friends that she was going to divorce Fisher.[6]

Triple homicide and arson

A neighbor reported hearing a loud argument inside of the Fisher home on April 9, 2001, at 10:30pm, approximately ten hours before their house blew up in an explosion.[7] However, police theorized that the murders took place between 9:30 and 10:15. At 10:43, Fisher was spotted on an ATM camera, where he took out $280. Mary Fisher's Toyota 4Runner was in the background.[4][8] Mary was shot in the back of the head and her children's throats were slashed from ear to ear.[7] At 8:42 A.M., the house exploded. Firefighters were immediately alerted to the explosion, which was strong enough to collapse the front brick wall and rattle the frames of neighboring houses for one-half mile (800 m) in all directions.[9] Firefighters kept the 20-foot-high (6 m) blaze from spreading to other homes. A series of smaller secondary explosions, believed to be caused by either rifle ammunition or paint cans, forced them to keep their distance. One suffered minor injuries to his leg when he lost his balance and fell near the burning house.[9]

The gas line from the back of the house's furnace had been pulled. The accumulating gas was later ignited by a candle that Fisher had allegedly lit, waiting for the gas to accumulate and descend to the flame hours after being lit. This delayed fuse would have given Fisher an approximate ten-hour head start in his successful attempt to evade law enforcement.[9] Fisher's decision to have the house explode is believed to have been an attempt to conceal evidence of his crimes and possibly to cause police to believe that he had died.[4] The burned bodies of a woman and two children were found lying in bed in the remains of the burnt out house. They were identified as Mary (age 38), and her two children, Brittney (age 12) and Bobby (age 10).[7] Investigators theorized that Fisher murdered his family because he felt threatened by Mary's intent to divorce him, and did not want his children to go through what he did as a child.[6]

Investigation

Fisher, who disappeared at the time of the murders, was named as an official (and to date, the only) person of interest in the case on April 14, 2001, when Arizona Department of Public Safety officers were instructed in a statewide bulletin to arrest him. On April 20, the last physical evidence of Fisher's whereabouts surfaced, when police found Mary's Toyota 4Runner and their dog, Blue, in Tonto National Forest, near the towns of Young and Payson, a hundred miles north of Scottsdale.[10][11][12] A pile of human excrement was found near the passenger door.[6] Although police searched the area immediately around where the car was found, they only searched one out of dozens of nearby caves. Several professional cavers have suggested that Fisher used these as a hiding place before either escaping, killing himself, or dying from low oxygen levels.[13] The spot on which his truck was located less than a mile from the Fort Apache Indian Reservation, an area which police never searched. A couple reported seeing a man several days before Fisher's car was discovered walking along the nearby Young Road who resembled Fisher. According to them, when the woman saw him, she said to her husband, "That looks like Robert Fisher." However, they waited until after the car was found to report the tip.[8]

Lori Greenbeck, an acquintance of the Fisher family, said that her husband had gone camping with Fisher in the area where his car was found shortly before April 10. She said that her husband believed that Fisher was scouting the area. According to Greenbeck, Fisher was very familiar with the region.[8]

On July 19, a state arrest warrant was issued in Phoenix, charging Fisher with three counts of first-degree murder and one count of arson. Subsequently, he was declared a fugitive, and a federal arrest warrant was issued by the United States District Court for the District of Arizona, charging him with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.[1] On June 29, 2002, Fisher was named by the FBI as the 475th fugitive to be placed on the Ten Most Wanted list. He was also on the America's Most Wanted "Dirty Dozen" list of the show's most notorious fugitives, and was profiled on The Hunt with John Walsh. The FBI offers a reward of up to $100,000 for information leading to his capture.[1] As of April 2003, FBI had received "hundreds and hundreds of leads."[14] However, all reported sightings of Fisher have been inconclusive or false.[5]

In the years immediately following his disappearance, some people living in Fisher's old neighborhood reported seeing a man resembling him driving in the area. In February 2004, an individual with a striking physical resemblance to Fisher was arrested in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The man had a missing tooth where Fisher had a gold bicuspid as well as a surgical scar on his back, also like Fisher. However, his fingerprints did not match. He was held by Canadian police for approximately one week until a family member correctly identified him. Responding to speculation that the man's fingerprints had been altered, Scottsdale Detective John Kirkham said that there was no scarring on the man's fingertips to suggest this. The man's identity was not released.[5] The FBI alerted local law enforcement in 2012 that Fisher may be living in the Payson area in Gila County, Arizona.[12] Detective T.J. Diran suggested that Fisher may have used his survival skills to continue living in the wooded area near Payson.[4] In October 2014, police raided a house in Commerce City, Colorado after receiving a tip that Fisher was hiding there. Despite arresting two occupants, they did not find any sign of Fisher.[15]

Fisher is considered armed and extremely dangerous and has ties to Florida and New Mexico.[1] There has been speculation that he has committed suicide or started a new life under an assumed identity.[6][16] FBI agent Bob Caldwell's sense of his personality and habits is that he is "arrogant. He's cocky. He's a know-it-all...and a loner." He chews tobacco and favors the Copenhagen brand, sometimes walks in an odd, erect manner with his chest out due to back pain, and is an avid hunter and fisherman.[14]

In April 2016, FBI officials and Scottsdale police displayed new age-enhanced photos of Fisher during a news conference on the fifteenth anniversary of the murders.[17][18]

Fisher was the subject of a documentary entitled Where is Robert Fisher? The film was released in 2011. It relied heavily on interviews with journalists and detectives, and also featured interviews with Fisher's sister and one of his neighbors. The documentary included home footage of Fisher taken by his wife, which was described as eerie and disturbing.[19]

The backdoor pilot of the CBS show FBI: Most Wanted depicted a story nearly identical to Fisher's. It aired on April 2, 2019, as episode 18 of season 1 of the CBS show FBI.[20]

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See also

References
  1. "FBI Press Release". Federal Bureau of Investigation. June 29, 2002. Archived from the original on April 11, 2010. Retrieved December 29, 2011.
  2. Federal Bureau of Investigation. "Robert William Fisher". Arizona Daily Star. Retrieved August 9, 2019.
  3. Baker, Nena (June 18, 2001). "Slayings likely rooted in marital strife, divorce fears". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  4. Patterson, Thom (August 12, 2016). "Police: Fugitive dad killed family, burned down house". CNN. Retrieved June 20, 2020.
  5. Bittner, Emily (February 6, 2004). "Mounties got their man, but he isn't Fisher". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  6. Tom, Zoellner (August 7, 2002). "Report portrays suspect in family killing as cruel, controlling". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  7. Zoellner, Tom (April 14, 2001). "Family in blaze slashed, shot". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  8. Whitney, Briana (November 8, 2019). "Robert Fisher: Dead or alive?". Arizona's Family. Retrieved June 19, 2020.
  9. Zoellner, Tom (April 10, 2001). "3 dead as explosion, fire destroy Scottsdale home". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  10. Collom, Lindsey (June 30, 2002). "Fisher added to FBI list of most wanted". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  11. "FBI releases age-enhanced photos of Robert William Fisher". April 9, 2016.
  12. "12 years later, hunt for Scottsdale murder suspect Robert Fisher continues". Arizona Central. April 29, 2013. Retrieved June 21, 2020.
  13. Loew, Morgan; Benson, Phil; Leitner, Tammy (November 9, 2011). "'5 Investigates' team goes underground in Robert Fisher search".
  14. Wagner, Dennis (April 11, 2003). "FBI still hunting for Fisher". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  15. "Two arrested as police raid home in search of murder suspect". October 11, 2014.
  16. Golfen, Bob (April 4, 2002). "Robert Fisher likely alive with new identity". The Arizona Republic. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
  17. "FBI to show new images of 'Most Wanted' fugitive Robert Fisher on 15th anniversary of Scottsdale killings". azcentral.com.
  18. "Robert William Fisher". Federal Bureau of Investigation. U.S. Department of Justice. Retrieved December 4, 2016.
  19. Rubin, Paul (October 13, 2011). "Robert Fisher Murder Case Documentary: Great Story, Not So Hot Story Execution". The Phoenix New Times. Retrieved June 19, 2020.
  20. "Most Wanted". IMDb. Retrieved April 10, 2019.
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