The Mammoth Book of Unsolved Crimes (36 page)

“What,” he asked thoughtfully, “keeps us moving back? Is it habit or money or what? Well, for some of us it’s just that we get kinda homesick for the sets, the smell of the sound stages, the order to cut and for action by a director. Of course, the money is another reason. I’m not that rich, so I can do with whatever money I can get.”

Crane explained that “it” for him was a combination of being eager to keep working and being just as eager to make money at it. He said he was the type who has to keep doing “something!” When other actors rested up during a break, Crane said he couldn’t. “The first day I’m up pacing around the house. To be idle drives me up a wall!”

But hadn’t he been idle during the demise of each of his television series and
Super
Dad
?

“No,” he replied. “I had an extremely hectic time. I was all over the place. I did some specials, I hosted some local TV shows. I was master of ceremonies for top events, like beauty pageants, and picked up good money doing it. I flew to New Zealand for a convention of prisoners of war because of the other series. I taped radio shows and took part in sports events. I did some stage work and came back to Hollywood to do some pilot shows for series that never made it to air.”

There were some rumors at the time of
Super
Dad
that the Disney Studios had some misgivings after signing him for the film because of Crane’s un-Disneylike offscreen image.

“Yeah, yeah,” he replied in a brush-off sort of way, “I read about that, too. But nobody at the studio really said anything. I mean, not officially. They didn’t know about my hobby of playing the drums in topless – bottomless bars around town!”

Very un-Disneylike behavior, to say the least.

“But,” he continued, “what was wrong with that? I loved sitting in with small groups to play the drums and naturally I like looking at those naked ladies. I’m a normal, red-blooded guy and I was only looking,” he emphasized, “at those ladies. I wasn’t doing anything with them. It happened that they were at the places where I could play drums.”

A month following the murder, law enforcement officials in other agencies expressed private concern about the Scottsdale Police Department and its ability to handle the high-profile and complex murder investigation of such a prominent person. The city, it should be pointed out because of its size, did not have a “central” homicide bureau, or detective squad. The same detectives who investigated burglaries, robberies and other crimes, also investigated the few murders that were committed in the retirement city.

One private investigator voiced an opinion that Crane’s killing could have been a “murder for hire” by a cuckolded husband. Because noise was a factor, as in the Vicki Morgan killing, a bludgeon-type weapon was used. But the PI could not come up with a motive with the exception of the “cuckold syndrome” which a lot of people had come up with when the news of the videotapes and still pictures came out.

The Scottsdale police were bombarded with “theories” but came no closer to solving the murder of Bob Crane. A man of Crane’s prominence, involved as he was with sex and porno films, invited conjecture about jealous husbands and lovers.

Such stuff, said the police, was the grist for tabloids; not serious police work. Theories were also advanced from Hollywood that the husband or boyfriend of one of Crane’s paramours who possibly “starred” on one of the tapes, “ordered” the hit and then managed to have it hushed up in the Arizona city. The oligarchy tentacles had been known to reach that far—and farther.

Crane’s lifelong friend, John Carpenter was, for a time, the number one suspect in the killing. While the Maricopa County District Attorney would not confirm—at least for the record—that the Los Angeles businessman was the “prime suspect,” other sources confirmed at the time that he was.

When Carpenter was reached at his Los Angeles office, he was speechless when told the news by a reporter. “I’m shocked. Completely shocked,” he said. Carpenter declined any further comment until he had consulted with a lawyer.

Carpenter had volunteered the information to the police that he was probably the last person to see the actor alive or talk to him the day (or early morning) he was killed.

Crane, said Carpenter, finished his Wednesday evening performance, as usual, around 10:30 p.m. As was his custom, he hung around the lobby for several minutes chatting with fans, something he liked to do, and signing autographs.

Friends say he was tired. Very tired. It wasn’t a large crowd that night. In fact, the play, which was owned by Crane, had not drawn more than half a house for three weeks. The theatre management told Crane that it was cutting his five-week run short by a week.

This did not upset Crane, and he was looking forward to a week off. His friend, Carpenter, had flown in a few days earlier on business, and to visit Crane. He was staying at the Sunburst Hotel, not far from the Winfield Apartments.

When he left the theatre Wednesday night, Crane told a theatre employee he was going to go home, even though a woman and her girlfriend were at the performance that night at Crane’s invitation.

Carpenter said that Crane did return to the Winfield and received a call from his wife. As the conversation was rancorous and loud, neighbors in the apartment complex heard the ruckus and parts of the conversation.

Crane and Carpenter then went to an East Phoenix bar with the two women whom they had arranged to meet (after stopping off at Crane’s apartment). At 2 a.m. all went to the Safari, where Carpenter said he had last seen his friend around 2:30 a.m. before leaving for his hotel to pack and catch an early morning flight to Los Angeles. Carpenter said he also telephoned Crane when he got back to the hotel. The subject of the call was not disclosed, except that the major reason was to say goodbye.

Carpenter checked out of the Sunburst Hotel “very hurriedly” early the next morning, said a hotel employee. He seemed nervous and demanded a limousine to take him to the Sky Valley Airport in Phoenix. None was available so the desk called him a cab.

About 2:30 p.m. from Los Angeles on Thursday afternoon, Carpenter called the theatre and asked for Crane. An employee told Carpenter she didn’t know where Crane was and suggested he call the theatre’s other office. The girl said as the call was long distance, she would check for him. Carpenter held on and in a few minutes was told Crane was not there. The employee then checked with the Winfield and learned the news from Victoria Berry who told her what had happened. The employee relayed this information to Carpenter who hung up aghast at the news.

The police investigation stumbled along at The Windmill. Employees said the police were not even aware of the theatre’s “second office” referred to in Carpenter’s call to the theatre. They were never even told of Carpenter’s inquiries until much later in the investigation.

Also, the police only made a cursory inspection of Crane’s dressing room at the Windmill and one of the employees was entrusted to pick up Crane’s personal belongings.

On Thursday evening, Crane’s eldest son, Robert, and Lloyd Vaughan, Crane’s business manager, the man who handled all of Crane’s business and financial affairs, arrived in Scottsdale and talked to the police about the situation. Vaughan, the police said, appeared to be very nervous and preoccupied and just going through the motions of tending to business. He put it down to being very upset over his client’s death.

According to Vaughan, the next day police took them to Crane’s living quarters at the Winfield. They gave Vaughan and Robert a bottle of wine and some beer from the refrigerator which, to anyone’s knowledge, were never checked for fingerprints. (At least no one noticed any “dusting powder” on the bottles). They allowed the two men to pack all of Crane’s belongings in suitcases that were already in the apartment.

Sources both inside and outside the Scottsdale Police Department say none of the items were checked for fingerprints and the murder weapon was never found. This could not be confirmed and the police may be withholding information on prints in case the murderer is ever caught. The trunks of rental cars at the airport should have been checked for missing or bloody lug wrenches. One rental car was checked at the Phoenix airport but the results were never made known. We understand that they did lead to a suspect, however, who did not hold up.

All in all, everyone connected with the case agreed that the police bungled it and conducted a very inept investigation. Most outsiders feel a suspect should have been arrested within forty-eight hours of the murder.

None of the following questions have ever been satisfactorily answered:

All the Scottsdale Police would say about the “black bag” was that when they found it on the bed, all it contained was “a few personal items.” Otherwise, it was almost empty.

On 11 June 1981, officials of the Maricopa County Attorney’s office and the Scottsdale Police confirmed what the unseated County Attorney, Charles Hyder, had maintained all along:

As part of his successful campaign platform to unseat Hyder at the previous November election, County Attorney Tom Collins promised Scottsdale that he would take another look at “the Bob Crane murder case.”

Some Scottsdale Police officers who investigated the 1978 homicide were disgruntled and threw their election support to Collins because of this campaign pledge. They were disgruntled because charges were not filed by Hyder and his staff against a man they suspected in the killing.

A County Attorney’s investigator and the Police completed “another look” at Crane’s killing on 11 June 1981.

Major Dave Townsend of the Scottsdale Police Department said that the review added another “key suspect” to the case, a woman. He would not reveal her identity.

“However,” said Townsend, “both offices [Police and County Attorney] agree there is not enough evidence to file any charges. I am,” he concluded, “very satisfied with the present County Attorney’s attempts to help in this investigation.”

Townsend concluded his remarks that the investigation will never be closed until someone is charged with Crane’s murder. It would appear at this late date that it will be a cold summer day in Scottsdale before this occurs.

Today, the killer of Bob Crane still walks free—probably on the streets of Beverly Hills or Los Angeles. Crane is, many believe, the victim of a husband or boyfriend of a wife or a girlfriend who was “featured” in one of the sex tapes discovered in the apartment—and that a particular tape was stashed in the little black bag.

Or . . .

“The killer will never be free from the guilt of that act,” said Gary Maschner of the Scottsdale Police Department. And Maschner hopes that “someday that guilt will one day break open the murder case,” he said in June, 1984, the sixth anniversary.

“The killer has got to live with it,” said Maschner. “Knowing what I do about random murderers or first time killers—it preys on his mind every time he thinks about it.”

Maschner also says he thinks the killer has tried to contend with the guilt by confessing to somebody. “People like to talk; people need to talk.”

But until the Scottsdale Police get some new information, their investigation of the case will remain stymied.

“As for now,” said County Attorney Collins, “there’s nothing new.”

Collins said that new “leads” come in every week, but none of them lead anywhere but to a dead end. “Just a couple of weeks ago,” he laughed, “someone ‘confessed’ to the murder, but we later proved they couldn’t be the murderer because of some evidence we have held back from the press and public,” he said.

What the police do know to date is this—and it is all the information they will release: