In the summer of 1975, Marlene Claire Carlson, a friendly 44-year-old mother of three, was living in an apartment in Portland, Oregon. She was a divorced mother raising her children, and her life was a testament to her resilience and dedication to her family. Her sense of security in her own home, however, was tragically shattered in an act of brutal violence that would remain a mystery for decades.
Marlene was last seen alive on July 30, 1975.
When friends and family were unable to reach her for a week, concern grew into alarm. On August 7, 1975, police entered her apartment at 715 Southwest 15th Avenue to a horrific scene. Marlene had been bound, sexually assaulted, and strangled to death with a telephone cord. The friendly mother was found deceased in her own bed, and a padlock had been placed on the outside of her front door. The initial investigation yielded few leads, and despite suspicions, no suspect was immediately identified.
For 37 years, Marlene's case grew cold, a painful and unanswered question for her children and loved ones. The man responsible for her death, Jeffrey Paul Cutlip, lived freely for much of that time, his dark secret hidden from the world. Cutlip, who also used the name Jesse Andre D'Breeze, was a tenant in the same apartment building as Marlene in 1975, but he was never questioned by police at the time. Over the years, Cutlip amassed a long criminal history as a predatory sex offender, including a 1982 conviction for sodomy and burglary where he tied up a woman and assaulted her for six hours.
The break in the case came from the killer himself. In July 2012, a 63-year-old Cutlip, then living in Brownsville, Texas, called 911. His conscience, he claimed, was bothering him, and he confessed to "some bad things he had done in the past." He admitted to killing four women, though police were ultimately only able to confirm three of his murders. Portland cold case detectives, who had long suspected Cutlip in Marlene's murder but lacked the evidence to arrest him, were finally able to act. Cutlip was arrested in Texas and extradited to Portland to face justice.
Cutlip confessed in detail to the murder of Marlene Claire Carlson. He admitted to entering her unlocked apartment, finding her sleeping, and demanding sex. When she refused, he first tried to smother her with a pillow before strangling her with the telephone cord and then sexually assaulting her corpse. In addition to Marlene's murder, he confessed to drowning 15-year-old Julie Marie Bennett in 1977 and strangling 33-year-old Nielene Loribell Doll in 1993.
In 2013, to avoid a potential death penalty, Jeffrey Paul Cutlip pleaded guilty to two counts of murder and one count of aggravated murder for the deaths of Marlene, Julie, and Nielene. At his sentencing in January 2014, relatives of his victims had the opportunity to confront him. Marlene's youngest daughter, Julie Robinson, spoke directly to the man who had stolen her mother from her. "Here I am, in the same room with the man who helped himself to mother's life, my mother's body, my mother's future," she said. "The man who has had his freedom all these years, the freedom he took from my mother."
Cutlip was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He was incarcerated at the Two Rivers Correctional Institution in Umatilla, Oregon. On March 29, 2026, Jeffrey Paul Cutlip, also known as Jesse Andre D'Breeze, died in hospice care at the age of 76, bringing a final, quiet end to a life marked by violence and the pain he inflicted on so many.
