John Charles Bolsinger

Serial Killer

John Charles Bolsinger: The Serial Killer Identified Decades After His Death

John Charles Bolsinger was an American killer whose crimes stretched from Utah to Oregon between 1980 and 1988. During his lifetime, he was convicted in connection with the strangulation death of a woman in Utah, but authorities did not discover that he was responsible for a series of unsolved murders in Eugene, Oregon, until decades after his death. Advances in DNA analysis and investigative genetic genealogy eventually allowed detectives to identify Bolsinger as the man who killed three women in Eugene during the 1980s. Bolsinger's known history is particularly disturbing because two of the Oregon murders occurred only months after his release from prison for the Utah killing. After he was imprisoned again for breaking into another woman's home, the killings apparently stopped. When he was released a second time, another woman was murdered within several months. Bolsinger died by suicide shortly afterward, never knowing that biological evidence preserved from the crime scenes would eventually identify him.

The Death of Kaysie Sorensen

Bolsinger's first known fatal attack occurred in Utah in March 1980. He was 22 years old when he encountered 33-year-old Kaysie Sorensen at Bill's Lounge in Magna, Utah. Sorensen was last seen at the bar on the evening of March 28, 1980. Court records established that she left the lounge with Bolsinger shortly before 10:00 p.m. The two eventually went to an apartment belonging to Sorensen's boyfriend, Mark Anger, who was away working a 24-hour shift as a firefighter. Bolsinger and Sorensen drank alcohol, listened to music and later went into the bedroom. What happened afterward became the central issue in Bolsinger's criminal trial. Sorensen died from ligature strangulation involving the electrical cord from a clock radio. After her death, Bolsinger emptied the contents of her purse onto the floor, covered her body with a sheet and took a stereo from the apartment before leaving. Anger returned on March 29, 1980, and discovered Sorensen dead in the bedroom. Bolsinger initially attempted to distance himself from Sorensen's death but ultimately admitted that he had caused the fatal strangulation. His statements concerning exactly how and why it happened changed. In one account, he admitted placing the cord around Sorensen's neck and pulling it. At trial, he offered a different explanation that portrayed the strangulation as occurring during consensual sexual activity and without an intention to kill her. A jury convicted Bolsinger of second-degree murder in 1981, and he received a sentence of five years to life in prison. Bolsinger appealed. In 1985, the Utah Supreme Court concluded that the evidence was insufficient to establish the mental state required for second-degree murder but sufficient to support the lesser offense of manslaughter. His conviction was therefore reduced to manslaughter.

Release from Prison and Return to Oregon

Bolsinger was eventually paroled and returned to the Eugene-Springfield area of Oregon. Eugene Police later reconstructed his movements and determined that he was paroled to Springfield on March 7, 1986. Only about three months later, the first of the Eugene murders later attributed to him occurred. The timing would become extremely significant when cold-case investigators looked at Bolsinger's life decades later. His periods of freedom closely corresponded with the periods in which the Eugene murders occurred, while periods when he was incarcerated coincided with long interruptions in the killings. ...

Confirmed Victims: (4)

Kaysie Sorensen Age: (33), Date of Death: 1980-03-29

John Charles Bolsinger - Wikipedia