John Edward Robinson

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John Edward Robinson : biography

27 December 1943 –

Robinson currently remains on death row at the El Dorado Correctional Facility in Kansas, and could become the first convict executed by lethal injection in that state.

Early crimes

Robinson was arrested for the first time in Kansas City in 1969, after embezzling $33,000 from the medical practice of Dr. Wallace Graham, where he worked as an X-ray technician, a job he obtained using forged credentials. He was sentenced to 3 years’ probation.

In 1970 Robinson violated probation by moving back to Chicago without his probation officer’s permission (or knowledge), and took a job as an insurance salesman at R.B. Jones Company. In 1971 he was arrested once again for embezzlement from that firm, and ordered back to Kansas City, where his probation was extended. In 1975 it was extended again after another arrest, this time on charges of securities fraud and mail fraud in connection with a phony "medical consulting" company he had formed in Kansas City.

During this period, Robinson cultivated and maintained the outward appearance of a personable, community-minded citizen and family man; he became a Scoutmaster, a baseball coach, and a Sunday school teacher. In 1977 he talked his way onto the board of directors of a local charitable organization and forged a series of letters from its executive director to the mayor of Kansas City, and from the mayor to other civic leaders, commending his generous volunteer efforts and generally singing his praises. Eventually he had himself named the organization’s “Man of the Year", and threw a festive awards luncheon in his own honor.

In 1979, Robinson finally completed probation, but by 1980 was under arrest again on multiple charges, including embezzlement and check forgery, for which he served 60 days in jail in 1982. After his release he formed a bogus hydroponics business and swindled a friend out of $25,000 who had hoped to receive a fast investment return to pay for his dying wife’s health care. At this time he reportedly began sexually propositioning many of his neighbors’ wives, triggering a fistfight with one of the husbands. He also claimed to have joined a secret sadomasochism cult called the International Council of Masters, and to have become its “Slavemaster”, whose duties included luring victims to gatherings to be tortured and raped by cult members.

In popular culture

A 2001 book by John Glatt, Internet Slave Master (ISBN 0312979274), documented Robinson’s life up to the time of his Kansas trial. A second book by Glatt, Depraved (ISBN 0312936842), published in 2005, focused on the lives of Robinson’s victims and others affected by his crimes. A third book, Anyone You Want Me to Be: A True Story of Sex and Death on the Internet (ISBN 1439189471) by John Douglas and Stephen Singular, was published in 2003.

Robinson’s criminal activities were also documented on episodes of A&E’s show Cold Case Files, Retrieved March 14, 2011. and Investigation Discovery shows FBI: Criminal Pursuit and Sins & Secrets.

Early life

Robinson was born in Cicero, Illinois, the third of five children of an alcoholic father and a disciplinarian mother. In 1957 he became an Eagle Scout, and reportedly traveled to London with a group of Scouts who performed before Queen Elizabeth II. Later that year he enrolled at Quigley Preparatory Seminary, in Chicago, a private boys’ school for aspiring priests, but dropped out after one year due to disciplinary issues.

In 1961 he enrolled at Morton Junior College in Cicero to become a medical X-ray technician, but dropped out after 2 years. In 1964 he moved to Kansas City and married Nancy Jo Lynch, who bore their first child, John Jr., in 1965, and fraternal twins Christopher and Christine in 1971.

Aftermath

In 2005 Nancy Robinson filed for divorce after 41 years of marriage, citing incompatibility and irreconcilable differences.

In 2006 Lisa Stasi’s daughter—known since her "adoption" as Heather Robinson—filed a civil suit against Truman Medical Center in Kansas City, and social worker Karen Gaddis. The suit accused Gaddis of putting John Robinson in contact with Stasi and her newborn daughter in 1984, after he told Gaddis that he ran a charitable organization providing assistance to "unwed mothers of white babies." In 2007 Heather Robinson and the hospital reached a settlement for an undisclosed sum, which Robinson said she would split with her biological grandmother, Patricia Sylvester.

In 2006 the body of a young woman was found in a barrel in an area of rural Iowa where Robinson reportedly had a business partner. The identity of the victim—whose remains, forensics experts say, could have been in the barrel for 20 years or more—and Robinson’s possible involvement, remain open questions.Body Found In Barrel Linked To Robinson? (May 18, 2006). Retrieved March 14, 2011. Kansas and Missouri police note that long stretches of Robinson’s time remain unaccounted for, and they fear that there are additional undiscovered victims. "He’s maintained the secrets about what he’s done with the women, he won’t ever tell, it’s the last control that he’s got," said one investigator. "There are [probably] other barrels waiting to be opened, other bodies waiting to be found."