Talking with Serial Killers: Dead Men Talking. Christopher Berry-Dee
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According to Robinson, when he was invited to this dinner he had ‘no idea’ that they would be honouring him. However, feigning surprise when the winner was announced, he humbly accepted what amounted to a rigged award as members of the organisation’s board sat, with their jaws on the floor, in stunned silence. Were the world just, he would have enjoyed universal acclaim, but for various heartbreakingly complicated reasons it was not to be.
A short time later, however, the meritorious award was exposed as having been obtained fraudulently. It had been granted as a result of faked letters of commendation received at City Hall, all written by none other than the ‘Man of the Year’ himself, John E Robinson Sr.
Thing went from bad to worse for JR when the city fathers, whose names he had forged on the letters of recommendation, read about the event in the local press. One man was outraged because on ‘his’ letter supporting Robinson, his name had even been spelt incorrectly. The Kansas City Times, stung by the scam, took its revenge by exposing him two weeks later as a fraud. His children were ridiculed at school and his wife, who says today that her husband had been unfaithful to her for at least twenty years of their marriage, was reluctant to show her face in public. But how did John react? One might have thought that had he had the right ingredients he would have concocted a potion to make himself invisible. The truth, however, was that JR, a fake as genuine as a hooker’s smile, couldn’t have cared less.
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By now the reader will have come to the inescapable conclusion that Mr Robinson is a disagreeable fellow and not a man to trust, least of all the type to enter into any form of agreement with. It came as no surprise to this author when JR penned a letter, dated 20 February 2008, demanding that, ‘Before I enter into any further correspondence with you, I want $400,000, although that amount may be adjusted depending on need. My attorney will control all information and distribution of funds. Don’t blow smoke! I don’t have time for meaningless delays. I will await word from you.’
In 1980 Robinson was given the position of Director of Personnel by another company, and very soon he homed in, like a heat-seeking missile, on his client’s chequebook and money, selflessly using the former to direct quite a lot of the latter into his own bank account. After laundering $40,000 into PSA, a paper company he owned, JR yet again found himself placed on probation, this time for five years.
Between 1969 and 1991, John Robinson was convicted four times for embezzlement and theft, earning himself the notable distinction of being barred for life by the Securities and Exchange Commission from engaging in any kind of investment business. Of course, some of his thefts were minor – he lost his job with the Mobil Corporation for pinching $300 in postage stamps – while others were a tad more significant.
He had no real employment, unless you consider figuring out ways of scamming people out of their money to be real employment.
District Attorney Paul Morrison – Robinson’s murder trial.
Avoiding financial castration by the skin of his teeth, Robinson soldiered on unfettered and undeterred, founding another firm, Equi-Plus, to add to his impressive portfolio. This newcomer to the Robinson stable specialised in ‘management consultancy’, and was very soon engaged by Back Care Systems, a company which ran seminars on the treatment of back pain… and give the company a pain, John surely did.
To keep this brief, Equi-Plus, aka John Robinson, was awarded a contract to prepare a package that included a marketing plan, printed publicity material and promotional videos, which advised the public on how to successfully resolve back pain. However, what Equi-Plus actually provided was a string of inflated, in most cases bogus, invoices and little else. Once again, a criminal investigation was started into the business activities of the energetic JR, who responded by producing a series of faked affidavits, all of which attested to the legitimacy of the invoices submitted to Back Care Systems.
While this investigation continued, this slippery eel founded Equi-II, an Overland Park corporation again run by Robinson who, at the time, described himself as a ‘consultant in medical, agricultural and charitable ventures’. And it was while he was at the helm of this new outfit that he navigated himself into a sphere of activities far more sinister than embezzlement and fraud.
With some $40,000 of stolen funds neatly stashed away, JR acquired an apartment in Olathe, a city south of Kansas City. Here, in this most agreeable of extra-marital climates, he was able to enjoy sexual affairs with at least two women, one of whom is quoted as saying, ‘John kind of swept me off my feet. He treated me like a queen and always had money to take me to nice restaurants and hotels.’
Well done, John, but there is no such thing as a free lunch. Retribution loomed on the horizon for the thieving and libidinous Robinson. The theft of the money resulted in his being convicted and, given his criminal record, this time he faced a possible prison sentence of seven years. However, he escaped with having to spend only a couple of months behind bars and, once more, we find John placed on probation, this time for five years.
John Robinson took away from our family our oldest daughter that we all loved so much. After she disappeared, my wife was a changed woman. A big part of her was ripped away.
William ‘Bill’ Godfrey – Paula’s father in 2003
In 1984, an attractive, dark-haired young woman, named Paula Godfrey, went to work for JR as a sales rep at Equi-II after graduating from Olathe North High School. She was told by her new boss that she was going to be sent to Texas to attend a training course paid for by the company. Robinson collected Paula from her parents’ home in Overland Park to drive her to the airport. Her family never saw her again.
Having heard nothing from their daughter for several days, Paula’s parents became anxious and, eventually, they contacted the Overland PD to report her missing. The police questioned Robinson, but when he professed ignorance of Paula’s whereabouts they went away satisfied with what he had told them.
Not long afterwards, the police located a letter bearing Paula Godfrey’s signature which began: ‘By the time you read this I’ll be long gone. I haven’t decided on Cleveland, Chicago or Denver, oh well.’ In the rest of the letter, Paula seemed to be saying that she was perfectly fine but didn’t want to remain in touch with her family. This neatly folded letter had been found in the bottom of a briefcase belonging to one Irving ‘Irv’ Blattner, an ex-con associate of Robinson, who had been arrested on an entirely unrelated matter. The one-pager was a photocopy and accompanied an original letter from JR addressed to Blattner in an Equi-II business envelope.
After reading the letter, the police closed their investigation, however, Paula Godfrey was to become JR’s first murder victim; the truth of what happened to her would not come out until 2003.
It seems that Paula, an excellent ice skater, had got into some kind of boyfriend trouble, with Robinson assisting by loaning her money. For his part, Irving Blattner helped her find places to stay in Belton, on the Missouri side of the state line, where her boyfriend couldn’t find her. One night, Robinson drove to a Belton motel where the young woman was staying and, for reasons known only to the tight-lipped JR, he hit her in the head with a lamp while Blattner blocked the doorway so she couldn’t escape. Her body has never been found.
Notwithstanding this, in pursuit of his new vocation as a philanthropic helper of young women, JR approached the Truman Medical Center in Independence, a small city in Montgomery County. Here, he spoke to social workers, telling them that he, together with some other local businessmen, had formed ‘Kansas City Outreach’. This, he explained while patronisingly peering over the top of his glasses, was a charitable organisation, which would provide young unmarried mothers with housing and career training, along with a babysitting service. The Truman Medical Center smelled a rat. They refused to help this Patron Saint of Lost Causes, so this ‘Saint Jude’ pitched the same story to Birthright, an organisation which gave help to young pregnant women, who, in turn, pointed him in the direction of Hope House, a refuge for single mums.
According to the writer David McClintick, JR told both organisations that Kansas City Outreach was likely to receive ‘funding from Xerox, IBM and other