Susan and Michael Kuhnhausen

0:00 Hi. I'm Rich and I'm Tina. And if there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years of marriage. It's that some days you'll feel like killing your husband. And some days you'll feel like killing your wife. Welcome to love, Mary Kill. Hey Tina, Hey Rich? How are you today? Pretty good? How about you? I'm doing pretty good. It's hot. It is hot Sunday morning. We're here in the recording studio and it is sweltering out already. I think it's supposed to be one hundred degrees today.

0:42 Nearly with the humidity and other factors, it will be over one hundred degrees. Oh boy, let's just stay inside today. If only we had a swimming pool. Been going hard. I've been going hard in the swimming pool. So if you guys would like to support me and I sure rich to put in a swimming pool. I will put in a swimming pool if you commit to being the one who takes care of it, fixes the well. We had a pool at our old house and it was a thirty year old pool. The pool was really old. The pool was falling apart, like literally, like it needed to all be redone. And we didn't do that, and I think if you put in a brand new pool, it's going to be easier. Okay, we're gon, we're gonna settle this off here.

1:28 All right, fair enough. We got to review a few days ago. It was a very nice review. But the reviewer did have one piece of feedback for us, Well, you share this with me, and that was that we used the word horrible too often. And I think that's probably true. We do use the word horrible definitely, because true crime is pretty horrible. We talk about all these horrible things. But I came up with a list of words that we could use instead of horrible. Okay, the last episode, I tried really hard not to say horrible. If anyone wants to go. Let's keep score today. So you could say appalling, atrocious, despicable. Okay, ghastly, ghastly. That's good, monstrous, depraved, unforgivable, wretched, grim, or nightmarish.

2:11 Do you have those written now for me? No, you just have to remember. Someone make a needle point for us. That would be really fun to have a needle point with all those where you should do that, Say you do like to needle point in your spell? I was going to say I should print them out for you. But we'll just try to keep it in mind. Okay, Well, I can smell something you made a snatch. I hope you're hungry. I know it's only like ten am on Sunday morning, but I hope you're hungry. You know. I don't think we've ever talked about this, but I'm kind of an intermittent faster. Yeah. I usually don't eat, and I. Don't usually eat until two. Yeah, but I have had to give it to me. Well, today for our episode, for the case we're going to talk about, we're going to Portland, Oregon, which I've never been to Oregon.

2:54 I would love to go there. It sounds like a beautiful I've never even watched Portlandia, which people love. We watched at least an episode, I don't think so. I watched maybe a bit some pieces. But and I don't know if you knew this, but tater Tots were developed in nineteen fifty three in Portland, Oregon. No. I didn't know, but I feel like such a ninny. Everyone knows. I know. I know. I'm glad I'm here for you. But it was created by the founders of OORDA. They were basically looking for. A way like, oh, oh, I get it now, it's all coming to Idaho. Yeah. So they were looking for a way to use the leftover pieces of potatoes that would otherwise be thrown away. Yeah, genius. So they chopped it all up, they added some flour seasoning, put it through like this masher, and made it into the shape that we know as the tater tot. And originally the sales were slow, but the Orida folks thought they were maybe not charging enough money for them, and so they raised the price and suddenly it took off.

3:48 People were like crazy, people loved it. I didn't make you tater tots, but I did make you a Portland classic snack. I know what you made already. Really, what is it? I think it must be loaded. It's tachos. Okay, well, yeah they saw them. I saw the guacamole and the refrigerator and the cheese that you specifically would aside. And it's hard to not make a lot of nachos or tachos in this case, but basically. Tachos you could eat off old cha. No, you're not gonna be able to eat all of this, but we'll have a challenge. Sure. So yeah, here are your loaded tachos. How did you enjoy your tachos?

4:29 They're really tasty. Yeah, I mean to pretty much guess what they would taste. An important ingredient though, that I think you left off. Did I leave off sour cream? Oh? I did leave off sour cream. I also left off the onions though, So I'm not. All bad all right, because I don't like raw onions, but you don't like sour creams. Just in case people don't know that about us, But do you want to tell us about today's case? I do say we're going to tell the story of Susan and Michael Kunhausen. And this is a recommendation from Genessa, so thank you, Jenessa. It was early evening Wednesday, September sixth, two thousand and six, in Portland, Oregon. Fifty one year old Susan Kunhausen had just finished another long shift as an emergency room nurse at Providence Portland Medical Center. She was in no particular rush to get home. She had been living alone ever since she kicked her husband, Mike Kunhausen, out of the house the year before. They weren't divorced yet technically still separated, but the writing was on the wall.

5:22 They met occasionally, mostly for the sake of Mike's kids and grandkids, trying to preserve some shred of normalcy, but Susan was preparing to make the split permanent. Mike, on the other hand, had made it clear he didn't want a divorce. He saw her decision as betrayal abandonment. On her way home that evening, Susan decided to do something for herself. She stopped into the Perfect Look hair salon, just a short detour to get a fresh cut and a new color, a symbolic step into a new chapter. While waiting, she picked up a copy of Oprah magazine and flipped through the pages. A poem caught her attention. It was called I Will not Die an unlived Life by Donna Markova. The lines read, I will not die an unlived life. I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire. I choose to inhabit my days, to allow my living to open me, to make me less afraid, more accessible, to loosen my heart until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise. I choose to risk my significance to live so that which came to me as seed goes to the next as blossom, and that which came to me as blossom goes on as fruit.

6:23 I'm not big into poetry, but I really like that poem. The words resonated deeply with Susan. After nearly eighteen years of marriage, she had chosen to walk away to live more fully. She wasn't afraid of starting over. In fact, she was starting to enjoy it. She left the salon feeling refreshed and renewed. She drove back to her modest, blue, single story cape cod tucked behind a gray picket fence in the Montevilla neighborhood of southeast Portland. It was around six thirty pm when she entered through the mudroom at the back of the house. She saw a handwritten. Note left by Mike. It read quote, Sue haven't been sleeping, had to get away, went to the beach. See you Friday or Saturday. Love me. She set her aside, disarmed the security system, and walked through the house to the front door, stepping back outside to grab the mail. After flipping through a few envelopes, she came back inside and kicked off her birkenstocks. Something caught her eye. The bedroom was dark. That was strange.

7:18 It was still light out and she usually opened the curtains in the morning. Had she forgotten? And then everything changed. A man burst out of the bedroom, charging straight at her, a baseball cap pulled low over his face, long hair tucked behind it, yellow rubber gloves on his hands. In one of those gloved hands, he gripped a red and black clawhammer raised high above his head. He didn't say a word. Susan screamed as the hammer came down. We've done a few cases like this where you know someone a woman comes home and is just surprised by someone in. The garage or in the house. It's just such a terrifying feeling, knowing that you know you're just something doesn't feel right to you, and you probably have this inkling of it, and then this strange man is in your house coming at you.

8:02 I was going to say it's horrifying, but I'm going to say it's ghastly. Yes, they say we learn how to be married by watching our parents and seeing their marriage. Boy, I hope not. But as Susan would later tell her friends, quote my parents loved me, but they couldn't teach me how to have a successful marriage. Any more than they could teach me how to fly. Her father served in the Air Force. Her mother was a homemaker. The two separated when Susan was in second grade. Her childhood was far from stable, moving from Colorado to Arizona, to California to Nevada. New homes, new schools, new friends. The ground beneath her feet was always shifting. After high school, Susan earned her credentials as a licensed practical nurse and later became a registered nurse.

8:46 She moved to Oregon in her late twenties, eventually making Portland her home. She was outgoing, vibrant, and quick to make friends. Being single never felt like a problem. She had a full, independent life packed with friends, purpose, and the adrenaline of her job as an r nurse. But in nineteen eighty eight, when Susan was thirty three, her mother and a friend teamed up and decided it was time Susan met someone. Together, they placed a personal ad in Willemette Week, Portland's free alternative weekly. I don't know if Susan went along with this or if they did it without her knowledge, but yeah, they decided to do this. The ad described Susan as quote someone different, a single white female thirty three, overweight but not over life, seeking a single male who wants more out of a relationship than just slender.

9:33 It bothers me that her weight is mentioned twice in that brief ad. Had she not had a lot of luck dating and had her weight been an issue in her previous relationships? The sense I get was that she just it wasn't anything that she ever really pursued that hard, Like she just was happy being with her friends and being on her own. So probably wasn't you know, wasn't something she really thought about. And also the ad says something different like that's kind of we too. Yes, maybe her mom and friend were looking for a way to make her stand out. Yeah. So the replies came quickly. One letter stood out to Susan. It began, quote, Hi different. My name is Mike. I'm a thirty nine year old divorced, white male. I enjoy most things in nature, from wandering in the ape caves at Mount Saint Helen's to walking on the beach at sunset. If you're not familiar, and I was not familiar, the ape cave is a lava tube at Mount Saint Helen's. It was formed thousands of years ago in an eruption. It has like two different sections. You can hike through ones really easy, and then the other is much more rugged but sounds really cool.

10:35 Yeah. Susan was intrigued by the reply. She and Mike talked for the first time on January thirtieth, nineteen eighty eight. She marked the date with a smiley face drawn in redpen in her day planner. That first call led to another, then another. Susan later estimated they spent over one hundred hours on the phone before ever meeting in person. She said, quote, he had a nice voice. I was impressed that he wanted to talk about the deeper things. Does Mike live in Portland? Yes, he does. Their first in person meeting came in February. They met at the Crystal Springs Road to Dendron Garden, next to Read College. It was a simple, sweet date. They fed the ducks and Mike tossed unsalted peanuts to the squirrels. That's very specific, unsalted peanuts. In many ways, they were opposites.

11:18 Susan was bubbly and social. She loved going out dinners, comedy clubs, road trips, spontaneous adventures with friends. Mike was quiet, reserved, a home buddy with few close friends, but Susan didn't mind. They were grown ups with their own lives. She could go out with friends, have her independence, and still come home to Mike. At that time, he seemed okay with that too. Susan's brother James, remembered Mike this way quote. He was nice to my sister. He had a good job, he seemed to have a good work ethic, all that sort of thing. Mike had grown up in Portland and was adopted as an infant in nineteen forty eight. He served in Vietnam, and although he told people he saw combat, his official records list his role as a switchboard operator.

12:02 Some of those war stories may not have been entirely true. We weren't able to find much about his first marriage, except that he had two young children when he met Susan. His ex wife had primary custody, while the kids stayed with him every other weekend. In May of nineteen eighty eight, just a few months after they met, Susan and Mike moved in together. By December, they decided to make it official. They were married in a small ceremony in Reno, Nevada, surrounded by a few family members and friends. Why Reno. For Mike, it was the slot machines. For Susan, it was symbolic. She'd always thought of marriage as a gamble. She later said, quote, what bigger gamble in life is there than marriage? I hit the jackpot.

12:45 You have been working on that one all week, haven you, I can tell, just came up with it. I won the jackpot. She felt proud of herself for taking that leap, and proud of Mike too. He was willing to try again after a failed first marriage that took courage back in Royland. The newlywed settled into their routines. Susan embraced Mike's kids as her own. Not long after the wedding, Mike landed a new job as a janitorial supervisor for Oregon Entertainment, the parent company of Fantasy Adult Video, which operated several adult video stores around Portland. It's not clear exactly what Mike's role entailed, but he most likely oversaw the crews responsible for cleaning the stores and may have done some of the work himself. So there's a whole chain of adult video stores.

13:30 Well, this is like nineteen This is you know, in the late eighties, early nineties or so, and I think, you know, the internet was not around yet, and so I think there were probably more adult bookstores and places where you could go buy porn videos and things like that. So I'm guessing there were quite a few. I think there are still a few. I did google it on my work computer. Maybe it was not good. I don't remember seeing any adult only video stores in our area, but I remember the video store when I was a kid that we went to. There was a black curtain, uh huh. So oh, and that's where they kept the adult videos. Yeah, it's hard to remember, but thinking back to those days, not like Blockbuster didn't have it, but your local video story, Yeah they had.

14:13 They had the secret room in the back curtain. Yeah. I think I just remember like stumbling back there accidentally as a kid like that. You know. So in those early years, life was good. They worked various shifts, Susan and the chaos of the er, Mike with his custodial duties, but they made it work. They spent time with Mike's parents, had his kids every other weekend, juggled family, work and friends. Things seemed normal, even happy, but Early in the marriage, Mike made a comment that, in hindsight, feels like a warning. He told Susan, quote, marriage changes people, So who do you think is going to change more? You or me? As it turned out, it was Mike who changed. He stopped making an effort. Always introverted, he at least used to enjoy hiking with Susan, but that too faded, she said, quote, it wasn't very long after we got married that there was no more hiking, no more getting out. And it wasn't just about differing lifestyles.

15:09 Mike's entire worldview had a darkness to it. He once admitted he didn't think he'd ever been truly happy, not even as a child. He told her flatly, quote life is a shit sandwich, and every day you take another bite until you die. Really depressing outlook on life, isn't it? Absolutely? They never had children together, which was fine with Susan, but a growing emotional divide started to take a toll. Over time. Mike grew more controlling. He'd complain whenever Susan went out with her friends to dinner, a movie, anything. He criticized her for spending money that baffled Susan. She'd always earned more than Mike, and money had never been an issue before. In Susan's mind, it was her money, and if she wanted to go do something with friends, then she was going to do it. Her friends noted the shift too. Mike was becoming more negative, more critical, more possessive. When Susan and talked to friends on the phone, they could tell he was there, hovering, listening in the background.

16:05 He chain smoked cigarettes and guzzled diet cokes all day, and his anxiety only seemed to intensify with time. He continued to criticize her over spending money. When Susan pointed out that he was spending over two thousand dollars a year in cigarettes, he brushed it off, saying it was an addiction. Her response, well, I'm addicted to going out from time to time. One thing I read is that Mike got a five thousand dollars a year bonus from his job, and he kept that a secret from Susan. So he not only was criticizing her for spending money, but he was also hiding money that he was making as well from her. Well, I would guess a lot of their money went to support his children too. I don't know for sure what he was paying in child' support, but yeah, I'm sure you're right.

16:45 Whether or not Mike actually saw combat in Vietnam remains unclear. As we mentioned, military records list him as a switchboard operator, but Susan's brother James, who worked for the VA, believed he showed signs of PTSD. PTS can show up in a lot of ways, flashbacks and nightmares, emotional numbness, sudden mood swings, irritability, paranoia. For Mike, the signs were there. By the summer of two thousand and five, after nearly seventeen years of marriage, Susan had had enough. Mike seemed checked out emotionally, physically in every way. She tried to kiss him and he'd respond by burping, Oh, that's really disgusting. Yeah, that's not cool. Susan begged him to try couples counseling. He refused, saying it was the death knell of his first marriage. Susan gave him an ultimatum, go to counseling or we get a divorce. Reluctantly, Mike agreed, but he didn't take it seriously.

17:38 He showed up, but he didn't show up. Susan could see his heart wasn't in it. She still didn't want to fail, and she didn't want Mike to fail again either, But she began to realize that she wasn't married to a broken man who needed help. She was married to a malignant narcissist, a manipulator, a liar, a man who needed control. Mike would often say quote, I'm just an asshole, always haven't, always will be. I know guys like that. Yeah. Eventually Susan came to believe him. After seventeen years, she decided she didn't want to be with an asshole anymore. When somebody says that, like regularly, I'm just an asshole, I'm a jerk, like, probably believe them after a short time.

18:18 Yeah, she said, quote I cared about him, but I didn't want to live with him anymore. I wanted to be happy again. It's really draining to live with someone who is negative all the time. Yeah. I wouldn't know, but I'm sure it is. I do catch myself sometimes I'm like, gosh, I mean like a grumpy, negative, mean old woman today. Well I think we all do that sometimes, and it's fine to have bad days. And be irritable. But nobody wants to live with someoney who was always yeah right. Mike lived in with his father. By then, his kids were adults and had children of their own. Susan considered the grandkids hers too. For their sake, she tried to maintain a friendly relationship. They still had family get togethers.

19:02 Mike would come over when the grandkids visited, and Susan did her best to keep things civil. She genuinely wanted to stay on good terms, but she was also rediscovering herself. Her friends noticed she seemed lighter, happier, more optimistic. She'd been happy before Mike, she was starting to believe she could be happy after him too. By the time the two thousand and five holidays rolled around, Susan felt more and more secure in her decision. Mike, on the other hand, did not. One evening Susan had friends over, Mike came by two. She was laughing and talking with her friends when she noticed him sitting off to the side, not saying a word, just watching, staring, his eyes full of anger.

19:43 That's creepy. It was in that moment that Susan knew the separation wasn't enough. She needed a clean break. She needed a divorce, and she needed to move on for good. We'll be back after a break. By January of two thousand and six, Susan Kunhausen knew that her marriage was over after more than seventeen years with Mike. They had been separated for six months. She had done her best to keep things amicable for the sake of his kids, their grandkids, and maybe even for Mike himself. They still spent time together at family gatherings, birthdays, holidays. It sounds like Mike's kids really loved Susan and considered her part of their family.

20:26 As far as I know, I really wasn't able to find out a lot about the relationship between the kids, but I did read that Susan considered them like her own children, so I'm assuming the feeling was mutual in some ways. Susan hadn't fully closed the door. She hadn't even changed the security code to the house alarm. It was still twelve ten, their anniversary December tenth, a code that she had programmed herself years earlier. She had asked Mike not to come over when she wasn't home, but deep down she suspected that he wasn't respecting that boundary. There were little things, small signs, a sense that someone had been there. She believed that Mike was letting himself in while she was at work, going through her belongings, checking up on her life. Still, Susan wasn't especially worried.

21:10 She was firm in her decision. She had nothing to hide. Her instinct told her that he was snooping, not threatening, and maybe part of her still wanted to believe that Mike wouldn't cross a line. Not really was the house Susan's. I don't know if she bought the house before they met, or if they bought it together after. I do know they were They jointly owned it. Together, so he kind of did have a right to be there. That's an interesting question really, because she she kicked him out of the house. They were separated, they weren't fully divorced yet, so I mean, technically, you're right he did if he did own the home as well, but she did specifically ask him not to come when she wasn't there. Yeah, yeah, I can totally understand that. It is weird how Susan said that she could sense that he had been there. I've had that feeling before a lot too.

21:55 Uh huh, Like you don't know if someone has been there or not. You just get this sense that different. Yeah. As the months passed, Susan continued to move forward. By the end of that summer, she had separated their finances and opened her own bank account. She was living fully on her own terms now, both emotionally and practically, and she had started the process of making the separation official. The divorce was underway, and now we're back to where we began. Wednesday, September sixth, two thousand and six, Susan Kunhausen had just finished another shift at Providence Portland Medical Center. She was preparing to leave the next day for a nursing convention, so around three pm she called Mike. It was a simple check in to ask if he could feed her cats while she was gone, but Mike sounded off, surprised to hear from her. Agitated, he told her he was stressed and heading to the beach. He mentioned that he had left her a note at the house. After work, Susan stopped by the Perfect Look hair salon for a haircut and color. She told her stylist that she was planning to file for divorce and wanted a new color for a new life. She left the salon feeling refreshed and hopeful. She pulled into the garage, entered through the back door, and disarmed the security system twelve ten, same code as always. She read the note that Mike had mentioned left in the mudroom quote, Sue, haven't been sleeping, had to get away, went to the beach. See you Friday or Saturday?

23:14 Love me. Was that something that Mike did frequently? He would escape to the beach when he was stressed. I don't know, but I do know that the to get to the beach, like if you're going to the Pacific Ocean from Portland, it's like an hour and a half drive, so it's not just a quick getaway. Yeah, but maybe it was something he did regularly. Susan walked back out of the house through the front door, got the mail, and spent a couple minutes leafing through the mail, enjoying the nice weather, before heading back inside. At first, nothing seemed out of place, but something fell to off. It was subtle, barely more than a whisper in the back of her mind, a strange quality to the light. It was only six thirty PM, but the house felt darker than it should had she left the curtains closed. I think it's interesting sometimes you talked about intuition, like that somebody has been in your house, and I think similarly, like you might just get this sense that someone is there in the house or that something is different, but you might not.

24:05 Be able to put your finger on where that comes from. Yeah, and then everything went off the rails. A man burst from her bedroom, charging straight at her. He wore yellow rubber gloves and a. Baseball cap pulled low, long hair tucked underneath. In one hand, he held a red and black claw hammer raised high. Before she could react, he struck her in the left temple. Susan staggered. She wanted to run, but she was trapped. But Susan wasn't just any woman. She had worked for nearly thirty years in the er, one of the most chaotic, dangerous environments in healthcare. She had seen overdoses, psychotic breaks, violent outbursts. She'd been assaulted twice. As a charge nurse. She had overseen takedowns of out of control patients. She knew how quickly calm could turn to crisis, and how to respond. The emergency department is a particularly vulnerable setting for workplace violence. Studies have shown that emergency room nurses experience some sort of violent event every two months on average.

25:00 Because of this, many er departments provide training for nurses to spot warning signs of an escalating situation, to de escalate aggressive behavior, and if necessary, to use physical self defense maneuvers to protect themselves. Susan had long been an advocate for required training across organ to help healthcare workers prepare and defend against violence in healthcare settings. Susan had received regular self defense training, and as she realized how serious this threat was, it was quickly clear that the man intended to kill her. Her training and a good dose of adrenaline kicked in. She decided she was not going to be killed in her own home. Later, Susan would say, spoiler alert, Susan.

25:40 Did survive this attack. Quote. What I saw in his eyes and what I heard in his voice terrified me because he was not afraid. He seemed surprised, But the very scary part was he seemed excited. She felt like he had done this before. When you're being attacked with a blunt object, instinct tells you to create distance, but distance gives the attacker room to build momentum and swing with more force. So Susan did the opposite. She closed the distance. She rushed forward, trying to throw off his balance. She was five inches shorter and her knees weren't great, but she outweighed him, and she used that to her advantage, slamming her body into. His I love it. That's really good advice. Yeah, for sure. If you have a lower scent of center of gravity, just charge.

26:22 But he didn't fall. Instead, he shoved her back into the wall of her bedroom. That's when he said the only words he spoke during the entire ordeal. You're strong. Susan shoved him again, screaming. Who are you? What do you want? He punched her in the face, splitting her lip, and then again she collapsed to the floor. She opened her eyes and saw him standing over her, hammer raised for the final blow. She had one terrifying thought, I'm going to die today, but she wasn't ready to die. She snapped back into survival mode. She thought, I've got to get that hammer. Incredibly, she managed to pull him to the ground. She doesn't even know how it just happened. She bit him his arm, his side, his thigh, anywhere she could. If I'm going to die, she thought, maybe my teeth marks will help the police identify him. It's amazing to be thinking like that in that moment.

27:11 Yeah, and I love that we have her thought process. I do too, But it also makes me sad because she's thinking she's going to die and she's trying to leave clues so that the police can find her killer. Which is really so glad that she is still with us. Yeah, I'm curious how quickly her thought went to was this my husband that is sending this killer? I think it was pretty quick. Yeah, the fact that she was asking who sent you? Right away. As they wrestled on the floor, she reached into his pockets, hoping to find an id, something that she could toss under the bed which could be discovered later. At one point, she managed to wrench the hammer from his hand and struck him in the head, but he snatched it back, so she grabbed him by the throat and squeezed hard. His face turned red, then purple.

27:54 Who sent you? She screamed, who sent you here? She eased her grip, hoping for an answer, but instead he fought back and tried to flip her over, and Susan knew if he got on top of her again, it was over. So she climbed on top of him, threw her leg across his body, wrapped her left arm around his throat and locked it in tight. Quote tell me who sent you, and I'll call you a fucking ambulance, she shouted. He just growled and kept fighting, so she tightened her forearm around his neck, and this time he didn't get back up. The entire fight lasted fourteen minutes. Holy cow, If you think about fourteen minutes in a lifer death struggle, that's a really long time too. Oh my gosh. I love that she kept fighting. I know when he stopped moving, Susan let go, grabbed the hammer and ran barefoot to her neighbor's house. She pounded on the door, panicked. Quote, Dennis, open the door, call the police. I've been attacked. I think I may have killed the guy. His wife, Anne opened the door.

28:48 Susan stood there, wild eyed, bleeding, holding a bloody hammer. Hope it sounds like she knew her neighbor as well, because if she didn't know them, could you imagine opening the door and seeing this, it would be pretty really scary, and let Susan in. Susan dropped the hammer on the counter, trying to steady her breathing while Anne called nine one one. We have an intruder in the house next door. The intruder was in the bedroom with a hammer. The woman who lives there thinks she might have strangled him. He was down when she left. Can you put her on the phone. She's bleeding. Does she need an ambulance? No, she's a nurse, she says, call an ambulance for the guy. He may be dead. What did she use on him? She strangled him? What else did she do? She put a choke hold on him. I've got help on the way. Stay on the line.

29:29 She has a hammer here. Don't touch it. Don't touch it, just leave it there. She hit him in the head several times. That's the hammer he had with him. She struck him and she strangled him, and she thinks he's dead. Was he by himself? Anne asked Susan. Did he have anyone with him? And then to the dispatcher said no. She expressed a concern it may have been her ex partner who sent the person. Have there been problems with her ex husband or her ex partner. She did talk to Mike, her ex partner, and asked him to house it for the cats, and he said he couldn't do it. He was on his way to the beach. He left her a note he knows the alarm. Okay, that's good information to pass to the officers. When police arrived at the scene, they entered Susan's home and found the attacker lying motionless on the bedroom floor.

30:10 He was dead. Wow. Susan was rushed to the hospital, battered, bruised, but alive. She had lumps on her head, a split lip, bruises all over her face and body, and teeth marks on her arm. When her friend Helen arrived to check on her, Susan looked at her and asked, quote, do you think Mike could have done this? It didn't take long for the Portland police to identify the man who had attacked Susan Kuenhausen. In the dead man's back pocket, they found a wallet inside was an ID Edward Dalton Haffey, aged fifty nine. A background check quickly revealed that Haffy wasn't just any petty criminal. He was a Vietnam veteran with a long and violent record robbery, burglary, conspiracy to commit murder. One of those crimes stood out.

30:51 In nineteen ninety one, Halfy had been involved in the murder of his ex girlfriend, Georgia Lee Dutton, a thirty nine year old woman who had threatened to report Halfy and two other men for manufacturing and distributing math. Ten days after she went missing, a canoeist found her decomposing body on the banks of the Umpquah River. Although Hafy didn't carry out the murder himself, he helped plan it. He took a plea deal guilty of conspiracy to commit aggravated murder and served nine years of a twelve year sentence. He was released in two thousand and three. After prison, Hafey moved to Portland and began looking for work. By July two thousand and four, he found a job cleaning the floors for Fantasy Adult Video, the same company where Mike Kunhausen was working as the janitor supervisor. The connection between Mike and Haffey had just come into focus, and the next day another clue surfaced. Susan's friend Helen, went to her house to pick up some belongings in the basement.

31:46 Amid the clutter, she noticed a backpack that didn't belong the police had missed it. Inside were a random assortment of items, a container of Hershey's syrup, two hundred dollars in cash, diabetes medication, a pay stop made out to Edward Haffey, and most revealing of all, a day book. In the day book, the entry for September fourth, two days before the attack, was a note call Mike, and inside the bag a folder with Mike's new cell phone number written on it. And autopsy later revealed that Haffy had a nearly lethal dose of cocaine in his system at the time of the attack. It was clear now Mike Kuenhausen needed to be found, but Mike had vanished.

32:26 Police checked his credit card activity and saw that on the day of the attack, he'd driven his Dodge Neon two hours west and checked into the Lincoln City Inn on the Oregon Coast. He didn't stay overnight, just for the afternoon. The next day, back in Portland, Mike used his credit card to purchase a three fifty seven magnum revolver from a pawnshop for three hundred thirty nine dollars. Then, on September eighth, Mike left would appear to be a suicide note at his daughter Angela's house. It read quote all I ever wanted was to be loved, and every time I had it, I fucked it up. Angela told the police her father had dropped off the note and disappeared. Police issued an APB. Meanwhile, Susan was terrified. She was afraid to go home, afraid to be alone. Friends took her in and made sure someone was always with her. Finally, on the morning of September thirteenth, around ten am, police found Mike. He was sitting in the parking garage of Kaiser's Sunnyside Medical Center. He told officers he was checking himself in. I have nothing left to live for anymore, he said. They placed him on an involuntary psychiatric hold for eleven hours, then arrested him for a conspiracy to commit murder. Mike's reaction quote, You're not going to believe my side of the story. My side of the story is so fucking off the wall. He admitted to being at Susan's house the day of the attack and leaving the note, but at first he claimed he didn't know who Ed half he was, but that didn't hold up for long. Soon he changed his story, saying he knew Ed, but I didn't do it. Just because I know the guy doesn't mean I did anything. Mike's bail was set

33:59 at two million, later reduced to one million dollars. There had been no signs of forest entry at Susan's home and the alarm system had been disarmed. Investigators believed that Mike had unlocked the door and turned off the alarm to let Halfy in, then driven to the beach to give himself an alibi, but ed Halfey was dead and dead men don't talk. What the police needed now was more evidence. Witnesses a trail, and they soon got it. A former salmate of Halfey's came forward. He told police that Halfey had approached him with an offer helped stage at burglary for insurance money. He agreed to meet the man backing the plan. That man, he said was Mike Kuenhausen. Mike offered five thousand dollars to help Halfy kill his wife.

34:40 The former inmate turned him down. Another witness told police he had driven Halfy to an Appleby's parking lot off of I two five to meet a man. After seeing Mike's photo on the news, he identified him as the man from that meeting, and there was more. In the days leading up to the attack, Halfy told people that he had been offered fifty thousand dollars to kill a w one twenty five thousand dollars up front and the rest after it was done. Half he added, killing someone is an easy thing to do. He sounds like a great guy. Yeah, he couldn't have been more wrong. Mike doesn't seem like the guy that would have fifty thousand dollars laying around. Yeah, he doesn't. I don't know where he came up with that money, if he was kind of squirrelling it away for some time or something. So yeah, I'm not sure about that.

35:23 One thing I think is interesting about this case is that even though it seems obvious that Mike must have hired this guy, really there wasn't a lot of direct evidence to it. And I think without Halfy talking to a lot of people, right, he said a lot of things to a lot of people. I think without that, it might have been it would have been a very circumstantial case, and they may have still been able to pin it on Mike. But I think it would have been much more difficult if a lot of these people they just they just talk and talk and they can't shut up about right things that they, you know, are really not smart to talk about. Well. Susan had like yelled at him, like who sent you? Who sent you? And he never answered right. Believed that the primary motive was money. Mike had lost his job and the divorce would be devastating financially. Susan had always been the main breadwinner, and while he wasn't the beneficiary of her life insurance policy, that was her brother. He would inherit the house if she died, and it was paid off and worth around three hundred thousand dollars. That's interesting that her brother was beneficiary.

36:20 I don't know if she. Changed that after they separated. I'm guessing maybe that was what she did, but I don't know for. Sure that money wasn't the only motive, and in fact, he had started planning the killing before he lost his job. Mike had always been controlling, manipulative, and Susan's decisions to end the marriage had shattered whatever fragile self image he had left. She had rejected him, and for that, in his eyes, she had to pay. At some point before the attack, Mike allegedly told his daughter's boyfriend that he quote couldn't face losing everything again like he had in his first divorce, then added that anyone willing to kill his wife would be well compensated. I don't know why his daughter's boyfriend and did not do anything with that information. That's pretty disturbing that he said that, And.

37:05 Well, he probably thought it was an off handed comment. I mean, maybe it's a pretty weird, offhanded comment, but yeah, I'm sure he thought it was a joke or something. The hammer used in the attack was traced back to Susan's own home. It had been left in the bathroom during remodeling. The planet seemed was to stage a burglary gone wrong to make it look like Susan had come home and interrupted a robbery, but Susan survived and the evidence kept piling up. Finally, in August two thousand and seven, almost a year after the attack, Mike Kuhnhausen pleaded guilty to soliciting Susan's murder. At his sentencing, Susan addressed the court and her ex husband directly. She spoke for over an hour. Holding up a photo of her battered face, She told him, I am damaged by what you've done to me. I am damaged, but I am not destroyed, and then, looking Mike in the eyes, she added, at least if I believed you deserve to die, I would have had the balls to kill you. My I love Susan for this, She's amazing. When given the chance to speak, Mike didn't apologize directly. He didn't even acknowledge what he had done. He simply said, I've heard a lot of people in the last year, and I'm sorry. Susan's response a loud, bitter ha.

38:15 So technically he pleaded guilty. So in the legal sense, he did admit to doing what he did, but he never said it out loud. He never said, yeah, I did this, and I apologize for it. She's a coward. Yeah, I hate him. Mike was sentenced to ten ten years in prison. Isn't that crazy? With good behavior that met, he would be eligible for parole as early as twenty fourteen. It is crazy, and I think because she didn't die. Yeah, so technically it wasn't murder, but still it's weird. That the sentence should be different, like your intent was to kill her. So that's really unfortunate. I don't like it. We'll be back after a break. While Michael Kunhausen was sentenced to ten years in prison, Susan felt like she had received the real life sentence, not because she fought off a man who tried to kill her, but because, as she put it, she was being punished quote for picking a bad husband. Once adventurous and outgoing, Susan said she now felt like a broken plate glued together.

39:16 Oh that's horrible. Did she sustain any lifelong injuries. No, I don't think so. I think she recovered from all of her injury. So the emotional turmoil and yeah, HETSD and having to live on your own as a woman is scary, But having to live alone as a woman who has survived an attack like this, that's I can't imagine how horrifying it is. She has a really good I guess we know she has a security system, and you've just told everyone the coat, so good chat. I'm hoping she changed it since that. I'm sure she did. Actually, she no longer lives in that house, but when she went out to eat, she always sat facing the door. Driving to work, she would vary her route. If she thought someone was following her, she would circle the block right down license plate numbers. She often felt like someone was watching her, but she didn't crawl into bed and hide.

40:05 The very next day, after Mike was arrested, she filed for divorce. She also changed her last name, considering at one point becoming Susan Strong, a nod to the only words her attacker said to her, You're strong. Oh, I love that. In the end, though, she chose her grandmother's last name instead. She also took legal action, successfully suing Mike for emotional distress, not because he had money, but because she didn't want him to have the means to hire someone else. It would also ensure that she wouldn't owe him one hundred and forty thousand dollars when she did eventually sell the house. Susan never took pride in killing her attacker, but she never felt shame about it either. She said, quote, the worst of this is not that somebody tried to kill me, but that I had to kill someone else to survive.

40:47 But I have no shame because I did not choose this death for him. I chose my life. Well, he would have taken her life. Yeah. Absolutely, I'm glad that she feels no guilt for it. The Portland Police Department awarded her the Civilian Medal of Honor, not for ending a life, but for saving her own. In twenty ten, Edward Hafey's aunt wrote Susan a letter quote, although this was a terrible thing that happened, no one in this family has any bad feelings toward you. You did what you were forced to do, and in doing so, you spared many others from the same trauma you experienced. Ah, that's very generous, it is. Yeah. Susan returned to work as a nurse, but she didn't stop there. She became an outspoken advocate for survivors of violent crime and a champion for women's self defense. She partnered with Portland area organizations like Women's Strength, Girl Strength, and the Oregon Crime Victim's Law Center. In twenty seventeen, she helped launch case Companion, a free online tool created with the Moltnomah County DA's office. The platform helps victims track offender court dates, sentencing information, and release details. It also connects them with resources and advocates.

41:54 So I really love that it's a website. You know, you can go find out like if someone attacked you in there in prison, like you can find out when they're eligible for parole. Yeah, that's an amazing tool, really. Is, and Susan never stopped protecting herself. At work, one day, a patient threatened her, saying he could quote snap her neck and not think a thing about it. As security escorted him out, Susan told him, you might want to google me first. Her coworkers, especially those who knew her story, burst out laughing. A new employee, confused, asked what was this all about. When he found out, he said, I thought she was just a sweet grandma lady. I mean, you can be a sweet grandma lady and also be a bad ass. Yeah. Absolutely. Seeing pictures of Susan actually reminded me a little bit of my own grandma, who was my hero growing up.

42:39 I think I've mentioned her a couple of times, but she she was a nurse also, and after my grandpa passed away, she went back to school. I think she was in her fifties. She became a nurse, and then she moved to San Diego to start a new life. So the pictures just kind of brought that memory back and also reminded me that nurses are just amazing peakle. Even while Mike was behind bars, Susan prepared for the worst. She moved to a new home with gravel surrounding the perimeter so that she could hear footsteps. She bought a gun and practiced at the range. She said, quote, if he came here, he was not going to get close enough to hurt me. But while Susan was prepared to defend herself again, she still held space for something rare compassion. She once said, quote, what would make this all be okay is if I continue to find even greater peace than I'm already finding, and that my ex husband could find insight into how much we all loved him. Mike never got that chance. He was scheduled to be released on September fourteenth, twenty fourteen, but cancer caught up to him first. He died in prison in June, three months shy of his release date. He was sixty five. Susan has shared her story with various news outlets and television shows.

43:46 One of the main sources for this episode an article by Beth Slovak for Willamette Week was incredibly helpful and will include it along with our other sources in the show notes. I did reach out to Susan and asked for an interview, but she declined. Over the years, she's posted on Reddit and Facebook to correct inaccuracies and how her story's been told. Hopefully we've done it justice. We've certainly tried our best. You know, I don't blame her at all. I don't either. I think that she's been through enough, and you know, we don't have a right to everyone's story. And you know, she's done so much advocacy work and you've got to respect her and love that. Yeah. Absolutely. In twenty sixteen, she announced that she was writing a book and created a Facebook page titled Nurse Kills Hitman, which she often says in comments that's like sort of the headline of her life. As far as I know, the book hasn't been published yet. I hope it will be.

44:35 I would love to hear the story in her own words today. Susan often refers to the bonus years that she's been given since the attack. She's now at nineteen bonus years and counting, and she seems grateful for each of those years, she has said that she struggles with being called a hero. Her job was to heal people, so why would she be called a hero for killing someone. A friend offered this quote, They're not calling you a hero because you killed a man. They're calling you a hero because you give them hope that if they ever found themselves in the same situation, they might survive too. Well, I would call her a hero for training other women to be able to defend themselves. I couldn't agree with you more. To me, Susan's not just a hero because she survived. She's a hero because of what she's done, since she turned a horrifying traumatic moment into something powerful, a reason to help others, a mission to protect, educate, and empower. By sharing her story, especially with Portland groups like Women's Strength and Girl Strength, Susan has helped many others get the knowledge and skills they need to prevent violence and the support and resources they need to cope with the aftermath of violent crime.

45:39 For that, she's a true hero, and I'm really happy that we can share her story with those who may not have heard it before. Well. I am excited to donate to some of those causes because they are great. They are. This is normally where we do the rest in peace segment, and I always get choked up during those, But I'm getting choked up today because we don't have to do when And it's so nice and I'm so glad that Susan is still with us. Yeah. I when I started reading about this story, I was just so it was so nice to be able to do. A story with I mean, there is still a doubt. Yeah, I was gonna say it's not a completely happy ending because her husband never admitted to what he did. He never acknowledged it, and the you know. When having a woman persevere in domestic violence is just really.

46:23 Yeah, she went through a lot of trauma and went through quite a bit so to fight back. Yeah. Let me ask you a couple questions. So one is about motive. We talked about the police thinking that the motive was money. I wonder if you think his motive was more about money or was it more control or revenge. His motive seemed to be a vengeance. He didn't want her to be happy. He was miserable, and the thought of her starting over and living a happy life seemed to be too much for him. Yeah, he was a control freak like he I think as a malignant narcissist, which I think he probably was. He just couldn't handle the rejection and feeling like she was abandoning him. And she was going to you know, thrive and he was going to be left in his miserable girl gloom. Yeah.

47:07 Yeah. Do you think that he would have taken his own life. That's a good question. I mean, he left a note that sounded like a suicide note, he bought a gun the day after, but he you know, he didn't get caught for ten days or something like that, so I don't think so. We talked a little bit about this earlier, about intuition and not just in a relationship, like you get some early warning signs that maybe someone is very negative and not a happy person, but also when Susan walked into her house that night and she sensed that the lighting was off, it was a very subtle thing. I'm interested to explore that a little bit more, and you know, what you should do with any intuition and how you kind of get in touch with that. In that situation, I think that I would be able to send something, but you would be in real trouble.

47:52 I agree, really, I mean, I don't. You travel a lot and you come home and sometimes I'll I don't know, buy a new lamp or whatever the thing is, and I'll be like, do you notice anything different? Do you? And you rarely do rarely. I'm not insulting you. I'm saying I think that you're right general I don't. I'm not saying Almond, but you are not the most observant. You're right, But I just I like to think that I would sense something, some danger or something like that's not you know, when you rearrange furniture, buy a new you know, thing or something that's different. But you're probably right. You're probably right. You traveled this week and because I'm a head, has just left like there was just some reorganizing of our house, and I moved. I moved to Keith.

48:32 Did you notice I did? Keith is on the other side of the room, because I. Was we're talking about Keith Morrison, of course of dayline same. Our cardboard cutout of Keith. I mean, I I because he's now when you walk by the room you can see him, and he really scared me, and I'm like, ohos sorry. He scares me sometimes. Yeah, I think I did, like apologize, like there's some guy in the house, and I'm like, god, it was very strange. I think the bottom line this intuition discussion, though, is trust your gut. Right if you feel like something off, either in your relationship or when you walk in your house, definitely listen to that voice inside. But then sometimes people hear voices that are real, and you know, if you have PTSD, you're always going to be, you know, in a situation of alarm, and you know that's not good either. I said something earlier that I probably shouldn't have said when we were talking about who owned the house and if Susan you know, was separating from Mike and she had boundaries in place, like Mike, you can't come over here anymore. He should have respected those boundaries.

49:38 Yeah. Absolutely, Just because he owns the house doesn't mean he has a right to be there, right exactly. Boundaries matter when you are, you know, either working on your relationship or ending your marriage, whichever they were doing. Like, he needed to respect that. Once he didn't respect those boundaries, then then he would maybe become more comfortable crossing other boundaries. Let me ask you to put yourself in Susan's shoes for that day September sixth, when she walked into her house and she's attacked. How do you think you would react to that? I mean, I don't have training like Susan has. I should, but I mean I think I might not have survived. I think preparation is so important for things like that. I think the bottom line is, no one knows how they would react, right. Some people have a fight response, some people have a flight response, and it's just it's hard to know how you'll react, which is why I think training is so important.

50:29 Right, Absolutely, And she was comfortable with that training. She knew what she was capable of, and I think that's a fabulous Yeah. One thing I wanted to say before we close is Susan's story is remarkable and her strength is definitely worth celebrating. When I was young, my father died of cancer, and when other people would talk about survivors of cancer, they would talk about like he was so strong, or she fought cancer and she wasn't going to let cancer beat her. And used to make me really angry as a kid because it made me feel like my father wasn't a fighter like he didn't try his best. So I just say that because I. Want to acknowledge that not everyone survives a situation like Susan was in.

51:10 And I think most people fight as hard as they can and a lot of people lose their battle. It's like your dad lost his battle, but I'm sure he would have fought as hard as he could to be there for you and your family. Yeah, before we go, there was one aspect of this case that we glossed over really quickly. We didn't talk about much, and that was the fact that Susan had cats. And I don't know if you remember, but she called Mike to see if he could take care of the cats because she was going out of town. Apparently he said no, we couldn't because he was stressed out and he had to go to the beach or something like that. But he got me thinking, like where were the cats in this situation? Like if you had a dog and someone broke into your house, most dogs would be all over that intruder, right, I think the cats were like, well, this isn't this isn't our business. We'll just be here under the couch, you know, while all this happens. So I'm wondering, how do you think Cosmo and Clover would react if someone broke into our house.

52:06 I mean, they would definitely be hiding. I think in. General, cats are probably the worst security pets that you could have. Although Cosmo he bit me the other day. He did, and if he would do that to an intruder, I think it would help a lot, but he really is well. I think to really scare an intruder, they would have to jump at the intruder's face. Yeah, claws out, and I don't think our cats would do that. No, probably not. I actually did find a few stories where a cat did save the day, so there was This is in Mississippi. A retired surgeon named Fred Everett was alerted in the dead of night by his twenty pound Calico cat Bandit. The cat pawed and yanked his blanket, prompting Fred to discover that two men were actually breaking in. So wow, bandits instinct prevented a burglary, or it could have been worse.

52:50 The cat didn't attack the intruders, but the cat did at least warn its owner that someone was coming in the house. How much was the average cat weigh I think it's fourteen. I thought it was funny. The story specifically mentioned it was a twenty two. Yeah, well, I don't think that the clover wouldn't be able to. She's very small. She wouldn't be able to get the covers off of us. That's true. Cosmo is he is kind of a big boy. Yeah, he might be able to. Another story from the UK, forty two year old woman Sam Felsted suffered a heart attack in bed. Her cat Billy, sprang into action and actually jumped on her chest and basically did like chest compressions. Yeah how cats do that? Right? They sort of like needing motion. I know, don't even have to have a lot more pressure to restart the heart.

53:33 I would think so. But the cat helped her regain consciousness and she was able to actually call for help. So I don't know if the chest compressions actually did that or if the cat did it intentionally, but it's pretty cool. And then the last one I had, this was actually a video that went viral and I saw I hadn't seen it before that I remembered, but it was pretty amazing. So in twenty fourteen, this is in California. There was a four year old boy playing in his driveway when suddenly this dog came out of nowhere and attacked him. And the dog came after this boy and grabbed him and started dragging him away, and this boy's cat, Tara, the cat just immediately sprang into action and jumped out and just like attacked the dog. It was so impressive because this cat was like, uh huh, you are not going to do this to my little boy, and it was Yeah, it was really cool to see that. I'll share the video or I'll put the link in our show notes as well.

54:25 I mean, I love our cats. I think they're great companions. I have lately been missing having dogs. Dogs, but dogs have a completely different energy than cats. Yeah. Cats are so subtle and you could. Just leave them home alone for three days and they're. Like, yeah, well they're a little angry when you get back. Yeah, for sure. Well, this week has been really hard, especially on Clover, because Emma is gone and Clover and Emma are very close. Emma has texted to be a few times and she's like, I really miss Clover. Yeah, she has another cat at her apartment, but she still misses Cosmo and Clover. But they are going to be united today. I know. I kept trying to tell Clover that Emma was coming to see you today. I was afraid to tell her in case it didn't happen. Right, She's on her way, so that's very exciting. I'm excited to see their reunion. But you know, cats are Clover is probably gonna be like, yeah, where are you've been?

55:13 And I'm like, it is interesting. Do you think that Clover was was really like depressed? Do you think cats really feel that like? I do think she was because because the place is that she was actually in this room, which we call a light bulb lab. She was underneath one of these green chairs. Yeah, for like hours, and I tried to move her and she did not want to move. And that's just not a place that she normally. Yeah, I can definitely tell she knows that something isn't right. It's not her well, and Emma's room is like she you know, she took a lot of this stuff out of it. But I am going to make it into the cat's bedroom now, so good idea, not exactly the cat's bedroom, but Emma took the bets. So we're getting a new bed and we're just going to make it, you know, cozy where the cats or anyone can go hang out. Yeah, like a reading room.

56:03 Kind of nice. Thanks again to Jenessa for recommending today's case, and thank you all for listening. We really appreciate each and every one of you. If you're enjoying the show and you want to support the work we do, we would love to invite you to join our Patreon for just five dollars a month. You get early accessed episodes, so you get access on Saturday instead of Monday, and if we're doing a multi part case, you don't have to wait. You'll get the whole thing at once, no cliffhangers, no see you next week. You'll also get completely ad free episodes, plus a bonus episode every month just for our Patreon members. It's a simple way to support the research, writing, and the production that goes into every episode, and it helps us keep doing this show the way that we love to do it. So if you want more true crime, less waiting, and the warm glow of knowing that you're helping out an independent podcast you enjoy, come hang out with us at patreon dot com. Slash Love Mary Kill.

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