A Quantity Of Horror

Linda Elizabeth Halverson was born on 16 June 1952 and grew up in the Minneapolis suburbs. She met Charles Jensen in kindergarten, and they became a couple at about twelve at a relative's cabin near Spicer. They married on 4 April 1971 and their son Andrew was born in about 1974. By 1979 the marriage was failing: Charlie admitted he could not let go of the drinking and partying of his youth, and they divorced. Linda then married Robert Beard and had a son, Joey, who suffered a stroke at six weeks old and was left with permanent disabilities. She said Beard was abusive, left him, and in 1986 married John Silman and moved to California with Joey. That marriage was over by about 1988. Linda and Charlie had stayed friendly because of Andrew, and in about 1989 they got back together, Charlie now sober and working as a carpenter. On 4 April 1991, their twentieth wedding anniversary, they married again with Linda seven months pregnant, and their daughter Lisa was born that summer. The family lived on Sherburne County Road 15 in Big Lake Township, about four miles north of U.S. Highway 10. Linda worked at a home for the developmentally disabled in Elk River, was a licensed dental hygienist and a keen runner.

On the morning of 24 February 1992 Charlie left for his carpentry job in Maplewood at about 6.20, after changing Lisa's nappy and kissing Linda goodbye. She had shin splints and said she was staying home with the baby. Joey left for school about an hour later. Charlie called home three times and got no answer. He was home by about 4.15. Lisa was in her playpen in the same pyjamas, soaked through, and Joey was sitting at the dining table. Charlie found the sheets stripped from the bed and no washing machine running, then saw Linda on the bedroom floor, naked, covered by a comforter pinned to her chest with a ten-inch knife from the kitchen block. He said he touched the knife, walked out and called the police.

There was no forced entry and nothing was taken except Linda's clothes and the bedsheets, which were never found. Jewellery was left behind. The autopsy found she had been beaten, raped, strangled and stabbed at least eleven times, the knife wounds described as slow and deliberate, some probably after death. A quantity of semen was recovered, and the medical examiner said the enzyme levels suggested it had been deposited close to death. He put the killing between 8 and 10 a.m., later narrowed to about 7.30 to 9.30. A postal carrier, Gloria Thompson, saw a short, unkempt, shaggy-haired man of about forty with a beard leaving the property at about 11.30 in a copper-coloured 1970s pickup with a flat silver bumper. A sketch was circulated, then withdrawn after Thompson changed her account. No one identified the man.

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it But the missing sheets and clothes made little sense for a husband whose hair and fingerprints were all over the house. Police also looked at Andrew, who lived half an hour away, and at Linda's ex-husbands and acquaintances. Robert Beard resembled the sketch, had called about visitation two weeks earlier, and his former girlfriend said he repeatedly told her he had killed Linda, describing a stab wound to the abdomen, the rape, semen that was not his and the baby in the room. Richard Christie, a man Linda knew from her gym, was said to have arrived with blood on his hands and jacket on the day of the murder and later left with towels and bags. this part of the story is covered for now John Silman was teaching in front of a class and was cleared. Charlie, Andrew and the other family members gave DNA and were excluded. The case went cold.

In 1995 the reward rose from $5,000 to $25,000. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it In 2000 a woman came forward. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed A court order was obtained and his DNA matched the semen from the scene.

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it He admitted two affairs in the late 1980s and early 1990s that he had hidden from his wife, and said he lied to police because he did not want her to find out. He said he had a five-month affair with Linda from October 1991 until the day before her death, that they had sex three times at his house, that he always wore a condom and that on the third occasion it broke. He denied rape and murder. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it

this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now In September 2006 his lawyer left over a payment dispute and an Oklahoma lawyer, Mike Johnston, took over. details of the account remain covered until revealed

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it The prosecution again rested on the DNA, now put at a chance of about one in five hundred billion of matching someone else. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it

this part of the story is covered for now In 2009 Angela Hennan was finally given an $18,000 cheque for the tip that led to the DNA. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it Linda is buried at Fort Snelling National Cemetery. this part of the story is covered for now