The Grand Canyon hiking trail to Horsehoe Mesa is known for its leg-busting climbs and spectacular views.
It is also a “smart place if you wanted to murder somebody.” At least that was the opinion of National Park Special Agent Bev Perry, who investigated the death of Donna Spangler, 59, during a backpacking trip in 1993.
Donna and her husband, Bob 60, woke up on Easter Sunday morning and decided to take a photo. “I positioned Donna and turned to mount the camera on a rock for an automatic picture of us together,” he wrote in an incident report for the Park Service. “I heard a small sound from Donna and turned and she was gone,” he explained.
The death was ruled an accident.
But some speculated that Spangler had given his wife a “Grand Canyon divorce,” wrote Robert Scott in his 2004 book on the case, “Married to Murder.”
Their four-year marriage, her second and his third, had not been going well.
Donna tried to make the relationship work, following along as he pursued his passion for hiking in the Grand Canyon. It was not an ideal activity for her. Although she was an aerobics instructor, she suffered from vertigo and used ski poles to maneuver on the trails.
Relatives said she was also afraid of heights.
Perhaps more disturbing was her husband’s history. Donna was not the first of Bob Spangler’s spouses to die under suspicious circumstances.
That distinction went to Nancy Stahlman, the high-school sweetheart he married in 1955.
Bob was the adopted son of a university professor in Ames, Iowa. Born in 1933 in Des Moines, and immediately put up for adoption, he knew nothing about his biological parents.
As a teen, he was bright, brash, and full of confidence. He also had a wicked temper.
Bob and Nancy married after college, and he joined the Army. After he was discharged, he worked in public relations, journalism, and broadcasting (he contributed to the development of Sesame Street for PBS). A public relations job brought the Spangler clan, which by this time included a daughter, Susan, and a son, David, to Littleton, Colorado.
They had been married for about 20 years when a young secretary, Sharon Cooper, caught Bob’s eye. He started spending his free time hiking with Cooper in the Grand Canyon. His marriage frayed, and he moved out.
On Dec. 30, 1978, Nancy, David, 17, and 15-year-old Susan Spangler were found dead in the family home. The children were shot in their bedrooms. Police found Nancy’s body in the basement, a bullet wound in her head. Near her body was a .38 caliber pistol with a man’s sock wrapped around the handle, a typewriter, and a suicide note.
The deaths were ruled a murder/suicide.
There were no accusations of foul play, even after Cooper moved into the Spangler family home. They married the following year. Together they continued to hike, and Sharon wrote a book based in part on their travels, “On Foot in the Grand Canyon.” But things started to go sour after a few years, and the couple divorced in 1988.
Bob met his next wife, Donna, through a singles ad. A mother of five, she had been divorced since 1974.
Bob Spangler was not initially a suspect in his third wife’s death. Hiking in the Grand Canyon, after all, was inherently dangerous. In the same year that Donna fell from the trail at Horseshoe Mesa, six other people died in falls somewhere in the park, the worst year on record. Spangler, who hiked in the area for 14 years, was interviewed about hiker safety. “The people that visit simply forget how spectacularly dangerous it can be,” he told the Associated Press.
Soon after Donna’s death, his second wife, Sharon, hit a rough patch in her life and moved back in with him. In 1994, she died from an apparent drug overdose. Her death was ruled an accident.
Spangler moved on, marrying for the fourth time. He was unaware that for years a team of investigators were gathering information to tie him to the deaths of his wives.
They were still looking into the cases when they got a surprise break. In the fall of 2000, Spangler was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.
On the chance that he might confess before he died, detectives visited his home in Grand Junction, Col., on Sept. 14. He confessed to the murders in 1978 and 1993. He insisted he played no part in the drug-overdose death of his third wife.
He described how he brought Nancy into the basement and told her to sit in a chair and close her eyes. Then he shot her point-blank in the head.
“It was easier than divorce,” he rationalized.
Next, he shot his daughter as she slept in her bed. His aim was off when he shot his son, resulting in a non-fatal wound. “I ended up smothering him with a pillow.” Donna’s murder was also carefully planned. He knew the trail well and picked a spot where she’d be most likely to die in a fall. As to why, he repeated his earlier motivation: “Easier than divorce.”
Spangler pleaded guilty to Donna’s murder and admitted to killing his first family. His sentence — life in prison — was cut short by cancer in August 2001.
