Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison (9 of Diamonds, Iowa)

Summary

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The Deck – Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison (9 of Diamonds, Iowa)

Podcast: The Deck
Episode Title: Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison (9 of Diamonds, Iowa)
Date: February 4, 2026
Host: Ashley Flowers

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Episode Overview

This episode explores the chilling double homicide of Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison, found brutally murdered in room 260 of the Holiday Inn Amana in rural Iowa, September 1980. Despite decades of investigation and the involvement of multiple law enforcement agencies, the case remains unsolved, shrouded in mystery due to the bizarre and staged aspects of the crime scene—and now, with new advancements in DNA technology, the case might finally be on the brink of a breakthrough.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Discovery and Details of the Crime Scene

[00:00–13:10]

• Timeline of Discovery:
  Housekeeping staff discovered the bodies after the couple failed to check out. Initially, staff thought they were sleeping due to clothes on the floor, but further checks revealed the grisly scene.
  Told by Ashley Flowers [02:17]

• Victims' Identities:

  • 32-year-old Roger Atkison and 22-year-old Rose Burkert.
  • The couple was so viciously attacked they were unrecognizable.

• Cause of Death:

  • Both were bludgeoned to the backs of their heads; Roger received 7 blows, Rose 12.
  • Defensive wounds indicated the victims tried to protect themselves.
  • The murder weapon likely a cleaver or cane knife rather than a hatchet.

    "I think it was probably something more like a machete or a cleaver type of weapon. Something heavy enough to do significant damage." — Chief Deputy Todd Sauerbrai [05:12]

• Odd Aspects of the Scene:

  • Two mismatched chairs were pulled up side by side, facing the bed. One, closest to Roger, was draped with a pristine hotel towel, possibly indicating the presence of two observers.

    "The chairs was an unusual thing...almost indicating that somebody was sitting in the chairs, looking at the bed." — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [06:58]

  • Personal belongings ransacked and scattered; a picture of a baby (linked to Roger) and a cashier's check (linked to Rose) both torn up.
  • Bar of soap destroyed on the floor—possibly pulverized or carved.
  • Bizarre message: The word "this" written in soap on the bathroom door.

    "He wrote the word 'this' on the back of the door with...that bar of soap." — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [10:42]

  • No personal toiletries left in the bathroom—just a tube of toothpaste squirted and spread into the tub.

2. The Victims’ Background and Secret Affair

[13:54–17:08]

• Affair Context:
  • Room was not booked under either victim’s name, but as "Roger Burkert" (a combination of their names).
  • Roger was married, and his wife Marcella only learned of Rose upon being notified of the murder.
  • Roger had told his wife he was on a work trip; he and Rose met for a secret weekend rendezvous.

3. Movements the Night of the Murder & Mysterious Calls

[17:08–19:58]

• Arbitrary Room Booking:
  • Couple got the room last-minute due to a cancellation; unlikely anyone knew their exact plans.
• Timeline Gaps:
  • 8:00 PM: Rose calls her daughter's babysitter from the room.
  • 8:31 PM: Babysitter’s husband calls back—no one answers.
  • 9:00 PM: Unknown white middle-aged man calls hotel, asks specifically for Rose; call is transferred.
  • 9:15 PM: Neighbor hears a woman say "room service" from 260’s direction, followed by a thud.
  • 10:30 PM: Another neighbor hears a voice say, "I don't believe it. Where's Randy?" from outside.
  • Next morning: Do Not Disturb sign on door.

4. Parallel Murders and the Toothpaste Link

[23:11–26:55]

• Similar Cases:

  • Three months prior, William Kyle was murdered in similar circumstances in Galesburg, IL: no forced entry, squirted toothpaste in the bathroom, bludgeoned head wounds, robbery.
  • Third case in Meridian, MS: Jack McDonald, similar features, both salesmen, same peculiar presentation.

    "...in both, the wounds are approximately three and a half inches apart...in both, the personal effects and belongings have been gone through..." — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [23:35]

• Key Suspect in Other Cases:

  • Raimundo Esparza, seen near a previous crime scene, but not tied conclusively to any case.

5. Theories and Potential Suspects

[26:55–38:45]

• A. Raimundo Esparza

  • Connected as a suspect by proximity and resemblance of the murders.
  • Not definitively linked via evidence; DNA and fingerprints do not match crime scene.
  • He died in 1983, leaving unresolved suspicion.

• B. Charles Hatcher (Family Serial Killer):

  • Convicted child killer, related to Roger’s wife. Ultimately ruled out by timecards and lack of motive.

    "Trying to find a motive for Charles eventually became so outlandish that investigators wrote him off completely." — Ashley Flowers [30:13]

• C. Floyd Hatcher (Marcella’s Father):

  • Known to be aware of the affair, possibly had a motive.
  • Made odd, potentially incriminating statements to girlfriends.
  • Alibi unclear; multiple people "covered" for him.

    “Well, mom said he was with her, and his girlfriend said he was with her, so I don’t know where he was at.” — Marcella [32:42]

  • Died in 2017; ruled out through familial DNA testing.

• D. Marcella Atkison (Roger’s Wife):

  • Faced intense suspicion and scrutiny, including accusations by Roger’s brother Larry.

    “I envisioned...she’s probably sitting in one of those chairs along with her dad...giving him devil out of the Bible.” — Larry [36:18]

  • Had a strong alibi and no evidence or motive tying her to the crime.

• E. Mike H. (Roger’s Brother-in-Law and Colleague):

  • Unusual behavior post-murder (dumping items before police arrived).
  • Provided alibi more than a decade later, remembered by his wife.

6. Advances in Forensics and The Hope for Justice

[38:45–46:42]

• DNA Testing Initiatives:

  • 2015: Forensic evidence from the scene (including towels) was tested for DNA for the first time.
  • Result: Male DNA profile uncovered—but not matching any known suspects or previously tested persons.

    “It’s an unknown male DNA profile. It’s a pretty good profile, all things considered.” — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [39:58]

• Challenges:

  • No matches in national databases; concern about potential red herrings due to hotel towel/contamination.

• New Efforts:

  • More advanced testing (MVAC) is planned for the towel, Roger’s wallet (not yet tested), and the toothpaste tube, in hopes of extracting further DNA.

    "There is one item that I've never tested, and I'm just waiting for the right time to do that...Roger's wallet." — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [44:07]

7. Linger Questions, Family Reflections, and the Unsolved Nature

[44:46–46:42]

• Unknown male caller the night of the murders—his identity could be key.
• Marcella believes the murder was "personal" given the overkill and circumstances.

  “I think it was personal because they were. It was overkill, you know, just...they didn’t just kill somebody, they overkilled them.” — Marcella [45:40]

• Marcella has moved on with her life but still hopes for justice.
• The investigation awaits breakthroughs from DNA or a crucial tip.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On the bizarre crime scene:

  “There was just a lot of odd things about the crime scene. We don’t really know why they would have taken the time to do some of those things.” — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [06:29]

• On the killer’s behavior:

  “The killer had taken out bars of soap...and he had crushed one of the bars of soap, kind of pulverized it, and it was just laying...on the floor amongst those other items.” — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai [08:07]

• On the emotional toll for family:

  “If he ever talks like he needs to get something off of his mind, you know, like some kind of confession...please listen.” — Marcella [33:23]

• Roger’s brother’s suspicions:

  “He told me he had an old rotten watermelon.” — Larry, on Mike H.’s explanation for dumping items [37:56]

• On the hope for a break:

  “Maybe this new method of testing for DNA will finally close Rose and Rogers case.” — Ashley Flowers [44:46]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 01:51 — Introduction of the case, initial scene recounting
• 03:58 — Chief Deputy Sauerbrai describes cause of death and scene details
• 06:29 — Crime scene oddities: chairs, soap, shredded items
• 10:42 — Soap-written message: “this” on the bathroom door
• 13:54 — Revelation about victims' affair and false room registration
• 17:08 — Timeline of last calls and room service ruse
• 23:11 — Discussion of similar murders in Illinois and Mississippi
• 29:39 — Exploration of Charles Hatcher as a suspect
• 31:37 — Floyd Hatcher’s possible motive and suspicious comments
• 35:45 — Roger’s brother Larry’s speculation about Marcella
• 39:12 — DNA testing timeline and findings/suspect elimination
• 41:32 — Attempts to retrieve suspect DNA from deceased suspect
• 44:07 — Reveal: Roger’s wallet has never been tested
• 45:40 — Marcella’s conviction that the crime was personal

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Conclusion

The Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison double murder remains a frustrating and haunting mystery—one amplified by strange details, familial secrets, and the chilling possibility of a serial killer’s pattern. With new DNA technologies and a persistent investigative team, hope lingers that the nearly half-century-old case can still be solved. Anyone with information is encouraged to contact the Iowa County Sheriff’s Office.

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For more episodes and information on cold case advocacy:
thedeckpodcast.com

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Transcript

[A]

Hi everyone. Ashley here with some exciting news. The Deck will not only land right here in your feed for you to listen to every week, but now we are also on camera for you to watch on YouTube. Now you can see the cards, the case files, and the people behind the coldest cases as I share these stories with you. So no matter where you get your podcasts, whether you prefer to listen to watch or maybe both, I will be there with stories you need to hear. Join me for the Deck on YouTube. Subscribe to Audio Chuck Investigates on YouTube today. Our card this week is Rose Burkert and Roger Atkison the nine of diamonds from Iowa in September 1980, a Holiday Inn hotel in rural Iowa became the scene of a shocking double murder. A couple was found dead in their hotel bed covered in lacerations and the scene around them is one of the strangest and most puzzling I have ever come across in all my work. It's one of the reasons that this case has gained notoriety over time. I mean, to this day, the hotel where the couple lost their lives is still visited by true crime fanatics. Despite multiple suspects and three agencies contributing to this investigation. No one has ever been arrested or charged in connection with Rose and Rogers deaths. But we have an exclusive update. Something is about to happen in this case that just might solve this nearly 50 year old mystery. I'm Ashley Flowers and this is the Deck.

[B]

Saint.

[A]

Saturday, September 13, 1980 was a busy one for the housekeeping staff at the Holiday Inn Amana in Iowa. Nearly every One of their 291 rooms were booked by members of a morticians convention that was in town. Housekeeping was probably up to their eyeballs in work that morning trying to get rooms turned over. So I imagine the supervisor, Ida Block, was annoyed to hear that the guests in room 260 were staying well beyond their checkout time. The do not Disturb sign had been on the door as early as 8am when her staff checked. But well after checkout time had passed, one of Ida's staff members tried entering the room. As soon as she cracked the door open, she noticed clothes on the floor, so she assumed that the couple were still sleeping and she left. Then at some point she notified Ida, who now had to go be the bad guy and kick this couple out. So at 1:15pm Ida headed through the outdoor breezeway to room 260 at the very end of the hallway on the second floor. Back then, digital key cards weren't really a thing, meaning Ida had to use a physical master key to unlock the door where the do not disturb sign still hung. When she opened it, she saw the same mess of clothes on the floor from before. But she continued in planning to wake up the sleeping guests. But the second she passed the bathroom on her left, when the full view of the room came into sight, she was horrified. Two people lay in the bed side by side under a blood soaked comforter. Here's Chief Deputy Todd Sauerbry of the Iowa County Sheriff's Office.

[C]

They've been bludgeoned with a sharp object both to the back of their head. They had some defensive wounds or what I would describe as defensive wounds to their hands where they were probably trying to protect the back of their head. All that was contained on the bed. They would have been killed while they were in bed.

[A]

When detectives were called onto the scene, they soon found out that they were looking at a man and a woman, 32 year old Roger Atkison and 22 year old Rose Burkert. But they had to learn that through investigative means, the couple had been attacked so viciously that they would have been unrecognizable even to those who knew them. Roger was face down, clad only in his underwear, while Rose was on her back with her head tilted toward Roger. But unexpectedly, at least to me, when I first heard this, Rose was fully clothed in blue jeans and a halter top, but she wasn't wearing shoes or socks.

[C]

Roger had seven blows to the back of his head and Rose had 12. I don't know if there's any significance on more or less to one or the other, but the lacerations were all fairly consistent. I think they were three and a half inches. I mean, they were fairly deep and long lacerations on the back of their head. They speculated it was either a hatchet type of weapon, a machete type of weapon. We called the Amana hatchet murders. I don't. Personally, I don't think it was a hatchet. I think it was probably something more like a machete or a cleaver type of weapon. Something heavy enough to do significant damage. I think an axe would have been almost too heavy, so I think it was more like a cleaver.

[A]

Specifically, Chief Deputy Sauerbride believes the murder weapon was a cane knife, a kind of blade that's used to cut down thick and fibrous sugar cane. Now, we don't know that for certain, but whatever kind of blade it was, it was solid and heavy. And while the sheer violence of this was enough to stop any investigator in their tracks back in 1980, it wasn't the part of the case that shocked them the most. What did was the strangeness of everything else in the small hotel room. And that is what I believe has caused this case to live in infamy for nearly 50 years.

[C]

There was just a lot of odd things about the crime scene. We don't really know why they would have taken the time to do some of those things.

[A]

Some of the bigger messes that stood out in the room Weren't that odd, like the luggage bags that had been rummaged through and tossed. It was the smaller details that would leave even a seasoned true crime investigator with goosebumps on the back of their neck. Like the two chairs in the room that had been repositioned to face the.

[C]

Victims, the chairs was an unusual thing that a lot of people spent a lot of time trying to figure out what that means. There was a small table in the back of that hotel room, and the chairs had been moved from that table and were positioned next to the bed. So if you're looking at. If you're looking at the bed, Roger was on the right side of the bed, and Rose was on the left. And so on Roger's right side, the chairs were positioned so they were a couple of feet away from the bed. So almost indicating that somebody was sitting in the chairs, looking at the bed.

[A]

Somebody or somebodies. Though the two chairs were side by side, they're different in style. And the one closest to the wall and the nightstand, and therefore, Roger's head is eerily covered In a pristine white hotel towel. And at the base of that chair on the floor, that's where investigators found.

[C]

A scattering of items he had ransacked or rummaged through. Roger's wallet. I don't know where the wallet was originally, if it was in his pants on the floor, or where he found the wallet, but he had gone through that wallet and removed a lot of property from it. Pictures, business cards. They're just laying on the floor randomly. And one of those things was a picture. It was a picture of an infant that was torn in half. And there was a cashier's check. It was torn in little pieces. It was probably torn into 20 little pieces. So that was very unusual that the killer took the time to shred that check for whatever reason. And the cashier's check was. It was from Rose written. It was either written to or from her. Her stepbrother, J.C. halter. So you had someone on personal side of that. Roger knew the torn pitcher. And then you had someone on the personal side of Rose with the Torn cashier's check. The other thing interesting on the floor was the killer had taken out the bars of soap, just the standard hotel soap that comes in the wrappers from that bathroom. And he had crushed one of the bars of soap, kind of pulverized it, and it was just laying, kind of crumbled and pulverized on the floor amongst those other items that were laying on the floor.

[A]

Chief Deputy Sauerbrai uses the words crumbled and pulverized when he talks about the soap pieces. But a good number of online sleuths speculate that the killer may have actually been carving the bar of soap, letting the shavings fall to the floor as this person worked. And I'm kind of partial to that theory because, call me crazy, but when I zoom in, I swear, it's almost like you can see an outline in the soap shavings of what could be a pair of shoes. Like someone was seated, leaning over, hands on knees, as the shavings fell to their feet. Did the killer destroy the whole bar of soap? Was there a carved piece left that they took with them? I wish I could tell you, but there isn't any mention in the case file of investigators retrieving other soap samples from the hotel to compare against. So I don't know if the pieces on the floor would account for the whole bar. I can say, though, that the bar was used for one other thing. A message left on the bathroom door.

[C]

He wrote the word this on the back of the door with. It looked like it was written with that bar of soap, so don't know why he did that either.

[A]

This. This what? This door, this bathroom. What did this clue mean in comparison to the rest of the hotel room? The bathroom was pretty tidy, devoid of any personal items belonging to Rose and Roger.

[C]

Except the only thing in that bathroom was a tube of toothpaste. That was. The toothpaste had been squirted into the tub.

[A]

In investigators photos of the tub, you can clearly see globs of Turquoise Crest toothpaste all over the dry floor of the tub, along with a small, crumpled hand towel near the drain.

[C]

That was the only thing in that bathroom other than there was towels in that bathroom that the killer had used to clean himself up with. One was on the sink, one was on the floor. There was another small hand towel in the tub next to that toothpaste. But there was no personal items in that bathroom. So I don't have any doubt that the killer took the time to remove the tube of toothpaste from the luggage and place it in the bathroom because it was the only item in there.

[A]

I agree. There was no toothbrush with it. The rest of Roger and Rose's toiletries were in their bags, or at least scattered near their bags in the bedroom area. So the killer went and got the toothpaste, brought it back to the bathroom intentionally to squeeze it out in the tub. But why? Why the toothpaste? Why the soap shavings and message and torn items? Why this? Right? It had to have some kind of meaning. It had to be personal. So who was this couple? What brought them to this hotel? Well, as it turns out, Rose and Roger had a secret. One that might drive someone to kill.

[D]

There was evidence in the house and they would not listen to me.

[E]

The Proof podcast is back with a new case and a new season. And this time the stakes are higher than ever before.

[B]

The letter from the doctor said I have six months or less to live. I'm scared shitless right now.

[E]

A dying man is serving a life sentence for a murder he says he didn't commit.

[A]

Did you ever question if they got the right person? I don't think I believed it at the time. I don't think I believe it now. I'm scared to be sitting here in.

[D]

This damn chair talking about this shit.

[B]

How many other cold cases were going to come forward and go, hey man, you need to look at my shit because I didn't do it. How many more do we have?

[E]

You can listen now to season three of Proof wherever you get your podcasts and follow along with us as we reinvestigate the murder at the bike shop.

[C]

Everything I tell you is the truth. I'm not bullshitting one way or the other. I hope I don't bring a ton of shit down on me. I really do.

[A]

Room 260 at the holiday Inn Amana was not registered to either of its now deceased occupants. Or at least it wasn't registered to either of them in their legal name. Instead, room 260 was booked for Saturday, September 13, 1980, using the name Roger Burkert, a combination of Roger's first name and Rose's last, as if Roger was trying to hide his identity. And that might have been for good reason. Because when investigators went looking for Rogers next of kin over 200 miles away at his home in St. Joseph, Missouri, it was his wife that they had to notify.

[D]

I found out the two men that were there in suits were detectives. And they started asking me like, where's Roger at? And I said, he's on a two week job. In Cuica, Missouri.

[A]

That was Roger's then wife, Marcella. We reached her by a slightly fuzzy phone line, as you can hear. But she told us that when two detectives showed up at her door, she couldn't believe what she was hearing.

[D]

They said, well, we found a body with his ID on it in Iowa in a motel. And I said, no, no, he's not in Iowa. He's in Missouri. Co Missouri. I said, it's got to be a mistaken identity. He, somebody must have stolen his ID and they've got it on them and it's them. It can't be him. He'll be calling me anytime to say this has been a big mistake. So I was convinced of that. And they go, well, we don't think so. We think, you know, it's him. You know, appears to be him. And there wasn't a whole lot of time that went by until they said, do you know Rose Burker? And I said, no, who's Rose Burker? And they go, well, that's the woman that was killed with him.

[A]

Marcella insists she'd never heard of Rose until that very moment. The idea that her husband of seven years was having an affair was shocking. I mean, after all, Marcella and Roger were devout Christians. They had met at church. And now she was learning that her husband had been murdered while on a secret trip with another woman just one week, by the way, after their wedding anniversary. Now, Roger's trip hadn't been a total lie. He did have a work trip that September.

[C]

Roger worked for a telephone company. I think it was GTE telephone company, and he was a telephone repairman and he was assigned a two week job up in northern Missouri. So he was in Cahoka, Missouri is where he was stationed for a two week period.

[A]

Cahoka, Missouri is less than two hours from the holiday in Amana. And what investigators discovered is that partway through Roger's work trip, Rose had driven up from Missouri to meet him. And when he got off work Friday, September 12, the couple took Rose's car and drove to the Holiday Inn Amana, which was this popular tourist spot. That's where they were going to have their little rendezvous. They checked in at 7:40pm it was.

[C]

Just kind of by luck that they actually got a room at the hotel. There was a convention going on that weekend and the hotel had been booked, but there was a last minute cancellation, so they were able to get a room.

[A]

The arbitrary nature of the couple's hotel choice stood out to investigators because Rose and Roger hadn't planned their Reservation in advance. It made it very unlikely that someone would have known their intended destination. So either this was a random attack or possibly their killer had followed them there. When the hotel staff were questioned about the couple's arrival that night, none of them could remember anything significant about Rose and Roger. Several of them even went under hypnosis at the request of investigators to see if they could recall anything that might be a clue, but nothing came up. Investigators were certain, though, that at 8pm at least, rose was in her hotel room. And they knew that because Rose placed a phone call at that time to her daughter's babysitter for from the room. The babysitter didn't pick up. So Rose just left a message and asked the babysitter to call her back. She left the hotel's phone number, said she was at the Amanas. Now, investigators were able to confirm with the hotel that Rose did get a call back at 8:31. This was the babysitter's husband phoning and the call was transferred to the room. But this time no one picked up. Now another call gets transferred from hotel staff to room 260 at 9pm Police records note that it was a man that called the main hotel line asking for Rose. Specifically, the staff member who picked up the phone described the caller as white and middle aged, but sounding different than the babysitter's husband who had phoned at 8:31. And according to the police records, that call was believed to have gone through. At no time after the couple checked in did anyone hear anything out of the ordinary. No shouting, no screaming, nothing. And this was a full hotel, mind you. I mean, the one room next to 260 and the one across from it were both occupied the night of the 12th. But somehow those neighbors heard very little. All we know is that at 9:15, this is 15 minutes after that final call was transferred to the room. The guests who were staying across the hall heard a woman's voice say, room service. Now, what's lacking in the case file is any canvassing report stating whether or not police confirmed that the hotel even offered room service. And if they did, which room in the general vicinity may have ordered any Chief deputy Sauerbrai didn't come onto this case until 2015, so the original investigators were long gone. But he's pretty sure that if someone got room service, it wasn't Rose and Roger.

[C]

There was nothing in their hotel room that suggested they had gotten any food. There was two kind of Styrofoam, almost like you went to Dairy Queen back in 1980 and got like a malt or something.

[A]

So was that room service announcement for another guest or was it a ruse that someone used to get inside room 260? At around the same time, the those same guests across the hall heard a loud thud coming from the direction of Rosen Rogers room, but nothing else that indicated anything worrisome. At 10:30pm, a woman in room 262, this is the one that shared a wall with 260. She heard a voice coming from the quote unquote outside say, I don't believe it. Where's Randy? From that point onwards though, no guests reported anything. And by 8am the next morning, the do not disturb sign was hung on Rose and Rogers door. If the killer hadn't used a ruse to get into room 260, investigators were unsure how the assailant made entry. Like I mentioned before, you need a physical. Old school key that went inside a lock. The hotel staff said the master key was kept behind the front desk and there were no signs that it had been removed or gone missing at any point. I found myself wondering if perhaps someone didn't come in behind Rose. I mean, I find it odd that she's fully clothed while Roger was only in his underwear. And something I haven't even mentioned yet is next to Rose on the bed were a small pile of random things. Glasses, her wallet, keys, and a deck of cards. So had Rose maybe gone out to her car or somewhere else on the hotel property and then been followed back to her room? But again, why? Was this a personal attack? Could it have been connected to their affair? Or was it a random assault and they had just been horribly unlucky? I mean, that seemed kind of far fetched, especially considering all those strange details at the crime scene, like that toothpaste in. In the bathtub. But as police were about to learn, that might not be as unique as one would think.

[D]

There was evidence in the house and they would not listen to me.

[E]

The Proof podcast is back with a new case and a new season. And this time the stakes are higher than ever before.

[B]

The doctor said I have six months or less to live. I'm scared shitless right now.

[E]

A dying man is serving a life sentence for a murder he says he didn't commit.

[A]

Did you ever question if they got the right person?

[D]

I don't think I believed it at the time.

[A]

I don't think I believe it now. I'm scared to be sitting here in.

[D]

This damn chair talking about this shit.

[B]

How many other cold cases were going to come forward and Go. Hey, man, we need to look at my shit because I didn't do it. How many more do we have?

[E]

You can listen now to season three of Proof, wherever you get your podcasts and follow along with us as we reinvestigate the murder at the bike shop.

[C]

Everything I tell you is the truth. I'm not bullshitting one way or the other. I hope I don't bring a ton of shit down on me. I really do.

[A]

Roughly three months before Rose and Roger were brutally murdered in their Iowa hotel room. A man named William Kyle had been killed a two hour drive away. And his murder bore a striking resemblance to the scene in Amana on June 24, 1980. William, a traveling salesman, was found dead in his Sheraton Inn hotel room in Galesburg, Illinois.

[C]

So the similarities are no forced entry into either room. Robbery apparent prior to the homicide in Galesburg, Illinois. Apparent robbery or ransacking prior to the homicides in Little Manna. Injuries or blows to the back of the head in Galesburg. In Little Manna, it's injuries to the back of the victim's heads. In both, the wounds are approximately three and a half inches apart. In both, the weapon is believed to be a hatchet type instrument. In both, the personal effects and belongings have been gone through. Both male victims are face down in the bed. The male victims are only in their shorts. Both victims were found by the maid, so they weren't found until the next day. The do not disturb sign is on both doors. Probably most significantly is the toothpaste. The toothpaste is squirted at both crime scenes.

[A]

Detectives in Iowa started working with the Galesburg investigators who were trying to solve William Kyle's case. I mean, they wanted to know if they'd identified any suspects that might be connected to Rose and Roger. And that's how they came across the name Raimundo Esparza. Raimundo was a steelworker who grew up in Los Angeles. But at the time of Rosen Rogers murder, he was living just over an hour from the holiday in Amana. Now, the sheer fact that he was considered a suspect in the Galesburg murder made the Iowa investigators consider him a suspect on their case, too. Although how Raimundo became a suspect in Galesburg is worth talking about. Our reporter Laura Frater talked with former Galesburg Sergeant William Horton about this, and I'll give you the short version, mostly because there isn't a long one. Raimundo was seen at the Sheraton Hotel when William was killed. That's it. Now, why he was the Only person police zeroed in on is a question that no one has been able to answer. And while there were a few pieces of evidence from the crime scene, like fingerprints and a pair of nail clippers, testing never connected them to Raimundo. Which is why he was never charged with the murder at the Sheraton Inn. Still, they passed his name off to investigators in Iowa. And listen, they were hard up for leads. And at that moment he was the only one they had. And if you can believe it, the only name that came up in the only other murder they knew of that involved a squeezed out tube of toothpaste. So it fueled Iowa investigators interest in Raimundo. Especially when the Iowa team learned that there was another hotel murder in Mississippi that also had unusual toothpaste globs squirted in the bathroom. That bathroom was at the Travel Inn in Meridian, Mississippi. The victim was 23 year old Jack McDonald, also a traveling salesman like William. Sergeant Horton remembered seeing the picture of that crime scene too and said that if you looked at them side by side with the Sheridan Inn crime scene, you could not tell which crime scene was which. Now we asked the Meridian Police Department for access to the photos, but they never responded to our request. I did though catch a glimpse of them after Chief Deputy Sour Bride dug around in the Rose and Roger file. Cause at some point the Iowa investigators got copies. And holy cow, it is no joke. In the Illinois and Mississippi cases, each man is knelt on the ground, clad only in shorts, with their bludgeoned heads face down in the bed. This is a noticeable difference to Roger, who was lying fully in bed under the covers and next to a second victim, Rose. But I get why they were looking at all three of these together. What I still don't get though is why anyone was talking about Raimundo. As far as we can tell, investigators could never place him at the Travel Inn and so he was never charged with that case or the Sheridan Inn murder. And even after police identified a partial fingerprint on the cashier's check found ripped on the floor of Rose and Rogers room and that print didn't match Raimundo, he remained the main suspect in Rose and Roger's case. On December 10, 1980, a few months after Rose and Roger were killed, investigators executed a search warrant on Raimundo's apartment. The police records state that Raimundo wasn't home at the time and some towels were collected during the search. But what happened to those towels isn't noted and investigators don't appear to have seen anything else of Significance. Two days after that, a whole host of investigators from different agencies from finally interviewed Raimundo. The team from Iowa wanted to know about Rose and Roger. The Illinois team wanted to know about William, but they all got nothing. While no one appeared to ask him explicitly where he was the night of the murders, Raimundo told them that he had never been to the area where the Holiday Inn Amana was located. The Amana colonies, I mean, in fact, Raimundo called it the amanda colonies. In 1983, roughly three years after Rose and Roger were murdered, Raimundo died without being charged for any murder, but without being cleared either. So he just kind of hung over this case like a cloud. While investigators ran down as many other leads as they could. Investigators had tracked down almost all of the hotel guests and the staff, along with all of the obvious suspects, like Rose's ex boyfriend, for example, and the father of her child. But even the ones with movies, more motive than Raimundo couldn't be definitively linked to the crime. Even the serial killer in Rogers Family was looked into. And you heard me right. It wasn't technically Roger's side of the family. It was his wife Marcella's. It was her uncle, Charles Hatcher. But he became a bona fide convicted predator who had killed multiple children. And he was one of the topics that our reporter Laura discussed with Marcella when they spoke on the phone. Did you ever meet him or have any kind of relationship with him?

[D]

Well, my mom said when I was little that he used to babysit me.

[A]

Oh, really?

[D]

Well, I mean, I don't know for long periods of time, but, you know, he'd look. He'd look after me, and I don't remember. I don't remember him. The only thing I remember is at my grandma's funeral, I was probably 10 or 12. I don't remember for sure. But at the funeral, he was shackled and handcuffed. And I thought, how sad that he comes to my grandma's funeral and it's his mother and he's shackled and handcuffed. I just thought that would be so humiliating.

[A]

While Charles Hatcher seemed like a good lead, investigators found time cards from his job as a dishwasher in Lincoln, Nebraska. That's four hours away from the Holiday Inn. And those were dated around the time of Rose and Rogers murder. Now, there was a gap in those time cards, though, one that would make it possible for him to have driven to Iowa and back. But the police files state that Charles hadn't seen anyone in the family since 1960. Why then would he have gone after Roger? And how would he even have known where Roger was staying that night? Also, Charles was known for killing kids, not grown adult family members. Trying to find a motive for Charles eventually became so outlandish that investigators wrote him off completely. They were more satisfied that the guy who had been seen at the same hotel as another victim was the more likely suspect. But still unable to make a case against Raimundo, investigators dug into the angle I venture to bet you have been screaming about since the start of this episode. Roger was found dead in bed with a woman who was not his wife. Sure, yeah, that could be random. But this also could be very, very targeted. And as we have come to learn, while Marcella holds firm that she hadn't known about her husband's affair, it wasn't exactly the area's best kept secret.

[D]

Supposedly, dad had seen Rose and Roger out somewhere having dinner when he went out to eat dinner, and I think he was with his girlfriend. So, you know, Roger's with his girlfriend, Dad's with his girlfriend.

[A]

Dad is Floyd Hatcher, Marcella's father, who was still married to her mother at this point, by the way. So it seems that Floyd may have known that Roger was being unfaithful to his daughter, and that could have given him something of a motive. A hypocritical one, but a motive nonetheless. Plus, investigators learned from another one of Floyd's girlfriends that he'd made some incriminating comments to her one day in 1993. According to the police files, Floyd said to her, do you know what I did to Roger? To which she responded, what did you do to Roger? And Floyd only replied with a grin. Now, that wasn't a confession, but it was a troubling account. The other troubling thing about Floyd was his alibi. Where was he when Roger was killed?

[D]

Well, mom said he was with her, and his girlfriend said he was with her, so I don't know where he was at.

[A]

In other words, no one knew for sure where Floyd was when Roger was murdered, which Chief Deputy Sauerbrai confirmed. Investigators did try and get a DNA swab from Floyd since technology was rapidly advancing. But by the time they knew that they wanted one, Floyd was in a nursing home, and they never got consent to get a swab from him. Marcella, on the other hand, held out hope that her father might reveal something about Rose and Roger's deaths in his final days. I mean, his lack of an alibi clearly weighed on her.

[D]

I said to the nursing staff or Somebody or to the chaplain or somebody. I said, if he ever talks like he needs to get something off of his mind, you know, like some kind of confession. I said, please be aware that, you know, my husband had been killed and dad was a suspect. And I said, if he ever talks like he wants to confess to something, please listen. You know, don't just slough it off. But there never was anything that was ever said.

[A]

Floyd died in 2017, but even though he was never charged with any crimes relating to the deaths of Rose and Roger, suspicions about his involvement didn't die with him. And they've continued to haunt some of his surviving family members, who have been accused of being an accomplice. After all, there were two chairs pulled up alongside the hotel bed.

[D]

There was evidence in the house, and they would not listen to me.

[E]

The Proof podcast is back with a new case and a new season. And this time, the stakes are higher than ever before.

[B]

The letter from the doctor said, I have six months or less to live. I'm scared shitless right now.

[E]

A dying man is serving a life sentence for a murder he says he didn't commit.

[A]

Did you ever question if they got the right person?

[D]

I don't think I believed it at the time.

[A]

I don't think I believe it now. I'm scared to be sitting here in.

[D]

This damn chair talking about this shit.

[B]

How many other cold cases were going to come forward and go, hey, man, you need to look at my shit because I didn't do it. How many more do we have?

[E]

You can listen now to season three of Proof, wherever you get your podcasts and follow along with us as we reinvestigate the murder at the bike shop.

[C]

Everything I tell you is the truth. I'm not bullshitting one way or the other. I hope I don't bring a ton of shit down on me. I really do.

[A]

For many years, those two chairs pulled up alongside the bed in room 260 made many people speculate that two people were in the room when Rose and Roger died. And for years, Marcella faced painful scrutiny from Roger's family, that she could have been one of those people. Here's Roger's brother, Larry.

[B]

The other strange thing. There were two chairs beside the bed there in the room. And this was revealed to us later. We couldn't see that there at that time. That was revealed later. And whether Marcy was there or not, I don't know. I. I envisioned. Because she was a Bible thumper, because Roger had asked her several times for a divorce and she would get her bible out and. And talk him down out of it. I just pictured in my mind she's probably sitting in one of those chairs along with her dad or whatever and really giving him devil out of the Bible. But that, that's just my imagination.

[A]

There was no bible found at the scene. And remember, Marcella had an alibi. She was babysitting four hours away from the hotel when Rose and Roger were killed. Regardless, it was clear from a letter kept in the case file written by Marcella to Roger's family that there was a lot of tension between them in the aftermath of Roger's death. In the letter, Marcella speaks of her deep grief in losing her husband while acknowledging that neither she nor Roger were perfect people. Now, Marcela wasn't the only person that Roger's family was suspicious of. Larry told our reporter that he was troubled by the behavior of Roger's colleague and brother in law. We're going to call him Mike H. At the request of investigators on the day Roger was found, Mike drove Larry to the hotel. But as they approached it, Larry told our reporter Laura that Mike allegedly said he needed to throw some stuff out of his car in the off chance that investigators wanted to look inside it.

[B]

We drove to the back of the hotel, and before we parked in the parking lot, Mike pulled up beside a container, a big trash container, and he said he had to throw some stuff out of his trunk of his car in case the detectives wanted to look into it, which was odd at that time.

[A]

Do you remember what Mike threw in the dumpster?

[B]

He told me he had an old rotten watermelon.

[A]

Chief Deputy Sauerbai said that Mike was an obvious person for investigators to look at as a suspect. After all, he worked with Roger. The pair were close, they were family, and Mike might have known that Roger was having an affair. But Mike provided investigators with an alibi, though, albeit more than a decade after Rose and Roger were found. But he said he was with his wife.

[C]

In talking to her, she recalled that he was home with her that night. So that's Again, this is 13 years after the fact as far as an alibi of remembering where your husband was 13 years later. So we don't have any strong indication or a way to discount that as not being true.

[A]

Investigators can ask suspects as many times as they want where they were the night of a crime, but if you want to physically place someone at a crime scene, you are going to need DNA. Back in 2015, Chief Deputy Sauerbride decided to investigate Rose and Rogers case. And by that point, DNA testing had advanced a ton, and he wondered if it could finally reveal the identity of Rose and Rogers killer.

[C]

We really just first just kind of get an understanding of that case and looking at all the evidence, because really by 2015, the only way we're going to solve this is if maybe we get some DNA. So we spent about a day just getting everything out of our evidence room and laying it out on a table and just going through everything, trying to determine what we have that might be suitable for DNA testing.

[A]

At that point, nothing had ever been tested from Rose and Rogers crime scene. So Chief Deputy Sour Brice started a list of what they had and what could be tested, including that bloody towel from the hotel bathroom. And in 2017, Chief Deputy Sauerbrai finally got some results from that towel.

[C]

It's an unknown male DNA profile. It's a pretty good profile, all things considered. That towel had a mixture of DNA on it. It had Roger's DNA, it had Rose's DNA, and it had this unknown male profile.

[A]

Even though they hadn't tested anything by 2015, in the years leading up to it, they clearly had DNA testing on their minds because investigators collected more than 30 DNA samples from folks pertaining to the investigation. A mixture of family, hotel workers and Rogers colleagues. And this even included an ex boyfriend of Rose's, along with a man who had bartended at the Holiday Inn. It even included a man who had just been 13 at the time of the murders, and he'd always been considered a person of interest because his fingerprint had been found on Rose's car in the parking lot. But all of those folks were ruled out because their DNA didn't match the male profile found on the towel. And it's worth noting that none of those people had fingerprints that matched the one found on the ripped up cashier's check either. There was still one suspect, however, that Chief Deputy Sauerbai wanted DNA from, and that was Raimundo. No one had ever gotten a DNA sample from him when he was alive. But Chief Deputy Sauerbrai reached out to the Galesburg police in 2019 just in case they had a swab that he didn't know about. Now, he knew Raimundo had died in a veterans hospital in Iowa back in 83. Had anyone been able to get a DNA sample from him after that?

[C]

When I talked to the Galesburg detective in 2019, talking to him and sharing his list of evidence and my list of evidence, I learned that they had collected those tissue samples from the VA hospital in 1983. I don't know when they collected them, which was a pretty huge break in our case, or at least I hoped it was going to be.

[A]

It was a potential turning point in a decades long cold case. But much to Chief Deputy Sauerbrai's disappointment, but maybe not to anyone's surprise, Raimundo's DNA did not match the male DNA profile found on the bathroom towel that left Floyd Hatcher. They wanted to get a DNA sample from him before he died. Right. But by the time they went knocking, he was in a nursing home, remember? And they couldn't get consent for a swab. Fortunately, though, Marcella and her half brother were willing to work with investigators. And even Floyd was ruled out through familial DNA testing, which left no other clear suspects. That male DNA profile found on the towel was put into codis, and that unidentified partial print from the check was put into aphis, but there have never been a match on either. We asked Chief Deputy Sauerbrai if it's possible that the DNA profile is a red herring. I mean, after all, we're talking about a towel from a hotel. Who knows how many people touched it and who knows how clean the towel was to begin with?

[C]

I just have a hard time believing the very first time we tested that on whatever it was, sample number seven on a. I mean, it's just a little teeny tiny piece of cloth that we found that partial DNA profile and that doesn't belong to our killer. But we have to consider that idea.

[A]

When our team met with Chief deputy Sauerbrai in November 2025, he told them that he has plans to get that towel retested for DNA. He's convinced that maybe a better profile of that unknown male can be found. Or who knows, maybe there's other foreign DNA on it that the labs just haven't located yet. He also revealed that there is one more piece of evidence that needs to be tested for DNA. Something that needs to be tested for the very first time.

[C]

There is one item that I've never tested, and I'm just waiting for the right time to do that. It's kind of a mistake on my end, or just things got mixed up over the years.

[A]

Chief Deputy Sauerbai was certain that Roger's wallet had been tested, but it turns out it was actually roses that had undergone testing. So now he's looking to get Roger's wallet tested for the first time. He also shared with us that he wants to get that infamous tube of toothpaste tested again, too. He hopes that maybe a New technology called MVAC will produce results.

[C]

There's a solution they can put on an object, say it's a towel or this wallet, and they're basically just. Just a miniature vacuum. In simple terms, you're sucking all the DNA material off whatever that object is.

[A]

So who knows? Maybe this new method of testing for DNA will finally close Rose and Rogers case. Maybe there's an unknown profile on the evidence that will lead Chief Deputy Sauerbride to someone new or someone who is already mentioned in that police file. I just can't help but believe that the truth is in the pages of the case file somewhere. A tiny piece of information that slipped through the crack or lacked meaning without more context. I keep thinking about that phone call from the unknown man who called asking for Rose the night that she and Roger checked in. Someone knew they were at that hotel. Who was that man? And why has his story never been told? He may very well hold the key to solving this whole case. Marcella told our reporter Laura that she believes that Rose and Roger's murder wasn't random.

[D]

I think it was personal because they were. It was overkill, you know, just. I mean, you know, they didn't just kill somebody, they overkilled them. And so I think it was personal and. And I still don't. I don't know that Roger ever had any enemies or, or people. You know, he was always friendly to everybody, always kind to them, and like I said, like a puppy dog. So I don't think it was on our side, but I don't know. You know, I don't know for sure because I don't know her side enough to know to be able to try to weed out or just confirm that it was maybe her that they were after and he just happened to be there.

[A]

Whether it was personal or not, Rose and Roger suffered deeply in room 260. And while their relationship was an act of betrayal for Roger's wife, she says she's more concerned with justice. She eventually went on to remarry, and she and her husband vernie adopted a 13 day old baby girl named Corey in 1985. Marcella and Vernie shared 43 years of marriage, and he passed away in 2025. Marcella still hopes Rose and Rogers case will be solved in her life. So if you have any information about the murders of Roger Atkison and Rose Burkert, you can call the Iowa County Sheriff's office at 319-642-7307. The deck is an audio Chuck production with theme music by Ryan Lewis. To learn more about the Deck and our advocacy work, visit thedeckpodcast.com I think Chuck would approve.