Bob Crane was one of the most recognized faces on American television in the 1960s, the clean-cut star of Hogan’s Heroes who played the witty and resourceful Colonel Hogan. To the millions who watched him outsmart his German captors in the World War II POW comedy, he was a charming, likable everyman. But on June 29, 1978, that image was shattered permanently when Crane was found bludgeoned to death in a rented apartment in Scottsdale, Arizona. The murder stunned the entertainment world, and the investigation that followed exposed a secret double life that changed how the public remembered him forever.

Crane had been performing in a dinner theater production called Beginner’s Luck in Scottsdale, one of several small-stage engagements he had taken on as his television career faded. After a lunch break that afternoon, he failed to return. A concerned co-star went to his apartment and discovered his body. An electrical cord was wrapped around his neck, and his head had been beaten with a heavy object.

There were no signs of forced entry, and nothing appeared to have been stolen. The murder weapon was never found, though investigators later speculated that a camera tripod could have been used. Almost immediately, police found items in the apartment that pointed to a far more complicated life than the one Crane presented on screen. Homemade sex toys and explicit videos revealed that the actor had been engaged in a pattern of reckless sexual activity, often recorded on camera, involving numerous women.

For years, Crane had used his fame to attract partners, frequently bringing women back to his dressing room or his home. What had been rumored in Hollywood circles for years was now part of an official police investigation. The evidence quickly led detectives to a man named John Carpenter, a friend of Crane’s who had been a frequent companion in his sexual exploits. Carpenter had visited Crane four days before the murder, and when police examined the rental car he had been driving, they found blood smears that matched Crane’s blood type.

DNA testing was not available in 1978, and without that technology the case stalled. For more than a decade, the murder remained unsolved. In 1990, Scottsdale detectives reopened the case. Although DNA analysis still could not provide conclusive results, a photograph found inside Carpenter’s rental car was deemed incriminating enough to secure his arrest.

Carpenter stood trial in 1994. During the proceedings, Crane’s eldest son, Robert, testified that his father had told him he planned to end his friendship with Carpenter, describing the relationship as troubling and something he wanted to walk away from. Some witnesses reported that the two men had argued at a Scottsdale club just hours before Crane’s body was found. Despite that testimony, the jury found Carpenter not guilty.

The case has never been resolved since. Bob Crane’s personal life had been unraveling long before his death. Born Robert Edward Crane in Connecticut, he discovered music as a child, taking up the drums at age eleven and playing in school bands and local symphony youth programs. He served in the National Guard for two years and married his high school sweetheart, Anne Terzian, before turning to radio.

He became a popular disc jockey in New York and Connecticut, and by the time he moved to Los Angeles for CBS Radio, his celebrity interview segment had made him a local star. Guests like Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Bob Hope appeared on his show, and he earned a reputation as the king of the Los Angeles airwaves. Television soon followed. Crane landed guest roles on The Twilight Zone, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and The Dick Van Dyke Show, where his performance caught the attention of producers.

In 1965, he was cast as Colonel Robert Hogan in Hogan’s Heroes, a role that made him a household name and earned him an Emmy nomination. But the success came with a heavy cost. His marriage to Anne collapsed as Crane became increasingly promiscuous, carrying on affairs with multiple women, including his co-star Patricia Olson, who played Hilda in the series. He divorced Anne in 1970 and married Olson the following year.

The show ended in 1971, and Crane’s career never fully recovered. A short-lived NBC series called The Bob Crane Show lasted only thirteen episodes. He turned to dinner theater work in different states, performing in small productions to keep his finances afloat. It was during this period that his behavior became more reckless.

His son Robert later described a man who was fascinated by women but who overstepped his boundaries into dangerous territory. He said his father had a vasectomy in 1968 because he knew he did not want more children and was afraid of fathering children out of wedlock amid his many affairs. Crane’s drinking also increased, and his later years were marked by frustration over his fading career. Robert Crane has spent decades trying to understand what happened to his father.

He has suggested that John Carpenter, who was bisexual, may have been in love with his father and reacted violently to rejection. He also pointed to the chaotic condition of the crime scene investigation. The apartment was not properly secured, and several people walked through it in the immediate aftermath, including Crane’s business manager, a lawyer, and an actress from the theater. They touched and handled items in plain view of the lead detective, potentially contaminating evidence and making it difficult to ever build a solid case.

Crane’s second wife, Patricia Olson, also became a point of tension within the family. She and her children inherited his estate after his death, and she later moved Crane’s body to a different cemetery without consulting his first family. Robert Crane further claimed that his father may not actually have been the biological father of Olson’s children, noting that Olson was already pregnant by another man when she married Crane. The public reaction to Crane’s revealed private life was harsh.

The man who had been beloved as Colonel Hogan was now seen by many as a fraud, a wolf hiding among sheep. But not everyone who worked with him judged him harshly. Robert Clary, who played Corporal LeBeau on Hogan’s Heroes, once said that Crane never bragged about his position as the show’s star and that his personal life was his own business. As long as he was doing his job properly, Clary said, no one cared what he did in private.

Investigators considered several possible motives over the years. Some believed a woman Crane had used and discarded might have struck back. Others thought Carpenter was responsible. Still others speculated that a business deal gone wrong or another quarrel could explain the violence.

The case has produced at least three investigations, five books, and a film, yet no one has ever been convicted. Forty-eight hours before his death, Crane called his eldest son and said he was making changes in his life. He planned to divorce Patricia Olson and wanted to distance himself from John Carpenter. He made neither move before he died.

He was fifty years old when his life was ended in that Scottsdale apartment, and the question of who killed him remains open to this day.