I Am a Killer

What I know now

is that there were a lot of people out there that loved Robby.

I loved him, too, because he was wonderful.

It's not fair that Robby is not here.

He was only 25...

and he had his whole life ahead of him,

but I made the choice.

I took his life...

and there's nothing I can do to undo it.

This is a true story.

I'll start it off like that.

I just wanted to rebel. I wanted to cause chaos.

I looked over at him. We'll see who kills who, huh?

I made the choice.

I took his life.

It's something that I never intended to do,

I wish I didn't do.

I knew I was gonna get out of that car and murder those two men.

As he kneeled in front of me,

all I remember is pulling the trigger.

I'd killed them both.

I'd stabbed them to death.

- Oh, goodness. - Doesn't help.

It's difficult to get it in the right position.

Yeah, it's weird.

My name is Lindsay Haugen.

I grew up in Portland, Oregon.

I enjoyed going to church.

Um, I loved to study the Bible and I loved to sing.

In high school, I became very rebellious

and I started to do things that maybe I would have said no to before.

I started smoking marijuana and hanging out with a different crowd.

Around 15,

I started to run away from home.

I spent the rest of the time in Portland, on the streets,

living with a very rough crowd, and I went straight from

trying marijuana a couple of times, to...

taking methamphetamines, um, with a needle.

And from there, it became...

heroin, and I realized that I was addicted.

And I was probably 16.

One day, I decided to take a pregnancy test,

and it turned out I'd been pregnant for three months

and I had just turned 17.

I changed... I changed right then.

I stopped using drugs,

and I wanted to be a parent.

I wanted to do well, and I wanted to take care of my son.

I loved basic training. I loved the uniform.

I loved being able to do more push-ups than the boys,

and it was probably some of the best times of my life.

I met this man in the end of 2013.

He was in the Army as well.

Almost immediately,

he was mean to me when he drank whiskey.

He would lose his mind over things that didn't even matter,

or weren't real, that he would make up in his head.

He told me he didn't like my work

because there were too many attractive men there.

And... I tried to tell him I'm used to it. This is what I've always worked around,

and it doesn't affect me. I don't even notice them.

But it didn't matter. It made him crazy.

He hit me while I was driving a couple of times,

just trying to get me to say what he wanted me to say.

He just wanted to hear me tell him that I was not being faithful.

I remember nights of him throwing me on the floor

and spitting chewed-up food on me,

pouring beer on my head...

Um...

raping me...

in all sorts of ways

and calling me dirty, calling me names that I wouldn't repeat.

And it got worse.

I remember one time he...

He spit on me...

while I was in the bathroom.

And so, I stood up...

I knew he blocked the only way out.

And so, I lifted my arm to swing at him, and he grabbed my hand.

And then he grabbed my other hand, and he crushed them.

I screamed...

until he started mocking my screams.

And so, I stopped screaming, and I looked him in the eye,

and I felt my hand break.

And...

he put me in a choke-hold.

I said, "If you're gonna do this, please don't let me wake up,

because I can't do this anymore."

And so, he held me in that choke-hold,

and made me look at myself in the mirror and said, "Watch yourself die."

And it went dark.

I found myself at home with no one to talk to but my dog,

drinking... drinking a lot.

I would wake up and I would drink.

I would drink until I went to sleep and I would wake up and drink again.

It felt crazy.

So, when I met Robby, I had just gotten out of a tough relationship,

and he had just gotten out of rehab in June of that year.

But I didn't know that.

What I knew was that there was this beautiful smile

sitting in a big pile of empty beer cans on the floor,

with no shirt on and dreadlocks.

And...

just very carefree.

He leaned back on his hands,

and he just went, "Hi," and...

there was just kind of this instant connection.

Robby embraced what he called a traveler lifestyle...

but he really lived it a lot harder than a lot of people did.

He would hop freight trains

and ride to wherever they were going,

hitchhike, whatever it was,

just traveling, never really staying in one place for a long time.

And I said, "I'll give you a place to stay.

You don't have to do anything. Just be here when I get home."

And he said, "I just can't stay in one place any longer. I need to go."

I said, "Okay, I'll come with you."

There were times when we'd be on the road. I'd be singing to him.

He'd just look at me and say, "I just love you."

And I just adored him.

He was my best friend.

And there were times when I would expect him

to treat me poorly, or to accuse me of something, or to think badly of me...

and he just wouldn't.

And... I treasured it.

I loved it so much.

But there was a time when we were driving...

Um, I think we were in Montana at that point, and...

I was looking at the scenery, just enjoying it,

thinking, "Man, this is awesome, look around us," and...

he looks at me, and he holds my hand, and he says...

"I wish I could just be happy with you,

but I'm not.

And it's not you."

And it just crushed me.

He kept telling me he wanted to see what the next life was like.

He was hurting.

He'd always be talking or motioning

as though he was shooting himself in the head.

Talking about how he wanted to die, about how tired he was.

And I just kept trying to bring him back from that.

"Robby, you're better than that. Robby, you have so much to live for."

I took it personally,

like I wasn't enough for him to be happy with.

One day, he looked at me, and again, he said, "Lindsay, I'm tired.

I don't wanna do this anymore.

I just wanna die."

So, I said...

"I know of a way to do it that won't hurt.

You'll just go unconscious, and then you just won't wake up."

He looked at me, his eyes sparkled,

and he said, "You would do that for me?"

And I said, "Robby, I love you. I would do anything for you."

And he said, "Okay."

And that floored me, and I broke down, and I cried so hard.

And so, he said, "No, no, no, no."

He hated to see me sad. He hated to see me cry.

And so he held me and he said,

"No. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. Don't be sad. Please don't be sad."

He just held me and we slept that night.

And the next morning, I woke up, and I said,

"I'm sorry I couldn't do that last night.

I didn't expect you to be so ready."

And he said...

"I couldn't have expected you to do that for me."

And there, again, my heart broke.

I expected him to say,

"No, we were just drunk, I didn't mean it," or...

you know, "I'm glad you didn't, because, you know, today is nice," or something.

But, no, he said,

"I couldn't have expected that from you."

And so I just felt like I'd let him down again.

When we got to Billings, we sat in the parking lot at Walmart.

We had wine to drink, enjoyed the sun.

And we got back in the truck,

and he motioned again...

that he was shooting himself in the head.

And I...

I... I just felt like I was letting him down again, like I just...

I thought we were having a nice day,

but now here he is again, just wanting to die.

And I asked, "Is that really what you want?"

And he said, "Yes."

And I said, "Are you sure?"

And he said, "Yes."

So I said, "Okay."

And I sat on the center console, and I said, "Come here."

And he came to me.

And I put...

my arms around his neck,

and then, he just bowed his head.

When I started, I didn't feel like I could really do it.

I squeezed, and I could tell it wasn't hard enough.

And so,

I put my other arm behind his neck

and squeezed until he was unconscious.

And...

...he shook.

I thought maybe he was waking up.

I thought maybe he was gonna stop me.