Slain burglar tied to Canadian killings

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - The burglar killed in a gunfight that also claimed a sheriff's deputy last week has been indentified as the prime suspect in the killing of a young couple in Canada 27 years ago.

However his death leaves unresolved a possible link to the 2004 murder of another young couple, this time in California, leaving the father of one of the victims still waiting for justice.

On Monday New Mexico State Police said the Jemez Mountain burglar known for years only as the Cookie Bandit was Joseph Henry Burgess. He'd been wanted since Canadian investigators tied him to the 1972 murders of a young couple camping near Tofino on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

"We were quite surprised," New Mexico State Police Lt. Eric Garcia said. "No one knew."

Burgess, 62, died early Thursday morning a shootout with Sgt. Joseph Harris and Deputy Teresa Moriarty in a cabin in La Cueva. Harris was fatally wounded in the femoral artery during the skirmish while Moriarty was not injured.

The two Sandoval County Sheriff's Department officers had staked out the cabin hoping to capture the mysterious burglar known for breaking into local cabins to get food, clothing and occasionally liquor.

Burgess was identified through his fingerprints. They were in a national database from the 1972 murder case. Investigators said they found his prints on the Leif Carlsson and Ann Durrant's belongings.

Burgess has been described as religious fanatic who often ended his phrases in, "Amen." Canadian investigators suspected he may have become outraged because Carlsson and Durrant were sharing a tent but weren't married.

His name also surfaced in the similar killings of a young couple camped out on a northern California beach in 2004.

When Jason Allen and Lindsay Cutshall were found shot to death while camping in California in 2004 police wondered if Burgess was the killer.

"There was enough similarities that caused our detectives to investigate," Cutshall's father Chris Cutshall told KRQE News 13 in a telephone interview.

The similarities were that both cases involved a young, unmarried couple who were camping when they were shot in the head.

The difference, Cutshall said, was that his daughter and her fiancé had been shot with a high-powered .45 caliber rifle while the couple in the 1972 case had been shot with a .22 rifle.

But now Cutshall's father may never know.

"It is a little frustrating," he said. "We would've loved to have talked to the man."

While Allen and Cutshall were killed in 2004, local investigators believe Burgess lived in the Jemez Mountains for the last 10 years.

Until now many who knew of Burgess thought he was hiding out in Canada or the Pacific Northwest.

More information on Burgess is available on the America's Most Wanted Web site.