On today’s podcast we are going to talk about the first of two strange deaths. These are not your typical deaths, if there even is such a thing. These two deaths are cloaked in so much mystery and so many unanswered questions, that even though they both happened many years ago, they are still talked about to this day. First let’s talk about Blair Adams.
Robert Dennis Blair Adams was born in December of 1964 and had grown up in White Rock but currently lived in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada. At the time of this mystery, he was a single 31 year old construction foreman. He had in the past struggled with drugs and alcohol but his mother said that he was faithfully attending AA meetings and was very proud that he hadn’t had a drink in two years. He seemed to be turning his life around.
However, in the middle of June of 1996, Blair Adams had been acting very strangely. He had stopped going to the AA meetings. He had been leaving his jobsite unlocked. He then abruptly quit his job without picking up his final paycheck. He told his co-workers he “didn’t know if he could carry on here”. They suggested that he see a doctor. He told his mother, Sandra Edwards, that someone had been spreading rumors about him. He told friends that someone was trying to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 him.
Then on July 5, 1996 he told his mother that something was bothering him. He then took a spur of the moment trip to Courtenay, BC to visit his uncle, but he was not home. Blair Adams then almost completely emptied out his bank account and safe deposit box. His mother estimated that he had around $6000 in Canadian money, several valuable gold coins and German currency.
Blair Adams
On July 7, 1996 Blair got in his Chevy Chevette and drove to Victoria and tried to board a ferry that would take him to Seattle, Washington. He was turned away when he lied about having a criminal conviction. Some reports say that he would make at least 5 attempts to enter the United States but was turned back. Customs would deny him each time and was suspicious because he was nervous, was carrying a large amount of cash and had a past record involving 𝒶𝓈𝓈𝒶𝓊𝓁𝓉 and 𝒹𝓇𝓊𝑔 charges.
After being denied entry on the ferry, he went to visit a friend in Vancouver and then a friend in Westminster. He then returned to Surrey to visit his mother. She said that her son spoke tearfully about quitting a job that he had been boasting about a week earlier. He seemed anxious and said that he didn’t want to stay in the apartment.
On Sunday, July 8th, 1996, Blair packed his bags and left his mother’s home. Blair would then go unaccounted for the next 3 days but here is a timeline of what authorities have been able to piece together during that time.
In the early morning hours of July 9th, Blair was discovered by Canadian border patrol officers attempting to cross the border on foot at the Pacific Highway Border Crossing. Officials observed scratches covering Blair’s legs and hands. He matched the description of a man implicated in an automobile theft, and the vehicle had been discovered abandoned near the Pacific Highway Border Crossing. He denied any involvement and there was no evidence against him so he was not detained.
Blair Adams was finally able to enter the US via a car that he rented from the Vancouver International Airport. He arrived in Seattle and purchased a round-trip ticket to Frankfurt, Germany. Blair had previously worked in Frankfurt for his stepfather’s company and had dated a woman there, but she told authorities that she hadn’t been in recent contact with him. For some reason Blair then changed his mind and traded in his ticket for a one way ticket to Washington DC. He chose to purchase a one way ticket for $770 even though a round trip ticket would have only cost $350.
When he arrived in DC, he rented a Toyota Camry at the Dulles Airport on the morning of July 10th. Later that morning Blair Adams was involved in a minor car accident when he backed his car into another vehicle that caused minor damage. The driver of the car said that Blair seemed nice, but was in a hurry. Then on the evening of July 10th, he would arrive in Knox County, Tennessee.
He stopped at the BP Station on Strawberry Plains Pike and told the clerk that he was having difficulty with his car key and was unable to enter the vehicle. They then called in mechanic Gerald Sapp to assist him. He realized that Blair Adams was trying to start the Toyota Camry with a Nissan key which had belonged to his first rental car that he had abandoned in Seattle. Sapp asked Blair to check his pockets, because obviously he had the key since he had literally driven it to the station, but Blair refused. Sapp then arranged to have the car towed to a local repair shop until the morning when the car rental agency could get him another key. He then dropped Blair off at the Fairfield Inn Motel. Blair Adams booked a room, but it appears that he never even entered it. Blair Adam’s strange behavior would continue once he arrived at the hotel.
Blair Adam’s crime scene
Strangely, closed-circuit television of the lobby would show Blair loitering at the hotel for about 40 minutes before purchasing a room with US currency. When the clerk tried to give him his change back, he left the lobby and walked outside. In the span of an hour, it would show Blair leaving and returning to the hotel 5 times that night but never even entering the room that he purchased. Then what happened during Blair Adam’s strange US trip would soon take an ominous turn.
On 7:30 am on July 11th, Blair Adams’ body was found by construction workers reporting for work near Crosswood Blvd. in Knoxville. He was found partially 𝓷𝓾𝓭𝓮 in a pool of blood at the construction zone of a Country Inn & Suites hotel that was being built off Interstate 40 near Knoxville. The area he was found in was only half a mile from the hotel that he had booked a room in.
He was only wearing a shirt and it was ripped open. His jeans, tennis shoes and socks were near the body. His jeans and socks were both turned inside out. Tufts of his hair had been ripped out. One of his shoes was said to be under his head like a pillow. Blair’s personal effects were nearby and they included several sets of keys, including the key to the rental car that he was convinced he had lost. In addition to that, Canadian, German and US currency totaling almost $4000. There were also gold coins and gold bars found. The only luggage found was a duffel bag that contained maps, receipts, a plane ticket and paperwork for two cars that he had rented.
So Blair Adams bizarre odyssey of the last few days had come to a tragic end. Blair’s family and friends were heartbroken and shocked to hear about their loved ones death. They knew that he had been acting strange in the weeks before his death and had told several people that someone wanted to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 him but they didn’t know whether or not to take him seriously. They also had no idea why he would have traveled to Knoxville, Tennessee, which was over 2600 miles from his home in Surrey. As far as his mother knew he knew no one there and had never been to the area prior. On July 20, 1996 Blair’s family would lay him to rest at the Victory Memorial Park in Surrey.
Blair’s headstone
The police did not think that robbery was a motive because Blair had quite a bit of money and gold around him when he was found. Authorities weren’t sure what Blair was beaten with, but they believe it was either a club or a crowbar. He had definitely fought back against his attacker. His hands were bloody with defensive wounds and he had many cuts and bruises. Blair also had sustained a blow to the head from the weapon. It is reported that the only physical evidence was one strand of long hair that was gripped in his hand. They believe that Blair was sexually assaulted, but no DNA could be found.
In the beating, Blair had suffered a blow to his stomach that ruptured and caused an abdominal perforation and because of that he developed septic shock so that was his official cause of death. A security guard at a nearby business reported that he heard a scream around 3:30 am that morning and he thought that it was a woman’s voice. It was also said that preliminary reports say that there were no drugs or alcohol in his system.
Reports said that Blair’s rental car would be found later the same day about 6 miles from the construction site where his body was found. That is a little confusing as his rental car was towed to a garage the night prior. Unless the location it was found in was the garage. Two women would come forward and say that they saw Blair talking to a man at a Cracker Barrel but the man was never identified. Police would speculate that Blair’s murder could be linked to a 𝒔𝒆𝒙𝒖𝒂𝒍 interaction that went awry. A truck stop filled with 𝒔𝒆𝒙 workers was nearby. Police also think that it is possible that Blair Adams wasn’t traveling alone because there was a different name than his on the car rental agreement.
When the theory was brought up of Blair’s murder being possibly related to a 𝒔𝒆𝒙 crime, his mother didn’t have any specific details to add. However, she did tell the Vancouver Sun that Blair did have at least one romantic relationship with another man who was his roommate. She said that when the relationship ended, as far as she knew, he had returned to dating females.
With the case growing colder by the minute, the television show “Unsolved Mysteries” would air a segment on Blair Adam’s mysterious disappearance on April 18, 1997. Sandra Edwards was praying that the airing would shed some light on her son’s tragic death. There was really no mention of the amount of tips the show brought in but in the end it apparently did not lead to a resolution in this case. The Knoxville Police Department said in an interview in 2010 that they had never received a credible tip in Blair Adams death.
To this day the murder of Blair Adams has never been solved. His case seemed to grow cold almost immediately. There have been no suspects ever mentioned by police and no avenues to investigate. As far as why he may have traveled in that direction, Blair’s mother did say in an interview 20 years later that he had possibly traveled south to attend the Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta that he had wanted to see. The games began just 8 days after his body was found. However, it appears that she never passed on that possible theory to the police. Sadly, Blair’s mom Sandra Edwards died in 2020 without having any answers as to who did this to her son or why he took his unexplained and bizarre trip to the US.
As far as my thoughts on this case, I think that Blair Adams was troubled. He was clearly experiencing some extreme mental problems. He did exhibit some of the symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia although he hadn’t been officially diagnosed with anything. I feel bad for the turmoil that he went through the last few days of his life. How terrified he must have felt. Robert Stack would say during the Unsolved Mysteries segment: “was he running from someone, or running from himself?” I think Blair Adams was running from himself.
Blair Adams
I don’t believe that anyone was trying to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 him. He had been hypersensitive in thinking that someone was following him, so if someone was following him I think he would have noticed it. Plus it was in Canada that he would say that someone wanted to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 him. For him to be murdered by the same people that he feared, they would have had to have known and even followed him to Vancouver, Seattle, Washington DC and then Knoxville. Not likely at all in my opinion.
It’s not often that you hear someone who is seemingly paranoid and says that someone is trying to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 them, actually being killed, but that is what happened here. I can definitely understand the police theory about it being 𝒔𝒆𝒙 related. The area he was found in was said to be a bad area of town with plenty of 𝒔𝒆𝒙 workers around. If it was 𝒔𝒆𝒙 related, since Blair’s mother indicated that he had relationships with both men and women. that would certainly open up the list of suspects. Plus, Blair knew no one in the area so this, in my opinion, was an attack by a stranger.
As far as the long hair found in his hand, that would at first make you think of a female. However, Blair’s death was so savage and brutal, it’s hard to think that a woman could have done it. There is a chance of course that it was done by more than one person. I don’t really put a lot of weight on the hair that was found in his hand. It wasn’t necessarily the attacker. Perhaps someone was standing or kneeling over Blair before he died, maybe even to check on him, and the hair got transferred that way.
With this case growing so cold and really no witnesses of the actual attack that we are aware of, I think it will be really hard to find out who murdered Blair Adams. The only thing we can hope for is for the person who murdered him to come forward or for them to have talked about the crime to somebody who tells the authorities. Perhaps the strand of hair that was said to be found in Blair’s hand will be tested and a DNA match can be made. That might provide much needed answers and they are desperately needed in this disturbing death.