Bio

Randy Roth was born on December 26, 1954, in North Dakota. He was one of five children of Gordon and Lizabeth Roth. The family moved to Washington in the late 1950s. As they grew up, Randy and his brother David had different stories about their childhood. David claimed their father was abusive, while Randy seemed to have a closer relationship with their father. After a divorce in 1971, the family dynamic changed. Randy often distanced himself from his mother, telling friends she was dead or unstable.

Growing up, Randy developed a reputation as a bully during high school. He often played cruel pranks on others and was controlling in his relationships. His friendships were mostly with those who admired him rather than challenged him. He enjoyed fixing cars and would drive them recklessly on back roads.

In 1973, Randy graduated from Meadowdale High School and enlisted in the Marine Corps. He admired action movie heroes and wanted to emulate them. Before his deployment, he committed a robbery at a service station but was not charged. His military service did not go as he had hoped. Instead of combat, he worked as a file clerk in Okinawa. His service ended after less than a year when his mother wrote a letter saying it was a hardship for the family that he was away.

Upon returning home, he got engaged but lost the engagement when his fiancée discovered evidence of infidelity. Shortly after, he pled guilty to burglary after items stolen from her family home were found in his possession. He served a brief jail time and soon married the woman he had been seeing.

Randy and his first wife, Donna Sanchez, had a son named Gregg in 1978. However, their marriage ended shortly after, with Randy filing for divorce without much explanation.

In early 1981, Randy met Janis Miranda, a divorced single parent. They married quickly, and Randy pushed for large life insurance policies on Janis. Tragically, Janis died in November of that year when she fell from a hiking area called Beacon Rock. The circumstances of her death raised questions, but there was not enough evidence to charge Randy.

After Janis's death, Randy continued working as a mechanic and raising his son. He moved to Mountlake Terrace and formed a friendship with a neighbor family, though he later seduced their teenage daughter. By 1985, he married again, this time to Donna Clift. Their marriage lasted only a few months, ending after an incident during a family rafting trip.

In 1990, Randy met his fourth wife, Cynthia Loucks Baumgartner. They married in Las Vegas after a brief courtship. Cynthia had two sons from a previous marriage and was financially secure after her husband's death from cancer in 1985. Randy and Cynthia moved into a new home together, but their relationship soon showed signs of trouble.

Murder Story

On July 23, 1991, Randy Roth and his fourth wife, Cynthia Baumgartner Roth, went to Lake Sammamish in Washington for a day trip. The couple took Cynthia's two sons along with them. It was a hot day, and the beach was crowded. Randy and Cynthia decided to paddle out on an inflatable raft, leaving the boys to play in a designated swimming area.

As the day went on, something tragic happened. Several hours later, Randy returned to shore with Cynthia, who was either dead or nearly dead from drowning. Emergency responders treated her at the scene and transported her to the hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

Randy claimed that the raft had flipped over due to the wake from a passing speedboat, causing Cynthia to drown. Investigators became suspicious of Randy's account because of his lack of emotion and the contradictory details he provided about the incident. Despite his claims, there was no solid evidence to suggest that Cynthia had been forcibly drowned.

In the days following the incident, Randy attempted to collect on Cynthia's life insurance policy, which was nearly $400,000. He arranged for her cremation quickly after the death, despite objections from Cynthia's family.

Eventually, on October 8, 1991, Randy was arrested for first-degree murder. The detectives had started looking into his past and uncovered a pattern of insurance fraud and suspicious circumstances surrounding the deaths of other women in his life, including his second wife, Janis Roth, who died in 1981 under similarly questionable circumstances. Janis had fallen while hiking, and Randy was also the only witness to that incident.

Throughout the investigation, evidence began to mount against Randy. It was found that he had a history of deceit and financial motivation when it came to his relationships with women. In January 1992, after a lengthy trial filled with testimonies and evidence, he was convicted of murder and theft, receiving a 50-year prison sentence.