Robert Leroy Biehler was born on August 5, 1934, in Chase, Kansas, a modest Midwestern town that offered little hint of the violent path he would later walk. In his early adulthood, he drifted into a life of crime. His first recorded offense was on February 25, 1956, when he joined accomplices Louis Evangelisti and Kay G. Mills in robbing the Pasadena home of Paul and Marguerite Troutner. They threatened and restrained the couple before making off with about $1,500 in valuables. The loot reportedly included a motorcycle—ironically leading to their arrest. Biehler served a short sentence, only to return to criminal activity upon release.

By 1960, Biehler had graduated from home break-ins to organized burglary—part of a ring that stole approximately $10,000 from a bank. Captured for this, he was sent to the California Institution for Men. There, he stayed until being paroled in August 1966.

Just months after earning his parole, Biehler allegedly headed to the North Hollywood home of Julia Cook—a former associate with a murky criminal history. Fearing she’d expose his involvement in a prostitution ring, he forced her and her 15-year-old son Kenneth to kneel. In a chilling moment, he shot each of them twice in the head. Though initially detained with a companion, Morton Molin, charges were dropped due to insufficient evidence, and Biehler was jailed only for parole violations.

And then came the paroled repeat offense. On a night in 1973, Biehler confronted Michael Rodney Coveny, a retired paratrooper, over an $800 cocaine debt after a dispute at a lounge. He coerced Coveny at gunpoint with a shotgun, drove him out to meet a supposed drug supplier, then executed him on the spot. Coveny’s body was later found buried in a shallow grave in the Angeles National Forest.

Biehler’s next chapter involved paid killings. Maida Sue Ellington contracted him to kill her roommate, Carole E. Phillips, who had threatened to reveal Ellington’s crimes. In the first attempt, disguised as a plumber, Biehler shot Phillips four times in the head—but she survived. Angered and backed into a corner, Ellington paid more. On Christmas Eve 1974, Biehler struck again. He approached Phillips near a bar in North Hollywood, pressed his gun against her face, and delivered a fatal series of shots—two into her eye and ear, followed by two more into her body—to make sure she was gone.

Not long after, Ellington was arrested for conspiracy to murder. During her incarceration, Biehler visited her on December 12, 1975, when LAPD swooped in and arrested him too—after locating Coveny’s buried remains.

The trial was brutal. The prosecution pushed for witness protection and sought capital punishment under special circumstances but faced initial procedural delays. Biehler's ex-wife, Janet, admitted during trial to lying about his whereabouts during the 1966 killings, unraveling his alibi. His defense even attempted to get a mistrial over juror bias on the death penalty issue. One attorney was jailed for contempt when refusing to share private client conversations.

After five days of jury deliberation, he was convicted on four counts of first-degree murder. Because of Furman v. Georgia, the death penalty was off the table. Instead, Judge Harry V. Peetris sentenced him to four consecutive life terms with the possibility of parole. The judge expressed frustration with the law and published an open letter urging citizens to lobby for sentencing reform . Biehler died of cancer in San Quentin State Prison on January 10, 1993, having served his full sentence.