Killer of ‘Hogan’s Heroes’ Star Bob Crane Set to Be Exposed After New DNA Evidence

The murderer of Bob Crane, star of iconic TV show Hogan’s Heroes, is set to be exposed on TV after a 38-year unsolved mystery.

Crane played the all-American hero Colonel Hogan for 168 episodes of the hit television show Hogan‘s Heroes. The actor became a huge star on the popular weekly sitcom set in a German Prisoner of War camp during World War II, which aired from 1965 to 1971.

The actor’s body was found lying in a pool of blood in his Scottsdale, AZ apartment in 1978, after being bludgeoned to death with a camera tripod. It was later revealed the clean cut actor led a double life as a sex addict and he and his close friend, John Henry Carpenter, a video equipment salesman, secretly filmed their sexual liaisons involving various women.

After blood was found in Carpenter’s rental car by police days after Crane’s death, he was tried for murder but the salesman, who died in 1998, was found not guilty. Without the availability of DNA testing at that time, the jury did not have conclusive proof it was Crane’s blood.

One jury member later said in an interview that the jury believed there was insufficient proof to determine Carpenter’s guilt and that “you cannot prove someone guilty on speculation.”

TV news anchor John Hook from Phoenix Fox 10 News began investigating the cold case a year ago and worked with the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office to convince prosecutors to release enough blood to conduct DNA testing.

The broadcast journalist is now set to reveal the results on his TV show on Monday.

Actor Willem Dafoe played Carpenter in 2002 biographical film Auto Focus directed by Paul Schrader, with Greg Kinnear starring as Crane. The screenplay by Michael Gerbosi was based on Robert Graysmith’s book The Murder of Bob Crane.