NAMES: William “Bill” Currier and Lorraine Currier
AGES: 49 (Bill), 55 (Lorraine)
SEX: Male and Female
RESIDENCE: Essex, Vermont
DATE OF INCIDENT: June 8, 2011
STATUS: Deceased (bodies never recovered)
BACKGROUND
William “Bill” Currier and Lorraine Currier were a quiet, hard-working couple who lived in a modest duplex in Essex, Vermont, a suburb of Burlington. The couple had been married for nearly 25 years and were considered dependable, reserved, and deeply routine-oriented by their friends and neighbors.
Bill was employed as an animal care technician at the University of Vermont, where he was known for his professionalism and kindness toward the animals he supervised. Lorraine worked as a clinical worker at Fletcher Allen Health Care (now University of Vermont Medical Center), where she was respected for her diligence and compassion.
The Curriers lived a simple life centered around work, church, and their pets. They had no known enemies, debts, or criminal involvement. Their disappearance shocked the small Vermont community, which had an extremely low rate of violent crime.
THE DISAPPEARANCE
On the morning of June 9, 2011, both Bill and Lorraine failed to appear for work, prompting concern from co-workers who immediately contacted police. When Essex Police Department officers arrived at their Colbert Street residence, they observed signs of forced entry through a window connecting the attached garage to the home.
Inside, investigators discovered evidence suggesting a violent struggle: broken glass, overturned furniture, and visible blood traces. The couple’s shoes and personal effects were left behind, indicating they were taken suddenly and against their will.
Their green 2005 Saturn Ion was missing from the driveway. Police issued a statewide BOLO (Be On the Lookout) for the vehicle and began canvassing the area for witnesses. Later that same day, the car was located abandoned at an old, rundown farmhouse approximately a mile away on Old Stage Road. The property was known locally as vacant and frequented by trespassers and wildlife.
Inside the vehicle, police located several personal items belonging to the Curriers, including a purse and eyeglasses. There was no evidence of robbery, and both occupants remained missing.
Initial search efforts included K-9 tracking, aerial sweeps, and the use of cadaver dogs, but no scent trail or trace evidence could be followed beyond the abandoned farmhouse.
INVESTIGATION
For nearly a year, the disappearance of Bill and Lorraine Currier remained a baffling mystery. Vermont State Police led the investigation, assisted by the Essex Police Department and the FBI. Without witnesses, suspects, or recovered bodies, the case went cold.
That changed in March 2012 when Israel Keyes, a 34-year-old man from Alaska, was arrested in Lufkin, Texas, for the kidnapping and murder of Anchorage barista Samantha Koenig. While in custody, Keyes began confessing to additional crimes across the United States, including a double homicide in Vermont.
Keyes told FBI interrogators that he had flown into Chicago in early June 2011, rented a car, and driven over 1,000 miles to Vermont. His purpose: to retrieve one of several pre-buried “kill kits” he had hidden years earlier. These kits, containing weapons, restraints, and cleaning supplies, were strategically placed around the country to allow spontaneous murders while minimizing evidence trails.
Keyes said he located the Curriers’ home by driving through neighborhoods late at night, searching for a house with an attached garage, no alarm system, and no children. The Curriers’ property met his criteria perfectly.
According to Keyes’s detailed confession, on June 8, 2011, sometime after 11:00 p.m., he approached the Currier home armed and masked. He broke through a window into the garage, entered the residence, and quickly subdued the couple at gunpoint. He bound both victims with zip ties and forced them into their own car.
Keyes drove the Curriers to the abandoned farmhouse on Old Stage Road, where he had previously scoped the location as a kill site. Once there, he separated Bill and Lorraine. He took Bill to the basement and restrained him before returning upstairs to assault Lorraine. Keyes admitted to sexually assaulting Lorraine before strangling her to death. He then shot Bill in the head with a .22 caliber Ruger pistol, killing him instantly.
After the murders, Keyes attempted to conceal the bodies in the basement and planned to return later to move them to another location. However, when he revisited the site, he found the farmhouse demolished and the debris removed to a landfill, effectively destroying all physical evidence.
Despite multiple excavation attempts and landfill searches, the remains of Bill and Lorraine Currier have never been found.
CONNECTION TO ISRAEL KEYES
The Currier case was the first confirmed double homicide linked to Israel Keyes during the FBI’s multi-state investigation. His confession matched the physical evidence at the Currier home and the abandoned farmhouse: broken glass, binding materials, and ballistic residue consistent with a .22 caliber firearm.
Keyes demonstrated knowledge of details that were never made public, including the layout of the Currier residence, the route taken, and the interior description of the farmhouse. He also correctly identified the make, model, and color of the Curriers’ car and the approximate distance of the farmhouse from their home.
The FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit concluded that the Currier murders were “consistent with Keyes’s operational signature”: pre-planning, opportunistic targeting, use of pre-buried supplies, total lack of personal motive, and immediate geographic displacement after the crime.
Keyes’s Vermont confession provided law enforcement their first clear look at the scope of his activities and helped link his methodology to other unsolved homicides nationwide.
IMPACT AND COMMUNITY RESPONSE
The disappearance of Bill and Lorraine Currier devastated the quiet community of Essex. Vigils were held, and residents left flowers outside the couple’s home long after the property was sealed off with police tape.
Even after Keyes’s confession, the inability to recover the Curriers’ remains left family members without closure. Lorraine’s coworkers at Fletcher Allen Health Care created a memorial garden in her honor, while Bill’s colleagues at the University of Vermont established an animal welfare fund under his name.
In 2013, after Keyes’s suicide in his Anchorage jail cell, investigators publicly confirmed his involvement in the Currier case, citing his detailed statements, corroborated timelines, and forensic consistency with the scene.
The Curriers’ families expressed both gratitude and frustration: relief that answers were finally obtained, but deep anguish that no remains were ever found.
BEHAVIORAL ANALYSIS
From a behavioral standpoint, the Currier homicides demonstrate Israel Keyes’s operational discipline and adaptability. He employed surveillance, forced entry, abduction, and execution—all within a span of hours—while leaving minimal trace evidence.
Unlike many serial offenders who act impulsively or target specific demographics, Keyes was driven by control and process, not desire or revenge. His victims were selected based on convenience and environmental vulnerability rather than personal traits.
The Curriers were, tragically, the embodiment of “random victims.” Their home location, late-night accessibility, and lack of visible security made them perfect targets for Keyes’s highly organized methodology. The case highlights the chilling precision of his hunting style: premeditated logistics, mobility, and emotional detachment.
Keyes’s Vermont trip revealed his tendency to operate thousands of miles from his home base, striking in unfamiliar territories before vanishing without suspicion—a method FBI profilers later labeled as “transient predation.”
KILLER THEORY
Killer Theory’s analysis concludes that the Currier homicides were a predatory abduction-murder motivated by opportunity and operational rehearsal.
Keyes intentionally sought random victims to test the effectiveness of his pre-buried kill kit and refine his methods. The selection of Bill and Lorraine Currier appears to have been spontaneous but driven by precise environmental cues: isolated residence, easy garage access, and no alarm system.
Both victims likely resisted, evidenced by physical disturbances in their home. Bill, described as strong and protective, may have attempted to shield Lorraine during the initial assault, provoking a violent reaction from Keyes.
This incident stands as one of the most psychologically revealing of Keyes’s known murders. It demonstrates his cold rationality, detachment from motive, and obsession with maintaining total control over both environment and victim.
In forensic terms, the Currier case offers insight into Keyes’s logistical discipline, forensic foresight, and emotional compartmentalization. The lack of body recovery, despite full confession, reinforces his operational success and the enduring challenges in solving nomadic serial offenses.
SOURCES:
Federal Bureau of Investigation, Behavioral Analysis Unit Interview Transcripts: Israel Keyes (2012) FBI Anchorage Field Office Press Conference: “Israel Keyes Case Summary” (2013) Vermont State Police Case File: “Missing Persons—William and Lorraine Currier” (2011–2013) Anchorage Daily News, “FBI Details Keyes’s Multi-State Murders” (2013) Oxygen Documentary, Method of a Serial Killer (2018) Burlington Free Press, “The Disappearance of the Curriers” (2012) FBI Evidence Response Team Report, Essex, VT (2011) True Crime Garage Podcast, Episode 103: The Currier Murders (2017) Investigation Discovery, Dark Minds: The Israel Keyes Confessions (2015)
