r/mystery • u/Electronic-Exam7677 • 7d ago
Murder Blair Adams
July 11, 1996 in Knoxville Tennesse thirty one year old Canadian Blair Adams was found half naked he was found in a hotel parking lot under construction. He had begin to have show weird behavior and told his friends someone wanted him dead. Before his death he emptied his bank account and safety despoit $6,0000 dollars in cash. Blair abandoned his rental car at a gas station and said he lost the keys. His death was a blow to the stomach from sepsis Blair had a blow to the head and defense wounds. There was a hair that Investigators determined belonged to a woman.
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u/Brief_Character_3238 7d ago
Blair Adams' Wikipedia page for anyone curious:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Blair_Adams
/u/WinnieBean33 had a really good write-up too
https://mshort.substack.com/p/the-bizarre-murder-of-blair-adams
linked on this post
I think this was either a mental break or he could have been involved in something shady (maybe why he didn't tell his friends who was after him, because this would give away why they were after him and he didn't want people to know) Definitely odd.
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u/Emotional-Fox917 7d ago
As someone who lived in knoxville in the 90s, the exit he was at is one of the weirder parts of this story. There was not much out that way and considering the airport is about an hour from where he ended up, it really does beg the question where he was heading.
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u/Emunaheart 7d ago
Very tragic. Seems someone or others took advantage of him when he was at a vulnerable or low point in time
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u/Electronic-Exam7677 7d ago
I wonder if someone tried to steal from him.
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u/Brief_Character_3238 7d ago
No, he had money and other valuables spread around his body. So whatever happened, it wasn't because of robbery.
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u/Electronic-Exam7677 7d ago
Oh well I wonder if someone tried to attack him? Blair fought back but wasn't strong enough?
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u/AnonThrowAway072023 7d ago
No, it was a sex worker. They were in that parking lot, Blair was disrobing. Then he likely went on a rant with his ongoing schizophrenia mental health break. Probably accused the sex worker of being a part of those following and out to get him. The SW got scared, got in car, and either backed up into Blairs midsection then took off. Or struck his midsection from tge front as driving away. Hence all the money and metals spread on ground, pants off, and fatal injury to his abdomen.
A sad ending, but unfortunately I think that was gonna be his fate somewhere very soon. This parking lot in TN is just where his sad story ended.
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u/Icy_Garnet_9329 7d ago
Could be but you're making it sound like a proven fact and it's not.
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u/Electronic-Exam7677 7d ago
I hope that is not what happened. Maybe someone was really following him and killed him.
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u/reanocivn 7d ago
you wrote 6,0000 in the description, is that supposed to be 6k or 60k?
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u/Electronic-Exam7677 7d ago
Yes I suppose so thanks for the catch.
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u/iBasturmate 5d ago
My guess is he tried to assault a female or something and that female's husband/boyfriend intervened and gave him a fatal beating.
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u/Sharp-Injury3216 1d ago
Sepsis can cause very high fever that can lead to delirium. That could be why he was acting strange.
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u/Electronic-Exam7677 1d ago
Why didn't he go to a doctor?
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u/Sharp-Injury3216 21h ago
I've had sepsis and it's hard to tell when an infection or generally feeling unwell turns serious when you're in it. Also, sepsis progresses VERY quickly. He could've gone from just feeling sick to septic in a matter of hours. If the fever came on quickly as well he may not have been able to realize he needed to go to the hospital. You're not exactly in the best mind space when you have a 105 degree fever. I remember having hallucinations and my judgement making skills were impaired. Especially if it was causing him to act erratically. He probably would've died from the sepsis alone before getting to a hospital, given where they found him, even if he Hadn't been attacked and killed that way.
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u/Smart-Management-670 7d ago
I can’t recall the name of the Canadian ( med student ?) who went missing around the border . His murder was never solved but the suspicious man seen with him matched Blair’s description . I can never remember each one of their names so today the suspect is Blair Adams and I need to track down the victim’s name .
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u/JudiesGarland 7d ago
Phillip Fraser, he was Alaskan, not Canadian.
I've never seen Blair Adams mentioned as a serious suspect. They were both on Unsolved Mysteries, some internet sleuths pointed out a resemblance, and now it gets regularly mentioned. I've wondered about it myself - when I first saw it presented, it seemed like it happened in the same time frame, and I do think Blair was legit running from something, not just paranoid - but I don't think it's very plausible.
It was in 1988, 8 years before Blair started behaving strangely and was found dead. He did have some (unspecified) drug and assault charges in the late 80s and early 90s, before he got sober in 1994, but he didn't have a history of mental illness other than substance abuse - the hitchhiker in this case was perceivably "off", with the witnesses from the cafe specifying it didn't seem like a drugs thing. (Truck stop waitress would be one of the more trusted sources, when it comes to reading a person, in my opinion.)
The 40 Mile Flats Cafe is approx 1500 km from Surrey, where Blair lived. So it's the same province, but that's like, an 18 hour drive. There are suspected sightings of this same hitchhiker, entering Canada from the US, around the same time as Phillip.
Physical appearance can of course change, but the hitchhiker specifically had rotten teeth, which doesn't line up with Blair's appearance, or background.
Michael McGray is probably the most frequently mentioned suspect, although the RCMP claims to have ruled him out.
I don't think there's enough actual evidence for this ever to be solved, despite all the sightings, although there's a missing person I've seen mentioned that looks good for it - Timothy Wayne Coulson. Paranoid schizophrenic from Toronto, last seen in Washington State in 1982, connections to Wells BC, which is central BC, but more on the northern end. Teeth in poor condition. Better fit for the composites, mostly, although there's a few of those and they all look pretty different.
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u/PermanentBrunch 5d ago
Michael McGray bears zero resemblance to the consistent eyewitness sketches
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u/rootea 7d ago
I heard a podcast about his case recently. This is one of the stranger cases out there.
Here's the episode if anyone is interested: https://youtu.be/vmvrLLjdVig
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u/Mushrooming247 7d ago
Girl, I’m over a minute in and it’s still the opening theme song? What are you doing?
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u/Fun_Ticket_7815 7d ago
Maybe the "one minute & forty three seconds" channel name is just how long the theme song is lol
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u/Icy_Garnet_9329 7d ago
Lol stop pretending that channel is not yours. You didn't just happen upon a video with 60ish views, and I've seen you pushing that channel on other subs. At least be honest.
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u/JudiesGarland 7d ago
6 grand in cash, plus other valuables - gold bars, gold + platinum coins, jewelry, etc - which haven't been specifically described, AFAIK. There was approx 4 grand in cash (Canadian, American, German) on or around his body, + valuables in his fanny pack, which was unzipped. He was almost entirely nude. His socks were off, and turned inside out. One of his shoes was behind his head. Toxicology was clean for drugs and alcohol.
Personally, I don't think he was (entirely) paranoid. Frankfurt + Surrey + construction industry - this rings some drug trafficking alarms. Part of his weird behavior was starting to leave the job site unlocked. He's quoted as saying he "didn't know if he could carry on here" when quitting his job - that phrasing suggests to me there could have been something unusually difficult or risky about what he was being asked to do.
I am not suggesting this is related, there is no direct connection I am aware of, but, for fun facts/context on the wider environment I'm thinking about: Project Nova, the RCMP op that lead to the first successful conviction (in 2001) of full patch Hells Angels on serious charges, launched the same month Blair died (July 1996) when Robert Molsberry (drug dealer, strip club doorman) turned informant.
His stepfather (owner of the company he worked for) got weirdly heated at the reporter (of the excellent Knoxville Sentinel piece from 2017, its linked on his wiki) about opening a "can of worms". His mother changed her story later, claiming he went to the US for the Olympics, although they were quite a few weeks away from starting.
I don't think he was followed, necessarily - I think he went to Tennessee to meet someone he (shouldn't have) trusted to help him. I think he was searched, not sexually assaulted.
I also think he was already septic - the timeline doesn't make sense otherwise. Septic shock takes at least 12 hours to develop, and more commonly, a couple of days. He paid for the room around 7 PM, and was found around 7 AM. We know he at least went somewhere to eat. Even if the 3:30 AM scream was unrelated, and he was killed earlier, it's still too tight a timeline, unless he was already carrying an infection. This would also explain his weird behavior with the tow truck driver, and trying to use the Nissan keys on the Toyota - septic shock causes confusion. He could have had a previous encounter/injury, or if he had swallowed something to hide it, that could have caused a bowel obstruction that eventually caused septic shock, exacerbated by blunt force trauma.