Ira Samuel Einhorn (May 15, 1940 – April 3, 2020), known as "The Unicorn Killer", was an American convicted murderer and environmental activist. He was convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend, Holly Maddux. On September 9, 1977, Maddux disappeared following a trip to collect her belongings from the apartment she and Einhorn had shared in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Eighteen months later, police found her partially decomposed body in a trunk in Einhorn's closet.
After his arrest, Einhorn fled the country and spent twenty-three years in Europe before being extradited to the United States. He took the stand in his own defense, claiming his ex-girlfriend had been killed by CIA agents who had framed him for the crime because he knew too much about the agency's paranormal military research. He was convicted and served a life sentence until his death in prison on April 3, 2020.
His nickname, "the Unicorn", was derived from his surname; Einhorn means "unicorn" in German.
Early life and activism
Ira Einhorn was born into a middle-class Jewish family. As a student at the University of Pennsylvania (where he received his undergraduate degree in English in 1961 before returning to complete some graduate work in the discipline in 1963) he became active in ecological groups and was part of the counterculture, anti-establishment, and anti-war movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Einhorn was a speaker at the first Earth Day event in Philadelphia in 1970 and later claimed to have been instrumental in creating and launching the event, but event organizers dispute his account.
Einhorn served as an instructor of English at Temple University during the 1964–1965 academic year, although his contract was not renewed after he conceded his "contempt for the academic world" and boasted of proffering "straight answers about the delights and dangers" of cannabis and LSD to students in an interview. He also was a resident fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics during the autumn 1978 semester.
Murder of Holly Maddux
Einhorn had a five-year relationship with Holly Maddux, a graduate of Bryn Mawr College who was originally from Tyler, Texas. In 1977, Maddux broke up with Einhorn and went to New York City, where she became involved with Saul Lapidus. On September 9, 1977, Maddux returned to the Philadelphia apartment she had previously shared with Einhorn to collect her belongings (which Einhorn had reportedly threatened to throw out into the street as trash) and was never seen again. Several weeks later, the Philadelphia police questioned Einhorn about her disappearance. He claimed that Maddux had gone out to the neighborhood co-op to buy some tofu and sprouts, and never returned.
Einhorn's initial alibi came into question when his neighbors began complaining about a foul smell coming from his apartment, which in turn aroused the suspicion of authorities. Eighteen months later, on March 28, 1979, Maddux's decomposing corpse was found by police in a trunk stored in Einhorn's closet. After finding the body, a police officer reportedly said to Einhorn, "It looks like we found Holly," to which he reportedly replied, "You found what you found." Einhorn's lawyer, Arlen Specter, negotiated bail of $40,000; he was released from custody after posting a bond of $4,000, or 10% of the $40,000. This was paid by Barbara Bronfman (née Baerwald), a Montreal socialite who married into the wealthy Bronfman family and met Einhorn through a shared interest in the paranormal. During Einhorn's flight he was again aided by Bronfman, who continued to support him financially until 1988, when she read Steven Levy's damning book on Einhorn, The Unicorn's Secret.
In 1981, just days before his murder trial was to begin, Einhorn skipped bail and fled to Europe. He lived there for the next seventeen years and married a Swedish woman named Annika Flodin. In Pennsylvania, as Einhorn had already been arraigned, the state convicted him in absentia of Maddux's murder in 1996. Einhorn was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Extradition
In 1997, Einhorn was arrested in Champagne-Mouton, France, where he had been living under the name "Eugène Mallon". The extradition process, however, proved more complex than initially envisioned. Under the extradition treaty between France and the United States, either country may refuse extradition under certain circumstances, and Einhorn used multiple avenues to avoid extradition.