Judge sentences suspected KC serial killer Robert Gross: ‘You’re a dangerous person’
Robert J. Gross, the suspected serial killer, was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Kansas City to 35 years in federal prison for stalking female massage parlor workers in Johnson County and Lawrence, along with several federal firearms offenses.
In announcing the sentencing, Senior U.S. District Judge Gary A. Fenner told Gross that his history of violence was “extremely disturbing. You’re a dangerous person.”
The 69-year-old has also long been a suspect in the killings of several women, including two who worked in the massage business, but he has never been charged in a homicide.
None of the charges that Gross was sentenced to Tuesday were related to the unsolved murders, arsons and assaults he has been suspected in over the past five decades, which were detailed in a six-part series by The Kansas City Star.
“This armed and dangerous criminal, with a history of stalking and violence toward women, will spend the rest of his life in prison,” said U.S. Attorney Tim Garrison.
Defense attorney John P. O’Connor declined to comment after the hearing, which lasted just under four hours.
In May 2019, Gross was found guilty on eight of the 10 charges that included stalking women who worked at massage parlors in Johnson County and in Lawrence. He was also convicted of possessing guns as a convicted felon and other firearms violations.
Gross was acquitted on two counts of stalking.
Those eight crimes of which he was convicted carry sentences of five to 10 years each. Prosecutors asked Fenner that those sentences run consecutive to each other for a total of 55 years.
Just before he announced the sentencing, Fenner asked Gross if he wanted to say anything.
After speaking briefly with O’Connor, Gross said “Your honor I choose not to make a comment at this time.”
Gross suspected in multiple killings
During the sentencing, federal prosecutors presented evidence that Gross “brutally murdered and decapitated” a woman found inside a burning Kansas City, North apartment.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jess E. Michaelsen said Gross had long been suspected in the Aug. 6, 2016, killing of Ying Li who was found slain in her living room. Michaelsen presented evidence in an effort to connect Gross to the homicide.
Gross has not been charged in the killing. Federal law allows prosecutors to present information about uncharged crimes at sentencing.
Kansas City homicide detective Alane M. Booth testified that thick smoke and flames poured from the second floor unit at the Oaks at Prairie View apartments in the 6900 block of Northwest 80th Terrace as the first fire crews arrived.
One of the three firefighters who entered the upstairs apartment immediately crawled on the floor to search for possible victims.
Within moments, the firefighter found Ying Li’s lifeless body.
Booth said their investigation led them to conclude that Gross decapitated Li after he received a massage and had sex with her. Li was stabbed 18 times and her killer also cut off her fingers.
The suspect also stuffed toilet paper into the coils of the mattress before setting it on fire, Booth said.
DNA evidence collected from Li’s body was linked to Gross. Traces of his DNA were found on a computer tablet and cell phone that were discarded and later found near Beacon and Bennington avenues in south Kansas City.
The area where investigators found the electronic items was about five miles away from Gross’ home.
Kansas City police later executed a search warrant at Gross’s home in south Kansas City and found an assortment of power tools and newspaper clippings of police investigations.
In an upstairs room, Gross kept a detailed calendar that included when female Asian massage workers were scheduled to arrive in Kansas City from New York.
He also kept track of a masseuse’s menstrual cycle, Booth testified.
During cross examination, Booth said investigators were unable to locate Li’s decapitated head or the fingers that were cut off both her hands.
Gross was one of several men who had visited and had sex with Li the day before her body was found. Investigators were unable to find the weapon that was used to kill Li.
O’Connor noted that prosecutors in Platte County, where the killing occurred, have not charged Gross in the homicide.
Stalking charges
Before the sentencing, O’Connor asked Fenner to throw out the conviction or grant Gross a new trial on two of the stalking convictions.
Chunqui Wu testified in the criminal trial against Gross but was later charged and pleaded guilty to federal charges of allowing her workers to perform sex acts in exchange for tips.
In court filings, O’Connor wrote two verdicts for interstate stalking were based on the testimony of Wu who lied to jurors. Those convictions should not be allowed to stand, he said.
Wu owned or operated three massage parlors, according to prosecutors. Two are in Olathe: Alpha Massage at 116 S. Clairborne Road and A Plus Massage at 527 N. Mur-Len Road. Another, in Leawood, is the King Spa at 13104 State Line Road.
“It is established that a conviction obtained through the use of false testimony, known to the government as such, must fall,” O’Connor wrote.
Fenner denied the motion for a new trial.
‘We might sleep a litter better at night.’
During the criminal trial in May, jurors convicted Gross of stalking multiple women between Oct. 1 and Dec. 22, 2017. During that period, Gross captured the attention of law enforcement in a rash of property crimes and stalking reports by workers at massage parlors in Olathe and Lawrence.
Video played to jurors at trial showed Gross walking around a Lawrence massage parlor in 2017, at times naked, while berating a worker.
The women told police their cars were keyed, screws drilled into their tires and their windows smashed out. The vandalism recalled earlier episodes that preceded assaults or killings of women Gross was connected to in the 1970s and 1980s, according to police reports and the accounts of women who survived attacks.
In regards to his firearms charges, prosecutors said Gross studied which type of firearms would avoid law enforcement detection. He bought two 12-gauge shotguns from a man in a dark parking lot after he removed the license plates from his car. Gross had also “stockpiled” at least eight sets of handcuffs at a Kansas City, Kansas, surplus store after he was told the business did not carry leg shackles.
Police detectives and federal agents who arrested Gross seized a black jacket, a cell phone, a black baseball cap and a pair of binoculars. Investigators testified those items are what police use to monitor suspects.
They noted Gross did not have a job and he did not work as a security officer.
As a result of that investigation, law enforcement officials in late 2017 put Gross under surveillance by the Kansas City Career Criminal Task Force, a group made up of local and federal law enforcement officers.
The surveillance team observed Gross over several weeks amassing a collection of guns, handcuffs and other security paraphernalia.
The sentencing draws a conclusion to the decades that local and federal authorities spent investigating Gross.
“We might sleep a little better at night,” said Kathy Zeysing, a friend of a couple who found shot to death in their Kansas City home in 1979. Zeysing had suspected Gross was involved in their killing.
“My heart goes out to all of his victims and their families. It is about time,” she said. “I’m not afraid now.”
This story was originally published October 13, 2020 at 4:27 PM.
