Christina Karlsen left behind her husband and three young children when she died in a house fire in 1991. Although police ruled it out as an accident, almost two decades later, it was proven that she was killed.
Tonight on NBC, Dateline will revisit the murder case of Christina Karlsen. Her daughters, sister, and family talk about how they found out about Karl Karlsen’s darker side where he was sacrificing his closest family members for insurance money.
Dateline Revisits Christina Karlsen Case- What Happened To Her?
A fire in 1991 during New year’s Day destroyed a family and their home in rural California. The Karlsen family was spending their New Year’s Day at home when a fire broke out and quickly burned their house.
They did lose not only their home but also one of their family members, Christina Karlsen. The mother of three young children who were taking a bath was trapped in the house’s bathroom and died in the fire. Her husband and children were able to safely escape the flames.
Karl and Christina fell in love while Karl was an Air Force cadet stationed in North Dakota. At the time, Christina was married to another cadet, but the two could not deny their chemistry and soon started a new life together.
The couple landed in New York, and Karl worked at a nearby stone quarry. But they struggled financially, and later they moved to Murphys, California, in the late 1980s after Christina’s father, Art Alexander, gave him a job at his sheet metal company in the Sierra Nevada foothills in central California, as per Oxygen.
The man who had captured Christina’s heart initially impressed Christina’s family, but over time they began to discover unsettling signs in the marriage. She was reportedly violently assaulted, as said by her sister Colette Bousson Karl.
Bousson advised Christina to break up with Karl, but Christina insisted that her kids should grow up with both parents at home. But her wish was never fulfilled as she passed away in 1991 in a house fire.
Although there was suspicion that the fire was set deliberately and Karl did not try to save Christina that Day as per his children who saw their mother die in a fire, the law enforcement officers could not carry out an investigation because the family had already gone back to NY and the officers did not have the fund for the travel.
Thus, her rule was ruled as an accident, and her husband got $200,000 from her insurance.
Is There Any Update On Christina Karlsen Murder?
Christina Karlsen’s murder case was finally closed when her killer got the sentence for his crime. He received a life sentence without parole in 2020.
Although it was said that Christina died because she was trapped in the bathroom. Later, it was discovered that she could not have escaped through the bathroom window since Karlsen had just a few days before boarded it up from the outside because it was damaged.
He said that he could only save his children and could not go back to get his wife, and she died in the fire. After over decades of her death, her son Levi also died in a weird accident, which caused many people to suspect him of murdering his son too.
His second wife was the one who found out that Karlsen had killed his son for the insurance money. He had received $700,000 after his son died. He was found guilty of murdering his son and had been serving in jail since 2008.
It was in 2020 that he was found guilty of murdering his first wife in 1991.
Where Are Christina Karlsen Children Today?
Christina Karlsen has three children- two daughters and a son. Her son Levi was father to two kids when he died.
Her daughters Erin DeRoche and Kati Reynolds did lose not only their mother and brother but also their father after finding out that he was the one behind the deaths of their family members.