Roger Adams was 31 when he was fatally stabbed while waiting for a bus in Buffalo, New York, on December 29, 1980. His killing was linked by investigators to a wave of violent attacks against Black men in the city and region that involved both a knife and a small-caliber firearm.

The investigation tied Adams’s death to a broader string of racially motivated murders carried out by a man later identified as Joseph Christopher. After a confession made during a psychiatric evaluation at a military stockade, police searched Christopher’s home and found evidence connecting him to multiple killings. In April 1981 he was indicted and returned to Buffalo for trial; he was convicted for a series of murders including the stabbing of Roger Adams and sentenced to life in prison.