Linda Laura Hazzard

Serial Killer

Linda Laura Hazzard: The "Starvation Doctor"

Background and Medical Claims

Linda Laura Hazzard was an American fasting practitioner whose treatments caused the deaths of numerous patients during the early twentieth century. Born Linda Laura Burfield on December 18, 1867, in Carver County, Minnesota, she had limited formal medical education and never earned a conventional medical degree. Nevertheless, a loophole in Washington State law allowed her to obtain a medical license as an alternative practitioner. She presented herself as a doctor and became widely known as a "fasting specialist." Hazzard taught that nearly every illness was caused by eating too much. She claimed that extended fasting would allow the digestive system to rest and remove poisons from the body. Her patients were often given no solid food for several weeks. Some received only one or two small cups of thin tomato, asparagus or vegetable broth each day. As they became weak and dangerously underweight, Hazzard continued the fast rather than restoring normal nutrition.

Her Treatment Methods

Food deprivation was only one part of Hazzard's treatment. Patients were subjected to daily enemas that could continue for hours. They were ordered to take long walks even when they were barely able to stand. Hazzard also performed forceful abdominal massages that witnesses described as painful pounding or striking. Hot baths and other exhausting procedures were used on people already suffering from severe malnutrition. Many patients became skeletal, confused and physically helpless. Some were moved from Seattle apartments to Hazzard's property near Olalla, Washington, after they had become too weak to resist or seek assistance. Local residents called the property "Starvation Heights." Hazzard officially referred to her establishment as the Institute of Natural Therapeutics or Wilderness Heights. ...

Confirmed Victims: (1)

Clair Williamson , Date of Death: 1911-05-19

Suspected Victims:

Eugene Stanley Wakelin , Date of Death: 1909

Lenora J. Wilcox , Date of Death: 1907

Daisy Maud Haglund , Date of Death: 1908-02-08

Blanche B. Tindall , Date of Death: 1909

Viola Heaton , Date of Death: 1909

Lydia Maude Whitney , Date of Death: 1910

Earl Edward Erdman , Date of Death: 1910-03-28

Frank Stuart Southard , Date of Death: 1911

Edward S. Harrison , Date of Death: 1911

John Ivan Flux , Date of Death: 1911

Lewis Ellsworth Rader , Date of Death: 1911-05

Ida Julia Anderson , Date of Death: 1913

Mary T. Bailey , Date of Death: 1913

Leonard Ritter , Date of Death: 1925

Survivors:

Dorothea Williamson

Linda Hazzard - Wikipedia