The Savage Murder of Cynthia Hoffman

A sickening murder near Anchorage, Alaska

There is nothing worse than children killing children, except perhaps when a teenager murders her best friend for the promise of money.

On Tuesday, June 4, 2019, Anchorage police discovered the body of nineteen-year-old Cynthia Hoffman in the creek near Thunderbird Falls in Chugiak, a few miles from Anchorage. Someone had bound her wrists and ankles with duct tape and then shot her execution-style in the back of the head. The more detectives dug into Cynthia’s murder, the more shocking and heartbreaking this case became.

According to her family, Cynthia (CeeCee) was sweet and funny. She loved hanging out with her friends and badly wanted her peers to like her. Her father, Timothy Hoffman, said CeeCee had a developmental disability, and she operated intellectually at a seventh-grade level. Her disability made her vulnerable to suggestions.

CeeCee had several friends, and her best friend was a girl CeeCee and her family knew as Angela. Angela was eighteen years old, and her real name was Denali Brehmer. On June 2, 2019, CeeCee told her father she planned to hang out with her friends for the day. Her father encouraged her to have a good time. He loved seeing CeeCee happy, and he knew how much she craved fitting in with kids her age. He also knew CeeCee would be with Angela, and he trusted Angela to look out for his daughter.

Timothy Hoffman built strong relationships based on trust and communication with his children. He bought each of his kids a phone, and he told them to call him anytime they had a problem. He also told them always to answer their phone when he called them. If he called, they were to drop what they were doing and immediately answer his call.

Cynthia was supposed to be home by 10:00 p.m. on June 2. Her father called her when she was late, but she didn’t answer. When she hadn’t arrived home and couldn’t be reached by 11:30 p.m., Hoffman called the Anchorage police. The police told him they could not consider her missing for 24 hours. When CeeCee still wasn’t home by the next morning, Timothy Hoffman knew something terrible had happened to his daughter. He again contacted the police, and this time, they began searching for CeeCee. Timothy texted CeeCee’s friend, Angela, and asked her if she knew where CeeCee was. Angela said CeeCee had asked her to drop her at the Polar Bear Playground at Russian Jack Springs Park in…