Comedy club owner with terminal cancer hunts kills ex-father-in-law before hunting down ex-wife who makes miracle escape

An Arizona man with terminal cancer tried to kill his ex-wife thousands of miles away in Alaska and fatally shot her father before he was found dead.

Matthew Becker, 61, was the owner of Chuckleheads comedy club in Bisbee, a small city about 100 miles southeast of Tucson and just north of the border with Mexico. 

On the morning of March 14, he attempted to track down his ex-wife in Anchorage, Alaska, according to court records. Anchorage is about 4,000 miles from Bisbee. 

Becker went to her hair salon and tampered with the lock, presumably to try to get inside. 

The woman, whose identity has not been made public, told police that when she arrived at her business, she was unable to open the door because of the damage to the lock. 

It was then that Becker hopped out of a car he was waiting in nearby and began firing shots at his ex-wife, court records said. 

The woman, who later said that she was unaware that her ex-husband was in Anchorage, managed to run away and hide between buildings before calling 911. 

When officers with the Anchorage Police Department arrived, she told them she was worried about her elderly father, whom she was living with. 

Police went to the home to conduct a wellness check. There, at around 9.46am, they found the woman’s father had been shot to death. 

The Anchorage Police Department identified the man as 87-year-old Romaine Clark.

Sean Case, an officer with the department, told KTUU it is believed that Becker drove straight to the elderly man’s home after shooting at his ex-wife.

He added that only about 45 minutes had passed between the woman calling 911 and the wellness check on her father.  

Police said that Clark was shot through a window in the back of the home, and they named Becker as the suspect in the murder of the elderly man and the shooting of the woman.

A manhunt for the terminally-ill comedy club owner ensued.

On March 15 around 10.24am, a little more than 24 hours after Clark was found dead, police found Becker dead in a wooded area near the Eagle River campground, which is just outside of Anchorage. 

The Anchorage Police Department said that Becker was found ‘with a gunshot wound to the upper body’ and that the medical examiner will determine the cause of death. 

Becker’s brother confirmed to Alaska’s news source that the comedy club owner had been living in Arizona since the divorce with his ex-wife and that he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. 

On Tuesday, the Chuckleheads comedy club, which is now listed as ‘permanently closed’ on Facebook, released a statement disavowing the actions of its deceased owner, calling him ‘a complicated man, to say the least.’ 

‘His last actions ruined every positive memory I had of him,’ the statement said before adding, ‘Matt ruined everything that the team at Chuckleheads ever tried to build.’

‘To make this tragedy about anything else than the murder of an innocent 87 year old man, is wrong and shameful. There’s no convoluted cancer medicated induced rational argument that will ever bring that dad back,’ the statement continued. 

‘This story can’t be summed up in a tweet or Facebook post. A father’s life can’t fit into a news article. It’s tragic that a person can enter someones life and monumentally alter it’s trajectory, scarring and traumatizing it forever. 

‘Rest in Peace Romaine Clark,’ the statement concluded.