A Heavy Weight returns with an episode examining the unresolved 1993 case of Todd Hanson and Chad Birkeland, a case that still sits in Minnesota’s official cold case materials decades later. According to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension case summary, Todd Hanson and Chad Birkeland disappeared from South St. Paul on May 2, 1993. On May 13, 1993, Chad Birkeland’s body was recovered from the Mississippi River near Hastings. Todd Hanson was never located and has not been seen or heard from since.
For anyone searching for information about the Todd Hanson missing person case or the Chad Birkeland unsolved homicide, those are the basic public facts that remain consistent in the official record. Hanson is still listed as missing. Birkeland is still listed as an unsolved homicide victim. Both entries trace back to the Newport Police Department, and both remain open enough that the BCA still asks the public for information.
The new A Heavy Weight episode follows the case through the limited but important public record that survives. One of the most significant developments came in 1995, when federal and state authorities excavated a rural homestead near Diamond Bluff, Wisconsin. A June 17, 1995 Star Tribune report stated that authorities found parts of three vehicles and a small amount of drugs, but no bodies. That same report said officers had hoped to find Todd Hanson’s body there.
That development seemed to point toward answers, but the public story quickly became more complicated. A second Star Tribune report published on August 11, 1995 said part of the reason the case drew so much publicity was that local authorities had said they were looking for Todd Hanson’s body. But the article also reported that U.S. Attorney Peggy Lautenschlager said the primary reason for the Diamond Bluff excavation was to look for evidence connected to a drug investigation, not to look for a body.
That tension remains one of the most haunting parts of the case. Was Diamond Bluff the place where investigators nearly found the answer to what happened to Todd Hanson and Chad Birkeland, or was it a drug investigation that briefly overlapped with their case in a way that made it seem closer to resolution than it really was? The public record does not fully answer that question. What it does show is that the disappearance of Todd Hanson and the death of Chad Birkeland continued to surface in connection with serious investigative activity years after the men vanished.
That unresolved quality is what makes this case linger. The official timeline is short. The consequences are not. Two young men disappeared from South St. Paul. One was recovered from the Mississippi River near Hastings eleven days later. The other has never been found.
In this episode, A Heavy Weight explores that silence and the story it leaves behind. Rather than inventing certainty where none exists, the episode stays with the known facts, the years of unanswered questions, and the weight carried by a case that still has not been closed.
I encourage you to listen to the Todd Hanson and Chad Birkeland podcast episode, below. If you have information about the case, the Minnesota BCA tip line listed in the official case materials is (877) 996-6222.
