Hausner was born in 1973 and worked as a hospital janitor in Phoenix; he was also an amateur boxing photographer. He shared an apartment with Samuel Dieteman.
Between May 2005 and July 2006 they drove around Phoenix at night shooting pedestrians, cyclists and, on some nights, animals, from the car. Six people were killed: David Estrada, twenty; Nathaniel Shoffner; Jose Ortiz, forty-four; Marco Carillo; Claudia Gutierrez-Cruz, twenty; and Robin Blasnek, twenty-two. Nineteen more were shot and survived. The victims were strangers, chosen because they were there.
Phoenix at that time had two unconnected serial cases running at once: this one, called the Serial Shooter, and the Baseline Killer, Mark Goudeau, who has his own entry here. The city's police were working both simultaneously, and the two were repeatedly confused in public reporting.
They were arrested on August 3, 2006 after Dieteman talked in a bar and was overheard. Dieteman pleaded guilty and testified against Hausner, receiving life. Hausner was convicted in March 2009 on six counts of murder and dozens of other counts, and sentenced to death.
He dropped his appeals in 2010 and asked to be executed. On June 19, 2013 he died in prison of a drug overdose, recorded as suicide.