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aliases category tags summary born died location relations created updated
Myroslawa Anna Ferkuniak
Myroslawa Ferkuniak
Myroslawa A. Ferkuniak
Myroslawa Anna Horsch
Myroslawa Anna Hoersch
Anna Ferkuniak
Anna M. Ferkuniak
Anna M. Horsch
Anna Horsch
M. Horsch
Other
AbuseNetworks
Person
RCHorsch
NewZealand
Wales
IdentityFraud
Fugitive
Welsh-born wife of the fugitive R.C. Horsch, whom she married in Reno in 1980 under his stolen name and accompanied to New Zealand, and mother of Eugene Horsch. 1949-10-07 1989-07-28 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
type with start end fn
spouse_of R.C. Horsch 1980-09-12 1989-07-28 9
type with role start fn
relative_of Eugene Horsch mother 1981 1
2026-09-23 2026-10-15

Myroslawa "Anna" Ferkuniak (October 7, 1949, to July 28, 1989), known after her marriage as Anna M. Horsch, was the second wife of R.C. Horsch, a Philadelphia filmmaker, counterfeiter and methamphetamine manufacturer who was a fugitive from 1977 to 1984. She married him in Reno, Nevada on September 12, 1980, while he was using the identity of a California chemist, Stanley Edward Stokowski. She lived with him in New Zealand until he left the country in March 1984, and she was the mother of Eugene Horsch.12

Early life

She was born in Nantymoel, Glamorgan, Wales, a daughter of Michael and Maria (Perwiczko) Ferkuniak.2 Her birth was registered in the Bridgend district in the last quarter of 1949.3 A 2026 The Philadelphia Inquirer article gives the same birthplace, spelled Nant-y-moel.1 She arrived in New York City on March 2, 1961, at the age of 11.4 Her parents later lived on a rural route outside Lehighton, Pennsylvania in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, and she had one sister, who survived her.2

The fugitive years

The Inquirer reported that Horsch met her sometime after she was arrested in an LSD raid at a house near Temple University, and that she was his longtime girlfriend when he fled to the West Coast.1 Agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration arrested Horsch in Philadelphia on methamphetamine charges in February 1977.5 The Press of Christchurch reported in 1985 that the offences occurred in 1977 and that Horsch "skipped bail."6 In California he took the identity of Stanley Edward Stokowski, a chemist with a 1968 doctorate from Stanford University. The real Stokowski, 42 in 1984 and working at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, told the paper's San Francisco correspondent that he had never lost his passport and was unaware that anyone had used his name.7

In a 2013 interview Horsch described her as the steadier partner of the fugitive years. "She was the practical one. She was the one who kept me from making big mistakes," he said, calling her "kind of the sea anchor."8

Marriage in Reno

They married in Reno on September 12, 1980. The groom is recorded as Stanley E Stokowski, and both residences are given as Florida.910 The Reno Air Races opened that day. Horsch's self-published biography later claimed that he flew a BD-5J micro-jet in air shows during his years as a fugitive and appeared on American Broadcasting Company's Wide World of Sports during the 1980 Reno races.11 The official program lists the daily BD-5J demonstration as flown by George Marshall (pilot).12

Horsch said in 2013 that the two had been together "five or six years or something like that" before they married, and that they "got married specifically because we needed a marriage license to get into New Zealand."13

New Zealand, 1980 to 1984

On October 3, 1984, The Press reported that the Minister of Immigration and Regional Development, Kerry Burke, had announced the completion of further inquiries into the case of an American-born man "now known to be Raymond Charles Hoersch, who entered New Zealand in 1980 and worked for a South Canterbury firm as an alternative fuels expert." The report said that Hoersch "has since left New Zealand with his wife and child." Burke said that the immigration department had been under "some pressure from the man's proposed employer to make an early decision," and that the transcript submitted in the stolen name was one the genuine Stokowski had since confirmed as his.14

On June 9, 1984, The Press wrote that "Stokowski" came to New Zealand "with his wife, Anna, and 18-month-old son," after the Christchurch lawyer John Rutherford (New Zealand lawyer) contacted him and with Rutherford set up Chemical Technology Limited in South Canterbury.15 A The New Zealand Herald article of September 23, 2026, repeated the account of "wife Anna and 18-month-old son" and placed the arrival in Canterbury in 1980.16 The Inquirer gives Eugene's birth as 1981, in its passage on the family's years at Timaru, and a 2026 Inquirer report on the 1985 evaluation describes him as four years old.117 In 2013 Horsch said that his son was three at the time of his 1984 arrest.18

The family lived at Hadlow, New Zealand, near Timaru, until mid-March 1984.19 Horsch was a director of Chemical Technology, which owned an ethanol plant at Clandeboye, New Zealand that converted whey into ethanol, and he ran a computer software exchange at Washdyke. Rutherford told The Press in June 1984 that he found Horsch "a particularly smart fellow, a real toiler and an excellent family man."1920

Horsch left New Zealand on March 17, 1984, on a passport that police believed had been stolen in a burglary at Temuka. Detective Superintendent R.N. MacDonald said on June 9 that his family left "soon after."15 On June 12 he said that police had confirmation that "Stokowski" had left the country but none that his wife and child had gone, and that properties at Clandeboye and Hadlow had been searched in the inquiry; police were looking for the wife and child.21 In 2013 Horsch said that he got them out first: "I got my son and my wife out of the country. They were able to travel in their passports."18 The Inquirer wrote that he "left Anna and Eugene behind, and they returned to America later."1 The Press reported in April 1985 that he had fled New Zealand "with his wife and 18-month-old son," and quoted Joanne Epps, a Philadelphia assistant district attorney, as saying that he left New Zealand in June 1984 and was arrested in Florida in October.6

Return to the United States and the last years

Horsch said in 2013 that after returning to the United States he settled in Orlando, Florida and started a computer business, and that he had arranged through a Philadelphia lawyer to surrender when agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested him there at 4 a.m. on the Monday he was to do so. He had set up businesses "which I thought would provide my wife and son with a little bit of income while I was in jail." They failed, he said, and "Her family and my family got together and we got through it."18 He was sentenced in Philadelphia on April 25, 1985, to a total of four years.6

A psychologist, Don Seraydarian, examined Horsch for four hours in 1985 at the request of his defense team before his sentencing. He recorded that Horsch's only real friend or support system was his wife, who had a "therapeutic and rehabilitative effect" on him, and that Horsch was "very protective" of his wife and son, who were the "most important things in his life."17

After an early release from prison in 1987, Horsch moved the family to Northeast Philadelphia and took a job as an IT director. She found work cleaning houses. Although he claimed never to have taken drugs, he "watched Anna fall into addiction," according to the Inquirer.1 In 2013 Horsch said that after the move "she started using prescription painkillers and that, and ended up killing herself," and that during the last year "I would go to work during the day and never know what was happening, whether she'd be driving the car stoned out of her mind, whether she was taking care of our son or not."22

Death

She died on Friday, July 28, 1989, at the family's home in Philadelphia, at the age of 39.2 Her death in 1989 is also recorded in the Social Security index.3 Her obituary in The Morning Call of Allentown, Pennsylvania described her as the wife of Raymond Horsch, said that she died "after a lengthy illness," and listed her husband, her parents and her son Eugene, then at home, among the survivors. Her funeral was held from the Andrew P. Ovsak Funeral Home in Lehighton, with a Divine Liturgy at St. Vladimir Ukrainian Catholic Church (Lehighton).2

The Inquirer reported in 2026 that she was sitting in the family's living room when she accidentally overdosed on glutethimide and codeine, and that Eugene, then seven, was in the room.1 Horsch's 2013 account attributes the death to her use of prescription painkillers and says the son was in the room. "My basic fundamental reaction was and is anger," he said. "Because she kind of bailed out, left me with a kid to raise by myself."22

The following month Horsch bought a house in New Britain Township, Pennsylvania, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, where, according to the Inquirer, he raised Eugene as a single father. A county real-estate transfer dated October 29, 1989, names him as the buyer.1723

Books credited to her

In 2013 Horsch said that one of the books he wrote in prison was written with one of his ex-wives, was her memoir of growing up, and was banned for content.24 In January 2014 Horsch's website, Eroto, credited "authors R.C. Hörsch and Anna M. Ferkuniak," along with "publisher S.E. Stokowski," with books that Amazon (company) had banned, and offered their eBooks free.25 The site's books page of September 2014 lists Annie, "the intimate journal of a troubled young girl wrestling with addiction, destructive behavior, bulimia and rampant promiscuity," by "Anna M. Ferkuniak and R. C. Hörsch," of about 162 pages. Its Foreword, signed A. M. Ferkuniak, begins: "My ex-husband, R. C., is the one who got me to write this memoir."26 A paperback edition of Annie, crediting R. Horsch and Anna Ferkuniak, was issued by CreateSpace in 2014.27

The Inquirer wrote that Horsch was "always looking for new women," particularly women who resembled his deceased wife, and that he told one woman he asked to appear in Slaves, a 2003 film he was producing, that she reminded him of Anna. Slaves is also the title of a Horsch book on the same site.126

Footnotes

  1. "How a pornographer's violent fantasies blurred fact and fiction as cops searched Olney house for missing women," The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 2, 2026 (the passages on the LSD raid and flight to the West Coast, the 1980 Nevada marriage, the 1981 birth, the departure from New Zealand, the 1987 move, the addiction, the 1989 death and the glutethimide overdose, the 2003 film, and the embedded profile line "He married Anna Ferkuniak, a native of Nant-y-moel, Wales, who was Eugene Horsch's mother. She died in 1989 at age 39 after a lengthy illness, according to her obituary."). https://www.inquirer.com/news/a/raymond-eugene-horsch-olney-philadelphia-missing-women-history-20260802.html ↩︎

  2. "Anna M. Horsch," obituary, The Morning Call, August 1, 1989, p. 18 ("died Friday in her home after a lengthy illness," "She was the wife of Raymond Horsch," "Born in Nantymoel, England," "a daughter of Michael and Maria (Perwiczko) Ferkuniak of Lehighton R.2"; survivors include her husband, her parents, "son Eugene, at home" and one sister; funeral at the Andrew P. Ovsak Funeral Home with a Divine Liturgy at St. Vladimir's Ukrainian Catholic Church). https://www.newspapers.com/image/283766965/ Death notices ran August 1, 1989, p. 30, and August 2, 1989, p. 37. ↩︎

  3. England and Wales Civil Registration Birth Index, December quarter 1949, "Ferkuniak, Myroslawa A," Bridgend, volume 8b, page 44 (FreeBMD, search of October 15, 2026); the same index lists "Myroslawa Anna Ferkuniak" with a death in 1989 (Ancestry.com, record 23055146); U.S. Social Security Applications and Claims Index, "Anna Ferkuniak" with the names "Myroslawa Anna Hoersch" and "M Horsch," born in the United Kingdom, death 1989 (Ancestry.com, record 37433855). https://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/search.pl and https://www.ancestry.com/search/?name=Myroslawa_Ferkuniak ↩︎

  4. New York State, Passenger and Crew Lists, 1917-1967, "Myroslawa A Ferkuniak," arrival at New York, March 2, 1961 (Ancestry.com, record 8290685), accessed September 23, 2026. https://www.ancestry.com/search/?name=Myroslawa_Ferkuniak ↩︎

  5. "A Philadelphia man is arrested on drug charges," The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 5, 1977, p. 10. https://www.newspapers.com/image/172176774/ ↩︎

  6. "Ethanol 'scientist' jailed for drug offences," The Press (Christchurch), April 27, 1985, p. 3 (Press Association; "The offences occurred in 1977, but Hoersch skipped bail and later spent three years in New Zealand. He left New Zealand in June last year and was arrested in Florida in October, Ms Epps said"; "He used the passport to flee New Zealand with his wife and 18-month-old son"; sentenced "on Thursday" to a total of four years). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19850427.2.26 ↩︎

  7. "Where has 'Dr Stokowski' gone?," The Press (Christchurch), June 9, 1984, p. 1 (the real Stokowski, "aged 42," a Stanford doctorate of 1968 who "works for the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory"; "He had never lost his passport and was puzzled and surprised about the affair"; "was unaware that someone had used his name"). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19840609.2.9 ↩︎

  8. West, Ashley. "Ray Horsch: Sociopathic Villain," The Rialto Report, Podcast 27, 2013, audio at 1:12:32 to 1:12:42 (Horsch interview; audio preserved in a Wayback Machine capture of March 31, 2019). https://web.archive.org/web/20190331064614/http://traffic.libsyn.com/therialtoreport/27_Rialto_Report_027_-_Ray_Horsch__Sociopathic_Villain.mp3 ↩︎

  9. Nevada, U.S., Marriage Index, 1956-2005, "Myroslawa Anna Ferkuniak," spouse "Stanley E Stokowski," both residences Florida, marriage date September 12, 1980 (Ancestry.com, record 3523542), accessed October 15, 2026. https://www.ancestry.com/search/?name=Myroslawa_Ferkuniak ↩︎

  10. Nevada Marriage Index, 1956-2005, same record: recorded September 16, 1980, Book 722, page 654, instrument number 4784, religious celebrant, Reno (Ancestry.com, collection 1100). https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/1100/ ↩︎

  11. "Biographical Note," by "S.E. Stokowski," eroto.com, Internet Archive capture of November 5, 2016 (the self-published claim that Horsch "somehow managed to fly a BD5-J micro-jet aircraft in various U.S. air shows, boldly (and foolishly) appearing on ABC's 'Wide World of Sports' during the 1980 Reno Air Races"). https://web.archive.org/web/20161105021502/http://eroto.com:80/commentary/3-biography ↩︎

  12. "Official Air Races schedule," Reno Gazette-Journal, September 12, 1980, p. 74 (the daily program of the National Championship Air Races, which ran from September 12 to 14, 1980; "BD5J" demonstration listed under George Marshall). https://www.newspapers.com/image/149117327/ ↩︎

  13. West, Ashley. "Ray Horsch: Sociopathic Villain," The Rialto Report, Podcast 27, 2013, audio at 1:05:45 to 1:06:01 (Horsch interview). https://web.archive.org/web/20190331064614/http://traffic.libsyn.com/therialtoreport/27_Rialto_Report_027_-_Ray_Horsch__Sociopathic_Villain.mp3 ↩︎

  14. "Impostor: immigration cleared of blame," The Press (Christchurch), October 3, 1984, p. 3 (Parliamentary reporter; Burke's announcement "yesterday"; "the department was under some pressure from the man's proposed employer to make an early decision"; the transcript "which the genuine Dr Stokowski had since confirmed as his"). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19841003.2.23 ↩︎

  15. "Where has 'Dr Stokowski' gone?," The Press (Christchurch), June 9, 1984, p. 1 ("came to New Zealand with his wife, Anna, and 18-month-old son, and with Mr Rutherford set up Chemical Technology, Ltd"; Detective Superintendent MacDonald: "the bogus Stokowski left New Zealand on March 17, using a stolen passport, and that his family left soon after"; the Temuka burglary). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19840609.2.9 ↩︎

  16. Leask, Anna. "Man linked to multiple missing women in US had fled NZ 40 years ago after posing as scientist," The New Zealand Herald, September 23, 2026 ("He reportedly travelled to Canterbury in 1980 with his 'wife Anna and 18-month-old son'"). https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/raymond-horsch-man-linked-to-philadelphia-house-of-horrors-lived-near-timaru-under-stolen-name/BVQSWBL3LZDL3GIXFEHHBFY6RY/ ↩︎

  17. Marin, Max, Ryan W. Briggs, and Ellie Rushing. "'Consumed by anger': Inside the 1985 psych profile of Raymond Horsch," The Philadelphia Inquirer, September 3, 2026 (the four-hour assessment commissioned by the defense before sentencing; the wife's "therapeutic and rehabilitative effect"; "very protective" of "his wife and then-4-year-old son, Eugene"; the move to Bucks County after her death and the raising of Eugene as a single father). https://www.inquirer.com/news/raymond-horsch-olney-missing-women-psych-exam-20260903.html ↩︎

  18. West, Ashley. "Ray Horsch: Sociopathic Villain," The Rialto Report, Podcast 27, 2013, audio at 1:07:13 to 1:07:51 ("I got my son and my wife out of the country"; "They were able to travel in their passports") and 1:08:12 to 1:10:14 (Orlando; "my son was three years old at the time"; the arrest at 4 a.m.; the businesses; "Her family and my family got together and we got through it"). https://web.archive.org/web/20190331064614/http://traffic.libsyn.com/therialtoreport/27_Rialto_Report_027_-_Ray_Horsch__Sociopathic_Villain.mp3 ↩︎

  19. "Police look for U.S. chemist," The Press (Christchurch), June 6, 1984, p. 1 (Press Association, Timaru; "Dr Stokowski lived in Hadlow, near Timaru, until mid-March"; "a director of the Clandeboye ethanol plant owned by Chemical Technology, Ltd, and also ran a computer software exchange at Washdyke"). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19840606.2.48 ↩︎

  20. Same article (Rutherford: he found Horsch "a particularly smart fellow, a real toiler and an excellent family man"); "Ethanol by September," The Press (Christchurch), July 20, 1981 (Chemical Technology, Ltd., "formed earlier this year"; the $1.5 million plant near Temuka and its whey feedstock; "Dr Stanly Stokowski, the director"). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19840606.2.48 and https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19810720.2.23 ↩︎

  21. "Police seek wife, child," The Press (Christchurch), June 13, 1984, p. 1 (Press Association, Timaru; "the police had confirmation that 'Stokowski' had left New Zealand, but they had no confirmation that his wife and child had gone"; searches of properties at Clandeboye and Hadlow). https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19840613.2.7 ↩︎

  22. West, Ashley. "Ray Horsch: Sociopathic Villain," The Rialto Report, Podcast 27, 2013, audio at 1:12:48 to 1:14:21 (Horsch interview: "ended up killing herself"; "my son was seven at the time. He was in the room when she died"; "Because she kind of bailed out, left me with a kid to raise by myself"; "My basic fundamental reaction was and is anger"; the last year). https://web.archive.org/web/20190331064614/http://traffic.libsyn.com/therialtoreport/27_Rialto_Report_027_-_Ray_Horsch__Sociopathic_Villain.mp3 ↩︎

  23. "[Bucks County real-estate transfers]," The Philadelphia Inquirer, October 29, 1989, p. 480 (transfer to Raymond C. Horsch in New Britain Township). https://www.newspapers.com/image/177531276/ ↩︎

  24. West, Ashley. "Ray Horsch: Sociopathic Villain," The Rialto Report, Podcast 27, 2013, audio at 1:36:23 to 1:36:59 ("I wrote four or five books in prison"; "a book that I wrote with one of my ex-wives. The book was her memoir of when she was growing up"; "That was banned for content"). https://web.archive.org/web/20190331064614/http://traffic.libsyn.com/therialtoreport/27_Rialto_Report_027_-_Ray_Horsch__Sociopathic_Villain.mp3 ↩︎

  25. eroto.com front page, Internet Archive capture of January 13, 2014 ("In honor of having three of four posted books banned by Amazon, authors R.C. Hörsch and Anna M. Ferkuniak, along with publisher S.E. Stokowski, have decided to make the eBook versions of everything available to all our friends for FREE download."). https://web.archive.org/web/20140113132225/http://eroto.com/ ↩︎

  26. eroto.com, "Books," Internet Archive capture of September 28, 2014 (Annie, "By Anna M. Ferkuniak and R. C. Hörsch," "approximately 23,000 words, 162 pages"; Slaves, "By R.C. Hörsch," "the book upon which the 'Slaves' film is based"), https://web.archive.org/web/20140928154523/http://www.eroto.com:80/books ; eroto.com, "Annie," capture of September 27, 2020 (Foreword "By A. M. Ferkuniak": "My ex-husband, R. C., is the one who got me to write this memoir."), https://web.archive.org/web/20200927100923/https://eroto.com/books/35-annie ↩︎

  27. Annie (2014), authors R. Horsch and Anna Ferkuniak, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, ISBN 9781492971054, 162 pages (Open Library edition OL55275516M, work OL40660562W). https://openlibrary.org/books/OL55275516M ↩︎