Gordon "Gordie" Edwin Sanderson, previously known as Septic Tank Sam, Sam Doe and Tofield John Doe, was a formerly unidentified Canadian murder victim who was found in a septic tank in 1977 at Lindbrook, Alberta, west of Tofield. His remains were identified in January 2021, and his identity was revealed five months later. The investigation into his homicide is ongoing. Early life Sanderson was an Indigenous man born in Manitoba on October 22, 1950. Police stated that Sanderson was a victim of the Sixties Scoop and put into foster care when he was nine years old. He struggled with addictions and had various run-ins with police. In the 1970s, he was living in Edmonton, and had planned to visit his brother, Arthur, in Calgary. Discovery Sanderson was found wearing a blue Levi's shirt with snap buttons, a grey T-shirt, blue jeans, and imitation Wallabee shoes. His decomposed body was wrapped in a yellow bed sheet and tied up with a nylon rope. Sanderson was found by a local couple scavenging their abandoned property for a septic tank pump. After seeing his leg bobbing in their old septic tank, they alerted the Tofield Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) detachment. Two officers came to the scene to recover Sanderson's body, where they spent an hour emptying the 1.8 meter deep septic tank with empty ice cream pails. Autopsy A medical examiner in Edmonton determined Sanderson to be Caucasian. His bones and teeth suggested he suffered from an unspecified illness at five years old. Sanderson's cause of death was two gunshots to the head and chest, although it was possible there could have been more if any of the bullets did not reach his skeleton. Before his death, Sanderson had been tortured: he had been beaten, tied up, burned with a small butane torch and cigarettes, and sexually mutilated with a sharp object. The sexual mutilation was so severe that the medical examiner took several months to positively identify him as a male. Based on the burn marks on his shirt sleeves, Sanderson could have been tied to a bed while tortured. The weapon(s) used to mutilate Sanderson could not be conclusively determined due to the condition of the remains, although the medical examiner suspected the use of farm shears. After Sanderson's death, he had been covered in quicklime, most likely in a mistaken attempt to hasten decomposition. Investigation Authorities suspected he was