NIGHTSTALKER RICHARD RAMIREZ - E True Hollywood Story documentary
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00:00The first thing I heard was a crack.
00:06Concern over rape is mounting in this community.
00:08We believe he watched as the two of them had sexual intercourse.
00:15The homicides were acts of rage.
00:18He, you know, crushed her face.
00:21He's a monster.
00:22He could be somebody's neighbor, he could be somebody's boyfriend.
00:25He has never been caught, and I will never be able to get it out of my mind until there
00:30is closure.
00:36In the 1980s, Richard Ramirez, a psychopath known as the Night Stalker, terrorized Los
00:55Angeles with a string of vicious murders.
00:57Ramirez was sentenced to death in 1989, but a decade earlier, another man, known as the
01:03original Night Stalker, baffled and eluded California authorities.
01:08To this day, this killer has not been caught.
01:14The summer of 1976 marked the beginning of a three-year reign of terror by a man known
01:19as the East Area Rapist.
01:22Starting in small bedroom communities in Sacramento, California, and reaching south to Stockton,
01:27this vicious predator is estimated to have raped more than 50 women, making him one of
01:32the most prolific serial sex offenders in history.
01:35The amount of fear he put in everybody, I mean, the fear in the victims, the fear in
01:43the community, this guy was scary.
01:46I got a call one morning, responded to a rape.
01:50A week or two weeks later, responded to another rape.
01:53We backtracked, found out there had been, I think, four other rapes before these, and
01:59nobody had bothered to connect them.
02:02Somebody put together a chart of a whole bunch of unsolved rapes, but as we went through
02:07the charts, we were able to eliminate all, but I think it was five or six that we decided
02:12were definitely all the same.
02:16It soon became clear to authorities what they were up against, a clever and ruthless criminal.
02:26The East Area Rapist had an extremely identifiable method of operation, his M.O., unlike any
02:34other rape cases that we had ever been involved in.
02:38The rapist attacked victims inside their homes while they were sleeping.
02:45He wanted a definite surprise.
02:46He wanted to catch them where they were really relaxed.
02:49He would come into the house, he quietly would go back into the bedroom where the victim
02:54was.
02:55He wakes the victims by shining a light on them and telling them to wake up.
03:01They could see nothing except there was a threat of the gun that they would be killed
03:06if they did not do what he asked them to do.
03:09It's pitch black and you just have this bright light in your face and this voice screaming
03:17at you.
03:18I mean, you're going to cooperate.
03:22Once the victim complied, the rapist blindfolded and tied them up.
03:29Most of the time he would bring shoelaces with him.
03:32Other times he would take them from the shoes that were in the closet there.
03:36He would tie them really tight, hands and feet, in their health circulation.
03:40You don't tie them that tight on somebody unless you're really trying to hurt them.
03:46One knot in particular became the rapist's signature.
03:51They called it a diamond knot and none of us knew how to tie it.
03:54Then he would just basically torture them.
04:00The initial attack was awful in its own right, but the rumors of the torture and what might
04:07be coming next, laying there not knowing if he was coming back, getting up not knowing
04:12if he was going to jump out at you again.
04:16He would spend hours in the house, just terrifying the subject that was inside.
04:22Even though rape is bad, that's not what they were reporting.
04:25They were reporting what they went through, the fear that they went through.
04:31To avoid alarming the public, local law enforcement decided not to immediately release any information
04:36to the press.
04:41We weren't quite ready to let the public know that we had a series going on here because
04:44we had nothing to give the people out there.
04:47Police worked with victims to piece together a physical description of the attacker.
04:52We know he was Caucasian and we know that because they did see his bare legs.
04:58And at the time they thought when he first started hitting in 76 that he was between
05:0319 and 28, 29 years old.
05:07Mostly they talked about medium height, medium build, athletic build.
05:13I was blindfolded and told not to look at him.
05:16He was bigger than me, but he wasn't not a giant bulky man.
05:21And the attacker made sure to hide his face.
05:25He always wore a ski mask or some type of mask.
05:29On November 4th, 1976, the East Area Rapist claimed his 7th and 8th victims, both on the
05:36same day.
05:37Police finally decided to alert the media and fear gripped the area.
05:43We have concluded that we probably are dealing with the East Side Rapist.
05:48The press came out that it was a serial rapist and everybody started getting involved.
05:53Concern over rape is mounting in this community.
05:56Many of the same women at this workshop will gather again next month for a sheriff's talk
06:01on safety in the neighborhood.
06:03The community was all up in arms.
06:05There were rumors out there that he was cutting off fingers, that he was cutting off ears,
06:10that he was cutting off the nipples from the women's breasts.
06:13And none of that was true.
06:15We decided that we needed to have some community meetings to be able to answer people's questions
06:20and to be able to set the record straight.
06:24I live alone and I would like to learn how to protect myself.
06:29People had to change the way they were living.
06:31You know, they had to lock themselves into their home.
06:34People just did not go out at night and some people just didn't sleep at night.
06:38They slept in shifts.
06:39There was a lot of fear and even in my own home, we put everything we could on the windows
06:48and door locks.
06:49I don't like it.
06:51It's getting too close to home.
06:52Do you plan on taking any precautions?
06:55I put locks on my doors, peepholes in, just last week.
07:00All hardware stores sold out on security hardware.
07:05Gun sales jumped 20-25%.
07:08I have a gun, but I still don't feel safe being, you know, at home alone.
07:14It was an entirely paranoid county.
07:16Anybody that did a burglary had to be out of their mind, had to be stupid, had a good
07:21chance of getting blown away.
07:24For a full year, authorities tracked countless leads and sifted through hundreds of clues,
07:29but were unable to develop a suspect.
07:32Meanwhile, in Sacramento suburbs like Carmichael and Citrus Heights, the victim count grew.
07:42When you start hitting 15, 20 and he's not been caught, I think everybody wanted justice.
07:49By the spring of 1977, a serial sex offender known as the East Area Rapist had brutally
07:55assaulted more than 20 women in Northern California.
07:58Now the whole community be victimized because he's running wild.
08:02The panic level was just extreme.
08:05He was like a phantom out there.
08:07Everybody was starting to be very fearful in Sacramento.
08:11A special task force was created in an all-out effort to catch the predator.
08:16I forget how many officers we had at the time, about 1,200.
08:19Sheriff's Department was spending more money than they ever spent on any other project
08:24in their history.
08:26Because if there is an intruder...
08:28Authorities focused on the fact that the attacks occurred within a contained area.
08:32Rancho Cordova is very middle class.
08:35On the north side of Rancho Cordova, there was the American River, and it's got a lot
08:40of trees and bushes and hiding places.
08:46We felt all along that he really lived in the Rancho Cordova area.
08:51It's a neighborhood that he's comfortable with.
08:54He likes to have things like creek beds and river beds.
08:57It seems to be his umbilical cord through the area.
09:00This is Cordova Park behind Cordova High School, and we spent a lot of evenings down in here.
09:09We set up sonic warning systems so that anybody walking through the area would set off an
09:14alarm.
09:15Our stakeout units had night vision glasses so they could see anybody that was moving
09:21around.
09:22There was just nothing spared in trying to identify and apprehend this individual.
09:30Even with state-of-the-art equipment and hundreds of officers scouring the area, authorities
09:37came up empty-handed, and the public was losing patience.
09:41There was a lot of anger.
09:43There was a lot of, I don't want to say it was righteous anger, towards the Sheriff's
09:48Department and the investigators because we were doing everything possible, working
09:52with every angle that we could.
09:54There's a lot of panic around this area, that's what I've heard, because they figure this
10:00guy should have been caught already.
10:01Reports of the rapist's habit of entering homes days before he attacked fueled the paranoia.
10:08He would break into the house when the people weren't there and set them up prior to hitting.
10:13We would find window screens that had been removed.
10:19He knew the house, he knew the layout.
10:21And then would leave and wait for the victims to come home.
10:26He had broken into one of the extra bedrooms and unloaded our .357, so if we had been able
10:32to reach for the gun, it would have been unloaded.
10:40Like many serial offenders, the East Area Rapist seemed to follow media coverage of
10:45his actions.
10:47Once the series really got going, he seemed to play off of what law enforcement was doing.
10:52Every time we said he wasn't doing this, his next rape he would do it.
10:57I think he was a little brazen.
10:58I think he just figured we were all pretty stupid, and he could do what he wanted.
11:02For instance, the first rapes, the victims were alone.
11:08And we made mention of that in the paper.
11:10The next rape, the husband was in the house.
11:13In the spring of 1977, the rapist attacked six couples.
11:19The first thing I heard was a crack, and then somebody yelling, and then a bright light.
11:26So he had come in through the slider and hit my husband in the ankle, and then just started
11:33screaming obscenities at us.
11:35He would tell them, I'm only here for food, I'm only here for money, and I'm not going
11:40to hurt anybody, until he got them tied up.
11:46The suspect has the female tie the male's ankles together, and then he has her laid
11:52down on the bed, he ties her hands behind her back using the bindings that he's brought
11:57with him, and then ties her ankles together.
12:00He then goes to the male victim, reties the bindings that the female has tied on both
12:06the wrists and the ankles.
12:10Why didn't a man fight back?
12:15Probably because he had a gun on his head, and the East Area Rapist threatened to kill
12:19his wife.
12:21He'd put a cup and saucer on her husband's back and tell him if he moved, he'd hear the
12:25rattle of the dishes, and he'd kill her.
12:28You don't get prepared for that type of thing.
12:31We had a plan that if it ever happened that I would only tie one hand, and he would get
12:36loose and catch the guy.
12:38Well, when it came down to it, you're scared to death, and you just do what you're told.
12:50The rape itself was only part of the horrific crime.
12:53Many times, he would complete the sexual assault, and they could hear him walking around the
13:00house.
13:01One or two cases, he ate food out of the refrigerator.
13:03And there were a lot of what I would call souvenirs of the victims that were removed
13:09from the home.
13:10Driver's license, photo ID, and jewelry.
13:14There was nothing you could do.
13:16You were completely vulnerable.
13:22Because the rapist always wore gloves, police were unable to collect fingerprints from the
13:26crime scenes.
13:27But a possible break came when authorities examined traces of the suspect's semen.
13:33The samples did not reveal a blood type, meaning the offender was what is known as a non-secreter,
13:40a status held by just one-fifth of the male population.
13:44Eighty percent of the population are secreters, twenty percent are non, so now we know it's
13:50only twenty percent of the population we have to look at.
13:53Eventually, one victim caught a glimpse of the rapist and provided details for a composite
13:58sketch.
13:59In May 1977, Sacramento residents finally got a look at the man who had been terrorizing
14:05them for nearly a year.
14:09The release of the drawings seemed to spook whoever was committing the attacks.
14:13That summer, not a single rape was attributed to the suspect.
14:17He just disappeared.
14:18That's all we knew.
14:19By the end of 1977, the East Area Rapist had claimed 28 victims in Sacramento, California.
14:30The attacker also stole driver's licenses from several of the victims' houses, leading
14:35authorities to believe he might try to contact some of the women.
14:40We decided to put phone traps on some of the victims' phones to see if he would call
14:46and if we could trace the phone call.
14:49Eventually, he started calling these people back.
15:01Hearing that same growl, that same voice, and that same threats, it just had to be really
15:07just very scary to a victim.
15:10I mean, they don't know if this guy's coming back.
15:12I can tell you.
15:16Police were unable to trace any of the phone calls because the criminal didn't stay on
15:19the line long enough.
15:21Meanwhile, the masked rapist grew even more brazen.
15:25He widened his range and started targeting other areas of the city.
15:30We knew that he was hitting on both sides of the American River and this whole area
15:35is riddled with 26-mile bike trails.
15:39We made the assumption that he was moving up and down those bike trails.
15:44He would steal a bicycle and he would leave on that bicycle and it would be found a couple
15:50of blocks away from where he raped.
15:52If he did have a car, it was probably maybe a mile or two or further away.
15:57And then he would eventually get into that and leave.
16:00As long as he was within five minutes of a thoroughfare, that would be all that he
16:05would need.
16:06And once he was on that road, he was gone.
16:10In a tragic irony, widespread fear in the community also helped protect the rapist.
16:16One woman spotted the attacker but was too afraid to make a report.
16:21One of the Rancho Cordova cases, a lady looked out her curtains and saw a man in a ski mask
16:28going around the side of the house across the street, closed her curtains because she
16:33knew that the East Area Rapist was in the community, did not call us.
16:37Why isn't it reported, I don't know.
16:41People don't want to get involved.
16:44That person ended up being a victim.
16:48On the night of February 2nd, 1978, newlyweds Brian and Katie Maggiore were walking their
16:54dog in Rancho Cordova.
16:56And police believe they noticed a man acting suspiciously.
17:01Brian may have confronted this individual and possibly told him to leave them alone
17:06or get out of the area.
17:08Brian was in the military and military police.
17:12Brian being Brian, you know, you feel like you can protect whoever you have to protect.
17:17You know, you can take care of yourself and take care of her.
17:21Somewhere in this area, the suspect draws a gun and points it at Brian.
17:26At which point he and Katie turn and start running along LaGloria Way.
17:30Fearing for their safety and we believe trying to hide, they ended up running into the backyard
17:34of this residence.
17:35I was in my upstairs bedroom there and I heard a lot of yelling and commotion.
17:41Brian and Katie continued around the side of the pool and ran into the adjoining neighbor's
17:45backyard.
17:46I looked out my window and I seen the guy go up and just shoot him point blank right
17:51in the chest and continued around the other side of the house chasing the gal.
17:56Katie continues running over to the east side of the residence toward a gate that's on the
18:00side of the house.
18:01The suspect caught up to her and shot her as well.
18:05He came running right down the sidewalk and came right up on the lawn next to the tree
18:12and right as he came to the tree, he looked up and he saw me standing right here.
18:17He just turned around as quick as he could and just headed straight down there towards
18:22the fire hydrant around the corner.
18:26The killer escaped, but a key piece of evidence left behind pointed to the East Area Rapist.
18:32There's a particular knot that was used in many of the East Area Rapist cases that were
18:37consistent with the pre-tied shoelaces that were found at this scene.
18:42It is the East Area Rapist that did it.
18:47I have no doubt that that's who's responsible for their murders.
18:53On April 16, 1978, a more detailed sketch of the suspect was released.
19:00After 31 rapes and a double homicide, things quieted down in Sacramento.
19:06Obviously this guy doesn't want to get caught.
19:09Now we have something that may be very consistent with his looks, so he flees.
19:15But that summer, he struck again outside of Sacramento.
19:19Five rapes with similar profiles occurred in Stockton, Modesto, and Davis.
19:24Detectives from those areas spread the word to other nearby communities.
19:29They told us all about him and how violent he was and what type of rapes were going on
19:35and said that we needed to be ready for them.
19:38Less than three months later, the nightmare continued.
19:41Early in the fall of 1978, a dozen women were assaulted in Contra Costa County, just 40
19:46miles east of San Francisco.
19:48This is a typical neighborhood of where he would hit, middle class and very clean, and
19:54that's what he went for.
19:55But you can see this type of area here where he can sit, he can watch, and nobody's going
20:00to see what he's doing.
20:03Then in July 1979, the attacks suddenly stopped.
20:08I was torn.
20:10Yes, I was happy that he was no longer raping the people in my community, but I was sad
20:15that I didn't catch him.
20:16I knew he was still out there.
20:18In the late 1970s, Contra Costa County Detective Larry Crompton worked a task force
20:24dedicated to catching the worst sexual predator in California history.
20:29But even after more than 50 rapes, police still didn't have a suspect in custody.
20:36We were all frustrated, and we felt bad knowing that we didn't catch him.
20:42The East Area Rapist basically stopped in 1979, and that there he just became that,
20:47you know, somebody had killed him.
20:50In my heart, I knew he wasn't dead.
20:52I knew he was still raping.
20:57On October 1st, 1979, a couple was fast asleep in the rural town of Goleta, 300 miles south
21:04of Contra Costa County.
21:06At about 2 a.m., a victim's residence was broken into through a side door.
21:13The door was pried with a screwdriver.
21:15The deadbolt was defeated.
21:18The intruder barged into the bedroom and tied up the couple.
21:23When he first came in, he had a knife up to their throats and telling them that if they
21:27were to say anything, he would slit their throats.
21:31He removes the female from the bed and moves her into the living room area of the house.
21:39He paces up and down the hallway, and as he's pacing, he begins to say over and over again,
21:45I'll kill them.
21:46I'm going to kill them.
21:47I'm going to kill them.
21:48It was like, you know, he was trying to build himself up, get the courage up.
21:59Now the victims have picked up on the fact that he's not there to rob them.
22:03He is there to kill them.
22:05The woman saw a window of opportunity and took charge of the situation.
22:10As the suspect moved up the hall to briefly check on the man who was in the bedroom, she
22:17got to her feet, hopped to the front door, hopped out into the front yard, and began
22:22to scream.
22:25And that's when FBI agent Stan Lowes heard this.
22:29I was up late reading, and at about 2.15, I heard a scream.
22:35Someone was in trouble, and it was a woman.
22:38Lowes called for backup and ran outside to see what was happening.
22:43At this point in time, the suspect seems to realize that he's lost control of the female,
22:49and so now it's time for him to leave.
22:52Right about here, I saw the guy on the bicycle take off.
22:57He came out of the driveway and turned left.
23:00I yelled at him, he pedaled harder.
23:03The FBI agent jumped into his car and chased the suspect.
23:08He went about 100 yards and dumped the bike and took off through the backyard.
23:13And that's when I decided it would be better to wait for the sheriff's deputies to arrive.
23:18The man got away, but the two victims were safe.
23:22Less than three months later, on December 30th, just a quarter mile from the first crime,
23:28another couple wasn't as lucky.
23:30Dr. Offerman was a well-known physician.
23:33Dr. Manning was a psychologist, and she was down that particular evening visiting when
23:40the intruder shot and killed him, and she was bludgeoned to death.
23:45It appeared that evidence found at the scene matched the earlier assault.
23:50Murders that occurred on December 30th, 1979 were linked to the attack on my neighbors
23:58that occurred on October 1st, 1979 by the rope used to tie them up, the knots used to
24:06fasten the rope.
24:08In Northern California, Larry Crompton heard news of the Goleta murders and thought of
24:12the East Area Rapist.
24:14I went over the reports, and I looked at it, and I saw the similarities.
24:19The bindings were the same, the mask, the gloves, it was all there.
24:24It had to be our man.
24:27On December 30th, 1979, in Goleta, California, an intruder entered the home of a doctor and
24:34killed him and his girlfriend.
24:36The criminal's method of operation was similar to that of the East Area Rapists, who was
24:42still at large.
24:44When I heard about the Goleta murders, everything was there.
24:48The ties, the binding behind the back, the prowling that happened before, all of that
24:54matched.
24:56And I knew, I knew in my heart, it was our man.
25:00Two and a half months later, 40 miles south of Santa Barbara, another couple was viciously
25:05murdered.
25:06Lyman and Charlene Smith were a fast lane couple.
25:11She was beautiful, she was ambitious, and he was a prominent attorney, and he wanted
25:17to be a judge.
25:18They lived in a very nice neighborhood, up on the hills of Ventura, with a distant ocean
25:24view.
25:25They had disappeared off the map for a few days.
25:29And so finally, Gary, Lyman's son by his first marriage, showed up to mow the lawn.
25:34He went inside and saw what appeared to be two bodies under the covers, the log on the
25:40floor and debris on the floor.
25:44When police got to the Smith residence, they were shocked by the brutality of the crime.
25:49The couple was tied up, Charlene was raped, and both were bludgeoned almost beyond recognition.
25:56There's what you call an overkill, where there's rage.
26:00And to me, the homicides were acts of rage.
26:06He chooses to beat them in the head, and to punish them, and to make them suffer, and
26:12have a painful death.
26:14He's angry with these victims.
26:16To find a motive for the murders, authorities focused on Lyman and Charlene's social circle.
26:22It just never seemed to anybody that this could be a random crime.
26:27But as potential suspects were eliminated, it seemed clear that the killer did not know
26:33the Smiths.
26:35Charlene had an office down near the beach, and there were a lot of tourists, a lot of
26:39people in that area.
26:41And so it's possible that this person was passing through town.
26:45He must have followed her home, and then scouted the area, identified her husband, the cars,
26:53a place to park, a time to hit.
26:58There were some neighbors who reported prowlers or reported hearing noises within a week or
27:05two prior to the homicide.
27:08The knot used to tie up the Smiths also indicated the crime was the work of a methodical killer.
27:15It was a more ornate knot.
27:18We know that in the murders down south, he used a diamond knot.
27:22Problem is, the investigators down south didn't know about the rapist.
27:27They didn't know about that knot being used.
27:30Therefore, they didn't have that connection.
27:32While Ventura law enforcement struggled with the case, another young couple was murdered
27:39in Dana Point, California, 120 miles to the south.
27:43In the Harrington case, you have a 24-year-old man who's in his fourth year of medical school
27:52and his wife.
27:53They've been married just three short months, and they're living in his father's home in
28:01Miguel Shores.
28:04We believe the suspect watched as the two of them had sexual intercourse, and shortly
28:10after that, he entered their home, raped her, and then murdered both of them.
28:18They were discovered by Keith's father approximately two days after the murder.
28:26They were super kids.
28:28Our message to those people listening is that it can happen to you, and it apparently can
28:34happen without reason or motive.
28:37The Harrington murders were almost identical to the Smiths.
28:41Both couples bound, both women raped, and all four bludgeoned to death.
28:46I think in the Smith case, and also in the Harrington case, I felt that he had reached
28:55this perfection of what he had wanted the crime to be.
28:58These were his two perfect crimes.
29:04Six months later, on February 6th, 1981, 28-year-old Manuela Whitcune was murdered in Irvine.
29:13The offender forced entry to her home and came in and sexually assaulted her, bound
29:20her hands behind her back and her ankles together, and then bludgeoned her to death.
29:27There was a serial killer on the loose in Southern California, and with the East Area
29:32rapists still at large, authorities speculated whether this could be the same maniac they'd
29:37been hunting for more than five years.
29:41Back in the 80s, communication was different than what it is today.
29:45We didn't have the internet, so it was word of mouth.
29:48Unfortunately, the law enforcement system, each county knows what's going on within a
29:52county, and maybe a neighboring county, but a lot of times not even the neighboring county.
29:56He was one step ahead of us, and a lot of times it was because of the lack of communication.
30:03From December of 1979 to February of 1981, seven people were brutally murdered along
30:10the California coast, from Santa Barbara to Irvine.
30:15The killer's method was similar to the East Area rapists, who was still on the loose.
30:22I was still working the East Area Rapist Task Force when the serial killer started hitting
30:28in Southern California, and it was very frustrating.
30:32The departments didn't want their communities to know who was in their area.
30:38They didn't want to frighten them that way.
30:41Then on July 27th, 1981, the murderer struck again in Santa Barbara, killing his eighth
30:47and ninth victims, Greg Sanchez and his girlfriend, Sherry Domingo.
30:52Domingo was about 35 years old.
30:55She was house setting for a family member, and they were in the process of trying to
31:01sell that particular home.
31:04Sherry's 15-year-old daughter, Debbie, was staying with friends.
31:08I was going through what I now look at as kind of typical teenage rebellion.
31:12She and I were arguing a lot over little things, so I had decided that I didn't need to live
31:18under her roof.
31:21Debbie clearly remembers the last time she spoke to her mother.
31:26I had called her from a pay phone with some ridiculous demand about why I needed to come
31:30get something out of her house.
31:33She had said, no, I couldn't do that.
31:36I remember getting very angry and screaming out, why don't you just get out of my life?
31:43And I hung up that phone.
31:45Two weeks later, Debbie got a phone call from a friend of her mom's.
31:50I thought that it was kind of a ploy to get me to come home and maybe negotiate and work
31:55things out.
31:56And I said, no, there's nothing you can say that's going to make me come home.
31:59I'm done.
32:01And she got real quiet and real serious and very directly, she said, Debbie, I think your
32:06mother's dead.
32:09When we arrived at the house and I could see the yellow police tape everywhere and police
32:15officers and news camera crews, when I got out of the car, I started to walk toward the
32:20house and people from the police department kind of intercepted me.
32:23And they said that it was messy and that they didn't want me inside.
32:33Police believed the killer might have pretended to be a prospective buyer to survey the home.
32:39One of the realtors remembered that somebody had come in, a gentleman, and he was busy
32:45with some other clients.
32:47So this person proceeded to go in and scope the interior of the house out.
32:53The attacker removed a screen, which allowed him access later that night.
32:58He entered into the bathroom, then went into the bedroom, and that's when he found both
33:03sleeping on the bed.
33:07She was tied up, lying face down on the bed, and he was laying halfway in the closet.
33:14I tortured myself with the idea that if I had been home when she was attacked, that
33:18I could have done something to save her life.
33:23And realistically now, looking back, I know that's not true.
33:29If I had been in the house, that I probably wouldn't be here today.
33:36Only circumstantial evidence linked the murders of Sherry and Greg to the earlier local attacks.
33:44The physical description, the shoe size, the ligatures casing out the place ahead
33:50of time, when you throw that all in, it's definitely the same person.
33:57Five years passed without another homicide.
34:00Our initial thought was that he had likely been incarcerated during that time period.
34:05We've conducted studies where we've looked at people that were in prison for that time
34:09period, released from prison, and at this point, that hasn't been proofful.
34:15There's also the possibility that he was a member of the military, was sent away for
34:19an assignment, and then sent back for release five years later.
34:23Not a day went by when I didn't think about the hysteria rapist.
34:27And I'd say, where is he now?
34:30People thought that he might be dead.
34:32I didn't trust that he was dead.
34:36On May 4th, 1986, in Irvine, California, 18-year-old Janelle Cruz became the killer's
34:42tenth and final victim.
34:45I was in Mexico on a vacation, and they called me.
34:49These are one of the calls that a mother gets in the middle of the night to tell me that
34:57the death of my daughter had just happened.
35:02This is where Janelle Cruz lived at the time of her death.
35:05She had been sexually assaulted.
35:07There is blunt force trauma to her face, her head in general.
35:13He got her in the back of the head when she was walking away from him before he, you know,
35:20crushed her face.
35:23He's a monster.
35:29In some of the female victims, he went way overboard in bludgeoning them.
35:34He's getting some kind of gratification from them.
35:37There hasn't been closure until he's caught.
35:43And that probably would be the closure for us and my family, and for other families.
35:51I would wake at 2, 3 in the morning wondering where he was.
35:55And I was tortured by the fact that he was not caught.
35:58So for all those years, I kept boxes and boxes of evidence, knowing that someday, somebody
36:05was going to catch him.
36:07And this evidence may come in handy.
36:09For more than a decade, 10 murders in Southern California remained unconnected and unsolved.
36:18But in the late 90s, a federal database was put in place to cross-reference criminal DNA
36:24profiles, shedding new light on the killings.
36:28When we put the DNA from the crime scene, from the Harrington case, and the Whithune
36:31case, and the Janelle Cruz case into the system, we started getting a match.
36:35At the same time, the people in Ventura had put their case into the system.
36:41Authorities were finally able to attribute 10 Southern California murders to one man.
36:46They dubbed him the original Night Stalker.
36:49Meanwhile, in Northern California, investigator Paul Holes generated a DNA profile for the
36:55East Area Rapist.
36:56Holes called retired investigator Larry Crompton, who had been trying to link the rapist to
37:01the murders in Southern California.
37:03That's when I told him, if you can get a hold of the criminalist down there, I know it's
37:07our person.
37:09Holes immediately called the Orange County Sheriff's Department and urged them to compare
37:13DNA from the original Night Stalker murders to the Contra Costa rapes.
37:19Consultation was occurring between the criminalist in Contra Costa County and our criminalist
37:24here in Orange County.
37:26In 2000, nearly 25 years after the first attack in Sacramento, California, police finally
37:32linked the more than 50 Northern California rapes to the 10 murders committed in Santa
37:37Barbara, Ventura, and Orange Counties.
37:42According to the DNA, the East Area Rapist and the original Night Stalker were the same
37:47person.
37:50Still, DNA evidence is not 100% reliable.
37:57There is a lot of debate in the scientific community.
37:59Is it an identification?
38:01Is it unique to that person or can other people share the same profile?
38:06With the millions of profiles that have been uploaded into the databases nationwide as
38:10well as internationally, we have yet to see two individuals have the same profile across
38:16all the DNA that we look at.
38:18The biggest thing would be the human error.
38:20Is there a sample switch?
38:21Was there contamination somewhere?
38:24In 2001, a man who believes the East Area Rapist targeted his sister in 1977 created
38:31a website to share information.
38:34The earliest theories were that the ear had some type of connection to law enforcement.
38:40He definitely showed tactics that are commonly taught to police officers in the police academy.
38:47Most of the individuals also are taught those tactics.
38:50I know in California there are a lot of military installations and bases across the entire
38:54state.
38:55One of the applications of the diamond knot was it had a nautical application.
38:59So was there some sort of Navy connection?
39:02His tendencies tend to indicate he had some sort of tactical training in order to carry
39:06out these crimes.
39:07Could he have gotten that through other means, through reading on his own?
39:11Most certainly.
39:12You can't just say he had to be a police officer or he had to have military experience
39:16in order to do this.
39:19The website uncovered fresh details about the case.
39:23We've heard about this belt buckle that left an impression on one of the rape victims which
39:29has supposedly two guns facing each other but not crossing.
39:34The site also contained information about the coat worn by the Maggiore's killer.
39:40The suspect seen playing the crime scene was described as wearing a dark colored leather
39:46jacket with a large grease stain on the back of it.
39:50But on the breast of the jacket there was an embroidered orange drag hair.
39:57Law enforcement also released a new piece of evidence never before revealed to the public.
40:02A poem sent to Sacramento authorities in the late 1970s.
40:07There's been an extensive amount of work done to the point of googling the lines within
40:12the poem to see if there's text matching from literature from around the world.
40:18So far there's been no direct link made.
40:21In 2004 the Harrington family spent 1.3 million dollars to help fund a California state law
40:28requiring all felons to enter their DNA into a federal data bank.
40:32From this investigation we've gained the ability to forcibly extract blood from prisoners
40:37in the state prison system who would otherwise just say no to having their DNA taken from
40:43them.
40:44So the data bank of profiles that we have is ever growing and so our opportunity to
40:52make a match to the offender grows each day.
40:56I really just for the sake of the victims want to unmask this guy.
41:01Chances are that this person would never stop committing these crimes unless he was
41:06physically incapable of doing so by being locked up in prison or being dead or being
41:13a paraplegic.
41:15However several serial killers such as the Green River Killer and BTK were apprehended
41:21long after their last crimes were committed.
41:25We now know that these types of individuals can stop and that is I think what is scary
41:30about the East Area Rapist and the original Night Stalker is he could still be out there.
41:35He could be somebody's neighbor.
41:36He could be somebody's boyfriend or somebody's husband at this point in his life.
41:41Every once in a while I just have to wonder where is he?
41:44What's he doing?
41:45Is he alive?
41:46It's hard to say but I think he is and maybe because I'm wishing he's alive because I want
41:52to know about this guy.
41:53One thing that's important to understand is that how an offender acts on the crime scene
41:58is going to be translated into their personal life.
42:00So we would want to look for people who have a history of bondage, who have a history of
42:05domestic violence, of being aggressive with women.
42:08I just believe that somebody out there knows something and I'm hoping that a piece to the
42:14puzzle will come to light.
42:17I don't know if we can put a label on somebody of pure evil or not but we have to be held
42:24accountable for our choices and he's going to have to be held accountable.
42:31I retired in 1998.
42:33I've been working on a book that I call Sudden Terror.
42:37It covers from the first rape in Sacramento all the way through the last murder in Southern
42:43California.
42:44It is the same person.
42:46He has never been caught and I will never be able to get it out of my mind until there
42:52is closure.
42:55I continue to look at suspects and eliminating people on an ongoing basis.
43:01One day there won't be an elimination, there will be a match.
43:05If you have any information regarding the original Night Stalker crimes, please contact
43:10the Sacramento Sheriff's Department at 916-874-5057.