The
Original Night Stalker is the nickname for an
unidentified serial killer and
rapist who murdered at least six people in
Southern California from 1979
through 1986 and sexual assaulted
at least fifty in the Sacramento
and the Bay
Area
from June 1976 to July 1979. However, the
connection to the Sacramento and Contra Costa Counties assaults was
not made until 2001, during this time he was dubbed
The
East Area Rapist
The Original Night Stalker/The East Area Rapist may be considered
one of the worst and prolific "unapprehended" serial offenders in
history since the
Middle Ages. So far in
the investigation, every named or investigated suspect has been
cleared through
DNA,
alibi
or
other investigative
means and methods.
Background
This case, along with that of the
Zodiac
Killer, remains one of the most tantalizing and mysterious
unsolved serial crimes in American history.
Some California Law
Enforcement authorities estimate his combined total number of
victims at well over 50, including his rape
victims in Sacramento
County
and Contra Costa County, California
, and his rape and murder victims in Ventura
, Dana Point
and Irvine, California
. Additionally, some law enforcement
authorities have attempted to link an additional 94 burglaries and
5 murders, in Visalia,
California
and Santa Barbara County,
California
, to the Original Night Stalker.
The perpetrator's
modus
operandi was to
stalk middle-class neighborhoods for victims who
lived in single story homes, then commit
hot prowl burglaries. Early in his spree,
the criminal sought out women alone by themselves, but later
partially changed focus towards couples. During the time the
perpetrator was known as the "East Area Rapist" his victims were
left alive following the attack. Later the perpetrator began
killing his victims and he become known as the "Original Night
Stalker".
Typically he stealthily entered their living space late at night,
and then took control with a handgun in a surprise home invasion.
All victims were bound with ligatures the criminal brought to the
crime scene. The male companion, if present, was either isolated or
killed first by
bludgeoning. Then a
considerable amount of time would be spent sexually assaulting the
female victim before bludgeoning her to death and ransacking the
home.
The
Original Night Stalker/East Area Rapist case was the motivating
factor in the passage of legislation leading to the establishment
of California's
DNA database, which
authorizes the collection of the DNA of all convicted felons in
California. California's DNA data retrieval and storage
program is considered by experts to be second only to Virginia's
in size and effectiveness in solving cold cases. Ironically, while the
California DNA database motivated by this case has solved numerous
previously unsolved cold cases across the country, the original
case remains unsolved.
Victims
Southern California
Six murders in Ventura, Dana Point and Irvine, California, have
been linked by DNA evidence to the Original Night Stalker.
- On March 13, 1980, Charlene Smith, 33, and Lyman Smith, 43,
were found murdered in their home in Ventura. A log from the fireplace was used to
bludgeon both the victims. Their wrists and ankles were bound with
drapery cord and an unusual Chinese
knot, known as the diamond knot,
was used on their wrists.
- On August 19, 1980, Keith Harrington, 24, and Patrice
Harrington, 27, were found bludgeoned to
death in their home in the Niguel Shores gated community in Dana
Point. Although there was evidence that the Harringtons were bound
at the wrist and ankles, no ligatures or
murder weapon were
found at the scene. The Harringtons were married only three months
at the time of their deaths. Patrice was a nurse in Irvine, while Keith
was a medical student at the University of
California, Irvine
.
- On February 5, 1981, Manuela Witthuhn, 28, was murdered in her
home in Irvine. Again, while the body showed signs of being tied
before being bludgeoned, no ligatures or murder weapon were found
at the scene. While the victim was married, her husband was
recuperating from an illness in the hospital, thus she was alone at
the time of the attack. A lamp and crystal curio was removed from
her house, presumably by the killer. Also, detectives remarked that
Mrs. Witthuhn's television was found in the backyard, which was
possibly the killer's attempt to make it appear as a botched
robbery.
- On May 4, 1986, Janelle Lisa Cruz, 18, was found bludgeoned to
death in her Irvine home. Her family was on vacation in Mexico
at the time
of the attack. A pipe wrench was
reported missing by Cruz' stepfather and was the probable murder
weapon.
Sacramento and the Bay Area
In 2001, California law enforcement linked DNA evidence from three
presumed East Area Rapist crimes committed in Sacramento and Contra
Costa County, California to DNA found from Southern California
victims of the Original Night Stalker. The connection of the East
Area Rapist to the Original Night Stalker make this the most
extensive and geographically widespread crime series in California
history. The case remains open in multiple California
jurisdictions.
Possible connections
Visalia Ransacker
The
Visalia Ransacker is linked to some 94 burglaries
and the murder of Claude Snelling, occurring in the early 1970’s,
in Visalia,
California. Some have found similarities in modus
operandi, between the Visalia Ransacker and the Original Night
Stalker/East Area Rapist.
At about the same time the Visalia Ransacker stopped his crime
spree in Visalia, the East Area Rapist began attacking victims in
Sacramento County, California. Based on witness descriptions of the
East Area Rapist and the method of operation which was used to
carry out his crimes, Detective McGowan, of the Visalia Police
Department, attempted to link the Visalia Ransacker crimes to the
East Area Rapist. Both the Visalia Ransacker and the East Area
Rapist were described as physically fit white males in their
twenties. In terms of modus operandi, both the Visalia Ransacker
and the East Area Rapist pulled Hot prowl burglary on single-family
residences in the middle of the night. Neither the Visalia
Ransacker nor the East Area Rapist ever took valuable items from
the homes they burglarized. Additionally, both the Visalia
Ransacker and the East Area Rapist took firearms along when
burglarizing residences.
The Visalia Ransacker has eluded capture as well and may actually
have been the Original Night Stalker/East Area Rapist in his
fledgling years.
Goleta murders
Even prior to 2001's connection of the Original Night Stalker to
the East Area Rapist, some law enforcement officials, particularly
several from the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department, sought to
link four Goleta murders in 1979 and 1981 separately to the East
Area Rapist and the Original Night Stalker. These postulated links
are considered primarily due to similarity in
modus operandi. One of the Original
Night Stalker double murders did take place in Ventura, California,
40 miles east of Goleta, while the remaining murders took place in
Orange County, California, an additional 90 miles to the
southeast.
A possible reason for discounting a connection is that a forensics
link between the two crime series has never been found, and that
the murderer in Goleta did not rape his female victims even when he
had the opportunity to do so.
In 2000 an official from the Santa
Barbara
Sheriff's Department claimed that DNA found at a
Goleta crime scene did not match that found in the linked Original
Night Stalker crimes. However, not all of the seminal fluid
or hair samples from the Goleta crimes have been preserved.
Additionally, the Goleta murders show distinctive characteristics
not found in the later crimes, such as the shooting of the victims
with a gun, the escape or almost escape of the victims, the
presence of a recently stolen bicycle at the crime scene and the
use of a weapon found in the home (rather than brought by the
attacker). However it is believed the same individual may be
responsible for those crimes as well.
Suspects eliminated
Throughout the course of the investigation into the Original Night
Stalker murders, the following persons were suspected of committing
the crimes, only to be determined to not be the culprit:
- Brett
Glasby - An alleged drug dealer and gangbanger from Goleta,
California
who was killed in Mexico in
1982. Glasby's untimely death, prior to the murder of
Janelle Cruz, eliminates him as a suspect.
- Paul "Cornfed" Schneider - A high-ranking member of the
Aryan Brotherhood prison gang.
Schneider
is a career criminal who was living in Orange
County, California
when the murders of the Harringtons, Manuela
Witthuhn, and Janelle Cruz occurred. In the late 1990s,
while serving time at Pelican Bay State Prison
in Crescent City, California
, Schneider provided a DNA sample to
authorities. This sample cleared him as the Original Night
Stalker.
- Joe Alsip - A business partner of victim Lyman Smith. Alsip was
a friend of the Smiths and visited their home on High Point Drive
in Ventura the day before the murders. Alsip's pastor claimed that
he had confessed to him during a family counseling session, but
this confession was considered dubious by the Ventura County
District Attorney's Office. Nevertheless, Alsip was arraigned for
the murders of Lyman and Charlene Smith in 1982. After the preliminary hearing, however, all of the
charges against him were dropped.
It would not be until 1996 when DNA testing came on line that the
murders would be linked.
In November of 2002, journalist Colleen Cason wrote a newspaper
series about the Original Night Stalker murders for the
Ventura
County Star.
According to Cason's articles, Detective
Larry Pool of the Orange County Sheriff's
Department visited California's Death Row at San Quentin
State Prison
in an attempt to locate the Original Night
Stalker. Detective Pool suspected that the Original Night
Stalker had been captured and sentenced to death for some other
violent crime. Nevertheless, none of the genetic samples collected
from Death Row inmates at San Quentin matched the DNA of the
Original Night Stalker.
Psychological profile
After criminalists matched serological evidence found at the
southern California murder scenes, a psychological profile of the
Original Night Stalker was compiled. According to Leslie
D'Ambrosia, who was the primary author of the profile, it's likely
that the Original Night Stalker would possess the following
characteristics:
- White male
- Emotional age of 26 to 30 at the time the crimes were
committed
- Likely began as a peeping Tom his
late teens or early twenties.
- Lived and/or worked near Ventura, California in 1980
- Had some means of income, but did not work in the early morning
hours
- Drove a well-maintained car
- Dressed well and would not stand out in upscale
neighborhoods
- Would appear harmless
- Intelligent and articulate
- Neat and well-organized in his personal life
- Possibly unmarried and did not enter into long-term
relationships
- Would have been described by those who knew him as arrogant,
domineering, manipulative, and a chronic liar
- Had some knowledge of police investigative methods and evidence
gathering techniques
- Was a skilled and experienced cat burglar and may have begun
that way
- Was in good physical condition
- Had a criminal record as a teenager which was expunged
- Engaged in sex with prostitutes
- Peeped into the windows of many potential victims who were not
attacked
- Engaged in deviant paraphilic behavior and brutal sex in his
personal life
- Sexually functional and capable of ejaculation with consenting
and non-consenting partners
- Self-assured and confident in his abilities
- Hated women for real or perceived wrongs
- Would continue committing violent crimes until incapacitated by
prison, death, or some other intervention
- If married, probably has a submissive spouse who tolerated his
sexually deviant behavior
In addition to describing the characteristics of the Original Night
Stalker, the profile also speculates about the fate of the slayer.
According to the profile, the Original Night Stalker could have
been incarcerated following Janelle Cruz' murder or killed in the
commission of a similar crime. As to the latter point, the profile
indicates that law enforcement agencies should look into attempted
hot prowl burglaries in the late 1980s which resulted in the death
of a lone male offender. The profile also indicates that there is a
slight chance the Original Night Stalker committed suicide, but
that it would be unlikely that he is confined in a mental
institution.
The profile reveals that, following the original homicides in this
series, teletypes were broadcast to law enforcement agencies
throughout the United States. These teletypes requested information
on similar home invasion attacks involving sexual assault, murder,
bludgeoning, multiple victims, and/or bondage. As of 2009, no
similar crimes have been reported in the United States. The profile
propounds the possibility, however, that the Original Night Stalker
could have continued committing his crimes in another country where
records were not consulted for linkage purposes.
References
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