Richard Ramirez - The Night Stalker
In 1985 the city of Los Angeles was terrorised by a mysterious killer known as the Night Stalker.
The Stalker would break into his victims house, get into the bedroom then shoot the male in the head with a 22., then he would rape and beat the female partner. He would control the woman by threatening violence to her children, although sometimes he would shoot the woman anyway and male children were sometimes sodomized. At times he would ransack the house looking for valuables or sometimes he would not bother at all. And most unusually he would force victims to declare their love for Satan.
All through the spring and summer of 1985 there were more than twenty attacks, most of which involved rape and murder. Survivors described their attacker as a tall and slim hispanic man with black greasy hair and severely decayed teeth.
As a tension of fear grew in the city which employed more security and a description was being circulated, Ramirez went to San Francisco. There he committed another murder. The police checked the hotels for the Night Stalkers description, and one matched but with a false name, and the man had left the day before.
The next murder was back in LA. The Night Stalker killed a man of the house and raped the woman. As he left, the woman caught a glimpse of his cars number plates. The plates were from a stolen car, and when the car was found it had been because it was dumped. The police successfully lifted fingerprints from the car and these matched to a Richard Ramirez, who had a past history of petty theft and burglary.
Ramirez's picture and name was being shown everywhere. As he was about to purchase some groceries he noticed his picture on the front page of newspapers, he immediately ran out af there as other peopel shouted to call the cops.
Ramirez ran into the hispanic area of Los Angeles. He unsuccessfully tried to steal two cars but both times the victim fought him off. One of the victims husbands and a growing crowd chased him down until a police man called to the scene arrested him.
Ramirez confessed to the crimes and the police evidence against him was damning. At trial Ramirez pleaded not guilty and his lawyers used many delaying tactics. It was not until 20 September 1989 that Richard Ramirez was found guilty on all thirteen counts of murder plus thirty other felonies. The jury voted for the death penalty. Ramirez is on death row and wont be executed until sometime after the year 2000.
