Criminology - Tracking the MO of a Predator

Episode Date: March 17, 2018

The East Area Rapist / Golden State Killer continues to terrorize Sacramento county. As the attacks begin to mount it becomes evident that the specifics of each, as well as the descriptions of the attacker are similar. But the attacker does begin to add new elements as he becomes more and more brazen in his attacks. You can help support the show by going to patreon.com/criminology   An Emash Digital Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. I'd like to welcome everyone back to episode four, season two of criminology. We're continuing the series on the East Area Rapists slash Golden State Killer Case and more. We've just got a little bit of housekeeping to do before we get into this episode. And first, let's give some shoutouts to our new Patreon. supporters. We had Anthony Englert, Alexander Ord, Ryan Stossel Stairs, hyenasor, and Jamie Colwell. So big thanks to everybody that chose to donate to the

Criminology Podcast. It's much appreciated and it goes a long way towards helping us continue to put out this content. We wanted to thank everybody that's been supporting our book, Criminology presents the case of the Zodiac Killer. That's available at Wild Blue Press for pre-order. You can find it at Wildblupress.com slash Zodiac Pre-orders. And that will be initially available as an e-book, but later on you'll be able to get it as a paperback as well.

And Wild Blue Press is offering listeners of Criminology the chance to download a free audiobook just by visiting wildblupress.com slash audio-dash books. And then more, if we have to talk about CrimeCon, it's less than 60 days away. So we hope that we'll see you there and that you stop by Podcast Row to say hi. If you're going to order your pass, be sure to use our promo code criminology at checkout on the CrimeCon site to save 10% on your standard badge. All right. So let's

dive into this case. We're on episode four already. We're moving along, but we have a lot to cover. And we need to recap where we left off in episode three. The East Area Rapist had just committed his 13th confirmed attack on February 7th, 1977 in Carmichael, California. There was a slew of prowlers, burglaries, and phone calls in the neighborhood where this latest attack happened. And people all over Sacramento County were on high alert.

They were very aware of... of anyone that seemed out of place. Just a little over a week after the last East Area rapist attack, a young man on Rippin Court in Sacramento had his own violent experience. A prowler shot and seriously wounded an 18-year-old youth who with his father was chasing him in a residential neighborhood in East Sacramento at 1030 last night. Rodney Richard Miller was in critical condition when he was admitted to Sutter Memorial Hospital. He was shot in the abdomen. A hospital aide today advised Detective Jay Payne that the youth emerged from surgery in a stable and alert condition. The prowler described only as male, white, and long-haired, escaped despite a police cordon on the neighborhood.

The neighborhood is in the Glenbrook District. Detectives are considering the possibility the prowler might have been the East Area rapist who was sexually assaulted 15 women in 16 months, including one last January in the Glenbrook area. The youth's father, Raymond, told investigators his son just had entered the house from the garage, When they heard a noise in the backyard, Miller said he and Rodney went into the yard and saw the figure of a man in the shadows. The father said the man ran, and he and his son chased him across the street. That news article you just heard was from the February 17, 1977, Sacramento B. And the victim mentioned was 18-year-old Rodney Miller, who had been attacked the day before near his home on Rippin Court in Sacramento.

Miller had been in his house with his parents and sister shortly before 11 p.m. when his family heard a noise out in the backyard. It sounded like a clang. Like somebody had banged into their metal smoker. Rodney's mother got up quickly and turned on the backyard light and caught the flash of somebody moving. These are the exact words from the police report about this incident from when the police questioned Rodney's father

at the hospital that night. We were all in our house and my son Rodney had just come in from the garage. We heard a noise in our backyard. and my son and I went out to take a look. We saw the shadow of a man but could not get a good look at him. He took off running towards the street and we both took off after him. The culprit ran across the street into a yard and over the fence on the right side of the house. My son nearly had him and suddenly the culprit fired two shots.

My boy was hit but we both ran to the left side of the house by the fence for cover and my boy fell. That's about all I can tell you right now. 18-year-old Rodney ran cross-country in high school, and he was pretty quick. He actually caught up to this man as he was trying to scale the fence and grabbed onto the man's foot, dragging him down off the fence. At that point, the gun went off, and Rodney was struck.

The man ran off. Police responded very quickly to this call and arrived on Rippin Court and found Rodney lying on his back, and he was very badly hurt. An ambulance arrived and Ronnie was with the Sutter Hospital where he would undergo emergency surgery to save his life. And luckily they were able to save his life, but he was in critical condition with major injuries to his stomach area. Meanwhile, back at the crime scene, police found evidence of the shooter's gun being a 9mm, which included a spent shell casing and a live round. Within two hours of the shooting, the police had brought in the dog to see if they could track the shooter. The dog was able to pick up the scent and track the man to a neighboring street called Citadel Way before losing it near the parking lot of a nearby school.

Once Rodney was stable, police didn't waste any time questioning him on February 18th, two days after the shooting. From his hospital bed, Rodney was able to tell police how the first shot from the man's gun had hit him, but fortunately, the second shot had missed. Rodney, due to the traumatic experience in the poorly lit area, was not able to give a detailed description of the man that shot him. A police canvas of nearby neighbors yielded some eyewitnesses that were able to provide a pretty good description of the shooter. One witness thought the shooter was about 20 years old and had Sandy blonde hair, 5'9, around 170 pounds. A second witness described the man in a similar fashion, but felt that the shooter was in his middle. to upper 20s and that he had, quote, heavy legs. Police theorized that based on the witness descriptions and the prowling,

the shooter of Rodney Miller was likely the East Area rapist. And what this shooting proved was that when cornered, this man wouldn't hesitate to shoot someone. One very interesting note about where this shooting occurred was that it was within 500 feet of where the 11th victim's car had been found after the East Area Rapist stole it following that attack. Although his wounds were extensive, Rodney Miller would eventually make a full recovery. A composite sketch of the man that shot him, who was presumably the East Area Rapist, was created and circulated soon after the incident. But it didn't lead anywhere.

It wouldn't be until February of 2018 that the sketch of Rodney Miller's shooter would once again become relevant in the East Area Rapist case. Very recently, Detective Sergeant Ken Clark of the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department was going back through some pre-East Area Rapist Burglary Incidents looking for burglars that might contain MO similar to the East Area Rapist. In one 1973 incident in particular, Ken found something that caught his attention. And as it turns out, it might be related to Rodney Miller's shooting almost four years later in 1977. It definitely seems to me to be conduct that is very bold and I would not expect any burglar

to readily find himself involved in. And in this case, September 13th of 1973, in the 29, I'm sorry, the 2,500 block of Sard away, a 28-year-old mother and her 18-month-old son are in the residence alone, the husband's at work. She's described by her family who I've spoken to and also So the officers at the scene that dealt with her as a very attractive lady. And she is at the home when somebody knocks on the front door. This is about 11 o'clock in the morning, give or take. And so she goes, doesn't answer the door. She thinks it's a religious solicitor.

And so she decides against it. And a few minutes later, she has her son in bed in one of the other rooms to the back. And she hears the noises coming from the back area of the house. So she walks down the hallway, and as she gets to her master bedroom, which basically faces the backyard, she sees a man at the window, and he has already taken the window screen off, and he is prying at the window itself. They see one another. He ducks down and runs around the side of the house. She looks beyond and sees that the gate to a schoolyard right behind her is open. and that gates normally kept closed.

So she was a bit alarmed by that. She comes back around and she begins locking the doors and windows of the home, and she arms herself with a handgun from inside the house. So she looks around and does not see any more sign of this guy and contacts her husband, and it's alluded to in the report that not directly stated that she kind of left it at that, believing that it was over, that she'd surprised a burglar who probably thought, thought she was, that nobody was home, and now he's running off. And I'll tell you that 99.9% of the time, this guy would have been gone.

He'd be gone from the neighborhood. He would be gone that day right then that minute. And so we wouldn't see him again during this episode. But things take a strange turn with this guy, because though she's locked everything up and she's armed herself, the door leading from the garage to the kitchen is forced open. while she's standing there a few feet away. And the suspect got the door open and then also smashed through a chain lock that she had secured at the top of the door.

And he got it open a little over a foot, and she had pointed the gun at him and said, you know, if you come any further, I'm going to shoot you. And the man stopped, and he turned around and walked out of the garage through the overhead garage door, which she had left open for lighting in the garage. It was in the middle of the day, and she'd been doing laundry out in the garage. This time she decides to call the sheriff's department, and she does, and the sheriff's department is on their way. Now, at this point, I would think based on the confrontation that just occurred, and even

if the guy had decided that he was going to take an opportunity to do something more horrible than he had potentially contemplated with the initial burglary, at this point, he's had a weapon pointed out, I'm thinking that he's going to see this as a good time to go. One would have to suspect that she called the cops, so I'm thinking he would leave. But not this guy. She's in the home waiting for law enforcement, and he forces his way in through the exact same door and rushes her and grabs a hold of her hands in which she's holding the gun, and he closed the distance so fast that she wasn't able to do anything, and they fight over this gun. She's 5'7, about 135 pounds. The guy is 5 foot 8, about 140 to 150 pounds, and she ends up wrestling over the gun

with him. He gets the gun kind of pointed at her, and so that's unnerving, but she uses all of her might and pulls it away, and it ends up going off and kind of over her shoulder in terms of how they're fighting. At that point, the suspect does run, and she's medically fragile based on some medical conditions that are going on in her life, and she actually passes out. So the cops arrive, and she has passed out, and basically recounts this story. And she describes the guy as being mid-20s. She actually settles eventually when she does a composite sketch at the age of 27. She said that he was neatly dressed. His hair was neat, but longer, as worn the style of the time, it was over the years. and he had some small pock marks or some kind of acne marks on his chin,

and he had a small sore or similar on the corner of his mouth. She said that he appeared to be sick, as in like physically ill, like maybe he was recovering from the flu or something, as he had kind of bags under his eyes, and she said that his eyes were deep set and pretty intense. she said that he was wearing a shirt that was a nice shirt that he had light-colored pants on. He had like a blue decorative scarf coming out of the pocket of the shirt. Had white ladies' gloves on, which she found to be very unusual.

So we're kind of getting the picture of kind of a guy dressed a little bit like a dandy. for that period of time. You know, it's unusual. Just another unusual thing to, you know, take into consideration here. He wasn't seen again, and he disappeared from the neighborhood. The composite sketch she produced got an immediate reaction for me, because when I first saw it in the report, I actually believe there had been a mistake,

and that the composite from the Rodney Miller shooting case that occurred in the city in February of 1977, It had accidentally been merged with this file, and it took me just about three to five seconds to realize that that wasn't what happened at all, that this was the actual sketch done by this victim, and that this would have occurred three and a half years before the, or even more years, before the Rodney Miller incident even occurred. So it piqued my interest, especially the behavior and the way he was described and then adding to, at the composite, made me think that, again, this was another individual potential case that was a pre-EAR and beginning to adopt some of the behaviors, but yet still not succeeding based on the plan and based on what he's doing at this point. It, of course, looked like an opportunistic crime, but it was unsuccessful and probably frustrating for him, and it was tremendously risky,

and he could have gotten shot, yet he still did it. This 1973 attack that resulted in a sketch of the attacker, which closely matched the Rodney Miller shooter, is still being investigated by the Sacramento Sheriff's Department. They also have some other leads that they're currently investigating, and we'll talk about them soon. It was incidents like the Rodney Miller shooting on top of all the rapes that had people in a state of panic. Right around the same time that Rodney Miller was shot, one woman in an undocumented incident in Sacramento had a 10th. terrifying experience. She was so unnerved and on edge after all the attacks that she could no longer sleep at night. And she sat up in the dark of her bedroom with a loaded handgun, convinced that the East Area rapist would come for her. She did this for several nights in a row. And all she had to

show for her trouble was a lack of quality sleep. But then one night while she sat there in the dark, she heard something outside of her bedroom window. She immediately went into high alert. She could tell that someone was tampering with her window. She tried to steady her shaking hands. She raised the gun and leveled it at the window. And then a light, possibly from a flashlight, trickled in from the outside and her window was raised open.

A man climbed in through the window and started to put a foot down on her floor. It was then that he made eye contact with the woman who was in a shooting position with the gun aimed right at him. And this woman wasn't planning on asking any questions or letting the man get the upper hand. As she started to squeeze the trigger, the thought raced through her mind, what if I kill this man and I go to jail for murder? So she raised the gun a bit higher and to the right and fired off a shot into the area around her window. Now this shot was far enough away from the man to miss him, but close enough to scare the hell out of him. In a flash, the man jumped back out of the window and disappeared into the darkness.

If this was the East Area rapist at her window, it may have been the first time someone had gotten the upper hand on him. And it's understandable why this woman chose not to shoot. But if she had put that shot into his chest, instead of the wall next to him, him, things might have turned out a lot differently and this man's evil legacy may have been cut short. Now, these are big, big ifs, Morf, right? We don't know for sure this was the East Area rapist and you really can't fault this woman, but what if? Now, as it stands, that didn't happen and the East Area rapist would go on to commit heinous acts over the next nine years. The Rodney Miller shooting itself had taken some of the focus off the rates for a moment,

but that wouldn't last. Residents on the 3,800 block of Thornwood Drive in Sacramento were troubled by odd phone calls. In some instances, the caller would hang up after a second, but in other calls, they would stay on the line without making a sound. One of the residents was a woman who was getting these calls along with her daughter. In late February, this woman's daughter answered the phone, and an unknown woman asked for the girl's mother. Before her mother could get to the phone, the unknown female caller hung up and never called back. Now at this point, there have been over a dozen attacks in the East Area

rapist case. And while police are openly acknowledging that there is a serial rapist, the one thing they're not doing is telling the public that many of the victims were getting calls prior to the rapes. So they're not putting that out there. And just imagine the panes. And just imagine the panic if the residents of Sacramento County had that info and then one of these calls came in. So I get not wanting to scare people, but you would think having this little bit of information could have allowed residents to take even more precautions. Yeah, you're right, Mike. It seems like there were some missed opportunities here to alert the public.

And what happened in mid-February of 1977 would be a major fail by police. In the same section of Thornwood Drive that was being targeted with phone calls, a neighbor found some things that didn't belong to them hidden in their bushes. They had discovered a cloth bag that contained a ski mask, a pair of gloves, and a flashlight. Obviously, the homeowners were disturbed by this, so they did what most people would have done. They called the police. Whichever police officer took that phone call instructed the residents to throw all the stuff away. And I just don't think you can understate what a major blunder this is.

was. Think about all of the things that are going on and then a police officer would tell these residents to throw this stuff away. But that's exactly what they did. So the homeowners threw away the ski mask, the pair of gloves and the bag, but kept the flashlight. And I don't know about you more, but if I was the person that found that stuff in my bushes, knowing everything that has been going on, I would be on high alert. Strange things continued late February and into March. There were odd men seen in the neighborhood, dogs barked at night. Something seemed to be happening on the 3,800 block of Thornwood Drive, but nothing was really being done about it. Around this time, multiple witnesses saw an old-style yellow truck from the 1940s or 50s. Sometimes they would see it

being driven and sometimes it would be parked in between two houses as if the driver could have been a visitor to either house. But as it turns out, he wasn't. Nobody knew who the driver was, but one eyewitness account said that he was white in his 20s and under six feet tall. On March 8, 1977, a recently separated woman on Thornwood Drive who had received some of the calls in February was asleep in her bed. Around 4 a.m. she heard some sort of noise that jolted her awake. And as she set up, she saw a man racing at her. Before she knew it, he had a knife to her throat.

The intruder spoke in a clear, hostile voice telling her that he had a butcher knife and that he only wanted her money. He warned her that if she moved, he would kill her. But it was dark and the woman was still groggy, so she couldn't see him very well. She thought he was wearing a mask, but she wasn't 100% sure. The man immediately forced the 38-year-old woman onto her stomach and bound her hands behind her back. And then he tied her feet. He also gagged and blindfolded her.

Once she was secured, the assailant left her room, apparently searching the home for money, but returned a check on her periodically. During one of the trips back into the bedroom, the man placed his penis into the woman's hands, which were tied behind her back. He then ordered her to play with it. After a couple of moments, he flipped her over onto her back and ripped her nightgown down the middle. The attacker then warned her by saying

she had better fuck good or he would kill her. He then raped the woman before throwing blankets over her. The man had been in the victim's home for about two hours and around 6 a.m. slipped out of the house. Right around the same time, a neighbor saw an unknown man standing on her front porch looking into a window. The window he was peeping into was near the intersection of Thornwood and Montclair, about eight homes away from the victims.

The neighbor would later describe the peeper as being white and about five foot eight or five foot nine with a medium build. Inside her home, the 38-year-old victim struggled to get free of her bindings. Once she was able to, she ran to a phone in the family room, but discovered that the phone wires had been cut. She then went to another phone in the house and called police. This call to police came in at around 7 a.m. And they arrived just a few minutes later.

The first thing the police did was ask the victim for description of the man who had attacked her. She recounted that she wasn't sure if he had on a mask or not. She described that the man wore what felt like some sort of rubber gloves and a jacket that looked shiny. Then she told them about one thing the man had done in the attack that was especially cruel. During the attack, he had squeezed a thumbnail on her right hand so bad that the pain was terrible. It seemed like she hadn't even put up a fight, so this was odd as it was unprovoked. Police were able to determine that a window on the backside of the house was the entry point for the rapist. The glass at the bottom had been broken and it was pried open.

Police asked the victim if she had anything unusual happened before her attack, and this is when she told them about the phone calls. She also recounted for police that a man she did not know had come to her door a few weeks before the attack asking for her husband. And she thought this was odd because anybody that knew her husband would have known that he had moved out following their separation. So a lot of things that happened during this attack were very typical of, the East Area Rapists M.O.

Attacking a lone woman, the bindings, and targeting a single-story house. And there had also been those phone calls to the victims and other relatives on top of the prowlers in the area. But there were also some differences in this attack. She couldn't say for sure if this man was wearing a ski mask, which is what the East Area rapist typically wore. She also described his voice as not being the normal low hissing clenched teeth voice that many victims had described, but rather a clear and hostile voice. This victim also did not mention that the man who had attacked her seemed to have a very small penis. But while there were some differences, the overall MO strongly matched and her attack was officially listed as the 14th confirmed East Area Rapist Attack. On April 6th, 2001, 24 years after she was raped by the East Area rapist, her phone rang.

The victim who by this time had moved and changed her name got the call between 6.30 and 7.30 p.m. When she answered, a male caller asked for her by her name. When she acknowledged that she was the person the caller was looking for, the man again referred to her by her first name saying, don't you remember? Don't you want to party again? when she asked who the caller was, he hung up. The woman couldn't tell for sure whether or not the caller was the same man that had raped her 24 years earlier. But she did feel that this call was directly connected to her rape because only a couple of days before she got this call, news about the East Area Rapist had made headlines across the state of California.

The East Area Rapists' DNA had been linked to a series of shocking crimes in Southern California. But we'll get to those crimes later this season. On March 18, 1977, only 10 days after the East Area Rapist's last attack, three taunting phone calls came into the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department. These calls were not recorded, but in the first call received at about 4.15 p.m., the caller said he was the East Area rapist before laughing, and hanging up. Another call came in at around 4.30 p.m. in which the same voice repeated what he had said in the first call. Finally, at about 5 p.m., the third call from the same caller came in, and he told the

dispatcher that he was the East Area rapist, and that he had his next victim stocked, and that police couldn't catch him. Once again, he hung up, and he didn't call back. Later that same day, on the 2,600 block of Benny Way in Rancho Cordova, a 16-year-old, cordova high school student had just arrived home after her job at a fast food restaurant. She walked into her house at about 10.45 p.m. The house was dark and quiet because her parents had gone away. And her plan that night was to eat some food that she had brought home from her job and then call a friend. She planned to sleep over at the friend's house that night due to the fact that her parents were not home.

As soon as she walked up to her front door, she noticed that her porch light was off, which was out of the ordinary. She dismissed it thinking her parents had simply forgotten to turn it on for her. Once she got into her house, she walked into the kitchen and sat her food on the counter before picking up the phone to call her friend.

She dialed her friend and the phone rang one time when she was startled by a noise behind her. She turned around just in time to see a man standing there with an axe raised above his head. She started to scream, but he stopped her saying, don't scream or I'll kill you. He yanked the phone court out of the law. Then he warned her again not to even look at him or he would kill her. The man shoved the young girl into the family room and ordered her down onto the floor on her stomach.

He pulled her hands behind her, took out brown shoe laces, and tied her hands tightly behind her back. He then tied her feet together. Once he had her secured, he opened up the back door and made sure that the living room drapes were closed tightly. It was at this point that a phone in the bedroom started to ring. The intruder froze as he listened to the phone ringing. After it stopped, he moved closer to the young girl. He warned her that he had a car parked a block away and he would kill her if she didn't comply. The man then started cutting up some tails using a pair of scissors.

The 16-year-old started to plead with the man not to hurt her. At that point, he tied strips of towel around her eyes and mouth. After she was secured, the stranger walked away. He came back after a few minutes and opened and closed the scissors close to her ear. And then at one point pushed the axe against her neck. Then the phone in the other room started to ring again. It rang for a full minute. and the man seemed nervous.

He pulled the strip of towel from the girl's mouth and asked her when her parents would be home. She told him that her parents were out of town and that her sister was sleeping over at a friend. He then told the girl to shut up. Then this man asked the 16 year old if she had ever fucked. Morph, we're not being gratuitous here. We're not theorizing about what this man said. this is word for word. I mean, it comes directly from police reports. It was at this point that the helpless girl likely knew what was about to happen.

He asked her again, calling her by her first name. She started to cry and pleaded with the man not to hurt her. He untied her feet. Then he pulled her pants and underwear off. He turned her onto her stomach and placed his penis in her bound hands in order to play with it. His penis felt like it was covered in lotion. after a moment the man turned her over and raped the 16 year old and there's no way around this this is awful subject matter to cover i have two daughters more if i know you have a daughter this is a nightmare this is something that

you can't even imagine happening and it shouldn't happen to anyone let alone a 16 year old girl after he raped her, he got up and explored the house. But then he comes back and rapes her again, and he would do this multiple times. She had been terrorized by this man for about an hour. By this time, the victim's friend had not heard from her and was getting worried. The 16-year-old was supposed to be at her house by 11 p.m. And now it was close to midnight. The friend had called the victim's home but didn't get an answer.

So she decided to ask her dad if he would give her ride over to check on her friend. They hopped in the car and a few minutes later arrived at the home on Benny Way. The friend's father knocked on the front door and this knock startled the girl's attacker inside. And he immediately raced towards the open back door and ran outside. The victim's friend and her father were able to make their way inside and they found the terrorized 16-year-old girl. They called the police who arrived on scene just before midnight. Police started to investigate the scene and determined that the attacker had likely gotten in through the garage door and then pried open the door leading into the home from the garage.

Outside, they found the green-handled hatchet the man had used in the attack hanging from the fence. Curiously, in the yard sticking up out of the ground was a pen with the local real estate company's name printed on it. It was near this pen that footprints were discovered. as well as two empty Dr. Pepper cans that did not come from the victim's home. The police were able to get a description of the attacker from the young girl. She described him as being around 5-9 to 5-10 and wearing a green jacket. In her statement, the girl told police that this man's penis was just a little bit larger than a hot dog. He wore a canvas mask of some sort with eye holes.

He was wearing dark, soft-sold shoes that didn't have any heels. And police would determine that the man had made off with some cash and jewelry, as well as the victim's driver's license and two of her rings. Her sister's ID was also stolen. Next, police checked with neighbors. One witness had seen a dark gray four-door car parked on the street that night that looked out of place. About an hour before the attack, a neighbor crossed the street from the victim saw a man moving around in the dark, but she couldn't give a detailed description. Another neighbor had reported that their dogs started growling and reacting to something near the victim's fence between 8.30 and 9 p.m.

Police tried to investigate anything that may have happened earlier that day. And later, they would find out that the victim's sister, before going over to spend the night at her friends, house had taken a phone call from a man who identified himself as a roofer. She told the man that her parents were out of town for the weekend. Other witnesses reported seeing an older yellow truck in the immediate area that day. It came to light that in the days and weeks before this attack, a nearby neighbor had a burglary. Another home had an intruder while the family was out of the house, but they couldn't find anything missing. One of the most interesting things was that the victim,

and her family had been receiving several calls for a couple weeks before the attack. The caller usually said nothing, but on at least one of those calls, it sounded as if there was a female coughing on the other end of the phone. A nearby neighbor also had received similar calls. This area of Benny Way and Rancho Cordova was very close to the first and the third East Area rapist attacks. The victim's home once again was a single-story home. She was a female alone at the house. So this definitely seemed like an East Area Rapist crime to police. The 15th confirmed attack. And it also seemed as if the phone calls made to police earlier that day from someone claiming to be the East Area Rapist may have really come from him.

After this latest attack, the 15th confirmed attack of the East Area rapist. The case was dominating the news. You couldn't live in Sacramento without seeing or hearing daily news headlines about this case. It really was front page news. In the last episode, we played a news segment that was very specific about who the East Area of Rapists was targeting. There have been no men in the houses at the time, although sometimes there have been children indicating the houses have been watched. This headline likely put some people's minds at ease. After all, it seemed as if couples that were home together had nothing to fear. But the East Area rapist was also paying attention to these headlines, and he was about to switch things up. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work

and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door, and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved, until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020. Money, Blood and Water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. Orange Vale was an area of Sacramento County that had been spared any attacks by the East Area Rapist. But from January of 1977 until April that year, one street in that town started to experience some East Area Rapist type activity. The street was Richdale Way. And, And most of this activity occurred on the 9,500 block.

In January, a homeowner caught a stranger in the backyard of a single woman. He confronted the strange man and the man ran off. This person was described as being white in his late 20s, 5 foot 9 to 5 foot 10 with a stocky build. Not long after this episode, in February, a home close to where this stranger was spotted was burglarized. By spring, multiple homes in this area were receiving hang-up phone calls for several weeks. All they could hear was heavy breathing. By March, there were reports of men claiming to be meter readers spotted in the area, but it turned out they were not meter readers.

In late March, one man discovered an empty meat wrapper near his patio where he kept his dog. He also discovered a tennis shoe print near part of his fence as if somebody had climbed it and scuffed it. Starting on the night of April 1st and carrying over past midnight into April 2nd, several area dogs were reported barking steadily multiple times for about a half hour at a time. The dogs barking were very close to one of the homes that had been getting some of the heavy breathing phone calls. Living in this home was a 29-year-old woman who was a Kaiser Hospital Pharmacy Tech. She had been out late to a movie with her 26-year-old boyfriend who also happened to work with her at the pharmacy. The woman's young children had also attended the movie.

They arrived home very late after midnight on the morning of April 2nd. The pair carried the kids inside and put them into bed. Since it was so late, the woman asked her boyfriend to stay over and he decided that was a good idea. The pair were in bed and asleep by 2 a.m. Just before 3.30 a.m., the woman woke up to a flashlight shining. in her eyes. When she looked up, a masked man was standing in her bedroom doorway. He spoke out, don't make a sound. Do you see the gun in my hand? The horrified woman told the man that she saw his gun. At that point, the man told her to wake up her boyfriend who was still asleep next to her.

Once she woke up her boyfriend, he instinctively tried to get out of bed, but was blinded by the flashlight. The masked man through clenched teeth growled at him to stop and to not make a move. He ordered them both to roll over on their stomachs. He then warned the couple that he was holding a 45 caliber and had 14 rounds. He told them that he just wanted their money and he asked the 26-year-old man where his wallet was. The man told the intruder that his wallet was in his pants pocket. It was then that the intruder told the pair that if they made any type of move, he would kill them like he did to some people in Bakersfield.

The man assured them that he would get their money and go and be out of their home in a few minutes. He then instructed the woman to tie her boyfriend's hands behind his back. He shined the light on the bed showing her some white shoe laces that he had thrown onto the bed. The boyfriend told the woman to do as the hooded man said. And it was then that the attacker barked out to the boyfriend to shut up. He told the female to make sure she tied him tightly. As she tied her boyfriend, the mass assailant walked close to him and put the gun close to his head, warning him not to look up or he would kill them both.

The man once again told the couple that he would be gone soon and heading back to his camp down by the American River. Their attacker then tied the male victim's feet together and then turned his attention to the female victim. He tied her hands behind her back as she was face down on the bed. The hooded attacker then walked out of the room, leaving the pair helpless on the bed. The couple could hear the intruder tearing through closets. Before long, he was back in their bedroom and he was carrying several dishes. He stacked the dishes on the male victims back and warned him that if he heard the dishes rattle, he would kill everyone in the home.

He took the woman out of the room telling her he was going to tie her up in the hallway. Once he got her into the hallway, he stuck something sharp into her back and ordered her to walk down the hall and into the living room. It was there that he ordered her down on her stomach. The attacker then tied the woman's feet with shoelaces and blindfolded her with a towel. He walked out in the kitchen and the woman could hear dishes rattling. When the masked man walked back into the living room, he was carrying more dishes. He asked the woman if she had matches and she told him that she. didn't. He then placed a cup and saucer on her back. At that point, the man walked back into the

kitchen and she could hear him eating food. After a few minutes, he walked down the hallway and checked on the man who was still tied up lying on the bed. After checking on the boyfriend and finding him still secure, the man walked by the female and told her he was going to go out to her car and get her purse. The woman wondered to herself how he knew that her purse was in the car. Once he came back from getting the purse, he straddled over her back and removed the dishes. He then placed his penis in her bound hands and told her to hold it gently. After a moment, he pulled back and untied her ankles and then removed her underwear. Then he asked her a question. He said, you have to tell me the truth. And if you don't, I'll find out

and kill you both. And the question was, did you fuck tonight? The woman said no, but she was lying to the man. The couple had actually had sex before they fell asleep. It was then that the man sexually assaulted her. After a couple of minutes and without any warning, he jumped up and walked off. A moment later, he was back and he placed high-heel shoes on her feet. For the next hour, the mass assailant alternated between raping the woman, eating in the kitchen, and checking on the boyfriend. During the rape, the man told the woman, that he was in the army before and had sex with a lot of girls. When he went in for the last time to check on the boyfriend,

he leaned over the man who was still tied in bed with dishes on his back and said, next place, next town. And then suddenly the man seemed to vanish. The house was quiet. The family dog who had been absent during the attack was suddenly walking around the house. Sensing that the attacker had left, the male victim was able to free him.

He then called police before checking on his girlfriend and freeing her. Police received the call for help just after 5 a.m. And they arrived very soon after. One of the first things they found was that the assailant had cut the power to the lamps and clock and had lit a candle, which may have been why he was looking for matches. He also cut the power to the television and heater. Police were not able to determine a point of entry for the attack, but discovered that the rapist had left the home through a sliding glass door.

Next, the police asked the pair to describe the attacker. He was white, about 5'10, and had a medium built. He had worn a white mask with eye and mouth holes. He talked through clenched teeth. The male victim felt sure that the man had a hint of a German accent. The female victim stated that the rapist had a very small penis. She then recounted two things that seemed to stand out. out to her. She mentioned that the attacker knew she kept her purse in her car. The other thing she

mentioned was that the rapist had placed high heels on her feet, which was something she would do when she was intimate with her boyfriend. It was as if the man somehow knew their secrets. Police turn their attention to neighbors. They found that one neighbor between 4.30 and 5 a.m. had seen a small foreign car circling the block several times at around the same time the rapist left. Another neighbor thought she had seen a large American car with a loud exhaust near the victim's home. Police learned that just a few weeks before the attack, the home next door had been put up for sale and a for sale sign was on the front lawn. Two different men that matched the rapist description had come by in the days after it went up for sale to inquire about the home. One was alone and the other was with a woman.

Neither of these men were ever identified. There's so much activity here that's very East Area rapist-like. Stocking, prowling, dogs barking, and then during the attack, placing his penis into her bound hands. But there were some things that were new. First off, was that the town of Orangeville was struck. But one thing that definitely stood out was that this was the first attack in which a man was present in the home. And while most East Area rapist attacks didn't involve a gun, this one did. did. Did he feel as if he needed to have a gun because there was a man in the equation?

It seemed as if the Easterer rapist was not going to take any chances. And after this attack, it truly seemed like no one was safe, not lone women and not couples. The Easterer rapist could pop up any place at any time. The next East Area Rapist attack would occur back in the city of Carmichael on the 6100 block of Sherilyn Way. This street had been experiencing unusual occurrences since February. Around dinner time on a day in late February, a resident and her daughter were inside their home when they saw a man outside jump their fence

and land in their backyard. And instead of leaving, the man just walked around in their backyard. Fearful, the mother called police, but the man left before they arrived. About a month later, in a nearby backyard, A resident spotted a fleeing prowler. The only description of this man was that he was white and in his mid-20s, around 5 foot 9 and 150 pounds.

Then in April, another home close by was burglarized. This pattern of burglaries and prowling was a signal that the East era rapist was about to strike there. But somehow, police didn't recognize it. Another incident on this street happened on April 11, 1977. A young woman and her boyfriend caught a man in the... the backyard of her house. He appeared to be checking out their locks, but he raced off as soon as he realized they were watching him. They were able to describe the prowler as 5'10 with dark blonde shoulder-length hair. A few days later, a dog in a nearby residence was barking wildly at

something or someone outside of the home. On April 14th, a woman saw a suspicious man drive by her. The car, a light-colored valiant, drove by slowly, and the driver was staring at her. She felt uneasy. It may have been because she had been receiving a series of hang-up phone calls for two to three weeks prior. The 19-year-old clerk typist, who was separated from her husband, tried to dismiss the incidents. But later that night, after going to bed, she would come to regret not taking the calls or seeing the man in the car more seriously. The 19-year-old and her boyfriend were asleep in her bed. Early in the morning of April 15th, at around 2.30 a.m., they were awakened by the sound of someone in their bedroom and by a flashlight shining in their eyes.

Suddenly, a hissing voice came from behind the light. Don't look over this way or I'll kill you. The young man looked anyway and could see a gun in the intruder's hand. Then he heard the hammer being cocked. It was then that the man asked the couple if they knew. what a 45 magnum was. The man walked closer to the couple who were frozen in place. Then the woman felt the blade of a knife at her throat.

The intruder spoke through clenched teeth instructing the young woman to tie up her boyfriend. He threw her some black shoe laces. After the woman tied her boyfriend's wrist, the assailant tied hers as well before retying the boyfriends more securely. Then he left the room and wandered around the house. And Morph, we know that this is part of the east. East Area rapist script. He does certain things in a certain order and we've talked about it time and time again. He secures the victim or victims and then he walks around the house. And in this incident,

after several minutes, he came back in the bedroom and told the woman to get up and come with him. He told her that he could not find her purse. As he walked out with the 19 year old victim, he warned the man that if he moved an inch, he would cut his girlfriend's throat. He walked out with the girl, but after a minute, came back in and tied the male victim's hands even tighter. Then he tied his feet using some electrical cord. It seemed as if this attacker did not want there to be even the slightest chance that the male would get loose.

When the assailant walked the girl into the living room, she saw that the lamp had been covered with a towel. At that point, he blindfolded her and tied her feet together. Then he left her there. Next, he walked back into the bedroom carrying plates, and he stacked them on the man's back and warned him that if the plates fell, he wouldn't hesitate to kill his girlfriend.

And Mike, you touched on some of the Easterer rapist ammo or his script, and this stacking of dishes on victims to use as an alarm system of sorts now had become part of that script. And sticking with his script, the next thing that the woman feels is the man place his penis in her bounty. hands. And then he put the gun to her head and told her to talk dirty to him. And he actually gave her certain phrases that he wanted her to repeat back to him. All the while, he's talking to her through clenched teeth. He then sexually assaulted the helpless woman. Afterwards, he left her to go into the

kitchen and then started to eat something. He went outside onto the patio for a few. He went outside onto the patio for a few moments and then returned and assaulted the woman again. Right around this time, both the woman and the intruder heard the dishes fall off her bound boyfriend's back and the intruder went to check on him. The dishes had simply fallen off. The young man was not trying to escape. The attacker stacked the plates on his back once more and covered the man's face with a blanket and mentioned that he would kill his girlfriend.

He then went out once again into the kitchen where he ate more. food and then once again he raped the woman who is still tied in the living room. He then started to rifle through the contents of her purse and he found two bottles of generic medication. The next thing that he did was odd because he went back in to where the victim was and asked her where she kept her coding. And it turned out that the two bottles of generic meds in her purse were generic Cody. She told the man that they were in her purse, and he went back into the kitchen and started to run water in the sink.

Later, the two empty pill bottles would be found in the kitchen. So the question is, what happened to the pills that were in these bottles? Was he running the water to flush these pills down the sink, or did he take them with him when he left? After he started running the water, she didn't hear any more noise. And after a while, she sensed that he was gone. She started to try and free herself.

Both of the victims were able to free themselves, and then they tried to call police. But the phone lines in the kitchen and bedroom had been cut, so they ran to the neighbors for help. From there, the police were called and arrived quickly on the scene. Police found that the sliding glass door lock had been pried and broken open, so they determined that that was the point of entry. And for some reason, the thermostat had been turned down low.

A small amount of cocaine that belonged to the couple was missing. And in their description of the attacker to the police, they would state that he was about 5-9 to 5-10, had brown eyes and collar-length dark blonde hair. He was wearing a ski mask of some sort, but they couldn't describe the mask very well for police. How many descriptions have been given to the authorities and they've all been 5-9, 5-10? I mean, how many times have we said that? Yeah, it's a recurring theme and most of the descriptions all seem to match each other. The female victim was taken to Sacramento Hospital for treatment and later she would be hypnotized. Specifically, police wanted to ask her about the strange

car that she had seen hours before she was attacked and under-hypict. Nosis, she was actually able to provide police with a license plate number, but it turned out that the plate number she gave them had never been issued. So that was basically a dead end. The male victim recounted that the attacker sounded to have an Asian accent, but he felt that it might have been faked. The East Area rapist was starting to get too comfortable attacking couples, and there would be no let up in sight for the residents of Sacramento. The next attack in the East Area Rapist case would come on May 3, 1977. This time it would occur on the 8,300 block of La Riviera Drive in Sacramento. And as in most East Area Rapist attacks, it was preceded by some troubling events. In mid-April, various residents on this block started getting hang-up phone calls.

One of the people receiving the calls would turn out to be the next East Area victim. She started getting calls in late April about a week before she would be attacked. Shortly after midnight on May 3rd at around 1230 a.m., the 30-year-old housewife and college student heard a loud bang in her backyard. She instinctively ran to check all the locks and windows and found everything was secured. She looked out in the backyard but didn't see anything unusual. By 1 a.m., she decided everything was okay and she went to sleep. Her husband, an Air Force serviceman at Mayther Air Force Base, was already in bed.

bed. Around this same time, a neighbor close to this victim heard someone walking outside on some gravel. The next day, this resident would find that her side gate was open. At around 3 a.m., the 30-year-old woman was awakened in her bed to the sight of a man standing in the bedroom doorway. He was shining a flashlight in her eyes. She reached over and immediately woke up her husband. The man quickly told them that he just wanted their mom. and that he had a 45-caliber handgun. He let the couple know that if he wanted to, he could easily kill them and get across the levy to his camp. He walked up to the male victim and placed the barrel of the gun against his head and repeated the

threats before throwing a shoelace to the female victim and hissing at her to tie her husband up. He ordered her to tie him very tightly or he would kill everybody in the house. The couple couldn't risk any type of heroics as they feared for the safety of their two young children who were asleep in their bedrooms. After the male victim was tied, the intruder ordered the female onto her stomach, and he bound her hands tightly behind her back. Then the intruder said that he needed money for cocaine to get his fix. Now, remember, in the last attack, the East Area rapist had stolen a small amount of cocaine

from the victims. In another attack, he mentioned to a victim that he had a camp near the river. So it seemed as if he was sticking to his script, but also changing it as he went along and incorporating specific things from his recent attacks. The intruder tied the man's hands tighter, then tied his ankles. The male victim volunteered his wallet to the intruder telling him it was on the dresser. After the attacker looked through the cash in the wallet, he told the couple that they had better have more cash or he would kill them both. It was then that the wife directed the man to her purse, which was upstairs. The man started to shake like he was having some withdrawal to drugs.

But the couple would later report that the man seemed to be faking the shakes. After this shaking, the assailant covered the husband's head with the sheet and placed a jewelry box on his back. He warned him that if the jewelry box fell off, he would kill everyone in the house. and sticking to the script that we've seen, he ordered the wife up, placed the gun to the back of her head, and told her to walk out of the bedroom. He ordered her to take him upstairs to find her purse.

And once he found her purse, he threw her down to the floor and tied her feet together. He put what turned out to be a shower cap over her face, and then she heard him walk off and head down the stairs. The man had gone downstairs and placed dishes on the male victim's back, in addition to the jewelry box that was already on it. Then he made his way through the house, rifling through closets and cupboards. The victim could hear what sounded like a zipper bag opening and closing. Suddenly, the man was standing by her side and he told her he wanted to move her and untied her ankles.

He sat her up and left for a moment going into the kitchen and opening the refrigerator before quickly returning to her side. She heard a wet slurping sound and she knew that he was masturbating. And in typical East Area rapist fashion, he told the woman to guess what he was doing. Following his M.O. He placed his penis into the woman's bound hands. And during this period, he talked with the woman and told her that she was very tall. And keep in mind, this victim was six foot tall. and after all of this small talk, the intruder raped this woman.

After the rape, he re-secured the 30-year-old woman and stacked plates on her back. He warned her not to move, then left the room and went downstairs. He started rummaging through the master bedroom closet next to the helpless male victim who was still tied up on the bed. The intruder asked the male victim if he was in the service, and he replied that he was in the Air Force, to which the attacker replied that he too had been in the service, but had gotten kicked out. The man walked out of the room and went into the kitchen where he started eating. After he finished eating, he walked in to check on the female victim who was still tied upstairs.

He placed the gun to her neck and asked her, You don't want to die, do you? As soon as she started to tell the assailant no, he stopped her. And he said, shut up. She became very frightened and started to cry. and once again he told the woman to shut up. The man left her side and before long the house was quiet. After a while, the victims freed themselves and called police.

Police got to the house sometime between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. The attacker had stayed in the house for about 90 minutes. Police quickly found that the point of entry was a pride sliding glass door, a typical entry point for the East Area rapists. The couple was able to describe their attacker as being white and wearing a light tan or beige ski mask. He seemed to be in his 20s, and he was about 165 to 170 pounds.

As usual, he was described as having a very small penis. When it came to the height, they felt the attacker was about 5 foot 8 to 5 foot 9. And the female victim was very specific because being 6 foot tall and walking next to him, she had looked down and could see the top of the attacker's head. They described the man's voice as articulate, but when he got nervous,

he would breathe heavily. While most of the MO here was typical East Area Rapist MMO, choosing to strike a two-story home was not. The female victim was taken to Sacramento Medical Center around 7 a.m. Police then brought bloodhounds in and tracked the assailant sent to a levee behind the victim's home. A knife that came from the victim's home was found near the levy, along with two empty beer cans,

but there was no proof that the beer cans were left there by the assailant. Several months after the attack, early on the morning of January 20th, 1978, the female victim in this incident answered the phone. On the line was a man who said, I haven't struck in a while. You will be my next victim. I'm going to fuck you in the butt. See you soon. Within 10 minutes of this call, an identical call would be made to the 27th victim in the series.

and we'll actually be talking to the 27 victim in an upcoming episode. But Morph, I think we have to wrap up episode four right here. But as we leave you all, it's important to note that the pace of these attacks is picking up. And the time in between attacks is getting shorter and shorter. And as we go through this, you're going to see just how quickly the frequency of these attacks escalate. And it's not going to be a question of, is the East Area rapists going to strike again? The only questions were where would he strike next and who would be his next victim? And we can't thank everyone enough for downloading and listening to the podcast.

We appreciate all the support that we get, both financial and through social media. and all those different channels. If you would like to support the show, all you have to do is go to patreon.com slash criminology. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter at Criminology Pod or you can find us on Facebook

by searching Criminology Podcast. You can also join our Facebook discussion group called Criminology Podcast, Discussion, and Fans. If you enjoy the show and you haven't yet rated or reviewed us on iTunes, we hope you'll take a minute to do so. We have a listener voicemail that we want to play for you, so let's take a listen to that.

Hey, Mike and Morse. It's Noel calling from Lublin, Colorado. I am a huge fan of the podcast. I discovered it January, so right after you guys had wrapped up season one and completely binged it, and I'm super excited that you're back for season two. season two episode three came out on my birthday so I was doing a little bit of a celebration with that

but I really just want to say thank you guys so much for everything you do I really appreciate how you handle these cases and all of the research and information you include it's really fantastic you guys are appreciated thank you so much talk to you soon bye if you'd like to leave a voicemail for us you can do so by calling 6-6-1-7 and seven-seven crime. And one thing we'd like to do before we go is remind everybody of the FBI tip line for the East Area Rapist case. If you think you might know who he is or have a tip for the FBI, please call 1-800 call FBI.

We'd like to leave you with a promo for the new podcast, Frozen Truth, hosted by our friend Scott Fuller. We think you'll like his show, so give it a listen. Sometimes we conflate truth with facts. Because to find one, you have to have to. have the other. But they're not the same thing. Facts are ours. They're human. They belong to us. And that's where truth is different. The truth doesn't belong to us. The truth is universal. There's only one truth. Truth is what actually happened. Sometimes our facts lead us to the truth, and sometimes they don't. But the truth is always there. It's waiting. It's frozen there until we

find it. If we ever find it. I'm Scott Fuller, host of the Frozen Truth, a new podcast premiering in March. I hope you'll join me in my pursuit. For now, stay up to date at Frozen Truthpodcast.com.