Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - “The Double Initial Murders” - Joseph Naso

Episode Date: December 17, 2018

A routine home inspection in 2010 uncovers heinous crimes committed by Joseph Naso. Dating back to the late 1970s, Naso was responsible for deaths in California, Nevada and possibly one of the most famous unsolved murder sprees in New York State history. Sponsors! Caffé Monster - Available in Mocha, Vanilla, and Salted Caramel. Caffé Monster: Chill it down, Shake it up, Enjoy! Calming Comfort - Go to CalmingComfortBlanket.com and use promo code KILLERS at checkout to receive 15% off the displayed price. Robinhood - Robinhood is giving listeners a FREE stock like Apple, Ford, or Sprint to help build your portfolio! Sign up at SERIALKILLERS.RobinHood.com. Upstart -Head to Upstart.com/SERIALKILLERS to find out how low your Upstart rate is.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Watch only on Prime. Due to the graphic nature of this killer's crimes, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes dramatizations and discussions of murder and assault that some people may find offensive. We advise extreme caution for children under 13. People like to win. From Little League to the Academy Awards, we pride ourselves on getting ahead, and the trophies we have to show for it. For some, sexual conquests are equally deserving of trophies, a photo, a kept item of clothing, even a body body. part. To Joseph Nesau, trophies let him keep a small part of the women he dominated. He loved to

photograph them, both before and after he took their lives. Police would eventually uncover over 5,000 photographs of the women Joseph had raped and murdered in his studio. If a picture is worth a thousand words, Joseph's trophies had a lot to say. Hi, I'm Greg Paulson, and this is serial killer. Today we're going to take a deep dive into the life of Joseph Neso and his obsessive compulsion with documenting his gruesome sex crimes. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone. Many of you have been asking us how you can support the podcast. If you enjoy the show, one of the best ways to help us is to leave a five-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. While you're there, you can listen to previous episodes of serial killers as well as podcasts, other podcasts.

A new episode comes out every Monday. You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram at Parcast and on Twitter at Parcast Network or in our website, parkast.com. Joseph Neso was a freelance photographer who worked in California and New York. He killed at least six women between 1977 and 1994 and assaulted and raped hundreds more. Nassau prayed on vulnerable women. He lured them in by offering to pay them to model for his photo shoots. He liked to photograph women in lingerie, tied up with pantyhose.

But after the shoots, he would beat them and often raped them. He even strangled some of his models to death. After taking their lives, he would pose and photograph their corpses. Neso documented his assaults in what the court would later call his rape diary. During his career as a photographer, he also took thousands of photos. photographs of his victims, both alive and dead. Today, we'll look at Nassau's life up until his incarceration in 2010 and see how a probation violation started a murder investigation.

Next week, we'll follow the investigation spurred by a mysterious list of 10 names found in Nassau's apartment, suspected to be the victims of the Alphabet murders. Joseph Nassau was born January 7, 1934, in Rochester, New York. It was the height of the Great Depression. There's little public information about his childhood, but it's noted that his parents struggled financially. While this might not have made Nassau's family unique, it almost certainly turned Nesau into a tough kid.

Outside of being poor, there's little to suggest that Nesau faced hardships as a child. He didn't seem to have been abused or neglected, and he wasn't a violent kid. In fact, he was astoundingly normal. Nassau graduated from high school with passing grades and played sports, but it suggested he did neither impressively well. He went on to join the Air Force at 19 alongside some of his friends.

He served from 1953 to 1957, spending six of those months overseas. It was in the Air Force that rumors first began to follow NASO. Like most branches of the military, the Air Force is highly structured and thrives on strength and brute masculinity. It could have been during his four years of service that NACISO, Neso solidified his ideals about traditional patriarchal masculinity. It was also in the Air Force that Neso became an avid journaler. We don't have specific excerpts from those early journals,

but we do know that within them were obsessive documentation of multiple rapes and sexual assaults of women he met while off the base. In 1957, Nassau was honorably discharged from the Air Force, but it's been suggested that he was encouraged to leave by commanding officers, who had heard rumor of Nassau's behavior and didn't want to risk an investigation on the base. Neso laughed, but much like dirt swept under a rug, his monstrous tendencies didn't disappear.

And neither did his need to obsessively document his sex crimes. This compulsion is consistent with a behavioral disorder known as obsessive-compulsive disorder, or OCD. Vanessa's going to take over on the psychology here and throughout the episode. Please note, Vanessa is not a licensed, psychologist or psychiatrist, but she has done a lot of research for this show. Thanks, Greg. OCD is defined by the DSM-5 as recurrent and persistent thoughts, urges, or impulses that are experienced

as intrusive and unwanted, and that in most individuals cause marked anxiety or distress. OCD is thought to be genetic and can begin in childhood, but the average age of the illness's onset is 19. Which would explain why he began journaling obsessively when he joined the Air Force, also at 19. Although, NASO's case is more complicated than most. According to the organization, beyond OCD, most patients of OCD are aware that their compulsions are irrational. A compulsion is anything that a person spends at least one hour a day doing, and which causes intense emotional distress. On TV, OCD is often portrayed as a tick, like needing deterrentia.

turn a light switch on and off repeatedly. But this depiction is far from the reality of an OCD routine. OCD starts with a string of thoughts that cause distress. This is oftentimes an obsession with germs or safety. The gnawing thought that an oven was left on and could burn down the house. These thoughts become so pervasive that the patient establishes routines as a coping mechanism. For someone obsessed with germs, they may need to repeatedly wash their hands or avoid direct contact with items they deem contaminated. It's nearly impossible for someone with OCD to

fully silence these repetitive, persistent thoughts. For NASO, persistent thoughts about dominating women may have led to an obsessive need to journal about his conquests. NASO returned home to Rochester from the Air Force in 1957. Perhaps for lack of a clearer career path, the 23-year-old started getting into freelance photography and building a small business. Through this, he met a beautiful woman named Judith. She was a 19-year-old English student at Kyuka College, who worked out both Crown Publishing and at the Kodak Company. They fell for each other and quickly started dating.

But unbeknownst to his new girlfriend, Naseau was spending his spare time assaulting women and compulsively journaling about the attacks. In one such journal, Nesau wrote, quote, Picking up a gorgeous chick at a bus stop and headed for the cemetery and started to kiss and molest her, end quote.

Neso described the rape callously, writing, quote, it was hard work trying to hold her down and pull off her underwear at the same time, end quote. To Neso, any sexual conquest was one to be proud of, even if it was rape. And while some of this callousness towards the women he raped could be blamed on the traditional masculinity he held dear, it's also highly indicative of narcissistic personality disorder.

Narcissists convey an exaggerated sense of self-importance, a constant need for attention, and a complete lack of empathy. NESA was particularly self-aggrandizing. He perceived himself to be a ladies' man and promoted himself as a professional photographer long before he had the experience that such a title suggested. According to mental health counselor Christine Hammond, the combination of narcissistic personality disorder and OCD presents itself differently than OCD on a situation. own. Narcissists with OCD don't feel bad about their atypical behaviors and don't care how they affect others. They believe that their compulsive behaviors are evidence of their superiority, allowing them to justify their actions. In Joseph's case, this served to justify raping the woman he picked up at the bus stop. After raping her at the local cemetery, the unnamed woman

pulled a brilliant move that could possibly have saved her life. She managed to convince me so that she liked him and wanted to introduce him to her parents. Neso drove the woman home and waited in the car while she went inside, presumably to announce his arrival. He was surprised when her mom ran out of the house and wrote down his license plate number. It might seem incredible that Neso fell for this trick, but again, he didn't do too well in school. Besides, he thought highly of himself, why shouldn't his rape victim?

Nassau's lack of empathy for his victims is clear in the aggressive language he used to describe his assaults. He understood that what he was doing was non-consensual, but he felt entitled to these women's bodies. The woman reported her rape to the police. Naysa was arrested, charged with second degree assault, and punished with probation. Ever the narcissist, he felt the rules didn't apply to him. Probation did little to curb him from committing further assaults on a series of unknown women. Each assault was well documented in his journal. In 1961, 27-year-old Nassault Neso offered a ride to a 24-year-old grad student at UC Berkeley. She was waiting for the bus.

He raped her in his car. Years later, the victim told authorities that it was her first time hitchhiking, and she did it against her better judgment. But it was common in the college town. Nesso thought he was a regular Casanova, able to sweet-talk any woman into his car. He saw them as unsuspecting prey. It made the ensuing rapes all the more exciting.

This behavior is consistent with sexual sadism disorder. It's a parapheria defined by the American Psychiatric Association as a sexual desire or behavior that involves another person's physiological distress, injury, or death, or a desire for sexual behaviors involving unwilling persons or persons unable to give legal consent. Sexual sadists feel an ongoing and intense desire to harm others during sex. It's only a disorder if it's non-consensual and causing harm. Sexual sadism disorder often begins in early adulthood and progresses in intensity over time if it goes untreated. Again, Nesos seemingly began assaulting women at age 19 about the same time the journaling started.

From an outside perspective, it almost seemed like the police agreed with Nassau's view of sex. One of Nassau's victims reported her rape to the police and recalled the officer dismissing her case, saying, you were just trying to make your boyfriend jealous. She pressed the issue until the police told her that they had spoken to her assailant and encouraged him to leave town so he wouldn't be a bother moving forward. Who knows if they ever actually spoke with Nayso?

This is a practice called victim blaming. According to psychologist Melvin Lerner, victim blaming is a defense mechanism. It's easier to feel safe and view the world as safe if we believe victims are at fault for their own misfortune. that they somehow wanted to be victimized. The most common example of this line of thinking is the idea that women who were assaulted were asking for it, based on what they were wearing or how many drinks they consumed. According to Dr. Lerner, it's easier to believe that women have a hand in their assault

than accept the fact that anyone could be a potential victim. In the end, no charges were filed against Joseph Nassau. He felt reassured that his behavior toward women would be tolerated without consequence. Meanwhile, his victim chose to remain anonymous, even 50 years after the assault. She never told friends or family about her rape. Victim-blaming likely kept many of Nesos victims quiet and allowed him to continue attacking women, eventually murdering as many as 10 of them in cold blood. We'll dig into some of those murders after this short break. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey?

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then assaulting them in secluded locations. But when he wasn't hunting prey, Nassau lived a double life. In 1962, after five years of dating, 28-year-old Neso married Judith. Crime writer C.L. Swinney described their early married years as, loving, exciting, and full of life. Judith wanted kids right away, although she had to convince a somewhat reluctant Nassau. Apparently in the five years they dated,

family never came up. But happy wife, happy life. In 1963, their first son, Charles, was born. In 1965, the family moved to Piedmont, California, where they had their second son, David. In their new home, Judith commuted to San Francisco and worked as a legal secretary. Neso worked as a freelance photographer and had a dark room in their house.

Initially, he shot weddings, family portraits, and art images. He gained a good reputation among local artists. Between 1965 and the early 70s, Nassau led a relatively normal life. He volunteered as a Cub Scoutmaster and coached Little League for his son's school baseball team. A childhood friend of David Nassau remembers Joseph Nassau as passive and good-natured. NESO helped them film video projects for school, watched Raiders games, and took the kids to baseball card shows. The friend even went with the family on a beach trip to collect antique bottles. He remembered thinking that Neso genuinely cared about his kids.

But not all of Neso's acquaintances gave such glowing reviews. A neighbor recalls hearing a lot of yelling coming from the NESO household. And just because NESO had no police record in Piedmont didn't mean that he wasn't still assaulting women regularly and journaling about his conquests. And Nesos photography was evolving into something much more sinister. By 1970, his shoots were getting so risque that the only models willing to pose for him were sex workers. Concurrently, the Nesos marriage deteriorated.

Judith Nesau began to grow suspicious of Nesos photo shoots, suspecting that Nesa was having affairs with the women he photographed. He denied it. and technically he was correct. Affair was far too consensual a word. In reality, he was paying his models for sex, and when they refused, he beat and raped them. At some point, the yelling between Joseph and Judith turned twisted and violent. Judith later testified that on two occasions during the summer of 1976,

Neso drugged her and let other men rape her in her sleep. In one case, they were out at a club in San Francisco. Anasso gave her pills. He claimed were vitamins to prevent a hangover. The next thing Judith could recall was waking up in a hotel bed with two unknown men lying beside her. She was still heavily drugged, so the memory was hazy. But she swears she saw Neso watching her from a hotel armchair in the corner. She now believes one or both of the men raped her while she was unconscious. In the second incident, Judith woke up in her own bed, dazed, with a man.

man she didn't know asleep on top of her. Naiso informed her that the man was a hitchhiker he'd picked up earlier that night. Judith compartmentalized these incidents. They didn't come up publicly until 50 years later at Nassau's trial. She said the memories were dreamlike and unclear, but she is sure they were real. At the time, Nassau tried to justify his actions by telling Judith that having sex with multiple men would improve her mood and make her feel desirable. Judith had been feeling depressed, and Nassau believed it was due to a recent hysterectomy. Judith felt it was due to her cheating husband who liked to watch other men rape her while she was unconscious.

We can't say why Judith stayed with Nesau as long as she did, but it's not unusual for victims to stay with their abusers. According to the Institute for Family Studies, it's common for victims to blame themselves or minimize their abuse. Judith also believed Nassau was a good father and may have worried about financial constraints. By 1970, Neso no longer bothered to hide his infidelity. Judith often arrived home to find models hanging around the house.

They fought more than ever. Judith was still unaware that Nassau was beating and raping his models, but she knew he paid for sex. Astoundingly, the couple remained married for another decade. Around this time, Nassau began journaling about his newest sexual fantasy, a woman, mostly undressed, tied up and unable to move. He wanted to watch a sexual conquest struggle, and he had just the woman in mind. On January 9, 1977, Nassau picked up Roxene Rogash, an 18-year-old red-headed sex worker on International Boulevard in Oakland.

At this point, Roxanne knew Nassau. He was a returned customer. Generally, the women who worked International Boulevard saw Nassau as an unattractive, unkempt old man. He still believed he had a reputation for being a ladies' man, but in reality, he was, was better known for being cheap. Neso underpaid sex workers, including Roxene. After sex, he would pretend to discover that he didn't have enough cash. There wasn't much recourse the women could take. Sex workers are a particularly vulnerable class of people.

Because of the illegal nature of their work, they can't go to the police if they're mistreated or if a John fails to pay. Neso even tried to negotiate sex in exchange for photography lessons or headshots, but he was shut down quickly. Most of the sex workers on International Boulevard were wary of Neso, but Roxene was different. She'd gotten into sex work out of desperation. She'd grown up in a violent home where her parents beat both her and her siblings. She was described as a fighter, but suffered from depression and had attempted suicide in the past.

She'd had two abortions by the time she was 14, but decided to keep her third pregnancy. She loved her son, Shane. Before leaving with Nassau, Roxene checked in with her pimp, Benjamin Bennett, who was also her boyfriend. They headed towards Foothill Boulevard where Neso kept an apartment. He liked having a second space

outside of his family home for photo shoots. But tonight's photo shoot would turn deeply disturbing. Once inside the apartment, Nesso knocked Roxine unconscious, then stripped her of her clothing. He then dressed her in panty hose and tied her up with a second pair. He also put Panihose in her mouth so she couldn't scream.

He masturbated over her unconscious body, took photos of her tied up, and waited for her to regain consciousness. When Roxene awoke, she couldn't scream, but she scratched at Nassau's bare legs, getting his skin under her fingernails. Ever the sexual sadist, Neso loved the power he felt in restraining Roxanne. He photographed her, enjoying watching her struggle, afraid. Against her will, and truly because of that, Roxene fulfilled Nassau's darkest sexual fantasies. Neso felt a rush in hurting and humiliating her. Neso then strangled Roxanne with a pair of pantyhose.

She became his first kill. According to Alan Francis and Richard Wallert of the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law, quote, rape and sexual sadism have in common violence, cruelty, and a callous indifference on the part of the law. perpetrator to the suffering of the victim. But they differ markedly in motivation. Rapists use violence to enforce the victim's cooperation, to express aggression or both. In contrast, in sexual sadism, the violence, domination, and infliction of pain and humiliation

are preferred or necessary preconditions for sexual arousal." End quote. Naysa's propensity toward non-consensual bondage suggests that he may have needed to humiliate and make powerless the women he raped and killed to reach sexual satisfaction. The photographs Neso took were trophies, ways that he could revisit this horrific attack and hopefully feel the same rush as he did during the act. The photos could help him achieve sexual satisfaction later on. Neso needed to dispose of Roxene's body quickly. He was nervous that her pimp would come looking for her. Benjamin Bennett did go looking for Roxanne, but he was arrested for an unrelated crime that night, which ended up being somewhat lucky for him. His arrest

later served as an alibi. Neso dumped Roxene's body on the side of a rural road near Fairfax, California in the middle of the night. According to Nassau's journal, he sat in his car after dumping the body and did his best to memorize every detail about the patch of roadside. He wanted to remember everything about his first kill. On January 11, 1977, police found Roxene's body via an anonymous tip. In retrospect, they believed Naseau had been the one to call in his own murder, given the overly specific details about where to find her. It might seem strange that Nassau would report his first kill, but he enjoyed following the police investigation. He was a narcissist and wanted police to admire his work.

Neso started clipping and collecting all of the articles about his victims, adding them to his journals to obsessively document his crimes. Police found Roxene's body on the side of the road, naked, except for the pair of pantyhose she was wearing. They were inside out, possibly because Neso had dressed her in haste, so that she wouldn't wake up before he had her restrained. The pantyhose that had been used to strangle her still dangled around her neck.

Two more pairs were wrapped around her mouth, jaw, and stuffed down her throat. Her feet were bound with a fabric belt. The authorities gathered semen and other DNA from the pantyhose, as well as skin from under Roxene's fingernails. But at the time, Joseph Neso had no criminal record, and the criminal DNA database was still small. So the DNA evidence returned no matches. Detectives IDed Roxene's body using her fingerprints. Her sister Linda told police that Roxene had believed someone was trying to kill her.

Unfortunately, the lead revealed no suspects, and it's unclear as to whether or not she was referring to Nassau. Dr. Ken Holmes, the Marin County Medical Examiner at the scene, believed that the elaborate bondage indicated that the killer had enjoyed the kill and would be anxious to kill again. We'll continue examining Nassau's crimes right after this. You said this place was steps from the water.

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Just tell the manager you'll sue. Instant room upgrade. Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. Now, back to the story. At the beginning of 1977, Joseph Naseau bound and strangled sex worker Roxene Rogash and dumped her body on the side of the road. On August 5th, 1978, about a year and a half after that first kill, Joseph Nassau, now 44, picked up a 22-year-old sex worker in Oakland named Carmen Cologne.

Nassau had been stalking Carmen for three weeks. He often had sex with and photographed sex workers but he put special attention into choosing the ones he killed. Neso already knew Carmen. He'd paid for sex with her before. On this day in early August, he paid Carmen for kinky sex in his car, then invited her back to his apartment. He promised her additional money in exchange for a photo session.

She had actually done this before and knew the drill. She went with him willingly. This was a different apartment than where he'd killed Roxene. After his first murder, he had moved out of the obfutable. apartment in an attempt to cover his tracks. Neso provided lingerie for Carmen to model. He had sex with her and took photos. He asked to tie her up with the panty house.

Having modeled for Neso before, Carmen agreed. She knew he was into weird stuff, but always came out of it all right. But this time would be different. Neso was braver with Carmen than he had been with Roxanne. He took the time to develop a relationship first. Her repeated willingness to be photographed at his house, and to have consensual, kinky sex with him, fueled Nassau's machismo. Carmen, half his age, likely saw Nassau as a creepy, albeit harmless, old man.

The misperception allowed Nassau to carefully choreograph his bondage fantasy. He bound her with the pantyhose, then began to have sex with her. Midway through the sex, he began to strangle her with another pair of pantyhose. She fought, which only served to excite him. he raped her as she died. Afterward, he arranged and photographed her corpse. Neso dumped Carmen's body in a cow pasture. Ten days later, a California state patrolman found Carmen's body

while on his way to investigate a cattle shooting in Port Costa. The body was in bad shape from being out in the summer heat. Police collected what DNA they could, but there were no matches. Police were only able to get a partial fingerprint from Carmen's badly decomposed hand. But she had an arrest record for alleged sex work, so her prints were on file and they were able to ID her. Carmen's sister was listed as a contact on her arrest paperwork, so police brought her the bad news. She told police that Carmen had recently worked as an erotic model for someone, but she didn't know who. With no other leads and an inconclusive cause of death, Carmen's case went cold.

Meanwhile, Naseau's marriage was finally falling apart. He couldn't satisfy her. He couldn't satisfy his sadistic sexual needs with his wife, and she hated the random women hanging around her home. In 1979, Judith filed for divorce, and on January 16, 1980, the divorce was finalized. After the divorce, Nassau and Judith's son, Charles, was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Charles' serious illness kept Judith and Nassau in amicable contact. They were both involved in their son's care and seemed to have a workable relationship. Neso took the divorce well, which is surprising for a man who couldn't handle rejection. But in this case, the end of his marriage meant more time to dedicate to his sexual conquests.

Neso continued to follow the coverage of Roxene and Carmen's murder investigations. He collected articles about them. He was part trophy collector and part obsessive documentarian. Without his marriage to keep him tethered, Nesa moved from his family home in Piedmont to the Mission District in San Francisco. It was a new city full of sex workers to exploit and kill. In January, 1981, Nassau got an apartment manager job in his building at 839 Leavenworth Street. In addition to photographing sex workers, he took up a new hobby, stalking the women in his building.

Nassau rented an apartment to 56-year-old Sharia Patton. She was new to San Francisco and looking for a job. They bonded when she tried to hang on her. on the rent, and he gave her a small discount. Sharia differs from Nassau's first two murder victims in that she was older and not a sex worker. It's likely she reminded him of his wife, and they became friendly neighbors. But like Roxene, Sharia needed money. Neso exploited that. Nesau convinced Sharia to model for him numerous times, including some partially nude shots in a gray rabbit fur coat. Nassau paid sex workers for photos and expected sex, whether or

he paid or not. Luring Sharia proved to be more challenging. Naseau assured her that the photo gigs weren't a sex thing and slowly gained her trust. He started with fully clothed portraits before getting her to pose in lingerie and tied up with pantyhose. Sharia was calculated about her participation in the photo shoots. She was aware that Naiso was attracted to her. She agreed to do more provocative photos in exchange for more money, but she never succumbed to his sexual advances. Neso saw his photo sessions as foreplay for his sadistic fantasies. It probably frustrated him when shoots didn't escalate to sex. It was likely this rejection that led Neso to rape and strangle Sharia in January of 1981. Soon after, two black

plastic garbage bags washed up on the beach in Tiburon, California. A jogger stumbled upon the bags while on her run. They smelled terrible and were crawling with maggots. She reported them to the police who didn't prioritize garbage pickup and tried to outsource the cleanup to Park's service. When the police finally arrived, they discovered that the bags contained a decomposing human body. The local coroner, Dr. Gindrich, could tell that the body had been strangled. There were ligature marks on her neck. In his notes, he described in detail how the body was bound into a fetal position with panty hose and put inside two garbage bags tied with plastic ties.

Luckily, Dr. Jindrich had been the coroner assisting on Roxene Rogash's autopsy and recognized the similarity between the victims. Both were bound with pantyhose. While he was able to identify the correlation, the police still had no leads in the case. Sharia's daughter, Roussel Heckert, IDed the body. A family friend called Roussel after seeing a composite sketch of Sharia on TV, After learning her identity, the police contacted Charles Gaiatani, the owner of the apartment building where Sharia had been living.

He pointed them in the direction of the building manager, Joseph Nassau. This is the first connection police made between Nesau and a murder. Guy Tani told detectives that Nassau was interested in Sharia romantically and that the feeling was not reciprocated. He also indicated that Nesah was creepy, a sentiment shared by many tenants, some of whom called him. Crazy Joe. In 1981, detectives interviewed 47-year-old Nassau. They found him suspicious, but couldn't get enough information to establish probable cause. Sharia's case went cold. Nevertheless, the police interview felt a little too close for comfort. Nassau hung around San Francisco for a little while to avoid seeming suspicious. Then, packed up and got out of town. Within about a year,

Nayso had settled in Yuba City, California. There, he spent the rest of the 80s working as a photographer and stalking women in his downtime, business as usual. In 1992, a woman named Renee Shapiro was hitchhiking to San Francisco for a Bob Dylan concert.

Shapiro had, at the time, already changed her name to Sarah Dylan as an homage to her favorite singer, whose former wife was named Sarah, but she never made it to the concert. She disappeared on May 3, 4, 1992 in Marin County where Naseau lived. Neso would never cop to this murder, but years later, her ID would be found in his home.

On April 5, 1993, Nayso saw Pamela Parsons for the first time while she was waiting at a bus stop. Pamela was a 38-year-old waitress and sex worker, and likely short on cash. Nassau liked her immediately. He began to stalk Pamela. He noted that she would commute by bus on. days she planned to pick up Johns and would drive her car on days she worked at the restaurant. On April 21, 1993, Nayso stopped into Pamela's restaurant while she was working as a waitress. They struck up a conversation and Pamela quickly realized that Nassau, now 59, was interested in paying for sex.

She invited him to come back to the restaurant to visit. A week later, on April 29th, Pamela used her signature ploy to get potential Johns to make a move. She told Neso that she was $200 short on rent, and if she couldn't pay, she'd be evicted. Neso saw right through the game and used the opportunity to offer to pay Pamela to model for him. Pamela agreed. She met Neso at his apartment and modeled for him. Nesau paid her the $200, plus a little extra, presumably, for sex. But he never said so explicitly. Pamela took advantage of Nassau's coyness.

She accepted the extra cash, but left without. having sex with him, Neso later journaled that she had ripped him off and he was seething about it. On September 15, 1993, they arranged another shoot. This time, Neso decided to get his money's worth. He waited until Pamela was bound with pantyhose before he strangled, raped, and killed her. He then posed and photographed her corpse. Neso later noted in his journal that he, quote, got even on an old account, end quote. Naseau dumped Pamela's body off the side of a rural road by a dairy farm. Unique to this body dump, he crossed her arms over her chest, making her look peaceful.

On September 19, 1993, a man found her body while he was out walking his dog. Pamela was identified quickly because people in town knew her. Sadly, because Pamela didn't have many friends or family members to advocate for her, and because she was a known sex worker and methamphetamine addict, She was dragged in the media. The police put minimal effort into finding her killer, and the case quickly went cold. Sometime between 1993 and 1994,

Neso relocated from Yuba City to the nearby town of Marysville, California. Neso was confident that the police were not pursuing him. He spent his time doing freelance photography and building up his collection of newspaper clippings. Piles of clippings soon began to litter his home. Boxes of media coverage of his crimes were stacked around his home. He got sloppy about hiding his overt interest in the crimes, since the police didn't so much as suspect him.

Soon, Neso decided it was time to christen his new apartment. On August 6, 1994, he spotted 31-year-old Tracy Tofoya as she worked a street corner near his home. She was exactly his type, hard up on cash, depressed, a drug addict, and a known second. worker. One of her five children had recently died of SIDS. She and her husband Richard were separated, although they spoke on the phone every night. Naiso stalked Tracy for weeks before he approached

her on the street and asked her to model for him. They agreed on a price. Neso took Tracy to his apartment for the shoot. He gave her lingerie and wine. Everything went smoothly. He paid her for sex, and he took her back to town when they were done. He gained her trust, and they agreed to meet again soon. Tracy thought she had just stumbled into the easiest source of income she had found in years. But of course, Neso had ulterior motives. On August 9, 1994, Neso picked Tracy up again. This time he offered her more money for photos, sex, and the privilege of tying her up. We know how this ends.

Rape, strangulation, death. On August 14, 1994, a paper boy discovered Tracy's body, face down and naked in a drainage ditch. Her body was mangled. She had been pushed from the passenger side of a moving vehicle. Once again, the police connected the similarities between Tracy's death and Pamela's, but they had no leads.

Astoundingly, Joseph Nassau still didn't have a criminal record. And even though he'd been a person of interest in San Francisco, police departments didn't share information like that in the early 90s. The case went cold for 16 years. But luckily, over the course of the next year, NASO was arrested on several occasions for shoplifting small items from grocery stores and malls throughout Northern California. In 1994, NACA was jailed for petty theft, and in 1995, he was arrested for trying to steal 30 pairs of women's underwear in Oakland. Charges were filed, and a judge sentenced him to probation. Nassau moved to Sacramento sometime between 1997 and 1990.

and lived there until 2003. There's no evidence to suggest that he killed anyone during this time or attacked women in general. Now nearly 70, perhaps old age was finally catching up with him. In 2004, Neso moved again, this time to Reno, Nevada. He was still on probation for petty theft in California, so the move to Nevada had to be approved by the state. He bought a home in Nevada with an extra bedroom for his son Charles to come visit.

Of course, NESO had no respect for rules, so he bought the house and had at least partially moved in before even making a probation transfer request. The transfer wasn't approved until 2009, when NESO had technically been living in Nevada for five years already. But the move took NESO years to complete due to the amount of stuff NESO had acquired over the years. Plus, he had wanted Charles to be able to come live with him. And since Charles suffered from schizophrenia, there were a lot of logistics to. figure out in moving him. With this move came new rules. An interstate compact is the process of transferring responsibility of a probationer from one state to another. Neso had to report to the Nevada Department of Public Safety parole and probation immediately upon his approved arrival in the state.

On July 15, 2009, Neso did check in with the state, but was frustrated to learn that he had to return a second time for an investigational interview. August 12, 2009, NASO met his probation officer, West Jackson, who explained the rules of Nassau's probation, set to expire June 21, 2012. These rules included a required monthly check-in. Jackson was allowed to drop by Nassos unannounced and searched Nassau's home, property, and vehicle as he deemed necessary. On August 28, 2009, NASO got caught shoplifting chips at a convenience store. Unfortunately, his newly transferred probation status

had not hit the computer system yet, so he came up clear. The shop owner didn't press charges because NASO was in his 70s and stealing low-priced items. The shop owner just assumed NASO was senile and let it go. On September 10, 2009,

probation officer Jackson conducted his first home visit. He met NASO's son Charles, who had a room in the house but was not living there. Jackson didn't find anything criminal, but noticed an accumulation of clutter, an indication of hoarding. Jackson visited again on December 9, 2009, and again found no violations, but noted more clutter.

It peaked his interest, and he made a note of it. Hoarding can be another symptom of OCD. According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, hoarding is a compulsion. For many people, they hoard items that have sentimental value, or that might jog a memory later on. For someone like Nassau, who was obsessed with documenting all of his crimes, there would have been an enormous emotional attachment to his newspaper clippings about his crimes and the ensuing investigations. Nesso didn't like how often Jackson came around. He didn't like other people being in his space, touching his things.

Nesau filed a harassment complaint against Jackson and threatened to sue the state. When Jackson didn't visit for four months, Neso believed his threat had worked. In actuality, Jackson had gotten overloaded with new probation cases and was completely unaware of Nassau's complaint. He didn't visit again until April 13, 2010. This time, NASO was unprepared. Jackson found two rounds of ammunition in Nassau's home and determined that Nassau had been haggling with a cellar to buy a gun.

Probationers are not allowed to have weapons. Jackson put Nassau in handcuffs and waited for backup to sort. search his house. Police began to search Nassos home and found a myriad of unsettling, sinister things. Rooms with doors that locked from the outside. Manikins hanged from the ceiling with pantyhose, piles of lingerie, and most disturbing, thousands of photographs of frightened, bound, and in some cases, dead women. It didn't take long for police to connect the dots. They had found the man who had strangled women with pantyhose. Across California, police began reopening cold cases,

matching them to a killer who had walked free for 50 years. But that wasn't the only pertinent evidence they'd find. Next week, we'll cover the massive investigation that was launched after police found a list of 10 women in Nassau's kitchen and were forced to figure out, were these women he planned to kill, or were the women, already dead. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers.

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Have a killer week. Serial Killers was created by Max Cutler is a production of Cutler media and is part of the Parcast Network. It is produced by Max and Ron Cutler, sound design by Russell Nash, with production assistance by Ron Shapiro and Paul Mahler. Additional production assistance by Carly Madden and Maggie Admeyer. Serial Killers is written by Laura Fortier and stars Greg Poulson and Vanessa Richardson. Hey, Mama, thanks for making all my favorite recipes.

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A beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is brutally beaten and, killed. Despite an exhaustive investigation, the killer avoids arrest and then strikes again. I'm Global News crime reporter Nancy Hicks. You might listen to a lot of true crime podcasts this year, but they're not crime beat. Search for and follow the award-winning podcast Crime Beat on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.