The Golden State Killer
Produced by Susan Mallie, Lourdes Aguiar, Gayane Keshishyan Mendez and Lauren Clark
“She blogged about unsolved murders and missing persons. She was a beautiful writer,” true-crime journalist Billy Jensen says of Michelle McNamara.
But there was one case that consumed her. McNamara was obsessed with a prolific criminal who, for a decade, forged a path of destruction across the state of California -- committing 50 rapes and 12 murders before he vanished. She dubbed the suspect “The Golden State Killer.”
“He was the boogeyman,” says Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert. “He was the man in the bushes that we didn’t know who he was and we didn’t know when he was going to strike again.”
McNamara was hot on his trail and was writing a book about him.
“She was really tired. She had been pretty much awake for about three days. I think she’d gotten, like, two hours sleep because there was a lot of new developments going on with the case,” McNamara’s husband, comedian Patton Oswalt tells CBS News correspondent Tracy Smith, talking for the first time about Michelle’s quest to find the elusive criminal.
“She thought she was getting real close to finding him. And then she was gone,” Jensen says of McNamara’s unexpected death last April.
“What’s fascinating to me about this case is that it’s rich with so many clues. And frankly, it should be solved” – Michelle McNamara
Now … the race is on to find him.
CITIZEN SLEUTH
Patton Oswalt is a comedian and actor known to millions of fans. Yet he would tell you it was his wife, Michelle McNamara, who was the true star of the family -- something Oswalt sensed as soon as they began dating.
Patton Oswalt: I’ve met someone who is so much-- so above my punching class in terms of intelligence and wisdom and empathy. …I was done for. She took a little bit of convincing.
But convince her he did in 2005.
Patton Oswalt: It was just like, “Oh, this is amazing.”
Tracy Smith: Is that how you felt, like you married up?
Patton Oswalt: Oh my God. …Like basically having a false passport that gets me into, you know, these amazing countries. …That’s the level that I married on with her.
Oswalt learned his new bride had some unique interests.
Patton Oswalt: You know, Michelle was always a writer. She had … published short stories and-- and poetry. And … she was also always just fascinated with people – and -- and just the messiness of a life.
Michelle was captivated by true crime stories, especially cold cases.
Patton Oswalt: She had a mind for the details of true crime the way that other people have for baseball or me for films. She could recall the details of pretty much every late 20th and 21st century crime. It was just in her head.
In 2006, she started the blog True Crime Diary, where she profiled both recent and long-forgotten crimes.
Patton Oswalt: When she started that blog and -- and she realized, “These two -- pursuits, they just haven’t collided yet.” And once they collided it wasn’t a crash, it was a melding. And then it was, you know, she was just off to the races.
The pair welcomed daughter Alice in 2009. But even as motherhood took center stage, Michelle hunted for cases and clues.
Patton Oswalt: Once everyone was asleep, she was on that laptop. … There is a breed of men and women that are just wired to pursue these people and keep going, you know, when other people woulda gone, “Oh, I gotta go live my life.”
Soon, Michelle’s online quest brought her face-to-face with one of the worst villains she’d never heard of.
Billy Jensen: When you hear Zodiac killer, you know what it is. You hear Jack the Ripper, you know what it is.
Billy Jensen is a true-crime journalist in southern California.
Billy Jensen: You hear East Area Rapist/Original Night Stalker, nobody knows what that is.
The East Area Rapist Original Night Stalker -- EARONS for short -- not a very memorable name. One of the most prolific criminals California has ever seen, responsible for 50 rapes and 12 murders. And to this day, no one knows who he is.
Patton Oswalt: When she started looking at the devastation that this guy wrought. …You’re taunting the police, you’re taunting the population and you’re never caught?
Michelle McNamara had found her nemesis.
Paul Haynes: If one could be said to have a taste in crime, Michelle and my taste in crime were very similar.
Paul Haynes is a researcher who worked with Michelle.
Tracy Smith: Michelle called herself a citizen sleuth. What does that mean?
Paul Haynes: A private citizen who’s not in law enforcement and who’s not a private investigator, that is drawn into a crime and does their own … investigating based on, you know, the tools that are available to them.
Michelle started hitting the message boards of fellow online sleuths, hunting for everything she could learn about EARONS. Over one horrific decade he’d covered a lot of ground, starting as a rapist in the Sacramento area in 1976.
Paul Haynes: His MO is basically break into a house -- in the middle of the night, and confront a sleeping couple -- by shining a flashlight into the eyes of the female and insisting that she tie up the male.
Then EARONS moved to southern California, where he used the same MO to break in and rape. But now, he’d leave no witnesses. Twelve people would be murdered before the serial rapist and killer stopped in 1986 and seemingly vanished.
Paul Haynes: And, she began working on a feature for Los Angeles Magazine.
Michelle wrote an article about EARONS in 2013. She had details from bits of information she gleaned online and more explicit details from investigators on the case. The odd acronym EARONS was not a name many knew. So Michelle decided to rebrand him, hoping to give him a higher profile.
Billy Jensen: Working with her editor at Los Angeles Magazine, they said, “You know what, this Golden State Killer, it shows just the breadth of him having hit Northern California, Southern California, and then sort of right in the middle.
With that, EARONS became the Golden State Killer. And Michelle would become a book author -- signing a deal to write about him. But Michelle was no armchair detective; she wanted to see the places he terrorized up close.
Patton Oswalt: The sun and the air look different in different places, and it changes how you perceive things.
Oswalt says they sacrificed family time so Michelle could travel extensively, by herself, to retrace the steps of the killer.
Patton Oswalt: It’s one thing to read it on a piece of paper, but to actually walk it every day and see businesses and houses that were there, that are still there, you know, changes the writing. So I would go outta my way to try to give that to her.
Tracy Smith: So you were really the Watson to her Holmes?
Patton Oswalt: Yeah, except Watson was way smarter than me [laughs]. If I was the Watson to her Holmes, I was the kinda Watson that just went and got, like, coffee or, “Can you go get me a turkey burger please?” “Fine, I’ll get a turkey burger.” And even -- I would get that order wrong.
The obsession of hunting a serial killer took its toll on Michelle.
Patton Oswalt: I’d go … back in the back office and Michelle would just be there, just like, in tears because some -- some road she had gone down had not panned out and then -- it’s like, “I now have to start back again from zero.”
And she did, picking up new, promising leads in her hunt for the Golden State Killer. By April 2016, Michelle had been driving herself hard, hoping for a breakthrough. On the night of the 20th, she was exhausted from it all.
Patton Oswalt: I just remember this so clearly, saying, “You know, tomorrow just sleep ‘til you wake up.”
The next day, around mid-morning, Oswalt checked on Michelle.
Patton Oswalt: She was snoring. Remember I was laughing, like, “Oh, she’s snoring.” And then I-- I brought her -- I went and got her an Americano left it on her bedside.
By early afternoon, when Michelle still hadn’t gotten up, Oswalt went to check on her again.
Patton Oswalt: She was dead. And I tried reviving her and it was just -- you know. And then everything after that to me is -- it just-- I remember it as, like, screaming, and vomiting, and EMT guys, and friends.
Michelle McNamara had died at the age of 46.
Patton Oswalt: It was -- It was April 21st-- “Spring’s coming, it’s all good.” And then literally within the space of three hours, just annihilation. Like -- like, you’re -- this world that you’re seeing in front of you is just—in cinders. It’s just all--it’s just cinders.
THE RAPIST’S MO
When Michelle McNamara died so suddenly, her husband, Patton Oswalt, and 7-year-old daughter Alice were devastated.
Patton Oswalt: I wanna talk to her so badly. I miss her so much. And I’m just sad all the time.
So when he won an Emmy for writing a variety special just five months later, the moment was bittersweet.
Patton Oswalt to reporters backstage at the Emmys: ”I’m not trying to say this is meaningless but it really does -- everything seems like the lights have been turned down 50 percent on everything since she’s gone.”
Oswalt was still waiting for the L.A. County Coroner’s office to find the cause of Michelle’s death, but he’d reached an important decision.
Patton Oswalt: Her book needed to be finished. …It had so consumed her life and it was so much a part of her.
Larry Crompton: I thought she was one of the nicest people I had ever had the opportunity to meet.
Larry Crompton spent decades with the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Department. Michelle met with him in the hope of tapping into his wealth of knowledge about the monster she was chasing.
Larry Crompton: He would walk through the area just like a normal person, so nobody would notice him.
Crompton tells the story of a white man of average height and slim athletic build, in his early 20s, who stalked his victims before striking, though they never knew it.
Larry Crompton: Would go in the house when the people weren’t there and set that house up. And he would leave a window unlocked or a door unlocked so that he could go in.
Michelle learned the rapist would also hide tools for his attack.
Larry Crompton: One thing that the rapist would do is leave shoelaces or whatever to tie people up with.
When the rapist returned to attack, he’d come armed with a knife or gun, wearing a ski mask and gloves.
Tracy Smith: No fingerprints.
Larry Crompton: No fingerprints. …He would blindfold the victims. And -- after tyin’ them, he would take a towel and tear it up and use that for a blindfold.
Within a year, the rapist crisscrossed Northern California, striking 22 times. A few sketches were released, based on brief glimpses by eyewitnesses on the street as he got away every time. That knack for avoiding capture haunted Michelle.
Anne Marie Schubert: He struck so often, he hit so many times, it was so frequent.
Today Anne Marie Schubert is the District Attorney of Sacramento County. But back in 1976, she was just a local 12-year-old.
Anne Marie Schubert: I have very vivid memories of what -- what he did to this community. Because it was so significant. It really changed Sacramento County.
It was a national story covered by CBS News:
CBS News report: “Each night they patrol the neighborhoods of Sacramento County’s east side… “They call themselves the EARS patrol. EARS – short for East Area Rapist Surveillance.”
Paul Holes is a cold case investigator with the D.A.’s office in Larry Crompton’s old county.
Paul Holes: You have people who are scared. This was a community where they wouldn’t lock their doors. …And now they’re having locksmiths come out to install deadbolts. People were going and buying guns.
Michelle had flown to meet Holes, as well.
Paul Holes: That first day -- we spent probably six hours in the car – between -- you know, in the car and getting out and looking at the various scenes that I took her to.
To catch him, Michelle had to understand him. For the Golden State Killer it seemed to be about the notoriety.
Anne Marie Schubert: He had complete control over this community. And he thrived off that. He thrived off the media attention.
In fact, he took cues from the press. Initially, he’d only attacked women who were alone. But then…
Larry Crompton: The newspaper mentioned that he had never hit a place with a man in the house.
Tracy Smith: And that –
Larry Crompton: He read that –
Tracy Smith: --was a challenge to him.
Larry Crompton: That was a challenge. And that’s when he started with the men.
Immediately, the rapist started targeting couples. And he adjusted his MO as he went. After waking the pair, he’d insist the female tie up the male.
Paul Haynes: Then he would bind the female, and then reinforce the bindings on the male.
He’d lull the couple into thinking he was just there to rob them.
Paul Haynes: He would ask the victims where the money was, where the female’s purse was. …He would ask the female to accompany him, to show him where it was.
As soon as the couple was separated, the rapist would set his true -- and terrifying -- plan in motion.
Paul Haynes: He would re-tie the female -- in the living room of the house. He would return to the male, and stack dishes on the male’s back. And he would tell the male, “If you move, I’ll hear these dishes rattle, and I’ll kill everything in the house.”
Immobilized and emasculated, the man was then forced to lie there, listening to the rape occurring a room away.
Larry Crompton: How a man can deal with that, knowing that he could be the reason for his family to die, and then in his mind know, “But I can’t do anything. …I have to shut up. …I can’t save anybody,” for him to live with that -- very, very, very difficult.
The rapist toyed with his victims, often breaking off mid-attack and wandering into the kitchen.
Billy Jensen: He would go in, he would eat food in the house. …He would take things that weren’t necessarily worth a lot, but they would be worth something to the individuals.
When it was over, the rapist slipped out silently, leaving his victims bound and blindfolded, afraid to move for hours. One victim remembers all too well.
Jane Carson-Sandler: What is he gonna murder us? Is he gonna kill us? What’s he gonna do to us?
STATE OF FEAR
The identity of the Golden State Killer is a mystery that kept true-crime writer and amateur detective Michelle McNamara up all night.
“I don’t think this guy was a homeless drifter type …I think he was probably a tradesman …something like that” – Michelle McNamara
Patton Oswalt says what drove his wife was the pain the attacker had inflicted on his victims.
Patton Oswalt: You know, she was filled with angst for the survivors, for the families.
Michelle had spoken to many victims, women like Jane Carson-Sandler. She was the rapist’s fifth victim:
Jane Carson-Sandler: You’re always looking over your left shoulder. Always.
Jane’s horrifying ordeal began shortly before dawn in October 1976. Her husband had just left for work leaving Jane, then a student nurse and Air Force Reserve Captain, in their bed.
Jane Carson-Sandler: My son came and got -- he was 3 years old. He came and got in bed with me to snuggle. And -- right after that I heard the garage door close. …So I knew my husband was gone. …And within … three minutes, I heard someone running down the hall. And they had a flashlight in their hand.
A man wearing a ski mask and black leather gloves burst into her room holding a large butcher knife.
Tracy Smith: What was going through your head?
Jane Carson-Sandler: What’s he doing? Hopefully he’s just going to -- rob us and leave. So I said, “Take our money. Take whatever you want.” …And the minute I started to say something, he would say, in his clenched teeth, “Shut up or I will kill you.” …He then proceeded to take shoelaces and tie our hands, our wrists and our ankles. And then he gagged us and blindfolded us, both of us. …Just fear. Fear.
When the intruder untied her ankles, Jane realized he was going to rape her. But Jane was focused on something else.
Jane Carson-Sandler: When I went to lean next to my 3-year-old son, he was gone. He was gone. …So when the rape took place, I wasn’t paying any attention to it. …Because all I was thinking about is, “Where’s my son?”
After the rape, the attacker kept going in and out of her bedroom.
Jane Carson-Sandler: And at one point… I leaned again and my son was back next to me. So he put him back. …And that was such a relief. Because I knew he was alive.
But the rapist wasn’t gone. Jane could hear him in the kitchen rattling pots and pans.
Jane Carlson-Sandler: And then he would come back in the bedroom and say, “Don’t you make a move or I’ll come back in here and kill you.”
Finally, after what seemed to Jane like an eternity, there was silence.
Jane Carson-Sandler: I was still afraid to move. But it was getting light outside. …And I thought “we’ve gotta get out of here.” …So hobbled around the backyard … to the gate in the front of the house, and then just screamed for a neighbor.
Jane and her son survived, but the carefree life her family had known did not.
Jane Carson-Sandler: I was afraid. “Is he gonna come back? Is he still stalking me?” You know, “does he live down the street?”
Tracy Smith: Did you ever think that it would happen to you?
Margaret Wardlow: Never ever. My mom always said she’s too old. I was too young. …We wouldn’t be victims.
But the rapist would prove them wrong. In November 1977, 12-year-old Margaret Wardlow would become the rapist’s 27th and youngest victim.
Margaret Wardlow: I woke up to this flashlight in my face … I saw him in a mask. …I had my hands tied behind my back. He tied them extremely tight.
The attacker left Margaret’s room, but she soon heard him upstairs in their kitchen. Margaret knew from newspaper accounts that the rapist would use plates as an alarm system placing them on the backs of household members that were not his intended target.
Margaret Wardlow: I knew if he came into my room, he was gonna rape my mom. And if he
went into my mom’s room, he was gonna rape me. And he went into my mom’s room.
The intruder raped Margaret, but in her youthful defiance she refused to give him what she thought he really wanted.
Tracy Smith: You didn’t wanna show him you were scared?
Margaret Wardlow: I didn’t want to show him I was scared. I knew he got off on scaring people and having the control of fear.
In fact, the rapist would often call his victims after the attack. Investigators recorded one of his bone-chilling phone calls:
Phone call recording: “Gonna kill you. Gonna kill you. F--ing whore.”
District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert says he also relished tormenting investigators.
Anne Marie Schubert: It was the thrill … and the excitement of taunting them.
Tracy Smith: And “I still have the power.”
Anne Marie Schubert: And “I still have the power. And you haven’t caught me.”
In 1977, investigators held a series of town hall meetings.
Larry Crompton: And in one of those meetings … a man stood up, and said that “If he ever comes to my house, I’ll kill him -- that he would “protect his wife, protect his family.”
Just months later, that man and his wife were attacked. The rapist was probably at the meeting disguised as just another concerned citizen.
Desperate to capture him, investigators literally chased down thousands of leads. Larry Crompton went through the names of 6,000 paroled rapists.
Tracy Smith: Did you feel like you were constantly going down rabbit holes?
Larry Crompton: Oh, yes … There were -- names that would come up that really looked good. And you would work ‘em and work ‘em and work ‘em. And -- nothing.”
But the assailant did leave some intriguing clues. Investigator Paul Holes says three sheets of notebook paper may hold the key.
Paul Holes [with Tracy Smith outside]: The homework evidence was -- some -- found somewhere generally along in this area.
Tracy Smith: Just lying on the ground somewhere -- around here.
Paul Holes: Lying on the ground.
Holes believes the suspect dropped the papers as he fled from a rape scene in 1978. One of the sheets appeared to be a homework assignment on General Custer. Another page is full of angry rants about an unnamed teacher. But it’s the hand drawn map that interests Holes the most.
Paul Holes: And the million-dollar question is, “What was the purpose of that diagram?”
Tracy Smith: And your answer is?
Paul Holes: That diagram is a brainstorming session of somebody trying to figure out how to lay out a parcel of land. …So this tells me, this is somebody that has an association with the development, building or real estate industry.
And, Michelle McNamara shared Hole’s enthusiasm about the map.
Tracy Smith: You and Michelle both thought this diagram is key.
Paul Holes: So Michelle and I talked about the diagram a lot. …She understood the importance of the diagram.
Whoever he was, the rapes in Northern California stopped shortly after he dropped that note. The attacker disappeared, but the nightmare was about to begin for Southern California.
A KILLING SPREE
“I definitely think that there’s something about the housing thing that seems interesting. There seemed to be a lot of new houses around where he hit and a lot of houses for sale.” -- Michelle McNamara
In July 1981, a realtor walked into a home in Santa Barbara County and made a grisly discovery. Inside were the bodies of Cherri Domingo and her boyfriend, Greg Sanchez. Cheri had been bound and bludgeoned. Greg Sanchez had been shot and beaten.
Debbi Domingo: I’ve always had this image in my head of what her last moments were like. The fear, the absolute terror that she had to have been going through.
Debbi Domingo, Cherri’s daughter, was only 15 at the time. To this day she lives with that painful image and with regrets.
Debbi Domingo: And the last thing I said to her was, “Why don’t you just stay outta my life?” And I carried a lotta guilt for a long time because of … the last things that I said to her.
Domingo says their relationship had been turbulent in the weeks before the murders.
Debbi Domingo: She and I were fighting just like you wouldn’t believe … She was doin’ her best to be a good mom …she had never really dealt with a headstrong teenager and…
Tracy Smith: And you were a headstrong teenager.
Debbi Domingo: I was. I was….I was pushin’ the envelope pretty bad.
When her mom tried to lay down some house rules, Domingo decided to run away. She’d been gone for about three weeks when she got a call from a neighbor.
Debbi Domingo: And she said, you need to come home.
Tracy Smith: What were you told at the time about what happened to your mom and Greg?
Debbi Domingo: The best answer I ever got was, “Someone broke into the house and killed them.” …I resigned myself to never ever knowing what really happened.
Debbi Domingo had no way of knowing that her mother and Greg’s murders were the latest in a string of unsolved murders across Southern California. Over the span of a year-and-a-half, three other couples and a woman were killed in their homes … all in a strikingly similar brutal fashion.
In December 1979, Dr. Robert Offerman and his girlfriend, Debra Manning, had been murdered in Goleta. In March 1980, Lyman and Charlene Smith had been found dead in Ventura. Five months later, Keith and Patrice Harrington had been killed in Dana Point. And in February 1981, Manuela Witthuhn was found bludgeoned to death in Irvine.
Tracy Smith: So, you had a hunch that the Southern California homicides were related to the East Area Rapist.
Larry Crompton: Yes.
When Larry Crompton-- who’d investigated the rapes up north -- first heard about the murders, he knew almost immediately it was the same suspect.
Larry Crompton: I had no proof. But we looked at the reports and said, “It is the same.” …the victims were treated the same way … and tied up the same way.
Crompton had always suspected the rapist would escalate to murder.
Larry Crompton:We knew that he wanted to kill.
But all he needed was the justification. That came after two couples in a row managed to escape during an attack. The assailant would never let that happen again.
Larry Crompton: The next time he murdered … And that’s what he did after that.
Even though he was sure that Southern California was now under attack by the same suspect, Crompton couldn’t convince the different jurisdictions that their murders were all connected.
Larry Crompton: One of the problems we had back then is that law enforcement agencies did not work together … And very little information went from one to the other.
Michelle McNamara believed the suspect used this to his advantage, moving from county to county killing without mercy.
“This was a crazed horrible psychopath … he was obviously very, very angry” -- Michelle McNamara
The killer seemed to take a five-year hiatus after 1981. But in May 1986, he resurfaced again in Irvine … at another house that was for sale.
Michelle Cruz: Everybody always wants to know why. …Why Janelle?
Michelle Cruz’s sister, 18-year-old Janelle Cruz, was the killer’s youngest and last-known murder victim.
Michelle Cruz: I got a phone call, and it was one of my girlfriends. …And she said, “Your sister was murdered.”
Michelle learned that Janelle had asked a male friend to keep her company that night.
Michelle Cruz: …maybe she was scared because she felt like maybe somebody was watching her.
Tracy Smith: And he said that they heard noises?
Michelle Cruz: They heard noises. She said, “Well maybe it’s just … a cat outside. …And they went back to talking … before he ended up having to leave and go home for the night.
Larry Montgomery: That noise that she heard that night was probably accurate. He probably was in the side yard.
Larry Montgomery was the lead investigator on Janelle’s case back in 1986.
Tracy Smith: What state was she in?
Larry Montgomery: She had been bludgeoned badly on the face … She was on her back. …In a position that looked like it’s possible she had been tied up … It looked like she’d been sexually assaulted.
Montgomery’s investigation into the murder was intense; still it went nowhere. But in 1996, the advent of DNA technology provided a break in the cold case.
Larry Montgomery: They were able to find DNA -- and discovered that the DNA from Janelle Cruz’s case matches the DNA in the Witthuhn case five years earlier … And then they started getting hits on other DNA in Ventura County, Santa Barbara County…
A year later, investigator Paul Holes’ testing on the Northern California rape kits connected the rapes to each other. But the most important forensic discovery came in 2001, when the murders were finally connected to the rapes, officially confirming what Larry Crompton had long suspected.
Tracy Smith: What was it like for you to get that confirmation that your hunch was right?
Larry Crompton: It settled a lot in my mind. … And I really had a feeling that, “Yes, now they’re going to catch him.”
Today there is a concerted effort among all the jurisdictions to bring the violent rapist and killer to justice. Erika Hutchcraft from the Orange County D.A.’s Sex Crimes Unit has been working on the case for over a decade.
Erika Hutchcraft: I thought when I first looked into the cases that it was like something you would study in a criminology course. … And it was horrifying but at the same time … you think “Oh I can make a difference … and contribute to the solving of the case.”
Hutchcraft found a kindred spirit in Michelle McNamara. Michelle had reached out to Erika and the working moms soon bonded, trading information and debating ideas.
Erika Hutchcraft: It was nice to be able to talk to someone who knew as much about the case, and that she could talk the case with me and rattle off things.
One of the biggest questions surrounding the case has always been: why did the murders stop after Janelle Cruz was killed? Michelle had a theory:
“People slow down in life. You don’t have that sort of energy. I mean, it’s biological and emotional. You can’t be out at 3 a.m. running across roofs because you’re not 18 anymore.” -- Michelle McNamara
But Hutchcraft is not so sure.
Tracy Smith: There could be other victims -- after Janelle Cruz.
Erika Hutchcraft: There could be other victims after Janelle Cruz if they didn’t get DNA evidence and upload it to the system … That’s what I am fearful of …and I do go down that avenue still … we go and talk to groups of investigators still and we say, “Where’s your cold case team? … Do you have evidence that can be tested in any of your old cases?”
And Hutchcraft’s been consumed by this case, just like Michelle was.
Erika Hutchcraft: I have never been the same since I started working these cases … It’s like an obsession. …You know, so it’s - -it’s overwhelming at times, but it does change your life.
And this case has even changed the law in California. Since 2009 -- largely due to the efforts of Bruce Harrington, the brother of one of the murder victims -- all adults arrested or charged with a felony in California must submit a DNA sample for inclusion in the state database.
But even though California currently maintains the third largest DNA database in the world, so far they have had no hits that match the killer. He has somehow even managed to elude technology.
Debbi Domingo: I believe he can be found. … I believe that it’s time for his reign of terror to end.
THE FINAL CHAPTER?
“The great tragedy of this case to me is that it’s not better known … and frankly it should be solved. I mean, it just should be.” -- Michelle McNamara
In June 2016, two months after Michelle McNamara’s death, the FBI used the 40th anniversary of the Golden State Killer’s first attack to announce a renewed investigation and a $50,000 reward.
FBI press conference: “Today, we’re going to launch a national campaign to help identify the East Area Rapist/Golden State Killer.”
Larry Crompton: …when the FBI finally got involved … that opened it up … they were getting hundreds of calls a day with names. …a lot of ‘em were nothing. But it only takes one.
Jane Carson-Sandler: All of this attention now is -- is being placed on this case.
Tracy Smith: Isn’t there a piece of you that says, “It’s been 40 years”--
Jane Carson-Sandler: Oh, yes. Why now? Right, why now? But I’m glad now.
And, an official list now includes two early homicides attributed to the Golden State Killer.
Paul Haynes: They were walking their dog when somebody confronted them and pursued them into a backyard.
In 1978, Brian and Katie Maggiore were living just outside of Sacramento when they were shot near their home. Though seemingly not premeditated, they’re now believed to be his first murder victims.
Paul Haynes: So the question is, was it somebody that Brian Maggiore knew and recognized, and saw peeping in a window and confronted?
Investigators believe there could be others who recognize him – and his distinctive path through California, but, time is running out.
Erika Hutchcraft: All the witnesses, all the original investigators, everybody’s going to start passing away … it’s now or never.
They also still believe the DNA profile will find a match.
Anne Marie Schubert: …there is nothing that you can do to change your DNA. …it is the greatest tool of identification we’ve ever had.
“Thank God they have his DNA…” -- Michelle McNamara
Just as Michelle had tracked down every possible lead …
Paul Holes: Once she earned my trust … she literally became my investigative partner.
.. authorities today are pursuing the hundreds of new tips.
Anne Marie Schubert: It’s a needle in a haystack, but the needle’s in there somewhere. And it’s our job to find it.
Paul Holes: He’s one step ahead. …And it’s not to try to put any type of -- glamour on the guy. But I truly appreciate the offender that I’m chasing. …I think even within the last few months, we’ve notched closer to him.
Erika Hutchcraft: We’re all so dedicated and we work so much on this case and we -- it becomes your life. Sorry. [cries]
Tracy Smith: That’s OK. … Why do you think it gets to you?
Erika Hutchcraft: ‘Cause I care. You know, I care. …I don’t wanna ever stop caring. If you stop caring then what good are you as a detective or a cop or a human being?
Michelle was fueled by that same caring. Whether or not the Golden State Killer is still alive, his victims deserve justice.
Debbi Domingo: …there are hundreds and hundreds of lives that have been ruined by this guy. …I don’t care how long it’s been; we need an answer. We need to know who he was, who he is.
Jane Carson-Sandler: I think the frightening thing about that is that one of us may say, “I knew you. I know you.”
If he’s still alive, the Golden State Killer would be in his mid-60s. Where is he now? Is he in prison in another state, where his DNA hasn’t been collected? Or is he living quietly among us, a neighbor, maybe with a family of his own?
Tracy Smith: If you had an opportunity to talk to your mom’s killer, what would you say?
Debbi Domingo: “How dare you?” I just [sniffs] -- it just infuriates me. …Those things can’t be undone.
Patton Oswalt: There are survivors, there are victims of the Golden State Killer alive who wake up every day goin’, “That guy is walking around free.”…that’s what Michelle thought about all the time, were those people.
The permanence of loss is still new to Patton Oswalt, but he recognizes that he now has something in common with the Golden State Killer’s many victims.
Patton Oswalt: …all the stuff she’s not gonna see Alice do. …all the stuff she would have written, and she’s not gonna write it. [Sigh] I don’t know.
Nine months after Michelle McNamara passed way, the Los Angeles County Coroner released the cause of her death: a combination of powerful prescription drugs, along with an undiagnosed heart condition.
Tracy Smith: Do you think that -- this Golden State Killer case affected her health mentally, physically, negatively?
Patton Oswalt: I mean, yeah -- I think it did affect her health somewhat negatively. …I’m very loathe to call it, like …”that’s the thing that killed her.” But it wasn’t helping, you know? She just wanted this guy caught.
Patton Oswalt: …once she had passed everything in me was dead, except that was the one spark of, like, life force left in me… of a moving forward life force is, “Finish her book.”
Oswalt says there’s no way he could finish writing Michelle’s book by himself.
Patton Oswalt: It’d be like if Hendrix were tryin’ to finish a guitar piece and then, you know, someone said, “I’ll do the last bar of this.” Like, “OK, we can see where Hendrix dropped out of there, dude. That was pretty obvious.”
He has entrusted Jensen and Haynes to bring it across the finish line. Michelle’s work could well be the key to finally identifying the Golden State Killer.
Billy Jensen: One of the things I would like more than anything is to be able to see this guy, and show him a picture of Michelle, and say, “This is the woman that helped catch you.”
“I’m optimistic … I know that it sounds crazy to be optimistic... but I am.” -- Michelle McNamara
Tracy Smith: In your gut do you think he’ll be caught?
Patton Oswalt: In my-- in my gut I think he is gonna be caught. …because of what Michelle did and because of what all the cops did before her … I hope. Those are the two words I say way too much these days, “I hope--”
Michelle McNamara’s book is expected to be published in early 2018.
HAVE INFORMATION?
The FBI urges anyone with information on the Golden State Killer to call the tip line at 1-800-CALL-FBI, or go to tips.fbi.gov.
