This man had a loud and romantic nickname - “The Night Stalker”, and he received it not from street punks, but from journalists who published reports of his crimes. He hardly understood the meaning of the word with his mind, which was degraded from the constant use of drugs, but, nevertheless, it unusually flattered and increased his self-esteem. It contained something mysterious and sinister. And he tried to fit him. His name was Richard Ramirez.
Biography that started with drugs
The future serial killer, who was destined to instill fear in Los Angeles, was born in 1960 in the city of El Paso, Texas. His father, a former police officer, once immigrated to the United States from Mexico, and here he had five children, the youngest of whom was Richard. To feed a large family, his father got a worker on the railway. This made it possible to make ends meet, but there was no time left for raising children.
In his early childhood, Richard had bouts of epilepsy, but over the years they stopped. He grew up a weak and poorly developed teenager, for which reason the class was often attacked by other students. Perhaps this served as the basis for his future hatred of people. Undoubtedly, the drugs that he, according to the testimony of his former classmates, began to use at the age of ten, also played a detrimental role. If before his school achievements were, to put it mildly, modest, now Richard has completely lost the ability to learn something in the classroom.
The destructive influence of a cousin
Communication with the cousin Miguel, who returned home after the Vietnam War, played an important role in shaping the future “ripper”. Apparently, what he had to go through there irreparably crippled his psyche. It is known that Richard listened to Miguel's stories about the atrocities against prisoners, which he passed on, savoring the details. He also showed photographs of mutilated bodies with his own hands.
With his participation, Richard Ramirez first witnessed a real-life murder. Once a cousin, quarreling with his wife, smashed her head with a pistol shot. At the same time, the blood of the unfortunate victim splattered the face of Richard standing nearby. Undoubtedly, what happened had a strong psycho-emotional effect on him, because after what he saw, he became isolated and soon completely left school.
The first thefts and robberies
Since that time, his lifestyle has changed dramatically. All his time, Richard now spends on the street among the same teenagers of his Latin American origin. Here, their laws and their morals reign. Starting with shoplifting that is generally accepted by his peers, he gradually moves on to robbing houses. The reputation of a thief is fixed to him, of which he is very proud. According to those who knew him in those years, his goal was to become a professional robber, one of those whose photos are printed in newspapers. The beginning of his fascination with Satanism dates back to this time.
Over the next few years, he repeatedly changes his place of residence, moving from El Paso to San Francisco and back. In the same years, he was arrested several times - sometimes for possession of marijuana, then for petty thefts, but each time released, without bringing the case to court.
Only in 1982 did Ramirez spend five months in jail for theft. Then he decides to get a job in Los Angeles. Having finally become addicted to heavy drugs, Richard does not work, and makes money by stealing, renting rooms in cheap hotels or simply spending the night with friends.
The first victims of a maniac
Even with the lifestyle that he led, until the times described by us, there was no blood on his hands, but now the beast hiding inside broke out. The first victim of a long series of murders is a seventy-nine-year-old woman, whom he brutally stabbed with a knife. In this terrible act, as in most subsequent crimes, the driving force was not selfish calculation, not a robbery to take possession of something, but a feeling of pleasure that went beyond the normal human psyche at the sight of blood, torment and death of the victim.
His next victims are two unarmed young men and a girl, who he was guarded by on one of the night streets of Los Angeles. Richard Ramirez shoots them at point blank range with a pistol. By a lucky coincidence, the bullet rebounded from a bunch of keys that the girl had pressed to her chest at the last moment, and this saved her life. At the police station, she was able to describe the appearance of the attacker, and from her words, a photobot was made.
Further bloody way
Feeling the taste of blood, the beast, escaped to freedom, creates madness. Richard Ramirez begins a real campaign of terror and terrifies the inhabitants of a huge metropolis. Daily morning newspapers are full of reports of his new crimes. He, having penetrated the homes of ordinary inhabitants, robs, rapes and slowly, with pleasure kills. However, he deliberately leaves some of his victims alive so that with their testimonies describing his sadistic fantasies, they create an even more sinister halo around him.
In the desire to become famous, he reaches his goal. His name is heard on television and printed on the front pages of newspapers. "Night stalker" becomes a symbol of almost mystical horror. By the way, he strongly supports this, leaving the image of a satanic pictogram at the places of his crimes. He even drew one of them with lipstick on the inner side of the thigh of an eighty-three year old woman stabbed by him.
Unsuccessful police efforts
To everyone’s indignation, not only adults but also children are becoming victims of Richard. It is known that in June 1985, this sadist abused a six-year-old girl. The entire Los Angeles police were thrown to his capture, but the serial killer continued to remain at large. The matter was complicated by the fact that as his victims he chose various, sometimes random people, while usually such psychopaths aim at a certain type of character, which allows them to plan their detention.
His photobot was shown on television and published in newspapers. But all was inconclusive. A huge number of Hispanics live in America, and it was impossible to identify any of them according to a low-expressive drawing made up of words from people who had not yet recovered from a nervous shock from a meeting with a murderer. But the case soon helped. One of his surviving victims was able to describe the car on which the serial killer hid.
Killer identity
The woman remembered well the old Toyota Toyota of orange color, all covered with scratches. She was soon found in one of the suburban parking lots and the fingerprints left in the cabin were able to accurately identify the offender, since these prints were already in their file cabinet after Ramirez’s previous detentions. Now in the city, not faceless photobots were pasted, but his real photographs taken once at the police station.
The maniac was also helped by the fact that three days before the publication of his photographs he left Los Angeles for a short time, and when he returned, he did not suspect that his appearance became known to the whole city. On the morning of August 31, 1989, Richard Ramirez went to the store to shop and was identified there. A police squad arrived immediately and arrested him.
End of life: time behind bars
In November of the same year, a trial was held that sentenced the maniac to capital punishment. Like all those sentenced to death, Ramirez was placed on death row, in which he spent twenty-four years awaiting execution. During this time, he managed to marry one of his many fans - admirers are among such scumbags. The wedding took place there, in prison, in a meeting room. After that, the convict behaved extremely defiantly, his behavior took completely unacceptable forms. In this regard, the administration was forced to tighten his detention regime. Ramirez did not wait for the execution of the sentence. He died in June 2013 from kidney failure.
Talking about the causes of the tragedy
Subsequently, his father, Julian Ramirez, in one of his interviews as the main reason that made his son a serial killer, called drugs and their harmful effects. One of Richard's close acquaintances, covering the same topic, called the cause of a car accident in which he was in 1980. According to him, despite the fact that Ramirez was not injured then, his psyche was affected by the depression he experienced, caused by the death of a friend who died in that car.
Both versions are probably worthy of attention (although they cannot be considered an excuse for all the atrocities committed by him), but the true reason must be sought in all circumstances of the life of this generally extremely miserable person known as serial killer Richard Ramirez. A documentary about him went around the screens of many countries of the world, created him fame far beyond America.