Victim sensed a presence in the room. She woke from her sleep. There in the bedroom door she saw a figure. It was a man wearing a mask. He shined a flashlight in her eyes. He held it in his left hand. In his right hand he held a revolver.

     Victim elbowed her husband, telling him there is a burglar in the room. As husband  began to roll over, the figure in the doorway spoke in an angry whisper, through clenched teeth. “I have a .357 Magnum. If you don’t do as I say, I’m going to blow your fucking head off.” Assailant then threw shoelaces on the bed.

     “Tie him up. If you don’t tie him up right I’m going to blow your fucking head off. Put his hands behind his back and be sure that you tie him tight.”

     After the victim tied her husband, assailant approached and then tied the husband tighter. He then tied the victim. He then left the room and they could hear him rummaging throughout the house. A short while later they heard him returning. Victim could hear the dishes rattle when the assailant put them on her husband’s back.

     When this happened the victim realized that this was the East Area Rapist. When assailant picked her up to lead her out of the room, she was relieved, for she knew she would be the victim and not her 13-year-old daughter still asleep in her own room.

     As in the other attacks, the assailant put a knife and/or gun to their necks/temple (husband/victim) and threatened to kill them if they did not do what he said. In one instance he threatened to cut the fingers of the husband off.

     The assailant led victim from the bedroom to the living room and raped her twice. After the second time, he stuttered into her ear, “T-t-t-tell the p-p-p-pigs I’ll be b-b-b-back on New Year’s Eve.”

     After the second time he raped her, victim then heard assailant in a corner of the room. He was sobbing.

Investigation

Investigation showed that the East Area Rapist had pried open the garage door. He then broke through the kitchen door to get into the house. Two weeks prior the 13 year old daughter had come home after school one day and found the door from the garage to the house ajar. Daughter told mother (victim) but mother dismissed it as having been done by some other family member.

EAR had not pulled the phone out of the wall jack or cut the cord.

Description

Geography

This was the first attack in the Foothill Farms area. Though quite far afield to the others, it is at the extreme end of Greenback Lane, where it turns into Elkhorn Blvd. Thus it is in-keeping with EAR’s MO of following the main thoroughfares. For instance, despite the Orangevale attacks being far out of his usual prowling areas, the community was at the end of Madison Avenue, a significant thoroughfare used by The EAR. The same rings true here.

House

The house was a single story, detached middle class home.

Analysis

This appears to be new ground for EAR, but the area clearly conformed to his previous MO. It was also right at the end of Greenback Lane. Thus, though a new community, he wasn’t that far afield of his usual escape routes.

     The Foothill Farms area also fit his recent pattern to select new territory that was still relatively close to the old areas he had stalked. No 24 is also an example of this. He had stalked La Riviera Drive before, but not this far to the east. In like manner he had stalked communities off Greenback Lane before, but never this far north where Greenback is called Elkhorn Blvd. No 23 had been in Stockton.

     Altogether The EAR was playing it safe. He was the center of news. He had sent Sacramento into a panic last May, and then stopped cold in the Summer of ’77. When he returned to Sacramento it was to nearby communities, but not back to the old ones he had stalked and in which he had struck before.

     The fact that The EAR did not cut the phone wire or pull it out of the wall jack indicates that he had parked close by, possibly in the blind spot, that night.

     This is one of those incidents where The EAR tried his sobbing routine. This was a new addition to his signature. However, we must remember the number of false clues he always consistently left behind. They were never very clever ones, but he was consistent in trying some diversion. The papers were now building up a psychological profile that some psychiatrist had made up. This declared The EAR to be a “paranoid schizophrenic.” It is more likely that EAR, who did obviously follow the news, was merely playing to that theory by giving his rendition of what he thought a schizophrenic would act like. Whatever the answer, his sobbing routine would evolve and he would even begin speaking to his fictitious mother.

     But his attacks would continue, with the same calculated menace he had always shown.

Night Predator
Files on the East Area Rapist/Original Night Stalker