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1-11 of 11
- Jack Luden's story is one of the saddest in Hollywood. He was born as Jacob Benson Luden in Reading, Pennsylvania, with a silver spoon in his mouth; his uncle was the millionaire founder of Luden's Cough Drops and he attended the finest schools on the east coast. But he was restless, possessing an impulsive rebellious streak and opted for an acting career. Against enormous odds, he won a contest to attend the Paramount Pictures' School of Acting on Long Island, New York in 1925 where he stood in good stead with classmates Thelma Todd and future all-American star, Charles 'Buddy' Rogers. Paramount ordered him to Hollywood the following year and he acted in various films both there and on loan to FBO during the sound transition period. His personal heyday lasted for about 3 years; his studio had faith and patience in him, and he earned enough money to indulge his passion for sailing, and bought a boat. Possessing good looks, passable voice and a degree of acting talent, he should have been on the fast track toward stardom but his studio faced hard times after 1930 and somehow Luden was lost in the shuffle. More seriously, he acquired a heroin habit (possibly as early as 1929) and found it impossible to keep it hidden. Released from his Paramount contract --- some accounts claim he simply walked out --- having never achieved stardom, Luden found himself adrift and was known to commit wholesale shoplifting to support his drug habit. His life between 1930-36 is largely a mystery. He apparently gave up any pretext of hiding his drug addiction. His father died in the mid-1930s and his immediate family, by what accounts there are, expressed dismay over his lifestyle. He was reputedly arrested several times during this period for petty theft, but details are lacking and there's no indication that anyone ever associated his crimes to his faded Hollywood career. Luden somehow managed to re-enter the film business and came to the attention of veteran low-budget Gower Gulch producer, Larry Darmour who rode on the coattails of Columbia's ascent out of the ranks of Poverty Row studios. Columbia boss Harry Cohn was loathe to ignore the profits to be mined in Saturday afternoon matinées and gave Darmour a unit. His features were budgeted at $100,000 or less and, typical for the era, he sought to brand his western stars, making them more easily marketable to kids. This was Luden's second and last big break. He was cast as "Breezy" through four productions in 1938. Relatively speaking, Columbia's western efforts were top notch entertainment compared to the cinematic gruel spewing from the likes of its neighbors along Gower (an arguable exception would be Republic, despite its far lower budgets). Whether Darmour or Cohn were initially aware of the extent of his drug addiction is open to speculation, but it's probable that his relative obscurity in Hollywood was initially considered an asset since his police record didn't prevent him from this last stab at stardom. In any event, Luden once again failed to click with the targeted audience and he was cut from Columbia. He ended his film career in the early 1940s making minor, uncredited walk-ons. He made a half-hearted attempt at forming a film production company in the late 1940s that went nowhere (given his reputation, it was likely a scam). Married three times, he turned to drug dealing to support his increasingly expensive heroin habit. It's easy to speculate how failing in Hollywood affected him, but the undeniable fact was that Luden was completely comfortable being a low-life; his favorite saying was "a crooked buck is sweeter than an honest dollar." Not exactly the desired credo of an actor who once aimed, albeit half-heartedly, to be a cowboy star and idol of children. He was arrested for possession and writing bad checks and was sent to San Quentin State Pennitentiary. Luden, ultimately his own worst enemy, died there 9 months into his sentence from a heart attack at age 49 in 1951.
- Lawrence Bittaker was born on 27 September 1940 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. He died on 13 December 2019 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- Richard Trenton Chase became known as "The Vampire Killer of Sacramento" because he would drink the blood of his victims and practiced cannibalism with their body parts. Six known victims were claimed by Chase.
Chase was born on May 23, 1950 in Sacramento, California. As a child he was known to set fires, wet the bed, and torture animals. Once he became older, he started drinking and using drugs, mostly smoking marijuana and using LSD. He was in and out of mental institutions during much of his life. He developed hypochondria from his drug and alcohol abuse which caused him to tell doctors that his pulmonary artery had been stolen, his heart would stop beating, and he claimed that his blood was turning to powder.
When he was 21, he lived on his own in an apartment. His roommates became fed up with his behavior and decided to move out, and he eventually had to return home. He didn't stay long because his father put up rent for a new apartment. He had no social life and no girlfriends. Chase spent time capturing and killing animals, and then eating them raw or blended up.
In 1976, he was hospitalized for blood poisoning after injecting himself with the blood from a rabbit he killed. Many patients and nurses were frightened by him and referred to him as Dracula. He was frequently found with blood smeared on his face which he claimed was from cutting himself shaving. However, he was actually biting the heads off birds and sucking their blood. Once he began taking medication, he was released.
A year later, Chase was found in a field near Lake Tahoe, Nevada. He was naked and covered in cow's blood. The incident was reported but nothing else was done. Only a few short months later, Chase shot and killed Ambrose Griffin. The event was a drive-by, according to the FBI. Chase was not identified at first as the shooter.
His next victim, Terry Wallin, was the 22 year-old pregnant wife of David Wallin. She was found by her husband when he arrived home from work, disemboweled and drained of her blood. It appeared that Chase had collected her blood into a yogurt cup to drink it. Again, Chase was not identified as the savage killer. An investigation began and other incidents were discovered, such as the burglary of a house nearby where the disemboweled remains of a dog were found.
The FBI developed a profile for the suspect based on the evidence; it was a perfect match for Chase. The FBI asked for any information leading to his capture but it wasn't long before another murder was committed. A neighbor entered the home of Evelyn Miroth, only to find a massacre. Not only was 36 year-old Evelyn found dead, but her 6 year-old son Jason and family friend Daniel Meredith were also found dead. Evelyn's 22 month old nephew, Michael Ferreira was also missing from the home. The playpen where Michael would normally be found was covered in blood and contained a pillow with a bullet hole, so it was assumed he was also killed and the suspect took the body with him when he left.
A significant lead for the police came from a woman in her 20s who mentioned that she ran into a man she had gone to high school with and he approached her car. She noticed that his eyes were sunken, he was extremely thin, and he had blood stains on his sweatshirt. She identified him as Richard Trenton Chase. The police discovered that he resided within a mile of most of the murder sites. After staking out his apartment, police took Chase into custody. He was forcefully detained and a gun found in evidence was linked back to all of the murders. Authorities also discovered a 12-inch butcher knife, rubber boots, animal collars, three blenders containing blood, and several dishes inside the refrigerator containing body parts. A calendar was even found in his apartment containing the word "today" marked on the dates of the Wallin and Miroth murders. A mummified, decapitated, baby was then found later in a box outside of a vacant lot. It was determined to be the nephew of Evelyn Miroth.
The trials began in 1979, and Chase pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. However, he was deemed legally sane at the time he committed the crimes and was found guilty on all six murder counts. During an interview, Chase admitted to walking the streets checking to see if doors were unlocked. He stated that, "if the door was locked that meant you weren't welcome."
Following his conviction, he began receiving medication. Instead of actually taking the medication, he stockpiled it until he had enough to commit suicide. He was found dead in his cell in December 1979. - Stanley Tookie Williams III was one of the founding members of the Crips, a notoriously violent street gang in South-Central Los Angeles. Williams had started his own gang and united it with an existing one called the Baby Avenues, a union that came to be known as The Crips (Williams later claimed that the Crips were initially formed to "cleanse" the neighborhood of other violent street gangs, but that it got out of control and wound up becoming the kind of gang he had set out to eliminate). The Crips became known for engaging in a wide range of criminal activities, crimes, including robberies, hold-ups, drug sales, auto thefts and murders. They also became known for extreme violence and their willingness to attack and kill any who they thought were getting in the way of their criminal activities; oftentimes innocent civilians were caught in the crossfire of their attacks and seriously wounded or killed.
Williams was convicted of the 1979 murder of Albert Owens, a clerk in a 7-11 store in Whittier, California, during a robbery by Williams and other gang members that netted them $120 (at his trial his accomplices testified that Williams had laughed about the dying noises Owens made after Williams fired two blasts from his shotgun into him, after making Owens lie down on the floor, and that Williams had bragged he had killed Owens because he was white and Williams was out to kill all white people).
On March 11, 1979, Williams entered the Brookhaven Motel in South Central Los Angeles holding a shotgun, broke down the door to the office and shot and killed manager Yen-Yi Yang, 76; his wife Tsai-Shai Yang, 63; and their daughter, Yu-Chin Yang Lin, 43, all of whom were immigrants from Taiwan. After the murders he emptied the cash register and left. It turned out that there was only $100 in it. Police investigations of these murders and the earlier Owens killing led to the arrests of Williams and several fellow gang members. He was tried in 1981 on four counts of capital murder, and although he maintained his innocence and claimed that the police and the prosecutors were framing him, the jury convicted him and sentenced him to death.
While in prison Williams remained defiant and was constantly involved in fights with inmates and guards. He was disciplined for threatening to have several guards and their families killed, and once threw a chemical in a guard's face that resulted in the man being taken to the hospital with severe burns. Another time Williams was observed engaging in sexual behavior with a female visitor. When both were ordered by a guard to stop, Williams threatened to have the guard killed. On another occasion prison officials learned that Williams had ordered inmates who were fellow Crips members to kill another inmate. The man was subsequently attacked and stabbed, but he survived. For these and other offenses Williams was placed in solitary confinement, where he spent a total of 6-1/2 years.
After his release from solitary Williams seemed to have changed his attitude. He renounced his gang affiliations and apologized to the residents of Los Angeles for his part in the formation of the Crips. He wrote an autobiography in which he urged young black males to not make the mistakes that he did and to stay away from gangs, and he also wrote several children's books. He gained attention and praise from several notable writers and public figures, and a movie was made of his life, Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story (2004), starring Jamie Foxx as Williams. In 2004 he helped arrange a peace agreement to end a long-running and bloody feud between two rival gangs, the Crips and the Bloods, in Los Angeles and Newark, New Jersey, and was presented by US President George W. Bush with a national "Call to Service Award", given to those who have helped to make their local communities a better place to live. In addition, each year from 2001 to 2005 Williams was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Many community leaders asked Bush to pardon Williams, but that was not possible because Williams was convicted in a state court, not a federal one, and only the California governor could pardon him. Williams appealed his conviction several times, but in each instance the appellate courts upheld it. He then appealed to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for clemency, and a closed-door clemency hearing was convened, but on December 12, 2005, Schwarzenegger denied the clemency petition, saying "there was no reason to second-guess the jury's decision of guilt", and citing, among other things, Williams' steadfast refusal to assist authorities in their investigation of numerous crimes committed by Crips gang members and that his book, "Life In Prison", was dedicated to several notorious criminals, among them George Jackson, a Black Panther who organized a prison escape in which he and several guards were killed. Schwarzenegger stated that these were strong indications that Williams had in fact not reformed nor was remorseful for his past actions, and was in fact still a hardcore gang leader and a danger to society.
On Decemer 12, 2005, Williams was taken to the execution chamber at San Quentin State Prison and put to death by lethal injection. - William Bonin was born on 8 January 1947 in Willimantic, Connecticut, USA. He died on 23 February 1996 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- Caryl Chessman was born on 27 May 1921 in St. Joseph, Michigan, USA. He was a writer, known for Cell 2455, Death Row (1955), Teledrama (1955) and Cela da Morte (1958). He died on 2 May 1960 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- Barbara Graham was born on 26 June 1923 in Oakland, California, USA. She was a writer, known for I Want to Live! (1958) and I Want to Live (1983). She was married to Henry Graham, Charles Oldman, Al Bushnell and Harry Kleman. She died on 3 June 1955 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- Lonnie David Franklin Jr. was born on 30 August 1952 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He died on 28 March 2020 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- Robert Alton Harris was born on 15 January 1953 in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, USA. He died on 21 April 1992 in San Quentin State Prison, California, USA.
- Christopher Adam Geier died on 31 August 2017 in San Quentin, California, USA.
- George Jackson died on 21 August 1971 in San Quentin, California, USA.