OC Register: Original Night Stalker: Could O.C. clues lead to killer?

By CLAUDIA KOERNER

IRVINE Ð The investigation has stretched past its third decade, but recently reviewed details from an Orange County crime scene are helping authorities follow a new lead in the search for one of California's most notorious serial killers.

The Original Night Stalker has never been identified despite a prolific criminal history spanning the late 1970s and mid-'80s. The killer often targeted couples, breaking in and tying them up before raping the women and then killing both. He is believed to be responsible for at least 10 murders, including the deaths of a newlywed couple in Dana Point and two women in separate homes in Irvine.

In 2001, DNA evidence first linked multiple Southern California killings as well as dozens of sexual assaults near Sacramento. That breakthrough showed the killer was the same man as Sacramento's East Area Rapist and also provided a DNA profile to assist authorities.

In 2011, Santa Barbara investigators linked DNA from the 1981 slayings of a couple in Goleta to the unknown killer. The same man is also believed to be responsible for a 1979 double homicide in the area. The new DNA link prompted the department to comb through associated crime reports from other areas. In the files, they found that traces of paint were present at the scenes of two rapes near Sacramento and a homicide in Irvine.

That made investigators consider a new possibility: that the killer came to the area to work on a construction site, perhaps as a painter, said Kelly Hoover of the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office.

Now, investigators are seeking information on anyone who worked on construction sites at a strip mall at 5801 Calle Real and the Longs Drug at 5875 Calle Real, both in Goleta. Around the time of the Goleta killings, a developer from Sacramento was involved in a project there. The final stages of the project, which would have included painting, took place around the time of the first Goleta slaying in 1979, Hoover said.

Gary Kitzmann, a sheriff's cold case investigator, said he came to the new theory after considering why someone might spend several months at a time in various regions of the state. A longtime Goleta resident, he remembered several construction projects in the area at the time of the homicides. The several instances of paint at various crime scenes Ð plus the discovery of a 1979 building permit in the neighborhood of the killings archived on microfilm Ð made him consider more seriously the possibility that the killer worked in construction.

"It's a huge case, and there's a lot of information," he said.

Putting together an employee list 30 years after a construction project will be a challenge, but officials are committed to identifying the killer and bringing him to justice, Hoover added.

"He terrorized our community and he terrorized many other communities," she said. "He destroyed families and brought a great deal of fear and heartache to our community."

Larry Pool, a retired Orange County detective who began working on the case in 1997, said investigators have chemically analyzed paint in the past as one of the many details in the case. Now an investigator for Broadcom, Pool continues to follow leads and work with authorities in his spare time.

"It's one of those cases you want to see solved before you breathe your last," he said.

SCREWDRIVER MAY BE KEY

A screwdriver with five types of paint on it was found near the 1981 Irvine crime scene, he said.

"It may be very relevant," he said. "It may not be."

At the time, Pool said, investigators questioned whether the paint-stained screwdriver could mean the killer worked in construction. The screwdriver could also have been stolen and simply used as a burglary tool, he said.

"You start revisiting things over the years because you're looking for meaning in everything," he said. "Sometimes you get that meaning, sometimes you don't."

The possibility that the killer spent time at the Goleta strip mall carries more weight in light of a hand-drawn map and writings recovered after one of the Original Night Stalker's rapes in Northern California. The pieces of loose-leaf paper were discovered at the end of a bloodhound trail from the crime scene, Pool said, but then sat in evidence storage as "miscellaneous papers" for more than 20 years.

The Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office crime lab rediscovered the papers in 2011, and officials made them public earlier this year. An essay that begins "Mad is the word" shows handwriting and turns of phrase that Pool said may spark recognition in a friend or family member Ð much the way Unabomber Ted Kaczynski's published manifesto was recognized by his brother.

"The right person is going to see it, then we're going to get the right call that leads to the suspect," he said.

HAND-DRAWN MAP

The hand-drawn map also shows a freeway, shopping complex and residential neighborhood that resemble the Goleta center that's now the focus of the Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office investigation. The area is not far from a riverbed that connects the two homes the stalker victimized. It's not an exact match, and Pool said he believes the map to be a mix of the killer's memories and fantasies.

In the drawing, homes of varying sizes line curving streets and surround a lake. Several of the streets end in cul-de-sacs with planters in their middle Ð a fairly distinct development feature that Pool said was present in the neighborhoods of the killer's victims in Irvine and Dana Point as well. The cul-de-sacs are just one of the small, puzzling details of the case that Pool said investigators begin to understand as they learn more about their unknown suspect.

"I think that's fairly key," he said

On the back of the map, the word "punishment" is scrawled. It fits with the anger he showed in each of his crimes, Pool said.

"That's stuff that comes right out of a creep show," he said.

Not long after killing two couples in Goleta and Ventura, the Original Night Stalker made his first foray into Orange County, killing newlyweds Keith and Patty Harrington in Dana Point in 1980. He returned in February 1981, striking the Irvine home of Manuela Witthuhn. After again killing a couple in 1981, he dropped off the map for several years. Authorities believe he may have been locked up for another crime, perhaps a rape. But in May 1986, he was back in Irvine, where he raped and killed 18-year-old Janelle Cruz.

LAST KNOWN CRIME

The death of Cruz was the killer's last known crime. He received his nickname for the crimes' similarities to those of Night Stalker Richard Ramirez. Ramirez, who died in June of natural causes while on death row, began his spree of nighttime killings later in the decade. The fate of the Original Night Stalker Ð and why the killings stopped Ð remains unknown.

Investigators believe he may already be incarcerated, perhaps in a state where DNA testing of prisoners is handled differently. Pool said it's also possible that he became disabled or aged to a point where he no longer felt compelled to kill. The killer may also be dead.

In spite of the decades that have passed, Pool said he's sure the homicides are solvable. Even if the killer has died, investigators could perform DNA tests on remains, personal belongings or family members to determine a match.

"The grave is not too far for him to be identified," he said.

Investigators will continue to look at the case from different angles and seek the public's assistance, Pool said.

"I just think it's a matter of getting the information we have in front of the right eyes, and for those people to speak up."