Steve Huff

DNA and the Golden State Killer

The Golden State Killer—Joseph James DeAngelo—was caught after police matched him to a partial profile on GEDMatch. That’s a site that allows users to voluntarily upload their raw DNA data from sites like Ancestry.com and 23andMe.com. Essentially, some relative of DeAngelo’s was looking for further distant family connections and inadvertently outed him as one of the most vicious serial killers in California history. I am among the many who have had mixed feelings about this. I don’t have any mixed feelings about DeAngelo being put away for life. I enjoy thinking about that, and thinking about him as an old man suffering behind bars. I wish Michelle McNamara was here to see it, too. But I do get the privacy concerns. And I don’t know what to say about it. The part of me that’s been covering crime for years loves the idea that many more cold cases could be solved this way. My inner civil libertarian quails when thinking about how badly police could abuse this method of investigation. Until the public can be assured that police will use this kind of thing wisely, I won’t really know what to say about it. It’s a brave new world kind of thing, and there are always unknown challenges in that world.

Reports Indicate There May Have Been an Arrest in the Golden State Killer Investigation

gsk3 — Golden State Killer suspect sketch; Joseph James DeAngelo

Update: The suspect is Joseph James DeAngelo, a one-time cop and Navy vet. A photo of the younger DeAngelo strongly resembles suspect sketches (see above). He’s currently booked in a Sacramento County Jail on murder charges.

Original post: Fox40 reports that the Sacramento County (CA) Sheriff’s Dept. has had a “significant break” regarding the Golden State Killer. A significant break means an arrest, and I’m aware of rumors that the suspect was targeted after a DNA hit. Remember: the Golden State Killer may have killed as many as 12, and committed dozens of rapes and burglaries. I began crime-blogging anew after Michelle McNamara, author of I’LL BE GONE IN THE DARK—the definitive book about the case—passed away. We were friends, but really, I was a fan. Michelle did this, in a way. She pulled this terrifying monster’s crimes out of the dark. I wish she were here to see it. More information will be out later in the day, including a press conference at noon Pacific Time.

Tennessee Waffle House Shooter Travis Reinking In Custody

I grew up about a mile from the location of the Waffle House where Travis Reinking opened fire Saturday night, killing four. Naturally, I’ve paid extremely close attention to the hunt for Reinking. He was captured today by Metro Nashville Police. He was roaming in a semi-rural area a mile or two from the Waffle House. I’ll be writing more about this crime for Real Clear Life Wednesday, but had to say it’s been surreal hearing the name of the community where I lived from birth through age 19 mentioned so often on the news. When I was a kid, Antioch, Tennessee was Nashville’s forgotten outer rim. No one outside the city knew it was there, and Nashvillians, by and large, viewed it as a dangerous, redneck-filled no-go zone. It was where Nashville ended and the countryside began. Right now it’s home to a tragedy with a national profile. It’s very strange, and truly awful.

Texas Serial Criminal Anthony Shore Admitted to Golden State Killer Copycat Crimes Before Execution

Before his execution, serial killer Anthony Shore told investigators from the Texas Rangers about crimes he’d committed when he was a teen living near Sacramento in the 1970s—crimes he said were inspired by the rapist and murderer now known as the Golden State Killer. The Houston Chronicle reports Shore “admitted to participating in another serial crime, as a copycat of the East Area Rapist, a Sacramento-area criminal active in the late 70s and early 80s.” He claimed he began with groping women on bike trails. The Rangers report indicated he progressed to truly terrifying assaults. Via the Chronicle, a quote from the Rangers gives some idea of the horrific acts to which Shore confessed. He said he bound a couple, then “made the man ‘watch’ as he sexually assaulted the woman.”

Shore was called the “Tourniquet Killer” and targeted women in and around Houston during the 80s and 90s. He was convicted of killing four. He was put to death on January 18, 2018.

Source: [Houston Chronicle]

My New Article For Real Clear Life…

For exactly one month in 1992, the I-70 serial killer calmly walked into businesses all along I-70—from Indiana to Kansas—and shot the lone workers there, often killing with a single shot to the head. He left almost no evidence behind. Read my latest here.

Teen Suspected of Murder Led Search For Victim

Victim Jeremy Sanchez

Seventeen-year-old Jeremy Sanchez was allegedly murdered by the friend who reported his disappearance. Stranger still, the so-called friend supposedly attempted to evade suspicion by helping search for the victim. He ended up finding Sanchez’s ‘s body and telling the victim’s dad. Sanchez’s absence from school was the first indication something was wrong. His parents looked to his friend–a still unnamed 16-year-old–for help. The suspect found Sanchez on the San Gabriel River Trail, reports the Washington Post. The teen was facedown by the river. The alleged killer’s odd behavior is reportedly what first drew police attention. Police say they believe it was a well-planned murder. [WaPo]

Genius Disguised With Clear Plastic Bag Burglarizes Game Stop

dumbass Sometimes in this life we all encounter someone who glows with brilliance, whose genius seeps from every pore. This is not one of those times. News4Jax reports the master criminal in the video still above broke into a St. Marys, GA GameStop after 1 am on April 13. His disguise was reportedly “a bottled water wrapper.” The TV station didn’t report on merchandise stolen or anything like that, only noted he got in some light cardio as he suffocated in an effort to collect goodies. Watch him frolic in the video below. Also, if you know a neckbearded Florida-Georgia line resident who matches this description, don’t let him get away with the Great GameStop Heist of ’18. Call CrimeStoppers at (912) 576-0565, get this miscreant taken off the street. No Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, or Pokemon is safe. [News4Jax]

The Murderous Trail of Lois Riess

Lois Riess is 56 years old. In a driver’s license photo released by police, she looks like a kindly grandmother. She has a pleasant smile, blonde hair, brown eyes. She doesn’t look like a killer.

Police say she is a killer, and she’s on the run, and no one is safe.

Riess is the alleged killer of Pamela Hutchinson, age 59. The Bradenton, Florida woman was only guilty of one thing: resembling Lois Riess.

Police in Fort Myers Beach, Florida found Hutchinson dead from gunshot wounds last Monday. As reported by multiple media sources including the Associated Press, no one is aware of any social connection between Riess and Hutchinson. Riess may have killed Hutchinson to assume her identity. A Lee County official reportedly said Hutchinson’s purse “was found to be in disarray and all cash, credit cards and identification appeared to be removed.”

The buried lede is this: Hutchinson isn’t Riess’s alleged first victim. Her first victim may have been her husband, David Riess.

In late March, David Riess was found shot to death at the Blooming Prairie home he shared with his wife. After she allegedly wrote checks amounting to $11,000 on David Riess’s account, Lois Riess—who is said to have a gambling addiction—visited an Iowa casino, then vanished for a while.

Investigators think she popped up again in Florida, where she met Pamela Hutchinson.

The AP reports that after abandoning her Escalade, “Riess is believed to be driving Hutchinson’s car, a white Acura TL with Florida license plate Y37TAA.”

So far there have been sightings of the Acura TL in Louisiana and Texas.

Can a gambling addiction make someone snap like that? Several reports quote police as saying Lois Riess’s m.o. is to steal identities—as if she’s done it before.

She may look like a plump, friendly middle-aged woman, but it sounds like Lois is as dangerous as any wild-eyed psycho.

My Latest For Real Clear Life

In my latest post for my weekly true crime column, I write about the Max Headroom Signal Intrusion. It’s a signal hack that occurred in Chicago in 1987 that was particularly striking for just how gonzo weird it truly was. Read more here.

‘Let me get my heads’

Roena Cheryl Mills just wanted to get her heads. The AP reports police in Princeton, WV have charged the 41-year-old woman with the murder of Bo White, age 29. White was reportedly decapitated. It’s unclear as to whether that was the cause of death. The AP reports the blood-soaked woman had came out of the woods and went to someone’s home. Naturally they called police, since no one wants a blood-soaked woman hanging around their yard. Mills was taken in. During interrogation, she reportedly said, “you have to take me back and let me get my heads.” Mills and White were acquainted, police say, though the nature of their relationship isn’t clear. She’s in jail and being held on a nearly quarter-million dollar cash bond. I’d like to know why she said “heads” instead of “head.”

[AP]