Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul Holes | Shadows in Cordova Meadows

Summary

Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul Holes | Shadows in Cordova Meadows

Small Town Dicks Podcast — July 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode takes a deep dive into the geography, behavioral evolution, and investigative breakthroughs around the Golden State Killer’s early attacks, with a focus on the Cordova Meadows neighborhood. Host Yeardley Smith, twin detectives Dan and Dave, and forensic expert Paul Holes break down the offender’s tactics, neighborhood selection, changing MOs, victimology, and the critical revelations that helped tie together decades of unsolved crimes. Listeners are brought into the gritty details—strategic choices of homes, the policing perspective, victim stories, and chilling new theories—illuminating the tenacious work that finally unmasked Joseph DeAngelo as the long-sought serial predator.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Offender’s Return to Familiar Ground

• Paul Holes introduces the shift in the East Area Rapist’s (EAR) attacks to Cordova Meadows, Rancho Cordova, Sacramento—a neighborhood with links to DeAngelo’s high school years.
  • "What may have looked random from the outside starts to hint at some similarities in Paul's eyes. The houses, the streets, the fences, the backyards, all of them matter." —Paul Holes (01:31)
• Five of the first fifteen EAR attacks occurred in Cordova Meadows, making it the most concentrated cluster outside Visalia (01:44).
• Confirmation that DeAngelo lived just two blocks away during high school; he and a friend committed burglaries in this very area as teens (02:49).

2. Cat Burglaries as ‘Training’ and Behavioral Escalation

• Early cat burglaries in Cordova Meadows (1972-73) match the ERA's later MOs, including one burglary at the same house/family as a later sexual assault (04:45).
• Discussion of the unique pattern: DeAngelo comfortable in both unoccupied (Visalia Ransacker) and occupied (cat burglar) homes; this dual experience 'trained' him for escalating crimes (05:52).
  • Detective Dan: "It's the only offender I'm aware of where extensive series of both types of burglaries are occurring...the cap burglaries are almost a training aspect for DeAngelo..." (05:52)

3. Environmental Analysis: Why Cordova Meadows?

• Cordova Meadows was ‘perfect’ for prowling—single-story homes, short five-foot fences, low visibility from neighbors, and no street lamps (07:46).
  • "In almost the entirety of the East Area Rapist series, all the attacks are occurring in similar type neighborhoods." —Detective Dan (07:47)
• Second-story homes present tactical risks ("the fatal funnel"), making single-story neighborhoods preferable for undetected movement (08:04).

4. Policing and Perimeter Challenges

• The winding, curved street layout with courts and cul de sacs makes containment almost impossible for responding officers (13:04-14:11).
  • Detective Dave: “As a K9 officer coming into an area and trying to set up a perimeter would be a nightmare in that neighborhood.” (14:16)

5. Victim-Based, Opportunity-Driven Attacks

• The offender demonstrates both long-term surveillance and opportunistic offending—cases where he exploits open space, traffic patterns, and even family schedules (22:41–23:59; 27:13–29:24).
• He pre-stages bindings (clothesline from the victim’s backyard), showing advanced planning and intent (25:05).

6. Offender Tactics: Disappearing into Shadows

• DeAngelo uses neighborhood features (low fences, high bedroom windows, no streetlights) and police training (using shadows for concealment) to move unseen (15:09; 27:37–28:45).
  • Detective Dan: "If he sees patrol in the distance, he just goes dunk over the fence and ducks down low. And he's completely hidden." (15:09)

7. Dogs as Both Deterrent and Target

• Despite the belief that dogs deter offenders, DeAngelo often neutralized them—using repellent, firecrackers, or brutal violence (17:42–18:47).
  • “That dog always barks at strange men. And that dog would just be sitting there quiet and hunkered down. And I believe Deangelo was doing some negative training ahead of time with some of these dogs.” —Detective Dan (16:53)
• Notable incident: DeAngelo kills a dog with an explosive and, in another case, slits a German shepherd’s abdomen (18:19).

8. “Compulsion” and Escalation Evidence

• The seventh attack (October 1976) is dissected for signs of compulsion—prolonged presence in the home, attacking a mother and son despite the chaos, and the use of threats and psychological intimidation (19:49–22:32).
  • “Sacramento is now recognizing... if we don't stop him, he's going to escalate to homicide.” —Detective Dan (20:43)

9. Offender’s Psychological Games

• Victim manipulation: DeAngelo sometimes engages in disturbing conversation, then abruptly silences victims ("Shut up!"), likely to prevent empathy or personalizing the crime (21:32).
• He invents lies about his identity ("something happened to my face..."), intentionally misleading victims (22:41).

10. Listening In: Surveillance and Technology

• The team theorizes EAR may have used crude FM radios to eavesdrop on home cordless phones, tracking victims’ conversations and movements (32:50–33:57).
• Supporting evidence: In Santa Barbara, a found hatchet and FM radio at a crime scene (33:57).

11. Evolving Patterns: From Homes to Outdoors

• Transition from breaking into homes at night to ambushing outside (car abduction, pulling victims into dark culverts), reflecting experimentation with risk and strategy (24:01–29:24).
• Victim of opportunity: Sometimes, chance meetings (e.g., a victim doing laundry at her parents’ house) triggered an attack (35:35).

12. Stalking and Psychological Aftermath

• In the case of a 38-year-old victim (March 1977), DeAngelo leaves his own blood on her thumb—a deliberate, personalized message (37:56–38:02).
• He taunts her with a phone call 24 years later, one day after her married name and address became public knowledge in connection with the EAR/ONS DNA link—demonstrating long-term tracking and psychological cruelty (39:09–39:35).
  • "He has kept track of at least her, and I believe he's probably kept track of other victims..." —Detective Dan (39:21)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Fencing and Neighborhoods:

  • “This neighborhood is nothing but single story houses...five feet tall fences...you don’t have witnesses on a second floor that can look into their neighbor’s backyard and see you wandering around prowling.” —Detective Dan (07:46)

• On Dogs and Deterrence:

  • “People think that dogs will scare away offenders. This did not work with DeAngelo.” —Detective Dan (16:53)

• On Victim Manipulation:

  • “As soon as she would talk to him through clenched teeth, he would just go, shut up.” —Detective Dan (21:32)

• On the Power of Familiarity:

  • “So as a teenage boy, he’s breaking into houses where now, as East Area Rapist, he’s coming back…” —Detective Dan (03:52)

• On the Chilling Phone Call:

  • “…he calls her up the next day to let her know he is still around. She had remarried, so her last name was different. She had moved all the way across town. And at the time, her listed phone number was under her new husband’s name.” —Detective Dan (39:09)

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Important Timestamps for Key Segments

| Timestamp | Topic | |-----------|-------| | 01:13 | DeAngelo’s movement from Exeter to Auburn, attack at Cordova Meadows begins | | 02:49 | Discovery of DeAngelo’s teenage connections and early burglaries in neighborhood | | 05:45 | Cat burglaries as “training”; unique behavioral progression | | 07:46 | Cordova Meadows’ physical features—single story, low fences, ideal for prowling | | 13:04 | Difficulties of police patrol and perimeter—the challenge of neighborhood design | | 16:53 | Reality of dog deterrence, dog repellent, violent neutralization of animals | | 19:49 | Detailed breakdown of the 7th attack—a mother and son, compulsion evidence | | 22:41 | Offender’s victim manipulation tactics; shutting down empathy | | 24:01 | Outdoor ambush: victim abducted from car, patterns of evolution | | 29:24 | Attacks on teens home alone, moving victims outside; possible surveillance | | 32:50 | Use of FM radios to eavesdrop, technical eavesdropping theory and evidence | | 37:56 | Case of the 38-year-old victim, blood left as a message, taunting phone call | | 39:09 | Taunting call after 24 years—continued stalking, psychological manipulation |

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Conclusion & Coming Up

The episode leaves listeners on the cusp of further escalation, with a preview:

"The East Area Rapist changes his approach. The attacks become more technical, and a local town hall meeting may have placed one man directly in the offender's path." —Paul Holes (39:39)

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Summary Table of Major Victims/Events Discussed

| Case (#, Date) | Victim(s) | Notable MO or Detail | Significance | |-------------------|-------------|------------------------------------------------------------|---------------------------------------| | #1 Cordova Meadows| — | Retreading familiar ground from teenage years | Territorial return, comfort zone | | 1972-73 Burglaries| Families | Early cat burglaries, including same house as later attack | Behavioral evolution, practice | | 7th Attack (Oct 76)| Mom, son | Prolonged, violent assault, undeterred by dog | Signs of compulsion, escalation | | Girl in Car (Oct 76)| Teen girl | Outdoor abduction attempt, aborted in progress | Experimentation in MO | | Teen Alone at Home (Nov 76) | 16yo girl | Pulled outside, walked through culvert | Risk-taking, planning, surveillance | | 38yo Woman (March 77) | Woman | Isolated attack, blood left as message, call 24 years later| Ongoing stalking, psychological games |

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This episode showcases the investigative brilliance, survivor resolve, and the relentless darkness of a serial predator who weaponized familiarity, geography, and technology—offering listeners both a chilling education in criminal behavior and a celebration of relentless detective work.

Transcript

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[Paul Holes]

Previously on Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul Holes Paul walked us through the early East Area rapist attacks and the questions investigators were trying to answer as the crimes moved from Visalia to the Sacramento area. In this episode, Paul takes us to Cordova Meadows, a neighborhood that becomes central to understanding the offender's evolution.

[Detective Dan]

He leaves Exeter after He shoots Officer McGowan. He's living in Auburn. But then he starts attacking as the East Area Rapist. And with that very first Easter era rapist attack, he attacks in this Cordova Meadows neighborhood.

[Paul Holes]

What may have looked random from the outside starts to hint at some similarities in Paul's eyes. The houses, the streets, the fences, the backyards, all of them matter.

[Detective Dan]

5 of the first 15 east area rapist attacks occurred in this neighborhood. This is the strongest cluster of attacks in the entirety of the Golden State Killer series.

[Paul Holes]

This is where the case becomes not just a list of crimes, but a map of behavior. And for Paul, understanding the geography means understanding how this offender moved around in the shadows, chose his victims, and stayed hidden.

[Detective Dan]

I spent a lot of time driving through this neighborhood going, why here?

[Paul Holes]

Episode 3 Shadows in Cordova Meadows.

[Detective Dan]

Now that we know deangelo is the East Area Rapist, first thing I want to know is where was he living

[Yardley Smith]

when he was committing the east era

[Detective Dan]

committing East Erapus cases? He's living all the way up in Auburn. Oh, and he was working for Auburn PD when he becomes the East Area Rapist.

[Yardley Smith]

And how far is Auburn from the area he's terrorizing?

[Detective Dan]

So Auburn, I would say from downtown Sacramento, is about an hour drive northeast of Sacramento. And so he leaves Exeter after he shoots Officer McGowan, he's living in Auburn. But then he starts attacking as an East Area Rapist. And with that very first East Area Rapist Attack. He attacks in this Cordova Meadows neighborhood. And this is in Rancho Cordova, right off of Highway 50. And when we looked at DeAngelo's past, well, it turns out he was living during high school in the neighborhood that's just two blocks south of this location. And when it was announced that he had been arrested as the Golden State Killer case, a former high school buddy of his who was living in Texas at the time of the announcement of the arrest called up SAC DA Investigator and said, I was friends with Joe, and we would burglarize houses in this very neighborhood.

[Yardley Smith]

Oh, my God.

[Detective Dan]

So as a teenage boy, he's breaking into houses where now, as East Area Rapist, he's coming back to start the East Area Rapist series. So he's going to the very neighborhood that he has immense familiarity with. Plus, Sergeant Ken Clark, who is a SAC sergeant, Homicide, who had immense knowledge on the East Area Rapist attacks. He theorized, well, we must have some earlier fetish burglaries or something similar that was occurring in Sacramento. So he worked with his records department, and they pulled out a bunch of burglaries. Ken went through them and found a whole series of cat burglaries in this very neighborhood from 1972-73, somewhere in that timeframe. And like one of the cases is one of the cases where the East Area Rapist attacked a teenage girl. This cat burglar had gone in there.

[Yardley Smith]

Same house.

[Detective Dan]

Same house, and same family that was living there. So Ken's pretty convinced this was DeAngelo committing these cat burglaries. And this is where earlier we're talking about barriers to offense. Visalia Ransacker was going into unoccupied dwellings, except for when he tried to abduct Bess Snelling, but he's going into unoccupied dwellings. The cat burglar is going into houses when they're occupied. And the reason they're known as cat burglars is because they are able to silently move through the house. Right. Because they don't want to have the occupants wake up and see them. So this is a step up, you know? And so if he's the cat burglar, he's actually comfortable going into occupied houses. But then later, when he becomes an Exeter cop, he's starting out as just a fetish burg and not going into occupied houses. So in some ways, it's a step down, but it doesn't eliminate those cat burglaries as being d'. Angelo.

[Yardley Smith]

Is that unusual that you're Going into occupied houses, and then you sort of take a step back and go into unoccupied houses.

[Detective Dan]

I can't say if it's unusual or not, because this is probably the only offender in which there's this extensive series in both realms. If you were. Because there's a significant number of these cap burglaries that Ken found. So this is the only offender that I'm aware of where extensive series of both types of burglaries are occurring. I would say that in some ways, the cap burglaries are almost a training aspect for Deangelo, and he's getting comfortable moving through when he becomes the Visalia Ransacker. I think part of it is now he's got a full time job and when he can commit, the burglaries is going to be off shift. And oftentimes that may have prevented him from going in the middle of the night. So speculation on my part.

[Yardley Smith]

Paul, take us back to the neighborhood you told us about at the top of this episode.

[Detective Dan]

This Cordova Meadows neighborhood. Five of the first 15 East Area Rapist attacks occurred in this neighborhood. This is the strongest cluster of attacks in the entirety of the Golden State Killer series. Absent Visalia Ransacker, which is just off the hook. Right. So there's a reason why he's attacking in this neighborhood. I spent a lot of time driving through this neighborhood going, why here? Well, this neighborhood is nothing but single story houses. The fencing in this neighborhood is like five feet tall. Oh, it's not tall fences. We know these dairy rapists loved to prowl through backyards. And the reason for the single story type neighborhood is you don't have witnesses on a second floor that can look into their neighbor's backyard and see you wandering around prowling.

[Yardley Smith]

Right.

[Detective Dan]

So in almost the entirety of the East Area Rapist series, all the attacks are occurring in similar type neighborhoods. Second, what is the problem with a two story house?

[Yardley Smith]

The fatal funnel going up the staircase.

[Detective Dan]

Right, Exactly. Because all the bedrooms are typically. And the victims are going to be upstairs. And if somebody comes home or somebody enters in, he either has to go out the second floor window, or he has to go down that fatal funnel and be confronted by whoever's coming up.

[Yardley Smith]

Right. Or if they wake up while you enter from the ground floor and an occupant wakes up and they're waiting for you at the top of the stairs, you're a prime target.

[Detective Dan]

Yep.

[Detective Dave]

I think we should rename it the Death Runway.

[Yardley Smith]

Okay, that's fine.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

The Red Carpet of Death.

[Detective Dave]

Well, you know, Yeardley and I down at the house in la, we came up with kind of a safety plan if somebody were to break into the house. And that stairway was a big part of that plan.

[Detective Dan]

Sure.

[Detective Dave]

That's all I'll say.

[Detective Dan]

I remember talking to a woman who really was expressing concerns that her ex was going to come over. And not to get into too much specifics, but she did have firearms in the house. Two story house. The instinct is to go into your kid's room. Right. And I was like, nope. You grab your gun, you post up at the top of the stairs, but be shielded if you will, and you just wait and you get on 911 if he suspects something and let the cops know that you're in there with a gun. But if he's going to come after you, he has to get up through those stairs. And you now have him isolated in terms of his movements in case you do have to use fatal force.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yeah. You don't have to give warning shots. You got to give a warning shot. You're like, what?

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[Yardley Smith]

Did the suspect give you one before he shot you through the heart?

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

That's the thing is, like, it's all up to what you articulate. You know, we've already said who breaks into an occupied dwelling. You're not there just to steal some stuff.

[Yardley Smith]

No.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

You're there to interact with the people. And so I have to assume that you have good intentions. No, sorry. You already broke the barrier, so you get to answer any of my questions.

[Detective Dan]

So the other notable thing about this neighborhood is there's no street lamps.

[Yardley Smith]

Why is that?

[Detective Dan]

They didn't build a neighborhood with street lamps.

[Yardley Smith]

What the. Do they have them now?

[Detective Dan]

Now, when you drive around, what is stunning is the number of bright security lights that have been installed definitely after the east area rapist or probably during the east area rapist attacks, but there are no street lamps. So this was like the perfect prowling neighborhood. And of course, with his familiarity from his high school years and possibly from the cat burglary years, he's now going, I am now a rapist. I'm going to sexually assault these women. He is going to a familiar area. So two of the early cases, and I've already talked about them, are the first and third attacks. And these are the two cases in which the east area that shows up nude from the waist down. But it's interesting is that the locations of these two cases, they're only a couple houses apart. And these houses back up to other houses that are On a cul de sac. One of the houses that was in the rear cul de sac was vacant for most of the time leading up to these attacks. And then a renter moved into that house. That renter living in the house started to hear somebody jumping over his rear fence to get to the houses in which the victims houses were along, and he would come out. And sometimes these fence boards, you know how they're nailed in and they'd be pushed away as the guy jumps up over them. At one point, the renter is getting so sick of somebody using his backyard to get through like a shortcut. He ends up nailing his gate shut. And then the east area rapist comes, and I'm pretty sure CCA rapist kicks the gate open in the middle of the night, like, how dare you try to block me from going through here?

[Yardley Smith]

Oh, my God.

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[Detective Dan]

There are three victims we know of.

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[Detective Dan]

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[Paul Holes]

I believe there's a deeper motivation here.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

You have no idea who you're dealing with, and you are gonna end up dead.

[Paul Holes]

I've been waiting for you.

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[Detective Dan]

Honey, what are you listening to?

[Paul Holes]

Mom?

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[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

The layout of these neighborhoods, they're not straight shot, like laid out like a grid, right? These blocks are curved. They have little offshoot courts and cul de sacs that go off of them. So from a patrol standpoint, thinking about, okay, dispatch is putting out a call right now that there is just a home invasion, sexual assault that happened in this neighborhood. And you think about it from a patrol perspective, going into that neighborhood, thinking, okay, there are time delay from suspect leaving to getting on the phone. Now I've got to expand this out to eight or nine blocks at least. And in these neighborhoods, a lot of the roads are curved. So when we set up perimeters, we want to see as far in two or three directions as we can. And in these neighborhoods, in some cases, you're looking down the street, but it bends 100 yards later. And so you don't have the same capabilities from a personnel standpoint to cover a true perimeter in this neighborhood because you have to have too many cops to look at all the intersections.

[Detective Dan]

You don't have line of sight.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Exactly. It's really challenging to set up any sort of perimeter in these neighborhoods.

[Detective Dave]

These streets are kind of L shaped and they're parallel. If you think about an L stacked on top of another L. And as a K9 officer coming into an area and trying to set up a perimeter would be a nightmare in that neighborhood.

[Detective Dan]

And of course, with DeAngelo being in law enforcement, he most certainly probably has a pretty good understanding how the sheriff's office is going to respond once the call comes in that there's been an attack.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yeah. What it is, is you're doing an area check. When you go into those types of call, patrol's gonna send one officer to the victim location, get as much information out as you can. But everybody else is kind of mobile in this neighborhood. And if you think about that, that means they're just driving their cars around, which means if you're on foot and you're the suspect, there's infinite hiding spots. If you just stay off the concrete.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Sure.

[Detective Dan]

One of the other notable things that I noticed about these houses is some of these houses, they look fairly close together and the windows are up high, like the bedroom windows that are in the backyard area. And I noticed that if I jumped over the fence in between these two houses and just kept low, the people in either house would never be able to see me. Plus, nobody from the street like patrol would be able to see me. So if he sees patrol in the distance, he just goes dunk over the fence and ducks down low. And he's completely hidden.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yep. I used to love these types of area checks. I didn't have a Joseph d' Angelo in our jurisdiction, but it was always a challenge, like, I gotta think like the criminal. So there are times where you just kind of sit back, darked out, stay put, and just look for movement. And those are the times somebody thinks the coast is clear. They don't see headlights or they don't hear engines coming up and down the road. And then they're like, it's safe. I can poke my head out. And you're like, oh, there he is. I got somebody who just came out of this yard mid block of this street. And then everyone kind of shrinks it down.

[Yardley Smith]

That's cool.

[Detective Dan]

Yeah, that's very cool. So the east area rapist is now active, and he's starting to attack. And it really isn't after eight attacks until Sacramento authorities are going, oh, we have another predator in addition to these other rapists. And press is starting to become aware of that. This rapist is active in the Sacramento area.

[Yardley Smith]

And just as a reminder to our listeners, we're now in the middle of October, 1976.

[Detective Dan]

Yes. So by the time the seventh attack rolls around. You're right, Yardley. It's in October of 76. I pulled this attack out because it really shows a level of compulsion, and people think that dogs will scare away offenders. This did not work with DeAngelo. And in fact, I will tell you that there's examples throughout the series where the owners, they would have a dog inside the house, and the victims would say, that dog always barks at strange men. And that dog would just be sitting there quiet and hunkered down. And I believe Deangelo was doing some negative training ahead of time with some of these dogs. And ultimately, we know that DeAngelo was arrested. And what was he arrested for? Shoplifting, dog repellent and a hammer.

[Yardley Smith]

And just to confirm, that arrest that you're talking about, Paul, is the one that happened in 1979. DeAngelo was a few years into his stint as an Auburn police officer at the time. But that arrest was actually just for shoplifting, nothing else, right?

[Detective Dan]

Yes. So is he coming up ahead of time? And when that dog comes at him, he sprays him, and he just gives that negative reinforcement.

[Yardley Smith]

I see. So then the dog would recognize DeAngelo again and be like, I don't mess with that guy.

[Detective Dan]

Yeah, that dog is like, uh, I don't want any of that.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Door's open.

[Yardley Smith]

Come on in.

[Detective Dan]

Yeah, we know in Cordova Meadows, his. His high school friend that was committing burglary said at one point, a dog lunged at DeAngelo, and DiAngelo had, like, the equivalent of an M80 firecracker, threw it under the dog and killed the dog. And then we have another situation down in Santa Barbara where a German shepherd was off leash and went behind a house, and the owner of the dog hears a yelp and comes back, and the dog has been slit up its abdomen.

[Yardley Smith]

God damn this guy.

[Detective Dan]

But with the seventh attack, you know, this is a really nice neighborhood. That's north of that Cordova Meadows, Kind of northwest of that Cordova Meadows attack. Across the American river, there's a 32 year old mom living in the house and she's with her 10 year old son. 10 year old son has the family dog in his room and that dog just starts going crazy. So he lets the dog out of the room. The dog runs to the rear sliding door and is just barking. So the 10 year old boy looks out and sees a masked man in the yard. So he lets his dog out and the dog chases the man and he last sees the east area rapist get on top of the fence looking down at the dog while the dog is jumping up.

[Yardley Smith]

This is, the boy sees this, the boy sees this.

[Detective Dan]

You know, this is a nice neighborhood. So of course, you know, the neighbors are probably going, why is there a dog going crazy, right? So the boy goes and gets mom, they go to the phone in the kitchen to dial the operator and next thing they know, this masked man, these dare rapists, is inside the house and he's basically telling him, get this dog the hell away from me. And he proceeds to bind up the mom and the 10 year old boy puts the boy in his own bedroom on his bed, bound up and then goes out and cuts the clothing off the mom. And ends up in this particular case, while he's starting the sexual assault process and she's been rendered nude, he's taking a knife and running it up and down her body. And so early psychologists that were consulted by investigators said he is fantasizing about killing very early on. Sacramento is now recognizing, oh, this is, this is a serious offender and if we don't stop him, he's going to escalate to homicide.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

That kind of dog alert and chaos in the middle of a suspect trying to commit a burglary. Most suspects would ditch the attempt right there and move on or come back another night. But he's not even deterred. He's like, this is just a challenge.

[Detective Dan]

Now this is the point that I make. You know, first I talked about, okay, you think the dogs are going to be a deterrent? Well, in this case the dog was assessed by these dairy rapists, by d' Angelo and he ended up probably evaluating the current state of the neighborhood and was like, nope, I'm still going to do this. But it also shows a level of compulsion. And in this particular case, she's a very attractive, very well built woman.

[Yardley Smith]

This is the mom.

[Detective Dan]

This is the mom. As he's sexually assaulting her, he's engaging in some level of conversation and is telling her how beautiful she is. And so it's possible she's somebody that he saw ahead of time. Now, her house happened to open up to open space. And it appears that he drove a vehicle and parked in this open space, kind of an off road, undeveloped area that at one point I think they were looking at possibly putting a freeway in. But they weren't successful in doing that development. But she tries to engage in some psychology. It's Jesus loves you. As soon as she would talk to him through clenched teeth, he would just go, shut up. I mean, he typically would do that. When the victims would try to engage with him verbally, it was shut up, shut up. He would not allow them to talk. And there is some thought that possibly he was concerned that maybe he would start feeling some empathy and didn't want them to personalize themselves to him.

[Yardley Smith]

I mean, that seems dead on to me. Of course, he doesn't want to be drawn into any other scenario than the one he's creating in that moment.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Detective Dan]

And if I remember correctly, and you know, at one point I think she asks him about why he's got the mask on. And in this case he says, well, something happened to my face. I don't want you to see it. No. You know, now that we've actually caught who this is, he's just lying. He's feeding the information to the victim. And I'm gonna circle back around to that tact that d' Angelo used in a little bit. So he carries out this compulsive attack. This attack occurred at 2:30 in the morning, spends about three hours with mom and the son. And the son, he would come in and flip the light on in his bedroom while the son is bound in his bed. But now with the light on in the bedroom, the son is looking at, and through the ski mask, he could see the offender's eyes. And the son said, no, he's got blue eyes. And I know we would debate this well, because we had victims give descriptions. And it was dark eyes, light eyes, green eyes. It's like, well, what is it? And here's a 10 year old boy, obviously traumatized. Is he providing accurate information? Well, it turns out he did. DeAngelo has blue eyes.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Good on that 10 year old.

[Detective Dan]

So after committing that attack, the day goes by, and then at 11 o' clock at night, we have another kind of attack. And this one I spent a lot of time on. This was a 19 year old girl, in essence, that would go to her boyfriend's house routinely. So she establishes a life pattern. And then this night, she goes to the boyfriend's house, drives into this neighborhood, does a u Turn like she always does, and parks on the side of her house, which is a corner house. She's got her family dog, older dog, in the vehicle with her. And she has some items on the front passenger seat that she turns around to gather up before going into the house. When she does that, her driver's door is yanked open and she is literally pulled out of the car. She starts to struggle and this man puts a knife up to her side and she's recognizing, I gotta comply. The man is described as wearing a ski mask and having a trench coat on it. And it appears that he has some sort of dark stain on the ski mask. You know, like, did he have a bloody nose or something? So he pulls her away from her car, around the rear corner of her yard to a house where he binds her hands behind her back and then pulls her around the corner of the street, two houses down, and lays her down where he's already pre staged bindings on the ground. And the source of those bindings were the clothesline from her family's backyard. So he now gets her bound ankles, hands behind her back, and he's standing over her and he's got her keys. And she said he was just jingling the keys above her, as if he were debating on what he wanted to do. And then ultimately he abandons. He steals her car with the dog in it, but only drives a few blocks. And I believe he drove to a location where he had parked his car, or at least near enough to where now he could get to his car rapidly and as we now know, probably drive back home to Auburn.

[Detective Dave]

You kind of wonder why he aborted there. Like a neighbor's light comes on, something startled him.

[Detective Dan]

And this is also where, instead of being inside a house, he's now attacking outside the house. And so there's a level of experimentation. And I'll kind of talk about how this pattern evolves over the next few cases. But at the same time, her brother and father, who were both at work, would typically come home right after she got home. So he has been surveilling her and is going, I can't take her into her own house or even into her own backyard because family is coming home. He knew what was going on. So I literally had sat in my car where she used to park, and I'm looking around at the houses going, okay, where was East Area Rapist posted up to watch this victim? And why this victim?

[Yardley Smith]

And we never find out?

[Detective Dan]

No. But one of my last prime suspects had an association with this victim. And I will Talk about that.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Okay, yeah, especially at night and between houses. Once you get beyond that front threshold of a building and you get into the little alleyway between the two houses, pitch black. Unless you got your little rolling spotlight as you roll by, you aren't gonna see anything.

[Hulu Advertiser]

No.

[Detective Dan]

And we knew the east area rapist, he knew how to work the shadows. We would have witnesses, they'd be like out front, just happened to see a man kind of walk past them. And then they would look and that man is gone. They said it was just like he just disappeared. That's Easter rapist going, oh shit, I just got seen. And then he just, poof, he's up fence line, in bushes or behind trees. He is l doing these disappearing acts.

[Detective Dave]

This is exactly how we are trained as police officers. Also my fto, my field training officer, also named Dan.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Great man.

[Detective Dave]

Very early in my training when we would approach a house for a domestic violence call, a dispute, whatever, unknown problem, didn't matter. When, you know, you park down the street and you don't walk down the sidewalk or the street to the house, you walk in people's yards and you use the shadows as concealment.

[Detective Dan]

And there you go. And here you got, you have d' Angelo being a trained law enforcement officer who worked patrol and probably developed some of those same tactics.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yeah, 100%.

[Detective Dan]

Okay. So the very next case, and this is now East Air Rapist or ear number nine, happens few weeks later. Now we're in November of 76 and this is where he starts a pattern of three cases in a row where instead of going into a house in the middle of the night, he's going into the house in the evening time and attacking teenage girls who have been left home alone. And with these cases, what he's doing is instead of attacking them inside the house, in terms of actually sexually assaulting them in the house, he's pulling them

[Yardley Smith]

outside to the backyard or something to

[Detective Dan]

the backyard or similar. And this one is probably the most interesting based on some of the details I'm going to get into now is that there's a 16 year old girl who's home alone. Her parents had just left to go visit their son who had been hospitalized. So the parents are out of the house. The girl is supposed to go out on a date with her boyfriend. I think she was in the middle of preparing herself a little dinner in the kitchen when she turns around and now there's this masked man inside the house. He ends up proceeding to take her outside and gets her bound up and immobilized. Outside her house, goes back in, turns the TV off, puts the window screen that he had pried off back on, locks the front door and leaves and goes and grabs her. He then walks her about 200 yards down this concrete lined culvert to an opening that is isolated and he cuts her clothes off. Initially, when this case was reported, she did not disclose about the sexual assault. And then as an adult, when she was re interviewed, she did disclose. Yes, he did sexually assault me. Parents come home, house is locked up, TV is off. They know their daughter's supposed to be out on a date. They have no idea what has happened, so they just go about their normal routine. This case, the daughter being a victim, isn't found out until the neighbor sees his daughter, who had now gotten out of her, at least her ankle bindings, running down the street crying. And she was nude. And that's how the parents found out their daughter was a victim of the east area rapist. But think about what this offender is doing or what Deangelo's doing. He knew what was going to happen inside that house. How did he know that? This is where he is Doing some pretty sophisticated surveillance to get to those types of details, you know, and I was starting to think, well, I know he's going into some of these houses ahead of time. Is there a chance that he's bugging the phones and is listening to conversations that way? Is he, you know, just kind of out listening through the windows or, you know, family just out on the porch talking?

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[Detective Dan]

Queen Carvania stood haloed by the morning sun. An army hung on her every word.

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[Detective Dan]

One of the things that I found out about as I was talking to certain experts, this was an era when residential houses were starting to get these cordless phones. And these cordless phones at this time they weren't encrypted, they were basically walkie talkies. And one expert told me, goes, yeah, with those types of phones you get that old style FM radio, you crank the dial up past 108 and you can now tune in to all the phone conversations that are occurring. And this neighborhood, when I talk to groups, I think, well that sounds just kind of like no way, that's not happening. Well, down in Santa Barbara, when this offender moves down to Santa Barbara, there's a case in which a girl sees a masked man or hears a masked man trying to get into her bedroom window. She screams out, dad comes running, man is gone, he abandons. But out on the front curb is a hatchet and an FM radio. So that just further supported somebody like Deangelo would possibly take advantage of that. I don't know if he had scanners

[Yardley Smith]

in his vehicles, like police scanners and stuff.

[Ryan Reynolds (Mint Mobile Advertiser)]

Right.

[Detective Dan]

And I think you guys talked about having similar things with walkie talkies, listening to these phone conversations.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yeah, it was what, mid-90s and Dan and I were in junior college, early 90s, 90s something. And we used to be able to hear, we had little walkie talkies I believe, but we would be able to hear other people in the apartment complex, their conversations. Yeah, I mean like you're on the call yourself, pretty uncanny. But what I was noticing about this slide is I think when I think about the Golden State killer at large is that these attacks are happening midnight, 2 o' clock in the morning. East area rapist victim number nine, 5:30 in the afternoon, evening. I mean it's November in California. I'm guessing it's probably getting dark around then. And he's doing it when people are getting home from work.

[Detective Dan]

Sure. You know, that's a good observation. And he does three of these in a row. So for whatever reason, you have the girl, 19 year old girl, that he's pulling out of her car, so he's attacking her in the open and now he's pulling these victims like three in a row, teenage girls out into the open. In this particular case, he's possibly aware the parents are going to be coming back from visiting the son. I can't, he can't spend much time with her inside the house.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Right? Yeah. It's interesting how many times he would have walked that culvert. From where they ended up all the way to the house and really figuring out where's a good spot that I have some privacy and people aren't gonna be able to see or hear.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Right.

[Detective Dan]

And there's another several cases that I haven't selected in terms of like the presentation that I give. But there was two victims, houses that were right around the corner from each other. There was like a park that led to a school. But there was a similar type culvert between these two victims houses. And the first victim that he attacked between these two, she just happened to be at her parents house and she didn't live there, but she brought her laundry to do her laundry at her parents house. Nothing planned, this was just nothing that anybody could observe ahead of time. And he attacks her and actually pulls her in to her parents house and sexually assaults her. This is an example of an absolute victim of opportunity. And I believe he was in that culvert prowling and he sees her and he's now assessing. I think I can do this.

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

Yeah. Never know who's walking around your neighborhood.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Right.

[Detective Dan]

So jumping ahead a little bit to the 14th attack, and this is now in March of 1977. This is an interesting case on multiple levels. You know, first, this is the oldest victim in the entire series. She was 38 years old. Second is where her house was located. Is the most geographically isolated of all the attacks up in Sacramento. In many of the attacks, he is doing multiple cases in the same neighborhood, pretty close together. This one is just absolutely away from all the others. So there's something that is drawing him out. And this may be a victim that he sees at a mall and follows her and has decided that she's going to become a victim. That may be the reason for the isolation. But one of the oddities in this is that after she's been bound and she's been blindfolded during the interactions he's having with her, she feels him squeeze on her thumb and she just thought, that's weird. What's he doing? So once he leaves and she's able to get the blindfolds off, she looks at her thumb and it's got blood on it. And she has no bleeding injuries. So he purposefully left blood on her thumb. And it was sort of like, why do that?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Right, right.

[Yardley Smith]

Do you have a theory?

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

It's the squeeze of the thumb to let her know.

[Detective Dan]

He's letting her know I'm doing this.

[Yardley Smith]

It's deliberate.

[Hulu Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Detective Dan]

It was not just sort of a casual touching. So this is where Ken Clark from Sac. Sheriff and I, we talked about this and we go, there's something special about this victim to him. Well, that is further emphasized that, you know, she's attacked in 1977, seven, 24 years later, he calls her and he just says, remember when we played? It's so evil, it even gets more devious, because when he calls her is the day after the Sacramento Bee published the article of the DNA link I made between the East Area Rapist series and the homicides down in Southern California. So now this article is saying the East Area Rapists isn't just a rapid. She is a killer. And he calls her up the next day to let her know he is still around. She had remarried, so her last name was different. She had moved all the way across town. And at the time, her listed phone number was under her new husband's name.

[Yardley Smith]

And even though the listed phone number was under her new husband's name, it was not the same phone number she had had back in 1977.

[Detective Dan]

That's correct.

[Yardley Smith]

So everything is different.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Yardley Smith]

Somehow he's tracking her.

[Detective Dan]

He has kept track of at least her, and I believe he's probably kept track of other victims because there's other victims that receive phone calls from him years later, sometimes years later. But this one was the most extreme in terms of the amount of time

[Another Detective (possibly Dan or Dave's partner)]

that had passed and the timing.

[Detective Dan]

Yes.

[Paul Holes]

Coming up on Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul Holz. The East Area Rapist changes his approach. The attacks become more technical, and a local town hall meeting may have placed one man directly in the offender's path.

[Detective Dan]

In this article, it says, quote, the East Air Rapist has never attacked while there was a man in the home. So he has already thought, how can I attack with a man present but minimize risk to myself?

[Yardley Smith]

It sounds like this man was chosen because of the comment he made.

[Detective Dan]

Yes. So this is showing that vindictive personality.

[Paul Holes]

That's coming up on Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul Holes.

[Yardley Smith]

Small Town Dicks presents.

[Paul Holes]

Chasing the Golden State Killer with Paul holes is an audio 99 production. It's written by Paul Holes and features Detective Dan, Detective Dave and me, Yardley Smith. This series is produced by Jessica Halstead and Monica Scott, executive produced by Ben Cornwell and me, edited by Katie McMurran and Soren Bajan with additional editing by Christina Bracamontes. Sound supervision by Logan Heftel, Design and social media by Andrew Polk. The theme music is Connected, composed by Logan Haftel. If you'd like to support the making of this podcast, please go to smalltowndicks.com superfam and hit that little join button. Also, you can stream all [e-mail] Goldenstakekiller from all of us at Audio 99 thank you thank you for listening.

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[Detective Dan]

Stop. This is Simplisafe. Police are on the way.

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[Detective Dan]

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