Sunday, September 1, 1985 The Orange County Register A3 'NIGHT STALKER': SUSPECT CAPTURED

How ordinary people rounded up suspect

Alleged slayer overpowered on East LA street
By Gregg Zoroya and Enrique Rangel The Register

In an ordinary neighborhood, much like those where the socalled "night stalker" struck, ordinary people caught Richard Ramirez. They overpowered Ramirez and held him for police on a neat resi-. dential street in East Los Angeles, a close-knit place where the neighbors know each other. Usually, Hubbard Street is a quiet little community. But in the hours after the capture, Hubbard Street rang with the sounds of celebration. Neighbors joined in groups to chat and congratulate each other. "This is a good neighborhood," said Olegario Garcia, a 35-year-old unemployed resident who joined in catching Ramirez on Saturday morning. He and the others who captured Ramirez people such as Manuel de la Torre, a quality control inspector, and 21-year-old Jaime Burgoin, a college student who aspires to be a California Highway Patrol officer did not know whom they had at first. They said they acted only on an instant outrage at some unnamed stranger dressed in black, from his rubbersoled shoes to his T-shirt, who ran onto their street and tried to commandeer two cars. They did not know at the time that people throughout 'Los Angeles had been spotting Ramirez all morning. According to police, the suspect's earlier movements had been tracked by reported sightings, first in a liquor store south of downtown Los Angeles and then on a bus just south of Boyle Heights. . About 9 .a.m., Elena Salter, 56, was watering the front lawn of her Hubbard Street apartment when . she saw Ramirez and immediately recognized tym. An unidentified

Ygnaclo Nanetti/The Register

A crowd gathers outside the Hollenbeck police station in East Los Angeles, hoping for a glimpse of the 'night stalker' suspect.

Southern California Gas Co. employee who was driving by yelled out that Ramirez was the "night stalker." "My heart almost stopped," Salter said. After hiding briefly as Ramirez disappeared around the building,

Salter ran to call police. Seconds later, at the house next doorj Faistiho Pinon, 56, was about to climb under his 1966 Mustang to check the transmission. The car's engine was running and suddenly someone was inside trying to drive it away, Pinon later recounted. ?i-

non ran around the car, grabbed the man around the neck and was dragged back and forth as the driver, later identified as Ramirez, tried to back out of the tight driveway. When Pinon finally pulled the steering wheel and forced the Mustang into a tree, he and Ramirez

were thrown out of the car. Ramirez took off running. Across the street, Manuel de la Torre's wife, Angie, 29, and neighbor Lourdes Estupinan, 25, were about to drive off to the local supermarket when, according to Mrs. de la Torre, Ramirez suddenly ran up

and forced her out of her car. Mrs. de la Torre, who speaks little English, said the man told her in Spanish, "give me the keys!, give me the keys!," and then got into the car while she fell to the ground. "I screamed es el maton! Es el maton! (It's the killer! It's the killer!)," Mrs. de la Torre said. "He looked scared and was sweating all over. "I knew it was him because I saw his picture on TV last night (Friday)." Responding to his wife's screams and those of Estupinan, Manuel de la Torre grabbed a length of steel bar and went after the suspect. "When I got to the car he was ready to flee but I hit him on the forehead," de la Torre said in Spanish. "Then he started running but I went after him ... he had just hit my wife and I was very angry, I wasn't about to let him escape." De la Torre said he chased the suspect four houses down the street and hit him for a second time on the base of the skull. The suspect reportedly stumbled after being hit for the second time and screamed in Spanish "Let me go, let me go!" De la Torre, who by that time had been joined by at least five neighbors in chasing the suspect, said he hit him at least twice more in the arm and in the back. Thirty-year-old Jose Perez and Garcia, de la Torre's next-door neighbors, said they joined the chase after seeing the woman being pushed to the ground. "I just couldn't sit here and watch... I had to help," Perez said. "I picked a stone and yelled to Olegario. I knew we would catch him." The de la Torres were questioned at the Hollenbeck Division of the Los Angeles Police Department, then returned to a hero's welcome. "You had done a lot for our people," said an unidentified Spanishspeaking man to de la Torre, "We are all indebted to you." Asked by reporters if he considered himself a hero, de la Torre replied, "No, I just did what anyone else would have done." The crowd cheered.

Relief in Mission Vjejo area where slayer struck

CHAIN OF EVENTS 1 . ffeb, 25; A 6-year'Ofct $in was kfdVfcppetf as he wailed in front of & MorKetiettof elementary school. She was Angeles, molested, then set free a few hours later ir* that - city's Rampart District, where a pedestrian (bund ner " 2. March ti: A 9-yearoid boy was kidnapped fromWS Monterey FarknOme in the early morning,hours as his parents and-younger brother slept. He was molested, and found warjdertng in Chinatown rnat day, 3* March t7: Dayle tteakt 34< was shot to death in her Ptosemead condominium at 11 Her 25<year-oid female roommate was wounded 4. March 17; TsaMian Yu, 30, of Monterey Park, apparently pulled from her oar fn the 500 block ot 'Alhambra Ave,, was shot fatally at midnight, S March 20; An 8*year>old gjri was kidnapped from her bed as her parents slept durtng the early momtftg hours in their home "*n tile Eagle flock section olios Angles, Srie was fountf in w .. * undisclosed tocasorfc Her adscriptkm matched s previous desertptioiis o< the "night stalker." ; 6. March 2?t The bodies of Vincent Za2zara,'.84,: and hfe wife Maxim; 44t vwere found shot to death in thetr Whittie? home, They were kttteii betoneeri 10(30 p..rn, fV^cb ^e^and 6 a,m, March 27< 7. May 14: vyilliam Ooi, 66, was killed aix| hte wife was assaulted in frteir Morterey Park home sometime between 4 and a rr 8. June 1 ^ Mabei Close Bell, 83, was bludgeoned in her Monrovia hOflrW She died Six weeks later Her aQ-yBaf<0ld Sister swriflvedlhe attack. Their home wa& ransacked3m vlune 27i A 6"year-0ld girt was taken from her Arcadia home during ihe ear^ niornlng rtours as her parents slept nearby, A younger brother slept undisturbed in the same room. She was raped aftd sodomized, then abandoned in the Los Angeles Rampart tstrst, where police founo* her wandering, distinctive footprints from an athletfcshoe identical to footprints at other "fright stalker" grime scenes - - ,< were found outside the gW's ttome,/ ' 1O* June 28: Patty Elaine HlogEns, 32, was found dead of a slashed throat m her Arcadia home. Her time of death was listed as between midnight and 2

^ neighbors 'just ecstatic' suspect

By Maria Cone The Register

11. July 1 f Mary Cannon, 75, was found dead, beat&t and her throat slit, in her ransacked Arcadia home, - -' , Nelson, 60, wa& killed between 2330 a>m- and 10 kr&, in her home m Monterey - Park;, 1 3* July 20i Maxort Kneidtag, 68, and his wife, Lela, 84; were killed in their Oferfctaie home. 14* July 2Q; Chamarong Khovananth, 32, was shot while asleep between $ and 7 am in his Surt Vaifey ixjme/Hfs- wife and 8-yaa.r-old sort survived bMtirigsuAbout $30,000 wi rVwney and jewelry was stolen from itw home. 15* Aug. & Elyas AbOwatK 35, was Shot to death in his Diamond Bar home. His wife was assaulted, The attack occurred about 2 a.m, 10* Aug. 17; feter Pan, 66, wa& shot to death < whte 'asleep m his San Francisco home Hfs wife was shot in the head but survived. Hie house was ransacked, Aug* SS5r At-abOUt 2 a-m,( Bilf Carns was Shot three times In the head in his Mission Viejd hoim Cam survived artel is expected to live. His gfrlfnend

'?

Other significant events leading to the arrest of the suspect

tt& 2ft; A stolen we linked to trie Mission Vie|o attack was fountf in the Rampart District of Los Angeles. A fingerprint believed to bethfe "night stalker's" wa&cflsoovered in the car by Orange County 'sheriff& investigators. \' * ^" H ^Kugl 30: Based on a San Francisco poRcelnyestigatipfl a/id a fingerprint hratch in Sacramento * ctfrnputeY banks, art ^%pctrttsbulletin was fs$<*e<* on Richard Etamtefc, 25, as a, suspect in the "night l stajkerl' crime spree, * , ' Aug. 311 Ramirez was arrested in Los Angeles after allegedly attempting to steal a car.

Penny Miller heard it first from her neighbor, who yelled it over the fence: "He's been caught!" "Oh, God, I felt such relief," said Miller, who was all smiles Saturday afternoon. "I'm just ecstatic. We all are." The homeowners along Chrisanta Avenue in Mission Viejo, where William Carns was shot three times in the head by the socalled "night stalker," were able to relax Saturday for the first time in a week. The good news swept into the neighborhood like an ocean breeze on a hot summer day, and the doors that had stayed locked for so long were flung open to let in the fresh air. "We can breathe again," said Miller, who lives next door to Carns. "I couldn't stand it much longer." Since the attack Aug. 25, neighbors of the winding, uphill street had been carefully bolting their doors and locking all windows, even in homes that had no air conditioning. Before the killer's apparently random attacks struck so close to home, some of them felt so confident of their safety that they hadn't even bothered to lock their doors, much less buy special bolts. "I was obsessed with the guy. Every second, total obsession," Miller said. She said she is convinced that police arrested the right man. Ron Hartunian isn't so certain. Like many of his neighbors, he has been living with fear percolating in the back of his mind and with a gun in the house. At least, he said, his family now seems to be relaxing. "I hope it's him," Hartunian said. "But we don't know for sure." The neighbors were grateful that all the attention the police, the media, the Guardian Angels, the calls from strangers asking about the "night stalker" apparently is over. "I think we'v. ::ll learned a lesson from it," said John Cox, who lives across the street from Carns. "We'll all stick with Neighborhood Watch so we'll feel more secure. Whereas before, we didn't know half the neighbors." 'Few of the neighbors know

Hal Stoelzle/The Register

John Cox's family had the Guardian Angels watch their home. From left are wife Diane, daughter Stephanie, 15, and Cox.

U I think we've all learned a lesson from it (the 'night stalker' attacks). We'll all stick with Neighborhood Watch so we'll feel more secure. 99
John Cox
Chrisanta Avenue resident

Carns, 29, or his girlfriend, who was sexually assaulted in the attack, because the North Dakota couple recently had moved to the area. Carns was listed Saturday in stable but still critical condition, which hospital spokeswoman Bernice Ciolli called an improvement. Carns, who is paralyzed on the left side of his body, is conscious and expected to recover, surgeons said. Miller and the Cox family were the only neighbors on the block who took the Guardian Angels up on an offer to guard their houses all night Friday. The man in the red beret who stayed up all night in Miller's house armed only with a walkietalkie made her feel safe for the first time in days, she said. Her son nicknamed the beefy man, who claimed to have three black belts in karate, "Rambo," while Cox's young son was so impressed that

he wanted to join up. About 25 of the Guardian Angels stayed overnight, most of them on the street guarding a stretch of homes, the residents said. "I even slept with my windows open. It was fabulous having him here," Miller said. Cox and his wife, Diane, who were celebrating the day with tickets to a soccer game, were glad their family life now could return to normal. Since Aug. 25, his bedroom has been "like a bunkhouse," he said, because his 15-year-old daughter, Stephanie, and 11-year-old son, Bubba, were so frightened that they had hauled their sleeping bags into their parents' room. It was the first time he has kept his gun loaded, he said. Some neighbors were getting hysterical from the stress, he said. One woman from down the street called Cox late Friday and told him a suspicious van and car were parked in front of her house. She was terrified, Cox said, because the van and car suddenly moved just after she called police. She was afraid that somehow her phone was tapped and the "night stalker" could hear her voice. It turned out that the van and car were from a television news crew. "That shows you how scared some of the women are around here," Cox said. "There were so many stories going around."

Sunday's state and regional coverage can be found on pages B8-B12