Expendable For A Cause.

We’re back…

The Night Stalker cases should have been split into separate trials to prevent a joinder or “spill-over” where evidence from another case is used to suggest a connection to another. There are several ways to divide the cases. This post will focus on those where Ramirez was prosecuted for rape-burglaries: Kyle, Dickman, Khovananth and Abowath.

It is perhaps tempting to assume all four of these attacks were committed by the same man, by the nature of the crime and because all four women described a slim/thin man with curly or wavy hair. But is it possible that they were two, three or even four different men?

GEOGRAPHY

Location is important when looking for serial killer patterns. In his declaration, forensic psychologist Steve Strong noted that some attacks were not in Los Angeles County and there was no pattern to the locations. Of these four, two were in Los Angeles city, and two were in Los Angeles County.

They are also very different places: Kyle’s home on N. Avon St, Burbank is a middle-class but densely populated area with larger houses. The Khovananth home on Schoenborn St, Sun Valley is also densely populated, but is less tree-lined and attractive. To the east lies a huge power station and gas works. Similarly, Dickman’s house in Monterey Park is close to land owned by San Gabriel electricity* that is full of pylons. Diamond Bar is very suburban and middle class with houses spaced further apart, hills and more green spaces. If this was the same rapist, he was unbothered by the different types of location and confident of escaping different types of homes: Kyle’s house was two storeys high, more difficult to escape than the other scenes, all bungalows.

As for their descriptions of his appearance, they might have attributes in common, but there was always an odd one out. It is commonly reported that the Night Stalker was famous for his bad teeth and halitosis, but what did these rape survivors say about that?

TEETH

1. Kyle – straight, white, excessive gums
2. Dickman – no mention – despite the Night Stalker’s teeth being so ‘distinctive’.
3. Khovananth – stained with gaps, particularly between the front two. This is close to Richard Ramirez’s teeth at that time.
4. Abowath – wide front teeth, no gaps, but she later changed her description to “crooked and stained” and “something strange about his teeth.”

So, that leads you to think that at two of them definitely saw the same man – the two whose crimes were almost identical. Khovananth and Abowath both lost their husbands to close-range gunshot wounds. This brings us to the hair, commonly reported as “dishevelled.” But this is what they really said.

HAIR

1. Kyle – Black, wavy and side-parted, shiny and clean. He had bangs/a fringe swept to one side.
2. Dickman – curly, dark brown.
3. Khovananth – curly, brown.
4. Abowath – curly, blonde or light brown.

There we have three different hair colours, a discrepancy excused by the poor light quality, although Dickman and Abowath said they saw him standing under the bathroom light and it was daylight by the end of the Khovananth attack. They had a clear view of the attacker’s hair.

EYES

1. Kyle – brown.
2. Dickman – not mentioned.
3. Khovananth – brown.
4. Abowath – not mentioned.

Ramirez had very dark eyes; they look almost black, but nobody mentioned that. He also had very distinctive and unusual arched eyebrows – at a time when he had short hair, and they should have been visible. Yet none of them mentioned anything about his eye area. The Khovananth composite shows bulging eyes, very different to Ramirez’s.

HEIGHT

1. Kyle – 5’10” – 6’
2. Dickman – 5’8” – 5’9” changed in court to 6’ – 6’1”
3. Khovananth – 6’
4. Abowath – 6’2 – 6’4”

Regarding the height, Dickman’s has the biggest discrepancy. He was fairly short and she had said this to three separate officers, yet in court, insisted that they all lied and the man was tall. Kyle was unsure, putting him at a tall average, until changing her mind in August and asserting that he was six feet.

ETHNICITY

1. Kyle – tanned, Latino.
2. Dickman – Caucasian.
3. Khovananth – dark skinned “like a Mexican” but changed to light-skinned with a tan.
4. Abowath – Caucasian at first, but later she insisted he was yellowish in complexion and had “Latin features”.

So, again, they all interpret him differently. Abowath’s is strange. While it is entirely possible for Latinos to be blonde, why would she describe a light-haired man, yet later claim he looked “latin.” Light hair is not what one immediately associates with being Hispanic – and when identifying strangers, people tend to rely on stereotypes.

VOICE/ACCENT

1. Kyle – ‘Spanish’ sounding.
2. Dickman – no mention.
3. Khovananth – undeniable accent, sounded uneducated.
4. Abowath – no accent, standard American?

Again, the accents make it seem like two were Latino and two were Caucasian.

ESTIMATED AGE

• Kyle – 20
• Dickman – 27
• Khovananth – 30-35
• Abowath – 25-30

While it can be difficult to judge age in the dark, when terrified, there is an age range of fifteen years here.

SEXUAL ASSAULT KIT

1. Kyle – no result presented at trial.
2. Dickman – no result presented at trial.
3. Khovananth – no result presented at trial.
4. Abowath – semen inconsistent with Richard Ramirez’s blood type.

Ramirez should not have been prosecuted for Abowath at all – the wrong description and not his semen. Inez Erickson (from the Orange County incident) should also be mentioned here. While she could not identify the man, he said the same things about Satan as in the Abowath case, which suggests that was the same person. If it was, then the semen there would surely not match Ramirez. The two locations, while 35 miles apart, are connected by the same stretches of freeway – the California Highway 57 and the Interstate 5.

The only thing these attackers have in common is being thin with curly or wavy hair. For all the other features, there is one that doesn’t quite match Ramirez casting doubt over who really committed the crimes. Readers, what is your opinion?

-VenningB-