Daniel Lee Siebert

Serial Killer

Daniel Lee Siebert: A Multistate Serial Killer

Background and Escalation

Daniel Lee Siebert was an American serial killer whose known crimes stretched from the late 1970s through 1986 and crossed several states, including Nevada, California, Alabama and New Jersey. Born on June 17, 1954, in Mattoon, Illinois, Siebert moved frequently, used aliases and concealed his history from the people around him. He was ultimately convicted of five murders in Alabama and acknowledged responsibility for additional killings. During questioning, he claimed that he had killed at least a dozen people, although investigators were never able to conclusively connect him to every death he described. Siebert's first confirmed homicide occurred in Las Vegas, Nevada, in 1979. The victim was a man with whom Siebert had been romantically involved. Siebert stabbed the man repeatedly during a violent confrontation and was convicted of voluntary manslaughter rather than murder. He received a ten-year prison sentence but was released after serving only part of it. The relatively short period of incarceration allowed him to resume traveling, forming new relationships and committing increasingly calculated acts of violence. After leaving Nevada, Siebert lived in California. He worked as an artist and painter and sometimes presented himself as an art instructor. He could appear intelligent, creative and personable, qualities that helped him gain the confidence of potential victims. Beneath that outward appearance, however, he had a history of sudden violence and controlling behavior. He was wanted in San Francisco for an assault in which a woman survived being strangled, demonstrating a method he would repeatedly use in later murders.

The California Murders

While living in the Los Angeles area in 1985, Siebert encountered Gidget Castro and Nisie Gail McElrath. Both women were found strangled, and their cases were initially investigated amid a larger series of murders involving women in South Los Angeles. Some news coverage later associated Siebert with the nickname "Southside Slayer," but investigators did not believe he was responsible for all of the killings attributed to that unidentified offender. Gidget Castro, 28, was found on November 26, 1985, in an alley near the 4600 block of Washington Boulevard in Commerce, California. Her body had been partially undressed, and investigators determined that she had been strangled. Less than a month later, 23-year-old Nisie Gail McElrath was found dead in Los Angeles County. Authorities did not publicly establish a precise date on which McElrath was killed, but her body was recorded as having been found on December 19, 1985. In 1987, while awaiting prosecution for murders in Alabama, Siebert confessed to killing Castro and McElrath. Investigators reported that he supplied details about the crimes that had not been publicly released and that they believed only the killer would have known. Although the admissions strengthened the cases against him, his Alabama capital prosecutions took priority, and the California cases did not result in separate completed murder trials. ...

Confirmed Victims: (8)

Sherri Weathers Age: (24), Date of Death: 1986-02-19

Suspected Victims:

Sheryl Evans Age: (19), Date of Death: 1986-02

Daniel Lee Siebert - Wikipedia