Joseph James DeAngelo: The Golden State Killer
Overview
Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. is an American serial killer, serial rapist, burglar, and former police officer whose crimes terrorized communities throughout California during the 1970s and 1980s. Over the course of his criminal career, different police departments knew the unidentified offender by several names, including the Visalia Ransacker, East Area Rapist, Original Night Stalker, and eventually the Golden State Killer. For decades investigators did not realize that crimes separated by hundreds of miles and investigated by numerous law-enforcement agencies were the work of the same man.
DeAngelo ultimately admitted responsibility for 13 murders and crimes against dozens of additional victims. Prosecutors described a criminal campaign involving nearly 50 rapes as well as burglaries, kidnappings, robberies, attempted murder, and false imprisonment. His confirmed criminal activity stretched from the mid-1970s until 1986, while some of the earliest burglaries associated with the broader series began several years before his first confirmed murder.
Police Officer and the Man Behind the Crimes
Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. was born on November 8, 1945, in Bath, New York. He served in the United States Navy during the Vietnam War and later studied police science and criminal justice in California. His background would become particularly disturbing after his identification because he was employed as a police officer during part of the same period in which communities were being terrorized by a mysterious burglar and sexual predator.
DeAngelo joined the Exeter Police Department in 1973. Exeter is located only a short distance from Visalia, where a prolific burglar soon became known as the Visalia Ransacker. In 1976 DeAngelo moved north and became an officer with the Auburn Police Department. His time in Auburn overlapped with the reign of the East Area Rapist in the Sacramento region.
His law-enforcement career ended in 1979 after he was caught shoplifting a hammer and a can of dog repellent from a store. He was convicted of misdemeanor shoplifting and dismissed from the Auburn Police Department. In retrospect, the items involved in the theft attracted considerable attention because investigators later learned that DeAngelo routinely carried tools, weapons, restraints, and other equipment while stalking neighborhoods and entering homes.
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