All language subtitles for Very.Scary.People.S02E06.The.Night.Stalker.I.Will.Be.Avenged.Part.2.1080p.MAX.WEB-DL.DD+2.0.H.264-playWEB_track3_[eng]

♪♪

Milam:
Me and Ricky were best friends.

He was just a normal kid
like everybody.

We went to school together.

He was very smart.

God-fearing person.

He studied the Bible.

He was a good, good student.

And then certain things started
going wrong with Ricky,

and he started doing bad things.

He was doing something
very wrong.

My belief -- you live by
the sword, you die by the sword,

and that's just the way it is.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

Welcome to "Very Scary People."

I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

The media called it a rampage.

There was a serial killer
on the loose in California,

random attacks throughout
the spring and summer of 1985.

No one felt safe.

Police described his actions
as savage.

He broke into people's homes,
stole anything of value,

then raped, beat, and murdered
those he found inside.

He had been linked to at least
15 murders,

from children to the elderly,

male and female,
wealthy and poor.

Now investigators had
a promising lead,

one that would finally end

the Night Stalker's
reign of terror.

Here's part two of "The Night
Stalker: I Will Be Avenged."

♪♪

♪♪

Reporter: The victim --
her throat had been slashed.

He found her
horribly mutilated and murdered.

Reporter: It appears the suspect
got in through an open window.

He stole a lot of jewelry

and graduated to these
horrible crimes of violence.

It was a night of sheer terror.

She begged him not to shoot her.

It was an isolated murder here
and an isolated one there,

but then, that summer,
it was just constant.

Reporter: Five murders
and three sexual attacks

in the past eight weeks.

This man may be linked
to at least six homicides.

Reporter #2: Seven bodies
beaten, stabbed, or shot.

Reporter #3:
33 cases, including 14 murders,

have definitely been linked
to the Walk-In Killer.

The killer leaves the pentagram,
the mark of the devil.

He was openly bringing
a Satanic aspect to the attacks.

I'm nervous.

You know,
I'm nervous for my family,

nervous for my friends
and neighbors.

Reporter: 29-year-old Bill Carns
was shot in the head.

Yochelson: But what was
different about this incident --

there was a young man
who lived a couple blocks away.

Jenkins:
He spotted a suspicious man,

and he is able to get
a partial license plate number.

Jordan:
The license plate matched

with a 1976 orange
Toyota station wagon.

And so it was one of
the best leads that they got

through the whole investigation.

Martin: It affords law
enforcement the ability to issue

an all-points bulletin
for the orange station wagon.

♪♪

And, ultimately, that
station wagon turns up

abandoned in a parking lot.

So the police -- they watch
the car for 24 hours,

and the driver never showed up.

Eventually, they brought it in
to be processed for evidence.

Martin: The forensic examination
of the car

helped reveal the presence
of a latent fingerprint

off the rearview mirror
of the car.

Yochelson:
There was a brand-new technology

that was just coming online.

It was called
the Automated Fingerprint

Identification System, or AFIS,

and it's computerized technology
where a fingerprint is scanned.

It goes through a database.
and compared.

The computer spits out
possible matches,

and then there's
a physical match.

Martin: He'd been arrested in
December of '83 for auto theft,

and that was on file.

That's where the make occurred.

And it came in just in time

to help them identify
the Night Stalker.

Block: The individual who
we believe is responsible

for these crimes --

a man by the name
of Richard Ramirez.

Richard Ramirez was a tall,
thin, dark-haired, dark-eyed,

Hispanic male
with rotting teeth,

a 25-year-old described drifter
from El Paso, Texas.

Martin:
There was a booking photo,

and his photograph
was published.

Block:
At this very moment,

an alert is going out
to all law enforcement agencies

to be on the lookout
for this individual,

who is to be considered armed
and extremely dangerous.

Jordan: And now police
all over California

are on the hunt
for Richard Ramirez.

The police were also staking out
the Greyhound bus station

where he was known to frequent.

So he gets off the bus,
and the first thing that he sees

is a newspaper stand
with his picture

on the front of "L.A. Times."

Big picture.

Vidal: And believe me,
exactly what

that booking photo looked like

was exactly the way he looked.

He's surprised when the crowd
recognizes him.

The jig is up.

Reporter #3: Walk-In Killer
suspect Richard Ramirez

had just discovered
he was a wanted man

and desperately tried
to make a run for it.

Hernandez: He starts running.
He gets into a bus.

People recognize him in the bus.
He jumps out the bus.

He fled on foot
and tried to steal a car.

I was assigned to my car, 4A57,
with my partner.

We handle a radio call.

We receive a broadcast
over the air

of a possible
Night Stalker sighting.

Hernandez: He tries to hijack
this old classic Mustang.

You don't do that in East L.A.

Reporter #3: He chased after
the suspect after he claims

Ramirez was trying to steal
his red Mustang.

And even though he says he was
being threatened with a gun,

Pinon fought
that suspect anyway.

Then I got him by the neck.

Reporter #3: Got him by
the neck, and then what?

Then we struggled back and forth
over the car.

During this time, we're hearing
broadcasts of requests

for additional units to respond.

The air unit, police helicopter,

was requested to follow
any possible suspect.

He was last seen traveling
Eastbound on 8th Street.

Yochelson:
They chased him physically.

A number of the other neighbors
got involved.

Hernandez: And people were just
yelling, "El matón,"

"The killer,"
and "The Night Stalker."

And I remember going up
on Indiana to Percy Street,

and we see people
pointing down the direction

where this person was going.

So then it was a mob.
It was a mob scene.

Then Ramirez attempted to
carjack another vehicle.

Big mistake.

Reporter #3:
Saw another man hitting his wife

while pulling her
out of her gold Granada.

He hit her?
Yes, he tried to --

Where'd he hit her?

Oh, he hit her right here,
all over right here.

What was she thinking?
Was she scared? Yes.

Reporter #3: That's when Torres
grabbed the pipe

and began hitting that man.

Vidal:
When I exited my police car,

he was bleeding
from the back of his head.

I remember that.

Ultimately, a group of folks
realize who it Is

and wind up grabbing
onto Ramirez.

At that point, he was dead meat.

My concern was
I wanted to remove him

from that hostile situation
that he was in at the time.

He was hit over the head
with, like, a copper rod

they used to ground
these telephone poles.

I'm sure he was happy to see
the cops show up.

Vidal: He was on the grass
parkway of the street,

south side of Hubbard,
and he was laying there,

and the deputy had
just rolled him over.

We requested
a rescue ambulance to come.

You look at the media coverage
of the time,

you'll that he's bandaged

because he was struck
on the head during the arrest.

And these citizens were heroes.

They caught the Night Stalker.

♪♪

Walls: We're happy to report
that the suspect

that we have in custody
is Richard Ramirez,

otherwise known
as the Night Stalker.

Vidal: He's handcuffed,
hands behind his back.

When I was talking to him,
I felt just different.

You might call it Satanic.

I mean, he just looked
the presence of evil before you.

He was a drifter.
He was in Arizona for a while.

Came to California
for unknown reasons.

Started out as a burglar

and graduated to these
horrible crimes of violence

and the Satanism,
which my personal view,

was an affect on his part
to stir up notoriety.

The Night Stalker was now
in custody,

but the big question was,

what happened to this person
that created this monster?

Ricardo Leyva Ramirez
was born February 29, 1960,

in El Paso, Texas.

Hancock: Richard's mother worked
in a boot factory,

and his father worked
for the Santa Fe railroad.

Richard was the youngest
of five kids.

Milam:
We went to school together.

He was very smart.

God-fearing person.

And then he started
doing bad things.

Hernandez:
When we interviewed some people,

people were saying that he was,
like, a little petty thief.

And he didn't have
a very good reputation.

Hernandez: We found out
through medical records

that he had had many seizures
in the sixth, seventh grade,

and we had a doctor
examine him.

And they did some scans
on his brain,

and they found
some abnormalities.

There was something wrong
with him.

Maybe he was epileptic, but he
never got an official diagnosis.

Richard Ramirez also had
a very disturbed childhood.

He had what can be considered
now a very abusive father.

The father was
very authoritarian.

He would not hesitate
to use the whip

and, you know, belt him.

He would go and steal things.

He would get, you know,
caught by his dad,

and part of that corrective
measure that he would use,

he would tie him up
at a cemetery

that was right next door
to where they used to live.

Put him on crosses, tied up,
overnight.

So he had to endure those things
very early age.

We're talking about
when he was 12, 14 years old.

Jordan: Richard's father was
clearly an influence,

but many believe that it was
another family member

that may have done
the most damage.

Martin:
Part of Ramirez's childhood specific to his teen years

had to deal with a cousin,

a Vietnam veteran
who had shared with him

some of the details
of war, of combat,

of some of the killings
that he had witnessed.

He taught him how to use
the knife

and how to cut throats.

Milam: Ricky was very,
very scared of Mike,

and he had panic attacks.

He told me how much
he despised Mike.

Schecter:
Mike, who had all these tales

about Vietnamese women
he had raped and killed

and Polaroid photographs

which he would show
young Ramirez

of decapitated heads of women
he had raped and then beheaded,

and who really schooled him
in how to kill stealthily.

Sometimes gruesome pictures
put images in your mind.

And they did have
a great impact on Ricky.

♪♪

There's no question that his
criminal behavior later in life

reflects lots of sex offenses
that are violent,

that involve torture,

that involve horrific,
brutal acts.

So for him,
there was a clear fusion

between lust and cruelty.

Hancock:
When Richard was 13,

he was present when Mike got
into an argument with his wife

and shot her in the face
and killed her.

Dietz: Ramirez shot many of
his victims in the face.

That is not a common place
to shoot people.

And yet he is shooting victims
in the face

disproportionately often,

just like his cousin Mike
shot the first homicide victim

Ramirez ever witnessed
in the face.

Hancock: After he shot his wife,
he went to trial,

and he was found not guilty
by reason of insanity.

He was given a lighter sentence,

and he actually,
after he finished his sentence,

came back into Richard's life.

It seems like a pivotal,
harrowing moment

in this young kid's development.

Jordan: Hardened by
his early experiences,

Richard became increasingly
drawn to macabre things.

Richard took to sleeping
in cemeteries.

He would wear
a lot of black clothes

and go into what you can
perceive as a persona

of a gothic, evil
night marauder.

He started with marijuana
and then later on

went into heavy drugs like acid.

He was having
epileptic seizures.

Coupled with the drugs
and, you know,

all that stuff,
it's a combination.

He explained it to me that,
"You don't care about nobody,

not even yourself,"
and when you come to that stage,

it's a very,
very dangerous stage.

Hancock:
He didn't go to school much.

He started hanging out
with a rough gang.

Richard dropped out of
high school when he was 14.

He got in trouble with the law.

And once that happened,

I guess he decided
not to go back to school.

And then certain things started
going wrong with Ricky there.

♪♪

Jordan: After Ramirez was
finally captured,

the arresting officers said
that he was very polite,

but he refused to cooperate.

Yochelson: The sheriffs came
and transported him later

to the county jail,
where he was booked.

When he was arrested,
his arrest had led to a locker

at the Greyhound bus station.

There was a trove of evidence
recovered in that bus locker --

stolen property
that was linked to the victims.

The guns weren't recovered,

but ammunition that had been
in those guns were recovered

and linked to Ramirez.

The charges were filed within
48 hours, as required by law.

Jordan: Richard Ramirez was
charged with 14 murders,

19 burglaries, 7 rapes,
and a slew of other charges.

Richard was arrested in '85,

and it was three years
before he went on trial.

He came to court
wearing sunglasses.

He changed from a really ugly,
evil-looking guy to a rock star.

♪♪

Aw, you ain't no reporter.

Jenkins: Richard Ramirez was
finally behind bars,

and Californians could
finally sleep at night

after a year of being on edge.

Now came the monumental task

of bringing the Night Stalker
to justice.

Judge: All right, this again is
case number A771272,

the People of the State
of California vs.

Richard Ramirez, the defendant.

There were tremendous challenges
just putting the case together.

Martin:
You've got all these agencies that you've got to coordinate.

You've got all these victims
that you've got to care for.

This was a monumental effort,

and then you add to it that
this is a capital murder case.

The preparations are
absolutely incredible.

Yochelson:
He was initially represented by two appointed members

of the L.A. County
Public Defender's office.

Great attorneys.

He had excellent representation.

But for whatever reason,
Ramirez's family

chose to fire
the Public Defender's office

and bring in a series
of private counsel.

First issue that came up was
who was paying for this defense,

because mounting a capital
defense under any circumstances

is tremendously expensive.

Hernandez:
And then he got Mr. Gallegos

for a couple of weeks.

Woman: My understanding,
Mr. Ramirez --

that you would like
to have Mr. Gallegos

as your attorney.
Is that correct? Yes.

Mr. Gallegos apparently
had offered him

some deals with movies.

Jordan:
In the '80s, some serial killers

were treated like celebrities,

and the media outlets
would actually compete

to get the rights
to their stories.

Ramirez was in that group.

Linedecker: He did what
a lot of people like him do.

He suddenly decided that,
"Gee, I'm a celebrity,

and I'm going to milk this for
everything I can milk it for."

Yochelson:
There was some indication

that there was a book deal
in the works,

which poses all kinds
of ethical issues,

so the judge actually
appointed another lawyer

just to advise Ramirez
as to the possible issues

of financing his defense
through a book deal,

and Ramirez refused
to talk to that lawyer.

Ultimately, Daniel and Arturo
Hernandez came on the case.

They're not related, even though
they have the same last name.

The family has retained us
officially,

and as far as we're concerned,

we are the attorneys
for Mr. Ramirez.

Hernandez:
We ended up with the case,

and it made a big difference,
absolutely,

knowing the culture,
bilingualism,

because, you know, in El Paso,
we speak both languages.

We seem to get along very well.

Hernandez: He was very impressed
that I unshackled him and not --

you know, we broke the ice,
so he hired us.

He signed the substitution of
attorneys that need to be filed.

But we were not welcome
in L.A.

We were really in danger.

I was working as a paralegal
with Arturo Hernandez,

who is now my husband.

The day that Judge Soper
let them into the case,

I received a phone call
late in the evening,

and they said,
"We know who you are.

We are the family of one of
the victims in the Ramirez case,

and we're going to kill you."

So I immediately hung up
on the person

and hightailed it
out of the office.

Yochelson: And there was
an issue that was brought up

as to whether or not
they were qualified

to handle a case like this.

Both had only been attorneys
for about five years

and apparently had never
handled a capital case.

Jordan: At preliminary hearings,
defense and prosecution

would get into shouting matches
with each other.

Woman: They're matters
of public record, sir.

There's presently pending
in that court --

These liars.

Judge Tynan and I did not
get along, to say the least.

He was always mocking us.

He, to me, did not have what
they call judicial temperament.

He would get pissed off.

Yochelson: Daniel and Arturo
Hernandez made statements

that the prosecution considered

were unsupported
by the evidence --

flat out lying
or going for publicity.

Phil Halpin,
who was lead counsel,

lead prosecutor --
very knowledgeable,

knows how to handle a case,
but there was really contention

between the Hernandezes
and Phil.

And I think a lot of that
was just natural,

given the nature of the case and
the stakes that were involved.

And in the middle of all of this
chaos was Richard Ramirez.

Reporter: Richard Ramirez came
into court for the final day

of his pre-trial hearing
flashing the same grin

he displayed during testimony

about the grisly details
of the Night Stalker killings.

He kept smiling
as Judge James Nelson

ruled there
is sufficient evidence

to bind the 26-year-old drifter
over for trial

on 14 counts of murder

plus 36 other counts
of attempted murder,

rape, robbery, and burglary.

Yochelson:
He was arraigned and immediately

took on the persona
of the Night Stalker

as he left court,
and the circus began.

Reporter:
Ramirez revealed a pentagram,

a symbol of devil worship,
on his left palm

and later shouted out

what most observers agreed
was "Hail Satan."

Hail Satan.

Aguilar-Hernandez:
The first time that I spoke to

Richard Ramirez on the phone,

it was -- it was very scary,
very scary,

because I knew what he had
represented on his hand

and all the Satan hype
that had happened

after he had done that
in open court.

Yochelson:
I truly believe that

all of this
was simply him acting out

and wanting to play the role of
the celebrity serial killer --

that he's the Night Stalker,
he should be feared.

♪♪

♪♪

Welcome back to
"Very Scary People."

On August 30, 1988, almost
three years after his arrest,

the Night Stalker finally
stands trial in Los Angeles.

But the man who terrified
the nation for more than a year

isn't finished yet.

Instead, he begins
a bizarre new chapter

that has some wondering

if the Night Stalker
could escape justice after all.

Linedecker: It was one of
the biggest trials

in the history of L.A.

The courtroom was packed,

and you had to get there
hours ahead of time

to even have a chance
to get inside the courtroom.

Richard really loved
the attention.

Jordan: Ramirez, who had spent
months in the shadows,

now seemed to relish
his time in the spotlight.

Hernandez: We got him
some Armani suits

donated from Goodwill.

He changed from a really ugly,
evil-looking guy to a rock star.

And shades, the teeth --

you know, yeah,
we got his teeth fixed,

so he became
a very well-looking guy.

His transition was just
another part

of the kind of circus atmosphere
that the case was taking on.

It's almost what you expected

because he just seemed
to be enjoying his role

as the defendant,
the star of this case.

The gratification he was
getting, he was being fed,

so he said, "Wow," you know,
"I'm getting all this fame now."

And, unfortunately,
he got all his glory.

Aguilar-Hernandez:
He had a very powerful energy,

but it wasn't a good energy.

It was something
other than good.

It was just difficult
to explain what you felt.

Man: Case number A771272,
Richard Ramirez.

Ramirez's father took the stand
and tried to alibi him.

Hancock:
Julian Ramirez had testified

that Richard was at
a family gathering in El Paso

at the same time that were
several attacks in Los Angeles.

Which would eliminate him
as a suspect

because if Ramirez
didn't commit these,

he didn't commit
the others either.

The prosecution brought me in
as a rebuttal witness

to the father's testimony.

I interviewed Julian Ramirez
in 1985.

He said to me,

"I have not seen him
for two or three years."

Yochelson: Ramirez periodically
acted up between trial --

or acted out.

Parasites.

Yochelson: He came to court
wearing sunglasses.

Judge Tynan ordered him
to take off the sunglasses,

and he said, "No,"
in a very loud voice.

Security in the courtroom
was increased

after Ramirez threatened

to have an unidentified friend
smuggle a gun in to him

so that he could kill
the prosecution team.

They had to erect
metal detectors,

blocking the entrance
to the courtroom,

and then Ramirez was brought in
heavily guarded and shackled.

There were rumors
about everything --

he was gonna bring in a gun --
so we were frisked all the time.

Came with the territory,
I guess.

There was something
that happened in the lock-up

where the bailiffs
took him to the ground.

Two officers that were
martial arts,

ex-Navy SEALs --
they were watching him.

They said that he went
like this,

"I'm gonna cut your head off,"
threatening the witness.

That causes a whole, you know,
bar-fight-like scenario.

They grabbed him, they drag him,
and beat the crap out of him.

Jordan: With so much drama
happening in the courtroom,

the judge decided that the two
Hernandez attorneys needed help.

Yochelson: Judge Tynan appointed
a third lawyer.

He made a great selection
in Ray Clark,

who came on and took over
a lot of the case.

Hernandez:
A wonderful, wonderful guy.

He helped out a lot.

But Ray Clark also had
a controversial strategy.

Reporter: Any speculation
on how Mr. Ramirez

might stand right now
at this point?

Hopefully not guilty.

I think somebody else did it.

He is innocent
in your mind?

He is not guilty in my mind,

and I would like for the press
to make the distinction.

The argument at trial
was that somebody else

did all these crimes.

Linedecker:
Some other dude did it.

I don't think there was another
dude like Richard Ramirez.

Jordan: And that wasn't even the
oddest thing about the trial.

The entire back row
was filled with goth girls.

♪♪

Reporter: Why were you
in the courtroom today?

I just wanted to see
what he looked like.

I think he's cute.

Yochelson:
He loved the attention.

At this point, the women
started showing up,

the so-called groupies,
who would come to court

and want to see Ramirez
and who were rooting for him.

Hancock:
The first thing I remember

is that I walked into
the courtroom,

the entire back row was filled
with goth girls

in black leather dresses

and dark black hair
and silver and chains.

All kinds of people --
really crazy, you know,

street folks and some other
professional ones.

There was a lot
of weird stuff --

you know, "Send me your semen.
I want to have your baby."

You know, I mean, people --
people are really crazy.

The thing that really
astonished me in this

was the attraction of
what you'd describe

as otherwise intelligent
and capable women

attracted to somebody
who is accused of crimes

of this horrific magnitude.

Woman: Everyone makes him look
so bad, you know,

but I know that he's --

he's a nice person
'cause I've met him and I know.

It's an extreme,
exaggerated form

of the tendency of many women
to be attracted to bad boys,

and there's some kind of
"Beauty and the Beast" fantasy

going on.

You know, "My love will
transform this creature

into a warm, loving being."

Hernandez:
Doreen Lioy was one of Richard's

very persistent followers --
groupies.

She was a, you know,
very eloquent, very sharp lady.

One of the things that she did
was claiming

that she wanted to die with him

and she would go
and kill herself,

you know,
if he was ever put to death.

But she really liked to,
you know, write to Richard,

and she apparently wrote
very good letters.

You know, this is Los Angeles,
and even then,

even as a young attorney,

it just seemed to be
par for the course.

It's show biz,
and it was a distraction

because it was annoying.

At that time, it was like the --
the case of the century.

Yochelson: There was a lot
of press coverage.

Mostly print reporters
were there.

There were still photographers
in the courtroom.

Television filmed
the closing argument.

Many of the jurors
had tears in their eyes

as they listened to the horror.

Yochelson:
There was direct evidence.

Surviving victims were able
to identify Ramirez

and describe what he did.

You connect his fingerprints
to a couple of the scenes.

It's either Ramirez doing this

or that somebody else
was wearing his fingerprints.

The guns were linked to Ramirez

that were used
at the crime scenes,

so that's another piece
of the circumstantial evidence.

And all the stolen property
traced back to him, as well.

Yochelson: Richard Ramirez stole
a lot of jewelry,

and a lot of this jewelry
was recovered

that was in turn identified

by either the victims
or the victims' survivors.

Jordan:
Despite all the evidence,

the defense team
continued to argue

that Richard Ramirez
was just the wrong guy,

and in one case, they actually
tried to implicate

the victim's family.

Reporter:
Jack Vincow discovered the body

of his 79-year-old mother
stabbed to death

in her Los Angeles apartment,

but Vincow later admitted
under defense cross-examination

that his mother had often
engaged in loud disputes

with Vincow's mentally disturbed
brother Manny.

Jenkins: So the defense was
shooting from the hip

trying to create any kind of
diversion from Ramirez's guilt.

We were not here to provide
total exoneration.

We're trying to throw in
some kind of a reasonable doubt,

you know, and that was our duty.

Reporter:
But as Vincow described

how he found his mother's body,

Ramirez leaned forward
and smiled.

Hancock: He had a little smirk
on his face.

He was just radiating evil.

Just -- just pure malevolence.

I could feel waves of hatred
coming out of him

and just pure malice.

And I looked at him,
and I thought,

"I better not look
at him anymore."

Dietz: When he got the nickname
"Night Stalker,"

why not play it out
a little more

and get some more power

by scaring people
in the courtroom,

creating images
that would be remembered

decades later of his antics
in the courtroom?

So he succeeded.

Yochelson:
This was a long trial.

We had approximately
165 witnesses,

some 8,000 pages
of transcript or testimony

that the jurors had to go
through to reach their verdict.

And then a bizarre twist
made the public wonder

if Richard Ramirez was
still killing from behind bars.

One day, one of the jurors
didn't show up.

But big deal. Death always went
with the territory.

I'll see you in Disneyland.

♪♪

Reporter:
Dark sunglasses and shackles --

that was Richard Ramirez's
daily attire

throughout the almost
year-long Night Stalker trial.

And from the very beginning,
prosecutor Philip Halpin

left no doubt about
his intentions for Ramirez.

Ray Clark's argument was,
we got to have sympathy

even for the worst
of all people.

But you're not gonna
get sympathy for a guy

that had done
all these horrible things.

Some people would hang you
for spitting on a sidewalk.

I wouldn't hang you for
atrocities such as Hitler did.

Hernandez:
I would've argued differently.

We're talking about
a death penalty.

We're gonna take
somebody's life.

The state is gonna
execute somebody.

The prosecution's argument was
a very methodical argument.

It was simply going through
all the crimes,

listing all of this evidence
that linked Ramirez.

Jordan: It was a long
and tumultuous trial.

In the end, there were
165 witnesses

and 658 pieces of evidence
presented

before the defense
and the prosecution

gave their final
closing arguments.

As the jury was deliberating
this mountain of evidence

that they had to consider,

one day, one of the jurors
didn't show up.

Then she was found dead.

There was a lot of speculation
in the media that --

that the murder of this juror

was really somehow
related to the case,

that it was a conspiracy --

maybe, perhaps Ramirez
had followers who had done this,

that Ramirez had somehow
orchestrated this.

Well, the rumors included me
as a co-conspirator.

I was the prime suspect.

Yochelson:
None of this was true.

It was an act
of domestic violence

on the part
of the juror's husband.

But this was all out there,

and the defense argued
that there should be a mistrial

because they were afraid
that the jurors would speculate

that it was somehow
connected to the case.

You know, I thought, "Oh, boy.

If they're gonna need to
declare a mistrial,

that's gonna be God awful."

An alternate juror
was substituted in,

and under California law,

the jury had to begin their
deliberations all over again.

Jordan:
After such a chaotic trial,

the jury had to deal with
this awful distraction

and the murder
of one of their own.

But in the end,
they did their job.

♪♪

Reporter: Richard Ramirez wasn't
in the courtroom

to hear the verdict against him.

He opted to stay in his cell

for what was
a loud and clear decision.

"We, the jury in the above
entitled action,

find the defendant,
Richard Ramirez,

guilty of murder."

Yochelson:
They came back with verdicts

convicting Ramirez
of 13 counts of murder,

murder in the first degree,

with various what are called
special circumstances

making him eligible
for the death penalty,

and then 30 other felonies.

He was yelling from
the holding cell, "I'm guilty.

I want the death penalty.
I want to die now."

Reporter: When Richard Ramirez
was found guilty,

he left the courthouse
flashing the sign of Satan.

Evil.

Reporter:
When he returned to find out if he would live or die,

he flashed an obscenity.

♪♪

The final courtroom chapter
of a serial killer

was played out
for Richard Ramirez.

The 29-year-old
devil-worshipping

drifter from Texas

had been found guilty
of the heinous crimes.

This courtroom date was
to pronounce final sentencing.

I don't think anyone
was surprised

when the sentence was read.

"We, the jury in the above
entitled action,

found it to be
an intentional murder,

fix the penalty
therefore at death."

Reporter:
And Ramirez finally spoke,

evoking the spirit of Satan
after a year-long trial.

When he was leaving
the courtroom for the last time,

he made some statements.

Reporter: He made it very clear
he is not afraid to die.

But big deal. Death always went
with the territory.

I'll see you in Disneyland.

Jordan:
As the trial ended,

his time in the spotlight
was over,

but still there was one person
who would stick by his side.

Man: Here she comes.

Man #2: She's here
and walking in the door.

Martin:
Doreen Lioy was the winner

in the serious suitors
that he had attracted

during the course of the trial.

I just wanted to say
I'm ecstatically happy today

and very, very proud
to have married Richard

and to be his wife.

And I hope that you will be
very respectful of the day

and let me go
and enjoy my day in peace,

and I appreciate your patience.
Thank you.

Reporter: Couldn't you respond
to some of the allegations

that you're a recluse,

that you live in a fantasy
world, things like that?

- No.
- Don't you want to speak to us?

Can you just say why,
Doreen?

In 2009, the San Francisco
police department

was able to link an unsolved
homicide of a small child.

Once he had his DNA
in the system,

they started finding out,
for example, the little girl,

9-year-old that was killed
in San Francisco.

She was killed
and sexually assaulted,

which was a terrible case.

Jordan:
Doreen Lioy divorced Ramirez,

citing this information
as the reason

she wanted to distance herself
from the Night Stalker.

Kristof: He never showed
any sign of remorse

all through the trials.

He never showed any sign
of remorse whatsoever.

He was just a monster.

I don't think we've seen the
likes of him before or since,

and thank God for that.

Since the mid-1980s, I've asked
the correctional officers

to unchain the inmate
that I was going to interview

so that he'd be comfortable.

Richard Ramirez is
the only inmate I've interviewed

for whom I did not request
he be freed and unchained.

Carns: It has put a huge detour
into my life.

I wasn't the same person
I was prior to the injury.

Now it's time to pick up
the pieces and keep going on.

He would've never stopped.

He would've never stopped.

Richard Ramirez continued
to attract female admirers

from behind the walls
of San Quentin up until his end.

After almost 24 years
on death row,

Ramirez died on June 7, 2013,
at the age of 53 --

not by execution

but from complications
related to B-cell lymphoma.

Meanwhile, victims' families
and survivors

of the Night Stalker's
vicious attacks

did what they could to move
forward with their lives.

I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

Thanks for watching.

Good night.