| Randy Kraft | |
|---|---|
Randy Kraft, pictured during his trial in 1989. |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Randy Steven Kraft |
| Also known as | The Freeway Killer, The Score-Card Killer |
| Born | March 19, 1945 Long Beach, California, United States |
| Conviction | Murder |
| Sentence | Death |
| Killings | |
| Number of victims: | 16–67 |
| Span of killings | September 20, 1971–May 13, 1983 |
| Country | United States |
| State(s) | California |
| Date apprehended | May 14, 1983 |
Randy Steven Kraft (born March 19, 1945) is an American serial killer. He was convicted of 16 murders and is strongly suspected of committing at least 51 others.
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Kraft's parents moved to California from Wyoming prior to his birth. Born in Los Angeles County in 1945, he was the fourth child and the only son in his family. In 1948 the Kraft family moved to Westminster, California in neighboring Orange County. Kraft was regarded as bright and scholarly at Westminster High School, where he graduated in 1963. He went on to attend Claremont Men's College, now Claremont McKenna College, in Claremont, California.
At CMC, Kraft joined the ROTC (Reserve Officer Training Corps). He demonstrated in support of the Vietnam War and campaigned for conservative presidential candidate Barry Goldwater in 1964. The following year he began working as a bartender at a local gay bar. At this time, acquaintances noted his extensive use of Valium to ward off stomach pains and migraines. Kraft earned a bachelor's degree in economics in 1968. By this time, his political views had shifted to the left, and he began working for Robert Kennedy's political campaign.
In 1968 Kraft joined the U.S. Air Force. Because of high scores on aptitude tests and background checks, he was provided with high-security clearances. He was stationed at Edwards Air Force Base, in Kern County, California. In a job-related intelligence test it was found that Kraft had an I.Q. of 129, which was rated "highly intelligent." [1]
In 1969, Kraft disclosed to his family that he was gay.[2] He was discharged from the Air Force on "medical" grounds the same year. Forced out of the military, Kraft resumed his bartending career.
Late in 1971, police found the decomposing body of Wayne Joseph Dukette, a 30-year-old gay bartender, beside Ortega Highway. The coroner placed the date of death around September 20, 1971, but found no obvious signs of foul play. Dukette’s clothing and belongings were never found. Dukette is thought to be Kraft's first victim.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, dozens of grisly homicides murders occurred along the freeways of California, with some victims turning up in the neighboring state of Oregon. The victims were young men and teenage boys, most of whom were savagely tortured and sexually abused. Some had been burned with a car cigarette lighter, and most had high levels of alcohol and tranquilizers in their blood systems, indicating they were rendered helpless before they were sadistically abused and killed.
The method of murders varied, with some strangled, some shot in the head and others killed through a combination of torture and drugs. Many victims had been bitten in the genitals and nipple areas, and some individuals also had their genitalia, head or eyes removed entirely. A number of victims were in the military, hitching their way either to or from their bases. Others were teenage runaways, hitchhikers or were picked up by the killer in gay bars.
Victims were typically found with their pants removed or unzipped, exposing bitten or removed sexual organs. Almost all of the individuals murdered were found barefoot, leading psychologists to suspect Kraft had sexual fetish for feet.
Kraft was nearly arrested in 1975. A 19-year-old high school dropout, Keith Daven Crotwell, left Long Beach on March 29, 1975, hitchhiking for southbound rides. Over a month later, Crotwell's severed head was found near the Long Beach Marina. Long Beach was scoured for the car that took Crotwell on his last ride, and it was quickly located. The registration was traced to Randy Steven Kraft. Police questioned Kraft on May 19, 1975. Kraft admitted taking Crotwell for a ride, saying that they went "just wandering around," but claimed he left Crotwell "alive and well" at an all-night café. Detectives reportedly wanted to charge Kraft with murder, but L.A. County prosecutors refused, citing the absence of a body or known cause of death.
At 1:10 a.m. on May 14, 1983, two California Highway Patrol officers pulled over a brown Toyota Celica driven by Kraft that had been weaving erratically on the San Diego Freeway in the Orange County community of Mission Viejo. As Kraft exited the car, he dumped the contents of a beer bottle onto the pavement. Officer Michael Sterling met Kraft at the front of his patrol car and observed that his jeans were unbuttoned. Sterling had Kraft perform a series of field sobriety tests, which he failed, and Sterling arrested Kraft for driving while intoxicated.
Sterling's partner Sgt. Michael Howard approached the Celica and saw a man in the passenger's seat, partially covered by a jacket with empty beer bottles around his feet. Later identified as Terry Lee Gambrel, a 25-year-old U.S. Marine, he had been strangled with his own belt. Other incriminating evidence was found in the car, including alcohol, tranquilizers, other prescription drugs and an envelope containing 47 pictures of young men in pornographic poses, appearing either asleep or dead.[3] The passenger seat was heavily bloodstained; however Gambrel had no open wounds. The officers turned Kraft over to the Orange County Sheriff's Department for further investigation. More evidence was found in the house Kraft shared with his partner, including clothes and personal possessions of young men who had turned up dead at the side of freeways over the last decade, and many photos of victims either unconscious or dead.
It was also discovered that Kraft kept a coded list of 61 neatly-printed terms and phrases such as "JAIL OUT" and "EDM" in his car. Upon closer investigation, the list was discovered to be a cryptic "scorecard" of his many victims: "JAIL OUT" referring to 23-year-old Roland Young (released from the Orange County drunk tank hours before his murder) and "EDM" to the initials of Edward Daniel Moore. The list also included four double murders, leading to a total of 65 listed victims. Two of the victims, Eric Church and Terry Gambrel, appear unlisted for unknown reasons. However, since the list is in code, the possibility exists that Eric Church and Terry Gambrel are listed in a way that investigators cannot recognize, which would lead to a total of 67 listed victims.
Kraft was eventually charged with 16 homicides committed between December 1972 and May, 1983.[4] He pleaded not guilty at his trial in 1988, but he was convicted on all counts and sentenced to death on November 29, 1989. The death sentence was upheld by the California Supreme Court on August 11, 2000. Kraft is currently on death row at the San Quentin State Prison.
To date, 22 of Kraft's 67 estimated victims remain unrecovered and unidentified. This is due in part to the killings occurring throughout several states with bodies dumped in varying locations.
Certain details surrounding some of Kraft's murders have caused many to suspect that Kraft did not always act alone.
During the trial, the prosecution believed the inconsistencies could be explained away because Kraft had not acted alone in his initial murder spree. His roommate, Jeff Graves, occasionally helped him, according to members of the prosecution team. Graves died of AIDS before police could question him, so the question of Kraft's accomplice was never raised in court.
In 1991, writer Dennis McDougal authored a book, Angel of Darkness, about the Kraft case. McDougal also published an article about the case in Beach magazine in January 2000.[5] McDougal recounted his interviews with Bob Jackson, who reportedly confessed to murdering two hitchhikers with Kraft, one in Wyoming in 1975 and Colorado in 1976. (Authorities in Colorado and Wyoming are unable to confirm these confessions.) Jackson also told McDougal that the list included only Kraft's "more memorable" murders, saying the total body count stood closer to 100. McDougal reported these allegations to the police and provided tape recordings of the interviews. Detectives quizzed Jackson and finally persuaded him to enter a mental hospital, but no murder charges were filed.
Kraft sued author McDougal and the publisher of Angel of Darkness (ISBN 0-446-51538-8), the book about Kraft's murders and trial, because, Kraft said, it smeared his "good name" and unjustly portrayed him as a "sick, twisted man," which hurt his "prospects for future employment." Kraft sought $62 million in damages. The lawsuit was dismissed as frivolous in June 1994.
Occasionally, Kraft (sometimes called the Southern California Strangler) is confused with William Bonin. Both have been called "The Freeway Killer," and both murdered young men and often left their victims roadside. Bonin would stop his vehicle to dump the bodies of his victims, while Kraft shoved his victims out of a fast-moving vehicle, often to gruesome effect. The similarity of the crimes often confused investigators, who were initially surprised that the murders continued after Bonin's arrest.
A third "Freeway Killer," Patrick Kearney, also happened to select young men as victims from the freeways of Southern California during the 1970s.