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Randy Kraft Accused in 37 Deaths : Trail of Slain Young Men: ‘Investigator’s Nightmare’

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<i> Times Staff Writer</i>

It began with a routine traffic stop.

At 1:10 a.m. on May 14, 1983, two California Highway Patrol officers pulled over a brown Toyota Celica that had been weaving on the San Diego Freeway in Mission Viejo. Behind the wheel was Randy Steven Kraft; next to him was a Marine in his mid-20s, apparently asleep.

Within minutes, after a rough shake failed to rouse the Marine and they could find no pulse, the officers suspected that they had a homicide on their hands. A jacket covered the victim’s lap, and his pants had been pulled down to his knees.

Within hours, investigators searching the car had found color photographs of several other young men. Many were nude; they appeared to be dead. Within a day, Kraft had been linked to four other homicides in Southern California, six in Oregon and two in Michigan.

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Before it was over, Orange County prosecutors would conclude that the studious Long Beach computer consultant was one of the most prolific serial killers in U.S. history--a killer who drugged, sexually molested and strangled young men, mostly hitchhikers, and often mutilated their bodies.

Kraft’s neighbors and childhood friends were stunned by his arrest and the sordid revelations that followed. To them, it seemed impossible that the bright, former high school tennis player and Claremont Men’s College graduate could have committed the unspeakable crimes for which he is scheduled to be tried in July.

“You know those guys who always carried a slide rule with them everywhere, the bright guys? Randy was one of them,” said Santa Ana lawyer Clarence E. Haynes, who was in Kraft’s 1963 graduating class at Westminster High School.

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Kraft’s closest neighbor, Penny Dewees, said she and others who lived nearby “were all just astounded. It wasn’t the Randy Kraft I knew.”

Nonetheless, Kraft now stands accused in Orange County Superior Court of 37 murders. He faces 16 first-degree murder charges, and prosecutors say they intend to prove during the penalty phase of his trial that he is guilty of 21 others. No one has ever been accused in court of that many serial murders. Prosecutors say it will be the longest and most expensive trial in the history of the county, if not the state.

Kraft, who will be 42 this month, remains in isolation in the Orange County Jail, held without bail. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

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The complicated, tortuous investigation that led Orange County prosecutors to file the charges they have against Kraft--and, citing a “death list” found in his car, to maintain that he may have killed more than 60 young men in all--unfolded with little of the sensation and fanfare that have surrounded other serial-murder cases. There was none of the public hysteria that accompanied the recent Night Stalker case or the Atlanta child murders of the early 1980s, for Kraft was in jail while investigators were working quietly and meticulously to link him to one unsolved murder after another.

Little Public Attention

As a result, the magnitude of Kraft’s alleged crimes has received little public attention. It is only now, through reviews of court transcripts and interviews with friends and acquaintances of Kraft and his alleged victims, that it becomes clear how authorities pieced the case together. And through that process a chilling image of Randy Steven Kraft emerges.

The job of building the case against Kraft fell largely to James A. Sidebotham, the dean of murder investigators in Orange County. The lanky, 51-year-old senior homicide investigator in the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, who has called the Kraft case “an investigator’s nightmare,” was awakened at home at 3:45 a.m. on the morning of Kraft’s arrest. He was told only that Terry Lee Gambrel, an El Toro Marine Corps Air Station corporal, had been found dead in a drunk driver’s car. The driver had said Gambrel was a hitchhiker.

Sidebotham drove directly to Mission Community Hospital to view the body, only to learn that it had been removed to the county morgue in Santa Ana. There, he learned that Gambrel had been strangled. At 5:45 that morning, Sidebotham walked the short distance from the morgue to the County Jail to ask Kraft about the body. Kraft did not want to talk.

A search of Kraft’s car later in the day, after a warrant had been obtained, would produce two key items of evidence linking him to other deaths and drawing authorities from all over Southern California, as well as Oregon and Michigan, into the investigation. One was a packet of 47 color photographs of several young men, many of them nude and apparently lifeless.

The other was a notebook inside a briefcase in the car’s trunk. On the first page was a handwritten list of notations such as “Airplane Hill,” “Jail Out,” “New Year’s Eve,” “2 in 1 Hitch” and “Parking Lot.” Kraft’s attorneys call the list “People’s Exhibit 25.” Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. James G. Enright calls it the “death list.” Prosecutors contend that each of the more than 60 notations represents a young man Kraft murdered.

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‘True Score Card Killer’

“What we have here is a true score card killer,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Bryan F. Brown, the chief prosecutor in the Kraft case, said during a court hearing in November, 1983. “It’s my argument that Mr. Kraft made these notations in an attempt to refresh his memory to all of the different people he killed.”

Also found in the car were prescription vials with Kraft’s name on them. Several victims of unsolved murders in Southern California had been found with a drug called diazepam in their systems. One of the prescription vials in Kraft’s car was labeled Valium, a trade name for diazepam. Another was labeled propranolol, which also is a depressant that causes extreme drowsiness in large doses. Propranolol had been found in the victims of two other unsolved murders.

Sheriff’s Department criminalists--forensics experts who gather and interpret physical evidence in criminal cases--also discovered that the seat cushion on which Gambrel was found had been saturated with blood at one time. But Gambrel had not been bleeding.

Sidebotham was familiar with many unsolved murder cases and could see a pattern emerging: young male victims, drugs, overtones of sexual molestation. Authorities elsewhere were contacted and questioned about specific unsolved murders--and the photos found in Kraft’s car were viewed by people familiar with those cases.

Within hours of the photos being found in Kraft’s car, two of the young men in them were identified. One was Eric Church, 20, of Hartford, Conn., whose body had been found four months earlier in Seal Beach. He had been hitchhiking across the country. The other was Rodger James DeVaul Jr., 20, of Buena Park.

Investigators’ Next Step

DeVaul and a friend, Geoffrey Alan Nelson, 18, also of Buena Park, had been together when they were last seen alive. That was on Feb. 12, 1983, four hours before Nelson was found dead in Garden Grove. DeVaul’s body was found in Los Angeles County the next day.

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A search of Kraft’s house on the day of his arrest, authorized by then-presiding Orange County Superior Court Judge Richard J. Beacom, was the investigators’ next step. Kraft had lived in the house at 824 Roswell Ave. in Long Beach with his roommate, Jeffrey Alan Seelig.

Seelig, a 25-year-old candy shop operator, had to wait outside the police barricade as Sidebotham led a parade of officials to the front door of the house: two criminalists, four sheriff’s investigators and investigators from Garden Grove, Seal Beach, Long Beach and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

As puzzled neighbors watched, they filed through the house until after midnight, hauling out a flower-patterned couch and dozens of other items.

Sidebotham later reported to Beacom that Robert Wyatt Loggins, a 19-year-old El Toro Marine found dead in 1980, had been identified in some of the photographs found in Kraft’s Toyota. The photos showed Loggins nude and lifeless on a couch--the same couch, Sidebotham said, that was taken from Kraft’s house. And, he said, bloodstains were found on the wall next to the couch.

There were two other searches of the house that week, and it was sealed until the last of them was completed. Seelig stayed with friends.

His Earlier Arrests

Teletype information from other law enforcement agencies had been sought within 48 hours of Kraft’s arrest. When the responses came in, the Orange County investigators learned that Kraft had been arrested on suspicion of lewd conduct in Huntington Beach in 1966, and again in June, 1975, in a beach restroom in Long Beach. The 1966 case was dismissed and no details are available, but the 1975 arrest, involving sexual activity with another man, led to a guilty plea, five days in jail and a $125 fine.

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In the three searches of Kraft’s house and garage, items identified as belonging to three Oregon murder victims were found. Also found were two items identified as belonging to one of two Michigan men found dead on Dec. 9, 1982, near Grand Rapids.

From June, 1980, until January, 1983, Kraft had worked for Lear Siegler Inc., a Santa Monica-based aerospace firm that has offices in both Oregon and Michigan. Lear Siegler officials confirmed for police investigators that Kraft had been on business trips in both states at the times the murders occurred.

But it was the list found in Kraft’s car that really seemed to tie the many pieces together, prosecutors say now. Each time Kraft was linked to another unsolved murder, investigators would point to another cryptic entry on the list: Edward Daniel Moore, they said, was “EDM”; Robert Wyatt Loggins, a Marine with a tattoo who disappeared in Huntington Beach, was “MCHB Tattoo”; Rodger James DeVaul Jr. and Geoffrey Alan Nelson, who disappeared together, were “2 in 1 Hitch.” And on and on.

As the investigation unfolded, Kraft grew more and more anxious in his cell at the Orange County Jail. He was displeased with the way his lawyers at that time were handling his case and frustrated by his inability to guide the seemingly endless legal process that had taken control of his destiny.

Finally, on Nov. 24, 1983, he sought an interview with The Times.

Flatly Denied Killings

The interview occurred at the jail, with a glass partition separating Kraft from the reporter. He was brought in by a uniformed deputy after the reporter was seated. He spoke into a telephone receiver, saying he wanted to tell people he was not a mass murderer and flatly denying that he had killed anyone.

“I don’t belong here,” he said.

He admitted having contact with “one or two” of the people he is accused of murdering but said it was only a coincidence that they had been killed.

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Asked about the handwritten list that prosecutors contend is a record of his victims, Kraft, who has refused subsequent requests for interviews, said the authorities were “stupid” for trying to link the list to any killings. He said it is “only a code list of some friends of my mate’s (Seelig) and mine.”

He said there are 61 notations on it.

What seemed to bother Kraft most was the way he was being portrayed in court hearings and in newspaper accounts of those hearings. “My friends read in the newspapers that I’m some kind of Jekyll and Hyde, because my side of things hasn’t been presented,” he said.

Indeed, Kraft’s friends continue to be astonished by the accusations against him. Paul E. Whitson, a research chemist in Clearwater, Fla., who was one of Kraft’s best friends from childhood through college, said in a recent interview that relatives had sent him newspaper clippings from Orange County after the arrest.

“My reaction was disbelief,” he said, “and it is still disbelief today. I just knew there had to be a mistake, that it couldn’t possibly be true. I know one thing: The Randy Kraft I knew in high school and college could never have committed such crimes. If he is guilty, then he is not the same person I knew. Something had to change him.”

A Quiet, Intelligent Person

Interviews with numerous friends and acquaintances of Kraft produced similar responses. He was a gentle man, his friends maintain--a quiet, intelligent person and a pretty fair athlete, especially on the tennis court.

“Randy would always help you with your homework,” said Kay Frazell, who now lives in Harrisburg, Pa., and who said she had a crush on Kraft when they were junior high classmates. She said she and other classmates were stunned by the news of his arrest.

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“Randy would be in the top five in our class who I would never believe could be involved in something like this,” Frazell said.

Whitson was Kraft’s classmate in grade school in Midway City, in junior high at the 17th Street School in Westminster and at Westminster High School, where they were members of the first graduating class. He remembered Kraft’s Boy Scout days and his involvement in “Students for Nixon” during Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign against John F. Kennedy.

“We were called eggheads,” Whitson said, chuckling. “We were very much interested in learning. We enjoyed our classes, and we enjoyed long conversations about our school work.”

After graduating from Claremont Men’s College with a degree in economics in 1967, Kraft spent a year in the Air Force and then, according to sources, received an honorable discharge under circumstances related to his homosexuality.

Openly Gay Life Style

In Long Beach, Kraft lived an openly gay life style, but he apparently kept his sexual preferences to himself while on the job. Investigators learned from Kraft’s co-workers at Lear Siegler that no one there seemed to think of him as gay.

All of the co-workers had high praise for him, according to sheriff’s investigators, who quoted one woman as saying, “Randy was the kind of man I would want as a father for my children.”

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“Randy always had a friendly word for me,” said neighbor Penny Dewees, who fondly remembers Kraft working in his garden and walking his dog in the evenings. “He’d help me with packages. Once he stopped and told me about his work in computers.”

Newport Beach psychiatrist Kaushal Sharma said a friendly, neighborly demeanor is remarkably common among serial killers.

Sharma, who has testified in more than 500 criminal cases, said serial killers “are usually very bright people who otherwise lead very normal lives. They are usually very charming, which is how they are able to get some degree of trust and cooperation from their victims.”

Kraft apparently moved to Long Beach soon after getting out of the Air Force. Witnesses at court hearings have said he was living in the Belmont Shore area in 1970.

Questioned About Murder

By 1975, when his name first surfaced in connection with the topic of murder, he had moved to the 1700 block of Ocean Boulevard. Orange County investigators learned after Kraft’s arrest in Mission Viejo of his earlier brush with Long Beach authorities.

Nineteen-year-old Keith Daven Crotwell disappeared March 29, 1975, and his severed head was found a little more than a month later near a jetty in Long Beach Harbor. But Long Beach police never found the rest of the body.

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Friends of Crotwell who saw him with Kraft the night he disappeared led police to Kraft’s house, and he admitted that he had driven Crotwell to Orange County. There, Kraft told Long Beach police, his car had broken down. He said he went for help, and when he returned Crotwell was gone.

That is where the murder trail ended in 1975. Long Beach police asked prosecutors in the Long Beach office of the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office to file charges against Kraft, but they refused, saying there was not enough evidence against him.

It wasn’t until 1983, after Kraft’s arrest, that Crotwell’s body was identified.

Orange County sheriff’s investigators discovered then, after weeks of researching old cases, that a headless body had been found in a remote area of Laguna Hills in October, 1975.

Three months after Kraft’s 1983 arrest, forensic anthropologist Judy M. Suchey examined what was left of that body and compared her findings with Crotwell’s medical records. She later testified she was “extremely certain” that the body was Crotwell’s.

16 Formal Murder Charges

It was the next month, in September, 1983, that prosecutors decided they had enough evidence to convict Kraft on a total of 16 formal murder charges. Six charges already had been filed, and 10 more were added.

Four months later, prosecutors filed written notice that they intended to prove during the penalty phase of Kraft’s trial, in an effort to ensure a death sentence, that he committed 20 other homicides. A 21st name was added to that list on Aug. 30, 1985.

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Prosecutors say they have been ready for months to present their case, but Kraft’s court-appointed defense lawyers say that, because of the number of killings and the fact that they are scattered across 12 years and three states, they still have a great deal of trial preparation ahead.

The trial, after several postponements, now is set for July 6, but Superior Court Judge Luis A. Cardenas has said there may be further delays.

“This case is unprecedented in California, if not the nation,” Cardenas said. “The paper work alone could fill a library.”

Dist. Atty. Cecil Hicks has said he “will be astonished” if it does not turn out to be far costlier than any trial in Orange County history.

And Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Enright predicted recently that the case, “when it’s all over, will be the most expensive California has ever seen.”

Given $310,000 More

Nearly a year ago, when the district attorney’s office gave the Orange County Board of Supervisors an estimate of how much Kraft’s defense had cost the county up to that time, the total came in at $2 million. The supervisors then gave the district attorney’s office an additional $310,000 a year to hire seven new staff people because of the burden the Kraft case was putting on that office.

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The district attorney’s office continues to maintain that prosecutors will prove Kraft killed at least 37 people, even though only 16 formal murder charges have been filed. Of the 21 murders that prosecutors intend to prove during the penalty phase of Kraft’s trial, six occurred in Oregon, two in Michigan, six in Orange County and seven others elsewhere in Southern California.

Kraft, who also has been indicted in Oregon and Michigan, cannot be formally charged here with murders that occurred outside Orange County’s jurisdiction, and sources say investigations of the killings of the last six Orange County victims were completed too late to add formal charges without causing still further trial delays.

After his arrest, Kraft did two things. He changed his voter registration to 550 N. Flower St. in Santa Ana, the address of the Orange County Jail, and he sold his interest in the Roswell Avenue house in Long Beach to Seelig.

Seelig, who law enforcement officials say has not been implicated in any of the murders, said he and Kraft still are close friends.

“Randy was very good to people,” Seelig said in a recent interview. “I mean, nothing but the best.”

‘I’m Still His Friend’

Seelig and Kraft, whose relationship began in 1976, bought the Roswell Avenue house together about 1979. Seelig said they invested much of their energy in fixing it up so they could spend quiet evenings there with friends.

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“Whether he did or did not do the things he’s accused of does not really matter to me,” Seelig said. “I’m still his friend. He was always good to me.”

Seelig refuses to discuss anything about the evidence against Kraft. He would talk only about the support Kraft is receiving from family and friends. Seelig said Kraft’s parents and three sisters “are very supportive of Randy, total love.”

But Harold Kraft, the defendant’s father, said in a brief telephone interview before declining further comment that his son’s case has been extremely hard on his family.

Asked if he supports his son’s claim of innocence, the father said: “The jury will decide what the truth is.”

Tales of Death

Randy Steven Kraft, a former Long Beach computer consultant, has been accused in Orange County Superior Court of killing 37 young men in three states over a 12-year period. The victims were sexually molested, and some of the bodies were mutilated; many apparently were drugged and later strangled. Prosecutors have said Kraft kept a handwritten “death list,” recording his victims’ identities in code prases. Sixteen formal murder charges have been filed, and prosecutors intend to try to convince the jury--in an attempt to ensure a death sentence--that Kraft killed 21 other young men as well.

Here are the two groups of victims: first, the 16 Kraft is formally charged with murdering and, below, the other 21.

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Edward Daniel Moore, 20 Camp Pendleton Marine from Louisville, Ky. Strangled. Found Dec. 26, 1972, beside 7th Street on-ramp to I-605 in Seal Beach. Prosecutors claim Moore is “EDM” on handwritten list found in Kraft’s car. John Doe Unidentified. Suffocated. Found April 14, 1973, near Ellis Avenue and Gothard Street in Huntington Beach, an area once known as Airplane Hill. Molested and sexually mutilated. Prosecutors claim he is “Airplane Hill” on handwritten list. Ronnie G. Wiebe, 20 A married electrical company employee from Fullerton. Found July 30, 1973, near 7th Street on-ramp to I-405 in Seal Beach. Sexually mutilated. Prosecutors claim Wiebe was “Seventh Street” on handwritten list. Keith Daven Crotwell, 19 From Long Beach. Last seen alive leaving Belmont Shore parking lot with Kraft on March 29, 1975. Severed head found in Long Beach Harbor on May 8, 1975. Skeletal remains found in Laguna Hills in October, 1975. Prosecutors claim Crotwell is “Parking Lot” on handwritten list. Mark Howard Hall, 22 From Pocatello, Ida. Working in Santa Ana. Nude body found Jan. 3, 1976, in Silverado Canyon. Sexually mutilated. Last seen alive at New Year’s Eve party in San Juan Capistrano. Diazepam found in his system. Fingerprints on broken glass near body identified as Kraft’s. Prosecutors claim Hall is “New Year’s Eve” on handwritten list. Scott Michael Hughes, 18 Camp Pendleton Marine from Seattle. Last seen April 14, 1978. Found April 16, 1978, on eastbound Euclid Avenue on-ramp to California 91 in Anaheim. Sexually mutilated. Diazepam found in his system. Experts say carpet fibers on body similar to fibers found on rug in Kraft’s garage. Prosecutors claim Hughes is “Euclid” on handwritten list. Roland Gerald Young, 23 From Maywood. Found June 11, 1978, near Irvine Center Drive, west of Deerwood Drive, in Irvine. Sexually mutilated and stabbed several times. Diazepam found in his system. Released from Orange County Jail on a misdemeanor drunk-in-public charge hours before body was found. Prosecutors claim Young is “Jail Out” on handwritten list. Richard Allen Keith, 20 Camp Pendleton Marine from New Castle, Ind. Nude body found June 19, 1978, beside Moulton Parkway in Laguna Hills. Strangled. Diazepam found in his system. Last seen alive leaving girlfriend’s house in Carson. Prosecutors claim Keith is “Marine Carson” on handwritten list. Keith Arthur Klingbeil, 23 Carnival worker from Chula Vista. Found July 6, 1978, on northbound I-5 just south of La Paz Road, a mile from where Kraft was arrested almost five years later. Sexually mutilated and apparently burned with cigarette lighter. Michael J. Inderbeiten, 21 Trucking company employee from Long Beach. Found Nov. 18, 1978, next to ramp from southbound I-405 to northbound I-605 in Seal Beach. Sexually mutilated. Apparently burned with cigarette lighter. Diazepam found in his system. Donald H. Crisel, 20 El Toro Marine from Des Arc, Ark. Found June 16, 1979, on Irvine Center Drive on-ramp to I-405. Apparently burned with cigarette lighter. Prosecutors claim Crisel is “Marine Down” on handwritten list. Robert Wyatt Loggins, 19 Tustin Marine from Montclair. Found Sept. 3, 1980, on El Toro residential street. Body wrapped in clear plastic inside green bag. Rope around neck. Nude photos of Loggins, showing tattoo on arm, found in Kraft’s car; investigators say couch in photos found in Kraft’s house. Last seen alive in Huntington Beach. Prosecutors claim Loggins is “MCHB Tattoo” on handwritten list. Eric Herbert Church, 20 From Hartford, Conn. Family said he had been hitchhiking around United States. Found Jan. 27, 1983, on 7th Street on-ramp to I-605 in Seal Beach. Strangled. Electric razor found in Kraft’s garage identified as Church’s by his father. Investigators say subject of photo found in Kraft’s car was Church, though his face was not shown. Diazepam found in his system. Geoffrey Alan Nelson, 18 Rodger James DeVaul Jr., 20 Two friends from Buena Park. Last seen alive early Feb. 12, 1983. Several photos of DeVaul, wearing jacket belonging to Nelson, found in Kraft’s car. DeVaul found Feb. 13, 1983, next to Glendora Ridge Road near Mount Baldy, pants open and throat cut. Molested. Propranolol and diazepam found in his system. Nelson’s nude body found Feb. 12, 1983, at westbound Euclid Street entrance to California 22. Sexually mutilated. Propranolol and diazepam found in his system. Prosecutors claim Nelson and DeVaul are “2 in 1 Hitch” on handwritten list. Terry Lee Gambrel, 25 Marine from Crothersville, Ind. Last seen alive at El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, where he was based. Found May 14, 1983, in Kraft’s car when he was arrested. Ligature marks on neck and faint marks on wrists. Kraft told police he had picked up Gambrel hitchhiking. Propranolol found in his system. 21 KILLINGS PROSECUTORS PLAN TO INTRODUCE IN PENALTY PHASE OF KRAFT’S TRIAL ORANGE COUNTY Wayne Joseph Dukette, 30 Aluminum company employee from Long Beach. Found Nov. 5, 1971, near Ortega Highway, 15 miles east of Interstate 5 in Viejo Canyon. Roger Dickerson, 18 El Toro Marine from Albany, Ore. Found June 22, 1974, at end of Ceanothus Drive in South Laguna. Gary Cordova, 23 From Pasadena. Found Aug. 12, 1974, near Cabot Road north of Oso Parkway in Mission Viejo. Diazepam (Valium) found in his system. James D. Reeves, 19 Baker with Winchell’s Donut House from Cypress. Found Nov. 29, 1974, a quarter of a mile east of Jeffrey Road, near intersection with Barranca Road, in Irvine. John William Leras, 17 Senior at Boyd High School in Long Beach. About to go into Army. Found Jan. 4, 1975, in waters off Bolsa Chica State Beach in Huntington Beach. Sexually mutilated. Last seen alive catching bus to roller-skating rink in Long Beach. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY Vincent Cruz Mestas, 24 From Los Angeles. Found Dec. 29, 1973, half a mile north of Old Waterman Canyon Road near California 18 in San Bernardino County. Hands cut off and paper bags tied around ends of wrists. Rope burns on neck. Sexually mutilated. Richard A. Crosby, 20 From Wilmington. Nude body found Sept. 29, 1978, just north of Chino, 200 yards from California 71. Lived with aunt, who last talked to him Sept. 28, 1978; he called to say he was coming home from movies. Gregory W. Jolley, 19 From Jacksonville, Fla. Missing two months. Body found Sept. 14, 1979, in garbage bag in Running Springs area, 10 miles northeast of San Bernardino, with head and legs missing. Head and legs found in San Bernardino service station dumpster next day. Sexually mutilated. Investigators say Jolley’s sketch pad found in Kraft’s garage. Christopher A. Williams, 17 From Franklin, Ohio. Found Aug. 20, 1981, at end of Old Toll Road, 10 miles south of Grass Valley Road, near Twin Peaks in San Bernardino County. SAN DIEGO COUNTY Mikeal Laine, 21 From Modesto. Disappeared Nov. 1, 1982. Skull found in San Diego County Jan. 9, 1984. Stanislaus County officials say Orange County investigators told them Laine linked to papers found in Kraft’s car. IMPERIAL COUNTY Malcolm Little Found June 2, 1974, in Imperial County. OREGON Michael Sean O’Fallon, 21 From Golden, Colo. Found July 17, 1980, near I-5 outside Salem, Ore., with wrists and ankles tied. Diazepam found in his system. John Doe Unidentified. Found July 18, 1980, in Marion County, Ore., a mile south of I-5 and about 20 miles north of Salem. Clothed and appeared to be in early 30s. Seen hitchhiking in Salem earlier that day. Strangled. Michael Cluck, 18 From Kent, Wash. Partly clothed body found April 10, 1981, about 100 yards from I-5 near Eugene, Ore. Cause of death: blows to head. Diazepam found in his system. Brown shaving bag with Cluck’s name inside found in Kraft’s house. Brian Witcher, 26 From Portland, Ore. Found Nov. 24, 1982, on rural road in Clackamas County, Ore., 20 miles south of Portland and two miles from Holiday Inn in Wilsonville, Ore., where Kraft was staying. Diazepam found in his system. Investigators say Witcher’s tan velour jacket found in Kraft’s house. Lance Taggs, 19 From Hawaii. Found Dec. 9, 1982, on rural road about half a mile from where Witcher was found. Taggs’ blue tote bag and martial arts equipment found in Kraft’s house, according to court affidavits. Anthony Silveira, 29 From Eagle Point, Ore. Nude body found Dec. 18, 1982, near I-5 just outside Salem, Ore. Strangled. Diazepam in his system. Last seen alive Dec. 3, 1982. Silveira’s fatigue jacket, bearing his name, found in Amway Grand Plaza Hotel in Grand Rapids, Mich. MICHIGAN Dennis Patrick Alt, 24, Christopher Schoenborn, 20 Alt was from Comstock Park, Mich., and his cousin, Schoenborn, from Conklin, Mich. Found together Dec. 9, 1982, in icy field just north of Grand Rapids, Mich. Both attended horticulture show at Grand Rapids’ Amway Grand Plaza Hotel where police say Kraft was staying on business trip. Last seen alive Dec. 7. Both strangled. Diazepam found in both. Schoenborn sexually mutilated. Investigators say Schoenborn had been wearing tan and maroon ski jacket and black work boots that were found in Kraft’s house. BODIES NOT FOUND Paul Fuchs, 19 From Long Beach. Disappeared Dec. 18, 1976. Jeffrey Bryan Sayre, 15 From Santa Ana. Disappeared Nov. 27, 1979. Last seen heading home from friend’s house in Westminster. Key Dates in the Case Against Kraft Nov. 7, 1971: Body of Wayne Joseph Dukette--the first victim Kraft is accused of killing is found. May, 1975: Kraft questioned by Long Beach police in death of Keith Davan Crotwell, but no charges are filed during that initial investigation. May 14, 1983: Kraft arrested in Mission Viejo during a routine traffic stop by CHP officers. Body of Terry Lee Gambrel found in car. Nov. 7, 1983: Kraft bound over for trial in Central Municipal Court on 16 murder charges. Aug. 30, 1985: List of 37 formal murder accusations filed by prosecutors. April 15, 1986: County supervisors allocate $310,000 annually for seven additional staff members for the over-burdened District attorney’s office. Costs for defense estimated at $2 million so far. July 6, 1987: Trial scheduled to begin before Superior Court Judge James K. Turner.

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