Stalker Bounty : 19 Collect Shares of the County’s $36,777 Reward Fund

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors meted out shares Tuesday of a $36,777 bounty for the capture of convicted Night Stalker killer Richard Ramirez, paying rewards ranging from $250 to $10,388 to 19 people.

Officials said that the largest sum will go to Jesse N. Perez, 65, of Los Angeles. Perez is a one-time acquaintance of Ramirez, who was convicted Sept. 20 of 13 murders and faces death in the gas chamber.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Alan Yochelson said Perez led police to the recovery of a murder weapon used to help convict the Night Stalker defendant. Perez’s daughter, Pauline, who persuaded her father to call the police, will receive $3,250.

“My father didn’t do it for the money,” Pauline Perez said Tuesday night at the family’s home. “He requested that any reward money be given to me. It will go into the bank for something we really need.

“We never gave much thought to what we would do with a reward. People shouldn’t think about spending money when they don’t have any idea of what they are going to get.”

Jesse Perez said he still feels there is some question about his own safety.

“I’m just glad that there was a stop to the killing and I don’t want to bring a lot of attention to myself,” he said. “I don’t want people to think I’m bragging about all this. I was doing it because I wanted to help the people in California stop all the killings. He had to be stopped.”

Of the $36,777 to be paid by the county, most was contributed by corporations and individuals. It is part of about $80,000 offered by various jurisdictions and the governor’s office for the Night Stalker’s arrest and conviction.

“We assigned the monies in proportion to how important a person’s information was in leading to the identification, arrest and conviction” of the Night Stalker, said Georgette Dewyer, deputy executive officer to the Board of Supervisors.

Citing privacy statutes, county officials declined to give addresses and other specific information about those who won rewards. Times sources provided the identification of some of the people issued awards.

Laurie Ochoa, an unemployed truck driver from Lompoc, will receive $2,500 for tipping off police to the possibility that Ramirez was the Night Stalker. “That’s great,” she said after hearing about the reward, adding: “It really helps. I’m out of work.”

Ochoa said her brother, Earl Gregg Jr., also of Lompoc, and Ramirez were once roommates.

“We looked at composites,” she said, “and the more we talked, the more we decided it was Rick.” She said her brother and his wife turned over to police a bracelet from Ramirez that was linked to one of the Stalker’s crimes. Gregg and his wife, Deleen, will also receive $2,500.

Alejandro Espinoza, who will receive $6,338, was awarded his share of the reward for assisting police in the recovery of property taken from the homes of murder victims, Yochelson said.

Rewards of $1,000 each will go to eight East Los Angeles residents who, in August, 1985, helped subdue Ramirez and held him until police arrived. They include Carmelo Robles, Frank Moreno and Faustino Pinon, three of the people who gave chase as Ramirez made a desperate--and futile--bid to outrun pursuers after Robles spotted Ramirez’s picture on the front page of a newspaper in a Boyle Heights liquor store.

Also receiving $1,000 is James Romero, a 13-year-old Orange County boy who in 1985 got a partial license number of a car believed used in several of the Stalker’s attacks.

Others receiving shares of the reward are Manuel De La Torre; Jose Burgion and his sons, Jaime and Julio; Ken Will; Edgardo Molinar; Elena Salter; Arturo Benavidez; Paul Wallace, and Donna L. Myers.

Times staff writer John H. Lee contributed to this story.