Police Want to Hear from Clairemont Tipster Again

San Diego police want an anonymous caller who left a tip about the Clairemont-University City serial killings on a Crime Stoppers’ answering machine to call back so they can ask him some questions.

Police said a man called saying that one day in May, when he was living in an apartment in the 3100 block of Cowley Way, he returned home and found a black man standing in his living room.

When the caller confronted the man, the man apparently told him that he was looking for someone else and was in the wrong apartment, said Homicide Capt. Dick Toneck at a press conference Friday morning.

After the brief exchange, the man turned and left the apartment, Toneck said.

Police said the tip could be significant because the first of the five killings happened in January in an apartment in the 3100 block of Cowley Way and two others occurred in apartments just a couple blocks from there.

From the sketchy information the caller left on the tape, it appears the man might have walked into an unlocked apartment in the middle of the day--a scenario similar to some of the other killings.

The anonymous call came in sometime this week and the caller left no name, address or phone number, Toneck said.

Police want to talk to the caller to determine if the man he saw matches the composite drawing of the suspected killer.

“We’d like to go out and talk to him and ask a lot of questions,” Toneck said. “But if he wants to remain anonymous, then we just want to talk to him.”

Investigators are asking that the man who left the tip call back at 235-TIPS or 531-2500.