SACRAMENTO, Calif. —
It’s been three years since Joseph James DeAngelo, the man responsible for dozens of rapes and murders up and down the state of California, was sent to prison.
DeAngelo became known by several monikers that reflect the geographical scope of his crimes, names like the Visalia Ransacker, East Area rapist and Original Night Stalker. Now, one of the lead prosecutors is sharing new details.
A Look Back at the Case
Joseph DeAngelo began terrorizing Sacramento in 1976, breaking into homes, and lying in wait while his victims slept.
“He vanished like a ghost, like a boogeyman,” said Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho, one of the lead prosecutors on the case.
DeAngelo would ambush girls as young as 13 years old, blinding them with light, binding their hands then raping them. It struck fear in the quiet town of Sacramento, Ho said.
"People would leave their doors unlocked, their windows open... but when he started committing his crimes, everybody started locking their doors," he said.
In the cover of darkness, DeAngelo preyed on people in Carmichael, Citrus Heights and Rancho Cordova, often targeting couples. While raping the women, he would psychologically torture their husbands, tying them up and placing dishes on their backs, threatening them not to move. He would destroy their homes, taking personal possessions—a pattern that would later escalate to murder.
"He was very savvy. When he committed his crimes, initially, his victims, his sexual assault victims, all lived. But at the time, he was committing his murders in Southern California, he was killing everyone not leaving behind any victims,” said Ho.
The crimes didn’t stop in Sacramento. DeAngelo left a trail of fear throughout California.
"He committed 13 known murders, over 50 rapes and 120 burglaries up and down the state of California in 11 different counties,” said Ho.
It took 40 years to identify the Golden State Killer. Investigators with the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office and the District Attorney’s Office connected him to the crimes using DNA.
The arrest came on April 24, 2018. DeAngelo, a retired mechanic, was home in Citrus Heights when investigators arrived at his door. He was living in the shadows for decades in Sacramento.
The New Details
District Attorney Ho remembers the night when detectives first interviewed DeAngelo.
"When he was first interviewed and put in an interview room, if you go back and you look at the booking photo, there's red at the top of his head. He actually ran his head into the wall. So, we were worried that he was going to hurt himself.”
That’s when the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office placed DeAngelo inside a cell with cameras where he could be monitored 24/7. District Attorney Ho was tasked with watching the videos and noticed something unusual.
"There's a video of him where he's walking into his cell with a cane in one hand, and he's hobbling and he's moving very slowly as he walks into his cell. And then the moment the door closes, he puts the cane down, and he starts just walking just fine.”
District Attorney Ho said DeAngelo tried to manipulate everybody.
"The fact that when he committed his crime, he was wearing a mask. When he was a retired mechanic living in Citrus Heights, that was a mask. His family was a mask; he was constantly wearing a mask,” said Ho. “The only time that you were able to see a glimpse of the true monster of Joseph DeAngelo was in his cell in those moments.”
When the prosecution began laying out their case collecting evidence from 11 different counties, Ho tracked every piece. He was tasked with coordinating and cataloging the discovery from each of the counties.
“It was a logistical nightmare... cataloging and organizing 3 million pages worth of discovery, police reports and documents,” said Ho.
Former Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert alleged special circumstances, making DeAngelo eligible for the death penalty. But the prosecution ended up making a deal, life in prison. It was a decision Ho disagreed with.
"I disagreed with that decision originally... because if anybody deserved the death penalty, (it) was him — 13 murders, 50 rapes, 120 burglaries. If anybody deserved it, it was him.”
But one of DeAngelo's victims ultimately changed his mind.
"Phyllis was the very first known sexual assault victim in Sacramento... I would see Phyllis come to court every single time,” said Ho.
In June 2020, the Sacramento State Ballroom became the courtroom, a building big enough for all of his victims to watch the man who had haunted their lives for decades, plead guilty to 13 murders and 13 counts of kidnapping.
Ho said Phyllis wasn’t there. She was in the hospital fighting cancer. But on sentencing day, she made it to the hearing. It’s a moment that Ho keeps close.
"Several months later, we came back to court where Joseph DeAngelo was sentenced to multiple consecutive life terms where he would never get out of prison. I look across the hood, I see Phyllis and Phyllis had this beautiful smile on her face. For the first time in 40 years, Phyllis was able to get a sense of closure injustice. By three months after that, she died from cancer.”
Ho said that if prosecutors had proceeded to seek the death penalty, Phyllis and all the other victims would not have obtained justice. Ho said ultimately he feels the right decision was made so all the victims and their families could have a sense of closure and justice.
DeAngelo is now serving 26 life sentences without the possibility of parole at an undisclosed prison in California. ABC10 asked Ho if he could share where DeAngelo is now.
"Probably, for security purposes, I can't share that. But I can tell you that he's currently housed in prison, being watched by the California Department of Corrections. He is in a secure facility in a secure unit. I get updates on him regularly,” said Ho.
Ho said that DeAngelo's health is fine, and he has a job in prison but would not disclose what his job is but shared “He obviously is in a protected unit because of his status. Because you can imagine he is, would be, a target in prison because of the crimes that he has committed.”
Three years after the sentencing, Ho said he still thinks about the case, about the victims and knows Joseph DeAngelo is where he belongs.
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