Born on February 29, 1960, in El Paso, Texas, this boy was the youngest of five children in a Mexican immigrant family.
His father worked as a railway laborer, and the family practiced Catholicism.
From the outside, it seemed like a typical working-class upbringing in the American Southwest.
But behind closed doors, this child’s world was far from ordinary.
His father was a violent alcoholic prone to fits of rage that resulted in frequent physical abuse.
The boy suffered multiple head injuries before the age of six, knocked unconscious so many times that he later developed temporal lobe epilepsy.
As punishment, his father would sometimes tie him to a crucifix in a cemetery overnight, leaving the frightened child alone in the darkness among the tombstones.
By age 10, he had already begun smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol, searching for any escape from the violence at home.
This sweet-looking boy grew up in El Paso, Texas. Credit: Adobe Stock
The transformation
On May 4, 1975, when he was just 15 years old, the boy witnessed something that would have shattered most people: his older cousin Miguel shot and killed his wife Jesse in the face during a domestic argument, right in front of him per Biography.com.
Once again, the boy’s reaction was chilling. After the shooting, he became sullen and withdrawn. Miguel was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and the boy dropped out of Jefferson High School in ninth grade.
Shortly after, he moved in with his sister and her husband Roberto, an obsessive ‘peeping tom’ who took him along on nocturnal voyeuristic walks, spying on women through their windows.
When Miguel was released from the mental hospital in 1977, he sometimes joined them on these disturbing expeditions.
By 1982, at age 22, he had moved permanently to California. It was around this time that he began using coc**ne heavily, which quickly became his drug of choice.
To support his addiction, he started committing burglaries and thefts.
He lived a nomadic existence between San Francisco and Los Angeles, with no stable home or employment.
His criminal behavior was escalating, but no one could have predicted what was coming next.
The cute-looking little boy in this photograph grew up to be one of the most evil men in the world. Credit: Alamy
Reign of terror
On April 10, 1984, he committed his first known murder, a nine-year-old girl named Mei Leung in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district.
He lured her to a basement, then beat, strangled, r***d, and stabbed her to death before hanging her partially nude body from a pipe.
This crime wouldn’t be connected to him until 2009, when DNA evidence finally linked him to the scene.
Two months later, on June 28, 1984, he murdered 79-year-old Jennie Vincow in her Glassell Park apartment, stabbing her repeatedly in her sleep and slashing her throat so deeply she was nearly decapitated.
Then, after a nine-month hiatus, he unleashed a wave of terror that would grip California in fear for over a year.
From March 1985 through August 1985, he embarked on a killing spree that terrorized the entire state.
His method was chilling in its randomness: he would break into homes after dark, often through unlocked windows or doors, and attack whoever he found inside.
His victims ranged from young women to elderly couples. He shot some, bludgeoned others with hammers and tire irons, stabbed many, and s**ually assaulted numerous victims.
The boy grew up to be interested in Satanism. Credit: Adobe Stock
Satanic signature
What made his crimes particularly disturbing was his incorporation of Satanic imagery.
He drew pentagrams in lipstick on walls and victims’ bodies. He forced survivors to ‘swear on Satan’ that they weren’t hiding valuables. He would tell victims: “I love Satan,” and demand they profess their love for the devil as he assaulted them.
In one particularly horrific attack, he murdered 64-year-old Vincent Zazzara and his 44-year-old wife, Maxine.
After killing Maxine, he mutilated her body by cutting an inverted cross into her chest, then gouged out her eyes and placed them in a jewelry box, which he kept as a grotesque souvenir in his apartment.
He beat 83-year-old Mabel Bell and her 81-year-old sister Florence Lang with a hammer, then used an electrical cord to shock them before r**ing one of them.
He drew Satanic pentagrams on Bell’s thigh with lipstick. Both women died from their injuries.
He stomped 60-year-old Joyce Lucille Nelson to death, leaving the imprint of his Avia sneaker on her face.
The man became a prolific serial killer. Credit: Adobe Stock
The hunt
The press dubbed him the ‘Night Stalker,’ the ‘Walk-In Killer,’ and the ‘Valley Intruder.’
A massive police manhunt was launched, one of the largest in California history. Detectives Frank Salerno and Gil Carrillo led the investigation, painstakingly connecting crimes across multiple jurisdictions.
The break came from a teenager.
On August 24, 1985, 13-year-old James Romero III was awake late at night when he heard suspicious noises outside his Mission Viejo home.
He spotted a man lurking around and watched as the intruder drove away in an orange Toyota.
James memorized the make, model, color, and partial license plate of the vehicle – information that would prove crucial.
The stolen Toyota was found abandoned on August 28 in Koreatown, Los Angeles. Despite the killer’s efforts to wipe it clean, police discovered a single fingerprint on the rearview mirror.
The print was matched to a 25-year-old drifter with a long arrest record for traffic violations and drug offenses, per Britannica.
On August 29, 1985, authorities released his mugshot to the media.
At the press conference, they announced: “We know who you are now, and soon everyone else will. There will be no place you can hide.”
The man in the photo was Richard Ramirez. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Identity revealed
His name was Richard Ramirez.
On August 30, 1985, Ramirez took a bus to Tucson, Arizona, unaware that his face was plastered across newspapers and television screens throughout California.
The next morning, he returned to Los Angeles and walked right past police staking out the bus terminal.
He entered a convenience store in East Los Angeles, where a group of elderly Hispanic women recognized him as ‘el matador’ or ‘the killer.’
Seeing his face on the front page of the Spanish-language newspaper La Opinión with the headline ‘Invasor Nocturno’ (Night Invader), Ramirez fled in a panic.
He ran across the Santa Ana Freeway and attempted to carjack vehicles, but angry residents fought back. Manuel De La Torre struck him over the head with a fence post.
A group of more than ten residents chased him down Hubbard Street in Boyle Heights, restraining and beating him until police arrived.
Richard Ramirez was sentenced to death. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Justice and death
Ramirez’s trial began in July 1988 and was marked by bizarre behavior.
At his first court appearance, he raised a hand with a pentagram drawn on it and yelled: “Hail Satan!”
He dressed in black with dark sunglasses and attracted a cult-like following of Satan worshipers who attended the proceedings.
On September 20, 1989, the jury convicted him of 13 counts of murder, five attempted murders, 11 s**ual assaults, and 14 burglaries.
He was sentenced to death on November 7, 1989. His response was chilling: “Big deal. Death always went with the territory. See you in Disneyland.”
The judge who upheld his 19 death sentences remarked that his deeds exhibited ‘cruelty, callousness, and viciousness beyond any human understanding.’
Ramirez never expressed remorse.
He spent nearly 24 years on death row at San Quentin State Prison, where he married one of his supporters, 41-year-old Doreen Lioy, in 1996.
While incarcerated, he openly bragged to prison officers about killing ‘more than 20 people.’
On June 7, 2013, at age 53, Richard Ramirez died from complications related to B-cell lymphoma. He likely died alone in his secured hospital room, his body unclaimed and later cremated.
Looking back at that photograph of a young boy, it’s almost impossible to reconcile that innocent face with the monster he became.