Richard Ramirez via Wikicommons
Everyone seems to be talking about “Night Stalker: The Hunt For A Serial Killer” on Netflix. It seems like an appropriate time to re-post my own experience with Richard Ramirez. This post was originally published on LAist.
There are some people, mostly retirees, who haunt the halls of the downtown LA courthouses, attending trials for entertainment. High-profile trials are mobbed, but the regulars know the secret is to attend the preliminary hearings instead. When the hearings were held for the Night Stalker, Richard Ramirez, the courtroom was practically empty. I only worked half-days, and at the time I was taking prescription opiates, so I had a lot of patience for just hanging out. Sometimes I took the bus to the courthouse and watched the afternoon sessions of the preliminary hearings. This is where Ramirez pulled a lot of the antics you saw in the newspaper, like drawing a pentagram on his hand, and lunging at the DA.
I often left the courtroom for a smoke when victims took the stand. The “regulars” knew when a particular witness was going to be harrowing or horrifying and warned each other. I was mainly interested in the detective work and forensics – the shoeprint outside a window, the blood spatter – what we now know as “CSI”. I didn’t want to witness people’s tortured tales of horror and fear.
