Richard Trenton Chase
Richard Trenton Chase (born May 23, 1950 in Sacramento , California , † December 26, 1980 in Vacaville , California) was an American serial killer who killed six people within a month. Because of the peculiarity of drinking the blood of his victims, he was nicknamed The Vampire of Sacramento .
Childhood and first signs of mental illness
Chase came from a modest background and grew up as the only child of his parents in a strict household. From the age of twelve, he was increasingly involved in his parents' marital disputes. His mother accused his father of taking drugs and wanting to poison them. Chase himself claimed that he was abused as a child by his mother and that she tried to poison him.
“The whole syndicate made money by commissioning my mother to poison me. I know them all, and they'll definitely end up in court - I just have to sort everything out. "
As a teenager, Chase was noted for excessive alcohol consumption and a tendency to torture and kill animals, as well as arson . As he got older, he developed hypochondria , which manifested itself in claiming that his heart would temporarily stop beating or that someone had stolen his pulmonary artery. He also stood out for holding oranges to his head, believing that vitamin C was being absorbed directly through his brain.
He had a few relationships in high school , but his impotence caused him to fail. Outside of the family, he had no close friends or other caregivers. A psychologist he consulted at the time attributed Chase's problems to suppressed anger or mental illness; Chase did not seek help after this diagnosis. It was later found that Chase had an aversion to conventional intercourse and could only be aroused and orgasm through violence and necrophilia .
Inpatient treatment and discharge
In 1976, Chase was admitted to a mental hospital after injecting rabbit blood and developing blood poisoning . There he often talked to the staff about his fantasies of killing animals. He was once picked up by hospital staff with a bloodied mouth after killing birds and drinking their blood. Because of this, he soon got the nickname "Dracula".
There have been several conflicting diagnoses of Chase's state of mind, such as schizophrenia or drug-induced psychosis ; he himself was of the opinion that he was slowly being poisoned and therefore his blood was turning into powder. He can only stop this poisoning by ingesting foreign blood.
After Chase underwent multiple drug therapies, medical professionals found his condition so stable that he was placed in open treatment despite protests from nurses. In 1977, Chase was released from the clinic under the responsibility of his parents, who also found him an apartment and took over bills. Since Chase's mother was convinced that the drugs that were prescribed for him would not help, she withdrew them from him.
In August 1977, Chase was stopped by a police officer on a reservation. He wore a blood-soaked T-shirt and carried guns and a blood-filled bucket in his car. Chase convinced the policeman that he was just hunting and was allowed to continue.
In the following three months he claimed to have killed at least six dogs and cats, some of which had been bought and some of which were stolen.
On December 7, 1977, he acquired a revolver.
Murders
On December 29, 1977, Chase shot and killed 51-year-old Ambrose Griffin from his moving car. One of Griffin's sons suspected the crime of a neighbor he had seen walking past the property that day with his rifle. Ballistic investigations by the police on the weapon showed, however, that the rifle was not the murder weapon.
On January 21, 1978, he killed Teresa Wallin, who was three months pregnant, in her home with three shots. Then he molested the corpse, mutilated it and bathed it in its blood.
On January 27, Chase entered the home of 28-year-old Evelyn Miroth, killing her neighbor Daniel Meredith, Miroth herself, her 6-year-old son Jason and her 22-month-old nephew Michael. As with Teresa Wallin, he practiced necrophilic acts and cannibalism on Miroth's corpse . Then he fled, startled by a friend of Jason's, with the body of the toddler in Meredith's car. With the help of the neighbors, the girl alerted the police, who were able to secure perfect hand and sole prints from Chase.
Chase returned to his house after the crime, where he drank the blood of the slain toddler and consumed parts of the internal organs. He then buried the body at a nearby church.
Arrest, interviews and suicide
Using a narrow profile of the FBI - profiler Robert Ressler and the testimony of a former school mate Chase, which had met those two hours after the murder of Teresa Wallin in bloody clothes could chase arrested at his home on 28 January 1978th Despite his mental health, he was declared fully guilty and sentenced by a jury to death in the gas chamber for sixfold murder .
During his detention, Chase Ressler gave several interviews in which he spoke about his fear of Nazi UFOs that would incite and poison him to murder. He claimed he only killed to keep himself alive, otherwise he would have died of soap dish poisoning that would slowly turn his blood into powder.
“Everyone has a soap dish. If you pick up the soap and the bottom is dry, then all is well. But if everything is slippery, then that means that you have soap dish poisoning. "
He also gave Ressler a cup of leftover food so that it could be examined in FBI laboratories for traces of the alleged poisoning. When asked what criteria he used to choose his victims, he replied that voices had asked him to kill. Then he would have run through the streets and rattled doors until he found one that could be opened. When Ressler asked why he hadn't broken in, he replied that a locked door meant that you weren't welcome.
On December 26, 1980, Richard Trenton Chase was found lifeless in his cell. An autopsy revealed that he is with a overdose of anti-depressants , which he had collected several weeks during killed themselves had.
Cultural influence
The 1988 released film Rampage - charges of mass murder of William Friedkin loosely based on Chase's crimes.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ressler, Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , p. 27
- ↑ Ressler, Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , p. 22
- ↑ a b c d Ressler, Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , p. 23
- ↑ Ressler, Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , p. 30
- ↑ Ressler, Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , p. 31
swell
- Robert K. Ressler, Tom Shachtman - I hunted Hannibal Lecter , Heyne 1993, ISBN 3-453-06432-1
Web links
- Richard Chase in the Crime Library ( Memento from December 21, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Chase, Richard Trenton |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | The Vampire of Sacramento |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American serial killer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 23, 1950 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Sacramento , California, USA |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 26, 1980 |
| Place of death | Vacaville , California, USA |