On July 21, 1979, off-duty Auburn police officer Joseph DeAngelo was cited by the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office for attempted shoplifting in Citrus Heights. The officer had tried to shoplift a hammer and a can of dog repellent.
DeAngelo, who was hired by the Auburn Police Department in 1976, was dismissed by the Auburn city manager Aug. 27. He was convicted of a shoplifting misdemeanor in October of that same year by a Sacramento jury, sentenced to six months of probation and fined $100.
Prior to coming to Auburn, DeAngelo was a police officer in Exeter, California, where he worked in their Burglary Unit from 1973 to 1976. Coincidentally, a nearby serial burglar nicknamed the “Visalia Ransacker” committed at least 120 burglaries between 1973 and 1976.
During the time DeAngelo worked in Auburn, the East Area Rapist began to terrorize communities in the Sacramento region. After he was dismissed, he soon moved to Southern California, where he began to commit a mass killing spree. He was quickly dubbed the Night Stalker. DeAngelo was later nicknamed the “Original Night Stalker” after Richard Ramirez became known as the Night Stalker.
In 2001, investigators discovered through DNA analysis that the East Area Rapist and the Original Night Stalker were the same man. On April 24, 2018, based on DNA evidence, Joseph DeAngelo, now known as the Golden State Killer, was charged with eight counts of first-degree murder. He pled guilty June 29, 2020, and was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
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