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Prisoners who died in California detention

  • Susan AtkinsOn the 24th of September 2009, Susan Atkins died at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla. Her husband, James Whitehouse, told reporters that her last whispered word was "Amen." At that moment she was California's…
  • Lawrence Bittaker and Roy NorrisLawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris, two men later known as the Tool Box Killers, kidnapped five teenage girls in Southern California during 1979. None of the five survived. Everything happened within a span of just five months. The nickname…
  • Charles MansonOn the first day of testimony in his 1970 murder trial, Charles Manson arrived with an X carved into his forehead.
  • Phil SpectorPhil Spector's first number one song came from his father's gravestone.
  • Leonard LakeLeonard Thomas Lake was born on the 29th of October 1945 and died on the 6th of June 1985, four days after police arrested him. He had swallowed cyanide pills that he sewed into his own clothing. Because of that, no jury ever weighed a…
  • Rodney AlcalaRodney Alcala walked onto the set of the television game show The Dating Game in 1978, and host Jim Lange introduced him as a successful photographer. Lange promised that between takes he might be found skydiving or motorcycling. The…
  • Richard RamirezRichard Ramirez was an American burglar, sex offender and serial killer who terrorized Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. A California judge, upholding nineteen death sentences against him, said his deeds showed "cruelty,…
  • Betty BroderickBetty Broderick entered a house at 1041 Cypress Avenue in San Diego at 5:30 on the morning of the 5th of November 1989. It was two days before her 42nd birthday. Inside, her former husband, Daniel T. Broderick III, and his new wife, Linda,…
  • Richard ChaseRichard Trenton Chase kept a calendar on the wall of his apartment in Sacramento, California. On the dates of two murders in January 1978, he had written a single word: Today. He had written the same word on forty-four other dates through…
  • Robert DurstOn the 30th of November 2001, Robert Durst was caught inside a Wegmans supermarket in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He was trying to steal Band-Aids, a newspaper and a chicken salad sandwich. In his pocket he had $500 in cash. Durst, an…

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