My special guest tonight is author Dennis McDougal who stops by to discuss serial killer Randy Kraft and how targeted gay men.
Randy Kraft was highly intelligent, politically active, loyal to his friends, committed to his work--and the killer of...
My special guest tonight is author Dennis McDougal who stops by to discuss serial killer Randy Kraft and how targeted gay men.
Randy Kraft was highly intelligent, politically active, loyal to his friends, committed to his work--and the killer of 67 people--more than any other serial killer known.
Randy Steven Kraft (born March 19, 1945) is an American serial killer and rapist known as the Scorecard Killer, the Southern California Strangler, and the Freeway Killer,[4] who committed the rape, torture, and murder of a minimum of sixteen young men between 1972 and 1983, the majority of whom he killed in California. Kraft is also believed to have committed the rape and murder of up to fifty-one other young men and boys. He was convicted in May 1989[5] and is currently incarcerated on death row at San Quentin State Prison in Marin County, California.[6]
Kraft became known as the "Scorecard Killer" because upon his arrest, investigators discovered a coded list with 61 entries on a scorecard containing cryptic references to his victims;[7] he is also sometimes referred to as the "Freeway Killer" because many of his victims' bodies were discovered beside or near freeways.[8] Kraft shares the latter epithet with two separate and unrelated serial killers, William Bonin and Patrick Kearney.
Between 1971 and 1983, Kraft is believed to have killed 67 victims. All of his suspected victims were males between the ages of 13 and 35,[13][35] the majority of whom were in their late teens to mid-twenties. Kraft was charged with—and convicted of—sixteen of these homicides, all of which had occurred between 1972 and 1983. Many of his victims were members of the United States Marines Corps,[36] and most of their bodies were found to have high levels of both alcohol and tranquilizers, indicating they had been unconscious when they were abused and killed.[37]
Kraft's victims were typically lured into his vehicle with an offer of a lift or alcohol. Once in Kraft's vehicle, the victims would be plied with alcohol and/or other drugs. They were then bound, tortured, and sexually abused before they were killed, usually by either strangulation, asphyxiation, or bludgeoning. However, some victims had also ingested lethal doses of pharmaceuticals. At least one victim was stabbed to death.[38] The victims would then be discarded, usually—though not exclusively—alongside or close to various freeways in southern California. Photographic evidence found at Kraft's home indicates several of his victims were driven to his house before their murder.[39]
Many of the victims were burned with a car cigarette lighter, usually around the genitals, chest, and face, and several were found with extensive blunt force trauma to the face and head.[40] In several instances, foreign objects were found inserted into the victims' rectums, while other victims had suffered emasculation, or mutilation and dismemberment.[41]
The majority of Kraft's murders were committed in California, although some victims had been killed in Oregon, with two further known victims murdered in Michigan in December 1982.
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