#police sketch

[vonvuuu]

The likeness is uncanny.

[funyjuice]

What I did on a Tuesday morning

[emofreakks]

Mr cruel

[fatmagic]

[nigthbreed]

Sophie Dickman and the Shortish Jewellery Expert

7th July 1985: Sophie Dickman was raped and burgled in Monterey Park.

The Night Stalker underwent one of his many metamorphoses in this case. After this attack, he also dropped his gun before driving off to commit murder a mile away, for the 7th of July was also the night he bludgeoned and strangled Joyce Nelson to death. Perhaps it was the other way round and after the murder – in which Joyce died fighting her assailant – he had a bath, patched himself up and picked up a gun on the way. In any case, Sophie Dickman did not report that her attacker was covered in blood or looked like he had been injured.

Sophie Dickman’s neighbour across the street was Linda Arthur, an LA County crime scene analyst, which was pretty handy (she was featured in the Netflix documentary). Linda Arthur was a friend of Detective Gil Carrillo and one of the few investigators that believed in his madcap serial killer hypothesis, so she decided – for reasons she did not care to explain – that this crime was somehow to do with Gil’s killer and called him in.

This makes no sense – before the Dickman incident, there had only been one rape attack – Carol Kyle’s – which was not yet linked to the Night Stalker attacks and it was not in the San Gabriel Valley. The previous attacks were very different: Dayle Okazaki, Maria Hernandez and Tsai-Lian Yu had been shot in hitman-style attacks. The Zazzaras had been brutally murdered, William Doi had been shot and burgled and Mary Cannon, Whitney Bennett and Joyce Nelson had all been beaten over the head and strangled. Why on earth would anyone connect the rape (and survival) of an older lady with any of those? Bell and Lang had also not yet been connected to the others and were an open case at this point, but their hammer attack did not match Dickman’s either.

This is the composite drawing dated 7th July by the press.

This is silly – composite sketches are not always drawn by artists, so this same face, aside from a few differences has been used in the 1978 suspected Golden State Killer attack (below, centre) and also for the ‘Brayman Road Attacker’ in Connecticut from 1988. Frankly, it should be thrown in the bin.

When Evil Triplets Attack

Sophie identified someone from a photo line-up who later went on to be convicted of murder, and he gave up samples of saliva, blood and hair. Because the rape was ultimately unsuccessful (she was sexually injured, but the attacker was impotent), there was no semen to be tested. Therefore, there is no evidence that Richard raped her.

At trial, Sophie Dickman denied that she had told the composite person (we can hardly call them an artist) that the rapist was around 5’8”. She said he had made a mistake and she had in fact, seen someone who was Richard’s height. She also said his hair was medium-length. Richard’s was short in 1985.

However, that becomes less plausible when we discover that she also said he was 5’8” in her initial report. Either both officers are wrong, or she has changed her testimony after media influence.

The latter is more likely, for she admitted to seeing Richard on television multiple times a day, and in the papers.

Sadly for Richard, the defence did briefly mention that her description did not match his appearance, but they did not adequately emphasise it to the jury. From the Petition:

But here is something else to put Richard’s guilt into doubt: we are not privy to the trial transcripts, so, unfortunately, we have to rely on the LA Times. Yes, papers sensationalise stories, but this is all we currently have. Sophie Dickman claimed that the rapist was knowledgeable about jewellery and could differentiate between real diamonds and cubic zirconia on sight.

This is in direct contradiction to what Sandra Hotchkiss, a convicted felon who committed many robberies with Richard said:

So, while Sophie Dickman was raped by a thin man with dark, wavy/curly hair, he was too short, too Caucasian and too knowledgeable about jewellery to be Richard Ramirez.

In the near future, we will compare and contrast the rape-burglary incidents to see if there was sufficient modus operandi to indicate Richard’s guilt.

-VenningB-

Full article

[chickie456-chickencoop]

Cartoon Police Sketches VS Actual Police Sketches...

[ratv1rus]

they should start doing police sketches with those picrews instead

[yourapple56-blog]

And they actually caught the guy...

[critterwithtoast]

Why do people say what they look like online?

No I want you to have to do a criminal investigation on my Tumblr and then be able to do a 100% accurate police sketch of me

[goat-paradox]

All the s&m sketches I made during lessons this week

At first I was unhappy that Max didn't look like a stupid bug enough, but on the second try it turned out awesome >::)

[doodle-beeez]

Sketch dump of the guys :)

[straw-terry]

sam max sketchess

[kucka-g]

what's wrong with that dog?

[mtsodie]

tango

[wyervan]

i cant believe 5 months ago i was in the midst of a 6 year artistic rut and now im just like:

[nigthbreed]

Identification? Hallucination? Falsification.

“The great enemy of truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.”

JFK

For the purpose of this article I will be referring to the expert witness statement of Dr Kathy Pezdek, document 16-7 from the Federal Petition of the Writ of Habeas Corpus, filed by the Federal Defenders Office 17th December 2008.

For ease of clarity when discussing the tainted line up procedure, I will briefly mention the events that led up to it. Those events will be comprehensively covered in a later article.

Police sketch released August 30th 1985. A point was made that the assailant had “straight, white teeth”, which considering that Richard had excessive dental problems, doesn’t sound quite right. No, I’m not seeing a likeness here..

On the 30th August 1985, the final police sketch of the man suspected of being the notorious “Night Stalker” was released to the media. That in itself is odd, because by then they were already in possession of his mug shot, which was released to the world and was soon seen staring out of every newspaper stand and TV. Law Enforcement had a man in their sights and now it was only a matter of time.

Not even if I squint.

After the well documented and public beating Richard received in East Hubbard Street after the release of the mugshot, LAPD wasted no time getting him into a live line up.

It should be pointed out that the people who attacked Richard in the street that day didn’t realise they were beating up the most wanted man in the USA, but a car thief after a failed carjacking. The officer in attendance, Deputy Sheriff Andres Ramírez (no relation), was told by Manuel De La Torre that Richard had attempted to steal his car and assault his wife. It wasn’t until the Deputy Sheriff asked for his name that realisation began to sink in. Richard was placed under arrest for attempted grand theft auto and assault. He was unarmed, compliant and non-aggressive. The most evil man ever born, was apparently, not carrying a weapon, although it has been said he threw his gun away. No gun was seen or recovered. A bit like those famous Avia trainers, that no one ever saw him wear, or throw away. If Richard had a gun that morning, does anyone seriously think he wouldn’t have hesitated to use it as he was running for his life? After all, this is the man they call the Night Stalker, right?

From the Federal Petition of the Writ of Habeas Corpus, 2008.

Richard had taken a severe beating, bleeding heavily from being hit on the head twice by a metal pole, an ambulance was called. This “street justice” meted out from a posse of enraged citizens may just have saved his life “as an LA Times reporter said that an order had been explicitly given out to police ‘we don’t want a trial for this guy’” (Taken from Programmed To Kill; The Politics Of Serial Murder by Dave McGowan) In other words he was never meant to be taken alive.

Alas for Law Enforcement he was handed over very much alive, his head wounds treated and completely covered in gauze bandages. With helicopters circling above, an angry crowd and a plethora of cameras, this drama was now playing out directly in the public gaze. Everyone had now seen his face staring out from every news stand and directly from their TV sets into their homes; he was instantly recognisable.

Into The Fire..

The line up took place on 5th September 1985, a couple of days after two award ceremonies had taken place honouring those citizens instrumental in taking the infamous Night Stalker off the streets. All before he’d even been identified, arraigned or even charged. He was already tried and found guilty in their eyes.

Varying police composites. Described at differing times as light, “Oriental”, 5ft 7 to 5ft 9 (Richard was 6ft 1) and my personal favourite, seen with a cat on his shoulder carrying, a tub of ice cream, about three blocks away from a crime scene.

Richard really didn’t want to take part in the live line up as he knew his face had been spread all over the media. He also had an obvious head wound with two shaved patches on his head where treatment had been administered. All knew the circumstances of his arrest and these wounds would not go unnoticed, especially as he was the only one out of the six individuals on the viewing platform that day with an injured head. Also Richard appeared that day for the first and only time with a side parting in his hair. A deliberate move, perhaps, to more closely match the last eye witness description given of him on August 30th? At no point before or since did he style his hair that way. Richard was given place number 2, with a board bearing the number round his neck.

The expert witness declaration of Dr Kathy Pezdek, document 16-7, taken from the Federal Petition of the Writ of Habeas Corpus, filed by the Public Defenders Office on 17th December 2008.

There were so many witnesses called to participate that day that there had to be two separate line ups. Public Defender Alan Adashek (briefly assigned to Richard) stated in court that he and 5 other public defenders had gone to the line up to make sure everything was done correctly and fairly. This seems to not have been the case as witnesses we’re allowed to gather together before hand, discuss and swap notes. Public Defender Judy Crawford also attended the line ups that day to observe, she later testified in court that she had noticed Deputy John Jones hold up two fingers to the assembled audience during the first line up. Apparently, she didn’t think much of this until she saw that Richard was in position number two. Her suspicions were then confirmed at the second line up when another deputy, Tom Hyeboek did the same. Two fingers were again held up to the audience as he said “Does anyone have any questions?”

So here we have a room full of tense and upset people, perfectly understandable considering the awful circumstances, most of whom, if not all, had seen his face plastered over every media outlet for days. Were they being subtly coached and encouraged to pick the man they’d already decided was guilty? It certainly looked that way to the lawyers observing. A kangaroo court in the making, even before the fact.

The public defenders in attendance during those biased line ups filed an objection sheet, pointing out the media saturation, visible head wounds and the deputies and their fingers. However, during the trial itself, Prosecutor Phil Halpin lied and said he’d never been given it. That, as it turns out, wasn’t the truth and the objection sheet was duly produced and handed to Public Defender Ray Wallen to read out to the jury. Halpin was proven to have been wrong and to have lied.

I am using this eyewitness identification taken from the Writ of Habeas Corpus to demonstrate how perceptions change, along with descriptions after prolonged exposure by the media.

Taken from the expert witness declaration of Dr Kathy Pezdek, document 16-7, which is available on line for any who care to look.

It is beyond imagining that anyone looking at the composites of Richard could readily identify him from those alone. None look anything like him and it’s absurd to suggest that they do. For eyewitness identification other methods must be employed, whether that’s a live line up or in court but what happens when the procedure is tainted from the start? The eyewitnesses were hopelessly compromised by their exposure to media coverage, daily, hourly, attested to in the court documents, of which I given an example above, although there are more.

Speaking of compromised identification, take a look HERE and perhaps HERE, or even HERE for more examples of how eyewitnesses differed in their descriptions.

How they managed to morph the composites by rubbing bits out here and there… they still don’t and never will match.

As for composites, below is a double one, with the one of “Richard Ramirez” on the left and one of the GSK aka The Golden State Killer on the right. A closer match to each other than the left hand one ever was to Ramirez!

Twins!

In the aftermath of this wholly inappropriate line up Public Defender Alan Adashek gave the following statement to the LA Times. “The publicity is so intense, so intense and constant, over so many days, it’s really a problem. A major problem. The effect of all this massive publicity can be very negative in terms of a fair trial”.

And so it came to pass. The first stage in the railroading of Richard Ramírez.

~Jay~

Full article