In the spring of 1971 the Romanian Militia mobilized thousands of officers, cadets, patriotic guards and reservists to catch one man. For more than a year women walking home alone at night in Bucharest had been attacked, and four had been killed. Rumor filled the gap left by a state press that said little. Women were warned not to go out alone after dark, and, according to later press accounts, some blonde women dyed their hair because word had spread that the killer chose blondes.
The man the Militia arrested on May 27, 1971, was Ion Rîmaru, a student at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine who lived in a student dormitory in the city. A medical certificate found at the scene of the last killing had led investigators to him. He confessed, and at a public trial in September 1971 the Bucharest Municipal Tribunal convicted him of four murders, six attempted murders and a series of rapes, robberies and thefts, and sentenced him to death. He was shot at Jilava Penitentiary on October 23, 1971. Romanian reports say he was 25.
The case did not end with his execution. A year later his father, Florea Rîmaru, died after a fall from a train, and a forensic specialist examining the body said his fingerprints matched prints left at the scene of a killing in Bucharest in 1944, one of a series of killings of women that had never been solved. The son was tried and convicted; the father was never charged with anything.
His surname is written both as Rîmaru and as Râmaru in Romanian reporting; most accounts, and Hunor Kádár's legal-history study of the case, use Rîmaru.
Ion Rîmaru was born on October 12, 1946, according to Evenimentul Zilei, the Iași daily BZI and a 2023 study of the case by the legal historian Hunor Kádár in the law journal Erdélyi Jogélet. Kádár, Evenimentul Zilei (2026) and Adevărul give his birthplace as Corabia, a town on the Danube in Olt County; Kádár adds that the family lived in Caracal. Two news reports, in Evenimentul Zilei in 2016 and on Observator in 2019, describe him as from Caracal.
He was the eldest of three children of Florea Rîmaru and his wife, according to BZI and Kádár. Kádár writes that violence was part of daily life in the house: Florea regularly beat his wife until she left him, and after the separation he moved to Bucharest, where he worked as a night-shift driver in public transport. Adevărul has described the father as a tram driver at a Bucharest depot, and an earlier Adevărul report called him a bus driver. A 2016 Evenimentul Zilei profile says that at the trial Ion's mother told the court he had inherited his father's violence.
At school he did poorly. Kádár writes that he repeated a year of secondary school and was caught up in a scandal at school, and Adevărul reported in 2019 that he finished secondary school with a low average. In 1965 he was convicted of robbery. Adevărul's 2019 account says the charge arose after he beat a watchman who caught him stealing melons, and that he was sentenced to five months; Kádár also gives a robbery conviction at 18, while other reports describe it as a theft conviction. Evenimentul Zilei's 2016 profile says he spent two years in prison, which the other accounts do not repeat.
In 1966 he was admitted to the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Bucharest. Adevărul (2019) and Kádár both give his admission average as 5.33, a bare pass. His studies went badly. He repeated his second year, and when he was arrested in 1971 he was repeating his third.
Teachers and fellow students later described him to investigators and reporters in similar terms. Adevărul reported that teachers saw him as shy, with a poor vocabulary, and that classmates found him withdrawn and uncommunicative. According to Kádár, police described him as aggressive, impulsive and sadistic; dormitory roommates kept away from him, and he had more than 20 self-inflicted cuts on his arms and legs. He kept his room locked with two padlocks, often stayed out at night and always carried a knife. His medical file at the student hospital recorded a diagnosis of "unstable psychopathy," Kádár writes.
The first woman he was convicted of killing was Elena Oprea. BZI, drawing on his statements and on earlier coverage, describes her as a waitress who was attacked late at night on her way home and died in the hospital the next day. The date is reported in three ways. A list of the offenses in the case published by Adevărul in 2019, and the list of offenses he confessed to as summarized by Kádár, both put the attack on the night of April 8 to 9, 1970. BZI, and another section of Kádár's own study, give the night of May 8 to 9, 1970. A 2025 Adevărul account says the series began in March 1970.
Through the rest of 1970 the attacks continued. The 2019 Adevărul list records an attack in June 1970, a theft from a state clothing shop the same month, a robbery in July and an attempted murder in November 1970. At the time, the Militia did not connect all of them; Kádár writes that the killing of Elena Oprea and the November attack were only later linked to the same offender.
In February 1971 the attacks resumed and grew more frequent. Women were attacked on the nights of February 15 to 16 and February 17 to 18 and survived, according to the Adevărul list and Kádár.
On the night of March 4 to 5, 1971, Fănica Ilie was killed. Kádár describes her as a 31-year-old restaurant worker; her name appears as Fănica and as Fănică in different reports. She died of a beating, and a watch and a bag were taken from her. Her death was one of the four murder counts on which he was convicted, with other charges including theft. Kádár writes that dental experts were able to compare evidence from this killing with that from the next, and later with a third, and concluded that the same man was responsible.
On the night of April 8 to 9, 1971, Gheorghița Popa was killed. She was 35, and Kádár describes her as a kitchen worker in a restaurant; BZI calls her a waitress. Her watch and a bag containing 350 lei were taken, according to Kádár. Her death was another of the murder counts, with other charges including theft.
Her killing changed the investigation. BZI and Kádár both report that a cloth apparently used by the attacker to bind a cut on his own hand was found, and that its blood group, A2, matched traces from the scene. Kádár writes that a taxi driver came forward to say that at about 2 a.m. that night he had picked up a passenger who left blood on the seat, and that the blood matched Popa's group.
The Militia set up a dedicated operation under Lieutenant Colonel Ion Sîntea (spelled Ioan Sântea by Kádár), head of the homicide section of the Bucharest Militia, according to Adevărul (2019) and Kádár. It was code-named "Vulturul" ("The Eagle").
Investigators went through the lists they had. Kádár writes that they checked registers of psychiatric patients, clinic records, and people released from prison in 1970 and 1971 after serving sentences for violent or sexual crimes, and questioned customers of restaurants, without finding the man. Adevărul's 2025 account describes the same checks, including questioning of mentally ill people living on the streets.
A composite portrait was drawn up from the accounts of women who had survived. Adevărul (2025) and Kádár both call it the first of its kind made in Romania. It showed a man of medium height, about 1.72 to 1.75 meters, with a round head, dark hair, a prominent chin and a high forehead, according to Adevărul. Forensic specialists also concluded that the attacker had a distinctive irregularity in his teeth. Kádár writes that anthropologists made a cast showing it, and photographs of the cast were sent to several hundred officers so they could compare it with suspects.
The pattern the investigators described was consistent. He attacked women who were alone, late at night, usually in rain or wind. Adevărul reported in 2011 that he was believed to choose bad weather to wash away traces. Women in the city were warned not to go out alone at night, and Adevărul (2025) reports that in 1971 women went out after dark only in groups or with men. Evenimentul Zilei wrote in 2016 that many women stopped leaving home after 9 p.m.
The nicknames came from the press and from rumor. He became the "Vampire of Bucharest" because of reports about what he did to the women he attacked, and the "killer of blondes" because, according to Adevărul (2025), the women who died were blonde and those who survived were dark-haired. Kádár points out that the pattern did not hold exactly.
At the start of May 1971 the attacks came almost nightly. On the night of May 1 to 2 a woman was attacked and escaped when a passer-by, a former athlete, intervened and chased the attacker off, according to the man's own account to Adevărul in 2019. He later said he was called as a witness at the trial.
On the night of May 4 to 5, 1971, Mihaela Ursu was killed. She was 39 and worked as a university assistant, according to Kádár and BZI. Her death was the last of the four murder counts, with other charges. The same night another woman was attacked and survived, and two more women were attacked on the night of May 6 to 7 and another on May 7 to 8, according to the Adevărul list and Kádár. All of them survived. A 2011 Adevărul report describes one May attack in which officers nearby fired warning shots and the attacker escaped by jumping into the Dâmbovița river.
After Mihaela Ursu's death the Militia widened the search to a scale it had not attempted before. Kádár writes that about 6,000 people took part, including Militia officers, staff and students of the Militia school, patriotic guards and military reservists; more than 100 cars patrolled at night; hundreds of people were followed or questioned; and more than 2,500 people were arrested. Adevărul's 2025 account gives the arrests as more than 2,500 in its introduction and as more than 2,000 in its main text.
The decisive clue was a piece of paper. At the scene of Mihaela Ursu's killing investigators found a medical certificate from the student hospital in Bucharest, damaged so that the writing had run, according to Adevărul (2019), Adevărul (2025), BZI and Kádár. Hair and blood traces were also collected.
Forensic examination showed that it had been issued in March 1971 by the neurology office of the student hospital. Adevărul (2025) adds that the name on it had been made illegible. Kádár writes that the stamp of the issuing neurologist could be read, and part of a serial number, which might have been 42, 47, 62 or 67. Investigators went through more than 30,000 medical files, Kádár says, and found 83 students who had received certificates from the neurology office that month. Only 15 of them had not handed their certificate in to excuse an absence, and Ion Rîmaru was one of the 15. Adevărul (2019) reports that he was 21st on the list of 83; Kádár gives a different list number.
Inquiries about him found the details that his teachers and roommates later repeated: the psychiatric note in his file, his earlier conviction, his nights away from the dormitory and the knife. According to Adevărul (2019), Lieutenant Colonel Sîntea said, "E omul nostru" ("He's our man"), and ordered him brought in.
He was arrested on May 27, 1971. Adevărul (2025) reports that officers stopped him as he was heading back to his dormitory carrying a bag with an axe and a kitchen knife, that he tried to strike them and was overpowered. Kádár writes that officers searched his room and seized a kitchen knife, a fire axe, a notebook in which the names of three victims were written and items taken from the women he had attacked. A watch found with him was recognized by people who had known Gheorghița Popa.
The forensic comparisons followed. According to Kádár, the dental and anthropological examinations matched his teeth to the evidence from the killings, his blood group was A2, and hair samples matched.
The public learned of the arrest only later. A Militia communiqué dated June 4, 1971, announced that the authorities had identified and arrested the criminal, Evenimentul Zilei reported in 2026, quoting the text. The article counted nine days between arrest and announcement and criticized the delay, given how frightened the city had been. According to the communiqué, he had admitted four murders, six attempted murders and a robbery, all against women.
For the first day he said nothing, Kádár writes. He then claimed to be mentally ill. After several days of questioning he confessed, giving detailed accounts of the killings and the other attacks, and led investigators to hidden evidence, including a metal bar. Observator reported in 2019 that after his capture he admitted 23 serious criminal acts. Adevărul (2025), by contrast, says he confessed at the start of questioning.
During the investigation he began to blame his father. In his statements, as BZI quotes them, he said, "Nu vreau să spun că tata e vinovat întru totul, dar are şi el o mare vină" ("I don't want to say my father is entirely to blame, but he also bears a great deal of guilt"). He said his father had taught him to go out in the rain or take a car, "so the Militia wouldn't come with dogs," and had told him to hand over any money he took, because no one would ask a salaried man where his money came from. He said his father had told him that nothing would happen to him if he were caught, because he was sick. "And I couldn't resist these urgings," he said.
The father denied it, BZI reports, though he told the Militia that his son "had a bad opinion of women." Investigators had no evidence beyond the son's statements tying Florea Rîmaru to the 1970 and 1971 crimes. Kádár writes that Florea was arrested three times in 1971 in connection with his son's case, that he had hidden money and items taken from the victims in a storeroom at his house in Caracal, and that he had told his wife he suspected Ion was the Bucharest killer and had washed his son's bloodstained clothes. He was not convicted of anything: concealing a crime committed by a close relative was not punishable, Kádár explains. Adevărul (2025) also reports that Florea had hidden stolen items at home and was never charged.
His defense rested on his mental state. Psychiatric experts examined him and concluded that he had acted with discernment, that is, that he was criminally responsible, according to Kádár and to Adevărul reports in 2011 and 2025. The psychologist Tudorel Butoi later described him as an organized sexual psychopath, Kádár writes; Butoi and Alina Tănase also wrote a study of the father and son from a psychological perspective, cited by Adevărul in 2015.
The trial took place before the Bucharest Municipal Tribunal in public sessions on September 1 to 3, 1971, according to Evenimentul Zilei, which quotes an Agerpres report of the verdict. He admitted all the charges in court, according to that report. Adevărul (2025) says he argued at trial that he had not understood what he was doing, and that the judges rejected the argument. The sentence was given on September 3, 1971, according to Adevărul (2019).
The charges are listed slightly differently in different reports. In the Agerpres wording quoted by Evenimentul Zilei, he was convicted of three especially serious murders, one qualified murder, six attempted especially serious murders and five rapes, together with attempted rape, robbery and theft. The 2019 Adevărul account gives three especially serious murders, one qualified murder, six attempted especially serious murders, four rapes, one attempted rape, three robberies and five qualified thefts. Adevărul's 2025 account lists four murders, six attempted aggravated murders, five rapes, one attempted rape, three robberies (one of public property and two of private property) and four thefts. A 2011 Adevărul report, which gives three murders and one attempted murder, does not agree with the others.
The court sentenced him to death. Evenimentul Zilei reports that the sentence was upheld on appeal and became final when his last appeal was rejected; Kádár writes that the Supreme Court rejected the appeal. The dates of the appeal rulings have not been reported.
He was executed by firing squad at Jilava Penitentiary on October 23, 1971. The newspapers carried only a short notice the next day stating that the sentence had been carried out, Evenimentul Zilei reports.
Accounts of his last minutes agree on the main points. He resisted being tied to the post and shouted that his father was to blame, according to Evenimentul Zilei (2016), Adevărul (2025) and Kádár. His last words are reported as "Vreau să trăiesc!" ("I want to live!"). Kádár gives a longer version: "I want to live! Call my father, let him see what is happening to me! He alone is guilty!"
Under Nicolae Ceaușescu, more than 100 people were sentenced to death and executed between 1965 and 1989, Newsweek Romania reported in 2023; executions were carried out by firing squad, at Jilava and Rahova prisons. Romania abolished the death penalty on January 7, 1990.
In 1944 five women were killed in Bucharest in a series of attacks that were never solved at the time. Kádár, BZI and Adevărul (2015) name the first as Elena Udrea, 19, killed on the night of June 29 to 30, 1944. The others named by Kádár and BZI are Maria Ionescu, 36 (July 1944), Elena Locusteanu, 17 (October 1944), Rozalia Coroiu, 20 (November 1944), and Maria Vizitiu (November 1944). The attacks took place at night in heavy rain and wind, Kádár writes, and the press of the time called the unknown man "the killer in the storm." Some reports, including Adevărul (2019 and 2025) and Evenimentul Zilei (2016), speak of four killings rather than five.
The young police officer who examined the first scene was Constantin Țurai, who found a palm print and fingerprints there. Wartime upheaval, the change of regime and the turnover of investigators left the case open, according to Kádár. By 1970 Țurai headed the biocriminalistics laboratory of the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Bucharest. He had kept the 1944 prints in mind; Kádár writes that their pattern was of a type found in about one person in 3,000. Țurai later wrote about the case in a book, "Enigmele unor amprente" ("The Mysteries of Some Fingerprints"), which BZI quotes.
In October 1972 Florea Rîmaru died after a fall from a train near Chitila station. BZI reports that he had been trying to ride to Caracal without a ticket, that he died on October 20, 1972, and that an autopsy was ordered because the circumstances were unclear. Kádár gives the date of death as October 23, 1972, one year to the day after his son's execution. Kádár gives his age as 54 and BZI as 53.
At the Institute of Forensic Medicine his fingerprints and palm prints were taken. Țurai, according to BZI and Kádár, recognized the pattern of the left thumb as the print from the 1944 scene, and a fingerprint comparison confirmed the match. BZI quotes Țurai as calling the timing "a strange coincidence with the date of October 23, 1971." Kádár writes that the 1944 killer had probably been 20 to 25 years old at the time. After the killings ended, BZI reports, Florea left Bucharest and settled in Corabia, where he married and raised his family.
Florea Rîmaru was never tried for the 1944 killings; he was identified only after his death, by the comparison Țurai described. The killings are attributed to him by Țurai's identification and by the writers who have followed it, among them the former investigator Traian Tandin, quoted by Adevărul in 2015.
How Florea Rîmaru died. Kádár writes that he fell or was thrown from the train and that some believe the Securitate threw him off to punish him for helping his son. Evenimentul Zilei stated in 2016 that Securitate officers threw him from the train, while an Evenimentul Zilei piece in 2024 describes this only as public rumor. No official finding on it was reported.
The father's part in the son's crimes. Ion Rîmaru said his father encouraged him and took the money; the father denied it. Kádár reports that Florea hid stolen items and washed bloodstained clothes, but no court ruled on his conduct, and the Militia had no evidence connecting him to the attacks themselves beyond his son's statements, according to BZI.
The number of victims. The court convicted Ion Rîmaru of four murders and six attempted murders. Press accounts give wider totals, such as four killed and ten others attacked (Adevărul, 2025; Observator, 2019) or 14 women attacked (Evenimentul Zilei, 2016), and they do not agree with each other.
The date of the first killing. Elena Oprea's death is placed in March, April or May 1970 in different reports.
Later rumors. Evenimentul Zilei wrote in 2024 that claims circulated after 1989 that Rîmaru had been made to take the blame for crimes by Nicu Ceaușescu, the dictator's son, and called them fake news. It also dismissed as a bluff a rumor that the family of Gheorghe Dincă, the man at the center of the 2019 Caracal case, had once borne the name Rîmaru.
Later errors. A 2025 Newsweek Romania article gives two dates for his execution, October 23, 1971, and December 14, 1981; the second, with an arrest in 1978, does not fit any other account. A 2012 Romania Insider report puts the start of the series in May 1970.
The case became one of the best-known crime stories of communist Romania. Adevărul reported in 2019 that the Ministry of the Interior commissioned a film reconstructing the crimes and assigned the director Dinu Cocea to it; whether it was made was not reported. In 2012 Romania Insider reported the publication in English of a book on the case by Mike Phillips and the historian Stejărel Olaru, drawing on police files that had not been released before, including Rîmaru's statements, and on interviews with relatives of the victims and of the Rîmaru family. Hunor Kádár's study appeared in Erdélyi Jogélet in 2023 under the title "'Rîmaru': A Family of Serial Killers."
1944, June to November: five women are killed in Bucharest in an unsolved series; Constantin Țurai records fingerprints and a palm print at the first scene.
1946, October 12: Ion Rîmaru is born, in Corabia according to most reports.
1965: he is convicted of robbery.
1966: he enters the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Bucharest.
1970, night of April 8 to 9 (May 8 to 9 in some reports): Elena Oprea is attacked; she dies the next day.
1970, June to November: further attacks, a robbery and a shop theft in Bucharest; the women attacked survive.
1971, February: two more women are attacked and survive.
1971, night of March 4 to 5: Fănica Ilie is killed.
1971, night of April 8 to 9: Gheorghița Popa is killed; the Militia operation "Vulturul" follows.
1971, May 1 to 8: Mihaela Ursu is killed on the night of May 4 to 5; other women attacked in the same days survive.
1971, May: about 6,000 people take part in the search, with more than 2,500 arrests; a medical certificate from the student hospital is traced.
1971, May 27: Ion Rîmaru is arrested in Bucharest.
1971, June 4: the Militia announces the arrest.
1971, September 1 to 3: public trial before the Bucharest Municipal Tribunal; sentenced to death on September 3.
1971: the sentence is upheld on appeal.
1971, October 23: executed by firing squad at Jilava Penitentiary.
1972, October: Florea Rîmaru dies after a fall from a train near Chitila; Țurai matches his prints to the 1944 scene.
1990, January 7: Romania abolishes the death penalty.
2012: a book on the case by Mike Phillips and Stejărel Olaru is published in English.
2023: Hunor Kádár publishes a study of the father and son in Erdélyi Jogélet.