"Like a Recipe": Richard Ramirez on Death Row, Inside Edition, 1993

Name: "Like a Recipe": Richard Ramirez on Death Row, Inside Edition, 1993
Uploaded: 2020-02-22
Duration: 5 min 39 s
Description: Four years after he was sentenced to death, Richard Ramirez refused to discuss his crimes but told Inside Edition that a serial killer "comes about by circumstances, like a recipe".

Four years after he was sentenced to death, Richard Ramirez refused to discuss his crimes but told Inside Edition that a serial killer "comes about by circumstances, like a recipe".

Subject: Richard Ramírez
Recorded: about February 1993
Runtime: 5:39

Content warning: Describes murders and sexual violence, and an allegation that Ramirez tried to molest two children.

The Interview

In 1993, about four years after he was sentenced to death, Richard Ramirez spoke on camera to Inside Edition. The programme's report, re-posted by Inside Edition in 2020, uses short clips of the interview within a narrated summary of the case. Ramirez would not discuss his own crimes. Asked why he had killed, he answered "No comments" and said he could not answer "at this time". He spoke instead in general terms about how serial killers come about, about evil, and about his belief in "a malevolent being".

Historical Context

Between June 1984 and August 1985 Ramirez broke into homes in the Los Angeles area, and later in the San Francisco area, at night, killing and sexually assaulting victims. The earliest of the murders he was convicted of was that of Jennie Vincow, 79, killed on June 28, 1984. The press called the unknown attacker the "Night Stalker". He was captured on August 31, 1985. Los Angeles County Sheriff's detectives Gil Carrillo and Frank Salerno had linked the attacks, in part through shoe prints left at the scenes.

Circumstances of the Interview

Ramirez was convicted on September 20, 1989, of 13 murders and many other felonies, and was sentenced to death on November 7, 1989. He was then held on death row at San Quentin. The report mixes his answers with comments from a law-enforcement speaker (not named on the audio), a relative of one of the victims, a childhood friend from El Paso, and Martin Kipp, a convicted murderer who says he befriended Ramirez in prison.

What the Interview Covers

Ramirez says that a serial killer "comes about by circumstances, like a recipe: poverty, drugs, child abuse", which build frustration and anger until the person "explodes". He says he believes in "the evil in human nature" and that "in a wicked world, wicked people are born", but that he does not blame society or his race. On Satan, he says he has "felt powers that are evil". He ends by saying he does not care what happens to him. The other speakers describe his crimes, his drug use as a teenager and what he is said to have told Kipp.

What Makes the Recording Significant

Ramirez gave very few on-camera interviews. Inside Edition has called this "one of his first and only jailhouse interviews". It records how, years after his conviction, he talked about serial murder in general while refusing to speak about his own.

Archival Importance

Ramirez died on June 7, 2013, while still awaiting execution. The clip is one of a small number of recordings of him speaking on camera after his conviction.

Important Caveats

The report contains only excerpts of the interview, not the whole conversation. Ramirez's statements are his own. The account of what he told Kipp comes from Kipp, and the childhood friend's allegation about the hotel job is his own recollection; neither is verified here. The upload's YouTube description gives Ramirez's age at death as 60; he was 53.

Narrator: The horror began in June 1984. Los Angeles was under siege. Death waited in the dark at the hands of a man they called the Night Stalker. After a 14-month reign of terror, he was finally caught. It was only then that his true identity was discovered. His name: Richard Ramirez.

Detective: Richard Ramirez's whole trip was to hide in a tree or hide behind a fence and watch these victims at nighttime, into the wee hours of the night. And then, while they slept, creep in like a coward and kill [unclear: "him" / "them"].

Narrator: The Night Stalker killed at least 13 times: 13 people who were awakened in the night to face death. At least 15 others survived his brutal attacks.

Richard Ramirez: I didn't particularly care for people.

Narrator: In a rare interview, Ramirez refused to discuss his own crimes, but had this to say about serial killers.

Richard Ramirez: A serial killer comes about by circumstances, like a recipe: poverty, drugs, child abuse. These things contribute to a person's frustration and anger. And at some point in life, he explodes.

Narrator: Perhaps for Richard Ramirez that anger and frustration turned to rage, which he in turn took out on his victims. His killings were so sadistic and brutal that even experienced detectives were shocked.

Detective: [unclear: "We took" / "He took"] a woman in her 60s and stomped her to death with his foot, leaving an imprint of a shoe on the side of her face. From that to just executing somebody upon walking into a room after he entered a house. He strangled, he used a ligature, he used a tire iron on a young girl, [unclear: "a beater" / "beat her"], left her for dead.

Relative Of A Victim: When [unclear: "your" / "the"] anger subsided, if you had to wipe up your mother's blood... I couldn't finish it. I had to leave my brother to finish that chore.

Interviewer: Why on earth would you have hurt those people? Why did you kill those people?

Richard Ramirez: No comments. No comments. I cannot answer it at this time.

Interviewer: What was Richard's motive?

Detective: To kill.

Interviewer: That's it?

Detective: To kill. It's as simple as that.

Narrator: Richard Ramirez was raised in El Paso, Texas, the youngest of five children born to hard-working, strict parents. Eddie Milam was Richard's best friend back then, and remembers when he began to change into a troublemaker.

Eddie Milam: I did start seeing something going wrong with Ricky Ramirez. I think what really messed him up was the acid. He would do a lot of acid. The stealing, you know, I noticed the stealing, and then started as a [unclear: "peepee" / "peeper"] and things like that.

Narrator: Ramirez's passion for burglary earned him the nicknames of "Ricky the Thief" and "Fingers". But Eddie knew Ramirez had other serious problems when he was fired from a local hotel.

Eddie Milam: He said he was fired. He was dismissed due to the cause that he had tried to molest some, two little kids that were going up the elevator.

Narrator: By 18, Ramirez was a high school dropout drifting around California. He stayed in Skid Row hotels, never seemed to work, but always had the money to buy cocaine. Friends say that the Richard Ramirez they knew didn't date and wasn't the type to commit such heinous crimes. But convicted murderer Martin Kipp, who befriended Ramirez in prison, says he heard another [unclear: "side of the knife" / "side of the Night Stalker"].

Martin Kipp: Richard told me he needed to associate gruesome violence with sex in order to be completely satisfied. He also told me that he had to violently fantasize about his victims before he could go away sexually gratified.

Richard Ramirez: They are desires, whereas if, where if I didn't give in to them, I would be crushed by them.

Richard Ramirez: I believe in the, in the evil in human nature. This is a wicked, wicked world, and, you know, in a wicked world, wicked people are born. I'm not going to blame society, my race, or people, or anything. It is up to the individual like myself to keep on knocking on whatever door they want to get into.

Narrator: Because the victims and the methods of killing were so diverse, many experts felt there was no one Night Stalker. Detectives Carrillo and Salerno disagreed, and finally broke the case by matching shoe prints. The subsequent trial turned into one of America's most notorious courtroom dramas, punctuated by continual outbursts from Ramirez. In that trial, Ramirez's fascination with Satanism emerged.

Richard Ramirez: As far as Satan is concerned, I believe in a malevolent being. His description eludes me, but I have felt powers that are evil.

Narrator: After an eight-month trial, Ramirez was convicted of all 13 murders and given multiple death sentences.

Richard Ramirez: I don't care about myself, really. I don't care about what happens to me. I never did, really.

Richard Ramirez: I don't care about myself. I never did, really. ---