Hillside Strangler Victims

Case background and investigation

Between October 1977 and February 1978, the Los Angeles area was gripped by a series of killings in which the bodies of young women and girls were found discarded, often nude, on hillsides and roadside slopes across the city and surrounding foothills. Because the earliest victims were left in elevated, exposed locations, the press dubbed the unknown killer the "Hillside Strangler," and investigators initially believed they were hunting a single man. The victims ranged in age from 12 to 28 and were typically abducted, sexually assaulted, tortured, and strangled before their bodies were posed in visible places, in several instances near police facilities.

As the investigation progressed, evidence suggested that two people were working together rather than one. The perpetrators were eventually identified as cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono Jr., an auto-upholstery worker. The pair frequently posed as police officers to lure women into their vehicle, then drove them to Buono's home and shop in the Glendale area, where the assaults and murders took place. By the time they stopped, ten women and girls in the Los Angeles region had been killed, including 12-year-old Dolores Cepeda and 14-year-old Sonja Johnson, whose disappearances heightened public alarm.

The case broke open outside California. In January 1979, Bianchi, who had moved to Bellingham, Washington, was arrested for the murders of two women there. Investigators linked him to the Los Angeles killings, and Bianchi at first mounted an insanity defense, claiming he suffered from multiple personality disorder and that an alternate personality named "Steve" had committed the crimes. Court-appointed and prosecution experts, including hypnosis specialist Dr. Martin Orne, concluded that Bianchi was faking the disorder; the courts rejected the insanity and multiple-personality claims, and Bianchi ultimately admitted the alter egos were fabricated.

To avoid the death penalty, Bianchi pleaded guilty to several of the murders and agreed to testify against Buono, naming his cousin as his accomplice. Buono was arrested in October 1979. His prosecution was long and difficult, at one point nearly collapsing over doubts about Bianchi's reliability as a witness, but the case proceeded to a lengthy trial featuring hundreds of witnesses. In November 1983 Buono was convicted of nine of the murders, and in January 1984 he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Both men were convicted and imprisoned. Angelo Buono died of a heart attack on September 21, 2002, at age 67, while serving his sentence at Calipatria State Prison in California. Kenneth Bianchi received life sentences for both the Washington and California murders and remains incarcerated, most recently reported at the Washington State Penitentiary, where he has repeatedly been denied parole. The Hillside Strangler case remains one of the most studied examples of two offenders killing in tandem, and of a defendant's disputed insanity claim being tested and rejected in court.