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Hillside Strangler
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Hillside Strangler
The Hillside Strangler, later the Hillside Stranglers, is the media epithet for one, later discovered to be two, American serial killers who terrorized Los Angeles, California, between October 1977 and February 1978, with the nicknames originating from the fact that many of the victims' bodies were discovered on the wooded hillsides surrounding the city. The perpetrators were identified as cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono Jr.
All except one of the murders were committed in Buono's upholstery shop in Glendale, California. The victims, who ranged in age from 12 to 28, were raped, sodomized, beaten, and sometimes tortured, before being strangled to death with ligature. Their corpses were then cleaned and dumped naked across wooded hillsides in Los Angeles. Buono and Bianchi impersonated police officers to lure their victims from nearby locales, then drove them to Buono's upholstery shop to be raped and killed.
The murders began with the deaths of two prostitutes who were found strangled and dumped naked on hillsides northeast of Los Angeles in October and November 1977. It was not until the deaths of five young women who were not prostitutes, but those who had been abducted from middle-class neighborhoods, that the media attention and subsequent "Hillside Strangler" moniker came to prominence. The murders caused a moral panic among young women who were terrified to go out after dark, as well as being pulled over by police. There were two more deaths in December 1977 and February 1978 before the murders abruptly stopped. An extensive investigation proved fruitless until Bianchi's arrest in January 1979 for the rapes and murders of two more young women in Bellingham, Washington, and the subsequent linking of his past to the Strangler case.
In order to avoid the death penalty, Bianchi named Buono as the other perpetrator of the Hillside Strangler killings and agreed to testify against him, leading to Buono's arrest in October 1979. Bianchi pleaded guilty to five of the murders, for which he was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole, two consecutive terms for the Washington murders and five concurrent terms for the California murders. Bianchi is currently serving his sentence at Washington State Penitentiary and was denied parole twice in 2010 and 2025, respectively. Buono pleaded not guilty and was convicted of nine of the murders in November 1983 before being sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in January 1984. Buono died of a heart attack on September 21, 2002, at age 67 while serving his sentence at Calipatria State Prison.
In January 1976, Kenneth Bianchi left Rochester, New York, and moved to Los Angeles, California, to live with his cousin Angelo Buono Jr. Buono provided a strong role model for the docile Bianchi. When Bianchi was short of money, Buono came up with the idea of getting some girls to work for them as prostitutes. Two teenage runaways, Sabra Hannan and Becky Spears, met Bianchi and Buono, and once under their control, were forced to prostitute themselves. Eventually, Spears happened to meet lawyer David Wood, who was appalled at her situation and arranged for her to escape from the city.
Encouraged by Spears' escape, Hannan ran away from Bianchi and Buono a short time later. With their pimping income gone, they decided to find more teenage girls. Impersonating police officers, they eventually found another young woman and installed her in the previous girl's bedroom. Additionally, they purchased (from a prostitute named Deborah Noble) a supposed "trick list" with names of men who frequented prostitutes. Noble and her friend, Yolanda Washington, delivered the trick list to Buono in October 1977.
The nude body of the first Hillside Strangler victim, 19-year-old Yolanda Washington, a prostitute and part-time waitress, was found on October 18, 1977, on a hillside near the Ventura Freeway. Detectives determined that her corpse was cleaned before being dumped, while faint marks were also visible around the neck, wrists, and ankles, signs of a rope being used, and she had been assaulted, raped, and strangled. According to Bianchi, they picked Washington up from her street corner on Sunset Boulevard on October 17 evening in Bianchi's Cadillac. Buono, who was in the driver's seat, flashed his badge and handcuffed her, after which Bianchi stripped her, raped her, and strangled her to death after a brief struggle.
On November 1, 1977, police were called to Alta Terrace Drive in La Crescenta, a community 12 miles north of downtown Los Angeles, where the body of a teenage girl was found naked, face up on a parkway in a middle-class residential area. The homeowner had covered her with tarp in the early morning hours to prevent the neighborhood children from viewing her on their way to school. Ligature marks were on her neck, wrists, and ankles, indicating to police she was bound and strangled. The body had been dumped, indicating she was killed elsewhere.
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Hillside Strangler
The Hillside Strangler, later the Hillside Stranglers, is the media epithet for one, later discovered to be two, American serial killers who terrorized Los Angeles, California, between October 1977 and February 1978, with the nicknames originating from the fact that many of the victims' bodies were discovered on the wooded hillsides surrounding the city. The perpetrators were identified as cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono Jr.
All except one of the murders were committed in Buono's upholstery shop in Glendale, California. The victims, who ranged in age from 12 to 28, were raped, sodomized, beaten, and sometimes tortured, before being strangled to death with ligature. Their corpses were then cleaned and dumped naked across wooded hillsides in Los Angeles. Buono and Bianchi impersonated police officers to lure their victims from nearby locales, then drove them to Buono's upholstery shop to be raped and killed.
The murders began with the deaths of two prostitutes who were found strangled and dumped naked on hillsides northeast of Los Angeles in October and November 1977. It was not until the deaths of five young women who were not prostitutes, but those who had been abducted from middle-class neighborhoods, that the media attention and subsequent "Hillside Strangler" moniker came to prominence. The murders caused a moral panic among young women who were terrified to go out after dark, as well as being pulled over by police. There were two more deaths in December 1977 and February 1978 before the murders abruptly stopped. An extensive investigation proved fruitless until Bianchi's arrest in January 1979 for the rapes and murders of two more young women in Bellingham, Washington, and the subsequent linking of his past to the Strangler case.
In order to avoid the death penalty, Bianchi named Buono as the other perpetrator of the Hillside Strangler killings and agreed to testify against him, leading to Buono's arrest in October 1979. Bianchi pleaded guilty to five of the murders, for which he was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole, two consecutive terms for the Washington murders and five concurrent terms for the California murders. Bianchi is currently serving his sentence at Washington State Penitentiary and was denied parole twice in 2010 and 2025, respectively. Buono pleaded not guilty and was convicted of nine of the murders in November 1983 before being sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in January 1984. Buono died of a heart attack on September 21, 2002, at age 67 while serving his sentence at Calipatria State Prison.
In January 1976, Kenneth Bianchi left Rochester, New York, and moved to Los Angeles, California, to live with his cousin Angelo Buono Jr. Buono provided a strong role model for the docile Bianchi. When Bianchi was short of money, Buono came up with the idea of getting some girls to work for them as prostitutes. Two teenage runaways, Sabra Hannan and Becky Spears, met Bianchi and Buono, and once under their control, were forced to prostitute themselves. Eventually, Spears happened to meet lawyer David Wood, who was appalled at her situation and arranged for her to escape from the city.
Encouraged by Spears' escape, Hannan ran away from Bianchi and Buono a short time later. With their pimping income gone, they decided to find more teenage girls. Impersonating police officers, they eventually found another young woman and installed her in the previous girl's bedroom. Additionally, they purchased (from a prostitute named Deborah Noble) a supposed "trick list" with names of men who frequented prostitutes. Noble and her friend, Yolanda Washington, delivered the trick list to Buono in October 1977.
The nude body of the first Hillside Strangler victim, 19-year-old Yolanda Washington, a prostitute and part-time waitress, was found on October 18, 1977, on a hillside near the Ventura Freeway. Detectives determined that her corpse was cleaned before being dumped, while faint marks were also visible around the neck, wrists, and ankles, signs of a rope being used, and she had been assaulted, raped, and strangled. According to Bianchi, they picked Washington up from her street corner on Sunset Boulevard on October 17 evening in Bianchi's Cadillac. Buono, who was in the driver's seat, flashed his badge and handcuffed her, after which Bianchi stripped her, raped her, and strangled her to death after a brief struggle.
On November 1, 1977, police were called to Alta Terrace Drive in La Crescenta, a community 12 miles north of downtown Los Angeles, where the body of a teenage girl was found naked, face up on a parkway in a middle-class residential area. The homeowner had covered her with tarp in the early morning hours to prevent the neighborhood children from viewing her on their way to school. Ligature marks were on her neck, wrists, and ankles, indicating to police she was bound and strangled. The body had been dumped, indicating she was killed elsewhere.