Two Slayings May be Linked to ‘Freeway Killer
by Santa Ana (AP)
The strangulation murders of two teen-aged boys whose nude bodies were found in the Cleveland National Forest during the weekend resemble 28 other slayings that may be connected to the so-called Freeway Killer case, it was reported Monday. Since 1972, 30 young males have been strangled and their nude bodies dumped along highways from San Diego to San Bernardino, the Santa Ana Register newspaper reported. One of the youths whose body was found last weekend was identified as Russell Duane Rugh II, 15, of Garden Grove, but the second youth has not been identified yet. Orange County sheriff’s Lt. Wyatt Hart said. “There are similarities in these two deaths to other homicides occurring in Southern California, but it is hard to say that they are connected for sure,” Hart said, noting most of the victims were young males who were found nude and strangled off major highways. “There are also glaring dissimilarities. “Right now, we’re especially concerned about the reports because of the potential for copycats,” he added.
The bodies of the two boys were found in nearly the same area along the Ortega Highway where two other Freeway Killer victims were discovered in November and December of 1979, said Hart. “Right now, we’re pursuing approximately nine homicides in this case,” Hart said of the Freeway Killer case. He noted that of the 30 victims listed by the newspaper, maybe half “are in the ballpark, but I can’t even say for sure yet that the nine we’ve got are absolutely connected.” However, such drugs as valium, the aspirin substitute Tylenol and chloral hydrate, a sedative often prescribed for alcoholics, have been found in the blood samples of several of the Freeway Killer victims, the newspaper reported. A toxicology examination, which takes about five days, will determine whether or not either of the two latest victims had any of those drugs in their blood. At least 21 young men were slain and dumped in trash bags along Southern California roads between September 1968 and April 1977, although the estimated death toll in the homosexual Trash Bag Murders has ranged up to 34. Patrick Wayne Kearney is serving life prison terms for 18 murder convictions in Los Angeles and three more in Riverside.
