This time, at the Seville Hotel, where he strangled Jean Reyner, a 25-year-old mother working in the sex trade to finance a child custody battle. Hes embarrassed by this case, he said. Over decades, through his rise from sergeant to detective to chief of detectives, Robert Anzilotti plugged away at cold cases in New Jersey involving young womens murders. 0000007658 00000 n James McMorrow, Cottingham confessed last year to three other cold-case slayings of teenage school girls in Bergen County: Jacalyn (Jackie) Harp, 13, of Midland Park, who was walking home from school band practice on July 17, 1968 when she was strangled with the leather strap of her flag sling; Irene Blase, 18, of Bogota, who went missing from Hackensack on April 7, 1969 and was found strangled in Saddle River; Denise Falasca, 15, of Closter, who went missing from Westwood on July 14, 1969. She had been abducted while walking home from practice with her schools fife-and-drum team in 1968. In August 2022, with a non-prosecution agreement, officials in Rockland County, New York, corroborated and accepted Cottingham's confession to the murder of 26-year-old Lorraine McGraw, who was beaten and killed March 1, 1970. A judge sentenced him to 25 years to life after Cusicks brother and only child read emotional impact statements in court. Goodarzi, of Trenton, was a sex worker who had been traveling to the then-seedy streets of midtown Manhattan, Vronsky said. God rest their souls," Bergen County Prosecutor's Chief of Detective Robert Anzilotti said Tuesday after Richard Cottingham of Lodi admitted killing both in 1974. . The public in Bergen County deserved to know the outcome of those girls, he said. A friend of one victim came forward and the slain woman was later positively identified through a cesarean-section scar and chest X-ray as 22-year-old prostitute Deedeh Goodarzi. Getting to that point wasnt easy, Anzilotti said. Just shy of his 21st birthday, Richard Cottingham began a vicious killing spree that tore through north New Jersey and New York City. Authorities believed it to be, thus far, the oldest criminal case to be solved and prosecuted by direct DNA evidence. The motel where Martin Luther King was assassinated. A notorious New Jersey serial killer pleaded guilty Tuesday to the cold case murders of two teenage girls in 1974. Because I was with them for a couple of days, he replied, according to a transcript, and got to know them., It was raining that day in August 1974, and Mr. Cottingham, then 28, was driving to work in Manhattan when he passed the two girls walking in the opposite direction. In other words, he may have been content and/or preoccupied. Cottingham, a former computer programmer whose wrath of terror spanned from 1967 to 1980, also copped on Monday to strangling Mary Beth Heinz, 21, in May 1972, three months before he killed Moye and dumped her body in the same creek. He kept these "trophies" in a locked room in the basement. He began torturing her, nearly biting off one of her nipples. This case was always haunting me.. The people listed below were born in, residents of, or otherwise closely associated with Lodi, New Jersey. The Blase family agreed. This story has been shared 150,597 times. Click here to follow Daily Voice Hackensack and receive free news updates. YouTubes privacy policy is available here and YouTubes terms of service is available here. A third the killing of 13-year-old Jackie Harp seemed to be the work of another killer. The year 2020 arrived, and running his office through the coronavirus outbreak kept Mr. Anzilotti too busy for cold cases. Did the old man kill those girls? [2], In 2010, he pleaded guilty to the 1967 murder of Nancy Vogel. She was found strangled to death the next day in Saddle Brook. But in 2009, he surfaced to again make waves, when he gave a chilling interview to journalist Nadia Fezzani about his motivation and his body count. As the New Jersey press reported on Cottinghams arrest, the NYPD started to take notice. But Cottingham flew under the radar precisely because of how he chose his victims and who his victims were. Over decades, through his rise from sergeant to detective to chief of detectives, Robert Anzilotti plugged away at cold cases in New Jersey involving young womens murders.CreditBryan Anselm for The New York Times. Cottingham has claimed in the past he. His additional confession to a 1974 murder was discounted by Rockland County police. I could feel it.. Moye, 55, stared down serial murderer and rapist Richard Cottingham in a Nassau County courtroom Monday as the 76-year-old notorious "Torso Killer" admitted to five more sadistic slayings. But then, four years ago, Mr. Cottingham stunned the chief. It was mainly psychological. [16], In the early hours of May 22, 1980, Cottingham picked up 18-year-old Leslie Ann O'Dell, who was soliciting on the corner of Manhattan's Lexington Avenue and 25th Street. It was just shock all the way around.. Mr. Cottingham left behind no clues. Boyfriends, ex-boyfriends, family members all were questioned and cleared of suspicion. He pleaded innocent and for decades insisted he was being "framed", until admitting in 2009 that he had actually perpetrated those five murders. On August 21, 1972, he is charged and convicted of shoplifting at a Stern's department store in Paramus, New Jersey, and was sentenced to pay a $50 fine or ten days in jail. Her breasts had been severed and torso had been set on fire, Vronsky said. In 2022, Cottingham also confessed to the 1968 murder of Diane Cusick after DNA evidence linked him to the crime. Cottingham had just raped, tortured and beheaded two sex workers in a room at the motel before setting it on fire. South Hackensack, Richard Cottingham, Lorraine Kelly, Mary Ann Pryor, Bergen County Prosecutor's Chief of Detectives Robert Anzilotti, Ecuadorian National Pleads Guilty To Brutal Stabbing Death Of Popular Bergen County Chef, Franklin Lakes Driver Indicted In Teaneck T-Bone Crash That Kil, Paterson Non-Violence Activist Shot Dead In Police Standoff Was, Man Killed By Amtrak Train In Central Jersey Was Family Breadwi, WATCH: YouTube Video Shows Rapper Assaulting Bergen Shop Rite W, Motel Guest Covered In Lotion Rescued From Knife-Wielding Woman, DWI Suspected In Horrific Route 80 Crash In Bergen County. The police photograph on the left was taken in June of 1980. Vronsky, whose works also include an authoritative tome cataloging 17,000 years of pathological homicide, said Cottingham scouted his victims before transforming from a family man into a ferocious monster. Her attacker was caught as he ran away. It is situated at 29 Vreeland Street in Lodi, New Jersey. Richard Cottingham, the notorious North Jersey serial killer known for dismembering the young women who were so often his victims, publicly confessed Tuesday to drowning two North Bergen girls. They were never able to fully recover from the monumental loss, she said. Its hard to understand how someone could be like that. During a search of the house, investigators discovered personal items belonging to some of his victims. Mr. Cottingham mentioned details of the killing that matched what Mr. Anzilotti knew from the case file. Little more than a week after Street was found, Reyner was found butchered in the Seville Motel in New York City. Use of and/or registration on any portion of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement, Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement, and Your Privacy Choices and Rights (each updated 1/26/2023). Community Rules apply to all content you upload or otherwise submit to this site. While some serial killers claim murders they have not committed, Mr. Anzilotti didnt believe Mr. Cottingham was that type, but still he meticulously lined up details of the admissions with facts that only the killer would know. 0000000991 00000 n I was shocked that one human being was capable of all this carnage, Moye said of Cottingham. Everything that I was taught about evil was evident in his presence, in his demeanor, in the gaze of his eyes, Moye told The Post. Richard was arrested at a motel in Hasbrouck . After nearly 15 years of interviews by Anzilotti and Detective Capt. A woman walking to her car found them: two teenage girls, naked and dead in a sliver of woods behind an apartment parking lot. He asked to quietly close their daughters murder case without formally charging the killer. It is situated at 29 Vreeland Street in Lodi, New Jersey. The other girls did, you have to take it, too. I had long suspected that whoever killed Irene Blase also killed Denise Falasca, Mr. Anzilotti said. Moye, 55, stared down serial murderer and rapist Richard Cottingham in a Nassau County courtroom Monday as the 76-year-old notorious Torso Killer admitted to five more sadistic slayings decades earlier, bringing his known tally to 17 although experts believe that figure could be as high as 100 victims. When a worker came to check on her, ODell cracked open the door and gave a hand signal asking for help. Richard Cottingham seemed like a character from a pulp novel: the crazed killer and the family man. It represented closure, Moye said of this weeks hearing. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Thanks for contacting us. On Dec. 2, 1979, fire alarms rang out at the Travel Inn Motor Hotel on West 42nd Street. <<69EF7C237A736942AE760EBDB9B8F80B>]>> Bergen County investigators realized there were numerous open sexual assault cases with similar hallmarks: Cottingham kidnapped them from Times Square, drugged and assaulted them. There were similarities in the two cases: the girls ages, the apparently hasty disposal of their bodies, even their appearance, both with long, dark hair. The victim's hands were tightly handcuffed behind her back and police would later lift a fingerprint matching Cottingham, the only fingerprint successfully found from any of his known murders. 0000009992 00000 n The investigators handed Ms. Mulder possessions of Jackies from half a century past. K3nVxb;X)oxeHME~> To Mr. Anzilotti, what had once seemed like a great disparity between the two series of murders one a group of suburban teenagers and the other mostly sex workers in the city now made sense. On May 5, 1980, a motel housekeeper found the body of 19-year-old Valerie Ann Street in the Hasbrouck Heights Quality Inn. Retrieved April 2nd, 2007, from Factiva database. He also claims that his true victim count is at least 85. Investigators noted the crime scene was devoid of evidence and they were unable to identify the victims. xref Serial killer Richard Cottingham made his admission in the cold case murders of the high school girls, acknowledging that he kidnapped, raped and finally drowned the pair inside a motel room. In the case of Diane Cusick, it was a drive-in that no longer exists there He remembers the victims characteristics, but he doesnt remember their names.. He married in 1970 and had three children. O'Dell's muffled cries of pain became so loud that the motel staff, already uneased by the previous two murders of Carr and Street, called police and then rushed to the room demanding that Cottingham open the door. Taking a bus to another location, Cottingham and Blase spent some time together. And at the time, it was beyond our capacity to look beyond New York City, he told The Post. But as he considered retirement, he kept returning to the two girls found dead in the woods. Now 74, Cottingham, who claims responsibility for dozens of murders, has confessed to a. Its Godlike almost. Instead, he drove her to the Quality Inn, where he tortured, beat and sexually assaulted her for hours, until a maid heard her scream. %%EOF Correctional officers found contraband and evidence of bookmaking and transferred Mr. Cottingham to solitary confinement. 0000008501 00000 n ADVERTISEMENT. Monday marked the first time Moye ever laid eyes on Cottingham, who dismembered some of victims, including two women whose bodies were found without their heads and hands in a Times Square motel in December 1979. A number of killings of young women and girls in New Jersey and New York had gone unsolved for years before a night in May 1980 when a maid at . document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Thanks for contacting us. But he carried those cold cases with him literally, his thick files in cardboard boxes that he moved from office to office chipping away at the false leads, seeking similarities in the victims and in the crime scenes. And later that same month, a fifth woman was found mutilated in the former Hotel Seville near Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Cottinghamss name came up several times, but it didnt fit for me, she said. 0000002831 00000 n She was Nancy Pryor, and she was 19 when her sister, Mary Ann, was found dead. Seth Wenig/Associated Press By Ed Shanahan Dec. 5, 2022 On a. He had his list of names, each one a dead girl and a crime long unsolved. In a candid interview, the Bergen County chief who spent 20 years trying to wrangle new confessions out of serial killer Richard Cottingham revealed the 74-year-old prisoner has "regrets". FPh_3Gj Nt%Q[r L`%/9QTh/| Q4_g8KI}u'?xbif`H>;wNQ|sd2(? Her youth and difference in appearance, with a boyish haircut, set her apart from the other victims. %PDF-1.4 % Later on, Richard took a job with Blue Cross Blue Shield in New York as a computer operator. He was a coward.. Cottingham was apprehended in the hallway by arriving police officers. Richard is related to Rosemarie Marie Cunningham and Larry J Cunningham as well as 3 additional people. xref He then left the scene with their severed heads and hands. Her killer, Richard Cottingham, was a computer operator, married with three children of his own, living a seemingly normal life. Which, of course, I wasnt overly interested in, the former chief said. He had come further in closing cases than his younger self could have imagined. The killer would suddenly recall picking a girl up from a store somewhere, and the chief, in the front passenger seat as a detective drove, surreptitiously took notes. On April 14, in a recorded interview, Mr. Cottingham said he remembered Mary Ann Pryor and Lorraine Kelly, and Mr. Anzilotti asked why he knew their names, when he hadnt in past cases. I have done many shows about serial killers, and I have always marveled at the fact that [Ted] Bundy, [John Wayne] Gacy, [Jeffrey] Dahmer and Berkowitz were all household names, perversely, Berlinger told The Post. Cottingham primarily sought prostitutes who were petite blondes in their late teens to mid-twenties. We've received your submission. H|U0+(QvG`b08NbHlSoZ2CRSs=* \e~ 0000000016 00000 n Premiering on Dec. 29, the three-part season explores the case of Richard Cottingham, a New Jersey man who was dubbed "The Torso Killer" and found guilty of killing 11 women between 1967 and 1980. [15] In December 2022, Cottingham was convicted of Diane Cusick's 1968 murder and, under a non-prosecution agreement, officially admitted to killing another four women during 19721973 in Long Island, New York: Mary Beth Heinz, Laverne Moye, Sheila Heiman, and Maria Emerita Rosado Nieves. She was believed to have accepted a ride from a stranger, and her body was found on the side of a road near a cemetery. (1981, June 25). However, he started killing again in 1974, when he murdered Lorraine Marie Kelly and Mary Ann Pryor. Unfortunately, we were unable to find a photograph of Jean Reyner. He had pornographic artwork, adhesive tape, books about S&M, said Geberth. F! He continued to live here until the police eventually arrested him on May 22nd, 1980. Prosecutors will seek dual life sentences to run alongside his current lifetime term when Cottingham is sentenced on July 9 for what Musella said were the willful, deliberate, and premediated murders of Mary Ann Prior and Lorraine Kelly. No one could find any clues in the girls backgrounds: no drugs, no trouble with the law. I just kind of looked at it and touched it and put it in a box where I had some dried flowers for my mother when she passed.. [4], On May 3, 1970, Cottingham was married at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Queens Village, Queens. I took over handling the calls, the arrangements. He enjoys our relationship. His yearbook photo shows a cross-country runner with blond hair slicked back. After their drink, Cottingham offered to bring Blase back to the bus station where they had taken the bus. His yearbook photo shows a cross-country runner with blond hair slicked back. Richard Cottingham who is already serving time in state prison for several . Maywood, 3. I was able to get almostany woman to do whatever I wanted them to do . Zestimate Home Value: $598,600. He later detailed his brief 1979 encounter with Cottingham in Times Square Torso Ripper: Sex and Murder on The Deuce. His upcoming book on the vicious predator will be released next fall. Cottingham has confessed to murdering 12 women. Altman, who was just 3 years old at the time, said her parents had separated prior to Cusicks killing.
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