I got the information on the serial killer
duo on Wikipedia, I blog about them in memory of one of their victims, Cyndi
Vanderheiden who disappeared on 14 November 1998. I am also thankful and relief that California
voted no on Proposition 34, as I want to see Wesley Shermantine pay
with his life.
The Speed Freak killers is the name given to serial killer duo Loren Herzog and
Wesley Shermantine, together
initially convicted of 4 murders (3 jointly), and suspected in the deaths of as
many as 15 people, in and around San Joaquin County, California. Their nickname
was given due to their being methamphetamine users, with "speed freak "
a colloquialism for such. Shermantine is on death row. Herzog committed suicide
in 2012. He had had his conviction overturned in 2004, and had been paroled in
2010. Bones recovered in 2012 from an abandoned well have been positively
linked to the killings.
Convictions:
Herzog and Shermantine were arrested by the
San Joaquin County Sheriff's Department and charged with a series of murders in
March 1999. Shermantine, suspected in the case for several months, had been
implicated by Herzog, his longtime friend, during questioning by sheriff's
deputies. The blood of 25 year old Cyndi Vanderheiden of Clements was found in
his car. She had gone missing after having left with them one night in 1998.
The duo had grown up as childhood friends in the town, and had been regulars at
the bar of Cyndi's father in Linden. In 2001, a jury found Shermantine guilty
of four murders; Vanderheiden, two men shot dead in their car in 1984, and
16-year-old Chevelle "Chevy" Wheeler, who disappeared in 1985 from
Franklin High School in Stockton, when she told friends she was leaving school
to go with Shermantine to his family's cabin in San Andreas. Shermantine was
given a death sentence, and is on death row at San Quentin State Prison. Herzog
was convicted of three murders, and was sentenced to 77 years to life. The
sentence was later reduced to 14 years. An appeals court overturned the
first-degree murder convictions, after ruling his confession was coerced. Herzog
was paroled in 2010 to a trailer adjacent to the High Desert State Prison in
Susanville. He committed suicide, hanging himself outside the trailer in
January 2012, after bounty hunter Leonard Padilla informed Herzog that
Shermantine was planning to disclose the location of a well and two other
locations where the duo had buried their victims. Prior to then, none of the
bodies of their victims had been found. Both men maintained that the other did
the killing in all cases. The citizens of Linden, a small town with fewer than
2,000 people, 95 miles east of San Francisco, were long aware of the duo's
reputation as methamphetamine users.
Recent evidence:
Letters Shermantine wrote to journalist Scott
Smith of the Stockton Record led authorities in February 2012 to a well
on an abandoned farm outside of Linden, California, where more than 1,000 human
bone fragments were recovered. The bones were to be tested by the California
Department of Justice for DNA profiling. Shermantine stated that he believed
that Herzog was responsible for the kidnapping of Michaela Garecht. Shermantine
had given investigators maps to the well and other possible burial sites after
bounty hunter Padilla promised to pay him $33,000 for the information. Two
bodies from separate sites were identified as those of Chevelle
"Chevy" Wheeler and Cyndi Vanderheiden. In February 2012, authorities
and Padilla searched for bodies on property owned by Shermantine's parents. The
search for bodies was spurred by a letter Shermantine wrote to Padilla that
detailed possible locations of victims. In March 2012, the FBI's Evidence
Recovery Team was asked to assist with the investigation.
Other remains:
Shermantine has stated he knows the location
of bodies, of victims killed by other death row inmates, in the Cow Mountain
Recreation Area. Lake County sheriffs were skeptical of the possibility of a
successful recovery of any bodies in the large park. In August 2012, California
Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani wrote to prison department Secretary Matt Cate
asking him to briefly release Shermantine from prison, to assist in the
discovery of any remains he may have knowledge of, under an emergency law she
had written.
Kimberly Ann Billy and Joann Hobson:
In February 2012, acting on Shermantine's
directions, authorities found more than 300 human bones and some personal items
in an abandoned well in Linden, California. In late March 2012, the remains of
two Stockton, California, teens who had been missing since the mid 1980s were
identified as Kimberly Ann Billy, 19, who disappeared December 11, 1984, and
Joann Hobson, 16, who disappeared August 29, 1985. The remains of an additional
victim found in the well have yet to be identified.
Other Links:
No comments:
Post a Comment