A maid heard the teenagers guttural screams and called police. Mr. Anzilotti and another investigator drove to the town of Reading, Vt., to deliver the news to Jackies older sister, Suzan Mulder, then 69. (1981, June 16). He forced his victims to address him as "master". They sat at the kitchen table, very professional, very polite, very considerate, Ms. Mulder recalled. However, he started killing again in 1974, when he murdered Lorraine Marie Kelly and Mary Ann Pryor. 0000000991 00000 n One day, Cottingham told his co-worker that he had stolen a sex worker's money and clothes while she was sleeping. On the way out, he bumped the author on the shins with a bag that felt like it contained bowling balls, Vronsky said. This murder was later linked to the 1977 murder of Maryann Carr, who was left in the same motel's parking lot. The sergeant was undeterred. I had long suspected that whoever killed Irene Blase also killed Denise Falasca, Mr. Anzilotti said. He continued to live here until the police eventually arrested him on May 22nd, 1980. 0000009992 00000 n Location of first contact Maryann Carr = her apartment; Prostitutes = street or bar . Geberth noted that this was a time before the proliferation of surveillance cameras and the use of computer analysis to establish patterns and share information across jurisdictions. xb```"WVf~g`0pt 9"~S?``Z V|bG!+N}TzYl@2 `QD2 @DACEDJaOs6x?+[Ihlrt ? After six years of visits, there was a break. 0000013001 00000 n Sitting in a conference room, Mr. Cottingham calmly reached back more than 40 years and described how hed murdered a woman whose name he couldnt remember, a 29-year-old mother found strangled in her car in Ridgefield Park, N.J., in 1967. And at the time, it was beyond our capacity to look beyond New York City, he told The Post. In 2009, decades after his first five murder convictions, Cottingham told a journalist that he had committed at least 80 to 100 "perfect murders" of women in various regions of the United States. They found an 18-year-old victim who'd been bitten and stabbed bound with handcuffs. When arrested, he had handcuffs, a leather gag, two slave collars, a switchblade knife, replica pistols, and a stockpile of prescription pills. Then in exchange for immunity from prosecution, he confessed to murdering three New Jersey schoolgirls. They captured Cottingham soon after. Accused serial killer nurse allegedly tried to murder premature infant twice. Furthermore, one of the women that he murdered in 1979 is still unidentified. Click here to follow Daily Voice Hackensack and receive free news updates. A hotel worker arrived at Room 417 to find smoke and a horrible scene: the scorched remains of two women on a bed. Once again, the victim did not appear in further proceedings and the case was dismissed.[6]. 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. He recalled the exact place in the woods where he left the bodies. [2], In 2010, he pleaded guilty to the 1967 murder of Nancy Vogel. The inmate made it clear that pressure would not work. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. In fact, Mr. Cottingham lurked around the fringes of a seedy Times Square and the prostitutes who worked its streets. Canadian author Peter Vronsky is now writing his second book on the horrifying killing spree that culminated in May 1980 at a New Jersey motel, where cops arrested Cottingham after he handcuffed, stabbed and bit an 18-year-old woman. Cottingham's confirmed killings resulted in nine convictions and a further eight confessions under non-prosecution agreements, leading to him serving multiple life sentences in New Jersey prisons. The series features interviews with former sex workers, including Barbara Amaya, who was raped and robbed at gunpoint by a man she believes was Cottingham, although she was inexplicably spared. Among the other faces in separate windows on the Zoom screen was a 66-year-old woman, identified simply as Nancy. He married in 1970 and became a father of. Richard Cottingham was born in 1946 and was raised mostly in New Jersey, according to the The New York Times. [1] He was nicknamed the New York Ripper, the Torso Killer and the Times Square Killer, since his crimes often targeted prostitutes and included mutilation. Then came Tuesdays pleas. Irene Blase, aged 18, vanished on April 7, 1969, in Hackensack and was found face down in four feet of water in the Saddle River, strangled with a wire, a cord, or perhaps the chain of a crucifix she was wearing. Cottingham admitted during the plea hearing that he brought Mary Ann and Lorraine to a hotel, where he raped both and bound the girls to keep them from getting away. Notably, none of his crimes took place on the property. In April 2021, Cottingham confessed to the unsolved 1974 double-abduction, rape, and forcible drowning murders of Lorraine Marie Kelly, 16, and Mary Ann Pryor, 17, in Montvale, one of New Jersey's most notorious cold cases. [6] At Blue Cross, Cottingham worked in an office with Rodney Alcala, the fugitive child molester and future serial killer who lived in New York under the alias "John Berger". 0000007658 00000 n . A married father of three, he lived in the. The people listed below were born in, residents of, or otherwise closely associated with Lodi, New Jersey. With an uncomplicated enthusiasm for his work, Detective Anzilotti rose through the ranks, eventually becoming the chief of detectives with a busy office to lead. Cottingham offered to give O'Dell a massage and she rolled onto her stomach. After nearly 15 years of interviews by Anzilotti and Detective Capt. I knew, he recalled, that was Irene Blase.. Straddling her back, he drew a knife and put it to her throat as he snapped a pair of handcuffs on her wrists. 0000002420 00000 n 0000003107 00000 n Their heads and hands had been cut off. For years, the three confessions remained a secret, until January 2020, when a true-crime writer who had been visiting Mr. Cottingham in prison, Peter Vronsky, announced that the inmate had revealed his crimes in interviews for a forthcoming book. Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters, List of serial killers in the United States, List of serial killers by number of victims, "New Jersey's 'Torso Killer' admits murdering 3 teenage girls over 50 years ago", "Justice Story: 'Times Square Ripper' revealed to be mild-mannered husband from suburban Jersey", "Long-Buried Secrets: The Serial Killer and the Detective", "First of Three Trials of Jerseyan in Prostitute Slayings Nears End", "Killer of 2 Is Guilty of 3 More Slayings", "Legislator Gaynor Honors Detectives Who Solved 50 Year Old Cold Case", "Mineola Woman's Murder 48 Years Ago Still Unsolved", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Richard_Cottingham&oldid=1142468060. Which, of course, I wasnt overly interested in, the former chief said. I couldnt even imagine losing a child. Instead, he drove her to the Quality Inn, where he tortured, beat and sexually assaulted her for hours, until a maid heard her scream. He also claimed to have committed 80 perfect murders no one knows about. The police hunted for leads, questioning prostitutes about suspicious men, examining the handwriting of the guest who had checked into Room 417: Carl Wilson of Merlin, N.J., a fake name from a fake place. 21 23 Mr. Cottingham mentioned details of the killing that matched what Mr. Anzilotti knew from the case file. xb```"VV~g`0pt 9mzQ[2fXar9XcK',6=3Yb%^)= RZlr$:kX;e =_i& ` ?# In April of 1979, he started living in the basement of the property after his wife initiated divorce proceedings against him for "abandonment" and "mental cruelty.". Neither man has claimed to have been aware of the other, nor is there any evidence they were familiar with each other prior to their respective arrests. A case based on his "signature pattern" was built against him, combined with the testimony of four surviving victims, as well as pieces of his victims' jewellery and other items found in his possession after his arrest. 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. After failing to return home from a trip to buy shoes at the Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream, New York,[9] 23-year old Diane Cusick was found raped, beaten, and strangled to death in the back seat of her car, parked near the mall. Cottingham severed the victim's breasts and posed them on the headboard of the bed, and set fire to the mattress under her body before fleeing, similar to the Travel Inn torso killings. Richard Cottingham, a family man who denied everything in court, was convicted of killing five women in the early 1980s. 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. The 22-year-old's death appeared brutal: she had been beheaded and set on fire and her skull has yet to be found. As he moved through Midtown undetected, Cottingham, a successful computer operator at Blue Cross Blue Shield in Manhattan, was also committing sadistic sexual assault and sometimes murder at the Quality Inn, a motel in Hasbrouck Heights, NJ. For more information, please read our Privacy & Cookie Policy. Questioning Mr. Cottingham was complicated. Investigators noted the crime scene was devoid of evidence and they were unable to identify the victims. He had been dubbed the Times Square Torso Ripper setting off Vronskys lifelong fascination of serial killers. That man, Richard Cottingham, had been convicted of crimes that seemed to bear little resemblance to the murders of the girls. Richard Cottingham of Lodi (NJ) is sentenced to 173-179 years in prison. Cottingham lived here with his wife, Janet, and their three children, Blair, Scott, and Jenny. At the mall, Cottingham, then a tall, brown-haired young man, met Vogel, a married mother of two. If hes going to confess to some others, if they can get him to talk, just for those families if he can confess to those, that right there would be I dont know the right word to say, Ms. Mulder said. 29 Vreeland St, Lodi, NJ is a single family home that contains 2,716 sq ft and was built in 1974. Cottingham had stuffed Streets body under the bed for housekeeping to find, Vronsky said. When they arrived, one firefighter attempted mouth-to-mouth resuscitation of a woman they found on the bed. I thought he could be responsible for some, Mr. Anzilotti said. They were never able to fully recover from the monumental loss, she said. The police believed they had given up on the bus and were trying to hitchhike to a mall. Long-Buried Secrets: The Serial Killer and the Detective, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/13/nyregion/new-jersey-serial-killer-cottingham-anzilotti.html. Therefore, you should be respectful and not step foot on the property without permission. He was locked away to serve several life sentences, aging into a portly man with a thick white beard. Hes younger when all this is going on in Bergen County, he said. Mr. Anzilotti, by then a sergeant, arranged a surprise search of the inmates cell the day after the Super Bowl. His upcoming sentencing will add more time to a prison term that already extends beyond his remaining years. She was stunned. Im leaving, he said. Richard Cottingham seemed like a character from a pulp novel: the crazed killer and the family man. ADVERTISEMENT. He began torturing her, nearly biting off one of her nipples. xref Anzilottihas spent all but 4 years of his law enforcement career with the prosecutors office after coming over from the Woodcliff Lake Police Department. She knew that Mr. Anzilotti had solved Denises killing, too. Mr. Anzilotti had begun to believe, he said in a recent interview, that Mr. Cottingham, between his history and the suspicions of detectives that came before me, could be responsible for one or more of those deaths. He also claims that his true victim count is at least 85. Peter Karas/The Record, via USA Today Network. The following is a list of his victims in chronological order. In October 1966, he became a computer operator for Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, where he worked until his 1980 arrest. For decades, a string of killings of teenage girls haunted suburban New Jersey. He called his detectives and gave the word: Bring in Cottingham. I was shocked that it was a serial killer, Moye said of his mothers confessed murderer. The investigators handed Ms. Mulder possessions of Jackies from half a century past. In 2004, Vronsky published his first book on homicidal maniacs, Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters, an exhaustive look at executioners slayings dating back to ancient Rome. 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 . He was originally from the Bronx in New York City. Rochelle Park & The police were called and Cottingham was apprehended while trying to flee. The little perks for the older man the pizza, the poker, the distraction from prison life were always in the service of the younger mans long game. But on May 22, 1980 Cottingham's life as a predator came to light. He soon realized the woman had no head, the Daily News reported. Hes embarrassed by this case, he said. I was shocked that one human being was capable of all this carnage, Moye said of Cottingham. Retrieved April 2nd, 2007, from Factiva database. YouTubes privacy policy is available here and YouTubes terms of service is available here. In this image taken from a New Jersey Courts virtual hearing, Richard Cottingham, center, known as the "Torso Killer," pleads guilty April 27, 2021, to two 1974 murders, finally closing the cold case deaths of teenage friends who had left home for a trip to the mall and never returned. 0000001262 00000 n Maintenance workers found her body covered in plastic bags and wrapped in a gray blanket near a Jones Beach bus stop. The police pursued a welter of tips, rumors and false alarms, The New York Times reported at the time. 0000002847 00000 n I was able to get almostany woman to do whatever I wanted them to do . Theyre pushing him on multiple other cases. Hes been interviewing Cottingham in state prison for years. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon. Goodarzi was later identified as the woman who had been tortured, killed, beheaded and had her hands cut off by Cottingham. This story has been shared 150,597 times. Maywood, He asked to quietly close their daughters murder case without formally charging the killer. But the arrest in 1980 changed everything, exposing Richard's double life and deadly exploits. And thats what bothers me, because I probably didnt have to do anything to them., Mr. Anzilotti left the confession both exhausted and relieved. She had been abducted while walking home from practice with her schools fife-and-drum team in 1968. Much of Cottinghams crimes were not murders, but other violent crimes like abductions and rapes. Inmates were wagering everything from cash to cigarettes. [6] In 2022, Cottingham officially confessed to the 1970 murder of Lorraine McGraw, under a non-prosecution agreement. Hed order pizza and play cards with the older man and other detectives. The body of Laverne Moye, of St. Albans, Queens, was discovered in a Rockville Centre creek on July 20, 1972. Those cases were already closed. Years after her sisters death, she had found some comfort speaking to another from her tribe, Karen Miller, a sister of Denise Falasca. This is possibly due to the fact that he got married in 1970. The New York Times, p. 26. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. He has been charged with 11 murders in all. She was Nancy Pryor, and she was 19 when her sister, Mary Ann, was found dead. Instead, she ended up shopping at one of Bergen Countys malls, according to Vronsky. Zestimate Home Value: $598,600. [13] In 2021, he pleaded guilty to the 1974 kidnapping, raping and drowning of Lorraine Marie Kelly and Mary Ann Pryor. This number may increase in the future, as he has stated in the past that his victim count is much higher. 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. 0000007874 00000 n 0000000016 00000 n 0000005280 00000 n The chief pressed ahead with his list. In December 2019, forensic historian and author Peter Vronsky, on the eve of publishing the revelation in his second edition of Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters, publicized the confessions with the BCPO's cooperation, in a community meeting in Midland Park. Authorities believed it to be, thus far, the oldest criminal case to be solved and prosecuted by direct DNA evidence. I lost so much more than just my mother that day, Altman said. 7{(~tm LB IBJ*ZB`0 Cottingham, a divorced father of three who previously lived in Lodi, NJ, also pleaded guilty to the February 1968 rape and murder of Diane Cusick, 23, a dance instructor from New Hyde Park, NY. To bring Mr. Cottingham back to court, where the case would certainly draw attention, would stop him from talking about other open cases, the chief explained. Cottingham, who is already serving a lifetime state prison sentence for killing several other women and girls, was brought to the office of Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella in Paramus to enter his pleas before Superior Court Judge Keith Bachmann in Hackensack. Did the old man kill those girls? 21 23 Mr. Cottingham left behind no clues. 0000003451 00000 n Filming Location in Lodi, New Jersey, United States, Filming Location in Paterson, New Jersey, United States, Filming Location in Clifton, New Jersey, United States, Filming Location in Bloomfield, New Jersey, United States, Crime Location Wylie, Texas, United States, Crime Location Memphis, Tennessee, United States, Place of Interest Brooklyn, New York, United States, Crash Site Location Beaufort, South Carolina, United States. He said he would talk about other murders only on the condition that the revelations would be kept out of the papers. It could only be Jackie Harp.. He lived with his wife and kids in. On Dec. 2, 1979, the murders that earned Cottingham the nickname the "Torso Killer took place in New York City. Like a werewolf, Vronsky told The Post. 0000010308 00000 n Authorities executed a warrant on his Lodi home, which had a private room containing evidence linking him to the Torso Killer. Eventually, Mr. Cottingham began to loosen up, and he spoke about killing the prostitutes. They'd left home for a trip 13 miles (21 kilometers) north to . Anzilotti and BCPO subsequently confirmed the "exceptional closures" of these three murders.[13][8]. He kept his glasses case tucked in a vest pocket of his prison scrubs, beneath his white beard, and folded his hands over his broad belly. A third the killing of 13-year-old Jackie Harp seemed to be the work of another killer. It was mainly psychological. Hours later, her parents drove to the mall and found Dianes Plymouth Valiant in the parking lot, where her body was discovered in the backseat. 0000002865 00000 n On February 15, 1968, Cottingham killed his second known victim. 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. Following his 1980 arrest, police found, in the locked room and in the trunk of his car, personal effects which they traced to several of his victims. [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. The family lived in Lodi, and Mr. Cottingham commuted to a job as a computer operator at Blue Cross Blue Shield in Manhattan. [15], In 2022, Cottingham was arraigned from his prison hospital bed for the 1968 murder of Diane Cusick in Long Island, New York. Despite the gruesome nature of his murders, the butcher, named Richard Cottingham, never warranted the breathless news coverage of David Son of Sam Berkowitz, who only three years prior paralyzed the Big Apple with fear. And I said, Hop in., He drove to the mall. Vronsky, who frequently visits Cottingham in prison, said he had a freak, random elevator encounter with the serial killer on the early morning of Dec. 2, 1979, as he tried to check into the Travel Inn Motel near a seedy and sex-crazed Times Square. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Cottingham has confessed to murdering 12 women. That girl was found drowned, similar to Blases killing, he said. Anything that might close more cases, bring answers to more families. In April 1978, after his wife had initiated divorce proceedings, he kept a locked room in a basement apartment of the house in which they lived in Lodi, New Jersey. %%EOF Then hed clear the room until only he and Mr. Cottingham faced each another, and begin with his questions. On Dec 15, 1977, Carr was found dead in the parking lot of a Quality Inn motel, in Hasbrouck Heights. She agreed to have sex with him for money. And he sat there with literally no remorse. He needed a way to approach Mr. Cottingham and found an opening in 2003, when he got a tip: Mr. Cottingham was taking bets on sporting events from his cell. Absolutely, its completely plausible. The teenagers were last seen on Aug. 9, 1974, in North Bergen.