Bizarre Crime of the Week : Investigation Discovery: "Night Stalker" Murderer Richard Ramirez Linked to the Death of 9-Year-Old Mei Leung

October 28, 2009

It almost goes without saying that anyone who follows true crime cases has heard of Richard Ramirez, also known as the "Night Stalker," one of California's most notorious serial killers. Ramirez is currently on death row at San Quentin State Prison for a number of murders he committed more than two decades ago, but detectives in various jurisdictions have not given up in their efforts to connect him to additional killings.

Ramirez, readers will recall, caused widespread panic in Southern California that began around 1985 when he went on a rampage of sexual assault and murder. His modus operandi consisted primarily of entering homes through unlocked windows and doors during early morning hours, strangling some of his victims and slashing the throats of others. Most of his victims, however, died of gunshot wounds. He was also known to spray paint pentagrams on the walls in some of his victims' homes. Because the pentagram is often associated with Satanism, Ramirez was viewed by many as being a Satanist. Some even went so far as to think of him as a vampire because he always committed his foul deeds during the night like the legendary monsters of yore.

One of the cold cases currently being looked at is that of 9-year-old Mei Leung, who was found dead on April 10, 1984 in the basement of a residential hotel located in the 700 block of O'Farrell Street in San Francisco's Tenderloin district. According to the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD), Mei lived at the hotel with her family. Prior to her death, she had been seen in the company of her 8-year-old brother as they walked home from a friend's house. At the time of Mei's slaying, Ramirez was known to have been staying at two hotels in the same general area, according to SFPD Deputy Chief David Shinn. Shinn said that investigators were attempting to find any information about Ramirez' whereabouts at the time of the young girl's slaying.

Mei's unsolved murder case was reopened about five years ago, in part because of the recollection of an officer who was familiar with it when she worked as a patrol officer. Now, Police Inspector Holly Pera has been advocating that the case be looked at closely—again.

"That's part of the reason why the case was relooked at," Pera said recently. "It's the type of case…that you can't forget."

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As a result of reopening the case, a number of evidentiary items from the scene were tested at the crime lab, according to Michael Gabriel, a DNA specialist with the department's Crime Scene Investigations Unit.

"We have probably 100 unsolved homicide cases that we have tested over the years," he said. "We're constantly working on these cases."

One of the examinations resulted in a cold hit when it was run through the national database, known as the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). The CODIS system holds approximately 1.2 million profiles of people convicted of various offenses, including those arrested for past felonies.

Although they could not go into great detail for obvious reasons due to the case still being under investigation, detectives announced in late October 2009 that they have DNA evidence linking Ramirez to Mei's death. Investigators recently paid Ramirez a visit at San Quentin, where they obtained a DNA mouth swab from the convicted murderer to confirm his connection to Mei's death. They said that they should have the results of the tests within the next two weeks or so.

Mei's family, still residing in the San Francisco area, recently expressed their gratitude to the police upon learning that investigators now have a suspect in their daughter's murder.

At the time of his rampage, which continued over several months, the murders attributed to the "Night Stalker" resulted in a marked increase in gun sales, ammunition, locks and window bars throughout many communities in the Los Angeles area. The killings finally stopped on August 31, 1985, when Ramirez was captured and beaten by angry residents in East Los Angeles who caught him attempting to steal a woman's car.

It took nearly four years for a sense of justice to be brought to the families of the victims of 13 murders committed by Ramirez. He was convicted of 13 slayings on September 20, 1989, and a month later the same jury voted that he be sentenced to death.

"Big deal," Ramirez was quoted as saying as he was led out of the courtroom. "Death always went with the territory."

Photo Credit: Police file photo

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