The California serial killer dubbed 'The Original Night Stalker', due to the similarities between his crimes and the crimes of Richard Ramirez, is a classic example of a serial rapist that gradually progressed into serial murder. This unidentified predator began by earning the nickname 'The East Area Rapist' during a spree of as many 36 home invasion rapes from 1976 through 1979 in several California cities and towns throughout the state.

As the East Area Rapist this perpetrator started out by raping women that were alone at the time and gradually moved on to couples. He was well-prepared, always bringing pre-cut lenths of rope and cord to bind his victims with, and patient in his stalking of victims before attacking. He also, showed off a creative streak, sometimes forcing a male victim to lie down on the floor with plates or perfume bottles stacked on top of him while he raped the female, threatening to kill them both if the man moved enough to rattle the dishes or tip the bottles onto the floor. As he evolved as a serial rapist he got progressively more violent, cruel, and verbally threatening. He was a serial killer waiting to happen.

He made the leap to murder on March 13, 1980, when he killed Lyman and Charlene Smith in Ventura. Charlene was raped and both were bludeoned to death with a log the killer had picked up at the scene. The Smith's were found still bound in their bedroom by their twelve-year-old son.

Kieth and Patrice Harrington were the next to die, also bludgeoned to death in the home in Dana Point on August 19. This time the murderer untied his victims before leaving, but left some cord laying on the bed. Strangely, a single burnt match was found in the home by investigators. Patrice had been brutally raped before her death.

For whatever reason, the slayer chose a woman who was alone for his final two crimes. The first was Manuela Witthuhn, 28, who was murdered on January 5, 1981, while her husband was in the hospital ill. Her killer entered her Irvine home, raped her and beat her to death, then disappeared. This time he took the bindings with him along with the murder weapon and, oddly, Witthuhn's answering machine. As with the Smith's, burnt matches were found in Witthuhn's home.

It was not until over five years later that the Original Night Stalker struck again, killing Janelle Cruz on May 4, 1986, only a mile from Witthuhn's home in Irvine. Cruz was raped and beaten to death like the the previous victims. The murder weapon was likely a pipe wrench that was found to be missing from Cruz' home. Cruz was slain soon after a male friend left her house, the man later telling police he had heard strange noises outside of Cruz' home before he had left.

With that the the killer seemingly vanished. It was actually not until 2001 that his murders as the 'Original Night Stalker' and his rapes as the 'East Area Rapist' were definitively linked by DNA testing. It is also believed by some that this prodigious criminal committed many other crimes, including three home-invasion attacks (two of the couples were killed while one couple managed to escape) in Goleta, California, from 1979 to 1981. While these crimes have obvious similarities to the "Original Night Stalker' slayings, there are also differences. In addition to blunt-force trauma to the head, the attacker in Goleta killed with a gun and in the non-fatal attack he employed a knife as his weapon. The women in those attacks were also not sexually assaulted even though the victims were bound. No DNA evidence exits in the Goleta crimes evidently so it is impossible to conclusively link them to the unsolved rapes and murders of the 'Original Night Stalker', another serial killer who appears to have gotten away with murder.