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Gerald and Charlene Gallego
American serial killers From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Gerald Armond Gallego (July 17, 1946 – July 18, 2002) and Charlene Adell Gallego (née Williams; born October 19, 1956), also called the Sex Slave Killers, were American serial killers who abducted, raped, tortured, and murdered ten known victims between 1978 and 1980 across California, Oregon, and Nevada. The couple garnered their nickname because according to prosecutors, they had preyed upon young women in the search for an ideal sex slave.[1]
Typically, Charlene would lure the victims to the couple's vehicle with an offer of selling drugs or asking them to help distribute flyers. They would then be restrained, abducted, and raped by Gerald, who would then kill them with a variety of methods, most commonly by shooting. After their arrests, Charlene accepted a plea bargain whereby she agreed to testify against Gerald and she was sentenced to sixteen years and eight months imprisonment in Nevada in February 1983.[2]
After a four-month long trial in California, during which Gerald acted as his own attorney,[3] he was found guilty and sentenced to death on June 21, 1983. Following his second trial in Nevada, he was again found guilty and sentenced to death on June 25, 1984, which was overturned in September 1997 but reinstated in November 1999.[4] Charlene served her sentence at Warm Springs Correctional Center and was released in July 1997. Gerald remained on death row in Nevada until his death from colorectal cancer in July 2002.
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Early life
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Gerald Gallego
Gerald Armond Gallego was born on July 17, 1946, in Sacramento, California, to parents Gerald Albert Gallego and Lorraine Davies.[5] His mother was a sex worker while his estranged father was a criminal who was imprisoned at San Quentin State Prison for auto theft at the time of Gerald's birth.[6] In May 1954, his father was sentenced to death in Mississippi for the murder of a police officer during a prison escape. While on death row, he and another inmate bludgeoned a corrections officer to death.[6] On March 3, 1955, at age 26, he was executed in the gas chamber at Mississippi State Penitentiary, becoming the first person in the state's history executed with such procedure.[7] Supposedly, Gerald did not know the identity of his father until around age 16.[5]
Gerald spent much of his childhood in Del Paso Heights, a Sacramento suburb, before moving to Yolo County and then to Nevada County.[8] During his formative years, his mother and her multiple boyfriends beat him constantly. Several of her clients even sexually abused him. He often begged to be hugged and was frequently left unclean and hungry. Gerald was arrested for his first known felony offense at age 10—robbing a neighbor's home.[9] Two years later, he sexually abused a 6-year-old girl which resulted in him being sentenced to a California youth authority facility, and he was released in 1961.[10]
As a student at Sacramento High School, Gerald was suspended numerous times for profanity, tardiness, failing classes, and violating closed campus rules.[11] In his adolescence, he developed a sexual relationship with his mother's sister-in-law, who had been a mistress to his father.[12] In 1962, Gerald and his half-brother, David Raymond Hunt, were convicted of armed robbery and served one year at a youth facility.[11] At age 18, he was arrested for motor vehicle theft and chose to represent himself in court, where he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to one year at the Deuel Vocational Institution. During his imprisonment, he learned the fate of another half-brother, which led to a mental breakdown and him exclaiming, "The only thing I care about is killing God".[13] One day after his release, he and Hunt robbed and assaulted an acquaintance, a crime for which he served six months at the Sacramento County jail.[11]
In October 1969, Gerald and Hunt were arrested for participating in the armed robbery of a motel in Vacaville. While awaiting trial at the Solano County jail, Gerald, Hunt, and another inmate sawed through a barred window and managed to escape but were recaptured by a tactical unit days later.[14] He served three years in prison and was paroled in September 1973.[15] After his release, he initially worked as a truck driver.[9] He later found work as a bartender at a club in North Sacramento, where he was recalled often firing his gun into the ceiling to wake up sleeping patrons.[16] He was married a total of seven times, including two marriages to the same woman, beginning at age 16.[11] He would often abuse and abandon his partners when they ran out of money. In one marriage, he fathered a daughter whom he sexually molested and orally raped during an approximate seven-year period, as well as one of her friends.[17] He was still married to a previous wife when he married Charlene.[10]
Charlene Gallego
Charlene Adell Williams was born on October 19, 1956, in Stockton, California, to parents Charles and Mercedes (née Whorton) Williams.[18][19][20] Raised in Sacramento, she was described as a smart, shy child from a supportive home with an ever-present source of income.[8][21] Her father was a well-known businessman who served as the vice president of a chain of supermarkets. As part of their professional lives, he and his wife frequently traveled. After Charlene's mother was severely injured in a car accident, Charlene took over her mother's responsibilities and started accompanying her father on his business travels, where she was frequently lauded by her father's clients for being an educated and articulate youngster.
Charlene graduated from Rio Americano High School in 1974 and opened a furniture store in Folsom with the financial assistance of her grandmother. She then enrolled at California State University, where she dropped out after one semester.[22] At age 17, she married her first husband, a U.S. Army solider, but the marriage was annuled after one year after the man was deployed thousands of miles away to Germany.[22] The trajectory of her life began to change when she started using drugs and alcohol. Because of her overly flirty behavior with her male co-workers, Charlene was disliked at work and developed a reputation as a nymphomaniac. Charlene wed a wealthy young man who was addicted to heroin who asserted that Charlene was desperate for a threesome with him, her, and a prostitute because she was enamored with lesbian sex. The marriage fell apart, and they divorced because Charlene's first husband was unhappy that her parents interfered in their relationship.[22]
Her next husband was a soldier who she described as a "mother's boy". She became bored with him, and they separated. When Charlene asked whether they might have sex with his wife, the married man with whom she was having an affair ended their relationship quickly. She attempted suicide after the breakup but survived. It was not long after this that she met Gerald.[23]
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Relationship
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In September 1977, Gerald and Charlene met at the Black Stallion poker club in Orangevale, California, and within a week she had moved in with him.[24] Charlene acted as the sexually subservient partner in their sadomasochistic relationship, and although she later claimed in court that she detested the painful experience, Gerald engaged in rough intercourse with her and particularly enjoyed sodomising her. Charlene allegedly became enamored by his machismo and started partaking in his deviant fantasies.[23][9]
After they had been living together for a few months, Gerald brought home a 16-year-old exotic dancer to Charlene, and they had a threesome together. He made sure the woman and the teenager did not touch each other and only touched him, but afterwards when he got home from work, he discovered that Charlene and the teenager were having sex alone. He beat Charlene after throwing the dancer out an open window in wrath. Then he refused to have intercourse with her, claiming he had lost his libido and had become impotent. Charlene felt he was sleeping with his patrons when he was working as a bartender because he had lost interest in having a sexual relationship with her.
Eventually, Gerald told Charlene that he required a pair of "sex slaves" to keep him excited.[22] This knowledge did not deter Charlene away from him, however, and she purchased a .25 Automatic pistol in December 1977. The following month, Gerald sought to divorce his current wife so he could marry Charlene.[22] The couple married on September 30, 1978, in a ceremony held at the Washoe County Courthouse.[18] Charlene would later allege that Gerald regularly abused her by repeatedly slapping her in the face, pulling her hair, and grabbing her throat. Such abuse allegedly transpired even prior to their marriage.[24]
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Murders
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Between 1978 and 1980, the Gallegos murdered a minimum of ten people in three states. All of the victims were aged between 13 and 31, all but one were female, and most were killed in California.[25][26][27] The couple typically cruised around the West Coast in Charlene's 1973 Dodge Ram Van, observing young women and girls as potential victims.[28] Typically, it was Charlene who lured their targets into the van using various ruses, including duping them into thinking they were only selling drugs.[29] Prosecutors have asserted, along with Charlene herself, that the couple were on the hunt for an ideal sex slave so that Gerald could rejoice in sexual sadism.[30] The couple would restrain their victims, drive to secluded locations, and kill them after prolonged periods of continuous sexual assault and psychological torture. The victims were killed usually by shooting, bludgeoning, and on one occasion strangulation.[25]
1978–1979
The couple is believed to have killed their first victim, 16-year-old Sandra Kaye Butler, on June 26, 1978, in Sparks, Nevada. At Fourth and Greenbrae Streets, directly across from her family's apartment, she was last seen making her way to the Greenbrae Shopping Centre. She's not been seen or heard from since. Butler was seen as a probable runaway at the time of her disappearance, and police took minimal action to investigate and track her down.[31][32] Authorities believe that Butler was Charlene and Gerald's first victim. Sandra had been given permission by her mother to ride her bike to the Rodeo at the Washoe County Fairgrounds on the day she vanished. It is known that the Gallegos were present there at the fair on that day. Gerald and Charlene were never interviewed then by the police who were investigating Butler's disappearance. Neither ever confessed, or were convicted of Sandra's supposed murder. Butler's remains have never been located, and there is suspicion of foul play. One year after Sandra disappeared on June 24, 1979, the Gallegos kidnapped two adolescent females from the Washoe County fairgrounds in Reno — the same fairgrounds Sandra was biking to one year earlier.[33][34]
On September 10, 1978, the Gallegos staked out the Country Club Plaza in Sacramento and noticed two adolescent girls, Kippi Jacquelyn Vaught, 16, and Rhonda Lee Scheffler, 17.[35] Charlene approached them with the ruse that she would give them money by distributing flyers and subsequently brought them to the van, where Gerald brandished his .25 caliber pistol and forced them into the back.[36] The girls were bound with tape around their arms and ankles and then were repeatedly sexually assaulted by Gerald all through the night while Charlene drove to a secluded area near Baxter, 65 miles east of Sacramento. When they arrived, Gerald ordered Charlene to return to Sacramento alone, switch vehicles, and come back, and during that time he continued to repeatedly rape both girls.[37]
The following day, Gerald and Charlene drove to Sloughhouse, where Gerald ordered Scheffler and Vaught out of the van. Then, after forcing them to cross a field to a ditch, he struck Vaught with an tire iron before swinging around and bashing Scheffler. Finally, he pulled out his .25 caliber pistol and shot each girl once in the head. Vaught moved and made an attempt to flee as Gerald was leaving because the gunshot had only lightly grazed her skull. She was killed when he went back and fired three more shots into her head.[9] Both then returned to Sacramento and the bodies would be found two days later a farmer.[38]
By the time the couple resumed killing in June 1979, they were married. On June 24, they abducted 14-year-old Brenda Lynne Judd and 13-year-old Sandra Kaye Colley from the Washoe County Fair in Reno, Nevada. Both were persuaded to enter the Gallegos' with the same ruse used to abduct Scheffler and Vaught: the promise of earning money by distributing flyers.[36] On Interstate 80, Charlene took the van northeast of Reno as Gerald repeatedly sexually assaulted the two young girls in the back of the van. Charlene then parked their van in the remote Humboldt Sink area.
Over the next couple of hours, Gerald rested and watched Charlene force the girls to perform sexual acts on each other. Colley was then dragged towards a dry stream bed by Gerald after he removed a shovel from under their van's seat and yanked her out of the car. He then crept up behind Colley and repeatedly struck her in the head with a shovel. Charlene would later recall in court the assault, describing it as "a loud splat like a flat rock hitting mud, and the girl sank to her knees and slowly toppled over on her face." After killing Judd, Gerald dug a large pit, placed the two girls' naked bodies inside of it, and covered it with a rock.[39] The teenagers were listed as runaways for four years until Charlene confessed to their murders during the 1982 trial.[9] Their remains were not found until twenty years later (November 1999) by a tractor operator, at which point their remains were identified.[40]
1980
On the morning of April 24, 1980, Gerald awoke Charlene and demanded, "I want a girl! Get up!" After some time spent driving around, he came upon two teenage girls exiting the Sunrise Mall: Stacy Ann Redican and Karen Chipman-Twiggs, both 17-year-olds.[41] On the pretext of smoking some marijuana, Charlene approached the two females and invited them to travel with her in the van. She led the girls back to the van after they enthusiastically concurred. Gerald met the girls with a .357 Magnum pistol as they entered the back of the van. He quickly commanded Charlene to drive and ordered the girls to undress. Gerald took turns raping and sexually assaulting them.
After he finished, he again had Charlene drive to a secluded area and led the girls one at a time into the woods carrying a hammer and a shovel. However, this time he forced Charlene to view the graves. She claimed that she saw movement, but Gerald insisted that both girls were dead. Three months later, picnickers discovered the coyote-ravaged remains of Karen and Stacy in two shallow graves in an area twenty miles outside of Lovelock, Nevada. They had both been raped and suffered massive and fatal head injuries by a blunt instrument.[10]
On June 6, the Gallegos were prowling through Southern Oregon when they offered a ride to a 21-year-old hitchhiker named Linda Teresa Aguilar in northern Gold Beach.[42] Aguilar, who was four months pregnant, had accepted the Gallegos' offer and was traveling with them in their van until Gerald brandished a .357 caliber revolver while Charlene was driving. The couple eventually stopped just off of Route 101 where Gerald told Charlene to get out and "walk around for a while" while he tied Aguilar's wrists and ankles with a nylon cord, raped her, and then bludgeoned her unconscious.[43] He then used a spare hubcap as a shovel to dig a shallow grave on Myers Creek Beach, where he placed her body and attempted to conceal it by kicking sand and placing a large driftwood log over her.[10] Relatives reported her missing on June 20 and German tourists found her body two days later. An examination revealed that she may have been buried alive since sand had been found in her mouth, throat, and nose.[44]
Shortly after killing Aguilar, the couple returned to California, where on July 17 they abducted 31-year-old cocktail waitress Virginia Maxine Mochel from the parking lot of her workplace, the Boat Inn bar, in West Sacramento.[45] Gerald and Charlene were acquainted with Mochel and had frequently been served drinks by her. Virginia was sexually assaulted by Gerald, who then forced her to beg for her life. After killing her by strangulation, he discarded her body by a pond. Her skeletal remains, still bound with nylon fishing line, were found three months later by two fishermen outside of Clarksburg.[46] Loops of cord from the victim's neck were admitted as proof of death by strangulation.[47]
On November 1, the Gallegos abducted 22-year-old Craig Raymond Miller and his fiancée, 21-year-old Mary Elizabeth Sowers, from a shopping center parking lot.[48] Gerald approached them while brandishing a .25 caliber Beretta, and ordered the two to get into the Gallegos' vehicle. After taking them to a remote location near Folsom State Prison, Gerald ordered Miller out of the car.[25] As Miller turned to approach the front of the car, Gerald pointed his pistol and shot him in the back of the head while his fiancée watched. Gerald then fired two more shots into Miller's head, as he lay lifeless on the ground; his body would later be found near Bass Lake, California. Gerald got back into the vehicle and ordered Charlene to drive to their apartment. There Gerald took Sowers into the bedroom and raped her for hours. Later he ordered Charlene to drive them to a rural area in Placer County, California. There Gerald ordered Mary out of the car and shot her three times at point blank range.[9]
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Surveillance and arrest
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A friend of Miller and Sowers who had witnessed their abduction memorized the car's license plate number and alerted authorities. Police used this information to track down the vehicle, which was registered to Charlene, to her parents' home in Sacramento. On November 2, police visited the home and questioned Charlene, who claimed to have no knowledge of the missing couple, and police did not arrest her. That same day, the body of Miller was discovered at Bass Lake.[49] A witness to the abduction identified Gerald in a photo line-up.[50]
Authorities grew suspicious that Charlene's parents were aiding her and Gerald, and the FBI began surveillance on them. During the weekend of November 15–16, the parents were surveyed driving from Sacramento to Sparks, Nevada, where they entered a Western Union office and transferred $500 via wiring to Omaha, Nebraska.[51] The FBI's Omaha field office was notified about the transfer, and they quickly moved in and arrested Charlene on November 17 as she entered the Western Union Office in Omaha. Gerald was arrested shortly after as he waited outside in his car.[52] The couple waived extradition and were returned to Sacramento three days later.[53] Around this time, the couple were investigated in the murder of Mochel due to their past acquaintance with her. Both denied any involvement and offered an alibi claiming to have been fishing at the time of her death.[54]
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Formal charges
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Gerald and Charlene were arraigned for two counts of first-degree murder on November 21. During the arraignment, Gerald, growing increasingly tired of spectators and reporters watching him, stood and shouted, "We're not animals! What happened to a fair trial?", which was followed by Charlene yelling, "Why are you doing this to us?". Charlene pleaded not guilty to charges of kidnapping and murder while Gerald refused to enter a plea, and a not guilty plea was entered by the judge on his behalf.[55] When Charlene's mother Mercedes visited Gerald on December 7, he was recorded saying that he had been on LSD when him and Charlene were killing Miller and Sowers.[56]
Charlene, who at this point was nine-months pregnant, was housed at an Elk Grove correctional center to await trial. On January 17, 1981, she began experiencing labor pains and was rushed to the UC Davis Medical Center. Soon enough, when it became clear that the baby's slow heartrate could become a problem, doctors were forced to perform a caesarean section and Charlene successfully delivered the baby.[57]
Although Charlene initially denied involvement in the murders,[58] she began to confess in mid-1982, admitting to participating in ten murders total, although she did attempt to downplay her involvement.[59] Charlene's attorneys were eventually able to convince prosecutors in several states and counties to allow Charlene to testify against Gerald for a plea deal that reduced her prison sentence, and in February 1983 she was sentenced to sixteen years and eight months imprisonment in Nevada for the murders of Redican and Chapman-Twiggs.[7]
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Trials
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California
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Gerald acted as his own attorney during the California trial. He sought a change of venue several times, arguing that the extensive publicity near Sacramento could affect jury selection, but his attempts were initially denied.[60] In September 1982, Superior Court Judge John Boskovich accepted Gerald's motion and the trial was moved to Contra Costa County.[61] The trial began on December 12, 1982, at the Contra Costa County Superior Court Building in Martinez, before Superior Court Judge Norman Spellberg.[62][63]
Sacramento Chief Deputy District Attorney James Morris, acting as prosecutor, sought the death penalty for Gerald.[64] During opening statements, Morris outlined the murders of Craig Miller and Mary Sowers and Gerald's sexual fantasies of abducting and raping young women. Morris called up Jeff Benner, an acquaintance of Miller and Sowers who had witnessed their abduction, who identified Gerald as the perpetrator. In his rebuttal, Gerald repeatedly asked Benner if he was positive about the identification because of an earlier incident at a preliminary hearing where he accidentally identified a separate attorney as the kidnapper.[65]
Gerald acknowledged he abducted both victims but claimed he only killed them out of self-defense, claiming that Miller had attacked and tried to disarm him and he was forced to kill him, and claimed Charlene had killed Sowers to "cover-up the crime".[66] While attempting to persuade the jury that he was too intoxicated at the time of the crime to be fairly judged, he called up psychiatrist Delbert Wilcox, who argued that Gerald's excessive drinking could have caused amnesia and hence why he could not remember exact details of the murders. Wilcox cited his conversations with Gerald, and when asked if he believes him, Wilcox responded "substantially".[67] In his rebuttal, Morris called up another psychiatrist, Lee Coleman of UC Berkeley, who dismissed Wilcox's claim and remarked that psychiatry "simply does not have the tools necessary to make such a judgement".[68]
On January 10, 1983, Morris called up Charlene, who had earlier agreed to testify on behalf of the prosecution. She testified that during their marriage Gerald had expected her "to be the lure for a young and beautiful woman" to fulfill his sexual fantasies.[69] While she readily admitted to being an active accomplice during the kidnappings, she denied having participated in the actual murders, and even claimed to be under the influence of alcohol during a majority of them.[70] When it was Gerald's turn to question Charlene, he promptly asked her, "Mrs. Gallego, did you kill Craig Miller?", which he followed with "did you kill Mary Beth Sowers?". She responded no to each of the questions. He also asked her what she thought about his sexual fantasies; "I thought you were crazy", she said.[71] On January 17, Charlene returned to the stand, and Gerald promptly asked her why she had lied to investigators and engaged in a cover-up, to which she responded, "Jerry, you know very well that you shot and killed those two kids". Gerald replied, "Isn't it a fact you entered this cover-up willingly because you are in fact murderess?". As Charlene was replying loudly that Gerald was a liar, Judge Spellberg interrupted the exchange and threatened to hold both in contempt of court if they were to continue.[72]
During closing arguments, Gerald reasserted that he and Charlene did abduct the couple and only killed them in self-defense once they tried to attack them.[73] The jury began deliberations on April 6,[74] and during that time he sat in his cell reading John Norman's Gor book series, which depicts an alternate world populated by slaves and women.[73] After five days, the jury convicted Gerald on two counts of murder and two counts of kidnapping, with the jury finding that his convictions had met the special circumstances allowing him to be eligible for the death penalty.[75] At the start of the penalty phase, Gerald requested an attorney and hired Richard Fathy to represent him, who attempted to portray Gerald as having a child-like mindset to the jury. Charlene would take the stand again on May 10, where she recounted the murder of Linda Aguilar in Oregon, how Gerald raped her in their van before burying her alive, and how he "had no tears in his eyes" after the fact. She also testified that, shortly after killing Virginia Mochel, Gerald bragged that "it was easy – just like the other one".[76] Under cross examination by Fathy, however, Charlene acknowledged that she could have called for help during the time both victims were alive but claimed she was afraid of Gerald's "emotional control".[43]
On May 12, Morris called up Gerald's 19-year-old daughter from a previous marriage, who testified that he had sexually assaulted her from ages 6 or 7 up until she was 14 and was additionally forced to perform oral sex on him.[77] In his final statement to the jury, Morris urged them to sentence Gerald to death, and said, "The man ought to have the opportunity, the sooner the better, to meet Gerald Albert Gallego. Then God can deal with his soul, whether or not he can swap stories with the man that he respects so much".[78] On May 24, the jury took less than two hours to recommend a death sentence,[79] which Judge Spellberg formally imposed on June 21.[3] At the sentencing, Spellberg referred to Gerald's prior criminal offences when citing him as representing "the failure of our system".[80]
Nevada
On September 20, California Governor George Deukmejian signed an executive agreement ordering Gerald's "prompt" extradition to Nevada.[81] There, he was to stand trial in Pershing County for the murders of Redican and Chapman-Twiggs. He chose not to act as his own attorney and agreed to the appointment of public defender Thomas Perkins as his attorney.[82][83] The trial commenced on May 23, 1984, before Superior Court Judge Llewellyn Young.[84]
Lovelock District Attorney Richard Wagner served as prosecutor.[85] For his first witness, Wagner called up Mildred Vaught, the mother of victim Kippi Vaught, who testified that she had become enraged with Gerald to the point that she made a plan to kill him, but did not follow through.[86] Charlene took the stand on May 24, where she testified that the victims, who were aged 16 and 17, were "too old" to satisfy Gerald's sexual fantasies.[87]
The jury found Gerald guilty on June 10[88] and recommended a death sentence on June 12.[89] The sentence was formally imposed by Judge Young on June 25. As the sentence was announced, Gerald reportedly stood and exclaimed, "You sentenced me to death with no damn evidence at all!".[90] During his imprisonment, Gerald accused Wagner of selling his life story to enrich himself and asked that the Nevada Attorney General and the State Bar of Nevada investigate him.[91]
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Imprisonment
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Gerald
Shortly after his second death sentence, Gerald sought to appeal to the Nevada Supreme Court, and in December 1985 they ruled unanimously to uphold his sentence.[92] He was scheduled to be executed at Nevada State Prison on February 6, 1987, by lethal injection; the U.S. District Court of Nevada issued an indefinite stay following an appeal to the federal court.[93] In 1993, Gerald filed a 17-page appeal seeking to overturn his convictions in Nevada, citing issues such as jury prejudice and errors on the judge's behalf. Despite the Nevada Attorney General urging the court to deny the request,[94] District Court Judge Howard D. McKibben issued a hearing on the matter in October 1995.[95] McKibben ultimately rejected the appeal after four months of hearing arguments.[96] Gerald further sought to appeal on the grounds that the trial had been unfair due to the extensive publicity tampering jury selection.[97]
On September 4, 1997, Gerald's death sentence in Nevada was overturned by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after it was discovered that jurors had been incorrectly informed that Gerald could be eligible for parole if not sentenced to death.[98] Clark County District Judge John McGroarty ordered him to undergo a psychological evaluation to determine if he was competent enough to move forward to a new penalty hearing; a psychologist would determine at a 1999 evaluation that Gerald was delusional, psychotic, and possibly schizophrenic.[99] Nevertheless, McGroarty ruled that Gerald was competent enough to participate in the hearing but rejected his proposal that he represent himself.[100]
The new penalty hearing began on September 20, 1999. As Gerald's original conviction still stood, his defense opted for a life sentence, arguing that he was no longer a danger to himself or others, while the prosecution outlined the murders in detail to the jury.[101] Although he chose not to take the stand in his own defense, Gerald did make a statement to the jury where he admitted guilt and apologized to the victims' families.[102] At the sentencing hearing on September 23, the jury ruled that Gerald be again sentenced to death, which Judge McGroarty formally imposed on November 16.[4]
Charlene
Charlene was imprisoned at Warm Springs Correctional Center in Carson City.[103] She extensively studied psychology, business and Icelandic literature.[104] While in prison, she received enough good time credit to warrant a sentence reduction, and she was due to be released in August 1991, prompting California authorities to file charges against her in relation to the murders of Miller and Sowers. In order to avoid facing trial, she asked to remain in prison for another six years, which the courts agreed to.[105] Charlene was released on July 17, 1997, and assumed a new identity.[23] During an interview, she claimed to have also been a victim, saying, "There were victims who died, and there were victims who lived. It's taken me a hell of a long time to realize that I'm one of the ones who lived."[106] She also claimed that she "tried to save some of their lives."[1]
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Death
In March 2002, Gerald was diagnosed with colorectal cancer, and it soon spread to his lungs and liver. He was transferred off death row at Ely State Prison to undergo treatment at Renown Regional Medical Center, but refused any efforts aimed at prolonging his life and opted to be sedated with painkillers.[107] On July 18, he died at age 56.[108]
Media
Bibliography
- Davis, Carol Anne (2001). Women who kill: Profiles of female serial killers. London: Allison & Busby. ISBN 978-0749005351.
- Flowers, R. Barri (1996). The Sex Slave Murders. New York: St. Martins Press. ISBN 978-1461191001.
- Biondi, Ray; Hecox, Walter (1988). All his father's sins : inside the Gerald Gallego sex-slave murders. Rocklin, CA: Prima Pub. & Communications. ISBN 978-0914629344.
- Van Hoffmann, Eric (1990). A venom in the blood. New York: Pinnacle Books. ISBN 978-0786006601.
Television
- The History Channel documentary series, Infamous Murders, analyzed the case in an episode in 2001.
- The documentary series Born to Kill? featured an episode focusing upon the Gallegos in 2014.
See also
References
External links
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