Fernando Caro murdered between three and five children and teenagers in the Fresno, California area in 1979-80. He was born in Brawley on December 3, 1949, the eldest of eight children of Mexican migrant laborers and spent much of his childhood working in farm fields. They subjected him to severe beatings when he displeased them, using their fists, boots, wooden boards, and other objects. Caro had a persistent smell of pesticides on his person which led to children at school bullying him and nicknaming him "Stinky." Nonetheless, he was quite intelligent and managed to graduate high school and studied civil engineering at San Diego State. Caro dropped out of college in his junior year and joined the Marines. He flew combat helicopters in the Vietnam War and attained an officer's rank. Caro was honorably discharged and went to work for a pesticide manufacturer, where he cleaned tanks. The workers did not use gas masks, rather they were tethered with a rope to a waist belt so they could be pullied out of the tank when they passed out from inhaling fumes.
Caro committed his first criminal act in 1976 when he abducted a law clerk, dragged her out to the desert, and raped her. He was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison. On February 3, 1979, Victoria DeSantiago, 8, left her Fresno home accompanied by her 3 year sister Eva and the family dog to run an errand downtown. Afterwards, the girls realized that the dog had gotten away and they went looking for it. Caro pulled up in his truck and asked what they were doing. Victoria explained that they were looking for their dog, so he offered to help them find it. Caro instead drove off where he molested Eva while continuing to hold Victoria hostage. He then drove to a field off Ashlan and Leonard Avenues where he raped and beat her to death. Her body was found in a dry creek bed on February 6.The murder was a shocking news story in Fresno and the girls' family received considerable sympathy from the community. Under pressure to find the killer, the Fresno PD assembled a large task force and questioned almost 300 suspects, but none of this led anywhere. In August, one of the detectives on the case, Lt. Maurice Regan, told the Fresno Bee that it was difficult because Eva was the only living witness to the crime and a 3 year old could not offer much useful help. Another detective said that he believed it was probably the same individual who had committed an unsolved sexual attack on a 9 year old girl a few weeks before the murder, but it was only a suspicion he had. Activist groups in Fresno distributed informational books to children warning them about taking rides from strangers and calling for harsher penalties on crimes against children.
On April 6, 1980, a farm worker was working in an orchard outside Shafter when he found two dead teenage girls. One was tied up and shot behind the ear, the other shot in the thigh and face, and raped. Both girls were freshly killed and decomposition had not begun, suggesting the murders were only a few hours earlier. Even though both had items on their persons that could be used to identify them, no luck was made and there were no missing persons reports filed.On August 20, Mark Hatcher, a 15 year old high school freshman in Fowler, went on a bike ride with his same-aged cousin Mary Booher, who was visiting him. The two rode up to a peach orchard in the early evening and encountered Caro in an orange '74 Chevy pickup truck. He called them over to his truck, pulled out a gun, and shot Hatcher in the head. Caro then kidnapped Booher, threw their bicycles into the back of the truck, and took off. He didn't get very far--in his hasty getaway he accidentally rammed another truck in the parking lot of a barroom on American and Clovis Avenues. The owner of the truck, Jack Lucchesi, 25, and his 23 year old friend Rick Donner, were inside the bar and heard the collision. They went outside and saw Caro trying to speed away.
Lucchesi and Donner, not knowing that he was armed, decided to chase after him. They got in their truck and tailed Caro, finally forcing him to a stop on Fowler Avenue. Lucchesi asked who his truck was insured with. Caro replied that he would get his insurance information out of the glove compartment, but instead he pulled a gun and started shooting. He struck Donner once in the left side and Lucchesi in the head, but they managed to escape while Caro got back in his truck and sped away. With Booher still held hostage, he took her to an orange grove and shot her in the head. Lucchesi and Donner were treated at a local hospital and gave police some description of the suspect and his vehicle. Detectives restored to hypnosis to try and get them to remember more--one of them was able to remember part of Caro's license plate. Lucchesi was blinded in one eye from the shooting.Police began questioning everyone who matched the description and owned an orange pickup truck. Caro was finally located on August 25 at a chemical plant where he worked as a maintenance man. He attempted to flee when he saw the officers, but was captured and booked into the Fresno County Jail. Caro's co-workers were surprised to see him arrested as they knew him to be a quiet, friendly individual who mostly kept to himself. Booher's body was found a short time later and Caro was charged with two counts of first degree murder, assault, use of a deadly weapon in the commission of a crime, kidnapping, and attempted rape.
After Caro's arrest, police suspected him in the murders of the two teenage girls in April since they had been killed with the same caliber of bullet. He was not charged in their deaths, however. They remained unidentified for 13 years. In 1993, investigators identified them as Charlena Simon, 15, and Robin Snead, 16. Both had run away from home about two weeks before their deaths and their families didn't report them missing because they thought the girls were old enough to look after themselves and would eventually return. Simon and Snead were both from stable, middle class homes and not poor or abused; their parents dismissed their taking off as simple teenager antics.Since Caro could potentially get the death penalty, his public defenders requested a change of venue. The trial was moved to San Jose and Donner and Lucchesi testified at a hearing about their encounter with him. The officers who arrested Caro at the chemical plant said that he told them he knew they were coming for him, which was why he shaved off his mustache and kept his truck parked in a garage. He was ultimately found guilty and sentenced to death.
Over the years, he appealed his conviction on the grounds that he was physically abused as a child and suffered cognitive deficits as a result of exposure to pesticides. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Caro's death sentence in 2002 and ordered a re-trial. This second trial saw him sentenced to life in prison. Caro was linked via DNA testing in 2009 to the murder of Victoria DeSantiago and prosecutors announced that they would seek the death penalty. During his years in prison, Caro learned to paint and sold his artwork on commission.Caro was found dead in his cell in San Quentin on January 28, 2017. He had not been ill and a medical checkup at the prison infirmary a month earlier determined him to be in good health, however an autopsy concluded that his death was due to natural causes.
>>18512267is that why he didn't publish that last book about LBJ? damn...
>>18512267>he workers did not use gas masks, rather they were tethered with a rope to a waist belt so they could be pullied out of the tank when they passed out from inhaling fumes.this was the 1970s? sounds more like the 1870s. absolutely medieval.
>>18512277mf-er was smart enough to attend college, hold jobs down, and plan and commit crimes. nobody was buying that his brain was mush from pesticide fumes.
>>18512272>>18512268god, people in the 70s were retarded>let's let an 8 and a 3 year old go downtown to do errands>nah my teenage daughters have the right to take off when they want, not my business they'll be fine
>>18512272>In 1993, investigators identified them as Charlena SimonI thought at first she was a Jew but I looked at her findagrave page and she wasn't.
>>18512294No that's just how it was before stranger danger paranoia set in.
>>18512268so, did they ever find their dog?
>>18512267>Caro had a persistent smell of pesticides on his person which led to children at school bullying him and nicknaming him "Stinky."think that explains his psychology>decides to murder kids and teens who resemble his old schoolyard bulliestalk about unresolved bully issues
>>18512271why didn't the girl try to get away while he was outside the truck arguing with the two guys? also didn't they notice her inside there?
>>18512417My guess is she wasn't in the cab but the truck bed and he had a cap over it.
>>18512270>On April 6, 1980, a farm worker was working in an orchard outside Shafter when he found two dead teenage girls. One was tied up and shot behind the ear, the other shot in the thigh and face, and rapedunfortunately, not a rare sight in that era
>>18512268In the early 80s my friend and I were playing basketball and a couple of guys in a car pulled up and asked us to get in. We didn't, they drove away. What the fuck was wrong with people then? Now it's just immigrant stabbings, which are a lot more understandable.
>>18512318Looking at all the serial killers and child abductions of that era, it seems the caution was warranted and not paranoid.
>>18513577>What the fuck was wrong with people then?the old rules and social codes of society had been upended in the 60s but the rules for the new post-60s social order hadn't been codified yet so for some years it was a free-for-all where people were kind of lawless and just did whatever they pleased. you could have thought of the 70s in the USA as a similar (but less extreme) version of 90s Russia where the old society was gone but the new one hadn't solidified yet so it led to a decade of anarchy.
>>18512548I remember a boomer detective saying they used to find dead girls along the highway in California all the time in the 70s.
>>18513618In the 80s it was pretty normal for teenagers to drink/smoke/use drugs, run away from home, start fights, get arrested, teen pregnancy, etc. Zoomers are really boring and behaved compared to Gen X, they're like the Amish almost.
>>18513577you could have gotten into their car and some Youtuber's true crime podcast would be talking about how you and your friend's remains were identified through DNA testing in 2013.
>>18513577>What the fuck was wrong with people then?
>>18513618>the rules for the new post-60s social order hadn't been codified yetWhat are the new rules?
>>18513640What's funny is I was so accustomed to doing what adults told me that I felt guilty for disobeying those guys. We thought about getting in their car.
