October 30, 2025 • 22 mins
In the late 1970s, Los Angeles was gripped by fear as the bodies of young women began appearing on the city’s hillsides. Behind these horrifying crimes were two men, Angelo Buono and Kenneth Bianchi whose twisted partnership would make them one of America’s most notorious serial killer duos. In this episode, we uncover the chilling story of the Hillside Stranglers: their backgrounds, their psychological manipulation, the police investigation that finally caught them, and how their crimes changed the way authorities profile and hunt serial killers today.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to be on infographics. We're the place you come
to get past those quick summaries to really dig into
the detailed case files. We look at the footnotes, the
surprising testimonies, the science, everything that gives you the complete picture.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Absolutely, and today we are tackling a case that well,
it truly defines true crime horror from the late nineteen seventies.
It fundamentally changed how Los Angeles saw itself, created this
wave of just intense fear.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
You're talking about that period, what was it, October seventy
seven to February seventy eight, those four.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Months, exactly, those four months, it was genuine pervasive terror
gripping the city. The media, you know, struggling to understand
why bodies were appearing on hillsides. They quickly came up
with a name, the Hillside Strangler, singular, this one terrifying figure, and.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
That name, the Hillside Strangler's that's really the central awful
irony here, isn't it. Because as the authorities dug deeper,
they realized, well, the name was.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Wrong, completely wrong. It wasn't one killer they were hunting,
it was two. It wasn't the strangler, it was the
stranglers plural.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
We're talking about the cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono Junior.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
That's them over that horrifying stretch. They work together, rape, torture,
murder ten victims in Los Angeles County and then Biyanki.
He went on to kill two more women by himself
later up in Washington State.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
Learning it was a duo. I mean, that must have
just amplified the panic. It cemented LA's reputation unfortunately as
a kind of serial killer capital back there.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
That absolutely did. The whole city was on edge.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
So our goal today for you listening is to really
extract the full chilling story from all the sources. We
want to go beyond just the what happened the body count.
We need to understand the psychology this toxic partnership between Borno,
the older, sadistic one, and Byanki, the younger guy who
followed him. How did this monstrous team even form and operate.
(02:00):
Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
You really can't understand the killing spree without first dissecting
the power dynamic between them and that like aetny relationship.
Really it starts with who these individuals were. Let's begin
with the older cousin, Angelo Borno Junior.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Okay Buono born nineteen thirty four, first generation Italian American,
And the sources make it really clear he wasn't someone
who just suddenly snapped. He had a long criminal history
before the murder started.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Oh yeah, a long history. We're talking a salt rape,
grand theft auto. This was new territory for him.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
The descriptions paint him as well, deeply violent, sadistic, with
this intense hatred of women. But paradoxically, he wanted to
be seen as a ladies man.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Right, this weird toxic bravado. He apparently demanded women, including
his wives, call him the Italian Stallion. It's just chilling.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
And the control, the manipulation within his own family that
seems to set the stage. His ex wife's divorce filing
mentioned perverse sexual needs and violence.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
That's a key point. The level of abuse was extreme.
Court records show he used aggression, humiliation. He even wanted
his own kids to watch him beat their mother.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Oh that's horrific.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
It shows how his view of power and sex was
all tangled up with domination and inflicting pain. And then
there's this detail he openly admired Carol.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Chessman, the red light bandit rapist from the forties and fifties.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, the notorious eliot rapist who was eventually executed. One
don't call Chessman a hero and role model. He wasn't
just a criminal. He seemed to aspire to infamy.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Okay, so that's Blano. Now let's look at the younger cousin,
Kenneth Bianki born fifty one. Very different background, but just
as damaging.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It seems very different. He was adopted shortly after birth.
His biological mother was a prostitute, and his adopted mother,
Francis Bianki, was well intensely overprotective. How so, sources say
it was psychologically damaging. She kept him home from school
a lot, subjected him to invasive medical exams for a
childhood bedwetting issue. It created this deep sense of anxiety
(03:58):
inadequacy in him, even though interestingly he had above average intelligence.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
So you have this insecure guy, an underachiever, but also
a compulsive liar with these big dreams of authority. I
read he was dissembling from the cradle.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Exactly, and that desire for authority led him to study
police science and psychology. He desperately wanted to be a cop,
applied to LAPD Glendale p D and got rejected by
both rejected, and you have to understand that rejection was
huge for him. He needed that badge, that veneer of control,
and he couldn't get it. It left this hole. So
when he moves from Rochester, New York, out to la
(04:31):
in nineteen seventy six, who does he seek out?
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Angelo Borno, the guy projecting all the confidence Bianki lacked.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Precisely, the timing is critical. Bianki apparently idolized Buno, the clothes,
the jewelry of especially how he controlled women, and Wono
saw this immediately in Biyanki.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Saw his vulnerability.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Maybe absolutely. Bono reportedly gave Bianchi this nickname Minumi. It's
Sicilian means something like my gods or maybe more accurately,
my fate my destiny.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Doesn't sound like a compliment.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Not at all. It sounds like Buono recognized Bianchi as
the perfect tool, you know, someone desperate for validation, someone
he could manipulate and use for his own twisted plans.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
And that manipulation turned pretty quickly into a joint venture, right,
this money making.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Scheme immediately pimping teenage runways. Buono suggested it. Right after
Bianci arrived.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
They used Bueno's auto shop, the place that later became
the murder scene.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
That's the one they basically turned it into a prison
for two girls. Initially, Sobra Hannon and Becky Spears locked
them in, subjected them to just constant brutal sexual assault, violence,
force prostitution.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
The details that came out later from the survivors are
stomach churning, like Becky Spears being forced to wear a
tampon rectily because of the severity of the assaults and
the threats, Bruno claiming mafia tize.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Total terror tactics. But here's the critical turning point for
the timeline. The girls escaped.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
How do they manage that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Becky Spears confided in a client who happened to be
a lawyer, David Wood. He helped her get out of
La so Imbra Hannon escaped soon after, so Borno.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
And Biyanki lost their income, but maybe more importantly, they
lost control.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Exactly that loss of control right then seems to be
the direct trigger. The pressure cooker environment in that shop
just exploded. It went from forced prostitution and abuse Street
into murder.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
And the very first murder victim, Yolanda Washington, that was
framed as revenge. Wasn't it over some bad business deal?
They claimed she was involved in.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Correct, a direct violent reaction to losing control and money.
The pursuit switched instantly from control to killing.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
Okay, So once they crossed that line, their methods became
really systematic, which is why the police initially thought, okay,
single killer here.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Very organized at least at first.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Let's break down their mo O. First, the lure. How
did they actually get these women?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
It was what investigators called the policeman lure, directly playing
on Byanki's failed police ambitions and born those fascination with
that kind of authority.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
So they pretend to be cops.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Yeah, sometimes flashing fake badges. They tell victims they were
being taken in for questioning or maybe arrested for soliciting.
It worked because you know, people often comply with perceived authority,
especially when scared.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Clever and cynical and the layer we mentioned it before.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
One Oh's Auto Upholstery Shop seven oh three East Colorado
Street in Glendale. That was ground zero. They lived there,
worked there, except for one victim. Committed all the La
murders right there. It was insulated, noisy, perfect cover.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
And the method of killing itself was consistent, linking the victims.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Disturbingly so all victims were subjected to prolonged sexual assault, rape, sodomy, beatings, torture,
and then strangulation.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
With ligature right rope or cord.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Yes, and it left very distinct marks what the coroner
called five point literature marks around the neck, both wrists,
both ankles, and after the murder, they were meticulous at
first about cleaning the bodies, removing hair fibers, any evidence,
before dumping them naked on various hillsides around La.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Let's check the timeline of victims because it shows how
quickly they escalated, how their criteria widened. Ulando, Washington, the
first October seventy seven, killed over that supposed bad trick list.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Then just days later, Judith Miller, she was only fifteen, runaway,
maybe involved in sex work, abducted, dumped in a residential
area in La Crecenta early November.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
And Judith Miller's case is crucial forensically, isn't it? Despite
their cleaning attempts.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Absolutely crucial because Detective Frank Seleno's team found something tiny,
almost invisible, on her eyelid, a piece of light colored fluff, just.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
A tiny fiber, a.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Tiny synthetic polyester fiber, the kind you'd find an auto upholstery.
It took painstaking work analyzing the specific chemical makeup, but
they eventually traced fibers like that directly back to materials
Bueno used in his shop. It was the silent witness
that placed her inside their layer.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Incredible. Okay, so, just five days after Miller, the victim
profile changes dramatically lysa cast in twenty one a waitress,
a dancer, not a prostitute, not a runaway.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
This showed a huge jump in confidence or maybe recklessness.
They apparently followed her home, used the fake badge routine again,
and her case reveals Bueno's deep misogyny. Oh so well.
The sources based on Bianki's later confections say they decided
not to sodomize her because they were and this is
their word, disappointed she had hairy legs.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Disappointed. That's grotesque.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
It shows the violence wasn't just rage. It was about
punishing women for not meeting their twisted standards of perfection,
controlled down to the most demeaning details, but.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
That need for control nearly tripped them up, didn't it.
With Catherin Laura Baker.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Ah Yes, the daughter of the actor Peter Lourie. They
pulled her over, same routine, but when she showed her
driver's license and maybe a photo with her famous.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Dad, they've realized her she was and they panicked.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Buono knew killing a celebrity's daughter would bring massive police attention,
media scrutiny on what he called too much heat. They
let her go. Preservation kicked in.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
A rare moment of calculation overriding impulse, but it didn't last.
Mid November, they targeted minors tragically.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Yes, yeah, twelve year old dolor Cepada and fourteen year
old Sonja Johnson abducted right after getting off a city bus.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
And their bodies found by a child.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Found decomposing in a trashy near Dodger Stadium by a
nine year old boy. Just horrific and dumping them like that, decomposing.
It suggests maybe one his control was slipping, or their
confidence was becoming arrogance, less careful concealment, and the torture.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
It seems like they started experimenting Christina Weckler, the twenty
year old honor student found November twentieth.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Yes, the autopsy found puncture marks, later confirmed Bianki admitted
it they injected her with windex and ammonia based cleaner.
Just gratuitous cruelty.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
And wasn't there a personal connection with Weckler?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
There was? Bianki knew her. He apparently asked her out
before and she turned him down, said he seemed like
a used car salesman kind of creepy, so there might
have been a personal revenge element there, especially for the
insecure Bianchi.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
The pre murder rituals are just as disturbing Evelyn Jane King,
the actress.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Bianchi later described how they forced her to go to
the bathroom before they started the assault and torture. Why
his explanation was chillingly practical to prevent her from losing
control of her bladder or bowels during the ordeal and
making a mess. It's this extreme level of planned dehumanization,
stripping away dignity before life, and.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
The violence continued even as she was dying.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Bianki confirmed one of them sodomized her while she was dying,
after they'd put a bag over her head, just absolute depravity.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Then Lauren Wagner, eighteen year old student late November, abducted
in broad daylight. This was the one with the witness.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Right, crucial witness, a neighbor saw the whole thing, described
two men, one tall, young biankie, one older, shorter, bushy
hair bono, and Lauren Wagner herself showed incredible courage. The
witness heard her yell you won't get away with this.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
She also had electrical burns signs of shock torture. So
the witness account plus the specific torture methods matching others,
this was the moment police knew for sure it wasn't
one strangler, it was two.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
The Hillside stranglers, the city's worst nightmare confirmed.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
So the killings continued for a bit longer in la
in a late seventy seven early seventy eight. But you
start to see, well, maybe sloppiness creeping in or just
extreme confidence, like.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
With Kimberly Martin, the seventeen year old found in December.
She was trying to be safe using a call girl agency,
specifically because of the strangler fear.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
Right, and what do they do? They just call the
agency from a payphone request a girl and Martin get
sent right to them. Unbelievable audacity.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
And they didn't even use Buono Shop for that one, No,
they used a vacant apartment in Byanki's own building.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Talk about hubris and get this. Around this same time, Bianci,
using his old police academy applications, somehow actually got permission
to go on ride alongs with the Lapdo.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
He was writing with cops while actively murdering women.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Absolutely, the arrogance is staggering. He's gathering intel on the
investigation into him. He was even questioned about Kimberly Martin's
murder because while she was taken from his building, he
just played dumb. He said he heard screams.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
That ability to compartmentalize to role play. It's deeply disturbing.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
It speaks volumes about his need to be associated with
law enforcement, even while betraying it so horrifically.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
The last LA victim was Cindy Hutsmith February seventy eight,
student waitress. This one seems different, though.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Less planned, completely opportunistic. It seems she just happened to
go to Buono Shop for car upholstery work. They saw
her and apparently just decide on the spot she'd be next.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
And her body was found in her own car.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Yeah, they killed her, put her body in the trunk
of her Orange Dats and drove it up Angela's Crest
Highway and pushed it off a cliff.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
And then just like that, after Hudsmith, the la murder stopped.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Cold, stopped completely because Kenn's beyond here did he go
up to Bellingham, Washington. He was trying to patch things
up with his girlfriend, Kelly Boyd. She was the mother
of his child and had moved up there earlier.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
So the partnership dissolved. Warno's control mechanism was gone. What
happened when Bianki tried to operate alone, he.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Fell apart, basically became incredibly sloppy. Almost a year later,
January nineteen seventy nine, he decided to kill again. He
lured two college students in Bellingham, Karen Mandick and Diane.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Wilder, same kind of lure, similar theme.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Pretended he needed someone to house sit for a.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Wealthy family, and he got caught how quickly the.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Very next day, without Bono's planning, his oversight, the meticulous
cleaning Byanki just left a trail the methods were similar
enough to the La cases, and crucially, when they arrested him,
he had his California driver's license on him. Oh boy,
Washington police ran the ID connected the docks to the
unsolved Hillside strangler case that had haunted La biankie solo act.
(14:55):
His carelessness was the key that unlocked everything.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
So now he's caught facing serious charges, maybe the death penalty.
And this is where his psychological games really ramp up.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Oh yeah, his pathological lying, his fascination with psychology, it
all comes out. He tries to fake insanity, specifically dissociative
identity disorder or d D, multiple personalities.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
He invented a personality he.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Did called the Steve, but it was a total fabrication.
Bianki later admitted he'd researched d D symptoms by watching
TV movies like Sybil and The Three Faces of Eve.
He was literally trying to act out what he saw
on screen.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
So how did they prove he was faking if he
studied it?
Speaker 2 (15:34):
They brought in experts, notably doctor Martin orn, a leading
forensic psychiatrist. Warning was clever. He didn't just look for
consistency in the Steve persona. He subtenly manipulated Biyanki. Orni
used what sometimes called the Doctor Jekyll and mister Hyde test.
He suggested the Bianki, while Biankie was supposedly being Steve,
that it's actually quite common for people with real dd
(15:55):
to have more than two personalities.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Ah planting an idea exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
He hinted maybe there was a third personality lurking Bianki,
thinking this was part of the expected script for DDE,
he immediately started producing two more completely made a personality.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Proving he was just creating them on demand.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Proving he was lingering faking it. The whole defense collapsed.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
So with the insanity plea gone, Bianki's only option was
to make a deal, pretty much.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
He pleaded guilty to the two Washington murders and five
of the California ones. The deal life in prison, not death,
and the crucial part he agreed to testify against Angelo Buono.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Becoming the star witness against his own cousin and partner
in crime, the only.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Way they could realistically hope to convict Bueno. But relying
on Bianchi, a confessed killer and master liar, was a
huge gamble for the prosecution. That's why that tiny piece
of fluff, that fiber from Judith Miller's eyelid became so
incredibly important. It was the objective scientific proof linking Bueno's
shop to the crimes, backing up Byankee's story.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
So Borno's arrested in October seventy nine, he pleads not
and that sets the stage for what became a real
legal marathon.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
An absolute spectacle. Yeah, prosecuting Bueno based mainly on Beyoncei's testimony.
It was incredibly complex. Bruno's defense team spent years just
trying to shred Biyanki's credibility.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Arguing he was just blaming Bueno to save himself exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Painting Bianchi as the sole killer or the mastermind, and
Borno as maybe just a sleazy pimp caught up in it,
but not a murder.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
How long did the trial actually last.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
It dragged on for over two years, from nineteen eighty
one to nineteen eighty three. At that point it was
the longest criminal trial in US history. Imagined two years
of reliving those horrific details in court.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Every day, just draining for everyone involved. But eventually the
prosecution's case held up.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
It did the combination of Biyanki's detailed testimony, which matched
the crime scene evidence in so many ways, plus the
forensic links like the ligature marks, the burns, and especially
those uphulsary fibers.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
It was enough so the verdict.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Buono was convicted on nine counts of murder, life in prison,
no possibility to parole. Bianchi, for his part, got multiple
life sentences served up in Washington.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
I remember reading about the judge's comments at one Oho sentencing,
Judge Ronald M. George. He seemed really frustrated.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
He was. Judge George, who later became Chief Justice of California,
basically said he regretted he couldn't impose the death penalty.
His words were something like, these defendants use almost every
form of execution on their victims, yet they escaped capital
punishment themselves. A powerful statement on the limits of the
law when facing such extreme brutality.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
So Buono goes to prison for life.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
He died there, right, Yeah, he died of a heart
attack in Calipatrio State Prison back in two thousand and two.
He was sixty seven. But even in prison, the weirdness continued.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
You mean the groupies, hybristophilia.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
That's part of it bono. This man known for hating
and degrading women actually got married while incarcerated to a
PRISM supervisor, Christine Kazuka.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
It's hard to fathom, and Bianchi, still serving his time
in Washington, still is.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
He continues his identity games, constantly changing his name in prison,
Nicholas Fontana, Anthony Diomatto. It's like he can't stop playing roles.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
But Bianki attracted an even more extreme follower, didn't he.
This Veronica Compton story is just wild.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
It's almost unbelievable. Compton was a playwright, became his pen pal,
completely convinced of his innocence. But she didn't just write letters.
She hatched this bizarre plot to exonerate him.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
The plot involving smuggling evidence out of prison.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yes, Biankei managed to smuggle out of condom containing his
semen hidden in the spine of a book.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Compton got it, okay, What was she planning to do
with it?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Her plan was insane. She was going to stage a
new murder, mimicking the Hillside Strangler's ligature method. Then she'd
plant Biankie seamen on this new victim.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
To make it look like the real strangler was still out.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
There exactly thereby approving Bianki, locked up in Washington, couldn't
be the killer. He was desperate and frankly incredibly stupid.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Actually try it, she did.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
She lured a woman to a motel, tried to strangle
her with a cord. Thankfully she failed to kill the woman,
but she was arrested for attempted murder.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Wow, convicted and imprisoned herself trying to free a serial killer.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
It just shows the powerful, disturbing pull these kinds of
figures can have, even from behind bars. The damage they
cause ripples outwards.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
And speaking of ripples, Detective Frank Salerno, who led the
strangler investigation, he later worked the night stalker case Richard Ramirez.
There's a connection there too, isn't there?
Speaker 2 (20:30):
A chilling one? When Ramirez was caught and jailed, he
was apparently put in the same cell Bono had occupied earlier,
and Ramirez was reportedly thrilled about it.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Thrilled.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Yeah. It suggests that Bono and Bianchi, their notoriety, their methods,
they created this dark benchmark, something later monsters actually aspired
to hashtag at tech outro.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
So, looking back at everything we've covered, the defining elements
of this case are just so stark, aren't they. You've
got that toxic power, dynamic poet of the mentor Bianci
the follow you have the horrifying escalation from pimping into torture,
the wind dex, the rituals, and.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
The sheer luck really of the breakthrough Bianchi getting sloppy
on his own in Washington, that one mistake brought the
whole thing down.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
It feels like a closed chapter in some ways, but
there are these lingering questions, these shadows that stretch even
further back. Potentially you're thinking about Rochester exactly. The Yankee
moved from Rochester, New York, to la and there were
those unsolved alphabet murders back in Rochester in the early seventies.
The methods ligature, strangulation, sexual violence, they bear some unnerving
(21:34):
similarities to the Strangler's mo.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Bianky has always denied it naturally, but the timing, the location,
the methods, it definitely makes you wonder could his killing
have started years earlier before he even met Wuano. Was
Bono just the catalyst that let the monster fully emerge.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
It's a disturbing thought. And then there's the final tragic
echo of this violence impacting Borno's own family decades later.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Yeah, that's just heartbreaking. Two thousand and seven, Angelo Buono's grandson,
Christopher Bueno, he shot his own grandmother.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That was Mary Castillo, right, Angela's ex wife, who filed
for divorce citing his violence way back when.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
That's her Christopher shot her and then he killed himself.
And this happened just months after he apparently found out
the truth about who his grandfather really was.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
It leaves you with such a heavy question, doesn't it?
Speaker 2 (22:20):
For you?
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Listening what happens when the knowledge of this kind of
pure evil just radiates outwards. The trauma clearly didn't end
when Bueno and Bianci were locked up. It seeped into
the next generation, destroying more lives long after the original crimes.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
It's a truly devastating legacy.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
A profound and horrifying close to end. Thank you for
joining us for this Beyond infographics
Welcome to be on infographics. We're the place you come
to get past those quick summaries to really dig into
the detailed case files. We look at the footnotes, the
surprising testimonies, the science, everything that gives you the complete picture.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Absolutely, and today we are tackling a case that well,
it truly defines true crime horror from the late nineteen seventies.
It fundamentally changed how Los Angeles saw itself, created this
wave of just intense fear.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
You're talking about that period, what was it, October seventy
seven to February seventy eight, those four.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Months, exactly, those four months, it was genuine pervasive terror
gripping the city. The media, you know, struggling to understand
why bodies were appearing on hillsides. They quickly came up
with a name, the Hillside Strangler, singular, this one terrifying figure, and.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
That name, the Hillside Strangler's that's really the central awful
irony here, isn't it. Because as the authorities dug deeper,
they realized, well, the name was.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Wrong, completely wrong. It wasn't one killer they were hunting,
it was two. It wasn't the strangler, it was the
stranglers plural.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
We're talking about the cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono Junior.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
That's them over that horrifying stretch. They work together, rape, torture,
murder ten victims in Los Angeles County and then Biyanki.
He went on to kill two more women by himself
later up in Washington State.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
Learning it was a duo. I mean, that must have
just amplified the panic. It cemented LA's reputation unfortunately as
a kind of serial killer capital back there.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
That absolutely did. The whole city was on edge.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
So our goal today for you listening is to really
extract the full chilling story from all the sources. We
want to go beyond just the what happened the body count.
We need to understand the psychology this toxic partnership between Borno,
the older, sadistic one, and Byanki, the younger guy who
followed him. How did this monstrous team even form and operate.
(02:00):
Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
You really can't understand the killing spree without first dissecting
the power dynamic between them and that like aetny relationship.
Really it starts with who these individuals were. Let's begin
with the older cousin, Angelo Borno Junior.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Okay Buono born nineteen thirty four, first generation Italian American,
And the sources make it really clear he wasn't someone
who just suddenly snapped. He had a long criminal history
before the murder started.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Oh yeah, a long history. We're talking a salt rape,
grand theft auto. This was new territory for him.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
The descriptions paint him as well, deeply violent, sadistic, with
this intense hatred of women. But paradoxically, he wanted to
be seen as a ladies man.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Right, this weird toxic bravado. He apparently demanded women, including
his wives, call him the Italian Stallion. It's just chilling.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
And the control, the manipulation within his own family that
seems to set the stage. His ex wife's divorce filing
mentioned perverse sexual needs and violence.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
That's a key point. The level of abuse was extreme.
Court records show he used aggression, humiliation. He even wanted
his own kids to watch him beat their mother.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Oh that's horrific.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
It shows how his view of power and sex was
all tangled up with domination and inflicting pain. And then
there's this detail he openly admired Carol.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Chessman, the red light bandit rapist from the forties and fifties.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, the notorious eliot rapist who was eventually executed. One
don't call Chessman a hero and role model. He wasn't
just a criminal. He seemed to aspire to infamy.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Okay, so that's Blano. Now let's look at the younger cousin,
Kenneth Bianki born fifty one. Very different background, but just
as damaging.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It seems very different. He was adopted shortly after birth.
His biological mother was a prostitute, and his adopted mother,
Francis Bianki, was well intensely overprotective. How so, sources say
it was psychologically damaging. She kept him home from school
a lot, subjected him to invasive medical exams for a
childhood bedwetting issue. It created this deep sense of anxiety
(03:58):
inadequacy in him, even though interestingly he had above average intelligence.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
So you have this insecure guy, an underachiever, but also
a compulsive liar with these big dreams of authority. I
read he was dissembling from the cradle.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Exactly, and that desire for authority led him to study
police science and psychology. He desperately wanted to be a cop,
applied to LAPD Glendale p D and got rejected by
both rejected, and you have to understand that rejection was
huge for him. He needed that badge, that veneer of control,
and he couldn't get it. It left this hole. So
when he moves from Rochester, New York, out to la
(04:31):
in nineteen seventy six, who does he seek out?
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Angelo Borno, the guy projecting all the confidence Bianki lacked.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Precisely, the timing is critical. Bianki apparently idolized Buno, the clothes,
the jewelry of especially how he controlled women, and Wono
saw this immediately in Biyanki.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Saw his vulnerability.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Maybe absolutely. Bono reportedly gave Bianchi this nickname Minumi. It's
Sicilian means something like my gods or maybe more accurately,
my fate my destiny.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Doesn't sound like a compliment.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Not at all. It sounds like Buono recognized Bianchi as
the perfect tool, you know, someone desperate for validation, someone
he could manipulate and use for his own twisted plans.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
And that manipulation turned pretty quickly into a joint venture, right,
this money making.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Scheme immediately pimping teenage runways. Buono suggested it. Right after
Bianci arrived.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
They used Bueno's auto shop, the place that later became
the murder scene.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
That's the one they basically turned it into a prison
for two girls. Initially, Sobra Hannon and Becky Spears locked
them in, subjected them to just constant brutal sexual assault, violence,
force prostitution.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
The details that came out later from the survivors are
stomach churning, like Becky Spears being forced to wear a
tampon rectily because of the severity of the assaults and
the threats, Bruno claiming mafia tize.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Total terror tactics. But here's the critical turning point for
the timeline. The girls escaped.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
How do they manage that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Becky Spears confided in a client who happened to be
a lawyer, David Wood. He helped her get out of
La so Imbra Hannon escaped soon after, so Borno.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
And Biyanki lost their income, but maybe more importantly, they
lost control.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Exactly that loss of control right then seems to be
the direct trigger. The pressure cooker environment in that shop
just exploded. It went from forced prostitution and abuse Street
into murder.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
And the very first murder victim, Yolanda Washington, that was
framed as revenge. Wasn't it over some bad business deal?
They claimed she was involved in.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Correct, a direct violent reaction to losing control and money.
The pursuit switched instantly from control to killing.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
Okay, So once they crossed that line, their methods became
really systematic, which is why the police initially thought, okay,
single killer here.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Very organized at least at first.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Let's break down their mo O. First, the lure. How
did they actually get these women?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
It was what investigators called the policeman lure, directly playing
on Byanki's failed police ambitions and born those fascination with
that kind of authority.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
So they pretend to be cops.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Yeah, sometimes flashing fake badges. They tell victims they were
being taken in for questioning or maybe arrested for soliciting.
It worked because you know, people often comply with perceived authority,
especially when scared.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Clever and cynical and the layer we mentioned it before.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
One Oh's Auto Upholstery Shop seven oh three East Colorado
Street in Glendale. That was ground zero. They lived there,
worked there, except for one victim. Committed all the La
murders right there. It was insulated, noisy, perfect cover.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
And the method of killing itself was consistent, linking the victims.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Disturbingly so all victims were subjected to prolonged sexual assault, rape, sodomy, beatings, torture,
and then strangulation.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
With ligature right rope or cord.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Yes, and it left very distinct marks what the coroner
called five point literature marks around the neck, both wrists,
both ankles, and after the murder, they were meticulous at
first about cleaning the bodies, removing hair fibers, any evidence,
before dumping them naked on various hillsides around La.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Let's check the timeline of victims because it shows how
quickly they escalated, how their criteria widened. Ulando, Washington, the
first October seventy seven, killed over that supposed bad trick list.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Then just days later, Judith Miller, she was only fifteen, runaway,
maybe involved in sex work, abducted, dumped in a residential
area in La Crecenta early November.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
And Judith Miller's case is crucial forensically, isn't it? Despite
their cleaning attempts.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Absolutely crucial because Detective Frank Seleno's team found something tiny,
almost invisible, on her eyelid, a piece of light colored fluff, just.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
A tiny fiber, a.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Tiny synthetic polyester fiber, the kind you'd find an auto upholstery.
It took painstaking work analyzing the specific chemical makeup, but
they eventually traced fibers like that directly back to materials
Bueno used in his shop. It was the silent witness
that placed her inside their layer.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Incredible. Okay, so, just five days after Miller, the victim
profile changes dramatically lysa cast in twenty one a waitress,
a dancer, not a prostitute, not a runaway.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
This showed a huge jump in confidence or maybe recklessness.
They apparently followed her home, used the fake badge routine again,
and her case reveals Bueno's deep misogyny. Oh so well.
The sources based on Bianki's later confections say they decided
not to sodomize her because they were and this is
their word, disappointed she had hairy legs.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Disappointed. That's grotesque.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
It shows the violence wasn't just rage. It was about
punishing women for not meeting their twisted standards of perfection,
controlled down to the most demeaning details, but.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
That need for control nearly tripped them up, didn't it.
With Catherin Laura Baker.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Ah Yes, the daughter of the actor Peter Lourie. They
pulled her over, same routine, but when she showed her
driver's license and maybe a photo with her famous.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Dad, they've realized her she was and they panicked.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Buono knew killing a celebrity's daughter would bring massive police attention,
media scrutiny on what he called too much heat. They
let her go. Preservation kicked in.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
A rare moment of calculation overriding impulse, but it didn't last.
Mid November, they targeted minors tragically.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Yes, yeah, twelve year old dolor Cepada and fourteen year
old Sonja Johnson abducted right after getting off a city bus.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
And their bodies found by a child.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Found decomposing in a trashy near Dodger Stadium by a
nine year old boy. Just horrific and dumping them like that, decomposing.
It suggests maybe one his control was slipping, or their
confidence was becoming arrogance, less careful concealment, and the torture.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
It seems like they started experimenting Christina Weckler, the twenty
year old honor student found November twentieth.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Yes, the autopsy found puncture marks, later confirmed Bianki admitted
it they injected her with windex and ammonia based cleaner.
Just gratuitous cruelty.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
And wasn't there a personal connection with Weckler?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
There was? Bianki knew her. He apparently asked her out
before and she turned him down, said he seemed like
a used car salesman kind of creepy, so there might
have been a personal revenge element there, especially for the
insecure Bianchi.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
The pre murder rituals are just as disturbing Evelyn Jane King,
the actress.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Bianchi later described how they forced her to go to
the bathroom before they started the assault and torture. Why
his explanation was chillingly practical to prevent her from losing
control of her bladder or bowels during the ordeal and
making a mess. It's this extreme level of planned dehumanization,
stripping away dignity before life, and.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
The violence continued even as she was dying.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Bianki confirmed one of them sodomized her while she was dying,
after they'd put a bag over her head, just absolute depravity.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Then Lauren Wagner, eighteen year old student late November, abducted
in broad daylight. This was the one with the witness.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Right, crucial witness, a neighbor saw the whole thing, described
two men, one tall, young biankie, one older, shorter, bushy
hair bono, and Lauren Wagner herself showed incredible courage. The
witness heard her yell you won't get away with this.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
She also had electrical burns signs of shock torture. So
the witness account plus the specific torture methods matching others,
this was the moment police knew for sure it wasn't
one strangler, it was two.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
The Hillside stranglers, the city's worst nightmare confirmed.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
So the killings continued for a bit longer in la
in a late seventy seven early seventy eight. But you
start to see, well, maybe sloppiness creeping in or just
extreme confidence, like.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
With Kimberly Martin, the seventeen year old found in December.
She was trying to be safe using a call girl agency,
specifically because of the strangler fear.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
Right, and what do they do? They just call the
agency from a payphone request a girl and Martin get
sent right to them. Unbelievable audacity.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
And they didn't even use Buono Shop for that one, No,
they used a vacant apartment in Byanki's own building.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Talk about hubris and get this. Around this same time, Bianci,
using his old police academy applications, somehow actually got permission
to go on ride alongs with the Lapdo.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
He was writing with cops while actively murdering women.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Absolutely, the arrogance is staggering. He's gathering intel on the
investigation into him. He was even questioned about Kimberly Martin's
murder because while she was taken from his building, he
just played dumb. He said he heard screams.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
That ability to compartmentalize to role play. It's deeply disturbing.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
It speaks volumes about his need to be associated with
law enforcement, even while betraying it so horrifically.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
The last LA victim was Cindy Hutsmith February seventy eight,
student waitress. This one seems different, though.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Less planned, completely opportunistic. It seems she just happened to
go to Buono Shop for car upholstery work. They saw
her and apparently just decide on the spot she'd be next.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
And her body was found in her own car.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Yeah, they killed her, put her body in the trunk
of her Orange Dats and drove it up Angela's Crest
Highway and pushed it off a cliff.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
And then just like that, after Hudsmith, the la murder stopped.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Cold, stopped completely because Kenn's beyond here did he go
up to Bellingham, Washington. He was trying to patch things
up with his girlfriend, Kelly Boyd. She was the mother
of his child and had moved up there earlier.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
So the partnership dissolved. Warno's control mechanism was gone. What
happened when Bianki tried to operate alone, he.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Fell apart, basically became incredibly sloppy. Almost a year later,
January nineteen seventy nine, he decided to kill again. He
lured two college students in Bellingham, Karen Mandick and Diane.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Wilder, same kind of lure, similar theme.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Pretended he needed someone to house sit for a.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Wealthy family, and he got caught how quickly the.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Very next day, without Bono's planning, his oversight, the meticulous
cleaning Byanki just left a trail the methods were similar
enough to the La cases, and crucially, when they arrested him,
he had his California driver's license on him. Oh boy,
Washington police ran the ID connected the docks to the
unsolved Hillside strangler case that had haunted La biankie solo act.
(14:55):
His carelessness was the key that unlocked everything.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
So now he's caught facing serious charges, maybe the death penalty.
And this is where his psychological games really ramp up.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Oh yeah, his pathological lying, his fascination with psychology, it
all comes out. He tries to fake insanity, specifically dissociative
identity disorder or d D, multiple personalities.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
He invented a personality he.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Did called the Steve, but it was a total fabrication.
Bianki later admitted he'd researched d D symptoms by watching
TV movies like Sybil and The Three Faces of Eve.
He was literally trying to act out what he saw
on screen.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
So how did they prove he was faking if he
studied it?
Speaker 2 (15:34):
They brought in experts, notably doctor Martin orn, a leading
forensic psychiatrist. Warning was clever. He didn't just look for
consistency in the Steve persona. He subtenly manipulated Biyanki. Orni
used what sometimes called the Doctor Jekyll and mister Hyde test.
He suggested the Bianki, while Biankie was supposedly being Steve,
that it's actually quite common for people with real dd
(15:55):
to have more than two personalities.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Ah planting an idea exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
He hinted maybe there was a third personality lurking Bianki,
thinking this was part of the expected script for DDE,
he immediately started producing two more completely made a personality.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Proving he was just creating them on demand.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Proving he was lingering faking it. The whole defense collapsed.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
So with the insanity plea gone, Bianki's only option was
to make a deal, pretty much.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
He pleaded guilty to the two Washington murders and five
of the California ones. The deal life in prison, not death,
and the crucial part he agreed to testify against Angelo Buono.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Becoming the star witness against his own cousin and partner
in crime, the only.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Way they could realistically hope to convict Bueno. But relying
on Bianchi, a confessed killer and master liar, was a
huge gamble for the prosecution. That's why that tiny piece
of fluff, that fiber from Judith Miller's eyelid became so
incredibly important. It was the objective scientific proof linking Bueno's
shop to the crimes, backing up Byankee's story.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
So Borno's arrested in October seventy nine, he pleads not
and that sets the stage for what became a real
legal marathon.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
An absolute spectacle. Yeah, prosecuting Bueno based mainly on Beyoncei's testimony.
It was incredibly complex. Bruno's defense team spent years just
trying to shred Biyanki's credibility.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Arguing he was just blaming Bueno to save himself exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Painting Bianchi as the sole killer or the mastermind, and
Borno as maybe just a sleazy pimp caught up in it,
but not a murder.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
How long did the trial actually last.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
It dragged on for over two years, from nineteen eighty
one to nineteen eighty three. At that point it was
the longest criminal trial in US history. Imagined two years
of reliving those horrific details in court.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Every day, just draining for everyone involved. But eventually the
prosecution's case held up.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
It did the combination of Biyanki's detailed testimony, which matched
the crime scene evidence in so many ways, plus the
forensic links like the ligature marks, the burns, and especially
those uphulsary fibers.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
It was enough so the verdict.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Buono was convicted on nine counts of murder, life in prison,
no possibility to parole. Bianchi, for his part, got multiple
life sentences served up in Washington.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
I remember reading about the judge's comments at one Oho sentencing,
Judge Ronald M. George. He seemed really frustrated.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
He was. Judge George, who later became Chief Justice of California,
basically said he regretted he couldn't impose the death penalty.
His words were something like, these defendants use almost every
form of execution on their victims, yet they escaped capital
punishment themselves. A powerful statement on the limits of the
law when facing such extreme brutality.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
So Buono goes to prison for life.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
He died there, right, Yeah, he died of a heart
attack in Calipatrio State Prison back in two thousand and two.
He was sixty seven. But even in prison, the weirdness continued.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
You mean the groupies, hybristophilia.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
That's part of it bono. This man known for hating
and degrading women actually got married while incarcerated to a
PRISM supervisor, Christine Kazuka.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
It's hard to fathom, and Bianchi, still serving his time
in Washington, still is.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
He continues his identity games, constantly changing his name in prison,
Nicholas Fontana, Anthony Diomatto. It's like he can't stop playing roles.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
But Bianki attracted an even more extreme follower, didn't he.
This Veronica Compton story is just wild.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
It's almost unbelievable. Compton was a playwright, became his pen pal,
completely convinced of his innocence. But she didn't just write letters.
She hatched this bizarre plot to exonerate him.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
The plot involving smuggling evidence out of prison.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yes, Biankei managed to smuggle out of condom containing his
semen hidden in the spine of a book.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Compton got it, okay, What was she planning to do
with it?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Her plan was insane. She was going to stage a
new murder, mimicking the Hillside Strangler's ligature method. Then she'd
plant Biankie seamen on this new victim.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
To make it look like the real strangler was still out.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
There exactly thereby approving Bianki, locked up in Washington, couldn't
be the killer. He was desperate and frankly incredibly stupid.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Actually try it, she did.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
She lured a woman to a motel, tried to strangle
her with a cord. Thankfully she failed to kill the woman,
but she was arrested for attempted murder.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Wow, convicted and imprisoned herself trying to free a serial killer.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
It just shows the powerful, disturbing pull these kinds of
figures can have, even from behind bars. The damage they
cause ripples outwards.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
And speaking of ripples, Detective Frank Salerno, who led the
strangler investigation, he later worked the night stalker case Richard Ramirez.
There's a connection there too, isn't there?
Speaker 2 (20:30):
A chilling one? When Ramirez was caught and jailed, he
was apparently put in the same cell Bono had occupied earlier,
and Ramirez was reportedly thrilled about it.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Thrilled.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Yeah. It suggests that Bono and Bianchi, their notoriety, their methods,
they created this dark benchmark, something later monsters actually aspired
to hashtag at tech outro.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
So, looking back at everything we've covered, the defining elements
of this case are just so stark, aren't they. You've
got that toxic power, dynamic poet of the mentor Bianci
the follow you have the horrifying escalation from pimping into torture,
the wind dex, the rituals, and.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
The sheer luck really of the breakthrough Bianchi getting sloppy
on his own in Washington, that one mistake brought the
whole thing down.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
It feels like a closed chapter in some ways, but
there are these lingering questions, these shadows that stretch even
further back. Potentially you're thinking about Rochester exactly. The Yankee
moved from Rochester, New York, to la and there were
those unsolved alphabet murders back in Rochester in the early seventies.
The methods ligature, strangulation, sexual violence, they bear some unnerving
(21:34):
similarities to the Strangler's mo.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Bianky has always denied it naturally, but the timing, the location,
the methods, it definitely makes you wonder could his killing
have started years earlier before he even met Wuano. Was
Bono just the catalyst that let the monster fully emerge.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
It's a disturbing thought. And then there's the final tragic
echo of this violence impacting Borno's own family decades later.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Yeah, that's just heartbreaking. Two thousand and seven, Angelo Buono's grandson,
Christopher Bueno, he shot his own grandmother.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That was Mary Castillo, right, Angela's ex wife, who filed
for divorce citing his violence way back when.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
That's her Christopher shot her and then he killed himself.
And this happened just months after he apparently found out
the truth about who his grandfather really was.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
It leaves you with such a heavy question, doesn't it?
Speaker 2 (22:20):
For you?
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Listening what happens when the knowledge of this kind of
pure evil just radiates outwards. The trauma clearly didn't end
when Bueno and Bianci were locked up. It seeped into
the next generation, destroying more lives long after the original crimes.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
It's a truly devastating legacy.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
A profound and horrifying close to end. Thank you for
joining us for this Beyond infographics
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