Killers_ The Most Barbaric Murderers of Our Time - Cawthorne, Nigel [67]
Berkowitz made other disturbing references in his letters. Shortly after the Son-of-Sam shootings had begun, he applied for a job in a dog pound. The pay was not good, but Berkowitz said that ‘there was another way in which I was getting paid. Somebody needed dogs. I guess you understand what I’m trying to say.’ Terry’s investigation again proved that Berkowitz was telling the truth.
Then Berkowitz dropped a bombshell. He ripped a chapter out of a standard work on Satanism and witchcraft. It concerned the satanic practices of Charles Manson and his Family. Then he wrote a note in the margin, saying: ‘Call the Santa Clara Sheriff’s office. Please ask the sheriffs what happened to Arlis Perry.’ He went on to say that Perry had been ‘hunted, stalked and slain. Followed to California. Stanford Univ’.
Stanford University is in Santa Clara County. A 19-year-old student called Arlis Perry was horribly murdered in the church in Stanford University at midnight on October 1974. She had only been in California for a few weeks. Her body was naked from the waist down. Her legs were spread and a 30-inch altar candle had been rammed into her vagina. Her arms were crossed over her chest and another candle was between her breasts. Her jeans lay inverted over her legs. She had been beaten, strangled and stabbed behind the ear with an ice pick. Little of this was made public until 1988, but Berkowitz knew details about the murder that had been withheld. He even cut out a picture from the paper that he said resembled Arlis Perry. The only picture of her that appeared in the newspapers showed how she looked in her school days. The picture that Berkowitz selected looked much more like Arlis Perry the night she died. At the very least, he had seen a picture of the murder, performed, Terry maintains, by the California satanic group associated with Charles Manson. Berkowitz said that Arlis Perry had once been a member of the group but had tried to leave.
Terry also noted that some of the Son-of-Sam killings had been performed with a ruthless efficiency. Others were inept and bungled. Terry concluded that Berkowitz had only committed three of the Son-of-Sam killings – those of Donna Lauria, Valentina Suriani and Alexander Esau. Donna Lauria had been killed, Terry says, because she knew about the coven. Christine Freund died because she had offended one of the members. Terry believes that the killer in the balaclava was actually a woman, who was a member of the coven. According to Terry, Stacy Moskowitz was killed by John Carr and Berkowitz was there because the killing was being filmed as a ‘snuff movie’. That is why the killer had picked out the car under the street lamp. Tommy Zaino and his girlfriend Debbie Crescendo were lucky. They had been parked under the street lamp but had moved to a darker spot just before Stacy Moskowitz and Bobby Violante drove up.
On 10 July 1979, Berkowitz was slashed with a razor by another inmate in the cell-block reserved for high risk prisoners. The cut ran from the left-hand side of his throat to the back of his neck. It needed 56 stitches and nearly killed him. He would not say who had attacked him. He later said that it was an attempt by a Satanic group to make him live up to his vow of silence. Maury Terry claimed that the leader of satanic cult was Roy Alexander Radin, a tycoon who earned his money in show business. He moved to California in 1982. But by the time Terry had tracked him down, yet again, it was too late. Radin