A 70-year-old convicted serial killer from Lake Elsinore has confessed to a different slaying in Southern California, placing an finish to a decades-old chilly case, authorities introduced Tuesday.
William Lester Suff, often called the “Riverside Prostitute Killer” and the “Lake Elsinore Killer,” confessed to killing 19-year-old Cathy Small in 1986, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Division Murder Lt. Patricia Thomas stated at a information convention. Suff additionally admitted to different killings in Riverside County however authorities didn’t instantly present particulars on these instances. He’s presently on demise row in San Quentin.
In accordance with authorities, Suff’s killings return to the Nineteen Seventies and Eighties, when Los Angeles was often called the serial killer capital of America. In 1974, he was convicted in Texas of killing his 2-month outdated daughter and was sentenced to 70 years. However in 1984, he was paroled to California, Thomas stated.
On Feb. 22, 1986, South Pasadena Police responded to a report of a lady mendacity within the street on Banks Avenue, Thomas stated. The lady was discovered carrying a nightgown and was unresponsive with a number of stab wounds; she was pronounced useless on the scene. An post-mortem decided she was stabbed and strangled to demise.
Three days later, detectives received a name from a Lake Elsinore resident, who noticed a newspaper article concerning the murder and was anxious the girl was his roommate, in keeping with authorities. The caller later recognized the sufferer as 19-year-old Cathy Small, a prostitute who had been residing with him in his home for a couple of months.
The person informed detectives that Small left the home on Feb. 21 and informed him {that a} man named Invoice was choosing her up and giving her $50 to drive with him to L.A., Thomas stated.
Detectives adopted up on a number of leads all through the many years however by no means solved the case. Authorities later found {that a} sexual assault equipment from the case and Small’s clothes had been by no means examined for DNA; on Aug. 20, 2020, DNA evaluation linked the case to 2 males. Certainly one of them was Suff.
When questioned by detectives in 2022, Suff stated he was working at a pc restore store and residing in Riverside County in 1986. At some point, Small went into the restore store and gave him her residence telephone quantity. He referred to as her and requested if she would go along with him to see his boss in Pasadena.
After they arrived on the location on Banks Avenue, the 2 received into an argument and Suff turned enraged when she knocked the glasses off his face, Thomas stated. Suff retrieved a knife from his automobile and stabbed her a number of occasions within the chest. He then pushed her into the road and drove away.
Suff would stay free till he was arrested throughout a routine visitors cease in 1992 and in the end confessed to a dozen different murders in Riverside County between 1989 and 1991 and was sentenced to demise.
Suff will not be anticipated to be placed on trial for Small’s killing as a result of he’s already on demise row, authorities stated.
“We consider we’re bringing a way of lengthy overdue justice and closure to the sufferer and her household,” L.A. County Sheriff Robert Luna stated at Tuesday’s press convention.
Small had two younger youngsters and was on her solution to getting her life again on monitor when she was killed, in keeping with an announcement from Small’s youthful sister that Thomas learn on the information convention.
“She was a loving mom and daughter,” the assertion stated. “She had an enormous coronary heart and would do something for anybody.”
