Keith and Patrice Harrington were killed in their Dana Point home in August 1980. Keith Harrington was a medical student; Patrice was a nurse. Both were in their mid-twenties. The Harrington case was the basis for the initial murder charges filed following DeAngelo’s arrest in 2018, as Orange County prosecutors elected to lead with that case.
Manuela Witthuhn was killed in her Irvine home in February 1981. She was twenty-eight years old and had been staying alone while her husband was hospitalized. Her husband, David Witthuhn, has been involved in the case’s public history and has spoken about his wife’s death and the decades of waiting for an arrest.
Cheri Domingo and Gregory Sanchez were killed in a Goleta home in July 1981. Domingo was a thirty-five-year-old woman who had rented the home temporarily; Sanchez was twenty-seven. They were not residents but were staying in the area.
Janelle Cruz was killed in Irvine in May 1986. She was eighteen years old, working at a local hotel and staying at home while her family was out of town. Her murder was the last in the sequence and was the crime that went the longest without being connected to the others.
The total victim count in the guilty plea — thirteen murder victims plus the admission of additional uncharged crimes involving sixty-one additional victims — is the legal accounting of what the cases document. Behind the numbers are the specific people: the professor who went to protect his daughter, the young couple walking their dog, the physician and the psychologist in their condominium, the attorney and his wife, the medical student and the nurse, the woman staying alone while her husband was hospitalized, the two people in a temporary rental, and the eighteen-year-old home alone.