A Marin County judge ruled Friday that an accused serial killer can view four pairs of pantyhose removed from a murder victim 35 years ago.
Joseph Naso, 78, will not be allowed to touch or manipulate the evidence, which was found with Roxene Roggasch’s body in 1977. But he will be able to examine the evidence from a distance of several feet under supervision by authorities.
Naso, who is representing himself in the case, filed a motion previously for access to the evidence. The motion was heard Friday afternoon before Judge Andrew Sweet.
The evidence in question includes four pairs of pantyhose — one found shoved in Roggasch’s mouth, two others tied on her body and a fourth she was wearing. Authorities say semen on Roggasch’s pantyhose matched Naso’s DNA profile, and that Roggasch was strangled with pantyhose that contained the DNA of Naso’s wife.
It is unclear why Naso wants to view the pantyhose, but criminal defendants are entitled to examine the evidence against them. Naso told the judge there is something about the pantyhose that “concerns me.”
“I promise I won’t jump on them or do anything to damage or destroy them,” he said.
The judge instructed prosecutor Dori Ahana to prepare guidelines for his approval on how, when and where Naso can look at the evidence.
In addition to Roggasch, Naso is charged with the murders of Carmen Colon, 22, found near Port Costa in 1978; Pamela Parsons, 38, found in Yuba County in 1993; and Tracy Tafoya, 31, found in Yuba County in 1994.
Naso, a retired commercial photographer, was identified as the suspect after a 2010 probation search at his Reno home revealed a vast collection of photographs of dead or unconscious women in various states of undress, incriminating writings, sadistic magazines, and diaries describing sex crimes, investigators said. Authorities are still investigating whether he can be linked to additional homicides.
Naso has pleaded not guilty. He says the photos are his private artwork and that the women are in staged poses.
All four murder cases are being prosecuted in Marin under an agreement among county authorities. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
The trial is scheduled to begin in November.
Contact Gary Klien via email at gklien@marinij.com.
I just get this disturbing image in my head of him smiling and stroking them. *shivers*
This old man creeps me out anyway and this just adds to it.
Really, just look at him. Do you want him touching your pantyhose?
The feeble 80-year-old woman, testifying by video feed from her home state of Florida, gave contradictory or inconclusive statements about his allegedly violent behavior, and giggled at times while Naso reminisced about their times together.
“You still look good, Betty,” said Naso, 78. “After all these years, you still look good to me.”
He is just so creepy. How could that have made her giggle? Puke I can see but not giggle.
The testimony came on the fourth day of Naso’s preliminary hearing in Marin Superior Court. After the hearing, Judge Andrew Sweet will decide whether there is sufficient evidence to try Naso on four counts of murder.
Naso has declined to hire a lawyer, despite having more than $1 million in assets, including bundles of cash and coin collections.
Naso, a retired commercial photographer, is charged with murdering four reputed prostitutes: Roxene Roggasch, 18, dumped outside Fairfax in 1977; Carmen Colon, 22, found near Port Costa in 1978; Pamela Parsons, 38, found in Yuba County in 1993; and Tracy Tafoya, 31, found in Yuba County in 1994. Roggasch was strangled with panty hose that contained the DNA of Naso’s wife, according to court documents.
Naso was identified as the suspect after a 2010 probation search at his Reno home revealed a vast collection of photographs of dead or unconscious women in various states of undress, incriminating writings, sadistic magazines and diaries describing sex crimes, investigators said. Authorities are still investigating whether he can be linked to additional homicides.
Naso has pleaded not guilty. He says the photos are his private artwork and that the women are in staged poses.
Scary thing is some might actually believe it. Keep reading.
The Florida woman met Naso while both lived in Sutter County in the 1990s. She responded to a newspaper ad Naso ran for a caretaker for his disabled son, and while she did not end up working for Naso, they began a sexual relationship.
This is very petty but I almost gagged a little here. Look at him!
Would you want to have sex with him?
Sorry for that. I just had to get that out.
The woman moved to Florida a few years later, and Naso visited her at least twice. She eventually broke off the relationship, and filed reports with local authorities that Naso was threatening her and sending unwanted mail and photos, according to court testimony.
Under questioning from prosecutor Rosemary Slote, the woman was able to identify herself as the woman in several Naso photographs. In some pictures, she appears standing and posed in lingerie, once with her hands tied by a cord going to the ceiling. In others, she is sprawling or bound on a bed, apparently unconscious.
The woman could not recall how she came to be in those positions, possibly lending support to the prosecution theory that Naso was rendering his victims unconscious. But she had difficulty verifying her old police statements in which she alleged violence and threats by Naso.
This is where it gets worrisome. There is a chance that someone, if not a judge maybe a juror, will have reasonable doubt due to these statements.
If this Rosemary had these photos taken, possibly willingly since there is no evidence that she fought them, and is still alive maybe he did not kill the others.
They do not have to absolutley believe the concept they just have to allow it to create doubt.
Naso, in his cross-examination, worked to charm his former girlfriend with recollections of day trips, dinners out and holding hands during long walks. But the approach sometimes fizzled into inconclusive or unflattering answers.
“When we were together, we had a good time, didn’t we?” Naso said.
“Yes.”
“Do you ever remember me mistreating you?”
“Yes.”
“And how was that?”
The witness was unable to answer.
I do not understand why he is being allowed to basically flirt with this woman the way he is.
Didn’t the DA question her before? I hope that they have stronger witnesses than Ms. Slote.
In another exchange, Naso asked if she could recall him driving her to give piano lessons.
“What I remember is you threatening me that you would blackmail me about the piano lessons I taught,” she said.
“How did I threaten you?”
“I wish I could remember better.”
“I wish I could, too,” Naso said.
I bet he can, in vivid detail. I have this icky feeling that he is enjoying toying with her, that he is remembering the drugs he gave her and what he did to her when she was passed out. Creepy old monster.
SAN RAFAEL, Calif. — A diary documenting rapes and sexual assaults of underage girls and women was found along with posed photographs of two Northern California slaying victims in the home of a suspected serial killer, a homicide detective testified Wednesday.
Nevada Department of Public Safety Det. Richard Brown, the lead investigator on the case, made the disclosure during a preliminary hearing for Joseph Naso, a Reno, Nev., man charged in the “Double Initial” killings.
Naso, 78, is acting as his own lawyer in what is likely to be a death penalty case. The former photographer has pleaded not guilty to four murder charges involving slayings of prostitutes the 1970s and 1990s.
Being his own lawyer worked out what I consider right for Bundy. Let us hope Naso is just as successful.
“Girl in north Buffalo woods. She was real pretty. Had to knock her out first,” read one entry in Naso’s journal. Brown said the journal was filled with such descriptions, and that Naso used the word rape in other sections.
White-haired and wearing leg shackles, Naso sat alone at the courtroom defense table with his head rested on his hand.
Was he bord? Such a shame that he is allowed to express such disrespect for the victims and the proceedings.
Naso listened as Marin County prosecutor Dori Ahana and Brown detailed dozens of sexual and violent photographs of women seized from his home, objecting at times to the relevance. The photographs showed many women unconscious or appearing dead, including two prostitutes Naso is charged with killing, Pamela Parsons and Tracy Tafoya.
“Who is paying for all of this entertainment?” Naso asked after hours of detailed testimony about the photos. “This is my private work, my photography. The women have been violated. What happens in a home is sacred and private. … The whole thing is disgusting, and I don’t see the relevance at all.”
At this point I can only yell at the screen. They found pictures of the dead woman. What the hell does he mean private and without relevance? That comment about entertainment is sickening.
Judge Andrew Sweet overruled Naso’s objection.
For stupidity I hope.
In one photograph of Parsons, Brown said she appeared to be dead.
“I thought she was deceased. Her face doesn’t appear natural,” he said, describing the picture.
Other photographs taken of the lower halves of women appeared to show the reddish-purple discoloration of the skin seen in dead people, Brown said.
In a bedroom in Naso’s home, investigators also found a “List of 10” that contained scrawled descriptions of 10 women, including four references that prosecutors believe described murder victims — Roxene Roggasch, 18, Carmen Colon, 22, Parsons, 38, and Tafoya, 31.
The matching letters of each woman’s first and last names gave rise to the “Double Initial” moniker for the case. Six other women referred to on the list have not yet been identified, but prosecutors say the investigation is ongoing.
That is a very disturbing part that so many had the double initials. He did research on his victims, he knew them (or about them) well enough to at least know their names.
The preliminary hearing is providing the first in-depth look at the prosecution’s case against Naso and his lifestyle. At the end, the judge will determine if prosecutors have enough evidence to take Naso to trial.
Evidence like photos of the dead women when they already appear to be dead? Notations that match the killings? Personal items from the murdered women? Evidence like that?
Authorities seized thousands of documents, calendars, ledgers, journals and photographs from Naso’s house. In two safety deposit boxes, Naso kept $152,400 in cash, along with news clippings covering the slayings of Parsons and Tafoya, and other personal items from women.
Nevada probation Officer Wesley Jackson testified that he arrived in April 2010 to check Naso’s Nevada home for violations of his probation agreement and found food rotting on the kitchen counter and debris strewn about.
All the bedrooms were locked, and Jackson said Naso resisted opening them for a time.
In Naso’s bedroom, Jackson said, he found mannequin parts and a full mannequin clad in a red dress. Women’s lingerie was in the dresser drawers. In his garage, suitcases were found packed with mannequin legs clad in hosiery.
Further searches of the home turned up a box of knives and guns hidden behind a refrigerator in Naso’s garage, authorities said. Naso was forbidden to have weapons due to probation from a felony larceny conviction in California.
Parsons’ strangled body was found in the Yuba City area of Northern California in 1993, where Naso was living at the time with his mentally ill son. Court documents state that Naso had photographed Parsons.
A 1993 calendar Naso kept had an entry for Sept. 15, Brown said, that placed him in the area.
“Stayed in (Yuba City) all day long. Took care of some old business,” Brown read from the calendar. “September 15 was the last time Parsons was known to be alive.”
Tafoya was killed in the area when Naso lived in Yuba City. Her body was found on the side of Highway 70 near Marysville Cemetery in 1994.
In a calendar entry on Aug. 6, 1994, Naso referred to meeting with a woman in Marysville near the time of Tafoya’s death.
“Picked up a nice broad in (Marysville). 4 p.m. She came over for four hours. Took photographs. Nice legs. She ripped me off,” Brown read, adding: “That’s the last date Tracy Tafoya was known to be alive.”
Investigators have said Naso might have used his then-wife’s panty hose to strangle Roggasch, a prostitute whose 1977 murder went unsolved for decades.
Circumstantial evidence but still compelling evidence.
Colon’s decomposed body was found near Port Costa 1978 by a California Highway Patrol officer in Contra Costa County. Authorities have said DNA evidence collected from her fingernails could tie Naso to her slaying.
I hope that they get the results back soon.
Authorities previously said Naso was being investigated for possible links to New York’s “Double Initial Murders” of three girls in the early 1970s.
SAN RAFAEL — The Nevada man accused of killing four women, including a woman whose body was dumped in Contra Costa County, went back and forth with a Marin County judge on Monday over how he would defend himself.
Joseph Naso told the perplexed judge that he needed more time to find an attorney or a legal adviser.
Naso, 77, said he needed a month or two to find a lawyer he could trust to advise him. At the same time, he said he wanted to continue representing himself.
“It’s not clear to me exactly why you want a continuance,” Marin Superior Court Judge Andrew Sweet told Naso, noting a confusing motion filed by the suspect who so far has represented himself. “The motion suggests you may be asking to have a lawyer represent you,” or a lawyer to act in an advisory capacity, the judge observed.
“All of the above,” Naso replied. “It’s not so much the question of spending money to retain counsel but of retaining someone I can trust and feel confident of to represent me. There are people out there who would like to get my money.”
“I have decided I do need legal counsel for this case,” Naso continued. At the same time, “I would like to maintain that privilege” of representing myself.
“If you were to ask me right now do I want counsel or do I want to represent myself, I can’t answer that,” Naso said.
“The bottom line is, if I can find an attorney who is reasonable and is not just out for my money, I would consider that.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” the judge said at one point.
Authorities have said Naso has access to about $1 million in savings.
Ultimately, Sweet said there was no good cause to delay a Sept. 6 preliminary hearing.
Naso said he was wary of attorneys because he had been burned by one and said he had talked to a half-dozen lawyers and was having trouble finding one that measured up.
“In this county there are not that many attorneys who are interested in this type of case,” he said.
Naso has pleaded not guilty to charges of killing four women: Roxene Roggasch, 18, dumped near Whites Hill above Fairfax in 1977; Carmen Colon, 22, found near Port Costa in 1978; Pamela Parsons, 38, found in Yuba County in 1993; and Tracy Tafoya, 31, found in Yuba County in 1994. The cases are being prosecuted in Marin Superior Court.
Suspected serial killer Joseph Naso was granted permission Thursday to have a legal adviser, but the judge is undecided on whether taxpayers should foot the bill.
IMO that answer is NO!
Judge Andrew Sweet said he will appoint a county official to investigate Naso’s wealth and his ability to access it, and report back later this month. Marin County prosecutors say Naso has more than $1 million in liquid assets — including $150,000 he can access by merely writing a letter to authorities in his home state of Nevada — but Naso says he cannot get to his money and no private lawyer will help him without payment.
“My assets are impounded,” Naso, 77, said during a brief hearing Thursday afternoon. “I have no assets.”
Not that I understand all the legal circumstances but I do not think that frozen is the same as gone.
Naso initially insisted on representing himself in the multiple murder case, saying he did not want to expend money on a lawyer. But recently he filed a motion seeking “advisory counsel” to help with the complex litigation, which could bring him the death penalty.
Deputy District Attorney Dori Ahana argued that Naso is not indigent and has no right to a publicly financed lawyer.
I agree. Nasso can pay for his own defense.
Sweet said he will rule on Naso’s request on July 26 after hearing the report on his finances.
Naso has pleaded not guilty to charges of murdering four reputed prostitutes: Roxene Roggasch, 18, dumped between Fairfax and Woodacre in 1977; Carmen Colon, 22, found near Port Costa in 1978; Pamela Parsons, 38, found in Yuba County in 1993; and Tracy Tafoya, 31, found in Yuba County in 1994. All four cases are being prosecuted in Marin Superior Court.
Roggasch, who lived in the East Bay, was strangled with panty hose that contained the DNA of Naso’s wife, according to court documents. The investigation also revealed that Naso kept a handwritten list of 10 women in 10 locations — including apparent allusions to the four murder victims, authorities allege.
The district attorney has declined to comment on whether the other six women have been identified and accounted for.
Naso, a retired freelance photographer, also kept a collection of racy photos of women — including admitted photos of Parsons — and rented a deposit box with newspaper clippings about two of the murders, authorities said.
The photographs and writings were seized last year at Naso’s home in Reno, where police were conducting a probation search. He was arrested by Marin authorities in April after completing a jail term in an unrelated case.
WALNUT CREEK, Calif. — Police have found the remains of a Walnut Creek woman who was kidnapped, raped and murdered by the serial killer known as the I-5 Strangler in 1977.
Walnut Creek police said Monday that a Napa County sheriff’s deputy found the body of 21-year-old Ellen Burleigh in a dry riverbed near Lake Berryessa.
Roger Reece Kibbe was convicted of murder of Burleigh and five other women in 2009. As part of a plea agreement, he agreed to help locate her body.
The Contra Costa Times reports Burleigh disappeared after meeting Kibbe to talk about a secretary job opening.
Kibbe was in prison for strangling a teen prostitute when San Joaquin County prosecutors charged him in 2009 with murdering six women and dropping their bodies along freeways between 1977 and 1987. Read more
I hope that finding her body gives the family and friends some peace.
France police are on high alert since it is rumored that suspected serial killer / known rapist Larry Murphy is going to try hiding out there since hiding out in other places around Europe did not work.
SUSPECTED serial killer Larry Murphy has fled Ireland again after spending three weeks holed up in Dublin hotels.
Authorities here breathed a sigh of relief today after the rapist left the jurisdiction without incident.
But police in France are now on high alert after it was reported that Murphy (46) had decided to relocate to Paris for the moment.
Since being freed from jail last year he has moved around Europe staying in both Amsterdam and Spain for extended periods.
He is reportedly staying in the ‘red light districts’ and trying to avoid contact with people. I can not imagine why unless he is slightly afraid that someone might kill him.
Murphy remains the chief suspect for the disappearance of several Irish women in the 1990s.
He has been linked to the cases of Annie McCarrick (26), Jo Jo Dullard (21) and Deirdre Jacob (18) all of whom went missing without trace.
He has served 10 years in prison for the horrific rape and attempted murder of a Carlow businesswoman, but was released last August.
He did not undergo any significant rehabilitation treatment while behind bars and detectives feared that he may strike again.
Joseph Nasso’s preliminary hearing has been postponed until Sept. 9, 2011 so that he has more time to prepare his case.
Nasso is the 77 year old who is defending himself against charges that he killed four women: Roxene Roggasch, 18, dumped between Fairfax and Woodacre in 1977; Carmen Colon, 22, found near Port Costa in 1978; Pamela Parsons, 38, found in Yuba County in 1993; and, Tracy Tafoya, 31, found in Yuba County in 1994.
In Germany a man being called only Jan O or the Cannibal Killer has been sentenced to life imprisonment.
(CBS/AP) BERLIN – German man Jan O., dubbed the “cannibal killer” after he confessed to eating the flesh and drinking the blood of one of his teenage victims, has been convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison.
The 26-year-old, whose last name has been withheld in accordance with German privacy laws, was convicted in Goettingen state court of two counts of murder Monday for the November slayings of a 14-year-old girl and a 13-year-old boy.
During the trial the defendant confessed to licking blood from a wound of the girl and biting flesh from her neck. He killed the boy five days later.
DAPD news agency reports Presiding Judge Ralf Guenther says the murders showed an “almost unimaginable dimension of criminality.”
According to Sky News , Jan O. had lured a victim identified only as “Nina B.” into the woods intending to rape her, but instead cut her throat. He returned to visit the body several times, and during one return visit, took the life of his second victim, named “Tobias L.”
The boy was allegedly sexually assaulted before being stabbed to death.
Jan O. admitted to committing “vampiristic” acts both before and after they died, Sky News reports, adding that the perpetrator apologized to the victim’s families and said: “I don’t know what came over me.”
Defense attorney Markus Fischer says he’s considering an appeal.
How can there be an appeal when Jan O confessed to drinking blood and apologized the way that he did? Appeal What?
Another article has even more disturbing information.
Nina had gone missing in mid-November 2010 after she ran away from home. According to O.’s confession, he lured the young girl into the woods with the intend to rape her. But he instead hit her on the head with a beer bottle before slashing her throat.
As the girl died, according to the confession, O. ate flesh from her wounds and drank her blood. “I did not want sex anymore, just flesh and blood. The taste of it made me addicted,” O. wrote in his confession, details of which shocked the European nation.
In the days after the brutal murder, O. returned to the body several times and repeatedly took advantage of her. He also filmed several clips with his mobile phone as he touched the lifeless body.
In addition, a message was found on O.’s Facebook page in which he said: “Slaughtered a girl yesterday. One everyday until they catch me.” O.’s other online profiles indicated he was looking to meet girls between the ages of 10 and 16.”
In the days after Nina’s murder, during one of his visits to the corpse, O. came across Tobias who he mistook for a young girl. He kidnapped him and stabbed him to death when he discovered that Tobias was a boy, not a girl. Although there is evidence to indicate that Tobias was still sexually assaulted, O. denied this and said he rejects homosexual acts.
That article also goes on to state that even though he was given a life sentence he could be released one day if he is no longer considered a threat. That is insane.
Real Life Monsters 