The first link is to Albuquerque’s PD page on the murders and the second to a recent article naming two possible suspects.

http://www.cabq.gov/police/contact-the- … estigation

http://krqe.com/2014/01/31/does-apd-hav … a-murders/

Thank you for those links Seagull. My friend Chris here in Albuquerque is just as obsessed with serial killers as I am. So when we hang out, guess what we talk about? We discuss the Zodiac case quite often and he has some really interesting views. I don’t know much about the West Mesa murders, but Chris knows pretty much everything there is to know, and has a few suspects of his own. Last night he was telling me about some of his suspects. When he mentioned one name to me, my jaw dropped. It was a man named Richard, who is Chris’ neighbor. Me and Richard go way back. He is the biggest scumbag I have ever met. I haven’t seen or heard from this guy in close to 15 years, but Chris is very interested in him as a suspect.

I’m coming down with a nasty cold and have a fever and a horrible headache, so I am going to try to stay off the internet and try to relax tonight for my shift at work, which is just starting. Once I am feeling better, I will post the things that Chris has told me about Richard, and I have a bunch of stories to tell about him as well. Some of the stories are hard to believe, but they are true. This guy is a real piece of work, as you will soon find out.

Sorry it took me a while to get to this. Been really exhausted lately. Don’t ya just love when life kicks your ass? Kick it right back, I say!! So anyways……….

So this Richard guy is a registered sex offender for a crime he committed in North Central Iowa in the late 90s. He was in his early 30s at the time, and knocked up his step daughter who was 14 or 15 at the time. I spent a lot of time with this guy in Iowa, and I can say that he is by far the biggest piece of crap I have ever met. About a year after my parents divorced, my mom started dating this guy named Robert. Robert was an ok guy. He was new in town (Clarion, Iowa… population of less than 3,000 people). He ended up moving to Clarion from Albuquerque, NM, because his brother, Richard, was living there, and Richard had talked him into moving up. I met Richard through Robert. Richard seemed like a great guy at first, but once you get to know him, you would realize that he was nowhere near it. I smoked pot quite a bit with Richard, Robert, and Richard’s step son, Ben. Ben and I actually became good friends. A couple of years down the road, Robert talked my mom into moving to Albuquerque. She took my sister with, as she was not old enough to make a decision to stay or go. My brother and I wanted to stay, so we moved in with our dad. Our dad was the town drunk, and I did not get along with him. One night, he came home completely wasted and we got into a fight. The next day, I asked Ben if I could stay at his house for a bit. This was in early 1998 I believe, and I was 19 at the time. Ben asked his mom and step dad (Richard), and they said yes. I had a pretty high opinion of Richard at the time. He smoked a little pot, drank on occasion and was pretty fun to be around. But something just seemed a little off about him. I could never put my finger on it. That is until I moved in to their home. Richard, his wife, and Ben had just got into meth when I moved in. I had plenty of bad moments with drugs back then, so I know how that stuff can change a person. People close to Richard said that the meth changed him in a very bad way. I don’t think it did. I think he was always bad and nobody realized it. The drugs just made it harder for him to cover up.

Richard was an amazing liar, and that is an understatement. He manipulated people to get things he wanted. I was a very shy teenager back then, and there were many occasions where I would be messed up and drugs and I would just sit back and observe my surroundings, including the people I was around. The cops knew he was doing meth and possibly a small time dealer, so they kept a close eye on him. I would come downstairs from my bedroom sometimes late at night to use the bathroom, and I would see some crazy stuff. Seeing Richard glued to the window at 3 am was pretty common. He kept the house pitch dark at night, and he would look out the window with binoculars to keep an eye on the "FBI agents who were on the roof of the church across the street." Ha! One time I came downstairs and saw him naked hunched over their family dog. Yep, he was banging a dog!!! F’n sicko. I walked back upstairs and just peed out my bedroom window. Another time, I was taking a leak, and I heard some strange noises coming from the dryer. And then I hear a cat hiss. I open the dryer and there is Richard’s son, Richard Jr., naked and holding a cat in his lap. I just laughed, said "you f’n weirdo," and walked out. This guys whole family is weird. They definitely have some screws loose. I could go on forever with Richard stories, but what’s the point? I think I have said enough already. I mean, seeing him bang a dog… that is just disgusting. Knocking up your 14-15 year old step daughter… disgusting!!! I have a bunch more stories, but like I said, you already get the picture about this guy.

So anyways, my buddy Chris lived next door to this guy for 3-4 years here in Albuquerque up until recently (strange coincidence), and has seen the guy do some strange things as well. I have talked Chris into registering on here because 1. I would rather him post about how he became interested in Richard as the West Mesa Killer, and 2. He wants to learn more about the Zodiac case.

Knowing Richard as well as I do, do I think he is capable of murder? I don’t know. He thinks he is a badass and does hold a black belt in some form of martial arts, although I forget which. I used to whoop his butt in sparing sessions, and I have no training in any for of fighting if that tells you anything. I’m not a very big guy either, but still a little bigger than this wimp! Do I think he is smart enough to get away with murder? No, but he will lie his ass off and come up with a very believable story. I have seen him lie to so many people including police, his wife, his kids and step kids, his own parents etc. He is the type of person that believes his own lies and he is very good at making others believe them as well. I never fell for them though. Not sure why, but I am a very good judge of character. One time when I was in jail for a few days (missed a court date on a traffic violation), I get out and come home and my car is gone. Turns out that Richard broke into my lock box, stole the title, forged my name on it, took it to the courthouse and transferred it to his name and traded it to a friend of his who had a meth lab. Guess what he traded it for. $500 worth of crappy Iowa street meth. We’re talkin about an ’85 z-28 with T-tops. White with gold racing stripes. It was my first car, and I loved it. A couple months later, I had to spend a couple days in jail (possession of marijuana) and guess what? I come home to find my other car gone. An even nicer car. An ’88 IROC-Z 5.7 liter amazing car. I had just bought the car and didn’t have time to register it or get it insured yet. He just flat out took it, and had Ben’s girlfriend drive over to some guys house to pick up some "stuff." She ran a stop sign and got nailed by a Bronco (no, OJ was not driving) and totaled it. No insurance, so nothing I could do. I paid $10,000 for both cars, so the way I see it he owes me that much, right? Don’t worry, the guy will never have that kind of money. When he’s not in jail, he holds low paying dead end jobs, and probably spends it all on drugs and hookers, which I hear he is into these days. I have found a few arrests on him since he moved back here after getting out of prison in Iowa. Mostly drug stuff. I think one was giving drugs to a teenage girl IIRC. My brother saw him on the news 8 or 9 years ago. Something to do with a drug bust, and they mentioned he was a sex offender. Oh yeah, after he got out of prison in Iowa, he thought it was a good idea to track down his ex-step daughter because he wanted to meet his son. Son/step-grandson??? EWWWW. He found her living in Ft. Dodge, Iowa and came to her house. The step daughter’s husband chased him off with a gun and she never heard from him again. She did say that he showed up in my Camaro though.

Ok, sorry, I have gone on long enough. This stuff is all to the best of my knowledge. There may be a few very slight things wrong, but hey, it’s been a long time so the memories aren’t as clear as they used to be. Just for the record, I am not accusing anyone of anything and not calling anyone a "Suspect." It’s just crazy that Chris happened to mention this name to me one night while discussing unsolved murder cases. It’s a small world!!

I had never read about the West Mesa murders. Man that was some sad reading.