Her escape intensified interest in a lurid tale that for a time made Sacramento the center of the media universe. I think she truly wanted to rehabilitate [her tenants] as she could not the people in her own family, Vicary says. A couple who braved the stigma of the house's curse purchased the home, fully aware of the history. When they returned to his apartment, he watched in a stupor as Puente helped herself to his checks and cash; before leaving, she slipped a diamond ring off his pinky. Know Her Death House Now The silence here feels powerful enough to swallow space. In summer 1982, Clausen and his siblings spotted a story in the Bee about Puentes conviction on theft and forgery charges related to her drugging four elderly people. How Did Dorothea Puente Kill Her Victims? Once free of the throng, Cabrera stopped and watched the pair until they entered the hotel. Instead, Puente found a husband. Puente's total count reached nine murders; she was convicted of three and the jury hung on the other six. Time has deepened the creases between her potato-like nose and dumpling cheeks, and her blanched skin has slackened at the neck. Then you will understand why these people believe Dorothea's life is worth saving. The hospitalization occurred a year after Sacramento police busted Dorothea in a raid on a residential house of ill fame on Fulton Avenue that had fronted as a bookkeeping service, according to court records. First off, I was getting the checks. John Cabrera and Terry Brown, homicide detectives with the Sacramento Police Department, and Jim Wilson, a federal probation agent, had arrived at the house late on the morning of Nov. 11, 1988. 'Never judge a book by its cover,' said retired police officer John Cabrera in 2018, the lead investigator on the case. The jokes on me. Speaking softly, she asked, Am I under arrest? When the detective told her no, she explained that the police presence and the growing mob of onlookers had her on edge. Thats between me and my God., Until 2006, Puente rotated through assorted prison jobs, cleaning cells, giving haircuts, toiling on a landscaping crew. Inside Dorothea Puente's Tragic Childhood. Puente had already been convicted and executed in the media, and the attorneys understood the long odds of winning in court. She was known as the "step house lady" after filing nine homicides. Cops hauling away body bags. I dont feel like confessing my sins to anyone, she says sharply. Still, prison has changed Puente in one profound aspect, reforming her into an obedient citizen. Con su simpata lograba escapar de la. She wants me to buy dozens of food and beauty care items for her from a prison-approved vendor that will mail the goods to her. Puente was born Dorothea Helen Gray on January 9, 1929. She was just pure evil, Ballenger says. She donated to Hispanic arts and education programs while providing cheap medical care to her boarders and other patients, falsely claiming she had worked as a nurse in World War II. She had breached her federal probation by running a boardinghouse, yet admitted to the offense when asked. On January 1, 1986, a fisherman spotted the suspicious looking coffin-like box near the river and called police. She had a terrible adolescence after being . Tests revealed high levels of unprescribed drugs in their systems, and in time, the physicians fingered her as the culprit. In the landladys presence, he corroborated her story about Montoya. Dorothea Puente was a convicted serial killer who ran a boarding house in Sacramento, California in the 1980s. Dorothea Puente - Wikipedia Dorothea Puente - Alcatraz East Pigeon Forge She was found guilty in three cases and one juror held out on the other four. Tempers spiked as the impasse stretched to its third week. "Which is gross," Hayden said. Twenty-one minutes laterhe remembers the time preciselyhe exhumed sufficient evidence: the remains of a second body buried about a foot deep in the earth. An Asian woman in her mid-thirties, with sharp cheekbones framed by long glossy black hair, wears standard-issue prisoner garb: white T-shirt with long navy blue sleeves, dungarees and blue sneakers. Wearing purple pumps and a long red coat over a pink dress, Puente carries a large maroon purse and pink umbrella, her eyes cast downward to watch her step. "Someone. The 1991 film Evil Spirits, starring Karen Black and Arte Johnson, is loosely based on the Puente murders. Then working as an in-home caregiver, Puente displayed an odd obsession with her own health, lamenting to clients and caseworkers alike that she suffered from cancer. Dorothea Puente, la abuela asesina y su 'casa de la muerte' As we continue talking, the topic switches to her life before prison, and I ask what she misses most about Sacramento. She recalls the future president and his first wife, Jane Wyman, as her good friends. When I mention the Gippers second wife, Puente frowns. 15 Notorious Female Serial Killers - The Lineup The press dubbed Dorothea Puente the 'Death House Landlady.' The name sharply contrasted with her perception in the community. Today the 59-year-old Cabrera works cold cases for the department as a retired sergeant. He called over Cabrera and Brown, and after he scooped away more soil, they saw what resembled a tree root. When attempts to extract it with a shovel failed, Cabrera climbed into the hole. Authorities alleged that, by poisoning her boarders, she wanted to collect their benefits checks without risk of them notifying social workers or police. A year later her mother died in a motorcycle accident. Most disregarded the warning in the face of a paucity of housing options for alcoholics, drug addicts and the mentally ill, and even after her release from prison in 1985, social workers and homeless advocates, ignoring or unaware that she was an ex-con running a boardinghouse without a license, sent their clients to her. After their deaths she continued to draw their social security cheques. He sits in his downtown office, shock of silver hair combed straight back from his high forehead, untucked short-sleeved shirt spilling over his jeans. Judy Moise, an outreach counselor with Volunteers of America, became suspicious when Montoya vanished. To my surprise, an envelope stamped with the words Central California Womens Facility State Prison arrived a few weeks later. This page was last edited on 18 February 2023, at 18:08. Newspapers dubbed Puente the "Death House Landlady". It is a wistfulness that lays bare the depth of chaos that defined Puentes status quo long before they married in 1952. Dorothea Puente was a convicted serial killer who ran a boarding house in Sacramento, California in the 1980s. An outreach counselor with Volunteers of America, she had visited Puente before placing him in her care. It seems fitting that a published recipe collection by serial killer Dorothea Puente, aka the "Death House Landlady," includes how-to's for whipping up . Would you want that to happen to your children? Today she repeats a tale she first spun for me three months ago, showing remarkable fidelity to the specifics of the earlier version. According to an interview in the documentary, The House is Innocent, and the couple believed that changing the . But in reality, he contends, she is the nation's most prolific female serial murderer ever . As reported by Dailymail, seven year after Puente's death, a man named William Harder had claimed to be his grandson. He was going with another movie star, she says. O'Mara's closing argument focused on Puente's acts of murder: Does anyone become responsible for their conduct in this world? She'd later return to smother her incapacitated prey. This is the disturbing story of Dorothea Puente, the Death House Landlady.. One was missing its hands, head and feet. Coverage spanned from the national networks and Time, Newsweek and The New York Times to the National Enquirer, National Examiner and news outlets from as far away as England and France. She marks much of the day reading mind-candy fictionshes a fan of John Grisham and Dan Brownand watching TV; her favorite prime-time shows include CSI, Criminal Minds and Cold Case. They separated in 1969, and not long after, Dorothea, who had briefly run an unauthorized rehab program for alcoholics, opened a boardinghouse at 21st and F streets. Puente had a reputation for taking in people considered tough cases recovering alcoholics, drug addicts, the mentally ill, and the elderly. The three men carried shovels as they fanned out across the backyard of the two-story Victorian at 1426 F Street. Gawkers gather outside 1426 F St. (Courtesy of The Sacramento Archives), Domestic bliss and her maternal instinct failed to take root. The 9/ . She moves toward the front of the room, where a guard seated behind a metal desk tells her my table number. Scant evidence exists to suggest she socialized with Reaganwhen he divorced Wyman, Puente was 20 years old and living in the Bay Areaany more than she danced with the Rockettes. I was struck by how pleasant and socially intact and intelligent she was, says Vicary, who works in Los Angeles. I realize today will be our last conversation when Puente sits down at my table and makes a request. But eventually, police searching for a missing tenant spotted a patch of disturbed dirt near the boarding house and uncovered the first of several bodies. [10] According to investigators, most of her victims had been drugged until they overdosed; Puente then wrapped them in bed-sheets and plastic lining before dragging them to open pits in the backyard for burial. Sacramento Co. By Remy Millisky / March 14, 2022 11:13 am EDT. Among them were four of her five husbands, two children, her two sisters, her mother, a grandson and a mother-in-law. I felt like someone had pulled my insides out.. For my benefit, she recites her prison medical history: a tumor removed from behind one knee last year; angioplasty in 2003; repair of a ruptured artery in 1998. The police returned and searched the house. Dismembering their corpses, she threw their remains into a mass grave in her garden, telling neighbors the foul smell emanating from the ground was sewage and dead rats, rather than dead residents. During their initial meeting, he encountered a woman of utter ordinariness, one far removed from the media caricature that depicted her as the embodiment of evil. Gray would continue to use the surname Puente for more than twenty years. She gave birth to a daughter in 1946 followed by a second less than a year later, but public documents suggest she inherited her mothers aversion to childrearing. I started working her, Cabrera says, but all along, she was working me. She claims he has sent her Christmas cards in prison, and as she talks about that small act of kindness, her eyes mist over. Though born in Redlands, Puente, who speaks passable Spanish, claimed Mexico as her birthplace, a ruse she perpetuated by alternately using the surnames of her last two ex-husbands, Roberto Puente and Pedro Montalvo. On the other hand, when these people, as could be expected, would act upat that point, she snapped and decided to kill them.. Back in Sacramento, police were digging up five more bodies, including Bert Montoyas. To vary her diet, Puente sometimes cooks in her room, making tamales with tortillas, canned chili, cheese and other ingredients bought in the prisons canteen or mail-ordered through a food-delivery service. In April of 1982, a 61-year-old woman named Ruth Monroe moved into Dorothea Puentes house. Police later accused Puente of lacing food or drinks she served her victims with a lethal mix of prescription drugs, poisoning them to collect their Social Security checks, a scheme that netted more than $5,000 a month. She has sent more than 15 letters and postcards in the months since I first wrote to her. Her body shapeless under a long-sleeve T-shirt and dungarees, she has pulled back her snowy plume of hair with a pink scrunchie. However, in 1978, she was convicted of illegally cashing state and federal assistance checks that belonged to her tenants. Puente passed away in 2011 at the Central California Women's Facility at age 82 from natural causes. She sent one child to live with relatives while another was put up for adoption. She tells me they appreciate the advice she provides them, whether informal legal counsel on their cases or how to traverse the social services network after their release. Granddaughter of Dorothea Puente Victim Talks About Her Disappearance The granddaughter of one of Dorothea Puente's victims recalls finding out that Puente had run away from the police. Sometimes she includes small handmade gifts: Christmas ornaments constructed from cardboard and yarn, a greeting card stitched with fine thread. Evidence from Dorothea Puente Case Preserved at Center for - FOX40 But 26 years after her conviction - and seven years after her death - a man who claims to Puente's grandson, William Harder, has stepped forward to reaffirm his grandmother's claim that she wasn't always bad. She came on a little hard, what with her questions about his Social Security benefits and abrupt suggestion that they consider living together. Grandson of Dorothea Puente, shared a 'real connection' with her I wonder what she wants when death does come. The three law officers had stopped by the house to try to learn the whereabouts of Alvaro Bert Montoya, who had gone missing three months earlier. Grandson of killer granny Dorothea Puente, who laced cakes with sleeping pills and then smothered them at her California boarding house, reveals how he shared a 'real connection' with her and . 'The contents might be what you'd never expected. [11], Puente has been featured on numerous true crime television shows, including Crime Stories,[12] Deadly Women,[13] A Stranger in My Home,[14] World's Most Evil Killers,[15] and Worst Roommate Ever.[16]. She seems entirely harmless. Inmates enter one at a time at irregular intervals through a gray metal door along the rear wall. Dorothea Puente, ne Dorothea Helen Gray, was born on January 9, 1929, in Redlands, California. Dorothea Puente had several children with McFaul but didnt raise them. Gray assumed the identity of "Sharon Johansson", hiding her delinquent behavior by portraying herself as a devout Christian woman. She did not strike me as a person who had a major mental illness. Given Montoyas history as a transient, his disappearance would have escaped notice without the persistence of Judy Moise. In effect, every cell has a waiting list.) Her evasive answersfirst claiming he had traveled to Mexico, then that he had returned and moved to Utahtripped Moises suspicion. A year later her mother died in a motorcycle accident. All three revolve around murder, a fact she notes without irony or self-consciousness. Granddaughter Of Dorothea Puente Victim Visits Boarding House Exclusive Granddaughter Of Dorothea Puente Victim Visits Boarding House Dorothy Miller was eventually found buried in the yard of Dorothea Puente's boarding house. For his labor and $800, Puente gave him the red Ford pickup, which she stated belonged to her boyfriend in Los Angeles, who no longer needed it. Inmates eat breakfast and dinner in a dining hall separate from their building units; after breakfast, they receive a cold boxed lunch that they take back to their cells. Trial began in October 1992 and ended a year later. Beneath a black and white mug shot of Puente wearing a polka dot dress and round glasses, the bulletin reads, The above suspect wanted for murder after several bodys (sic) found buried in her backyard. A stream of people tour Dorothea Puente's former home on Sept. 15, 2013. Some of the remains were in a mummified state - bound in bed sheets, cloth and duct tape (above), Puente would lure her victims to their deaths by baking them cake laced with sleeping pills. An extensive five-day search for the elderly fugitive ended when a stranger she'd befriended in Los Angeles recognized her face from the news and turned her into police. At 39, she was 16 years older than Roberto Puente, a Mexican migr whose interest in his heavyset bride concerned money and American citizenship, as chronicled in Disturbed Ground, a 1994 book about the Puente murder case. I think they needed somebody and I was the easiest one around., Yet the most illuminating aspect of talking with Puente in prison arises from her silence about the dead. She established herself as a genuine resource to the community to aid alcoholics, homeless people, and mentally ill people by holding Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and assisting individuals to sign up to receive Social Security benefits. For a moment the prisons visitors hall feels bereft of other people and sounds. But in truth, I approach this task without optimism, anticipating that our meeting will stick to the pattern of previous visits. Dorothea Puente was arrested in 1988 after the dismembered bodies of seven residents were found in the garden of her home in Sacramento, California Being escorted to a police car after her. Around the same time, she slipped a heavy sedative into the drink of a 74-year-old man she met at the Zebra Club in midtown. In addition to the usual fare sold in the halls chow line, there are heart-shaped boxes of chocolates for $7. Dorothea Helen Puente (nascido Gray; 9 de janeiro de 1929 - 27 de maro de 2011) foi uma assassina em srie americana.Na dcada de 1980, Puente mandava numa hospedaria em Sacramento, Califrnia, e assassinou vrios idosos e pensionistas com deficincia mental antes de descontar seus cheques de seguridade social. In the 1980s, she worked as a personal caretaker who drugged her clients and stole their valuables. . Cooking what I want. Instead, after buying the coffee, she fled immediately to Los Angeles, where she befriended an elderly male pensioner whom she had met in a bar. Some touch her shoulder. Investigators soon found the decomposing body of an elderly man inside. She also mentions undergoing major cancer surgery in 1961 to remove her reproductive organs and part of her intestines and stomach. Working in my yard.. I have also done this: Late at night, when it is said her deeds turned darkest, I have pondered the vastness of human nature as I stood outside the tiny yard where she buried her victims. [6], Following her divorce, Gray focused on running a boarding house located at 21st and F streets in Sacramento. In Olympia, Washington, she tried to make a living as a prostitute. I just did, she says. I scan the room out of empty impulse, certain I havent missed her. Ruth was not just Puente's friend but was also her business partner and had moved in with her just three weeks before the murder. "They immediately died," says Warren's grandson, Warren W. Bogle, who today serves as President and Vineyard Director. Murdaugh is heckled as he leaves court, Ken Bruce finishes his 30-year tenure as host of BBC Radio 2, Ukrainian soldier takes out five tanks with Javelin missiles, Family of a 10-month-old baby filmed vaping open up, Missing hiker buried under snow forces arm out to wave to helicopter, Hershey's Canada releases HER for SHE bars featuring a trans activist, Moment teenager crashes into back of lorry after 100mph police race, This Guy Collects Artwork From Serial Killers - VICE. She does not smile, laugh or joke much in my presence, but nor does she betray malevolence. This 'sweet little granny' was actually a psychotic serial killer Her father died of tuberculosis when Dorothea was 8; her mother, an alcoholic who alternated between abusing and deserting her children, lost custody of them in 1938. Clausen checked on her in April 1982 and saw his pallid, suddenly enfeebled mother, who rarely drank alcohol, sipping crme de menthe. Prosecutors said that Puente was one of the most cold and calculating female killers the country had ever seen..