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Exploiting her appearance of the sweet old lady, Puente would lure unsuspecting tenants to their grisly deaths by baking them cakes laced with sleeping pills. A 22-year-old soldier who had returned to the U.S. from the Pacific after World War II, he married Dorothea in 1945, and they moved to Gardnerville, Nevada to start a family. The 59-year-old looked like an ordinary grandmother when she was arrested after a five day hunt across California. Everybodys heard of me. She also suffered a miscarriage. Being escorted to a police car after her capture in 1988, serial killer Dorothea Puente told gathering reporters 'I used to be a very good person, at one time'. With age and health concerns relieving her of work duty, she considers her self-assigned morning chores, attending chapel and other diversions a means of survival. 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. As we talk on Valentines Day, I broach her long-ago brushes with the law, only to find myself stymied again. She stuck to her story that he had left for Utah after a trip to Mexico, and agreed to let her three visitors search the two-story house. [1] Puente's total count reached nine murders; she was convicted of three and the jury hung on the other six. The police dug up 78-year-old Leono Carpenter and then six more bodies. She tends to wear thick violet eye shadow and pink lipstick, both of a hue common to Toulouse-Lautrec paintings, and her body lotion of choice, Victorias Secret Love Spell, gives her the subtle bouquet of cherry blossoms. has sold out to audiences at the California Stage, Wilkerson Theatre, UC Davis, and in January 2023 at Saramento Theatre Company. The authorities left the cause of death as undetermined, since there was such an excessive amount of both these drugs, and she was bedridden at the time. 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. 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. Meet the Couple Who Live in a Serial Killer's House The Montoya file landed on Cabreras desk within a day. I dont know what to tell you, she said. 'We had a real connection,' Harder told VICE. Puente's total count reached nine murders; she was convicted of three and the jury hung on the other six. He was good to me. (Johansson did not respond to interview requests.). Dorothea Puente, also known as the Death House Landlady, was a little-old-lady serial killer who preyed on the elderly and drug-addicted men and women of Sacramento, CA in the 1980s. Despite this, their marriage lasted until 1966. Now she watched from her second-story porch as the trio began to dig. Dorothea Helen Puente (ne Gray; January 9, 1929 - March 27, 2011) was an American convicted serial killer.In the 1980s, she ran a boarding house in Sacramento, California, and murdered various elderly and mentally disabled boarders before cashing their Social Security checks. His head cocked to the side, he looks back at her, preparing to usher her past the crowd that looms outside the frame. [19] It was then the subject of the 2015 documentary short The House Is Innocent and was again opened to tours for one day in conjunction with a local film festival's showing of the film.[20]. A couple who braved the stigma of the house's curse purchased the home, fully aware of the history. Working in my yard.. Once, when I asked if she ever hears from her surviving siblings or two daughters, she shook her head. When we later part, Puente disappears through the gray metal door at the back of the hall. I am not here to take part in a reunion; I have never so much as glimpsed the woman I am waiting to meet. The advanced state of decay, meanwhile, suggested the person had died long before Montoyas presumed disappearance in August. There, she quickly got back to her old tricks. His eyes popped wide. I ask why the cops targeted her. 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. Artifacts from the Dorothea Puente case splay out before him: a faded article published in a local Spanish newspaper with a black and white photo of a younger Puente; a pair of her mug shots, blue eyes dimmed and weary in both; a prescription label in her name for diazepam, a tranquilizer sold as Valium; the original wanted bulletin from Nov. 12, 1988, the day she went on the lam. Anyway, so she had six boarders! Grandson of Dorothea Puente, shared a 'real connection' with her Dorothea Puente was a convicted serial killer who ran a boarding house in Sacramento, California in the 1980s. I dont feel like confessing my sins to anyone, she says sharply. In the end, Cabrera erred on the side of skepticism. A woman known as Dorothea Puente runs a boarding house for those less fortunate, but her seeming benevolence belies motives that are much darker. In his sessions with her, Vicary had inched up to the subject of guilt, knowing that she would withdraw if he asked directly whether she had killed people. 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. Dorothea Puente, The 'Death House Landlady' Of 1980s California He speculates that running a boardinghouse began for her as a humane endeavor rooted in a desire to undo painful childhood memories. Puente was charged with a total of nine murders: Puente's boyfriend, Everson Gillmouth, 77; and eight tenants who lived at the boarding house: Ruth Munroe, 61; Leona Carpenter, 78; Alvaro "Bert/Alberto" Gonzales Montoya, 51; Dorothy Miller, 64; Benjamin Fink, 55; James Gallop, 62; Vera Faye Martin, 64; and Betty Palmer, 78. Eventually, the "Death House Landlady" would then drug her tenants to the point of rendering them incapacitated. The four women and three men, ages 52 to 79, had boarded at the two-story, powder-blue Victorian. At the time of her 1988 arrest on murder charges, photos of Puente with Jerry Brown, former California Gov. [1] Sua contagem total chegou a nove assassinatos confirmados e seis no . In any case, after more than 20 years behind bars, and despite the withering of her features, she retains a physical vitality and a fondness for cosmetic excess. John Cabrera sits at a long wooden conference table inside Sacramento Police headquarters on Freeport Boulevard. He stares at the photo and points at her purse. A search of the home showed nothing amiss. 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. I wonder if she ever wishes she had received the death penalty. Dorothea Puente is one of the criminals whose crimes are detailed in 'Worst Roommate Ever.' Puente was known in her neighborhood for housing individuals who were homeless, elderly, or otherwise unable to care for themselves. Her past crimes belied her pose of pure benevolence, yet she had submitted to the house and yard searches without protest. Many of them found dead and buried in the boarding house's yard. Her bedroom was on the second floor. She was a respected figure to the Mexican community, says Donald Dorfman, a longtime Sacramento criminal attorney who handled some of Puentes legal affairs before her 1988 arrest. I could give her my answer now, but there are a few more questions to ask. The police bulletin sent out after Puentes escape (Courtesy of John Cabrera), Throughout our meetings, Puente furtively points out inmates and comments on their crimes. The grandmother would then sneak into the rooms of her incapacitated prey and smother them to death with a pillow. Going to church every day. She moves toward the front of the room, where a guard seated behind a metal desk tells her my table number. She married Roberto Puente in 1968, but the relationship dissolved sixteen months later. In addition to the usual fare sold in the halls chow line, there are heart-shaped boxes of chocolates for $7. Despite maintaining her innocence until the day she died, Puente has been immortalized as one of America's most notorious female serial killers. I dont give a shit what anyone else thinks., Did you like what you read here? Puente struck out on her own when she was 16. In another twist to the case, Sacramento police escorted her back to the city on a plane chartered by KCRA for its news crew. The serial killer shuffles into the room with a chickens hitched gait. 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. After learning about the murders inside Dorothea Puentes house, read about the serial killer known as the Angel of Death. She has sent more than 15 letters and postcards in the months since I first wrote to her. But the jury had a difficult time believe the matronly grandmother was capable of carrying out such menacing crimes. Some months earlier, another tenant, a longtime alcoholic on a bender, had vanished after Puente went to his room to make him feel better. The acrid stench of rotting flesh soon spread through the home and beyond, an odor she blamed on sewer problems and that drew complaints from neighbors. She is a California native, born in Redlands, Calif. 2. Puente had stayed poised a day earlier when Cabrera showed up with a fellow homicide detective and a federal probation agent. Its sick., Clausen knows Puentes appeals ran out last year. I am waiting for one of the countrys most infamous female serial killers, an inmate whose notoriety leaves her without peer among women murderers in California history. SPECIAL TO THE TIMES. Given Dorothea Puente's image, this meant the controversial artist, Shane Bugbee, would collaborate with her on a cookbook. Isabel Vincent. She attends services held at the prisons chapel, but avoids joining inmate worship groups. (Courtesy of John Cabrera). She had seven. Puente's deceptive appearance would later go on to confuse the jury presiding over her trial. Then, she asked if it would be ok if she went to buy a coffee. Been here 27 years. Intense news coverage led to Puentes trial moving to Monterey. One-time hitman Julio Santana (right) stopped counting after he reached 492 kills. [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]. A look back at how the Dorothea Puente case unfolded - MSN I have listened to the lingering grief and anger of a man whose mother died mysteriously while in her care. Police soon figured out why, uncovering the remains of six more bodies. Dorothea Puente right before she fled Sacramento. I wondered how the last two decades had changed her, how she had endured. She gasped at sight of the remains, hands bracketing her cheeks. [6], In 1978, Gray was charged and convicted of illegally cashing thirty-four state and federal checks that belonged to her tenants. But on the way to the storage facility, Puente abruptly asked Florez to pull over near a riverbank and just push the box into the water. And, she says, They like my tamales.. But every time youd go to see her, Ballenger says, her cancer had moved from her brain to her breast to her liver. We next met days before Thanksgiving, when the recent election of Barack Obama had boosted her hopes for the countrys future, and again in mid-December. She had breached her federal probation by running a boardinghouse, yet admitted to the offense when asked. I wonder what she wants when death does come. I now see them as tokens of loneliness, trifles to mark the time. A contrary perception derived from Puentes strong ties to Hispanic residents living in downtown and midtown. For years, the disappearances of these so-called shadow people who lived at the margins of society went unnoticed. More than 130 witnesses were called to the stand by the prosecution, and eventually the devilish landlady was convicted for three of the murderers and ordered to serve back-to-back life sentences. Authorities unearth a corpse buried in the lawn of 59-year-old Dorothea Puente's home in Sacramento, California.Puente operated a residential home for elderly people, and an investigation led to . As reported by Dailymail, seven year after Puente's death, a man named William Harder had claimed to be his grandson. [citation needed]. It wasnt until 1988 that suspicions first arose about Puente, after one of her tenants, 52-year old Alvaro Montoya, went missing. The only time they were in good health was when they stayed at my home. I watch as she pushes away the empty plastic container of fried chicken strips and french fries that she finished eating earlier. As it happened, her shovel was used to dig the hole that yielded a human leg bone, a decomposed foot inside a dark dress shoe and what looked like pieces of tattered fabric that in fact were rotting flesh. Puente has told me during previous meetings that her case still attracts worldwide attention, and that she recently spurned interview requests from a British newspaper and an Australian TV station. She received a life sentence without possibility of parole, and as before the trial, she granted few interviews in its wake, observing a self-imposed gag order. Alcoholics dont stay in one place for long. After their deaths she continued to draw their social security cheques. dorothea puente grandson - Las Palmas Police make a grisly discovery in Dorothea Puente's lawn (Obituaries for Ingemar Johansson, who died earlier this year, list his sole surviving brother as Rolf.). She established her reputation as a caregiver, providing young women with a sanctuary from poverty and abuse without charge. Aug. 27, 1993 12 AM PT. A few wander over to a colorful mural of Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, Tigger and Piglet, who prance beneath a banner reading Family Is Love, Love Is Family. None of the kids acts bothered that mom or grandma or big sister is doing time. Thats just too much coincidence., Finally, on the 24th day of deliberations, the holdout juror acquiesced, voting guilty on two counts of first-degree murder and one second-degree count. She never blinked, never broke a sweat. After the interview, he allowed her to return to the house, where a patrolman stood sentinel outside through the night.