Richard Chase

Chase spent a brief time in a psychiatric ward in 1973. In 1976, he was involuntarily committed to a mental institution upon being taken to a hospital after injecting rabbit's blood into his veins. The staff nicknamed him "Dracula" because of his blood fixation. He broke the necks of two birds he caught through the institution window and drank their blood. He also extracted blood from therapy dogs with stolen syringes.

Chase was promptly diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. After undergoing a battery of treatments involving psychotropic drugs, Chase was deemed no longer a danger to society; and, later in 1976, he was released to his mother's custody.

On December 29, 1977, Chase killed his first known victim in a drive-by shooting. The victim, Ambrose Griffin, was a 51-year-old engineer and father of two.

On January 23, 1978, Chase broke into a house and shot Teresa Wallin (three months pregnant at the time) three times. He then had sexual intercourse with her corpse while stabbing her with a butcher knife. He then removed multiple organs, cut off one of her nipples and drank her blood. He stuffed dog feces from Wallin's yard down her throat before leaving.

In 1979, Chase stood trial on six counts of murder. In order to avoid the death penalty, the defense tried to have him found guilty of second degree murder, which would result in a life sentence. Their case hinged on Chase's history of mental illness and the suggestion that his crimes were not premeditated.

On May 8, 1979, the jury found Chase guilty of six counts of first degree murder and, rejecting the argument that he was not guilty by reason of insanity, sentenced him to die in the gas chamber. His fellow inmates, aware of the extremely violent nature of Chase's crimes, feared him, and according to prison officials, often tried to persuade Chase to commit suicide.

On December 26, 1980, Chase was found in his cell, dead. An autopsy found that he committed suicide with an overdose of prescribed antidepressants that he had saved over several weeks.