A serial killer who said he is haunted in prison by the ghosts of his victims admitted to slaying two additional victims in California — in Aptos and Santa Cruz — prosecutors announced Monday.
Terry Childs, 61, pleaded guilty Friday to murdering Joan Mack and Christopher Hall, both cold cases that had remained unsolved for more than 30 years.
On October 11, 1984, Mack’s body was found at Beer Can Beach. She had been stabbed to death. On February 3, 1985, Hall was found shot to death in San Lorenzo Park. For these murders, Childs was sentenced by Judge Timothy Volkmann Friday to two terms of life without possibility of parole, to be served consecutive to each other.
Mack’s daughter Alexis, who was only five at the time of her mother’s death, expressed her gratitude to the prosecutors after the trauma she suffered as a child.
Childs, who is currently behind bars at Salinas Valley State Prison in Soledad, is set to serve the new sentences consecutive to murder sentences he is already serving for convictions in Santa Cruz in 1987, Nevada in 1998, and Santa Clara in 2007.
As the son of a bail bondsman, Childs studied police techniques to cover up his tracks while carrying out an unknown number of homicides.
This isn’t Childs’ first confession since he’s been imprisoned. Ten years ago, he told investigators that he kidnapped, beat, strangled, and stabbed 19-year-old Linda Ann Jozovich in 1979 before dumping her body in the Santa Cruz mountains. Childs abducted Jozovich from the parking lot of a store where she worked as a clerk, then drove her to a remote area near Lexington Reservoir and killed her. He said that he had been upset with his mother after an argument when he stumbled upon his victim.
In past confessions, Childs has told police detectives that some of his victims were haunting him in his cell, staring at him, and “eating up his brain” s— and also revealed that Jozovich was one of these victims who haunted him until he confessed to the crime.
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Main photo: Terry Childs [Santa Cruz Police]
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