"Conversations with a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes" No One is Safe

1 00:00:07,549 --> 00:00:08,967 -[shots] -[shattering] 2 00:00:09,050 --> 00:00:09,968 [shot] 3 00:00:10,051 --> 00:00:11,219 [shot] 4 00:00:11,720 --> 00:00:13,930 [distant sirens wailing] 5 00:00:14,514 --> 00:00:16,516 [eerie music playing] 6 00:00:17,267 --> 00:00:21,062 [Jones] After you commit a crime, would you go to work the next day? 7 00:00:22,063 --> 00:00:24,274 [Berkowitz] Yeah, I'd get up, 8 00:00:24,357 --> 00:00:27,986 and go to work. Like nothing ever happened. 9 00:00:29,904 --> 00:00:32,615 [Grossman] What's interesting about Berkowitz is that 10 00:00:32,699 --> 00:00:35,702 while he was going out and shooting people, 11 00:00:36,619 --> 00:00:41,332 terrorizing his neighbors, wreaking havoc in New York City, 12 00:00:41,416 --> 00:00:42,500 at the same time, 13 00:00:42,584 --> 00:00:45,420 he's presenting to the world as very normal. 14 00:00:46,796 --> 00:00:51,009 He became a post office worker, a mail sorter, the person in the back. 15 00:00:51,843 --> 00:00:53,470 [Berkowitz] Like ordinary guys, 16 00:00:53,553 --> 00:00:55,889 I take pride in doing a good job, a day's work. 17 00:00:57,640 --> 00:00:58,600 In the post office, 18 00:00:58,683 --> 00:01:01,561 they never had problems with me. I always worked hard. 19 00:01:02,312 --> 00:01:07,317 There was a definite Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde quality to this guy. 20 00:01:07,400 --> 00:01:08,777 When he was Dr. Jekyll, 21 00:01:08,860 --> 00:01:13,990 he was a very accommodating coworker, a friend to people. 22 00:01:14,074 --> 00:01:17,327 [Berkowitz] I got along very good with people there. I was sociable. 23 00:01:17,410 --> 00:01:19,454 I worked with them, drank coffee with them, 24 00:01:19,537 --> 00:01:21,122 took our lunch breaks together. 25 00:01:21,581 --> 00:01:25,794 [Jones] On the outside, he was someone who no one suspected. 26 00:01:27,128 --> 00:01:28,797 One day in the lunchroom, 27 00:01:28,880 --> 00:01:33,968 somebody was reading a New York Post story about the most recent horrible murder 28 00:01:34,052 --> 00:01:36,012 and talking about what kind of monster, 29 00:01:36,096 --> 00:01:40,100 an abnormal human being this guy had to be. 30 00:01:40,725 --> 00:01:44,270 And he said, "You know, he's probably a guy like you or me." 31 00:01:45,939 --> 00:01:48,399 [Berkowitz] I tried pointing out that he wasn't deranged. 32 00:01:48,483 --> 00:01:50,902 I said, "Look at the way he is doing the crimes." 33 00:01:50,985 --> 00:01:52,612 "He's too clever. He's not crazy." 34 00:01:52,695 --> 00:01:57,742 "He may be crazy in a sense, but not insane or anything, you know…" 35 00:01:58,326 --> 00:02:00,120 He gloated over the fact 36 00:02:00,203 --> 00:02:04,874 that he knew what was going on, but nobody else did. 37 00:02:04,958 --> 00:02:06,501 He talked about women 38 00:02:06,584 --> 00:02:10,338 who were afraid to walk alone to their cars at night. 39 00:02:10,421 --> 00:02:12,382 And he escorted them to the car 40 00:02:12,465 --> 00:02:16,302 and would comfort them about the fact that they were in no danger. 41 00:02:17,220 --> 00:02:19,514 Was there any time you went back and got the gun 42 00:02:19,597 --> 00:02:21,808 or if you had the gun with you, you went out… 43 00:02:23,143 --> 00:02:24,018 [Berkowitz] Yeah. 44 00:02:25,186 --> 00:02:29,023 [Jones] I often wonder what kind of nightmares those folks had later. 45 00:02:29,107 --> 00:02:30,483 They were that close. 46 00:02:32,193 --> 00:02:35,738 [Berkowitz] I was always upholding the image of a good, loyal citizen. 47 00:02:36,531 --> 00:02:38,199 Not all outright evil. 48 00:02:39,200 --> 00:02:41,035 [Jones] He played both sides. 49 00:02:41,119 --> 00:02:46,958 But reality was that he was a walking, seething cauldron of rage 50 00:02:47,917 --> 00:02:50,170 that was so well concealed 51 00:02:51,087 --> 00:02:54,591 until he becomes full-on Mr. Hyde. 52 00:02:55,258 --> 00:02:56,384 [distant horn honking] 53 00:02:56,885 --> 00:02:59,304 Continuing a hunt for another victim. 54 00:03:00,471 --> 00:03:03,433 [Berkowitz] Everyone has emotional outlets for anger. 55 00:03:03,516 --> 00:03:04,767 In different ways. 56 00:03:04,851 --> 00:03:07,437 You hear about people that do harm to somebody, 57 00:03:07,520 --> 00:03:09,480 or kill somebody, and that's it. 58 00:03:10,148 --> 00:03:14,110 That released all their pent-up anger, and now they're normal again. 59 00:03:15,236 --> 00:03:16,070 That was me! 60 00:03:17,780 --> 00:03:19,449 [gunshot] 61 00:03:19,991 --> 00:03:20,950 [shot] 62 00:03:22,160 --> 00:03:23,411 [switches click] 63 00:03:23,494 --> 00:03:27,332 [mysterious theme music plays] 64 00:03:34,672 --> 00:03:36,674 [distorted recordings play] 65 00:03:38,259 --> 00:03:39,969 [mysterious theme music fades] 66 00:03:42,096 --> 00:03:43,473 [slide projector whirs] 67 00:03:43,556 --> 00:03:44,432 [click] 68 00:03:47,352 --> 00:03:49,854 [mysterious music plays] 69 00:03:52,398 --> 00:03:53,733 [microfiche reader clicks] 70 00:03:55,109 --> 00:03:59,489 [reporter] Tonight, July 29th, is a date that clearly haunts one man in New York. 71 00:04:00,657 --> 00:04:03,159 He calls himself Son of Sam. 72 00:04:03,243 --> 00:04:06,454 A year ago tonight, he shot and killed a teenage girl. 73 00:04:06,537 --> 00:04:08,998 Since then, he's struck six more times. 74 00:04:09,082 --> 00:04:11,918 Each time using the same .44-caliber revolver, 75 00:04:12,001 --> 00:04:15,046 usually choosing young women with long brunette hair. 76 00:04:16,130 --> 00:04:17,590 [ominous music playing] 77 00:04:18,132 --> 00:04:21,135 He's hinted in a letter to the press that he will strike again. 78 00:04:22,637 --> 00:04:23,763 Possibly tonight. 79 00:04:25,223 --> 00:04:30,019 [Klausner] The one-year anniversary of the first victim, Donna Laurier, 80 00:04:30,103 --> 00:04:32,188 is approaching. And now it's here. 81 00:04:32,772 --> 00:04:34,232 [Murphy] There's a huge buildup, 82 00:04:34,315 --> 00:04:37,485 not only by the media, but by the police task force. 83 00:04:37,568 --> 00:04:40,697 They're worried, what's gonna happen? Is he going to shoot again? 84 00:04:40,780 --> 00:04:45,576 You get a little anxious, and you say, "Is he gonna follow through on this here?" 85 00:04:45,660 --> 00:04:47,745 [siren wailing] 86 00:04:48,663 --> 00:04:50,164 We geared up for the anniversary. 87 00:04:50,748 --> 00:04:54,711 [reporter] By night, police saturate neighborhoods where the killer has struck. 88 00:04:55,295 --> 00:04:57,880 We had every park in the city covered. 89 00:04:57,964 --> 00:05:01,217 We had every bridge covered in the Bronx and Queens. 90 00:05:01,301 --> 00:05:06,055 If you were a white, young male, you were going to be stopped. 91 00:05:06,848 --> 00:05:08,349 [Policeman] We're police officers. 92 00:05:08,433 --> 00:05:10,643 -Do you have some ID maybe? -[man] Yeah. 93 00:05:10,727 --> 00:05:12,437 You were gonna be questioned. 94 00:05:12,520 --> 00:05:14,230 -What type of gun is that? -A .38. 95 00:05:14,314 --> 00:05:15,189 A .38? 96 00:05:16,024 --> 00:05:18,860 You don't happen to know anybody carrying a .44, do you? 97 00:05:19,527 --> 00:05:20,486 You'll be searched. 98 00:05:20,570 --> 00:05:23,156 [man] They'll get him. Somebody's gonna get him. 99 00:05:23,865 --> 00:05:25,867 [suspenseful music playing] 100 00:05:26,951 --> 00:05:29,662 [Borrelli] But the anniversary went by with no problem. 101 00:05:31,289 --> 00:05:32,415 Nothing happened. 102 00:05:34,959 --> 00:05:37,837 [Hopkins] You do a lot of work, and it goes for naught. 103 00:05:37,920 --> 00:05:41,257 But that's okay, because now it's relief. 104 00:05:42,133 --> 00:05:47,055 We just assumed that we forced him out because of the police presence. 105 00:05:49,307 --> 00:05:50,808 [Klausner] But on that day, 106 00:05:50,892 --> 00:05:53,394 even though he doesn't do anything, he waits. 107 00:05:54,854 --> 00:05:57,190 [Grossman] But he completely flips the script, 108 00:05:57,273 --> 00:06:00,902 and he goes to a part of the city that no one ever considered. 109 00:06:00,985 --> 00:06:03,029 [slide projector whirs] 110 00:06:03,529 --> 00:06:04,739 [slide projector clicks] 111 00:06:06,407 --> 00:06:08,409 [mysterious music plays] 112 00:06:12,872 --> 00:06:16,000 [man] Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. It's a great neighborhood. 113 00:06:16,542 --> 00:06:19,379 Mostly all Italian and Jewish back in the day. 114 00:06:20,046 --> 00:06:22,340 It's where I grew up my whole life. 115 00:06:22,423 --> 00:06:26,969 The Summer of '77, I had just turned 20. 116 00:06:27,053 --> 00:06:33,226 I was supposed to start a modeling career with Wilhelmina Modeling Agency. 117 00:06:34,644 --> 00:06:37,063 And everybody was out having good times. 118 00:06:37,563 --> 00:06:42,151 The shootings at that point were in the Bronx and in Queens. 119 00:06:42,235 --> 00:06:45,947 People in Brooklyn think that they're totally out of harm's way. 120 00:06:47,782 --> 00:06:52,078 [Violante] It felt safe because the Son of Sam did not hit Brooklyn. 121 00:06:52,787 --> 00:06:54,539 [man] Yo brother! Brooklyn! 122 00:06:54,622 --> 00:06:57,375 [inaudible yelling] 123 00:06:58,000 --> 00:07:03,172 [Violante] Back in the day, we went to a place called Beefsteak Charlie's. 124 00:07:03,256 --> 00:07:08,636 I went one night with my friends, and that's where I had met Stacy. 125 00:07:08,719 --> 00:07:12,390 She was not just a beautiful girl outside, 126 00:07:12,473 --> 00:07:17,728 but she was an incredibly intelligent and beautiful person inside. 127 00:07:18,521 --> 00:07:20,606 And I asked her for a date. 128 00:07:23,067 --> 00:07:25,903 I'm walking down the stairs in my parents' house, 129 00:07:25,987 --> 00:07:28,197 you know, going out to pick up Stacy. 130 00:07:28,781 --> 00:07:31,617 And my mom, she's at the top of the steps. 131 00:07:32,410 --> 00:07:34,203 And she says to me, "Rob…" 132 00:07:35,121 --> 00:07:38,249 "Be careful. You know, it's dangerous out there now." 133 00:07:39,292 --> 00:07:41,210 I said, "Ma, don't worry." 134 00:07:41,294 --> 00:07:45,381 "The Son of Sam was going after girls with dark hair." 135 00:07:45,465 --> 00:07:47,925 "And I'm going out with a blonde tonight." 136 00:07:49,302 --> 00:07:51,304 [suspenseful music plays] 137 00:07:52,096 --> 00:07:54,724 I went to her house to pick her up. 138 00:07:55,433 --> 00:07:59,061 And then we drove off to the Kingsway Theater 139 00:07:59,145 --> 00:08:02,482 to see the movie New York, New York. 140 00:08:02,565 --> 00:08:05,359 I'll never forget that. With Liza Minnelli. 141 00:08:05,443 --> 00:08:07,695 If I leave now, I'll never get to know you. 142 00:08:07,778 --> 00:08:10,698 I'll never know what a wonderful, beautiful chick you are. 143 00:08:10,781 --> 00:08:14,869 I felt fantastic. I thought she was such a nice girl. 144 00:08:14,952 --> 00:08:16,037 Pretty girl. 145 00:08:19,040 --> 00:08:23,503 After the movie, we parked the car in what they called "lover's lane." 146 00:08:25,004 --> 00:08:27,673 It was about one o'clock, 1:30 in the morning. 147 00:08:27,757 --> 00:08:29,509 [ominous music plays] 148 00:08:29,592 --> 00:08:31,344 We walked into the park. 149 00:08:32,261 --> 00:08:37,892 And we saw some guy, young guy with a dungaree jacket on, walking around. 150 00:08:39,477 --> 00:08:41,145 But I didn't pay no mind to him. 151 00:08:41,229 --> 00:08:44,524 You figured he was just some guy hanging out in the park. 152 00:08:44,607 --> 00:08:45,733 [woman laughing] 153 00:08:45,816 --> 00:08:47,568 So we walked past him. 154 00:08:47,652 --> 00:08:49,612 And then we went on the swings. 155 00:08:49,695 --> 00:08:51,072 Like two little kids. 156 00:08:51,155 --> 00:08:52,114 [laughter] 157 00:08:52,198 --> 00:08:54,909 We talked about what a beautiful night it was. 158 00:08:54,992 --> 00:08:58,246 How we had met that night in Beefsteak Charlie's. 159 00:08:59,705 --> 00:09:03,876 And then all of a sudden she turned to me a few minutes later and said, 160 00:09:03,960 --> 00:09:06,504 "Rob, listen, I'm getting a little nervous…" 161 00:09:07,004 --> 00:09:08,548 "Why don't we leave here?" 162 00:09:08,631 --> 00:09:11,926 Everybody knew of the Son of Sam shootings, 163 00:09:12,009 --> 00:09:13,386 and it was late at night. 164 00:09:13,469 --> 00:09:15,054 So I said, "Okay, no problem." 165 00:09:16,722 --> 00:09:18,307 We went back to my car. 166 00:09:18,849 --> 00:09:21,352 I asked her to hang out five minutes. 167 00:09:21,435 --> 00:09:22,770 We're talking. 168 00:09:23,437 --> 00:09:25,523 And then all of a sudden… 169 00:09:25,606 --> 00:09:27,608 [ominous music crescendos] 170 00:09:28,859 --> 00:09:30,945 [gunshots] 171 00:09:31,821 --> 00:09:34,949 We were shot through the open window. 172 00:09:35,032 --> 00:09:36,450 [distant screaming] 173 00:09:37,034 --> 00:09:40,538 And I heard Stacy moaning. 174 00:09:40,621 --> 00:09:45,418 I said, "Stacy, you okay?" And she was out of it. 175 00:09:46,586 --> 00:09:49,422 I couldn't see anything, and I tried to get out. 176 00:09:50,881 --> 00:09:54,176 I'm… blowing the horn. 177 00:09:54,885 --> 00:09:58,889 At the same time, I'm screaming, "Help, help, somebody help!" 178 00:10:01,183 --> 00:10:04,937 I just slumped over the top of the hood of the car. 179 00:10:05,021 --> 00:10:07,690 And I fell to the ground outside. 180 00:10:12,737 --> 00:10:14,739 [mysterious music playing] 181 00:10:16,741 --> 00:10:19,952 [reporter] The young couple were hospitalized in critical condition. 182 00:10:20,786 --> 00:10:23,247 Both shot in the head as they sat in their car 183 00:10:23,331 --> 00:10:25,416 near the ocean in the Brooklyn section of New York. 184 00:10:25,499 --> 00:10:26,709 [camera shutter clicks] 185 00:10:27,585 --> 00:10:30,630 [Violante] My doctor told me, "You lost your left eye, 186 00:10:30,713 --> 00:10:34,342 and you lost most of the sight in your right eye." 187 00:10:34,425 --> 00:10:35,926 I was hysterical. 188 00:10:36,677 --> 00:10:38,638 What can you tell me about your son? 189 00:10:38,721 --> 00:10:39,805 [choking back a sob] 190 00:10:41,474 --> 00:10:43,517 We brought him up the right way. 191 00:10:44,685 --> 00:10:46,812 Good boy, never any trouble. 192 00:10:47,313 --> 00:10:51,067 There's this very vivid footage of Robert Violante's father 193 00:10:51,150 --> 00:10:53,402 in a doorway at Kings County Hospital. 194 00:10:54,528 --> 00:10:55,863 He was devastated. 195 00:10:55,946 --> 00:10:57,782 I told him to stay out of Queens. 196 00:10:57,865 --> 00:11:00,368 He said, "Dad, I'm gonna stay out of Queens." 197 00:11:00,451 --> 00:11:04,163 "I'll hang around in Brooklyn." And that's where they found him. 198 00:11:07,792 --> 00:11:11,379 [Grossman] Stacy Moskowitz had just received such an injury 199 00:11:11,462 --> 00:11:14,590 that ended up causing her brain to swell. 200 00:11:14,674 --> 00:11:17,718 And she ended up dying about a day or two later. 201 00:11:18,678 --> 00:11:22,890 An animal should snuff away a life of a young girl… 202 00:11:22,973 --> 00:11:29,105 …blind a young boy and has killed others and will probably go on killing. 203 00:11:29,605 --> 00:11:31,816 An animal like this has to be caught. 204 00:11:32,441 --> 00:11:34,068 [Violante] I was a basket case. 205 00:11:34,694 --> 00:11:38,531 If I would've left in that five minutes, she might still be alive today. 206 00:11:39,031 --> 00:11:44,829 And I couldn't believe that such a beautiful young girl was dead. 207 00:11:47,415 --> 00:11:49,667 [eerie music plays] 208 00:11:50,584 --> 00:11:53,879 [Berkowitz] The reporters followed the caravan of mourners, you know. 209 00:11:54,380 --> 00:11:55,756 [camera shutters click] 210 00:11:55,840 --> 00:11:58,509 Stood by the grave as she was being buried… 211 00:12:00,594 --> 00:12:05,766 Watching the coffin, get lowered into the grave, you know. 212 00:12:07,560 --> 00:12:09,854 [Jones] How did you feel, watching that on TV? 213 00:12:10,479 --> 00:12:13,232 [Berkowitz] I saw the picture, I said, "Geez, look at that." 214 00:12:13,315 --> 00:12:17,695 "The whole neighborhood was there. Right next to my mother's cemetery too." 215 00:12:18,362 --> 00:12:24,076 He remembers enjoying the grieving process that everyone was going through. 216 00:12:24,160 --> 00:12:27,288 It seemed to give him gratification at that time. 217 00:12:27,788 --> 00:12:31,083 That the killings were a way of being somebody… 218 00:12:32,668 --> 00:12:35,796 of doing something different, unique and… 219 00:12:36,297 --> 00:12:37,131 [Berkowitz] Yeah. 220 00:12:37,631 --> 00:12:41,427 You know, calling attention to yourself, something like that. 221 00:12:43,137 --> 00:12:47,433 [Grossman] He was incredibly narcissistic. I call him the Lord of Life. 222 00:12:47,516 --> 00:12:51,145 He was the puppet master that was gonna control everything. 223 00:12:51,228 --> 00:12:54,690 And this guy loved every second of it. 224 00:12:56,233 --> 00:12:57,651 [electronic music plays] 225 00:12:57,860 --> 00:13:00,905 [reporter] New York City is being terrorized by a gunman 226 00:13:00,988 --> 00:13:03,282 police call the .44 Caliber Killer. 227 00:13:03,365 --> 00:13:05,367 [woman] A lot of people want to kill him. 228 00:13:05,451 --> 00:13:08,788 A lot of people wanna go out by themselves and kill him. 229 00:13:08,871 --> 00:13:10,289 That was it, man. 230 00:13:10,372 --> 00:13:13,125 After Stacy Moskowitz died, 231 00:13:13,209 --> 00:13:15,461 the city was ready to riot at that point. 232 00:13:15,544 --> 00:13:18,172 Don't give him to the cops, don't give him to these boys, 233 00:13:18,255 --> 00:13:19,423 give him to us mothers. 234 00:13:19,507 --> 00:13:22,426 We want to handle him the way we want to. 235 00:13:24,386 --> 00:13:28,307 [Gardella] This was the eighth shooting, which made people irate. 236 00:13:29,016 --> 00:13:30,184 And on top of that, 237 00:13:30,684 --> 00:13:34,688 our case was in Brooklyn, and the victim had blonde hair. 238 00:13:35,773 --> 00:13:37,441 The locations were changing. 239 00:13:39,276 --> 00:13:40,945 The victims were changing. 240 00:13:41,862 --> 00:13:46,367 And it caused a tremendous amount of angst within the city. 241 00:13:46,450 --> 00:13:49,453 This just shows no one is safe in this city. 242 00:13:49,537 --> 00:13:53,249 And we did a headline that said, "No one is safe." 243 00:13:53,332 --> 00:13:55,626 All the girls are really afraid. 244 00:13:55,709 --> 00:13:57,628 And we all have to worry about it. 245 00:13:57,711 --> 00:14:01,090 The news media attention was just out of this world. 246 00:14:01,173 --> 00:14:04,260 It exacerbated the situation. 247 00:14:04,885 --> 00:14:06,887 [suspenseful music plays] 248 00:14:07,429 --> 00:14:09,974 Definitely not doing the right job finding the guy. 249 00:14:10,057 --> 00:14:11,225 -The police? -Definitely. 250 00:14:11,308 --> 00:14:14,353 Maybe they have to call in help from the federal government. 251 00:14:14,687 --> 00:14:15,938 [Murphy] People are like, 252 00:14:16,021 --> 00:14:18,357 "Why can't they get this guy? What's going on?" 253 00:14:18,983 --> 00:14:22,486 There's a lot of pressure on the detectives, and the task force, 254 00:14:22,570 --> 00:14:25,489 and city hall to do something. 255 00:14:26,073 --> 00:14:28,325 I lost about 30 pounds, yeah. 256 00:14:28,909 --> 00:14:31,161 The doctors all attributed it to the stress. 257 00:14:32,788 --> 00:14:34,123 We had to find this guy. 258 00:14:34,206 --> 00:14:38,669 [reporter] New York's Mayor Beame directed that a hundred more policemen be added 259 00:14:38,752 --> 00:14:42,381 to what's become one of the biggest manhunts in the history of this city. 260 00:14:43,132 --> 00:14:45,926 -[phones ringing] -[typewriter keys clacking] 261 00:14:46,886 --> 00:14:50,264 [Gardella] We must have interviewed several hundred people already. 262 00:14:51,390 --> 00:14:52,600 Well, how'd he act? 263 00:14:52,683 --> 00:14:54,476 There was a lot of eyewitnesses 264 00:14:54,560 --> 00:14:57,980 who thought they saw the shooter in the last shooting. 265 00:14:58,856 --> 00:15:02,902 He wasn't too tall of a man. He was, I guess, a medium-sized man. 266 00:15:04,069 --> 00:15:08,490 [Gardella] There were several sketches. They didn't resemble one another. 267 00:15:08,574 --> 00:15:10,910 [reporter 2] Not even a police artist will pretend 268 00:15:10,993 --> 00:15:13,913 that these sketches can pinpoint the killer. 269 00:15:13,996 --> 00:15:17,666 [man 2] Sort of an oval face, medium nose, 270 00:15:17,750 --> 00:15:23,130 ordinary eyes with that pensive look, and medium lips. 271 00:15:23,756 --> 00:15:25,215 And a stylish hairdo. 272 00:15:25,883 --> 00:15:28,302 -That only fits eight million people. -Right. 273 00:15:28,969 --> 00:15:32,097 [Grossman] So it confused the cops quite a bit, actually. 274 00:15:33,807 --> 00:15:36,143 [Gardella] At that point, we had no idea who did it. 275 00:15:36,977 --> 00:15:38,103 I was very concerned. 276 00:15:38,187 --> 00:15:40,439 [muffled chatter] 277 00:15:40,522 --> 00:15:45,069 And then we get a call about another eyewitness. 278 00:15:45,569 --> 00:15:47,821 The witness that turned the case around. 279 00:15:48,614 --> 00:15:50,616 [eerie music plays] 280 00:15:52,368 --> 00:15:54,119 [Gardella] The eyewitness. 281 00:15:54,203 --> 00:15:58,791 She says, while she was walking her dog the night of the murder in Brooklyn, 282 00:15:58,874 --> 00:16:01,794 "I think I was followed by the same shooter 283 00:16:01,877 --> 00:16:03,462 right outside the park." 284 00:16:04,755 --> 00:16:07,883 As I turned, I seen a man coming out from down that tree there. 285 00:16:07,967 --> 00:16:09,760 And right here… 286 00:16:11,261 --> 00:16:13,764 we crossed each other. As he turned the corner, 287 00:16:13,847 --> 00:16:16,809 I look on his back off the side of the arm. 288 00:16:17,726 --> 00:16:21,689 He had a long thing, like a bell, sticking up his sleeve. 289 00:16:21,772 --> 00:16:26,652 She reports, "I pulled my dog away, and I went home." 290 00:16:27,194 --> 00:16:29,989 "And several minutes later, I heard shots." 291 00:16:30,698 --> 00:16:32,324 [gunshots] 292 00:16:34,493 --> 00:16:36,161 [Gardella] She then volunteers. 293 00:16:36,245 --> 00:16:39,331 "Oh, and there was a parking ticket given out." 294 00:16:39,832 --> 00:16:44,169 [Borrelli] She said, "This car was parked by a fire hydrant." 295 00:16:45,379 --> 00:16:47,715 [Gardella] We had already checked for tickets. 296 00:16:47,798 --> 00:16:49,341 There were no summonses issued. 297 00:16:50,134 --> 00:16:52,803 But she insists, "I'm telling you." 298 00:16:53,679 --> 00:16:56,432 "I saw a police officer giving a summons." 299 00:16:57,141 --> 00:16:59,143 [dramatic music playing] 300 00:17:03,272 --> 00:17:05,441 [Gardella] So we gave it one more try. 301 00:17:06,150 --> 00:17:09,903 We checked for summonses till four in the morning during that time frame. 302 00:17:11,113 --> 00:17:13,323 It turned out there were summonses. 303 00:17:13,824 --> 00:17:15,868 What I heard happened was, 304 00:17:15,951 --> 00:17:19,455 the police officer who gave the summons, he was off for four days. 305 00:17:20,372 --> 00:17:23,459 So they were not submitted right away. 306 00:17:25,544 --> 00:17:28,255 [Borrelli] We got five summonses that weren't examined. 307 00:17:29,631 --> 00:17:30,758 Four of them were… 308 00:17:31,759 --> 00:17:33,552 And guess what the fifth one was? 309 00:17:34,303 --> 00:17:37,765 A car registered to David Berkowitz of Yonkers. 310 00:17:37,848 --> 00:17:39,767 The cops say to themselves, "Wait a second, 311 00:17:39,850 --> 00:17:44,813 what's a nice Jewish boy from Yonkers doing in a mobbed-up neighborhood 312 00:17:44,897 --> 00:17:48,525 in South Brooklyn at 2:30 in the morning the night of a shooting?" 313 00:17:49,026 --> 00:17:50,903 "We got to call this guy." 314 00:17:50,986 --> 00:17:53,572 "At the very least, he might be a witness." 315 00:17:54,656 --> 00:17:57,159 [Borrelli] We want to know why he was parked there. 316 00:17:57,242 --> 00:17:58,786 That's all. We're curious. 317 00:17:59,286 --> 00:18:01,580 Did you see anything? Did you hear anything? 318 00:18:02,164 --> 00:18:05,125 [Klausner] The Brooklyn detectives call up David Berkowitz. 319 00:18:05,209 --> 00:18:08,796 They have his telephone number. They call four times. 320 00:18:08,879 --> 00:18:10,339 [phone ringing] 321 00:18:13,550 --> 00:18:16,261 -[suspenseful music playing] -[phone continues ringing] 322 00:18:16,345 --> 00:18:18,639 [Berkowitz] They called me a couple of times. 323 00:18:18,722 --> 00:18:21,725 I never was home, or I never answered the phone. 324 00:18:21,809 --> 00:18:24,978 [Jones] How many days after the last crime was this? 325 00:18:25,771 --> 00:18:27,523 [Berkowitz] About a week or so. 326 00:18:27,606 --> 00:18:30,692 I knew it was over. I felt the punishment was coming. 327 00:18:30,776 --> 00:18:32,903 [dramatic music plays] 328 00:18:32,986 --> 00:18:33,987 And so… 329 00:18:35,197 --> 00:18:38,826 That was when I went to Long Island. Asparagus Beach it was called. 330 00:18:38,909 --> 00:18:40,744 A hundred miles from New York City. 331 00:18:42,412 --> 00:18:44,665 [Jones] A few days after the last shooting, 332 00:18:45,833 --> 00:18:48,877 David Berkowitz was a different wild card 333 00:18:48,961 --> 00:18:53,090 because it was chaos in his own mind at that time. 334 00:18:54,383 --> 00:18:59,721 He knew that sooner or later somebody would come knocking on his door. 335 00:18:59,805 --> 00:19:02,641 So he drove to the Hamptons 336 00:19:03,392 --> 00:19:04,977 to a public beach, 337 00:19:05,060 --> 00:19:08,021 a place where there were a lot of human targets. 338 00:19:08,689 --> 00:19:11,942 [Berkowitz] This was at the end of Long Island. It's wide open. 339 00:19:12,025 --> 00:19:14,069 Full of people, all very wealthy. 340 00:19:14,153 --> 00:19:16,655 I had a machine gun type gun, you know. 341 00:19:16,738 --> 00:19:20,450 It was a rapid fire semi-automatic. I was gonna do something there. 342 00:19:21,326 --> 00:19:25,831 [Jones] He actually talked about going out in a blaze of glory, 343 00:19:25,914 --> 00:19:28,083 you know, doing a mass murder, 344 00:19:28,167 --> 00:19:31,503 rather than continuing to pick his victims one at a time 345 00:19:31,587 --> 00:19:34,798 and do a grand finale bloodbath. 346 00:19:35,465 --> 00:19:37,551 [suspenseful music plays] 347 00:19:38,135 --> 00:19:43,223 [Berkowitz] I sat there feeling like an outsider and became angry. 348 00:19:43,724 --> 00:19:47,978 I was emotionally charged up or psyched up to commit a crime. 349 00:19:48,645 --> 00:19:50,272 I was gonna wait till dark. 350 00:19:52,733 --> 00:19:55,194 [suspenseful music crescendos] 351 00:19:57,613 --> 00:20:00,908 But when it started to rain, and there was nobody around, 352 00:20:01,992 --> 00:20:04,077 I just got in my car and went home. 353 00:20:04,161 --> 00:20:05,579 [rain pattering] 354 00:20:05,662 --> 00:20:10,918 [Jones] He drove to the Hamptons to satisfy the bloodlust. 355 00:20:11,668 --> 00:20:15,339 But the rain canceled that plan. 356 00:20:17,007 --> 00:20:21,386 So he just, you know, tucked his tail and drove back to his little rathole 357 00:20:21,470 --> 00:20:23,597 that he had turned his apartment into. 358 00:20:25,265 --> 00:20:29,061 -[Jones] What did you when you got home? -[Berkowitz] Went to bed or something. 359 00:20:29,144 --> 00:20:30,312 It was a long day. 360 00:20:30,395 --> 00:20:32,731 [Jones] You never answered when the police called? 361 00:20:33,232 --> 00:20:34,233 [Berkowitz] Right. 362 00:20:34,316 --> 00:20:37,819 I had a feeling what it would be about, but I just didn't answer. 363 00:20:40,447 --> 00:20:42,074 [phone ringing] 364 00:20:45,994 --> 00:20:47,955 [muffled voices] 365 00:20:48,038 --> 00:20:51,541 [Klausner] When the detective placed those calls to David Berkowitz 366 00:20:51,625 --> 00:20:54,670 about the parking ticket, and there's no response, 367 00:20:54,753 --> 00:20:59,258 he calls up to Yonkers P.D., where he lives. 368 00:20:59,758 --> 00:21:02,844 [Gardella] The detective gets the civilian dispatcher 369 00:21:02,928 --> 00:21:07,474 that worked for the Yonkers P.D. on the phone by the name of Wheat Carr. 370 00:21:07,557 --> 00:21:09,893 She happened to be Sam Carr's daughter. 371 00:21:09,977 --> 00:21:12,521 The neighbor who had a problem with Berkowitz. 372 00:21:12,604 --> 00:21:16,775 She says, "Oh, Berkowitz, that nut." 373 00:21:16,858 --> 00:21:18,193 [Grossman] The next thing, 374 00:21:18,277 --> 00:21:20,821 he's hearing all these horror stories from Wheat Carr. 375 00:21:20,904 --> 00:21:23,699 "He shot our dog. He's firebombing us." 376 00:21:23,782 --> 00:21:25,659 "He's sending us letters." 377 00:21:26,159 --> 00:21:27,786 The antenna went up. 378 00:21:27,869 --> 00:21:29,955 Like, this could be the killer. 379 00:21:31,331 --> 00:21:33,333 [suspenseful music playing] 380 00:21:37,462 --> 00:21:43,719 [Gardella] We send detectives Eddie Zigo and John Lungo, to Berkowitz's apartment. 381 00:21:44,428 --> 00:21:48,432 It's sometime in the afternoon, and they see his car, a Ford. 382 00:21:48,515 --> 00:21:49,725 They look into the car, 383 00:21:49,808 --> 00:21:54,813 and there is an army duffle bag on the floor of the vehicle. 384 00:21:55,480 --> 00:21:59,651 Protruding from the duffle bag is a semi-automatic rifle. 385 00:21:59,735 --> 00:22:05,115 And then they see the envelope addressed to the Suffolk County Police. 386 00:22:05,198 --> 00:22:07,868 And the writing has unique writing. 387 00:22:07,951 --> 00:22:10,996 It's very similar to previous writings that the newspaper's… 388 00:22:11,079 --> 00:22:13,123 that the assailant had sent in. 389 00:22:13,790 --> 00:22:15,417 Now we know he's the Son of Sam. 390 00:22:17,252 --> 00:22:20,339 The two detectives called our office in Brooklyn. 391 00:22:21,173 --> 00:22:24,384 And they were told, "Surveillance on the car." 392 00:22:24,468 --> 00:22:26,011 "We'll be coming up." 393 00:22:26,094 --> 00:22:27,596 [suspenseful music plays] 394 00:22:27,679 --> 00:22:33,602 [Klausner] Sergeant Gardella and Detective John Falotico get to the scene. 395 00:22:33,685 --> 00:22:35,729 And they see the car. 396 00:22:35,812 --> 00:22:37,856 They're in a car parked up the street. 397 00:22:39,024 --> 00:22:42,444 [Gardella] We were in the process of getting a warrant for the arrest. 398 00:22:42,527 --> 00:22:47,949 And so while we were waiting, we put surveillance on the car. 399 00:22:48,867 --> 00:22:50,452 And the rear of the building. 400 00:22:50,952 --> 00:22:55,791 I put two detectives on the roof to watch his fire escape. 401 00:22:55,874 --> 00:22:57,959 They have a radio. We have a radio. 402 00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:04,132 [suspenseful music continues playing] 403 00:23:05,384 --> 00:23:07,719 We see a male come out of the building. 404 00:23:09,721 --> 00:23:12,891 He looks into the car, but doesn't go into the car. 405 00:23:12,974 --> 00:23:16,144 We assumed this might be the registered owner. 406 00:23:16,812 --> 00:23:18,814 We said to him, "Police!" 407 00:23:18,897 --> 00:23:20,190 We search him. 408 00:23:21,358 --> 00:23:25,570 He's got a pistol, but not a .44 Bulldog revolver. 409 00:23:26,530 --> 00:23:29,157 We said, "What are you doing with this gun?" 410 00:23:29,241 --> 00:23:32,869 He says, "I'm a part-time deputy sheriff for Westchester County." 411 00:23:33,912 --> 00:23:35,580 "My name is Craig Glassman." 412 00:23:36,164 --> 00:23:38,792 We said, "What are you looking in that car for?" 413 00:23:39,668 --> 00:23:45,215 He says, "I think the owner of that car, I think he's my neighbor upstairs 414 00:23:45,298 --> 00:23:48,927 who I've had a problem with. He put bullets outside my door." 415 00:23:49,010 --> 00:23:50,637 And we ask him, "Is he in?" 416 00:23:50,720 --> 00:23:53,098 He says, "Yes." Now we know he's in. 417 00:23:54,766 --> 00:23:57,561 We then give the neighbor his gun back. 418 00:24:01,565 --> 00:24:05,026 And we sit there for several hours more. 419 00:24:06,653 --> 00:24:09,197 And finally, it's a quarter to ten at night. 420 00:24:11,533 --> 00:24:14,286 And I see a male coming out of the apartment building. 421 00:24:14,369 --> 00:24:16,371 And he starts walking up the sidewalk. 422 00:24:17,539 --> 00:24:18,790 [dramatic music plays] 423 00:24:18,874 --> 00:24:20,709 [Klausner] They don't know who it is. 424 00:24:20,792 --> 00:24:23,712 They don't know if this is David Berkowitz yet. 425 00:24:23,795 --> 00:24:28,133 But the man walks out of 35 Pine Street 426 00:24:28,216 --> 00:24:34,055 carrying in his hand a paper bag in the shape of a triangle. 427 00:24:39,895 --> 00:24:41,688 I said to John, "Let's go." 428 00:24:43,482 --> 00:24:45,609 So I jump out of the unmarked car, 429 00:24:45,692 --> 00:24:51,281 and I put my gun on top of the window and screamed at him, "Police!" 430 00:24:53,742 --> 00:24:56,953 "Don't you move your hands. Don't you go for a gun." 431 00:24:57,454 --> 00:24:58,580 And his reaction was… 432 00:24:58,663 --> 00:25:03,752 He had just turned the ignition on, and he slowly turns like this… 433 00:25:05,629 --> 00:25:06,755 And smiles at me. 434 00:25:08,757 --> 00:25:10,467 He says, "Well, you got me." 435 00:25:11,510 --> 00:25:12,928 "What took you so long?" 436 00:25:13,970 --> 00:25:15,805 [eerie music playing] 437 00:25:16,556 --> 00:25:19,392 [Jones] Did you say to the cops, "What took you so long?" 438 00:25:19,476 --> 00:25:20,310 [Berkowitz] Yeah. 439 00:25:21,144 --> 00:25:21,978 Yeah. 440 00:25:22,562 --> 00:25:25,899 "Okay, you got me" and "What took you so long?" 441 00:25:26,399 --> 00:25:29,152 Like, finally! They couldn't have been more happy. 442 00:25:29,236 --> 00:25:31,321 I couldn't have made their job any easier. 443 00:25:32,322 --> 00:25:35,325 At the same time, I wanted to make the public aware it was me. 444 00:25:35,408 --> 00:25:37,369 That I was responsible, you know. 445 00:25:37,869 --> 00:25:39,704 [Jones] You arranged to get caught? 446 00:25:40,372 --> 00:25:42,499 [Berkowitz] I left signs, hints and things. 447 00:25:44,084 --> 00:25:46,586 [Jones] Did you get that parking ticket on purpose? 448 00:25:47,087 --> 00:25:48,004 [Berkowitz] Yes. 449 00:25:48,088 --> 00:25:52,717 The news media were haranguing these police officials constantly. 450 00:25:52,801 --> 00:25:55,136 "When are you going to get him?" 451 00:25:55,637 --> 00:25:57,889 The commissioner said, "He'll probably make 452 00:25:57,973 --> 00:26:00,600 some type of mistake, a parking ticket or something." 453 00:26:01,142 --> 00:26:02,394 I saw the cops there. 454 00:26:02,894 --> 00:26:05,814 So, I stood across the street in a darkened spot, 455 00:26:05,897 --> 00:26:09,067 and one guy wrote out a ticket and just put it on my window. 456 00:26:09,150 --> 00:26:14,447 And about 45 minutes later or so, the shooting happened. 457 00:26:15,448 --> 00:26:19,995 [Grossman] He was the master of his fate. He chose to get caught. 458 00:26:20,078 --> 00:26:24,332 He reached a point where he wasn't getting enough attention. 459 00:26:24,416 --> 00:26:28,336 He had created, you know, this amazing stage for himself. 460 00:26:29,004 --> 00:26:32,424 And he wanted to be recognized for this person 461 00:26:32,507 --> 00:26:37,095 that everybody in the world now wanted to know the identity of. 462 00:26:37,804 --> 00:26:38,722 We got him. 463 00:26:39,931 --> 00:26:43,560 We traveled from Yonkers to New York City Police Headquarters. 464 00:26:44,352 --> 00:26:45,729 Berkowitz is in the back, 465 00:26:45,812 --> 00:26:49,608 sitting in the middle, next to Eddie Zigo and John Falotico. 466 00:26:50,275 --> 00:26:52,569 Berkowitz says, "Hey, guys." 467 00:26:52,652 --> 00:26:55,155 He called us guys like we were his buddies. 468 00:26:55,238 --> 00:26:57,741 He says, "I guess, the press is waiting with cameras." 469 00:26:57,824 --> 00:26:58,783 We said, "Yeah." 470 00:26:58,867 --> 00:27:01,453 He says, "You do me a favor? Can you comb my hair?" 471 00:27:01,953 --> 00:27:03,913 He's going to serve a life sentence in jail. 472 00:27:03,997 --> 00:27:05,290 He's worried about his hair. 473 00:27:05,373 --> 00:27:07,959 [camera shutters clicking] 474 00:27:10,211 --> 00:27:14,674 We're pulling up at four o'clock in the morning to police headquarters. 475 00:27:14,758 --> 00:27:17,093 There's already a crowd of people. 476 00:27:17,927 --> 00:27:20,472 [Klausner] And all the while, David is smiling. 477 00:27:21,765 --> 00:27:24,934 [Borrelli] I'm looking at him. He wasn't what we thought he'd look like. 478 00:27:25,435 --> 00:27:28,271 Frothing at the mouth. A monster. 479 00:27:30,523 --> 00:27:33,151 [Beame] I'm very pleased to announce that the people 480 00:27:33,234 --> 00:27:34,611 of the city of New York… 481 00:27:35,320 --> 00:27:37,822 …can rest easy this morning 482 00:27:38,406 --> 00:27:43,286 because of the fact that the police have captured a man 483 00:27:43,370 --> 00:27:45,497 whom they believe to be the Son of Sam. 484 00:27:46,206 --> 00:27:49,250 The successful conclusion of this case was the culmination… 485 00:27:49,876 --> 00:27:54,881 …of a tremendous amount of dogged, persistent, day in and day out work 486 00:27:55,632 --> 00:27:59,260 by uniformed officers and by our detectives. 487 00:27:59,344 --> 00:28:01,846 I am Detective Edward Zigo. 488 00:28:02,722 --> 00:28:04,683 Detective John Falotico. 489 00:28:06,434 --> 00:28:07,977 Sergeant William Gardella. 490 00:28:10,021 --> 00:28:11,981 [Gardella] I remember saying to myself, 491 00:28:12,524 --> 00:28:15,276 "This is unbelievable. I'm part of this." 492 00:28:16,027 --> 00:28:18,697 "We stopped these murders." My mother cried. 493 00:28:20,323 --> 00:28:21,282 Yeah. 494 00:28:21,366 --> 00:28:22,909 Police did a tremendous job. 495 00:28:22,992 --> 00:28:25,078 They're the best police force in the world. 496 00:28:25,161 --> 00:28:29,124 [Borrelli] The relief on the mayor's face was political though. 497 00:28:29,207 --> 00:28:31,835 The relief on our face was physical. 498 00:28:31,918 --> 00:28:33,545 [chuckling] 499 00:28:33,628 --> 00:28:35,547 Everybody was happy it was over. 500 00:28:36,047 --> 00:28:36,881 Good evening. 501 00:28:36,965 --> 00:28:40,969 The most intensive manhunt in New York City's history is over. 502 00:28:41,052 --> 00:28:45,265 David Berkowitz accused this morning as the .44 Caliber Killer. 503 00:28:45,765 --> 00:28:47,684 He looked like such a meek little guy. 504 00:28:47,767 --> 00:28:50,687 He kind of had a little smirk on his face. 505 00:28:50,770 --> 00:28:55,859 I wanted to smack it off his face. It almost seemed like he wanted the fame. 506 00:28:55,942 --> 00:28:58,737 He seemed like he relished in that a little bit. 507 00:28:59,320 --> 00:29:00,905 [Denaro] It was hard to believe. 508 00:29:00,989 --> 00:29:03,199 I sat on the side of my bed for a couple hours, 509 00:29:03,283 --> 00:29:07,662 just kind of like reliving the last year. 510 00:29:08,747 --> 00:29:11,916 [woman] I feel much safer walking the streets of New York. 511 00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:15,336 Much safer. I can go out at night, go to the discotheques. 512 00:29:15,837 --> 00:29:18,089 [scattered chatter] 513 00:29:18,173 --> 00:29:21,718 The streets of New York all of a sudden became alive. 514 00:29:21,801 --> 00:29:24,179 People were jumping around in the streets. 515 00:29:24,262 --> 00:29:25,722 People went out to bars. 516 00:29:26,431 --> 00:29:27,766 They were celebrating. 517 00:29:27,849 --> 00:29:30,560 Now I feel so much safer about going out at night. 518 00:29:30,643 --> 00:29:32,437 [Murphy] They could be young again. 519 00:29:36,274 --> 00:29:40,487 More newspapers were sold in both the New York Post and the Daily News 520 00:29:40,570 --> 00:29:44,574 than for the assassination of John F. Kennedy, 521 00:29:44,657 --> 00:29:47,202 the President of the United States. 522 00:29:48,077 --> 00:29:50,371 There were headlined six inches high. 523 00:29:50,455 --> 00:29:51,790 One word, "Caught." 524 00:29:52,582 --> 00:29:56,461 That turned out to be one of the five best-selling New York Posts ever. 525 00:29:56,544 --> 00:29:58,630 We sold over a million copies. 526 00:29:59,506 --> 00:30:02,801 [reporter] As news of the arrest of the .44 Caliber Killer spread, 527 00:30:02,884 --> 00:30:05,345 New Yorkers were generally relieved. 528 00:30:05,428 --> 00:30:07,722 But at the Brooklyn home of Robert Violante, 529 00:30:07,806 --> 00:30:09,766 who was blinded in the killer's last attack, 530 00:30:09,849 --> 00:30:14,062 Violante's mother said the arrest left one question unanswered. 531 00:30:16,064 --> 00:30:19,150 Would be one word, why? Just why? 532 00:30:19,234 --> 00:30:21,236 [mysterious music playing] 533 00:30:23,321 --> 00:30:25,323 [Murphy] As soon as Berkowitz was arrested, 534 00:30:25,406 --> 00:30:27,534 all of us wanted to know what made him tick. 535 00:30:27,617 --> 00:30:29,035 How did he get this way? 536 00:30:29,536 --> 00:30:31,538 [Belsky] What was his motivation? 537 00:30:32,330 --> 00:30:35,708 Why did you shoot all these people? Why did you shoot me? 538 00:30:36,626 --> 00:30:40,755 [Edmonds] He began telling his story to the police. 539 00:30:40,839 --> 00:30:43,341 There was a 6,000-year-old man named Sam 540 00:30:43,424 --> 00:30:46,344 who was directing him to commit these murders, 541 00:30:46,427 --> 00:30:50,932 speaking to him through a dog, his neighbor Sam Carr's dog. 542 00:30:51,766 --> 00:30:53,351 [barking] 543 00:30:53,434 --> 00:30:55,979 [Klausner] David said he wasn't picking the victims. 544 00:30:56,062 --> 00:30:57,230 The demons were. 545 00:30:58,481 --> 00:31:01,317 He will simply be the hand with the gun. 546 00:31:02,151 --> 00:31:03,862 [eerie music playing] 547 00:31:05,446 --> 00:31:06,656 [click] 548 00:31:06,739 --> 00:31:10,034 [Berkowitz] I have nothing against these victims. Who were they to me? 549 00:31:10,618 --> 00:31:14,163 They were just people! I didn't hate them. I wasn't angry against them. 550 00:31:15,456 --> 00:31:17,000 [detective] So why'd you do it? 551 00:31:17,542 --> 00:31:20,044 [Berkowitz] Sam did it through me! He used me. 552 00:31:20,837 --> 00:31:24,048 He made me go out there and do it. I did it for him, for blood. 553 00:31:24,132 --> 00:31:26,134 -[shot] -[man and woman screaming] 554 00:31:26,718 --> 00:31:28,219 [gunshot] 555 00:31:28,803 --> 00:31:31,514 So in his depraved mind, 556 00:31:32,015 --> 00:31:36,895 the only way to satisfy Sam is to do his bidding. 557 00:31:39,105 --> 00:31:45,028 And he will assume the identity of the Son of Sam. 558 00:31:46,112 --> 00:31:48,114 [Denaro] So I was reading newspapers. 559 00:31:48,740 --> 00:31:51,993 They're saying he's talking about dogs, commanding him to kill. 560 00:31:53,036 --> 00:31:55,538 I mean, this guy's totally nuts. 561 00:31:56,289 --> 00:31:58,291 [eerie music playing] 562 00:31:59,500 --> 00:32:03,421 [Grossman] Berkowitz lived in this world of internal madness 563 00:32:03,504 --> 00:32:07,091 where he was seemingly just wigging out in his apartment 564 00:32:07,175 --> 00:32:10,303 because of forces that were beyond his control. 565 00:32:10,386 --> 00:32:14,641 [Klausner] In fact, when the police would finally go into the apartment, 566 00:32:14,724 --> 00:32:18,728 the condition of the apartment was the condition of his head, 567 00:32:19,354 --> 00:32:21,439 of David's psychological head. 568 00:32:22,357 --> 00:32:26,402 [Gardella] I walked into his apartment after the arrest, it chilled me. 569 00:32:26,486 --> 00:32:28,154 My body's chilling now. 570 00:32:29,197 --> 00:32:32,659 He had the photographs of the girls he killed on the floor. 571 00:32:32,742 --> 00:32:36,663 He had cut them out of newspapers. He had writings on the wall. 572 00:32:36,746 --> 00:32:41,459 There were holes in the walls where the demons apparently had lived. 573 00:32:42,001 --> 00:32:43,419 One of the holes said, 574 00:32:43,503 --> 00:32:45,588 "Hi, my name is Mr. Williams." 575 00:32:45,672 --> 00:32:47,382 "I live in this hole." 576 00:32:47,882 --> 00:32:50,093 "I'm turning little children into killers." 577 00:32:50,593 --> 00:32:52,095 "Can't wait till they grow up." 578 00:32:52,595 --> 00:32:55,598 It was the most bizarre thing I've ever seen in my life. 579 00:32:55,682 --> 00:33:01,187 And it seemed like whoever lived here was very, very disturbed. 580 00:33:02,480 --> 00:33:04,232 [slide projector whirring] 581 00:33:04,315 --> 00:33:05,316 [click] 582 00:33:07,360 --> 00:33:08,569 [sirens wailing] 583 00:33:08,653 --> 00:33:10,613 [man] Berkowitz will be brought here 584 00:33:10,697 --> 00:33:13,408 to the state courthouse in Brooklyn this morning. 585 00:33:13,491 --> 00:33:16,828 And, unless he changes his mind, he's expected to plead guilty 586 00:33:16,911 --> 00:33:20,164 to at least one of the Son of Sam murder charges. 587 00:33:20,999 --> 00:33:23,751 I was 29 years old. 588 00:33:23,835 --> 00:33:25,837 I was an assistant district attorney 589 00:33:25,920 --> 00:33:28,756 in the Kings County District Attorney's Office. 590 00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:33,428 And I'm the kid who's asked by the DA, Gene Gold, 591 00:33:34,095 --> 00:33:37,181 to come in and work on David's case. 592 00:33:39,767 --> 00:33:41,686 There were 13 victims. 593 00:33:41,769 --> 00:33:46,983 Berkowitz was charged with six homicides 594 00:33:47,066 --> 00:33:48,609 and seven attempted homicides. 595 00:33:49,193 --> 00:33:54,782 And at the time, his lawyers advised Berkowitz to use an insanity defense. 596 00:33:55,450 --> 00:33:58,119 He refused. I don't know why, but he wouldn't do it. 597 00:33:58,202 --> 00:34:03,958 The so-called Son of Sam, in court today, pleaded guilty to all six of the murders 598 00:34:04,042 --> 00:34:06,544 that frightened New York City for about a year. 599 00:34:07,128 --> 00:34:10,965 [Hopkins] He pled guilty for all six. He says, "I'm guilty of everything." 600 00:34:11,049 --> 00:34:13,468 Right there. Right down in there. Shocked us all. 601 00:34:14,510 --> 00:34:17,513 [Berkowitz] I never took this to trial. I pled guilty, is one, 602 00:34:17,597 --> 00:34:19,348 because I knew was guilty. 603 00:34:19,432 --> 00:34:22,435 And two, I wanted to call attention to myself, you see, 604 00:34:22,518 --> 00:34:25,480 as a criminal, a killer. I wanted to be somebody. 605 00:34:26,230 --> 00:34:27,732 He wanted to make sure 606 00:34:27,815 --> 00:34:32,403 that the world knew that it was him, David Berkowitz… 607 00:34:32,487 --> 00:34:34,489 [shots firing] 608 00:34:35,031 --> 00:34:36,699 that actually was doing it. 609 00:34:36,783 --> 00:34:38,534 "Look at how important I am." 610 00:34:38,618 --> 00:34:41,412 "Cause I'm not important in real life." Which he wasn't. 611 00:34:47,126 --> 00:34:49,754 [Berkowitz] In addition to being the black sheep, 612 00:34:49,837 --> 00:34:53,341 in addition to being an outcast and stigmatized for adoption 613 00:34:54,133 --> 00:34:57,011 and being somewhat of a loner as I got older, 614 00:34:57,845 --> 00:35:01,349 doing all these things, I couldn't seem to fit into society. 615 00:35:01,849 --> 00:35:05,812 I got to a point where I was so angry, I blamed others, you see. 616 00:35:06,437 --> 00:35:08,397 And I started committing my crimes. 617 00:35:08,898 --> 00:35:12,568 You know, to make people pay attention to me. 618 00:35:13,736 --> 00:35:15,113 It's all part of the ego. 619 00:35:16,072 --> 00:35:18,282 Now admitting to all these crimes. 620 00:35:18,950 --> 00:35:21,869 Guilty. He's getting more attention. 621 00:35:22,620 --> 00:35:26,707 [Jones] He had achieved what he was after, 622 00:35:26,791 --> 00:35:31,003 you know, a lifetime of notoriety, of infamy. 623 00:35:32,463 --> 00:35:33,714 [slide projector clicks] 624 00:35:36,259 --> 00:35:38,261 [suspenseful music plays] 625 00:35:38,970 --> 00:35:41,556 [man] Do you think justice can be done in this case? 626 00:35:42,265 --> 00:35:45,768 Not unless they bring back the death penalty. And he burns for it. 627 00:35:48,187 --> 00:35:49,313 [sighs] 628 00:35:50,982 --> 00:35:53,651 I owed it to Stacy to be there. 629 00:35:54,152 --> 00:35:58,656 And I needed to be there for myself to see justice being served. 630 00:36:00,700 --> 00:36:03,411 The courtroom was packed. 631 00:36:05,204 --> 00:36:06,414 The victims are there. 632 00:36:06,497 --> 00:36:09,458 Family members of the victims who had been killed are there. 633 00:36:09,542 --> 00:36:14,630 And the media is there to watch the spectacle of the sentencing. 634 00:36:15,131 --> 00:36:21,971 Berkowitz is brought into the courtroom, and things completely went off the rails. 635 00:36:23,306 --> 00:36:25,266 [Murphy] Berkowitz starts flipping out. 636 00:36:25,892 --> 00:36:28,811 [Belsky] He put on such a show where he started screaming 637 00:36:28,895 --> 00:36:31,105 that Stacy Moskowitz was a whore. 638 00:36:31,189 --> 00:36:33,441 "I'd kill her again. I'd kill all of you." 639 00:36:33,524 --> 00:36:36,986 "I'll kill again." He was just screaming like a madman. 640 00:36:37,069 --> 00:36:39,405 There was a physical transformation. 641 00:36:39,488 --> 00:36:42,200 The face, the physical manifestation, it was different. 642 00:36:42,283 --> 00:36:45,620 It was the face of evil as I perceived it. 643 00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:49,790 [Jones] Mr. Hyde was totally losing control at that point. 644 00:36:49,874 --> 00:36:52,210 And he bolts to try to go out the window. 645 00:36:52,919 --> 00:36:54,712 The court officers bring him back. 646 00:36:55,379 --> 00:36:58,883 [Violante] I couldn't see anything but could hear the judge. 647 00:36:59,508 --> 00:37:02,053 "Everybody, calm down." 648 00:37:02,136 --> 00:37:03,930 I just got up. I said, 649 00:37:04,013 --> 00:37:07,433 "F you, you piece of garbage, you should be dead." 650 00:37:07,516 --> 00:37:10,645 I said, "This piece of garbage, I want to kill him." 651 00:37:10,728 --> 00:37:12,980 I mean, that animal, he is a sick bastard. 652 00:37:13,064 --> 00:37:15,358 I don't care what… He is a sick son of a bitch. 653 00:37:15,858 --> 00:37:18,069 I felt like killing him, scratching his eyes out. 654 00:37:18,152 --> 00:37:20,279 I really couldn't control myself. 655 00:37:21,030 --> 00:37:25,243 It was a really trying day, that day. 656 00:37:26,994 --> 00:37:30,206 [Berkowitz] The idea of being sentenced to prison, right? 657 00:37:30,289 --> 00:37:31,958 It's terribly frightening. 658 00:37:32,458 --> 00:37:35,419 And it was just an act of desperation to… 659 00:37:36,879 --> 00:37:40,049 I guess, get attention, hope that somebody would intervene 660 00:37:40,132 --> 00:37:42,134 and say, "Oh, he is a madman." 661 00:37:42,927 --> 00:37:48,140 Acting out shows his total lack of empathy and remorse. 662 00:37:49,809 --> 00:37:51,352 [reporter] Sentencing went ahead. 663 00:37:51,435 --> 00:37:54,814 Berkowitz receiving a series of 25-year sentences 664 00:37:54,897 --> 00:37:56,857 totaling hundreds of years. 665 00:37:56,941 --> 00:38:00,861 But under the law, David Berkowitz may apply for parole in 25 years. 666 00:38:00,945 --> 00:38:03,739 [Wax] The judge imposed a sentence 667 00:38:03,823 --> 00:38:08,828 of 25 to life on each of the murder convictions. 668 00:38:08,911 --> 00:38:11,372 Does Berkowitz have a chance of parole? 669 00:38:11,455 --> 00:38:14,208 Down the road? Between zero and one? 670 00:38:14,292 --> 00:38:17,586 Between zero and none? Something in that order. 671 00:38:17,670 --> 00:38:20,756 Did he get what he deserved? Yes, he got what he deserved. 672 00:38:20,840 --> 00:38:23,676 He probably deserved worse than what he got because he got life 673 00:38:23,759 --> 00:38:25,303 and none of his victims did. 674 00:38:28,389 --> 00:38:30,766 ATTICA CORRECTIONAL FACILITY 675 00:38:30,850 --> 00:38:32,685 [Belsky] When Berkowitz was sentenced, 676 00:38:32,768 --> 00:38:37,481 I, like most of the world, assumed David Berkowitz was Son of Sam. 677 00:38:37,565 --> 00:38:40,318 He confessed. He's in jail. It's over. 678 00:38:40,401 --> 00:38:42,737 But that wasn't the case. 679 00:38:43,404 --> 00:38:46,073 [Berkowitz] How much time is left on that, by the way? 680 00:38:46,157 --> 00:38:47,158 [Jones] Quite a bit. 681 00:38:47,241 --> 00:38:50,870 [Berkowitz] There is something I wanted to tell you that came to my mind. 682 00:38:52,038 --> 00:38:56,375 [Jones] Amazingly, even after he had arrived at Attica, 683 00:38:56,459 --> 00:38:59,837 he continued to write the next chapter of his play. 684 00:39:00,504 --> 00:39:05,009 [Berkowitz] Here I was committing crimes of violence against innocent people. 685 00:39:05,092 --> 00:39:08,846 I didn't, at that time, understand any motives for what I was doing. 686 00:39:08,929 --> 00:39:11,057 I needed some type of justification. 687 00:39:11,140 --> 00:39:12,558 I had to convince myself 688 00:39:12,641 --> 00:39:16,020 that, no, I'm not the man that's doing this. 689 00:39:16,562 --> 00:39:18,564 [gunshots firing] 690 00:39:21,067 --> 00:39:24,862 It's some sinister force that's controlling me. 691 00:39:25,446 --> 00:39:29,658 He said the talking dogs, and Sam Carr, and demons. 692 00:39:29,742 --> 00:39:32,995 It was a good story, but it was all bullshit. 693 00:39:33,079 --> 00:39:34,622 I had fun with it. 694 00:39:34,705 --> 00:39:37,375 And what about the demon thing? When did that… 695 00:39:37,875 --> 00:39:41,962 Did it happen about the same time as the identity of Son of Sam? 696 00:39:42,046 --> 00:39:42,963 Tell me about it. 697 00:39:43,047 --> 00:39:46,509 [Berkowitz] It just came to me, 'cause I've always had a wild imagination. 698 00:39:46,592 --> 00:39:50,346 Suddenly I started to blame Sam Carr for everything. 699 00:39:50,429 --> 00:39:51,430 That he was at fault, 700 00:39:51,514 --> 00:39:53,808 and that his dog was giving me orders and things. 701 00:39:53,891 --> 00:39:57,812 And it was all just a sham, to be quite frank with you. 702 00:39:59,855 --> 00:40:03,234 When the police, I guess, went over to my apartment, 703 00:40:03,317 --> 00:40:04,819 after I was arrested… 704 00:40:07,488 --> 00:40:12,118 You notice how, if you recall, all these scrawls of magic marker 705 00:40:12,201 --> 00:40:13,577 that were on the walls? 706 00:40:14,412 --> 00:40:16,997 [Berkowitz] You tried to make it look like you were a madman? 707 00:40:17,081 --> 00:40:17,915 [Berkowitz] Yeah. 708 00:40:18,874 --> 00:40:21,919 That somehow this was the home of the devil or something. 709 00:40:22,002 --> 00:40:26,006 I knew I was going to be captured, and I had set all these things up. 710 00:40:26,632 --> 00:40:30,553 Berkowitz says the demon dog story was a hoax, a ruse. 711 00:40:31,512 --> 00:40:34,306 [Hopkins] He made it up, you know. It was crazy. 712 00:40:34,390 --> 00:40:36,892 You really don't know what's going on in his mind. 713 00:40:37,768 --> 00:40:41,856 [Grossman] And then the story gets even more strange and weird. 714 00:40:42,648 --> 00:40:44,024 [slide projector whirring] 715 00:40:44,567 --> 00:40:45,401 [click] 716 00:40:47,695 --> 00:40:50,614 [reporter] Today, an Inside Edition exclusive. 717 00:40:50,698 --> 00:40:52,324 In a shocking confession, 718 00:40:52,408 --> 00:40:54,994 the .44 Caliber Killer tells of devil worship, 719 00:40:55,077 --> 00:40:59,081 of cult members who helped him carry out his gruesome string of killings. 720 00:40:59,165 --> 00:41:01,167 And he reveals chilling details. 721 00:41:01,250 --> 00:41:04,462 I did not pull the trigger at every single one of them. 722 00:41:05,921 --> 00:41:09,091 [Jones] Suddenly we've got a worldwide satanic cult. 723 00:41:09,175 --> 00:41:13,220 And other members of this cult that he belonged to 724 00:41:14,013 --> 00:41:15,890 did some of the shootings. 725 00:41:15,973 --> 00:41:20,811 [Jones] Which once again put David Berkowitz in the limelight. 726 00:41:20,895 --> 00:41:22,813 [man] Donna Lauria in the Bronx. Was that you? 727 00:41:22,897 --> 00:41:23,731 Yeah. 728 00:41:24,899 --> 00:41:27,610 Carl Denaro, Rosemary Keenan in Queens. 729 00:41:27,693 --> 00:41:29,320 -No. -That wasn't you. 730 00:41:30,446 --> 00:41:34,742 I'm like, "This is crazy. Was that the truth or a lie?" 731 00:41:36,327 --> 00:41:38,329 [Grossman] The media goes absolutely wild 732 00:41:38,412 --> 00:41:42,500 connecting Son of Sam with a cult in Yonkers. 733 00:41:42,583 --> 00:41:46,837 A cult that called itself the Twenty Two Disciples of Hell. 734 00:41:47,880 --> 00:41:50,508 [Grossman] And this theory caught on like wildfire. 735 00:41:51,509 --> 00:41:55,221 Other Son of Sam killers are still lurking on the loose. 736 00:41:55,304 --> 00:41:58,432 As soon as he joined that cult, the .44 was put into his hand. 737 00:41:58,516 --> 00:42:01,060 You try and figure out how much of this is real, 738 00:42:01,143 --> 00:42:04,313 and how much of it is just people, you know, speculating. 739 00:42:04,396 --> 00:42:09,026 I mean, it was not far-fetched to believe that this might've been more than one guy. 740 00:42:09,652 --> 00:42:13,405 But years later, it didn't make any sense. Where did they go? 741 00:42:13,489 --> 00:42:15,741 And why isn't he naming anybody else? 742 00:42:18,994 --> 00:42:19,954 [thud] 743 00:42:20,037 --> 00:42:23,415 [Borrelli] The day we locked him up, the shootings stopped. 744 00:42:23,499 --> 00:42:26,210 So you tell me if there's anybody else involved. 745 00:42:27,461 --> 00:42:28,796 [slide projector whirring] 746 00:42:28,879 --> 00:42:30,089 [click] 747 00:42:30,756 --> 00:42:33,926 [man] I met with David Berkowitz in early 2022. 748 00:42:34,009 --> 00:42:37,721 He took interest in me because of my background. 749 00:42:37,805 --> 00:42:40,599 I'm a PhD in advanced studies in human behavior. 750 00:42:40,683 --> 00:42:44,603 Was also a pastor of a church for about 16 years. 751 00:42:44,687 --> 00:42:48,482 Worked extensively with inmates within the prison. 752 00:42:49,066 --> 00:42:51,610 So he wrote me a letter and asked me if I'd visit him. 753 00:42:51,694 --> 00:42:52,736 [keys jingle] 754 00:42:54,905 --> 00:42:58,826 From that point forward, we just began a journey of exploration. 755 00:42:58,909 --> 00:43:01,954 Right around the midway point, trust had developed. 756 00:43:02,037 --> 00:43:03,664 And at that point, David said, 757 00:43:03,747 --> 00:43:06,750 "It's time for me to set the record straight." 758 00:43:06,834 --> 00:43:08,043 "I did all the shootings." 759 00:43:09,545 --> 00:43:11,463 David's reason for lying… 760 00:43:11,547 --> 00:43:15,718 He said that journalists pitched the possibility 761 00:43:15,801 --> 00:43:18,095 that David wasn't alone in the crimes. 762 00:43:18,887 --> 00:43:20,598 And David went along with that. 763 00:43:20,681 --> 00:43:23,559 Why was David Berkowitz agreeable? 764 00:43:24,143 --> 00:43:27,396 That goes all the way back to childhood, just wanting to fit in. 765 00:43:27,479 --> 00:43:29,773 He will go along to get along. 766 00:43:31,150 --> 00:43:35,112 I think it says he demands attention still to this day. 767 00:43:35,195 --> 00:43:38,991 He thinks he can get the world's attention with these stories. 768 00:43:40,200 --> 00:43:43,078 [Comparetto] It's been nearly 50 years since this happened, 769 00:43:43,162 --> 00:43:45,164 and still more things are coming out now. 770 00:43:45,956 --> 00:43:47,958 [mysterious music plays] 771 00:43:50,461 --> 00:43:54,590 [Grossman] The David Berkowitz, Son of Sam story is extremely fascinating 772 00:43:54,673 --> 00:44:00,638 because I believe that there's more to it than anybody even knows. 773 00:44:01,847 --> 00:44:04,683 And just recently, I discovered a new development 774 00:44:04,767 --> 00:44:06,769 that just absolutely blew me away. 775 00:44:08,395 --> 00:44:11,607 I was looking in David Berkowitz's case files, 776 00:44:11,690 --> 00:44:15,152 and I came across a sketch I have not seen before, 777 00:44:15,653 --> 00:44:18,614 that was the spitting image of David Berkowitz. 778 00:44:18,697 --> 00:44:20,574 The eyes are the same, nose is the same, 779 00:44:20,658 --> 00:44:22,993 the lips is the same, the hair is the same. 780 00:44:23,077 --> 00:44:25,329 This is the best Son of Sam sketch I've seen. 781 00:44:25,412 --> 00:44:29,333 And then I look at the date. 5-5-76. 782 00:44:29,416 --> 00:44:34,713 This is almost three months before the first official Son of Sam shooting, 783 00:44:34,797 --> 00:44:36,423 the Donna Lauria shooting. 784 00:44:37,174 --> 00:44:38,717 And then my friend sends me 785 00:44:38,801 --> 00:44:41,762 a New York Times article about Wendy Savino. 786 00:44:43,514 --> 00:44:46,809 And my hairs on my neck stood up on end. 787 00:44:47,351 --> 00:44:52,231 So I found Wendy's number, and Wendy told me her story. 788 00:44:54,316 --> 00:44:55,567 [slide projector whirs] 789 00:44:55,651 --> 00:44:56,819 [click] 790 00:44:59,405 --> 00:45:01,281 [suspenseful music plays] 791 00:45:02,866 --> 00:45:07,996 [woman] In 1976, I had a wonderful life in a beautiful neighborhood. 792 00:45:08,497 --> 00:45:10,582 Pelham Manor in Westchester County, 793 00:45:10,666 --> 00:45:14,378 which is a really nice area, near to the city. 794 00:45:14,461 --> 00:45:16,338 Could drive in quite easily. 795 00:45:16,422 --> 00:45:21,009 I was 39. I had two sons, six and eight years old. 796 00:45:21,635 --> 00:45:24,221 I felt quite safe and very happy. 797 00:45:24,722 --> 00:45:28,475 On April the 9th, I was at home with the children, 798 00:45:28,559 --> 00:45:30,269 and my husband phoned 799 00:45:30,352 --> 00:45:34,773 and invited me out for dinner at our favorite restaurant, Nina's. 800 00:45:35,566 --> 00:45:37,609 I say it's around 10:15. 801 00:45:37,693 --> 00:45:44,366 As we exited, he went to his car. I went to my car. 802 00:45:44,450 --> 00:45:45,826 My husband pulled away. 803 00:45:45,909 --> 00:45:48,662 He assumes I'm going to follow him home. 804 00:45:48,746 --> 00:45:50,414 [ominous music plays] 805 00:45:50,497 --> 00:45:55,461 I was in my car, and this young man walking towards me. 806 00:45:56,211 --> 00:45:57,337 Smiling. 807 00:45:57,421 --> 00:46:00,382 And I think he's going to ask for directions. 808 00:46:00,466 --> 00:46:02,092 He's right next to me. 809 00:46:03,927 --> 00:46:06,263 And the next thing, my chest exploded. 810 00:46:06,346 --> 00:46:07,306 [gunshot] 811 00:46:08,432 --> 00:46:09,850 I've been shot. 812 00:46:11,602 --> 00:46:15,022 I look back and he's now laughing. 813 00:46:15,105 --> 00:46:16,231 [gunshot] 814 00:46:16,315 --> 00:46:20,402 The second bullet. I put my arm up to protect myself. 815 00:46:20,986 --> 00:46:22,654 It went through my arm, 816 00:46:23,489 --> 00:46:27,242 hit the dashboard and went into my right eye. 817 00:46:28,410 --> 00:46:30,287 The third bullet came in here. 818 00:46:31,330 --> 00:46:33,957 He fired two more shots into my back. 819 00:46:35,125 --> 00:46:39,338 And I could hear him walking away from me. 820 00:46:40,255 --> 00:46:43,926 So I crawled across the gravel parking lot. 821 00:46:44,510 --> 00:46:46,011 And I see a policeman. 822 00:46:47,679 --> 00:46:51,767 And next thing, I am on a stretcher in the hospital. 823 00:46:52,267 --> 00:46:55,979 The police did what they always do in a case like this. 824 00:46:56,063 --> 00:46:58,565 They immediately focused in on her husband. 825 00:46:59,525 --> 00:47:01,318 [Savino] He was a politician. 826 00:47:01,401 --> 00:47:04,822 But my family, as far as I know, did not have enemies. 827 00:47:05,697 --> 00:47:07,574 [Grossman] I think it was the media. 828 00:47:07,658 --> 00:47:10,118 They were trying to push the mafia angle. 829 00:47:10,202 --> 00:47:15,040 But there was just no evidence, and the investigation went nowhere. 830 00:47:17,584 --> 00:47:19,920 [Savino] The police didn't know who he was. 831 00:47:20,921 --> 00:47:23,173 That was it. I was terrified. 832 00:47:24,967 --> 00:47:26,176 [slide projector whirs] 833 00:47:26,260 --> 00:47:27,094 [click] 834 00:47:30,389 --> 00:47:34,434 [reporter] The most intensive manhunt in New York City's history is over. 835 00:47:34,518 --> 00:47:38,981 [reporter 2] David Berkowitz accused this morning as the .44 Caliber Killer. 836 00:47:39,064 --> 00:47:45,529 [Savino] Then, in August of 1977, I saw David Berkowitz. 837 00:47:46,488 --> 00:47:49,449 And I looked at him and said, "I don't believe it." 838 00:47:50,033 --> 00:47:54,454 I told the police, I said, "That is the man that shot me." 839 00:47:55,122 --> 00:47:58,083 And I thought the sketch was proof of him. 840 00:47:58,166 --> 00:48:01,753 To me, it was that simple. "I've drawn his face. Get him." 841 00:48:01,837 --> 00:48:04,089 But I was shot by a .32. 842 00:48:04,673 --> 00:48:07,384 I was not shot by a .44. 843 00:48:08,635 --> 00:48:12,848 The gun used in the Savino shooting was a .32-caliber automatic. 844 00:48:12,931 --> 00:48:15,934 There is no record of Berkowitz ever owning this gun. 845 00:48:16,852 --> 00:48:21,315 [Savino] And I never heard another thing from the police after that. 846 00:48:23,275 --> 00:48:28,322 I have been carrying this around in my handbag for 47 years. 847 00:48:30,198 --> 00:48:33,035 I saw him vividly. I see him now. 848 00:48:33,118 --> 00:48:35,037 Those blue eyes are shining. 849 00:48:36,288 --> 00:48:37,748 It was David Berkowitz. 850 00:48:38,874 --> 00:48:42,085 But nobody really took my story seriously 851 00:48:42,169 --> 00:48:45,380 until I got a phone call from Manny Grossman. 852 00:48:45,964 --> 00:48:47,966 Here was a woman who'd been shot. 853 00:48:48,050 --> 00:48:53,221 Everything was the same as the other shootings except for the gun. 854 00:48:53,722 --> 00:48:58,894 And so I reached out to the NYPD to look into this. 855 00:48:59,645 --> 00:49:01,772 So, everybody has heard of the Son of Sam. 856 00:49:01,855 --> 00:49:04,608 I mean, it's kind of New York City lore. 857 00:49:04,691 --> 00:49:08,487 So when Manny Grossman reached out saying there's a connection here, 858 00:49:08,570 --> 00:49:10,781 it seemed compelling to me. 859 00:49:10,864 --> 00:49:14,618 Once we were able to obtain the Wendy Savino case file, 860 00:49:14,701 --> 00:49:16,787 we developed an investigative plan. 861 00:49:17,287 --> 00:49:18,121 And at the time, 862 00:49:18,205 --> 00:49:21,917 David Berkowitz lived just miles from where Wendy Savino was shot. 863 00:49:22,000 --> 00:49:25,963 And while there's no record of David Berkowitz owning a .32 caliber, 864 00:49:26,046 --> 00:49:27,756 when he was arrested, 865 00:49:27,839 --> 00:49:30,258 there was various weapons that were recovered. 866 00:49:30,342 --> 00:49:31,927 Now in regard to victimology, 867 00:49:32,010 --> 00:49:34,596 the majority of victims in these cases were women. 868 00:49:35,097 --> 00:49:37,307 And in regards to the methodology, 869 00:49:37,391 --> 00:49:39,601 he walked up to cars and shot through windows. 870 00:49:40,227 --> 00:49:42,229 [gunshots firing] 871 00:49:42,729 --> 00:49:44,189 Wendy was shot in a car. 872 00:49:44,856 --> 00:49:47,317 I mean, that's a statistical anomaly. 873 00:49:47,401 --> 00:49:50,779 There's not a lot of people then, now, or in between 874 00:49:50,862 --> 00:49:54,074 that were shooting women through windows in parked cars. 875 00:49:54,157 --> 00:49:55,367 [slide projector clicks] 876 00:50:01,832 --> 00:50:04,793 And it was at that point that we interviewed David Berkowitz 877 00:50:05,293 --> 00:50:07,629 at a correctional facility in upstate New York. 878 00:50:09,297 --> 00:50:12,050 -[Klein] How you doing, Dave? -[Berkowitz] Yeah. All right. 879 00:50:13,427 --> 00:50:14,386 [click] 880 00:50:15,387 --> 00:50:20,434 [Klein] The reason we're here, it sort of centers around a woman. 881 00:50:20,517 --> 00:50:22,102 She's 87 years old. 882 00:50:22,185 --> 00:50:26,648 And she discussed with us an incident that occurred to her. 883 00:50:26,732 --> 00:50:28,984 On April 9th of '76. 884 00:50:29,568 --> 00:50:32,195 Now at the time, she draws a sketch. 885 00:50:32,279 --> 00:50:35,741 -[Klein] There is a chance-- -[Berkowitz] It's an uncanny resemblance. 886 00:50:35,824 --> 00:50:37,743 [Berkowitz] I obviously admit that. 887 00:50:38,618 --> 00:50:40,370 [Klein] Did you ever own a .32 caliber? 888 00:50:40,454 --> 00:50:46,793 [Berkowitz] No. The only handgun I owned was the .44-caliber revolver. 889 00:50:47,377 --> 00:50:51,048 [Klein] Ever borrow one from a cop friend that used it as an off-duty? 890 00:50:51,131 --> 00:50:54,968 [Berkowitz] No. I was not involved, and I don't know what to say. 891 00:50:55,052 --> 00:50:57,471 [Klein] Your position is "absolutely not," correct? 892 00:50:57,554 --> 00:51:01,641 [Berkowitz] Yeah, right, I would like to do what I can to just clear that. 893 00:51:01,725 --> 00:51:06,396 [Klein] At the end of the day, our opinion based on evidence, is investigative. 894 00:51:06,480 --> 00:51:10,025 It's just… we're probably going to close this case as is. 895 00:51:10,817 --> 00:51:13,737 [Berkowitz] That's ridiculous. I don't know who this person is. 896 00:51:15,655 --> 00:51:18,617 [Savino] David Berkowitz denies shooting me. 897 00:51:18,700 --> 00:51:21,870 He's agreeing to all of these other shootings. 898 00:51:21,953 --> 00:51:23,080 Why not this one? 899 00:51:23,163 --> 00:51:27,042 You saw my face. I saw your face, David. 900 00:51:27,125 --> 00:51:29,419 You can't deny you shot me. 901 00:51:29,503 --> 00:51:31,671 I saw you doing it. 902 00:51:32,214 --> 00:51:34,591 You're an absolute rotten bastard. 903 00:51:37,928 --> 00:51:42,265 [Klein] Today, Berkowitz has a new identity as a born-again Christian. 904 00:51:42,349 --> 00:51:45,852 So I think to admit to being involved in Wendy's shooting 905 00:51:45,936 --> 00:51:48,522 was counter to that narrative he's now trying to present. 906 00:51:49,523 --> 00:51:52,067 [Caparrelli] He's passionate about stating that 907 00:51:52,150 --> 00:51:55,529 "I did not do this. This is not my doing." 908 00:51:56,363 --> 00:52:00,242 He has admitted some things to me that were hard to admit. 909 00:52:01,034 --> 00:52:03,870 So if he looks at me and emphatically says to me, 910 00:52:04,412 --> 00:52:06,456 "I did not do this," 911 00:52:06,540 --> 00:52:09,835 I would probably be prone to believe him. 912 00:52:11,461 --> 00:52:13,797 [Klein] It's the opinion of the investigators 913 00:52:13,880 --> 00:52:18,468 of the Bronx Homicide Squad and the Bronx District Attorney's Office 914 00:52:18,552 --> 00:52:21,805 that Berkowitz is responsible for the shooting of Wendy Savino. 915 00:52:23,348 --> 00:52:25,016 To tell her that we believed her 916 00:52:25,100 --> 00:52:28,395 and that we were closing the case, it was a heavy moment. 917 00:52:28,478 --> 00:52:30,730 She was happy, and I can only hope 918 00:52:30,814 --> 00:52:34,901 that this offers some semblance of healing emotionally. 919 00:52:36,695 --> 00:52:38,071 I am validated. 920 00:52:38,655 --> 00:52:41,783 And now the police know it's true. 921 00:52:42,659 --> 00:52:43,743 It's absolute. 922 00:52:44,327 --> 00:52:47,706 And hopefully the nightmares will go away. 923 00:52:49,708 --> 00:52:51,418 [crowd clamoring] 924 00:52:51,918 --> 00:52:56,006 [Caparrelli] Answering the question of what went wrong with David Berkowitz, 925 00:52:56,089 --> 00:53:00,510 it's to take a complicated phenomenon and boil it down to one factor. 926 00:53:01,553 --> 00:53:03,763 We want to say, "This is why." 927 00:53:05,682 --> 00:53:07,684 I've spent more time with him 928 00:53:07,767 --> 00:53:11,479 analyzing what made him do what he did than any person. 929 00:53:11,980 --> 00:53:16,985 David Berkowitz from a young age really never fit in feeling disconnected. 930 00:53:17,068 --> 00:53:18,195 He was an outsider. 931 00:53:18,278 --> 00:53:19,613 And little by little, 932 00:53:19,696 --> 00:53:23,366 the resentment kept building, and it kept growing like a fire. 933 00:53:26,161 --> 00:53:29,623 I put David more in the category of school shooters than your Ted Bundys 934 00:53:29,706 --> 00:53:33,210 because he wasn't wanting to be intimate with the victim 935 00:53:33,293 --> 00:53:35,378 and to see the pain on their face. 936 00:53:36,588 --> 00:53:37,839 He'd shoot and run. 937 00:53:39,216 --> 00:53:40,091 [shot] 938 00:53:41,676 --> 00:53:45,805 Because for David what was under the anger was shame. 939 00:53:45,889 --> 00:53:49,100 And we'd rather get angry because we feel powerful. 940 00:53:49,684 --> 00:53:52,103 We'd rather feel powerful than feel vulnerable. 941 00:53:53,313 --> 00:53:55,315 [mysterious music playing] 942 00:54:02,155 --> 00:54:04,407 [Berlinger] Hey David, how are you doing? 943 00:54:05,450 --> 00:54:07,494 [Berkowitz] I'm hanging in there, by God's grace. 944 00:54:07,577 --> 00:54:09,120 I'm doing okay. Thank you. 945 00:54:10,205 --> 00:54:11,957 [Berlinger] I'm just curious. 946 00:54:12,040 --> 00:54:14,876 What do you want people to know about your story? 947 00:54:14,960 --> 00:54:17,254 [Berkowitz] I'm so very sorry for what happened. 948 00:54:17,337 --> 00:54:20,674 I was in a very dark space in my life. 949 00:54:21,258 --> 00:54:24,844 Things were falling apart for me mentally, spiritually. 950 00:54:25,428 --> 00:54:27,097 My life spun out of control. 951 00:54:28,223 --> 00:54:31,643 And I just couldn't get on that right path. 952 00:54:32,602 --> 00:54:37,315 [Berlinger] If you could go back in time, what advice would you say to that David? 953 00:54:38,358 --> 00:54:41,611 I would say, "Dave, run for your life. Get help." 954 00:54:42,404 --> 00:54:45,282 I could have gone to my dad. I could have gone to my sister. 955 00:54:45,365 --> 00:54:49,327 But I kept everything to myself thinking, "I can handle everything." 956 00:54:49,411 --> 00:54:51,579 But the pull was too strong. 957 00:54:52,289 --> 00:54:55,792 I wish I could start all over again and take a better path in life. 958 00:54:55,875 --> 00:54:58,086 But it just didn't work out that way. 959 00:54:59,796 --> 00:55:02,382 [Grossman] This is a guy who really truly believed 960 00:55:02,465 --> 00:55:06,177 that the only way to improve his life and to relieve the tension 961 00:55:06,261 --> 00:55:10,140 that he was feeling in life was to go out and murder people. 962 00:55:10,849 --> 00:55:13,518 You and I wouldn't do that, but this guy did. 963 00:55:13,601 --> 00:55:15,061 And this is why, of course, 964 00:55:15,145 --> 00:55:17,814 we're sitting here 50 years later talking about him. 965 00:55:18,732 --> 00:55:20,859 [Comparetto] But you must not forget 966 00:55:20,942 --> 00:55:24,279 David Berkowitz really was just an evil human being. 967 00:55:24,362 --> 00:55:26,740 And with all the excuses in the world, 968 00:55:26,823 --> 00:55:30,410 a dog telling him what to do, a cult telling him what to do, 969 00:55:30,493 --> 00:55:32,495 I'm sorry, there's no excuse for what he did. 970 00:55:32,579 --> 00:55:35,665 We're talking about multiple murders, multiple shootings. 971 00:55:36,166 --> 00:55:41,379 We're talking about putting a city in panic and fear for over a year. 972 00:55:45,050 --> 00:55:48,470 [Kevin] Of course we moved on. New York City is a tough city. 973 00:55:49,179 --> 00:55:51,431 But it can never be forgotten what he did. 974 00:55:51,931 --> 00:55:56,061 Unfortunately, the victims do get forgotten. 975 00:55:56,686 --> 00:56:01,399 And the criminals just keep getting sensationalized. 976 00:56:01,483 --> 00:56:03,902 In this case, David Berkowitz. 977 00:56:03,985 --> 00:56:06,446 I just want the victims to know 978 00:56:06,529 --> 00:56:10,325 that I'm here to speak out so we aren't forgotten. 979 00:56:10,408 --> 00:56:12,786 After an accident happens, it doesn't end there. 980 00:56:12,869 --> 00:56:14,954 It's a lifelong suffering. 981 00:56:15,580 --> 00:56:17,082 I would have loved to see 982 00:56:17,707 --> 00:56:20,794 how Donna Lauria would have been in her life, 983 00:56:20,877 --> 00:56:24,130 where she would have gone, how she would have succeeded. 984 00:56:24,631 --> 00:56:26,758 He took her from her parents. 985 00:56:26,841 --> 00:56:31,596 They didn't see her get married, have children, have a career, 986 00:56:32,764 --> 00:56:34,391 buy her first house. 987 00:56:34,474 --> 00:56:37,769 In the big picture, I think that's what people forget. 988 00:56:38,395 --> 00:56:40,897 What happened to those of us who are still here. 989 00:56:41,398 --> 00:56:44,025 And the victims that aren't. 990 00:56:45,402 --> 00:56:50,865 And even now, 47 years later, 991 00:56:51,574 --> 00:56:52,909 it's still right here. 992 00:56:53,827 --> 00:56:54,994 For all of us. 993 00:56:56,287 --> 00:56:58,289 [ominous music playing] 994 00:57:02,127 --> 00:57:04,129 [mysterious music plays] 995 00:57:06,000 --> 00:57:12,074 Do you want subtitles for any video? -=[ ai.OpenSubtitles.com ]=- 996 00:57:33,992 --> 00:57:35,994 [mysterious music continues playing] 997 00:58:03,855 --> 00:58:07,650 Subtitle translation by: 998 00:58:17,785 --> 00:58:19,370 [mysterious music fades] 998 00:58:20,305 --> 00:59:20,584