The Return of Dracula

The Return of Dracula

William D LePoidevin

Mesa Community College

Abstract

        Richard Trenton Chase, a truly deranged man who would stop at nothing to save his own life. Growing up was tough for Richard, he didn’t grow up in what you or I would call a loving home. At a young age, Chase spiraled out of control abusing drugs and alcohol just like his father. He also displayed the McDonald Triad with an extreme thirst for killing and torturing animals, he would consume animals blood and organs. He saw a psychologist for problems performing sexually and all they said was that he had suppressed anger. After high school, Richard moved in an apartment with some friends. That didn’t last long, Chase’s odd behavior forced his roommates to move out, making Richard move back in with his parents. Declining rapidly from this point in his life, it was just a matter of time before he went over the edge.

Richard Trenton Chase, also known as The Vampire of Sacramento among other names the public had for him. Personally, I like Dracula out of all the names he was called. This man committed some truly horrendous acts, something that seems like it’s made up its so awful. When looking at the list of all the serial killers, mass murderers, and spree killers out there, it is almost a reality check of how ugly the world can be. Richard Chase is the ugly of the ugly, he is a mentally sick person who abused drugs to top it all off. Richard did some things that made me speechless, his crimes are unparalleled to anything I have ever heard of.

First, we must ask ourselves, what exactly is a serial killer and how do we define different killers? There are many different types of killers out there; serial killers, spree killers, and mass murderers. In each of those categories, we also have organized and disorganized crimes. A serial killer is a person who kills three or more people with a cooling off period between each killing. In between each victim they go back to their regular lives and put on their masks of sanity. That is the scariest part for me, serial killers are so good at that mask of sanity you could never see it coming if you were being targeted. Spree killers kill two or more victims, back to back with no cooling off period at more than one location. A mass murderer is a person who kills four or more people in one event, these people usually either kill themselves or engage the police in a shootout so they die either way. Knowing theses different types of killers, I believe that Richard Chase is a spree killer; for one Richard Chase didn’t have a mask of sanity and didn’t have a cooling off period where he went back to his normal life. Granted, there was a period of a month between his first and second killing, his last murdered was only twelve days after Chase had killed his second victim.

To really understand why serial killers, do what they do is to look at what led up to those events. The key to that mystery lies in the early years of Richard Chase. Born on May 23, 1950 in a strict household where his father beat him often (Blanco). It is not said anywhere that his father beat the mother but we can assume he did because she was seen my multiple Psychiatrists. The family had financial troubles losing their home in 1963 when Richard was 13. By the age of 10, Richard displayed every trait of the Macdonald Triad; bed wetting, fire starting, and animal cruelty. He would capture rabbits and other wild animals to torture and kill them; drinking their blood didn’t come until later. He became an alcoholic in his early teens and with that developed a drug habit, mostly marijuana and LSD, that would not help his conditions at all (Early Childhood, Weebly).

Knowing that these are all traits of serial killers, this man could have been put on a watch list when he was young, as to prevent the murders he committed later in his life. He attended Mira Loma High School from 1964 to 1968 (Storey, Strieter, Tarr, Thornton, Radford.edu) During high school, he had multiple girlfriends, none of which he was able to sustain a stable relationship with due to his inability to perform sexually. When going to see a psychiatrist about his issue, he was told that his problem was due to suppressed anger or a mental illness though it was not determined at that point. He did not seek out any additional diagnosis or treatment after that. Sophomore year he was also arrested for possession of marijuana, he was ordered to work on the weekends. This already strange beginning to Chase’s life is only bound to get even more strange.

Shortly after his high school graduation, Chase moves in with some friends into an apartment. He would also attend American River College at this time in his life from ages 18 to 21 (Storey, Strieter, Tarr, Thornton, Radford.edu). His behavior would only grow increasingly strange and intolerable for his roommates as time went on. His constant drug and alcohol abuse made Chase spiral downwards even faster than before. His strong use of drugs would cause him to completely lose his grip on reality. According to his roommates at the time, he would never shower and had no personal hygiene whatso ever. Richard had no personal boundaries, that was not a thing in his life. He would even walk around in his birthday suit when there was company around, he did not care. Finally, his roommates had enough and decided to talk to him about moving out. Chase being Chase, refused. When his roommates couldn’t get him to leave, it forced them to leave instead. Eventually, chase couldn’t afford to be on his own anymore and moved back in with his parents at the age of 21.

Chase would grow increasingly paranoid as the days went on. His parents separated shortly after Richard moved back in and Richards behavior was too much for her to handle alone. Richard was paranoid that his mother was trying to murder him through poison, conspiring with the Nazi party to kill him (Blanco). He was even known to run into emergency rooms and claim someone had stolen his pulmonary artery, bones were coming out of his head, his stomach had turned upside down, and that his heart would often stop beating. He shaved off all of his hair in order to see his cranial bones moving. So, his father paid for an apartment for him so he was all alone in his own apartment to do whatever he pleased. This is the time where he really started to capture and eat animals because there was no one around to catch him do it. He would capture wild animals and even go buy dogs and cats in order to consume their entrails. There was a report of him stealing a neighbor’s pet, calling them to harass them, and then leaving the dead pet on their front lawn.