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Fewer than 10% of the 20,000 people who were murdered in the United States in 2021 were killed by strangers. And yet, getting attacked and killed by a complete stranger remains reliable fodder for nightmares, horror movies and true crime podcasts.

You are more likely to be murdered by someone you know than by someone you don’t. The latest FBI statistics show that fewer than 10% of the 20,000 people who were murdered in the United States in 2021 were killed by strangers. And yet, getting attacked and killed by a complete stranger remains reliable fodder for nightmares, horror movies, and true crime podcasts. These random acts of murder, former SDPD homicide detective Rick Carlson surmises, also tend to attract the lion’s share of media attention, because they are typically more sensational. “In most murders, the victim and suspect know each other, and there’s usually an ongoing issue, like domestic violence or a dispute over money or drugs,” Carlson says. “But someone getting killed by a stranger usually occurs in a public place and is much more in the public eye — and more threatening to people who may be in the same situation, whether it’s a homeowner, a business owner, or just a commuter on public transportation.”

Photography by Barry Fitzsimmons, Des Moines Register

But even among “random” killings, there are patterns. Some are the result of home invasions that end in fatal confrontations. Sometimes bar fights turn deadly; in rare cases, so do road-rage incidents and neighborhood disputes. Only a small percentage of murders are truly random, truly baffling — simply, Carlson says, a case of bad luck, of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. An innocent bystander too close to a drive-by shooting, say.

The most sensational random murder in San Diego history, of course, is the San Ysidro McDonald’s massacre, which occurred on July 18, 1984, at the McDonald’s fast-food restaurant on the corner of San Ysidro Boulevard and Averil Road. Just before 4 pm, 41-year-old James Huberty walked into the diner, armed with a 9mm Browning HP semi-automatic pistol, a 9mm Uzi carbine, a Winchester 1200 12-gauge pump-action shotgun, and a cloth bag filled with ammunition. He began shooting, and in the 77 minutes between the time he fired his first shot and the moment he was was killed by a police sniper, Huberty managed to kill 21 people and wound 19 others, many of them children. The San Ysidro McDonald’s massacre remains the deadliest mass shooting in California history. The restaurant was razed four years after the shooting and the land donated to the city of San Diego, which subsequently sold it to Southwestern College for a campus extension and memorial.

But over the years, there have been numerous other notorious murders in San Diego County, committed by other killers who had no connection to their victims. The January 29, 1979 Cleveland Elementary School shooting, in which 16-year-old Brenda Spencer shot and killed the principal and a custodian and wounded nine others, was later immortalized by the Boomtown Rats in the song “I Don’t Like Mondays,” after Spencer’s response to police officers who asked why she did it. John Gardner’s abduction, rape, and murder of two young women, 14-year-old Amber Dubois in February 2009 and 17-year-old Chelsea King in February 2010, was recounted in the best-selling book Lost Girls by Caitlin Rother. The December 24, 2013, slaying of Ilona Flint, her fiancé Gianni Belvedere, and Belvedere’s brother Salvatore in the parking lot of the Mission Valley shopping center by a carjacker horrified San Diegans, because it occurred on the night before Christmas. And the rape and murder of Tiffany Schultz and five other San Diego women by Cleophus Prince Jr., aka The Clairemont Killer, between January and September 1990 made national headlines because it was one of the first instances in which DNA testing played a pivotal role in the serial killer’s arrest and conviction.

Here are some other random murders that have occurred in the San Diego area in recent years. These are all crimes in which police found absolutely no connection between the killer and the victim.

“I Don’t Want to Use the Women’s Room”

Saturday, November 14, 1998: Matthew Cecchi was excited. The cheery nine-year-old with the bushy brown hair and endearing gap-toothed grin was enjoying a campout at Oceanside Harbor with a bunch of other family members gathered there for a reunion. Little Matthew had driven down with his father Lou, mother Sharon, and his three-year-old brother from Oroville, a town 65 miles north of Sacramento on the banks of the Feather River. There, his twin passions were baseball and Legos.

The San Ysidro McDonald’s massacre remains the deadliest mass shooting in California history. The restaurant was razed four years after the shooting and the land donated to the city of San Diego, which subsequently sold it to Southwestern College for a campus extension and memorial.

Photograph Courtesy San Diego Police Museum

The day was a typical one for Oceanside at that time of year: hazy sunshine, warm but not hot. As afternoon turned into evening, the temperature dipped, but that hardly mattered to the kids, who were playing on the beach and playground next to the RV parking lot, on the narrow spit of land that separates the ocean from the harbor — a space that was (and still is) reserved for camping.

Matthew told his mother he needed to use the bathroom. According to news reports, his mother would later recall her son saying, “Mom, can I go into the men’s room? I don’t want to use the women’s room.” An aunt, Gail Gerhard, volunteered to accompany him. She and the boy walked to the nearest restroom; the aunt remained outside. As she waited, she observed a young man — whom she later described to police as a “teen-ager” — enter the restroom and then walk out a few minutes later. Matthew was still inside. The aunt began to get worried and called his name. No answer. When she went inside to look for him, she saw him lying on the floor in a pool of blood, “bleeding from an ear-to-ear slash across his throat,” according to a CNN report. The aunt, his mother and several bystanders tried to revive Matthew and stop the bleeding, but with no luck. The boy died at the scene as his mother gently stroked his hair.

Just two days later, Los Angeles police arrested a 20-year-old transient, Brandon Wilson of St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, as they were investigating the robbery and stabbing of a 40-year-old woman in Hollywood. Wilson made certain statements to police connecting him to the Oceanside killing, and also had in his possession the knife believed to have been used to slash young Matthew’s throat. Wilson later confessed in court that after walking into the restroom, he grabbed the boy, slit his throat with a hunting knife, and stabbed him five times in the back as he stood at a urinal: “I did it. I’m guilty. I want to talk myself. I did it. I killed him. I killed the little boy.”

He underwent psychological testing and was described by a psychiatrist as delusional and grandiose. According to an NBC San Diego report, the psychiatrist testified that “Wilson believed God had called him to be His special emissary…. Moments before Cecchi’s killing, Wilson passed up two potential victims on the beach because he believed they weren’t pure enough. Then he heard little Matthew say he needed to go to the bathroom. Wilson felt that Matthew’s soul was offering himself to him and this was the person he was supposed to kill and sacrifice, the psychiatrist testified.” Wilson was found guilty of first-degree murder with special circumstance and given the death penalty. He was sent to death row in San Quentin prison. On November 17, 2011 — 13 years after the murder, virtually to the day — he was found hanging in his cell.

Matthew’s legacy: The Matthew Cecchi Public Safety Act, passed by the county Board of Supervisors, which calls for family restrooms in all renovated or newly constructed county parks.

The Man with the Demon Tattoo

It was supposed to be a pleasant spring vacation in Oceanside. Katherine Parker, 54, lived with her husband Albert in Lincoln, a suburb of Sacramento. The pair had traveled around California for years in a motorhome and loved to spend winters in sunny Southern California. In early April 2009, the two drove down to Oceanside to visit relatives. They stayed at an RV park near the coast highway. On this particular trip, they were taking it easy: Katherine had just had lap-band surgery and was recovering from a fall that had caused internal bleeding.

On Friday, April 3, Katherine was excited. Her eight-year-old granddaughter was flying out for an Easter visit, and this was the first day she felt good enough to venture out for some shopping. In the afternoon, she drove to the El Camino North shopping center, a huge strip mall that stretches from El Camino Real all the way west to Jefferson Street. Her destination was the Hallmark store, located in a little plaza next to Toys ‘R’ Us. (The toy store is now the Burlington Coat Factory; the Hallmark space is now occupied by a nail salon.) Shortly after 4 pm, Parker walked out of the Hallmark store and crossed the plaza into the parking lot, headed toward her car. As she opened the driver-side door, a man ran up to her and asked her for money. When she refused, he grabbed her from behind and slashed her 10 times with a knife in the face, neck and stomach as startled shoppers looked on. He then threw the knife and lay down on the ground, arms out, where he waited for police to arrive. Parker was airlifted to a nearby hospital, where she died shortly after her arrival.

James Huberty killed 21 people and wounded 19 others in the 1984 San Ysidro McDonald’s Massacre. He was killed by a police sniper.

Eric Russell Andreasen, a 37-year-old resident of Oceanside with a demon tattoo on his right arm, was convicted of first degree murder in March 2011, and two months later was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. His defense attorney had argued that Andreasen suffered from schizophrenia and had psychotic episodes and religious-based delusions. But the prosecution, according to a San Diego Union-Tribune article, argued that Andreasen had a history of aggressive panhandling, sometimes threatening people who wouldn’t give him money. Prosecutors successfully convinced jurors that he killed Parker in a fit of anger over her refusal to hand over any cash.

No mercy

Two days after Christmas in 1986, Cara Knott was driving home from her boyfriend’s house in Escondido. The 20-year-old blonde and bubbly San Diego State University student lived with her parents in El Cajon, and she was headed southbound on Interstate 15 toward I-8. Before hitting the freeway, she had filled up her 1968 Volkswagen Beetle with gasoline, and now that she was finally on the road, she was eager to get home.

All of a sudden, there were flashing lights behind her. Officer Craig Peyer of the California Highway Patrol directed her to pull over on the unfinished Mercy Road offramp. She did as instructed. Peyer parked his patrol car behind her and, wielding his long flashlight, approached her vehicle. What happened next is unclear. All that is known for certain is that Cara never made it home that night. Her father, clearly worried, retraced her route, and in the early morning hours spotted her white VW near the old Highway 395 bridge off I-5. He called the police, and they soon found her body, 65 feet below the bridge, in a dry creek bed. She had been bludgeoned and strangled to death with a rope.

Just two days later, the local NBC television news affiliate broadcast a segment in which reporter Rory Devine rode along with Peyer and interviewed him about safety tips for travelers whose vehicle suddenly becomes disabled, forcing them to pull off the road. The 36-year-old Peyer, in full CHP uniform, was eager to talk safety. He urged anyone whose car breaks down on the freeway to pull over to the side of the road, lock all the doors and wait for law enforcement. “It’s better to be in the safety of your vehicle,” he said on camera. “Anything can happen...being a female, you could be raped...robbed, if you’re a male...all the way to where you could be killed. Once you get into that other person’s car, you’re at their mercy.”

Watching Peyer being interviewed, some observers noticed what appeared to be scratch marks on the officer’s face. After the segment was broadcast, nearly two dozen phone calls were made to police, mostly from women, saying that Peyer had pulled them over at or near the same spot. He was friendly, they said, a little too friendly. That made them uncomfortable. Some callers reported that he stroked their hair and shoulders. An internal investigation revealed many more such stops, along with other evidence pointing to Peyer as the culprit. Two and a half weeks after Knott’s death, the highway patrolman was arrested and charged with her murder.

16-year-old Brenda Spencer shot and killed the principal and a custodian and wounded nine others at Cleveland Elementary School in 1979.

At trial, prosecutors said they believed Peyer had a flirtatious interaction with Knott, who threatened to report him for his inappropriate actions. When he tried to grab her, prosecutors believed, she scratched at his face, prompting Peyer to beat her with his flashlight and strangle her to death with a rope. He then pulled her out of the car and threw her body over the edge of the abandoned bridge into a ravine.

Peyer was brought to trial, but in February 1988 a judge declared a mistrial because jurors could not agree on a verdict. A second trial was promptly held, and this time, Peyer was found guilty of murder. In August of that year, he was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. Two San Diego Union reporters, Lisa Petrillo and Joe Cantlupe, wrote an excellent book on the Peyer case, Badge of Betrayal: The Devastating True Story of a Rogue Cop Turned Murderer. Peyer is next up for parole in 2027.

“Can I help you?”

Extraordinary Desserts first opened in 1989 at 2929 Fifth Avenue on Banker’s Hill. It featured a wide assortment of sweet treats, from ice cream and sorbets to tarts, pies, cobblers and bread puddings. It soon became a popular date night spot, as well as a place where couples out on the town could meet after a meal at Mister A’s or any of the area’s other fine-dining restaurants for a spectacular dessert.

On the evening of December 30, 2006, Michael Fineman and his wife Thuy met up with another couple, Anthony and Carole Koveleski, at Extraordinary Desserts. They judiciously studied the menu and engaged in animated conversation before selecting their choices and ordering. Fineman, 44, ran a home-redesign business and had three young children. As the two couples chatted on, they were startled by a man they had never seen before who walked up to their table and start staring at them. He was slight, with thinning brown hair and bad teeth; he was dressed casually and had a backpack. The two couples had no idea who the stranger was, but as he stood there, staring, he made them extremely uncomfortable. Fineman asked the stranger, “Can I help you?” The stranger mumbled something back but continued to stand by their table, staring. Annoyed, Fineman summoned a waiter, who promptly escorted the man out.

About five minutes later, just before 9:30 pm, the man returned, walked up to the two couples, pulled out a handgun, and shot both men before running out of the restaurant. Police and paramedics arrived almost immediately. Fineman, who had been shot three times in the head, was pronounced dead at the scene, just moments after the shooting. Koveleski was rushed to the hospital and eventually recovered. The two women were uninjured.

John Gardner abducted, raped, and murdered two young women, 14-year-old Amber Dubois in February 2009 and 17-year-old Chelsea King in February 2010.

A news report on the crime, with surveillance video capturing the moments just before the shooting, spurred a witness to come forward. He had seen the suspect and jotted down his license plate number. A search soon ensued for 45-year-old Ralph Garbarini, a construction worker from Jackson, an old gold-mining town in the Sierra foothills. Garbarini had come to San Diego just one month before the shooting and was reportedly living in his truck, a brownish gray 1990 Toyota pickup with a plywood camper shell painted to look like a rock formation. The manhunt went nationwide. The case was even featured on the TV show America’s Most Wanted. Then, on March 13, 2007, Los Angeles Police received a call from two security guards who said a truck matching the description of Garbarini’s camper was parked on a residential street just off Hollywood Boulevard. The truck was put under surveillance and when Garbarini approached the vehicle about three hours after the initial call had been received, he was arrested.

It was later revealed that Garbarini had a history of paranoid schizophrenia. He pleaded guilty to murder and in April 2008 was sentenced to 75 years to life in prison, with an additional life term in prison with the possibility of parole. The trial had been delayed twice, once to determine Garbarini’s competency and a second time when he attempted suicide while in jail.

At the sentencing hearing, Fineman’s widow Thuy told Fineman that her children frequently cried for their father, and spoke about the incredible feeling of loss she dealt with. “Michael was a good man, a wonderful father and a loving husband,” she said, according to a San Diego Union-Tribune story. “Our hopes and dreams are all gone.” Koveleski and his wife said they continue to be plagued by anxiety whenever they are out in public, despite therapy and medication.

A “horrifying scream”

One of the most recent random killings is the June 19, 2023 stabbing death of Chi Cao, a 65-year-old grandmother, in the Central Avenue Mini Park. Located in the heart of the central San Diego neighborhood of City Heights, the mini park is a tiny patch of land sandwiched between Central Avenue and Interstate 15. It’s roughly the same size as the adjacent skate park — a small expanse of lawn between a playground and some picnic tables. Cao frequently rode her bike along Central Avenue and exercised in the little park near her home, a two-bedroom bungalow she shared with her daughter, son-in-law, and the couple’s two small children. She was a frugal matriarch, collecting cans and sending the money to another daughter and grandchild still living in Vietnam, from which she had emigrated in 2015.

On the morning of Monday, June 19, Cao headed out on foot to the park for her morning walk, picking up recyclables on the way and chatting on her cell phone with a friend. The morning air was still cool; the sky a hazy blue. According to a Go Fund Me page set up by a family friend, Cao was still on the phone, oblivious to any danger, “when an unprovoked man in broad daylight came up and fatally stabbed her multiple times in the neck. After hearing Chi’s horrifying scream, her friend on the phone immediately contacted Chi’s family, as there was no response on the other line. A neighbor who recognized Chi also ran to her home and rang the doorbell multiple times to inform the family. Chi fainted on the sidewalk in front of a neighbor’s home. The neighbor found Chi’s body lying lifelessly in a pool of blood and contacted the police.” It was shortly before 8:30 a.m.

Nine hours later, police arrested 23-year-old Silveinusi Hamala, who lived with his family a few blocks from the park. He was charged with first-degree murder. At his first court appearance, Hamala did not enter a plea because his defense attorney questioned his competency to stand trial. He was subsequently found to be competent and returned to court on October 24, where he entered a not guilty plea. His next court appearance is scheduled for January.

Short Takes

Saturday, July 5, 1986 was a hot summer day in the College area of San Diego. Dona Shenkman, 47, had just left the bank in what was then the College Grove Shopping Center and was walking to her car when she was jumped by a man with a knife who grabbed her purse and then began relentlessly stabbing her. About 15 bystanders witnessed the attack by the man, later identified as 30-year-old Anthony Robert Salas. Before he put down the knife, Salas stabbed himself in the upper left chest area, piercing his own liver. He was rushed to Mercy Hospital in Hillcrest. Shenkman died from her injuries. Salas’ fate is unknown; there were no further news stories about any trial or conviction.

Martin Andara, 68, rode the trolley from his home in Santee to the Old Town station bright and early on New Year’s Day 2022, headed for work at a Ralph’s supermarket in Pacific Beach. While he was walking to a connecting bus shortly after 6:15 am, a man walking ahead of him abruptly turned around, punched him, and then pushed him in front of a freight train rolling along the tracks next to the walkway. Andara died on the scene of severe head trauma. Surveillance video led police to 27-year-old Ryan Rukstelis, who was arrested three days after the attack. Rukstelis pleaded guilty to murder in June and in September was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. The two had been on the same trolley for about 30 minutes, but never interacted.

Cara Knott was murdered by Officer Craig Peyer of the California Highway Patrol in 1986. Peyer is next up for parole in 2027.

Justice Boldin was excited. He had just gotten a job as a parking valet for Ace Parking, and was assigned to the Pendry Hotel in the Gaslamp Quarter, where he soon made friends with a bellman and other service workers. On the night of April 22, 2021, around 10:30 pm, the 28-year-old Boldin was standing near the hotel’s J Street valet stand when 34-year-old Travis Sarreshteh walked up to him and, without a word, shot him dead with a “ghost gun,” an unserialized and untraceable firearm he had bought online and assembled at home. He then proceeded to gun down four other passersby, although none of them were killed. In January 2023, he was sentenced to 175 years to life in prison for killing Boldin and four more life terms for the other shootings. According to court documents, the rampage began just 10 minutes after Sarreshteh’s former girlfriend broke up with him.

On August 14, 1976, nine-year-old Aleta Sue Grosenbach was visiting her grandmother in Bird Rock. The warm San Diego sun agreed with the little girl, as did the proximity to the beach — a far cry from her home in Kankakee, Illinois, on the rural plains outside Chicago. It was a Saturday afternoon. Aleta’s grandmother asked her to walk over to a nearby store and buy her an afternoon newspaper. Aleta happily agreed — and that’s the last time her grandmother saw her. Three days later, Aleta’s body was found off Pomerado Road. She had been sexually assaulted. Aleta was later buried at El Camino Memorial Park beneath a headstone that read “Our Precious Sunshine.” The case remained unsolved until 1982, when the daughter of Louis Felton May Jr., a registered sex offender who lived in Escondido, told police her father — who died in a motorcycle crash in 1978 — had confessed to the abduction, rape and murder just two weeks after the crime. Police were skeptical but gave the woman a lie detector test, which she passed.