CHAPTER 8
LIVING LEGENDS
Most law enforcement detectives labor in relative obscurity. Sometimes a high-profile case may splash an investigator’s name in the news media for a while before the fame turns threadbare and fades like an old pair of jeans. Now and then, though, a selected few become legendary.
Louis Danoff and Frank Salerno belong in a Hall of Fame for lawmen.
Known as Louie “the Hat,” for his habit of covering advancing baldness with a variety of fedoras during most of his career, Danoff had been actively involved, along with Salerno, in a variety of headlined manhunts for notorious killers. These included the “Hillside Strangler” murders committed by Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono, and the hideous slayings perpetrated by “Night Stalker” Richard Ramirez.
Louis Danoff joined the LASD in October 1966. After twelve years in patrol cars, he took a promotion to homicide detective in 1978. He would eventually investigate more than one thousand killings, including the mystery of Julie Church, who had vanished from Lancaster in 1981. In 1991, he still had trouble coming to grips with the not guilty verdict for Steven Jackson, who had been seen leaving a bar with Julie.
With the muscular body of a wrestler and rugged facial features above a strong chin, Danoff could turn bad guys into quaking jelly with one of his patented stares magnified by pilot-style eyeglasses. Few criminals knew that this lion had the gentle heart of a lamb when it came to compassion for victims. He would eventually become a de facto member of Ann Racz’s family as “Uncle Louie.”
Frank Salerno had served thirty-two years with the LASD, seventeen in the Homicide Division. Highly recognizable in countless newspaper photos by his trademark graying, close-cropped beard contrasting with a dark mustache and easygoing brown eyes, Salerno’s features brought to mind Perry Como with whiskers. But it would be a serious mistake on the part of a killer to think that this soft-spoken homicide sergeant couldn’t be rawhide-tough in his pursuit of justice. He had been the team leader in the Night Stalker investigation. Additionally, Salerno had looked into the bizarre drowning death of Natalie Wood near Santa Catalina Island.
To Salerno, high-profile slayings were no different than routine cases. They all required common sense, logic, and hard work. He had spelled out procedures in a program developed for training sheriff’s homicide detectives.
Discussing basic investigation techniques, Salerno said, “Normally, with almost all homicides, you start with a crime scene, and you build your case from the victim out. When you have a body, obviously you’re there to collect evidence.” The objective, he explained, is to find links that will identify the perpetrator and connect that person to the victim’s death. “When you don’t have a crime scene to go to, per se, you still start with the victim. There is a saying in homicide we teach, and that is you learn as much as you can about your victim. The more you know about the victim—the closer you are to the victim—the better your chances for solving the crime. The victim becomes your best friend. You want to know that person in death as well as you would have in life. So that’s where you start, especially when you don’t have a body. You want to know the victim’s life patterns. And as you learn more, you determine if something occurred that caused the victim to do something they normally wouldn’t do, or break a life pattern.”
The starting point, said Salerno, is close to home. “You begin with those people who surrounded and knew the victim.” From there, you go where the leads take you.
In a missing person case that evolves into a suspected murder, the urgent focus turns to locating the body. Often that presents a huge challenge. One of the main obstacles in the case of Ann Racz, said Salerno, was the terrain of the Santa Clarita region. The geographic features around Valencia consisted of endless mountains, canyons, lakes, ravines, and a spiderweb of dirt roads crisscrossing the peaks and valleys. Her remains could have been easily hidden anywhere in underbrush extending hundreds of square miles.
It was quite unusual, Salerno acknowledged, for a missing person case to be turned over to the Homicide Bureau. Describing the factors that led to such a move in the Ann Racz search, he said that her life patterns, and the sudden breaking of them, pointed to foul play.
He and Danoff inherited the case on Monday, May 13, 1991. Sergeant John View and Detective Sally Fynan brought the facts to Salerno, laid out the suspicious factors, and requested that homicide take it over. Salerno agreed, and asked Louis Danoff to partner with him as they had on the Night Stalker task force.
After reviewing all of the written documentation prepared by View and Fynan, Salerno and Danoff followed the tried-and-true methodology. They started “with those people who surrounded and knew the victim.” Using a teamwork approach, Salerno requested Detective Sally Fynan to stay with them on the probe. “We asked her to continue helping, including notifications of the Department of Justice, checks with the coroner’s office, surveying local hospitals, the jail system, and other routine things. I believe we also had her check some of the mental institutions and told her to keep those checks going on a regular basis until they were no longer needed. In addition, we arranged for her to flag all the checking accounts and credit cards to determine if there was any activity on them.”
Explaining the term “flag,” Salerno said, “The particular institution, for example, if it’s Bank of America, or Nordstrom, or Macy’s, was contacted and their security was asked to flag that account. So when there was any activity on it, they would notify us at the sheriff’s department as to what had taken place with it.” The officers would be especially interested to see who made the transaction, when, and what might have been purchased.
Investigations begin with tiny, routine steps. First on the checklist, Salerno sought out California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) data, including photos of Ann and John Racz, their descriptions, and information about her vehicle. He incorporated these facts in composing flyers to be posted on hamburger hill sites, and for distribution to various agencies. Over the next few months, new information and photos would be included on additional flyers.
Even though the missing persons duo had interviewed several people, Salerno and Danoff chose to duplicate these efforts with different slants.
Fynan and View had collected a few papers and possessions from the Peachland condominium, and turned them over to the homicide team. Salerno and Danoff examined them, including a receipt from the Hughes Market in Valencia dated April 22, 1991, at 1:51 P.M. It listed purchases of mushrooms, shredded cheese, sliced pepperoni, Boboli pizza crust, and Ragú sauce. Acquisition of these groceries by Ann Racz indicated a specific intent by Ann, and a pattern of her routine that had been suddenly broken, one of the tenets of investigating bodyless cases.
Numerous other slips of paper, letters, business cards, and notes recovered from the condo gave the detectives insight into Ann’s daily life, her methodical organization, and her meticulous preparations for tasks she routinely undertook. These materials served as building blocks in getting to know the missing person intimately. It became obvious to Salerno and Danoff that this woman had not simply stopped everything on a sudden whim and deserted her family and her life. The whole thing reeked of foul play.
In the late afternoon of Tuesday, May 14, Salerno and Danoff drove to Van Nuys to visit the Flyaway airport service firm. Based on View and Fynan’s information, they had no trouble locating Ann’s white minivan parked approximately in the giant lot’s center, on the east side of a large camper-trailer and truck. They knew of John Racz’s statement about moving the vehicle to a shady spot to protect a VCR on the backseat. His rationale seemed odd, to say the least. Salerno arranged for an aerial photographer to make a pictorial record of the scene.
That same day, at about 6:45 P.M., Salerno made his first contact with John Racz by telephone. Introducing himself, he said, “I’m Sergeant Frank Salerno from sheriff’s homicide.” Ordinarily, when the spouse of a missing person receives such a call, they react with various levels of emotion, fear, panic, or distress. None of this seemed evident in Racz’s voice or behavior. He didn’t bother to ask why he was being contacted by people who investigate murders.
After noting this unusual reaction, Salerno asked permission to tow the car to a police impound lot for examination. Racz’s name on the registration slip made his concurrence a necessity. He granted it without question.
Salerno explained that Racz would be able to take possession of Ann’s minivan the next day. Racz’s next comment struck another odd note. He asked, “Do I have to pick it up?”
In reply, Salerno said, “Mr. Racz, the fees are going to build up on a daily basis. We, at the sheriff’s department, will cover a couple of days. But you do need to pick it up. Is there a problem with that?” Racz uttered something to the effect that he didn’t want the kids to see their mother’s car.
At this point in Salerno’s career, very little in the behavior of human beings surprised him. He asked, “Do you have a friend or a relative where you can store the car temporarily until the situation is straightened out?” Racz said he could probably find someone.
As he had in contacts with Sergeant View, Racz steered the conversation not in the direction of his missing wife, but instead to his previous tenure as a deputy.
John Racz asked, “Do I know you?”
“I don’t know you,” Salerno answered.
“When did you go to homicide?”
Keeping it on a courteous level, Salerno said, “In 1976.”
“Well, I was at Firestone then. I may have seen you then.”
It took Salerno a while to understand just what John Racz was talking about. The investigator hadn’t yet learned of Racz’s employment as a deputy sheriff years earlier. Ignoring the irrelevant comment, Salerno asked, “Have you heard from Ann?”
“No,” said Racz. “As a matter of fact, she didn’t show up for court today.” A divorce hearing had been scheduled for that Tuesday, May 14. Racz’s comment sounded as if he fully expected Ann to be there, despite his ongoing insistence that she had left town on a trip to think things over. His off-key comment sounded like a choir member singing the wrong tune.
After ending the conversation, Salerno ordered Ann’s vehicle to be transported from the Flyaway lot to an impound yard. With Danoff, Salerno examined both the exterior and interior of the Plymouth. They noted that the driver’s seat had been pushed back the maximum distance to accommodate a taller person than Ann. In the backseat, they saw a boxed VCR partially covered by a blanket, along with a Target store receipt. The transaction had been completed on April 22 at 12:45 P.M.
Wedged between the ceiling and the driver’s-side sun visor, Salerno found a small slip of white paper and a ticket issued by a machine at the Flyaway entry gate. The yellow ticket bore the date April 25, ten o’clock in the morning, three days after Ann had last been seen by family and friends.
Salerno unfolded the white paper and read a brief penciled note, apparently intended for John Racz: I’m glad you are becoming more reasonable about all this as time goes on—I think it helps to get along for the children’s sake. Thank you. In place of a signature, the writer had entered a large A. Salerno bagged it for fingerprinting.
In accordance with Salerno’s standard procedure in which “you start with those people who surrounded and knew the victim,” the two investigators began Wednesday, May 15, with a series of phone calls. They contacted Bob Russell, Emi Ryan, Dee Ann Wood, and Cheryl Freet, owner of the condominium Ann Racz had leased. With the first three, the conversations centered on establishing that none of them had seen Ann recently. They also discussed her lifestyle habits. Salerno asked Cheryl Freet for a key to the condo.
The sharp contrast between the demeanor of these four and John Racz impressed Salerno and Danoff. The relatives and friends all demonstrated deep anxiety about Ann’s safety, while the husband appeared unmoved by her absence.
From Bob Russell, they learned of the post office box Ann used for her Monday Flowers business, and as a conduit for correspondence with him. Salerno arranged for a warrant to search the box. Among several envelopes inside, they found a letter addressed to Ann from Russell. It surprised them to learn that John Racz’s name also appeared on the box rental agreement, but it remained unclear whether or not he actually had access to it. Salerno had a decision to make. After they examined the mail, what should they do with it? Give it to John Racz, because his name was associated with the box? Salerno decided to have each item returned to the senders, including the letter from Russell. Later explaining this, he said, “Not knowing exactly what we were dealing with, how the situation was going to turn out, we had a male individual who was corresponding with a married woman, and the husband had possible access to the box. Common sense told us we should do that.”
Near sunset that Wednesday evening, Salerno and Danoff, accompanied by Sally Fynan, drove to the Racz home on Fortuna Drive. She had called John earlier and set up an interview appointment. This would be the first meeting between John Racz and the two homicide investigators.
Another aspect of Racz’s puzzling behavior manifested itself when the trio arrived at the address and parked near the curbside mailbox. As they emerged from the vehicle, John Racz and his youngest daughter, Katelin, walked out the front door, turned toward the rounded cul-de-sac, stepped into the street, and began playing catch. They completely ignored Salerno, Danoff, and Fynan.
It couldn’t have been accidental, considering the complete absence of other cars on the street, and no other pedestrians in sight. Racz and his daughter tossed the ball back and forth, no more than twenty-five feet in front of the police vehicle. Stunned by the rude act, the officers stood and watched, amazed at this man’s peculiar attitude. Finally Salerno turned to Fynan and said, “Sally, get his attention. Tell him we’re here.” He reasoned that she was best suited to break the ice, since she had met with him a few days earlier.
Fynan called out to John Racz, who turned, appeared surprised, and said, “Oh, Sally.” He walked toward them with Katelin by his side. John directed the trio to the front door, opened it, and led them inside.
Expecting him to suggest places to sit, the officers faced yet another social faux pas. Recalling it, Salerno said, “We entered the house and really didn’t get any direction from him as to where to go. Generally, we look to the individual who is the homeowner to direct us. ‘I’d like you to go to the kitchen, dining room, living room.’ He didn’t do any of that.... We sort of wandered in like a herd.” Somehow they ended up in the dining room and sat around the table.
The first words from John Racz also seemed strange: “Should I tape-record this?”
Salerno replied, “If you feel you have to, go ahead.” Never before, in a search for a missing spouse, had he encountered such disconnected behavior. Racz promptly walked out of the dining area. After a short time, sounds came from another room, and Salerno assumed it meant Racz was searching for his recorder. When the noise ended, long minutes of silence set in. The detectives stared at one another in disbelief. Finally Salerno called upon Fynan again. “Sally, go find him.”
She brought John Racz back and he sat down nonchalantly. Salerno then spoke. “Mr. Racz, we are here to assist Detective Fynan in locating your missing wife.” Ann had been gone a little more than three weeks without contacting any of her relatives or friends.
“She is not missing. She is on vacation,” Racz responded instantly.
“So you know where?”
“No,” said Racz. He added that he had called Ann’s aunt Kay, the woman with whom she had taken several trips, but the relative in Hawaii said she hadn’t seen or heard from Ann.
With professional calm, Salerno continued by inquiring about Ann’s background, how they met, when they were married, and Racz’s job with the Compton School District. Racz answered the questions, told them about Ann’s being born in Hawaii, the family’s move to Los Angeles, her education, employment as a teacher, their meeting in 1969, marriage, and births of three children. He also spoke of being a deputy sheriff for twelve years and retiring due to a back injury.
Asked about Ann’s flower business, Racz described her delivery each Monday of fresh flowers, in vases, to several doctors. The home-based business had been in operation about two years, he said, and he thought she did it primarily for fun.
Regarding Ann’s church activities, Racz acknowledged her deep involvement, volunteer work a few days each week, and regular attendance at services while he just joined her on holidays. Recently, he said, she had been receiving a small amount of pay from the church for part-time work.
Salerno led into the marital problems, and later spoke of it: “He said approximately two years prior to our conversation that he noticed things starting to change . . . that she was letting the house go, although she was still taking care of herself. She was fastidious about that, as far as taking care of herself. He indicated that she told him of being tired of house routines, the kids, and that she wanted to get away.”
For most of their marriage, said Racz, they had traveled together, but in recent years, Ann had taken trips to other countries with her aunt. One of those vacations, to Russia, had lasted a full month, said Racz, and he stayed home to take care of the kids.
Volunteering the next comment, Racz said that when Ann returned after the long absence, their relationship “sexwise” was better for several weeks; then “it went back to the way it was before the trip.”
Ann had been unhappy recently, Racz commented, then added that she had been corresponding with someone named Bob in the San Francisco Bay Area for quite a while. He said, however, he had never seen or read any of the letters.
Racz appeared tense when he described her most recent trip. About a year ago, he said, she had traveled again with her aunt, this time to Hawaii and Japan. Salerno later recalled the part that seemed to bother John. “While she was in Honolulu, she had purchased a wedding band for herself. It upset him that she had not purchased one for him. And when we asked about that, he told us that she had said, ‘The next time we go to Hawaii, we will buy you one.’ It would be to replace their original matching wedding bands.”
Back to the subject of Bob Russell, Racz told of Ann traveling twice up north. Salerno recalled, “Ann had asked him about taking a trip to visit with Bob, who had a daughter about the same age as Katelin. And she wanted to take Katelin and go up to the Bay Area and visit with Bob. She asked if it was all right if she stayed at Bob’s house. He said no, he didn’t think it was right to do that.” During the three days of her trip, said Racz, he believed she stayed at a Motel 6.
The second journey north wasn’t quite as clear to John Racz. Salerno said, “There was a time when Ann was picked as a representative from the local PTA in the Santa Clarita Valley and she took a trip up there. I believe she asked about spending an extra day to visit Bob, and Racz said he didn’t know if she did, because she was only gone the specific time she originally said she was going to be gone.”
Her contacts with Russell, John Racz told the investigators, caused friction. “They had talked and argued about it. But he didn’t like doing it in front of the children, so he would take Ann upstairs to talk about it. And Ann—I don’t remember if he used the word ‘hated’—but she did not like that and it would give her knots in her stomach. She would really become upset about going upstairs to the bedroom to discuss this with him,” Salerno stated.
Years later a misconception circulated about Ann attending a high-school reunion a couple of weeks before she vanished, reconnecting there with Bob Russell. The reunion came up for discussion in the interview with John Racz and he asserted that he had not gone with her. Racz had no idea whether or not Bob Russell had attended. Russell himself, though, eventually cleared it up by stating that he had not been at the reunion.
Satisfied with the background information they had discussed, Salerno turned the conversation with John Racz to his activities between April 18, moving day for Ann, and April 22, when she vanished. “We asked him specifically to take it day by day and tell us what he did on each of those days.”
According to what John Racz told Salerno, he got up at five o’clock on Thursday morning, April 18, readied himself for the long drive to Compton, then woke Ann up. He hugged and kissed her, reminded her that they planned on eating dinner that night at a local Mexican food restaurant, and left for work at six. At about three or three-thirty, he called home to tell her that he had a meeting, but no one answered. Not long after that, he left the school and stopped at Carl’s Jr. on hamburger hill, had coffee and read the paper, then drove home, arriving close to six o’clock. Inside the house, it startled him to see some of the furniture missing and that his wife wasn’t home. The thought ran through his mind that she had left him. A note he found in the kitchen confirmed it and said that she would call later that night.
Continuing his version of the events, Racz said that he went across the street to neighbor Don Pedersen’s home, who told him that he had seen the moving van and Ann loading things into her car.
Sometime between nine and ten that night, Ann did call. She told him that she had, indeed, moved out, but she didn’t want to talk long on the phone. The kids were okay, she said, and she would be back in contact on Friday. According to John, he begged her to meet him somewhere that night, but Ann turned him down. She also refused to reveal her new address. To John, the call sounded as if it were made from a pay phone.
The following night, he said, Ann kept her promise to call again. She repeated that the kids were okay. He asked if she would agree to join him in a meeting with Pastor Glen Thorp for counseling, and Ann said she would. Once more, she rejected his plea to meet in person right away. Even though Racz wanted to continue talking with her, Ann cut the conversation short with an excuse about being tired and wanting to get the children to bed. Again, the call seemed to be from a public telephone.
On Saturday morning, Racz told Salerno, he contacted Pastor Thorp to arrange for a meeting. When Ann called, he gave her the early-evening appointment time at Thorp’s office. She showed up punctually at seven-thirty. In the discussion with Thorp, Ann could not articulate exactly what her concerns were as to the marriage, but she did make her unhappiness clear. According to John, he gave her a letter, the first of two he wrote, telling Ann that he wanted her back and that he would do anything to keep the marriage together. This would even include sleeping in separate bedrooms until they could resolve some sexual issues. Ann indicated she might be willing to give it a try, John Racz asserted.
Salerno knew that John Racz’s claims about the letters were true. Sally Fynan had found them in the condominium and turned them over to the homicide investigators. He wondered about the claim that Ann had considered patching it up.
A subsequent discussion between Salerno and Pastor Thorp revealed that Ann had been unequivocal in rejecting reconciliation. She had, though, agreed to bring the children over to the Fortuna house on Sunday to visit John. In John Racz’s statements to Salerno, he said that he attended church that Sunday morning, and arranged with Pastor Thorp to set up another counseling session. She brought the children over, as promised, that afternoon. At about 4:30 P.M., he and Ann kept the appointment. Racz said that he gave her his second letter, a plea for her to return on the condition that he would try to be a better husband, but she remained adamant in her decision to end the marriage.
On a more practical level, he reminded Ann of some tile work set to begin at the house on Monday, and she needed to cough up her share of the cost. They agreed that she could cash a maturing joint CD in the amount of $13,242, keep $2,000 for expenses, and give him the remaining check for $3,000 on Monday. Before leaving the counseling session, said John Racz, they made another appointment for the evening of Thursday, April 25. He told Salerno that he still held out hope for salvaging the marriage and for Ann’s return. “I’m determined to get her back,” he declared.
Moving on to the final day of Ann’s known existence, Salerno asked Racz about the events of Monday, April 22. Racz said he called in to the school principal that morning to report that he would be absent. He waited for the tile workers to arrive, but they didn’t show up. Ann came over by herself in the early afternoon, said Racz, and without exiting her car, she gave him the money according to their agreement. He told her he wanted to see the kids, so she left, picked them up from school, brought all three of them to the house a half hour later, and parked inside the garage.
This claim would subsequently raise questions when Salerno learned that Katelin had not arrived with Ann, but had been delivered later by the Brownie driver, Carol Kuwata.
After the kids went into the house, said John Racz, he asked Ann to go to the backyard patio with him, where they had a discussion.
Racz made no mention of the children sitting in the car for nearly a half hour before getting out, and that Ann never left the car, as neighbor Don Pedersen would report. Both Glenn and Joann would also tell the detectives that their mother stayed in her car. The detectives noted the discrepancy.
In recalling John Racz’s account of events that day, Salerno said that in the backyard conversation John told Ann that he wanted the marriage to remain intact, and if it didn’t, he might commit suicide. John also claimed that he offered to cash the check Ann had just delivered and give it to her on Tuesday. In addition, he would borrow $17,000 from another joint CD, this one in his credit union, and hand it to her on Wednesday. If she wanted to travel, she could go away and think about the marriage situation. She could take as much time as she needed, on the condition that she would come back.
When John Racz acknowledged to Salerno that all of their bank accounts, including CDs, were jointly owned by Ann, it seemed strange that John would be offering to get the money for her. She could easily withdraw it herself. He asked if Ann had accepted his offer. Racz said she indicated “she would try it.”
At the end of their discussion in the backyard, said John, they walked back into the garage. He called the children and told them to say good-bye to their mother. Without giving them any hugs or kisses, he said, Ann left.
A short time later, according to John, one of the kids said something about being hungry, so he went to McDonald’s to buy some fast food for them.
Racz’s tale about Ann’s sudden departure for an extended trip raised more questions in Salerno’s mind. He asked, “Did you discuss with her anything about arrangements for the children’s clothing, books, homework, medications, or their daily needs?” John said there had been no such discussion. Nor had the children brought up any of these needs when saying good-bye to their mother. Racz mentioned that he told the kids, “If your mother doesn’t come back, I will go to Target and buy you some clothes.”
“Did you go get the food for them?” Salerno inquired. Yes, said Racz. He drove the short distance to McDonald’s, near Lyons Avenue on hamburger hill. That evening, Racz said, he took the kids to a pizza restaurant for dinner.
Needing some details about the missing woman—“for obvious reasons, clothing, jewelry, handbag, whatever, to assist us if an individual was found alive, dead, or partial remains”— Salerno asked how Ann was dressed at the time she left. Racz said that she wore pink pants and maybe pink-and-white shoes, but he couldn’t remember anything more.
“Can you describe any jewelry she had on?”
Later discussing John Racz’s answer, Salerno stated, “He said she was wearing a diamond ring on her right hand. She had won it on a television program. I asked him how much it was worth. He estimated about a thousand dollars. And he also said she was wearing on her left hand that wedding band she had purchased on her trip to Hawaii.”
Asked to describe the Hawaiian ring, Racz said it was black and gold. “Was that the same wedding band you told me about a little while ago, the one that made you angry?”
Racz acknowledged that it was, indeed, the same ring.
In response to a query about any tattoos, scars, or other physical characteristics of Ann, John described a scar “that ran from her navel to an area of her groin, which was the result of a tubal ligation she received when Katelin was born.” He also noted that Ann didn’t smoke, didn’t drink, didn’t use drugs, and that she was “a very sound person.”
Regarding John Racz’s allegation that he offered to give his wife money the next day, Salerno asked him for details of events on Tuesday, April 23. Racz said that his children went to school, wearing the same clothing they had worn on Monday. He drove to a bank and cashed the roughly $8,900 check Ann had given him. She arrived at the house between one-thirty and two o’clock in the afternoon, pulled into the driveway, and asked him if they could go somewhere to talk. They went in separate cars to Carl’s Jr. on hamburger hill.
“What did you talk about?” Salerno asked.
John couldn’t seem to recall, only that Ann wanted to know how the children were. He claimed he handed her $8,900 in bills from the check he had cashed. And they made arrangements to meet at Tips restaurant, just one block away, on Wednesday, so he could give her additional money.
“What was she wearing when you met at Carl’s Jr.?”
“I’m not sure. I think it was the same outfit she wore on Monday.”
To Salerno, the whole picture seemed cockeyed. Racz wanted him to believe that this meticulously neat, organized woman drove away on Monday with plans to go on a trip, yet showed up the next day wearing the same clothing. She certainly had access to the condominium. Why would she not change clothes, as any woman would?
“Wasn’t that kind of unusual for her?” Salerno asked.
“Yes,” Racz answered. “She normally changed clothes every day.” He added that her routine included getting her hair done every couple of months. She was “immaculately groomed, and would not go out of the house without her hair being perfect and her makeup in place. She never left without looking good.” Even though Ann showed up at the restaurant wearing clothing from the previous day, said Racz, “she still looked good to me.”
With that, John suddenly remembered something else from their meeting at Carl’s Jr. He had asked her for the kids’ backpacks and Glenn’s flute, all lying in the backseat of her car, and she gave them to him. Instead of placing them in his vehicle, he said, he walked home, carrying the packs and flute.
The story grew more bizarre to Salerno with every new utterance from John Racz’s mouth. “Why did you do that?”
“I wanted to make Ann feel bad. I wanted her to feel sorry for me . . . I guess.”
To the detectives, that rationale sounded as valid as the Night Stalker’s claims of innocence. Curious about the distance from Carl’s Jr. to the Fortuna house, Salerno and Danoff later measured it and found it to be exactly nine-tenths of a mile, much of it uphill. Racz chose to walk it, carrying heavy books and backpacks, rather than put the stuff in his car and drive home. Then, later, he walked back to get his vehicle. Yeah, that made sense!
Racz next answered the detectives’ questions about Wednesday, April 24. He said that he went to a bank in Los Angeles and borrowed $17,000 against a $100,000 CD, taking it in two checks. Back in Valencia, he cashed both checks at a Security Pacific Bank, planning to give the money to Ann.
“Why didn’t you just endorse the checks and give them to her?”
“Because I didn’t want her to think of me as a cheapskate.”
Salerno and Danoff, both of whom had seen every type of scam possible, wondered if the story of giving cash to Ann might just be to avoid a specific problem. If he had given her checks, it wouldn’t be difficult to find out whether they had ever been cashed, and if so, where.
After leaving the bank, said John, he drove around to kill some time, and then went to Tips restaurant, near the Carl’s Jr., where he had met Ann on Tuesday. He had a cup of coffee, waited, and she showed up at about four o’clock.
“Was she still wearing jewelry?”
“Yes, she still had on the diamond ring and the black-and-gold wedding band from Hawaii.” Asked if he was certain, Racz replied in the affirmative. And he recalled that “she really looked good.”
“And did you give her the seventeen thousand dollars?”
“Yes, I did.”
“Was it just a bundle of cash, or packaged, or what?”
“It was in a Security Pacific Bank envelope.”
According to John Racz, Ann repeated her intention to go on a trip, but she wouldn’t say where or how long she planned to stay. He didn’t pressure her to tell him. They walked out of the restaurant that afternoon at about four-thirty, and he drove home alone, John said.
On Thursday, said Racz, he didn’t hear from Ann at all. He kept the appointment by himself with Pastor Thorp that evening.
The next day was the last time he heard from Ann, Racz told the detectives. She called him collect and said that she was going away. She had parked her car at the Flyaway in Van Nuys and said he could leave it there or pick it up, whatever he felt like doing. During this call, Racz added, he could hear cars in the background. She asked him to take good care of the children and said she would contact him again soon.
“Did you ask her how long she would be gone, to give you some estimate as to how long you would be taking care of the children?”
“No.”
About an hour after the call, said Racz, he drove to the Flyaway lot, found her car, and moved it to a shady spot.
“John, why did you move the car?”
Racz said that she had left a new VCR in the backseat, and he wanted to protect it.
“Why didn’t you just take it with you?” He had no answer. “Did you notice anything else in the car?” Salerno wondered if Racz would mention the handwritten note, signed only with a capital A, that they had found tucked under the sun visor. Racz acknowledged seeing it, and said it was in Ann’s handwriting.
“Did she usually sign her name with only the first letter of her name?”
Racz said that she didn’t, and he appeared upset that Ann hadn’t even taken the time to write her name.
“Why didn’t you take it with you?”
“I didn’t know what to do with it.” It seemed improbable to the investigators that he had even found the note. It hadn’t been visible until they searched the car. His comment just added one more oddity in this whole story that had more potholes than the mountainous dirt roads above Valencia.
“Is that the last time you saw her vehicle?” No, said Racz. He had driven over there again about a week later, with Katelin along for the ride. But he didn’t want the little girl to see her mother’s car, so he parked some distance away and walked over to it.
Salerno wanted to know if Racz thought Ann no longer loved him. Appearing to give it some thought for a few seconds, he said that he believed she had “fallen out of love with” him. She was no longer “demonstrative” toward him, and didn’t feel for him “like [he] felt for her.” But he didn’t think she had left him for another man.
Once again, Salerno asked Racz if he had any idea where his wife had gone. Despite his earlier denial of having any idea, he now said he thought she might be in Hawaii. Salerno noted that Racz had previously spoken of talking to Ann’s aunt Kay in Hilo, who said she hadn’t seen Ann or heard from her. So there seemed to be no logic at all in the supposition that Ann had gone to the islands, and not contacted her aunt.
Nearly finished, Salerno mentioned that they would like to interview the two younger children, and for the first time, Racz showed signs of stress and turned defensive. “Why do you want to do that? Why do you need to talk to my kids?”
“John, it’s just a part of the investigation. It’s something we have to do. They are two of the last people who saw your wife.” Racz uttered something about the officers wishing to poison their minds. Salerno shot back, “Why would we do that? All we want to know is what they remember.”
Still resistant, Racz said he wanted to see a list of the questions to be asked before he would grant permission. And he insisted on being present during any interrogation. Salerno explained, “John, that’s not going to be possible, because there may have been something that Ann shared with them in confidence. Something they would not tell us if you were there. For example, she might have told them she was leaving you and to keep it a secret.”
By way of additional explanation, Danoff commented, “They should have been talked to earlier, but they weren’t, and now we need to talk to them.” Of course, both men knew that Detective Sally Fynan had already interviewed Joann, but no one had yet spoken to Glenn or Katelin.
Still wearing a stern expression, John Racz said he would think about it and let the officers know. Then, as if they were all good friends in a social atmosphere, he began talking about the old days when he served as a deputy. He rushed upstairs and brought down a roster of Firestone station personnel, and asked if the trio knew any of them. His whole demeanor changed from solemn reluctance to animated interest. The three investigators recognized a few names and chatted briefly about them, mostly to be polite.
Before leaving, Danoff said he would like to take a few documents with him to be copied. He said, “I would like to see your personal phone book so we can make contact with those people listed, to see if we can get a lead as to somebody who may have seen or heard from Ann. Also, I’d like to make copies of your phone bills for the first four months of this year.” Racz surprised them with his ready compliance. He produced the personal phone listings, and telephone bills for January, February, and March. But, he said, he couldn’t find the one for April, and may have thrown it away.
To the detectives, it sounded suspicious. The April bill would be the most crucial one.
The strange behavior of John Racz intrigued Louis Danoff and Frank Salerno. In all their years of experience, they had never met anyone quite like him. And no potential homicide case had ever presented so many challenges.