Chapter 6

• Jurisdiction: United States

Chapter 6 Sexual Psychopaths and Career Criminals

With the new Juvenile Justice Act in place and the Juvenile Section in the good hands of Jay Reich, I was reassigned to a new mission—Coordinator of the King County Prosecutor's Office's yet-to-be-launched Career Criminal Program. I was soon to learn how the criminal justice system attempted to protect the public from sexual psychopaths and career criminals and how that system should be reformed.

Here, I offer both a case study of an offender who was a sexual psychopath and a career criminal and a road map for what to do and what not to do when seeking to bring this special category of criminals to justice and protect the community.

Sexual Psychopaths

James Edward Ruzicka took the lives of two teenage girls, Nancy Pauline Kinghammer and Penny Marie Haddenham. At the time, Ruzicka was both a career criminal and a sexual psychopath, having been previously convicted of burglary in the second degree in 1968, assault with an intent to rape in 1973, and rape in the second degree in 1974.¹⁰

In the fall of 1973, Ruzicka pled guilty to second-degree assault with intent to rape. Ruzicka had attacked a twenty-one-year-old woman in her Capitol Hill apartment in Seattle. Superior Court Judge David W Soukup sentenced Ruzicka to ten years in prison but he suspended that sentence. The suspended sentence was conditioned upon Ruzicka going to Western State Hospital for treatment as a sexual psychopath.

Washington State enacted a sexual psychopath law in the 1950s. This law was seen as a reform because it was designed to treat sexual psychopaths rather than punish them. The underlying premise was that sex offenders suffered from a mental disorder that could be treated, thereby eradicating any threat they posed to society. Washington's law defined sexual psychopathy broadly as follows: "'Sexual psychopath' means any person who is affected in a form of psychoneurosis or in a form of psychopathic personality, which form predisposes such person to the commission of sexual offenses in a degree constituting him or her a menace to the health or safety of others." Under the law, a judge could send an offender to Western State Hospital for an evaluation. If the person was found to have met the definition of a sexual psychopath and was deemed likely to benefit from treatment, the person was committed to a state institution until the person had improved to the extent that he no longer posed a threat to the health, lives, or property of himself or others.

According to a 1996 report entitled "Washington's Sexually Violent Predator Law: Legislative History and Comparisons with Other States,"¹¹ the program at Western State Hospital had gained national attention, and it "was recognized for its guided self-help model where individuals progressed to higher levels of independence after reaching treatment milestones. Group therapy was used extensively, and offenders were selected to serve as group leaders."

One milestone for an offender in the sexual psychopath treatment program was that the sex offender had to acknowledge that he was suffering from sexual psychopathy before the person could progress further. At first, James Ruzicka refused to acknowledge that he had committed sex offenses, and, therefore, he could not rise to a higher level of independence. Later, undoubtedly because Ruzicka had figured out how to game the system, he admitted to his prior sex offenses. For acknowledging his wrongdoings, he was granted campus privileges at Western State Hospital and a number of leaves. On January 31, 1974, Ruzicka did not return from an unsupervised leave.

Years later the 1996 "Washington Sexually Violent Predator Law" report, referring to Ruzicka's departure and murders, noted:

The program at Western State became headline news in 1974 when an escaped resident was apprehended for, and later convicted of, a rape of one person and the murders of two teenage girls.

When Ruzicka left Western State Hospital without authority, Judge Soukup issued a bench warrant for his arrest.

The Lives of Two Girls

On February 15, 1974, at approximately 6 p.m., a seventeen-year-old girl, Nancy Pauline Kinghammer, left her residence in West Seattle and did not return. It was not until March 23, 1974, that a Seattle Police detective discovered her naked body between two tree branches buried under blackberry bushes and debris in a shallow grave in a vacant lot. The body of the girl was partially wrapped in a white drape that covered her head, shoulders, and part of her torso. A towel was also found in the vacant lot together with articles of Nancy's clothing; they were strewn around the lot. Nancy had a scarf around her neck. Although Nancy's body had begun to decompose, the County Medical Examiner was able to determine that she was probably killed by strangulation.

On the day of Nancy's disappearance, James Ruzicka was residing at the home of Charles and DeeAnn Oberlander. He stayed at the Oberlander house from February 1 through until February 25. Oberlander was Ruzicka's ex-wife. The Oberlander house was a short distance from the home of Nancy Kinghammer and less than two blocks from the vacant lot where Nancy's body was found.

On February 21, 1974, Penny Haddenham, age fifteen, went shopping with a friend and disappeared after dropping off her friend on the walk home. On March 12, 1974, Penny's body was discovered hanging from a tree in a secluded wooded area near her home. Penny had seven or eight dollars in her purse when her friend left her, and this money was missing when Penny was found. A knife, Penny's purse, and some yardage of yarn she had purchased on the day she went missing were discovered in the area near her body. Seminal stains were found in Penny's underpants.

On the last night that Penny was seen alive, James Ruzicka left the Oberlander home at approximately 7 p.m. and returned shortly after 10 p.m. When he returned, his clothes were muddy, and he had eight dollars and some change. He said that he had become muddy and had received the money helping someone remove their car from the ditch.

The knife recovered in the area of Penny's body was identified as belonging to Charles Oberlander. When the knife was recovered, the handle had been painted black and was wrapped with electrician's tape. Black paint and electrician's tape were found in the Oberlander's basement. James Ruzicka had been seen with this knife in his possession by three members of the Oberlander household. Charles Oberlander realized his knife was missing on March 3, 1974, when his home was burglarized.

On the day following Penny's disappearance, Ruzicka abandoned his job in the West Seattle area, and, on February 25, 1975, he went to work in Redmond, Washington. Shortly thereafter in March, he left the state and went to Oregon. In Beaverton, Oregon, Ruzicka raped a twelve-year-old girl. He pled guilty and was sentenced to ten years in prison. Oregon authorities released him to law enforcement for the murder trial in Seattle.

When the Seattle Police Department detectives presented the case against Ruzicka, the evidence supported charging him with the first-degree murder of Penny Haddenham, which we did. However, the only evidence we had against Ruzicka for the murder of Nancy Kinghammer was the proximity of her body to both the Oberlander's house and the scene of Penny Haddenham's murder. The Homicide Division's sergeant and I had an acrimonious discussion. He wanted the charges filed in the Haddenham case. I pointed out that if we filed charges at that juncture, we could well lose the case and regret it if we came up with more evidence later because double jeopardy would have attached, and Ruzicka could not be retried for murdering Penny Haddenham.

DeeAnn Oberlander had reported to the police that some things had gone missing from their house. On March 26, 1974, Charles and DeeAnn Oberlander, the detective, and I went to the Seattle Police Department evidence room and waited outside while the detective brought out different items that had been picked up in the vacant lot where Penny's body was found.

Items were shown to the Oberlanders one at a time. They were shown a green sweater, and they said that they had neither owned it nor seen it before. Next, they were shown a peach, white, and brown-colored bath towel. When DeeAnn saw it, she said it resembled a towel from her home, but she was not sure it was theirs. When the detective produced the white cloth that had been wrapped around Penny's body, DeeAnn Oberlander...