Diane Alexis Whipple was an American lacrosse player and college coach. She was killed in a dog attack in San Francisco on January 26, 2001. The dogs involved were two Presa Canarios. Paul Schneider, the dogs' owner, is a high-ranking member of the Aryan Brotherhood and is serving three life sentences in state prison. The dogs were looked after by Schneider's attorneys, Robert Noel and Marjorie Knoller, a husband and wife who lived in the same apartment building as Whipple. After the fatal attack, the state brought criminal charges against the attorneys. Noel, who was not present during the attack, was convicted of manslaughter. Knoller, who was present, was charged with implied-malice second-degree murder and convicted by the jury. Knoller's murder conviction, an unusual result for an unintended dog attack, was rejected by the trial judge but ultimately upheld. The case clarified the meaning of implied malice murder.
In the U.S. state of California, capital punishment is not allowed to be carried out as of March 2019, because executions were halted by an official moratorium ordered by Governor Gavin Newsom. Before the moratorium, executions had been frozen by a federal court order since 2006, and the litigation resulting in the court order has been on hold since the promulgation of the moratorium. Thus, there will be a court-ordered moratorium on executions after the termination of Newsom's moratorium if capital punishment remains a legal penalty in California by then.
Susan Denise Atkins was an American convicted murderer who was a member of Charles Manson's "Family". Manson's followers committed a series of nine murders at four locations in California over a period of five weeks in the summer of 1969. Known within the Manson family as Sadie, Sadie Glutz, Sadie Mae Glutz or Sexy Sadie, Atkins was convicted for her participation in eight of these killings, including the most notorious, the Tate murders in 1969. She was sentenced to death, which was subsequently commuted to life imprisonment when the California Supreme Court invalidated all death sentences issued prior to 1972. Atkins was incarcerated until her death in 2009. At the time of her death, she was California's longest-serving female inmate, long since surpassed by fellow Manson family members Leslie Van Houten and Patricia Krenwinkel.
Michael Malloy, nicknamed Mike the Durable or Iron Mike, was a homeless Irishman from County Donegal who lived in New York City during the 1920s and 1930s. A former firefighter and stationary engineer, he was murdered by a group of five acquaintances after multiple failed attempts on his life by the men to perpetrate life insurance fraud.
The Han twins murder plot was a case of attempted murder of Sunny Han by her identical twin sister Jeena "Jeen" Han, occurring on November 6, 1996 in Irvine, California. Both are Korean-born American citizens.
Thomas and Jackie Hawks were a couple from Prescott, Arizona, United States, who were murdered in 2004.
Central California Women's Facility (CCWF) is a female-only California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation state prison located in Chowchilla, California. It is across the road from Valley State Prison. CCWF is the second largest female correctional facility in the United States, and houses the only State of California death row for women.
Valley State Prison (VSP), previously the Valley State Prison for Women (VSPW), is a state prison in Chowchilla, California. It is across the road from Central California Women's Facility. It was formerly a prison for women.
John Leonard Orr is an American convicted serial arsonist, mass murderer and former firefighter. A fire captain and arson investigator in Glendale, California, Orr was convicted of serial arson and four counts of murder; he is believed to have set nearly 2,000 fires in a thirty-year arson spree, most of them between 1984 and 1991, making him the most prolific serial arsonist in American history.
Julia Lynn Turner was an American woman who was convicted in the poisoning deaths of her two husbands.
On December 3, 1998, Mark Jensen, an American man, murdered his wife, Julie Carol Jensen in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, by poisoning her with antifreeze. The case is notable for the eventual admission into evidence of a letter written by the deceased prior to her death expressing suspicion of her husband's intentions.
Kristin Margrethe Rossum is an American former toxicologist who was convicted of the murder of her husband Gregory T. de Villers, who died from a lethal dose of fentanyl on November 6, 2000. Rossum is serving a life sentence at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla.
Lyda Southard, also known as Lyda Anna Mae Trueblood, was an American female suspected serial killer. It was suspected that she had killed four of her husbands, a brother-in-law, and her daughter by using arsenic poisoning derived from flypaper in order to obtain life insurance money.
Lethal Vows is a 1999 made-for-television American drama film based on the events which led to the trial and conviction of Richard K. Overton for the poisoning death of his third wife, Janet Overton. Starring John Ritter, Marg Helgenberger and Megan Gallagher, the movie premiered October 13, 1999, on CBS.
Stacey Ruth Castor was an American convicted murderer from Weedsport, New York. In 2009, she was found guilty of murdering her then-husband David Castor with antifreeze in 2005 and attempting to murder her daughter, Ashley Wallace, by spiking her drinks with pills in 2007. In addition, she was suspected of having murdered her first husband, Michael Wallace, in 2000; his grave lay next to David's until the latter's remains were disinterred and buried elsewhere in 2016. The story made national news, and Castor was subsequently named the "Black Widow" by media outlets.
Nellie May Madison was an American woman who was convicted of murder in 1934 for killing her husband.
Larissa Schuster is an American convicted murderer who was sentenced to life in prison without parole in 2008 for committing the July 2003 murder of her estranged husband Timothy Schuster by submerging his body in hydrochloric acid. Due to the unusual manner in which she committed the murder, Larissa's case made national headlines. She has been dubbed "the Acid Lady" by various media outlets.
Kerry Lyn Dalton was convicted of first-degree murder in May 1995 and was sentenced to death by lethal injection the same year. Since her sentencing, she has been incarcerated at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla, California, awaiting her execution and appealing her death sentence. On May 16, 2019, the Supreme Court of California published their opinion on Dalton's automatic appeal. The Justices found the charge of lying-in-wait and the charge of conspiracy were invalid; therefore, they recommended that her sentence be 25 years to life. The California Supreme Court did not invalidate the third death-qualified charge against Dalton; therefore, she continues to be condemned. Although the Supreme Court issues opinions and can order a case to be re-tried, they do not enforce their opinions.
On May 24, 2013, Gabriel Fernandez, an eight-year-old boy from Palmdale, California, who had been abused and tortured over a period of months, died due to a beating from his mother, Pearl Fernandez, and her boyfriend, Isauro Aguirre, two days earlier. Pearl Fernandez and Isauro Aguirre were charged and convicted of first-degree murder with special circumstances of torture. According to prosecutors, Aguirre allegedly abused Gabriel due to his perceived homosexuality. Pearl was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole and Aguirre was sentenced to death.
