By Peter Fimrite and Sophie Haigney, San Francisco Chronicle
Mary Berwert’s childhood ended on June 25, 1979, when she was awakened by breathing and opened her eyes to find a masked man holding a knife against her throat.
She was 13, living what she remembers as an idyllic suburban life, when the man later identified as the East Area Rapist and Golden State Killer crept into her family’s home in the Rancho San Miguel neighborhood of Walnut Creek, tied her hands and feet with white twine and stuffed a bra in her mouth.
The prowler, identified by investigators last week as Joseph James DeAngelo, a 72-year-old ex-cop living quietly in Sacramento County, knew her sister was sleeping in the next room and her father was down the hall. He told her in “an evil scratchy whisper” that he would kill her and her family if she made a sound.
Before raping Berwert, he asked her if she had ever had sex.
“I had hearts and rainbows and clouds and the picture of the boy I had a crush on up on my wall,” Berwert, now 52, said in an interview Friday as she broke down in tears. “I was a little kid!”
The devastation left by the sadistic rapist and killer who rampaged across California from 1976 to 1986 lingers in his victims more than three decades after his last known crime. Berwert was among nine teenagers — including a 17-year-old in a house 100 feet away that same month — who were raped during the crime binge. Countless others have endured years of heartache after their family members were assaulted or killed.
DeAngelo, who is being held on double-murder charges in Sacramento, has been linked by DNA and other evidence to 12 slayings and at least 45 rapes, authorities said.
Debbi Domingo-McMullan was overjoyed when she learned of his arrest. There would finally be some justice for her mother, Cheri Domingo, who was slain with her boyfriend, Greg Sanchez, on July 27, 1981, in the Santa Barbara County community of Goleta.
Domingo-McMullan, who now lives in Texas, said that she and her mother were arguing that summer, and she eventually packed a backpack and left her mother’s house for about three weeks to stay with girlfriends, “basically being a brat.” She was horrified when she learned about her mother’s violent death and spent the next 20 years pretending her life was fine, though she knew it wasn’t.
“I had depression and drug addiction and you name it,” she said.
In 2001, an investigator told her that her mother’s case had been linked by DNA to the Golden State Killer. She became committed to seeing it solved. When the arrest was made, she said, it took a while to sink in.
“I have had some moments in the past 48 hours that I’ve allowed myself to break down and grieve and be grateful and soak into this overwhelming joy and gratitude,” she said.
“My biggest question is, how many other victims are there that we don’t know about? I have this belief in my gut that says, we’ve got these documented cases, the ransackings and the rapes and the murders, but how much more is out there that he did that we don’t know yet?”
The horror came flooding back for Berwert, too, when she heard about DeAngelo’s capture Wednesday while she was sitting on her couch sewing a quilt, with the television on in the background.
“That day that girl was gone. After that, I was never going to be the same,” she said. “He was a life-stealing, evil encroacher. He insinuated himself on my life and my family’s life and my community’s life, and so many other lives.”
Her memory of the assault is still vivid, terrifying. Berwert said the man in the mask ordered her to remain quiet when he left, so she waited silently for 45 minutes, saying to herself over and over, “mind over matter,” before she broke the ties on her legs and ran to her father’s room.
The look on her father’s face when she woke him up still haunts her. He jumped out of his bed and went to the phone to call police. Not knowing whether the rapist was still in the house, she tried to grab a kitchen knife, but her hands were still bound behind her.
“Get those things off her!” her father screamed to her sister, who quickly cut off the ties and hugged her until police arrived.
Investigators later told Berwert that the rapist had probably been watching her from a perch near the Eichler home, which had an open glass atrium and sat at the end of a long cul de sac.
Berwert said she tried to forget the attack and, with help from many friends and family members, dived into life with vigor, becoming a cheerleader.
“I just wanted to be a normal person, and I wasn’t going to let it stop me, but I felt I had a neon sign on my forehead,” she said. “It was a long time before I felt people couldn’t see it anymore.”
Her father never got over what had happened under his roof, she said. Arman Berwert died of a heart attack three years after the rape. He was only 49.
“I was his little girl. I believe it killed him,” she said, crying again. “He died with a broken heart.”
Berwert eventually forged a successful career in retail sales. The arrest, she said, has lifted a tremendous weight. If DeAngelo is convicted, she plans to cook popcorn and laugh heartily.
“He can sit and dwell on it until he dies,” Berwert said. “We’re now at the spot in the road where our paths are meeting again. I like my side of the road.”
Peter Fimrite and Sophie Haigney are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: pfimrite@sfchronicle.com, sophie.haigney@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @pfimrite, @SophieHaigney
COMMENTS