Was Randy Kraft A Serial Killer

Ben Stinnett

Mrs. Neuberger

Composition 2 P.1

March 9, 2023

Serial Killer Randy Kraft

Word count: 1905

One of many Randy Kraft mug shots.

Photograph by San Quentin Prison

Introduction

Randy Steven Kraft was a serial killer during the seventies and early eighties. Though if a person saw him walking about, they would not think he was a murderer. That is the thing, he had a darkness to him that no one saw til he was caught. He would murder young homosexual men, usually marines. The way he took their lives was either strangling or having them overdose on painkillers and alcohol. After their deaths, he dumped the bodies near highways, interstates, and freeways, normally in the ditch. This is his early, crimes, and the end of his spree.

Early

These charges would range from sexual mutilation and sodomy and theft (Rosewood 216) (SC 5). During his trial, the jury was horrified by the evidence against him. One juror even said that he looked like a completely normal man but was hiding a dark secret. There was a doctor who took the stand to try and explain what may have been Kraft’s motives for his crimes. The jury found him guilty and sentenced him to the death penalty. Yet to this day, Kraft is still sitting on Death Row in San Quentin Prison in California

He is trying to get an appeal on his case stating he did not murder anyone (Kiger). Noted by Rosewood, ¨There was a lot of suspicion that an accomplice participated in at least some of the murders, but nothing has ever come of this. Some of this speculation was based on the theory that it would have been too difficult for Kraft to move the dead bodies around on his own,¨ (217). Though he was convicted and all the evidence that was used pointed to him, Kraft was still sitting on Death Row awaiting his sentence to be carried out. He does get exercise and listens to music while waiting for his sentence to call his end (Kiger).

Conclusion

While Randy Kraft is currently sitting on Death Row in San Quentin, the effect of what he did are still felt by the victims’ families today. He still does not admit to committing any of the murders. He keeps trying for appeals to the sentence. Randy Kraft will go down as one of the United States mystories of why. He is currently seventy-seven years old. He has spent the past forty years in a jail cell. Out of those, the past thirty-four years have been on Death Row. He will most likely die on death row before he is