FL FL - Danny Rolling, Gainesville Ripper, 8 known victims LA/FL 1989-90
- Thread starter Beyond Belief
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Liz
I am not a chemist and this is not my 1st rodeo
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AdoraBlue, I definitely believe you and understand why you were so creeped out. I know the feeling.
The above quote pulled from the article RiverRat posted for AdoraBlue, and I can testify to that!
I lived in Gainesville at that time and it felt like endless months of terrorization by this unknown serial killer, who was lurking God only knew where. I would pull into my garage after work, and have my gun at the ready, in case this murdering man might sneak in before I could close the garage door. My b/f would come over at night and he'd be sitting next to me with his arm around me with the gun in his hand. Strange times!
When I first moved to Gainesville, from Miami, I lived at Gatorwood Apts where Manny Taboada and Tracy Paules were murdered by Rolling. That really creeped me out, too!
All five victims were such bright and wonderful students, who had such promising futures ahead of them. Such a waste of brilliance!
Just to pay proper respects to the victims, the 17 yr old victim's name is Christina Powell, not Christa, as was incorrectly stated in the article.
Yes, count me among those that are glad to know that that serial murdering monster will soon be taking a permanent dirt nap! My only regret would be that it didn't happen sooner!
The above quote pulled from the article RiverRat posted for AdoraBlue, and I can testify to that!
I lived in Gainesville at that time and it felt like endless months of terrorization by this unknown serial killer, who was lurking God only knew where. I would pull into my garage after work, and have my gun at the ready, in case this murdering man might sneak in before I could close the garage door. My b/f would come over at night and he'd be sitting next to me with his arm around me with the gun in his hand. Strange times!
When I first moved to Gainesville, from Miami, I lived at Gatorwood Apts where Manny Taboada and Tracy Paules were murdered by Rolling. That really creeped me out, too!
All five victims were such bright and wonderful students, who had such promising futures ahead of them. Such a waste of brilliance!
Just to pay proper respects to the victims, the 17 yr old victim's name is Christina Powell, not Christa, as was incorrectly stated in the article.
Yes, count me among those that are glad to know that that serial murdering monster will soon be taking a permanent dirt nap! My only regret would be that it didn't happen sooner!
RiverRat
Patsy Ramsey to the Left
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http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061021/APN/610210506
Dianna Hoyt, Christa Hoyt's stepmother, said Rolling's execution has been eagerly awaited by the victims' families. They are unanimous in their desire for him to die, and some will be inside the prison Wednesday to witness it.
"What he did was so horrendous, how he tortured our children," Hoyt said. "I think this man can still find enjoyment from that. I just need his mind put to sleep. I don't need him thinking about it anymore."
Sadie Darnell, who was the police department's media spokeswoman at the time and developed enduring friendships with the victims' families, said Rolling's execution still matters, even if it also provides him more of the notoriety he sought.
"It symbolizes retribution," said Darnell, now a candidate for Alachua County sheriff. "It does not symbolize closure for any of the family members. Retribution, though, is important because it represents that our society is holding that person accountable."
Today's UF students may know the names of the victims only because they have remained painted all these years on a panel of a landmark graffiti wall on the western edge of campus. Several years ago, UF fraternities took on the responsibility of preserving the memorial.
"It's an important reminder for everyone to be careful and to be safe," said Christopher Bucciarelli, president of the UF Interfraternity Council. "And it's part of University of Florida history."
Dianna Hoyt, Christa Hoyt's stepmother, said Rolling's execution has been eagerly awaited by the victims' families. They are unanimous in their desire for him to die, and some will be inside the prison Wednesday to witness it.
"What he did was so horrendous, how he tortured our children," Hoyt said. "I think this man can still find enjoyment from that. I just need his mind put to sleep. I don't need him thinking about it anymore."
Sadie Darnell, who was the police department's media spokeswoman at the time and developed enduring friendships with the victims' families, said Rolling's execution still matters, even if it also provides him more of the notoriety he sought.
"It symbolizes retribution," said Darnell, now a candidate for Alachua County sheriff. "It does not symbolize closure for any of the family members. Retribution, though, is important because it represents that our society is holding that person accountable."
Today's UF students may know the names of the victims only because they have remained painted all these years on a panel of a landmark graffiti wall on the western edge of campus. Several years ago, UF fraternities took on the responsibility of preserving the memorial.
"It's an important reminder for everyone to be careful and to be safe," said Christopher Bucciarelli, president of the UF Interfraternity Council. "And it's part of University of Florida history."
txsvicki
Active Member
GlitchWizard said:
A boy that lived in my neighborhood and was friends with my first boyfriend, and a man that attended a church I went both brutally killed young women and have been put to death by Texas. After I once had a window peeper and found an odd symbol carved into the dirt outside my window another time, I have been scared ever since that some serial killer is around. My husband thinks that my brain is "saturated" with this crime stuff and that I need to quit reading these forums. I can only imagine the horror of actually seeing Danny Rolling in the neighborhood every day.
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It is about time for him to be gone from this planet. Actually, it's past time.
That remark about Jeb Bush was totally uncalled for IMO. He's upholding the law of the State of Florida. It's his job.
That remark about Jeb Bush was totally uncalled for IMO. He's upholding the law of the State of Florida. It's his job.
concernedperson
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the original tez said:
I agree. The brutality of Rolling's murders would have only continued had he be given the chance. There is evil...not just a wire loose...but evil. Sometimes it is generational hatred inbred.But it exists.
The laws of the land are monitored by the voters. Anytime a voter disagrees than they should follow up and ask their lawmakers to intercede.
In the interim Bush should comply as most of his electorate is behind him.
RiverRat
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Rolling 'calm' before execution for Gainesville serial killings
BY RON WORD
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
Danny Harold Rolling, the state's most notorious serial killer since Ted Bundy, was "remarkably calm" as he awaited his execution for the grisly 1990 slayings of five college students in Gainesville, his attorney said Tuesday.
Danny Harold Rolling, 52, is scheduled to die at 6 p.m. Wednesday for a reign of terror that paralyzed Gainesville as the University of Florida's fall semester was beginning.
"He was remarkably calm. He is a lot calmer than his lawyers are," said Baya Harrison, his appeals lawyer. He said Rolling told him: "I don't want to die, but it looks like I'm going to die." :boohoo:
His execution is reopening old wounds for some of the victims' families. Several relatives plan to watch the execution at Florida State Prison in Starke, including Diana Hoyt, the stepmother of Christa Hoyt.
"This is a tough thing, but is a necessary thing to go through," she said. "This is the final thing we can do for Christa and for my late husband and her dad, Gary."
"It is very hard for us to see someone else die," she said. "But, he deserves it."
The students' bodies, some mutilated, posed and sexually assaulted, were found over a three-day period in August and September 1990. The killing spree touched off a massive manhunt, causing students to cower in fear and purchase weapons as the killer remained unidentified.
Rolling was jailed for a supermarket robbery when investigators used DNA to link him to the killings months later. When he was finally scheduled to go on trial in 1994, he shocked the courtroom by pleading guilty to the five slayings.
"There are some things you just can't run from, this being one of those," Rolling told Circuit Judge Stan R. Morris, who accepted the pleas and found him guilty.
Rolling's remaining appeal contends that the chemicals used in Florida's execution process can cause severe pain. It is before the U.S. Supreme Court, which has turned down the same arguments in two other Florida executions this fall. :boohoo:
Harrison does not believe he will be able to halt the execution. :boohoo:
"It's tough, we are down to the last effort," Harrison said. "I'm not hopeful, to tell you the truth." :boohoo:
Crowds are expected outside the prison Wednesday, with possibly the largest turnout since Bundy's execution. He was suspected in the deaths and disappearances of 36 women across the country. He was electrocuted Jan. 24, 1989, in the same death chamber where Rolling will die by lethal injection.
That case was still fresh in the minds of many when Rolling's killings began the next year in roughly the same area as some of Bundy's.
Sonja Larson, 18, and Christi Powell, 16 were stabbed to death on a Sunday afternoon in 1990, in a townhouse just off the University of Florida campus. Hoyt, who had been decapitated, was found the next morning in her isolated duplex; and Tracy Paules and Manny Taboada, were discovered dead a day later at Gatorwood Apartments.
Authorities in Rolling's hometown of Shreveport, La., investigating a triple slaying that they believe he committed later suggested to a task force that it should check out the drifter and ex-con. The DNA left at the crime scenes in Gainesville matched genetic material police recovered from Rolling during some dental work.
Throughout the years, Rolling has insisted he was not as atrocious as many thought.
In a letter to The Associated Press in 2002, Rolling wrote, "I assure you I am not a salivating ogre. Granted ... time's past; the dark era of long ago - Dr. Jeckle & Mr. Hyde did strike up & down the corridors of insanety."
Rolling claimed he had good and bad multiple personalities. He blamed the murders on abuse he suffered as a child from his police officer father and his treatment in prison. He said he killed one person for every year he was behind bars. He served a total of eight years in Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi before the killings.
BY RON WORD
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
Danny Harold Rolling, the state's most notorious serial killer since Ted Bundy, was "remarkably calm" as he awaited his execution for the grisly 1990 slayings of five college students in Gainesville, his attorney said Tuesday.
Danny Harold Rolling, 52, is scheduled to die at 6 p.m. Wednesday for a reign of terror that paralyzed Gainesville as the University of Florida's fall semester was beginning.
"He was remarkably calm. He is a lot calmer than his lawyers are," said Baya Harrison, his appeals lawyer. He said Rolling told him: "I don't want to die, but it looks like I'm going to die." :boohoo:
His execution is reopening old wounds for some of the victims' families. Several relatives plan to watch the execution at Florida State Prison in Starke, including Diana Hoyt, the stepmother of Christa Hoyt.
"This is a tough thing, but is a necessary thing to go through," she said. "This is the final thing we can do for Christa and for my late husband and her dad, Gary."
"It is very hard for us to see someone else die," she said. "But, he deserves it."
The students' bodies, some mutilated, posed and sexually assaulted, were found over a three-day period in August and September 1990. The killing spree touched off a massive manhunt, causing students to cower in fear and purchase weapons as the killer remained unidentified.
Rolling was jailed for a supermarket robbery when investigators used DNA to link him to the killings months later. When he was finally scheduled to go on trial in 1994, he shocked the courtroom by pleading guilty to the five slayings.
"There are some things you just can't run from, this being one of those," Rolling told Circuit Judge Stan R. Morris, who accepted the pleas and found him guilty.
Rolling's remaining appeal contends that the chemicals used in Florida's execution process can cause severe pain. It is before the U.S. Supreme Court, which has turned down the same arguments in two other Florida executions this fall. :boohoo:
Harrison does not believe he will be able to halt the execution. :boohoo:
"It's tough, we are down to the last effort," Harrison said. "I'm not hopeful, to tell you the truth." :boohoo:
Crowds are expected outside the prison Wednesday, with possibly the largest turnout since Bundy's execution. He was suspected in the deaths and disappearances of 36 women across the country. He was electrocuted Jan. 24, 1989, in the same death chamber where Rolling will die by lethal injection.
That case was still fresh in the minds of many when Rolling's killings began the next year in roughly the same area as some of Bundy's.
Sonja Larson, 18, and Christi Powell, 16 were stabbed to death on a Sunday afternoon in 1990, in a townhouse just off the University of Florida campus. Hoyt, who had been decapitated, was found the next morning in her isolated duplex; and Tracy Paules and Manny Taboada, were discovered dead a day later at Gatorwood Apartments.
Authorities in Rolling's hometown of Shreveport, La., investigating a triple slaying that they believe he committed later suggested to a task force that it should check out the drifter and ex-con. The DNA left at the crime scenes in Gainesville matched genetic material police recovered from Rolling during some dental work.
Throughout the years, Rolling has insisted he was not as atrocious as many thought.
In a letter to The Associated Press in 2002, Rolling wrote, "I assure you I am not a salivating ogre. Granted ... time's past; the dark era of long ago - Dr. Jeckle & Mr. Hyde did strike up & down the corridors of insanety."
Rolling claimed he had good and bad multiple personalities. He blamed the murders on abuse he suffered as a child from his police officer father and his treatment in prison. He said he killed one person for every year he was behind bars. He served a total of eight years in Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi before the killings.
WISCer
Former Member
I, too, lived in Shreveport during that time. I even attended, on occasion, the same church Rolling did as a teen. I believe the time has long since come and gone for his punishment for the crimes he committed. My one wish is that he would, for once in his life be a man and, confess to the Gissom murders...so there could be some closure to that case. To the best of my knowledge, he was never charged with their murders.
AdoraBlue said:I, too, have been waiting for this for a long time.
And before I start, I will ask everyone also to remember Danny Rolling's victims in Louisiana (although he was never brought back to his hometown, Shreveport, LA, for prosecution):
Julie Grissom
Tom Grissom
Sean Grissom
Okay, here goes (and please forgive my rambling) . Back in 1988-89 I lived with my husband and two small children on the same block in Shreveport, Louisiana as Danny Rolling. I moved from that neighborhood in approximately July 1989, several months before he murdered the Grissom family.
One day I began to notice that every day this guy would be out in his yard (a police car was parked there, so who would think anything sinister?) waving at me on my way home from work and from picking up my babies from childcare. Well, being the naive country girl I was at that time, naturally I returned his waves (that is what Southern country people do). I never gave it a second thought, didn't even bother mentioning to my husband. The only time I ever heard anything else mentioned about him was when my husband and our neighbor (who both had muscle cars) would talk about the guy on the corner with the nice-looking Chevelle. They even tried to approach him once for "car talk," but my husband said he just gave them the brushoff and they said well, screw him, whatever.
Well, time rocks along and we move to another neighborhood, and then we hear about the heinous murders of the Grissom family. I distinctly remember that my husband was working the graveyard shift then and I had him install a double deadbolt on our back door, which had windows in it. Then, we heard news reports about some guy named Danny Rolling shooting his father, a policeman, and fleeing. I had no idea who this was and didn't pay much attention to it at all, just another story on the news. Then after the Gainesville murders and Danny Rolling's subsequent arrest, my husband said "Don't you remember that guy, he's the one who lived on the corner and had that old Chevelle?" I said, "You mean the one who used to wave at me every day on my way home from work? I thought he was just a friendly neighborhood guy." Needless to say, that was not the case. At that time, it creeped me out pretty bad.
Well, more time passes and we move back to our hometown in the country to get our children away from the city schools. Anywho, my husband had subsequently gone into cable/satellite TV work and we had one of those monstrous 10-feet satellite dishes and my husband knew how to tune it to all kinds of programming besides just your regular cable channels. One day while transponder-surfing, he came upon this FBI training video that was being broadcast to local LE departments regarding the Gainesville and Shreveport murders. My husband kept trying to get me to watch, but I couldn't bring myself to watch because I kept thinking about how Danny Rolling had waited for me every day, just to wave at me, just too creepy for me. The video showed the Shreveport crime scenes and (I think) even LE interviews with Rolling. On the video, it was disclosed that Rolling would break into neighborhood houses, rummage around, fix himself a sandwich, take a bite out of the sandwich and place it back in the refrigerator, and maybe steal some panties or something equally perverted.
Okay, so then my husband reminded me of the time we were out of town for a few days, came home and found our kitchen window had been broken and there was a half-eaten sandwich in the refrigerator. My husband had thought at the time that one of his buddies who had a house key had done it for a joke or maybe even been hungry, but no one ever owned up to it, and we just kind of blew it off and thought the window maybe had been broken before and we just hadn't noticed it. (Remember the naive country kids part here).
I just kind of was completely shocked and to this day I have never read any of the books written about and by Danny Rolling, for fear of what I might find. I am also hesitant to share this story because it sounds so implausible, but every word is 100% true. I was also always hesitant to put it out on the web cause what if Rolling somehow escaped death row and hunted me down?
So for everyone who believes that evil in the heart, no matter what the cause, should be coddled and excused, I think you are tragically wrong. My family could have easily been four more victims of Daniel Harold Rolling.
I, for one, will feel relief and and some sense of closure when this pseudohuman is exterminated.
RiverRat
Patsy Ramsey to the Left
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SARASOTA -- When Florida State Prison executioners begin flushing poisonous sodium pentothal into the veins of Danny Rolling today in Starke, Janet Frake suspects she'll be right here, at Sarasota Moose Lodge No. 1319 with her husband and friends.
As the last known survivor of an assault by the convicted serial killer, Frake has yet to wring any meaning from being raped 16 years ago.
"Well, bad things happen to good people," she says, attempting to readjust her smile amid a fresh flow of tears. "But I think the good always survives. And if they say about me, when I die, that I was a good person, that I was good friend, then I'll be happy with that."
Rolling, 52, is scheduled to be executed today at 6 p.m. for murdering and mutilating five college students in Gainesville in 1990.
Within a 48-hour killing spree in late August of that year, the robber/drifter from Louisiana left five students dead -- Sonja Larson, Christina Powell, Christa Hoyt, Tracy Paules and Manny Taboada -- and the University of Florida in a state of panic.
Given Starke's proximity to Gainesville, prison authorities are bracing for the biggest execution crowds since "Chi Omega Killer" Ted Bundy was electrocuted in 1989.
Arrested within weeks of the Gainesville murders for armed robbery of a convenience store, Rolling languished in jail for more than a year before being indicted on five-count murder charges. He pleaded guilty in 1994 and was sentenced to die the same year. The Shreveport, La., native also confessed to, but was never tried for, killing three people in his hometown during November 1989.
Although Rolling never admitted to raping Janet Frake, in a 1997 autobiography called "The Making of a Serial Killer" co-authored by crime writer Sondra London, he described a sexual assault on an unnamed Sarasota resident shortly before he fled to Gainesville.
But Sarasota Police Sgt. Bob Gorevan connected the dots against Rolling a year earlier -- thanks to some improvisation by his victim on the evening of Aug. 5, 1990.
"If it wasn't for the fact that she was able to change (Rolling's) mindset, Janet would be dead right now," says the 25-year law enforcement veteran. "I've been in plenty of high-stress situations, but I've never been a victim before. I don't know how she did it, but she did everything right."
Frake, a real estate agent, went public in 1997 "because I have nothing to be ashamed of," and to help other rape victims who suffer in silence.
She declined to have her photograph taken for this article because "I'm done; I'm over it" with having her face in the media. But she agreed to talk again as a reminder for all victims of sexual assault.
"What I encountered that night was pure evil," she says. "That's what it was -- pure evil."
Frake was between jobs and living within walking distance of the Cabana Inn off Tamiami Trail when Rolling struck. Rolling had blown into Sarasota on July 22 and eventually set a random course for Clematis Street, where the 30-year-old Frake shared a two-bedroom house with two cats.
Returning from a run to a video store, Frake had picked up a six-pack of Keystone Gold beer -- "Thank God for that" -- on her way home. She had been home for roughly two hours when Rolling -- having slipped in through a bedroom window -- attacked her in the bathroom with a hunting knife. Wearing leather gloves and a black ski mask, Rolling bound and gagged her with duct tape.
"At first I didn't think it was real; I thought somebody was playing a joke on me," Frake recalls. "But there was just so much rage in him, so much anger.
"I've read there is no right way to deal with rape, that you can take self-defense classes and try to defend yourself, or you can try to be smarter. Well, there was no way I was going to beat this guy. I was tied up and he had locked all the doors.
"So I decided to stay as calm as I could."
A devotee of murder mysteries and true-crime non-fiction authors such as Ann Rule, Frake created an opportunity shortly after Rolling told her he planned "to do this all night."
She said she had some cold beer in the refrigerator, and would he like to take a break?
"And it was weird," Frake says. "He went from one of the meanest, scariest, most violent sons of
you could ever imagine to being really calm and relaxed."
Rolling ordered Frake to shower off, but she cleaned up with a towel first to collect DNA samples, then tossed the evidence behind the toilet. She poured him his beer in a glass, hoping Rolling would leave fingerprints behind (he didn't).
He placed his knife in her lap, but she told him to take it away. When he asked if he could remove his ski mask, she told him no, keep it on, she didn't want to see his face (fearing he would kill her).
"I don't know why he asked permission about the mask," Frake recalls. "It was almost like I was his girlfriend now. You know what he told me? He said, 'You would really like to date me if the circumstances were different.'"
Omitting key details, such as having shot his own abusive father in the head several months earlier, Rolling told her about his miserable childhood, and Frake pretended to commiserate by sharing bogus tales of her own past.
"I lied out my," she recalls. "I couldn't have asked for better family and friends than I had growing up. I'm telling you, I should've gotten an Oscar that night."
Frake lost track of time. The attack itself "could've lasted an hour, or it might've been five minutes; I have no idea." But by roughly 1:30 that morning, she was exhausted and talked-out, and suggested it was time for Rolling to leave.
"The last thing he said was, 'Would you do me a favor? Would you give me 10 minutes before you call the cops?'"
Then Danny Rolling vanished into the night forever.
Or so she thought. Until she saw him on television in 1994, pleading guilty to murder and serenading Sondra London in a courtroom.
"I knew it immediately, just by listening to his voice and watching his body language," Frake said. "That's the guy who raped me."
But the police didn't confirm it until 1996 when, upon attending a seminar in Tampa conducted by the task force that nailed Rolling, Gorevan learned that Rolling had mentioned raping someone in Sarasota.
Gorevan sent Frake's evidence to the FBI for analysis, which confirmed what Frake already. Local authorities, however, were convinced Frake's perpetrator was a serial rapist named John Waterman, who was already behind bars for murder.
"What were the odds of two serial rapists, dressing up like ninjas, operating in the same area," Gorevan wonders.
Frake was in for another shock in 1997 when she learned that the Rolling/London collaboration was on shelves at Barnes & Noble Booksellers. When she read the excerpt about his attack on her ("It was really weird," Rolling wrote, "almost as though she was entertaining a welcome guest instead of a rapist"), Frake says "I fell to my knees. It made me nauseous."
The state of Florida placed a lien on book proceeds under "Son of Sam" laws that prohibit criminals from profiteering from their acts. She also attempted to sue Rolling for $1 million in civil court for damages, but the case was dismissed due to statute of limitations expiration.
But today, Frake is proud of the response she got from rape victims around the country. "I couldn't do much for them other than listen," she recalls. "But they needed to talk. When something like this happens, you do need to talk."
Frake spent several months after the attack sleeping under her dining-room table with a knife by her side. She attended therapy sessions that culminated with her writing a letter to Rolling, then burning it.
But she also recorded a videotape for Rolling in which she vented her anger. Gorevan delivered it to Florida State Prison, but Rolling refused to watch it.
If she needed a reaffirmation of humanity following the attack, it came during an appearance on a TV show hosted by Leeza Gibbons. That's when "they surprised me" by having two members of the audience step forward. They were Ada Larson, victim Sonja Larson's mother, and Ann Garren, victim Christa Hoyt's mom.
Frake has to pause to brush away more tears.
"They came all the way to California to be by my side," she says. "They didn't have to do that. For years after that, I was sending them Mother's Day cards because they were so good to me."
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061025/FEATURES/610250322
As the last known survivor of an assault by the convicted serial killer, Frake has yet to wring any meaning from being raped 16 years ago.
"Well, bad things happen to good people," she says, attempting to readjust her smile amid a fresh flow of tears. "But I think the good always survives. And if they say about me, when I die, that I was a good person, that I was good friend, then I'll be happy with that."
Rolling, 52, is scheduled to be executed today at 6 p.m. for murdering and mutilating five college students in Gainesville in 1990.
Within a 48-hour killing spree in late August of that year, the robber/drifter from Louisiana left five students dead -- Sonja Larson, Christina Powell, Christa Hoyt, Tracy Paules and Manny Taboada -- and the University of Florida in a state of panic.
Given Starke's proximity to Gainesville, prison authorities are bracing for the biggest execution crowds since "Chi Omega Killer" Ted Bundy was electrocuted in 1989.
Arrested within weeks of the Gainesville murders for armed robbery of a convenience store, Rolling languished in jail for more than a year before being indicted on five-count murder charges. He pleaded guilty in 1994 and was sentenced to die the same year. The Shreveport, La., native also confessed to, but was never tried for, killing three people in his hometown during November 1989.
Although Rolling never admitted to raping Janet Frake, in a 1997 autobiography called "The Making of a Serial Killer" co-authored by crime writer Sondra London, he described a sexual assault on an unnamed Sarasota resident shortly before he fled to Gainesville.
But Sarasota Police Sgt. Bob Gorevan connected the dots against Rolling a year earlier -- thanks to some improvisation by his victim on the evening of Aug. 5, 1990.
"If it wasn't for the fact that she was able to change (Rolling's) mindset, Janet would be dead right now," says the 25-year law enforcement veteran. "I've been in plenty of high-stress situations, but I've never been a victim before. I don't know how she did it, but she did everything right."
Frake, a real estate agent, went public in 1997 "because I have nothing to be ashamed of," and to help other rape victims who suffer in silence.
She declined to have her photograph taken for this article because "I'm done; I'm over it" with having her face in the media. But she agreed to talk again as a reminder for all victims of sexual assault.
"What I encountered that night was pure evil," she says. "That's what it was -- pure evil."
Frake was between jobs and living within walking distance of the Cabana Inn off Tamiami Trail when Rolling struck. Rolling had blown into Sarasota on July 22 and eventually set a random course for Clematis Street, where the 30-year-old Frake shared a two-bedroom house with two cats.
Returning from a run to a video store, Frake had picked up a six-pack of Keystone Gold beer -- "Thank God for that" -- on her way home. She had been home for roughly two hours when Rolling -- having slipped in through a bedroom window -- attacked her in the bathroom with a hunting knife. Wearing leather gloves and a black ski mask, Rolling bound and gagged her with duct tape.
"At first I didn't think it was real; I thought somebody was playing a joke on me," Frake recalls. "But there was just so much rage in him, so much anger.
"I've read there is no right way to deal with rape, that you can take self-defense classes and try to defend yourself, or you can try to be smarter. Well, there was no way I was going to beat this guy. I was tied up and he had locked all the doors.
"So I decided to stay as calm as I could."
A devotee of murder mysteries and true-crime non-fiction authors such as Ann Rule, Frake created an opportunity shortly after Rolling told her he planned "to do this all night."
She said she had some cold beer in the refrigerator, and would he like to take a break?
"And it was weird," Frake says. "He went from one of the meanest, scariest, most violent sons of
you could ever imagine to being really calm and relaxed."Rolling ordered Frake to shower off, but she cleaned up with a towel first to collect DNA samples, then tossed the evidence behind the toilet. She poured him his beer in a glass, hoping Rolling would leave fingerprints behind (he didn't).
He placed his knife in her lap, but she told him to take it away. When he asked if he could remove his ski mask, she told him no, keep it on, she didn't want to see his face (fearing he would kill her).
"I don't know why he asked permission about the mask," Frake recalls. "It was almost like I was his girlfriend now. You know what he told me? He said, 'You would really like to date me if the circumstances were different.'"
Omitting key details, such as having shot his own abusive father in the head several months earlier, Rolling told her about his miserable childhood, and Frake pretended to commiserate by sharing bogus tales of her own past.
"I lied out my
," she recalls. "I couldn't have asked for better family and friends than I had growing up. I'm telling you, I should've gotten an Oscar that night."Frake lost track of time. The attack itself "could've lasted an hour, or it might've been five minutes; I have no idea." But by roughly 1:30 that morning, she was exhausted and talked-out, and suggested it was time for Rolling to leave.
"The last thing he said was, 'Would you do me a favor? Would you give me 10 minutes before you call the cops?'"
Then Danny Rolling vanished into the night forever.
Or so she thought. Until she saw him on television in 1994, pleading guilty to murder and serenading Sondra London in a courtroom.
"I knew it immediately, just by listening to his voice and watching his body language," Frake said. "That's the guy who raped me."
But the police didn't confirm it until 1996 when, upon attending a seminar in Tampa conducted by the task force that nailed Rolling, Gorevan learned that Rolling had mentioned raping someone in Sarasota.
Gorevan sent Frake's evidence to the FBI for analysis, which confirmed what Frake already. Local authorities, however, were convinced Frake's perpetrator was a serial rapist named John Waterman, who was already behind bars for murder.
"What were the odds of two serial rapists, dressing up like ninjas, operating in the same area," Gorevan wonders.
Frake was in for another shock in 1997 when she learned that the Rolling/London collaboration was on shelves at Barnes & Noble Booksellers. When she read the excerpt about his attack on her ("It was really weird," Rolling wrote, "almost as though she was entertaining a welcome guest instead of a rapist"), Frake says "I fell to my knees. It made me nauseous."
The state of Florida placed a lien on book proceeds under "Son of Sam" laws that prohibit criminals from profiteering from their acts. She also attempted to sue Rolling for $1 million in civil court for damages, but the case was dismissed due to statute of limitations expiration.
But today, Frake is proud of the response she got from rape victims around the country. "I couldn't do much for them other than listen," she recalls. "But they needed to talk. When something like this happens, you do need to talk."
Frake spent several months after the attack sleeping under her dining-room table with a knife by her side. She attended therapy sessions that culminated with her writing a letter to Rolling, then burning it.
But she also recorded a videotape for Rolling in which she vented her anger. Gorevan delivered it to Florida State Prison, but Rolling refused to watch it.
If she needed a reaffirmation of humanity following the attack, it came during an appearance on a TV show hosted by Leeza Gibbons. That's when "they surprised me" by having two members of the audience step forward. They were Ada Larson, victim Sonja Larson's mother, and Ann Garren, victim Christa Hoyt's mom.
Frake has to pause to brush away more tears.
"They came all the way to California to be by my side," she says. "They didn't have to do that. For years after that, I was sending them Mother's Day cards because they were so good to me."
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061025/FEATURES/610250322
RiverRat
Patsy Ramsey to the Left
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1990
July 22 Danny Rolling arrives in Sarasota from Tallahassee. He stays in Sarasota for nearly a month, mostly at the Cabana Inn and the Sunnyside Motel.
Aug. 5 Real estate agent Janet Frake is raped in her home on Clematis Street in Sarasota.
Aug. 26 In Gainesville, the mutilated bodies of Christina Powell, 17, of Jacksonville and Sonja Larson, 18, of Deerfield Beach are found in their apartment.
Aug. 27 The decapitated body of Christa Hoyt, 18, of Archer is found in her Gainesville apartment. First Union Bank branch in Gainesville is held up by an armed robber.
Aug. 28 The bodies of Manuel Taboada of Carol City and Tracy Paules of Miami, both 23, are found in their apartment. A knife was the murder weapon.
Aug. 30 Amid a campus panic, UF freshman Ed Humphrey, 18, is identified as a top suspect. The scar-faced student, who suffers from mental illness, is accused of battering his grandmother in Brevard County and arrested.
Oct. 10 Humphrey is found guilty and sentenced to 22 months in prison.
1991
Jan. 24 Rolling, jailed in Ocala on charges he robbed a grocery store, becomes the prime suspect in the student murders. Authorities say they have DNA evidence linking Rolling to the killings.
Sept. 18 Rolling is sentenced to life in prison as a habitual offender for the robbery of an Ocala Winn-Dixie on Sept. 7, 1990. Humphrey is released after 13 months behind bars and insists he played no part in the Gainesville cases.
Nov. 15 Rolling is indicted on five counts of first-degree murder, three counts of sexual battery and armed burglary.
1994
Feb. 15 Rolling pleads guilty to five Gainesville murders, three sexual assaults and three burglaries.
March Rolling is linked to the murders of three people in his hometown of Shreveport, La., on Nov. 4, 1989, nearly a year before the Sarasota rape and the Gainesville murders.
April 20 Rolling is sentenced to death. The sentence means Rolling won't be prosecuted in the Louisiana murders because he's already on death row.
1996
July DNA tests, triggered by Sarasota police Detective Robert Gorevan, indicate Rolling raped Frake.
November "The Making of a Serial Killer," written by Rolling and former New College student Sondra London, is published by Oregon-based Feral House. In it, Rolling describes raping a woman in Sarasota.
1997
March 20 Court upholds that Rolling should die in the electric chair, although he still can appeal in state and federal courts.
April A judge grants a temporary injunction, freezing money that Rolling and London could earn from the sale of books, autographs, drawings and other merchandise sold over the Internet. A hearing will be held this year as to who will get any profits.
May 14 After consulting with Frake, prosecutors in Sarasota decide not to take Rolling to trial because he's already on death row. They also determine that bringing him to Sarasota could pose security risks.
May 16 Frake files a lawsuit against Rolling seeking $1 million.
Dec. 4 Case is dismissed based upon Florida Supreme Court ruling that the statute of limitations for such civil litigation has expired.
2006
June 26 U.S. Supreme Court refuses to hear Rolling's appeal.
Oct. 9 Gainesville trial judge denies new Rolling appeal.
Oct. 18 Florida Supreme Court upholds trial judge's ruling.
Oct. 20 Federal appeals court denies Rolling's appeal.
Today Danny Rolling is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison.
July 22 Danny Rolling arrives in Sarasota from Tallahassee. He stays in Sarasota for nearly a month, mostly at the Cabana Inn and the Sunnyside Motel.
Aug. 5 Real estate agent Janet Frake is raped in her home on Clematis Street in Sarasota.
Aug. 26 In Gainesville, the mutilated bodies of Christina Powell, 17, of Jacksonville and Sonja Larson, 18, of Deerfield Beach are found in their apartment.
Aug. 27 The decapitated body of Christa Hoyt, 18, of Archer is found in her Gainesville apartment. First Union Bank branch in Gainesville is held up by an armed robber.
Aug. 28 The bodies of Manuel Taboada of Carol City and Tracy Paules of Miami, both 23, are found in their apartment. A knife was the murder weapon.
Aug. 30 Amid a campus panic, UF freshman Ed Humphrey, 18, is identified as a top suspect. The scar-faced student, who suffers from mental illness, is accused of battering his grandmother in Brevard County and arrested.
Oct. 10 Humphrey is found guilty and sentenced to 22 months in prison.
1991
Jan. 24 Rolling, jailed in Ocala on charges he robbed a grocery store, becomes the prime suspect in the student murders. Authorities say they have DNA evidence linking Rolling to the killings.
Sept. 18 Rolling is sentenced to life in prison as a habitual offender for the robbery of an Ocala Winn-Dixie on Sept. 7, 1990. Humphrey is released after 13 months behind bars and insists he played no part in the Gainesville cases.
Nov. 15 Rolling is indicted on five counts of first-degree murder, three counts of sexual battery and armed burglary.
1994
Feb. 15 Rolling pleads guilty to five Gainesville murders, three sexual assaults and three burglaries.
March Rolling is linked to the murders of three people in his hometown of Shreveport, La., on Nov. 4, 1989, nearly a year before the Sarasota rape and the Gainesville murders.
April 20 Rolling is sentenced to death. The sentence means Rolling won't be prosecuted in the Louisiana murders because he's already on death row.
1996
July DNA tests, triggered by Sarasota police Detective Robert Gorevan, indicate Rolling raped Frake.
November "The Making of a Serial Killer," written by Rolling and former New College student Sondra London, is published by Oregon-based Feral House. In it, Rolling describes raping a woman in Sarasota.
1997
March 20 Court upholds that Rolling should die in the electric chair, although he still can appeal in state and federal courts.
April A judge grants a temporary injunction, freezing money that Rolling and London could earn from the sale of books, autographs, drawings and other merchandise sold over the Internet. A hearing will be held this year as to who will get any profits.
May 14 After consulting with Frake, prosecutors in Sarasota decide not to take Rolling to trial because he's already on death row. They also determine that bringing him to Sarasota could pose security risks.
May 16 Frake files a lawsuit against Rolling seeking $1 million.
Dec. 4 Case is dismissed based upon Florida Supreme Court ruling that the statute of limitations for such civil litigation has expired.
2006
June 26 U.S. Supreme Court refuses to hear Rolling's appeal.
Oct. 9 Gainesville trial judge denies new Rolling appeal.
Oct. 18 Florida Supreme Court upholds trial judge's ruling.
Oct. 20 Federal appeals court denies Rolling's appeal.
Today Danny Rolling is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison.
13th Juror
Inactive
According to our local TV news ...
Rolling enjoyed his last meal earlier today in Florida's Raiford State Prison.
On his chosen menu .. lobster tails, butterfly shrimp, baked potato, cherry cheesecake and sweet tea.
Why prison officials allow monsters like Rolling to order a "special" & expensive meal on the taxpayers dime is just beyond my comprehension!! And it makes me angry!
Like others here on our WS forum - I remember living through this whole horrendous nitemare back in Aug.-Sept of 1990.
My youngest son was a freshman in a college prep school here in the Orlando area & just beginning to look into future colleges. (Like many families, we made numerous college scouting trips during his high school years, but this was the first one.)
My niece was an brand new freshman entering the Univ. of Fla. My sister & I, along with my 14 yr. old son, made the trip up to Gainesville with all my niece's furniture n' stuff that same terrifying week of the murders. Within a week's time, my niece was so totally spooked by the gruesome news reports and with "no suspect in custody" that she couldn't feel comfortable in her new apartment. Not to mention, how we, here at home, were handling the investigation's daily coverage! Gotta say - we were all rather relieved when she requested that we come back & help her move back home. We did so immediately.
God Bless all the many victims of this evil monster's hideous rape & murder spree. He touched so many lives .. and none in a positive way.
You can bet that when 6 pm rolls around - I'll be one of many celebrating Rolling's departure from this life.
13th Juror
jannuncutt
jannuncutt
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FYI - Last meals for death row inmates may cost no more than $40.00 and must be purchased locally.13th Juror said:
http://www.dc.state.fl.us/oth/deathrow/
Liz
I am not a chemist and this is not my 1st rodeo
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A rather interesting article from yesterday.
Reporter's Notebook: Danny Rolling's Execution
Jeff Weinsier, Local 10 Reporter
The Night Before Death
Tuesday: It's almost here. The day many people in Gainesville have been waiting for.
It's amazing how this story has come full circle for me. I was at every murder scene, covered searches, covered hearings, trials, and became friends with many of the victims' families. Now I will get to see, actually watch, Rolling die. I can't wait.
That may not sound right to some, and it's not that
I want to witness anyone die, but this is about justice.
The system has taken too long in this case. He admitted it.
Cutting up bodies, posing them in certain positions for effect... These were innocent victims.
What will he say? How will he look? I will let you know exactly what happens tomorrow night.
More:
http://www.local6.com/news/10152707/detail.html
Reporter's Notebook: Danny Rolling's Execution
Jeff Weinsier, Local 10 Reporter
The Night Before Death
Tuesday: It's almost here. The day many people in Gainesville have been waiting for.
It's amazing how this story has come full circle for me. I was at every murder scene, covered searches, covered hearings, trials, and became friends with many of the victims' families. Now I will get to see, actually watch, Rolling die. I can't wait.
That may not sound right to some, and it's not that
I want to witness anyone die, but this is about justice.
The system has taken too long in this case. He admitted it.
Cutting up bodies, posing them in certain positions for effect... These were innocent victims.
What will he say? How will he look? I will let you know exactly what happens tomorrow night.
More:
http://www.local6.com/news/10152707/detail.html
Liz
I am not a chemist and this is not my 1st rodeo
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scandi said:
Me neither, Scandi! I think Jeff is the only reporter allowed in to actually observe the execution. I'll try to post it, but if someone beats me to it --- no prob!
Here's another article, to pass the time, as we await the long awaited execution. I think the coward took the optional valium, IF the footage shown on CourtTv was current of Rolling ... he appeared to be dozing as he sat there, allegedly speaking with his brother and I guess his spiritual advisor.
That totally ticks me off, as his victims didn't get any valium to alleviate their anxiety! I wish we didn't have to execute so compassionately! He doesn't deserve to die peacefully!
Just a few more minutes till he's rolled in on the gurney into the execution room where he will draw his last breaths of oxygen! None too soon!
Danny Rolling Awaits Scheduled Execution POSTED: 7:51 am EDT October 25, 2006 UPDATED: 1:47 pm EDT October 25, 2006
RAIFORD, Fla. -- Danny Rolling is scheduled to be executed Wednesday evening for the 1990 murders of five college students in Gainesville. Rolling spent most of Wednesday morning meeting with his brother, a spiritual advisor and his brother's spiritual advisor, Florida State Prison spokesman Robby Cunningham said. He was preparing to receive what is likely to be his final meal at about noon. "The last meal that he has requested consists of the following: a lobster tail, butterfly shrimp, baked potato, strawberry cheesecake and sweet tea," Florida State Prison spokesman Robby Cunningham said. Rolling will then receive a physical examination Wednesday afternoon and be given Valium, if necessary, to calm any anxiety he might have.
At about 4 p.m., he will meet with the prison warden, who will explain the details of the execution to him. Afterwards, Rolling will be strapped on a gurney, placed on a heart monitor and wheeled into the execution chamber, where eight carefully marked syringes will be waiting.
The first two syringes contain sodium pentothal, which will render him unconscious. The third, a saline solution, will act as a flushing agent. Another two containing pancuronium bromide will paralyze him. Another saline solution will be administered, and the final two doses of potassium chloride will deliver the lethal doses that stop his heart from beating.
Final Fight For Life ---> continued at link: http://www.local10.com/news/10152901/detail.html
Article: Victim's brother speaking out:
http://www.local10.com/news/10124131/detail.html
Edited to correct the link!
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Thanks Liz for posting that article. I'm sure he did take the valium. It's not fair that the prisoner is allowed to due that as you pointed out, because their victims had no such choice. I wonder if the valium is also a way for the guards to insure that the prisoner won't be much of a problem when he/she is being led to the execution chamber?
Tonya Wilson was just interviewed at the prison. She was the room mate of
Christina Powell and Sonja Larson. She said that she wasnt even able to attend their funerals because her family was afraid that the killer might attend. When asked if there was anything she would say to Rollings, she said
"Goodbye it is time to go meet your maker"
Christina Powell and Sonja Larson. She said that she wasnt even able to attend their funerals because her family was afraid that the killer might attend. When asked if there was anything she would say to Rollings, she said
"Goodbye it is time to go meet your maker"
Liz
I am not a chemist and this is not my 1st rodeo
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the original tez said:
Could be, tez. It certainly isn't right ... brings me to tears to think the murdering
gets to 'take the edge off'! Yet so cruelly massacred those kids, without a care as to the panic, fear and God only knows what else, they were feeling.Shoot, I bet a lot of people wished they could have had some valium back in the days when he was terrorizing us all in the city of Gainesville!
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