“ Richard Cottingham”

by Sekton Wandikbo

This is a story about a serial killer and rapist that operated in and .

His name is Richard Francis Cottingham. He was born in “ Bronx, New York on November 25,

1946. He grew up in a normal middle-class home. When he was 12-year-old, his parents moved the family to River Vale, New Jersey. There his father worked in an insurance company and his mother stayed home.” 1 He was an aloof person when he was a teenager, he did not have a lot of friends to play with neither in his neighborhood nor at school. After graduating from St.Andrews high school, he worked as a computer operator at his father’s insurance company for two years.

After that he moved to another insurance company called Blue Cross Blue Shield, working the same job. He has a wife with three children. He started killing in 1967 and stopped in 1980. He was sentenced to jail for life.

Cottingham is found guilty for killing "six victims."2 The first killing-spree began “ in

1967, when he was 21-year-old. He strangled his friend, a 29-year-old Nancy Vogel to death. Her body was found in her car in nearby Ridgefield Park. She had been last seen three days earlier, when she left home to play bingo with friends at a local church.” 3 He committed this murder

1 Charles Montaldo, “ Profile of Serial Killer Richard Cottingham” ThoughtCo, March 04, 2017. https://www.thoughtco.com/profile-of-serial-killer-richard-cottingham-973146

2 Jacklyn Cowin, Jenna Leonette, and The Phan, " Richard Francis Cottingham " The Torso Killer", " PDF, 2007. http://maamodt.asp.radford.edu/Psyc%20405/serial%20killers/Cottingham, %20Richard%20_spring%202007_.pdf

3 The Associate Press, " Bergen man convicted of decades-old killings, admits to fatal strangling of N.J. woman" NJ, September 19, 2010. http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/09/ bergen_man_who_killed_5_women.html after many years later when he was in jail already. All the murders he committed were mostly women who worked as a prostitute or his dates. He picked women because he thought women are weaker than men. He is a smart serial killer, the police and the investigator have had a hard time to figure the murder after many years. He has a family, his wife is Janet and they both have three children, two boys and a girl. He raped, killed and mutilated all the victims. After interviewed with a journalist, Nadia Fezzani, the reason he mutilated all his victims was because

"he wanted to be the best at whatever he did and wanted to be the best serial killer." 4 He is called the Torso Killer, because he always left the torso of the victims behind.

The crimes are basically raping and killing. Started in 1967 and stopped in 1980. His murder cases are not fully discovered. The police were only able to found six victims of him.

During the interview with the journalist, Nadia Fezzani, he said that "there were as many as 90 to

100 more victims."5 There are only six that were discovered, the rest is a mystery. He is called “

The Torso Killer” because after he killed the victims he left the torso. Most of his victims he killed are usually in a hotels or inns. He usually drugged and kidnapped the victims. “ Other women who had survived a date with Cottingham came forth to tell their stories. Some said they had met him in a bar and while drinking together they had become extremely sleepy. The theory

4 Montaldo, " Profile of Serial Killer"

5 Ibid was that he had slipped drugs into their glasses. After that he would do whatever he wanted to do to satisfy his thirst of violence. He raped, tortured, stabbed, bite and mutilated.” 6

He was finally caught and arrested when he was trying to kill Leslie O’Dell, an 18-year- old teenager in the Quality Inn Motel Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey. The girl was screaming and it caught the attention of one of the securities in the Motel. The security approach and asked if she is okay. So Cottingham threatened her to convince the security that everything is okay but in a mean time she gave a sign with her eyes to the security that finally end the misery after the security called the police a few minutes later. When the police caught him, “he seemed an unlikely candidate for this kind of violence. He looked so normal.” 7 He is a computer technician that he looked innocent but the crime he had done is reciprocal.

“He was found guilty of a total of five murders and was sentenced in New Jersey to

60-95 years in prison an additional 75 years to life in New York. He later confessed to killing

Nancy Vogel in 2010.” 8 So he is basically will spend the rest of his life in the jail. He also committed a lot of murders that was hidden for years.

6 Mara Bovsun, “ Justice Story: ‘Times Square Ripper’ revealed to be mild-mannered husband from suburban Jersey ,” Daily News, March 04, 2012. http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ justice-story-times-square-ripper-revealed-mild-mannered-husband-suburban-jersey- article-1.1030506

Ibid

8 Charles Montaldo, “ Profile of Serial Killer Richard Cottingham” ThoughtCo, March 04, 2017. https://www.thoughtco.com/profile-of-serial-killer-richard-cottingham-973146 Works Cited :

Bovsun, Mara. "Justice Story: Times Square Ripper." NY Daily News. N.p., 04 Mar. 2012. Daily

News. 02 June 2017.

Cowin, Jacklyn, Jenna Leonette, and The Phan. "Richard Francis Cottingham" The Torso

Killer"." Maamodt.asp. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 June 2017

Montaldo, Charles. "See Why Serial Killer Richard Cottingham Was Called "The Torso Killer"."

ThoughtCo. ThoughtCo, n.d. Web. 02 June 2017.

Press, The Associated. "Bergen Man Convicted of Decades-old Killings, Admits to Fatal

Strangling of N.J. Woman." NJ.com. N.p., 19 Sept. 2010. Web. 09 June 2017.