Tag Archives: Tok Kim

Spree Killer, Part 2

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Arizona Patrolman, Robert Dapser, pulled over a 1980 Datsun ZX when he saw the car, apparently driven by Mr. Toad, weaving along Interstate 40. The car’s driver was a man in his late 20s, Dean Phillip Carter. Dapser arrested him for driving under the influence and held him when a check on the Datsun’s registration revealed it was missing and possibly connected to a homicide in Southern California.

1980 Datsun ZX

1980 Datsun ZX

Detectives from Los Angeles and Culver City wanted to talk to Carter about the death of Jillette Mills, in whose car he was driving when he was arrested in Arizona. And they also wanted to question him about the slayings of Susan Knoll (Mills’ roommate), Bonnie Guthrie (a friend of Knolls’), and Janette Cullins. Carter was extradited to California and returned to Ventura County where there was an outstanding warrant on a sexual assault case. Cops in Oakland, CA thought Carter fit the description of the man seen with Tok Kim whose body was found in her apartment on April 13, 1984, and they were anxious to grill him about that crime.

headline3As if Carter wasn’t already in enough trouble, Seattle’s Green River Task Force was interested in him. The task force was attempting to solve the slayings of 25 young women that had started two years earlier.  Seattle detectives were able to clear Carter of any involvement in the serial killings in their city.

He may have been off the hook for the Seattle slayings, but he was suspect number one in the California murders when property belonging to all five of the dead women was found in his possession.  Police were still seeking a blue 1977 Honda Accord that belonged to one of his alleged rape victims. In mid-May 1984 he was charged with the murders of Susan Knoll, Bonnie Guthrie, and Janette Cullins.

L.A. County District Attorney Robert H. Philibosian held a press conference at which he stated that he intended to seek the death penalty for Carter who was still being held in Ventura County. Philibosian said, “We have now indications he committed at least five murders during a rampage that began in March and continued through part of last month.”headline1

Al Albergate, a spokesman for the D.A., dialed back Philibosian’s initial statement saying that the D.A. hadn’t meant to imply that Carter’s guilt was a foregone conclusion. Albergate said, “The remark was based on the fact that we have charged him with killing three people.”

headline2With Carter the prime suspect in the murders reporters and detectives started digging into his background.  He hailed from Nome, Alaska where he spent a troubled childhood. He never knew his birthfather but was was adopted by his stepfather (deceased at the time of the slayings) who was Nome’s Chief of Police. Police. If his stepfather tried to be a good influence on the boy, he failed.  When he was 12 Carter was declared to be a delinquent child and sent to a youth camp, from which he attempted to escape at least three times. He was ultimately placed in a foster home. As an adult he spent time in an Oregon prison for grand theft auto and possession of cocaine, and in Alaska for burglary.

Kicked loose from prison in 1980, Carter was employed by a non-profit where he became a television production assistant and cameraman.  He didn’t just learn job skills at the non-profit video center–it was there he met and subsequently married the receptionist.  The couple had twin boys, but the marriage didn’t last. His ex retained custody of the twins and that seems to have made Carter angry.  Did he harbor a grudge against his ex-wife that was deep enough to set him off on a killing spree?

NEXT TIME:  Carter’s story plays out.

Spree Killer, Part 1

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For 18 days, from late March to mid-April 1984, a series of rapes and murders spanned California from Oakland to San Diego. The police soon realized that the sexual assaults and slayings were likely the work of one man. All they had to do was find him.

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On March 25, 1984 a woman was raped at knife point in her San Diego apartment. Two days later another young woman was raped at knife point in Ventura County. Her assailant strangled her until she lost consciousness. She was lucky to be alive.

On April 1, 1984 in Lafayette, California, about 30 miles east of Oakland, Tok Kim met a man named Phil in a local bar. They spent the next several days together and were seen by a few of her neighbors. On April 13th, Tok’s decomposed body was discovered. The cause of death could not be determined, but strangulation wasn’t ruled out. Her car and some of her personal items were missing.

jillette mills

Jillette Mills

Kim’s car was located hundreds of miles away in Culver City parked in front of an apartment building where roommates Susan Knoll and Jillette Mills were found dead. Each of the women had been sexually assaulted, strangled, and then their bodies were stacked in a bedroom closet.

Jillette’s Datson 280 ZX with the vanity plate PHANTM Z, as well as personal items belonging to both women were missing.

The body of Bonnie Guthrie was discovered on the bedroom floor of her Culver City apartment on April 12th. She had been sexually assaulted and died of asphyxia caused by strangulation. Personal items were missing from her residence.

janette cullen

Janette Cullins

Janette Cullins was found in the closet of her San Diego apartment she, like the other dead women, had been strangled. Wood chips were found near the front door, which suggested that the killer had broken in.

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It was 10:50 p.m. on April 17th when Arizona Highway Patrolman Robert Dapser received a call on his CB radio from a truck driver. The trucker said that “an erratic vehicle had been driving in his location, passed by him twice and nearly cut him off.” The erratic driver, possibly drunk, was behind the wheel of a Datsun 280 ZX with a California vanity plate. The trucker thought it was “PHANTOM 2”.

Officer Dapser flipped on his emergency lights. He caught up with the Datsun and watched it swerve across the center line of the highway. The sports car finally pulled over and the driver, the lone occupant of the vehicle, produced his ID but couldn’t find the vehicle registration. He told Dapser, “I can’t find it, she must not have it in here.” The driver’s failure to produce the registration wasn’t a big deal, but Officer Dapser caught a whiff of marijuana and saw a roach in the center console. There was an empty beer bottle, and several full ones, on the floor on the passenger’s side of the car.

Dapser called dispatch and said that the license plate was not “PHANTOM 2′ as originally reported but “PHANTM Z”. A few minutes later he was informed that the car had been reported stolen. Dapser Mirandized the driver and took him into custody to await detectives from California.

susan knoll

Susan Knoll

 Detectives from Culver City and West Los Angeles arrived in Arizona and inventoried the contents of the Datsun. They found a suitcase containing a few household items identified as belonging to Tok Kim; a supermarket check cashing card belonging to Susan Knoll; workout gear and photo equipment belonging to Jillette Mills; Janette Cullins’ bank card; and three hand knit sweaters identified as Bonnie Guthrie’s.

The detectives were anxious to speak to the driver of Jillette’s Datsun.  Was he a killer and a rapist? Or was he just an unlucky car thief?

NEXT TIME: The killer is identified.