DALY CITY, Calif. (KGO) — Daly City police believe they have solved their oldest cold case murder; a young woman found at Thornton Beach in January 1974. A new documentary ties convicted serial killer Joseph Naso to the case, his first known African American victim. A death row inmate befriended Naso, and over the course of 10 years, got him to admit to 26 killings. Police agencies around the Bay Area are now working on these new leads.
During years of conversations in the San Quentin prison yard, former death row inmate Bill Noguera tells the I-Team, convicted serial killer Joseph Naso admitted murdering more than two dozen women. Naso freely discussed the list of his 10 favorite killings that investigators found in his Reno home – except for #5 “girl from Miami near down peninsula.”
“And I said, ‘Well, you know, how did you get a girl from Miami there?'” Noguera said. “He said, and he very cryptically said, ‘Bill, she’s not from the East Coast.’ And if I pressed him too much, he would really just wave his hand off and not want to talk about it.”
Noguera said Naso never revealed the victim’s name but did indicate she was visiting her sister at the time. Noguera handed the clues to cold case detective Ken Mains, who “couldn’t find anything for the longest time from anybody missing from Miami with the same MO or signature that Joe had, and it was driving me batty.”
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Mains then remembered that Naso is sometimes called the “Alphabet Killer” because the victims from his court case had first and last names that began with the same letter:
- Roxene Roggasch in Marin County 1977
- Carmen Colon, Contra Costa County 1978
- Pamela Parsons 1993 and Tracy Tafoya 1994, both in Yuba County
He checked peninsula cold cases and found another double-initial victim, 19-year-old Charlotte Cook, who had been strangled, her body dumped over the cliff just above the Thornton Beach ranger’s station. Cook was last seen alive leaving Oakland to visit her sister in San Francisco.
“You have everything lining up, the double initials, peninsula, the camel coat, visiting her sister, and the way she was killed, obviously,” Mains said. “So, to me, it just all kind of made sense then.”
It also made sense why Naso didn’t want Noguera to know about Charlotte Cook, for fear of reprisal from fellow inmates.
Dan Noyes: “Naso was worried about being attacked for having killed an African American woman.”
William Noguera: “Absolutely. And it made perfect sense, because he understood that, because I explained it to him. So, there was no way he was going to mention that because he felt that if it got out, for whatever reason, he would be suffering the consequences of that action.”
The only thing Mains couldn’t explain was the “girl from Miami” part. The answer came as he walked the blocks around McArthur Boulevard in Oakland where Naso kept an apartment in which he photographed women, some who became his victims. Mains spotted the Miami Court sign. “This is what he meant. That’s what he meant, right there, Miami Court.”
Mains believes Naso picked up Charlotte Cook at Miami Court. He brought the information to Daly City police, as part of the Oxygen documentary series “Death Row Confidential: Secrets of a Serial Killer.”
RELATED: Serial killer Joseph Naso left 2 bodies on Mt. Tam in 1977, according to new documentary
Former Daly City Police Detective Will Reininger said, “Now, I believe I have plenty to go and talk to Naso, which is my next step. As far as I’m concerned. I have probable cause to make that arrest. I think we’re going to court for this for sure.”
Daly City Police tell the I-Team they visited Naso in person, but he refused to answer any questions. Same story twelve years ago when we confronted Naso about the unidentified victims on the list of ten – we didn’t know then that the list included Charlotte Cook.
Noyes: “Who are those women?”
Joseph Naso: “You tell me.”
Noyes: “I don’t know, you know. You’re still playing games.”
Naso: “Ask the prosecution, ask the judge, I don’t know.”
Charlotte Cook’s daughters spent their entire lives wondering what happened to their mother. “Her life, just a puff. Just went away, and that’s that,” Oleta Cook told the I-Team. “That still hurts our family today, still hurts our family today.” They’re still trying to absorb the news that their mother fell victim to a serial killer. “When I heard it, I just, I didn’t hurt for myself. I hurt for my mom because she was so young,” Freedom Cook said. “She’s married. She’s happy. She had both her children in before she can even turn 20. Like gone, our life is a life over. So I just felt so bad for her.”
Daly City police suspect Naso in a second killing from 1987 a with similar MO. They’d like to close both those cases before Naso dies. He’s 91-years-old in a prison hospital in Stockton.
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