Murderpedia

 

 

Juan Ignacio Blanco  

 

  MALE murderers

index by country

index by name   A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

  FEMALE murderers

index by country

index by name   A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

 

 

 
   

Murderpedia has thousands of hours of work behind it. To keep creating new content, we kindly appreciate any donation you can give to help the Murderpedia project stay alive. We have many
plans and enthusiasm to keep expanding and making Murderpedia a better site, but we really
need your help for this. Thank you very much in advance.

   

 

 

Ralph Raymond ANDREWS

 
 
 
 
 

 

 

 

   
 
 
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape - Evisceration
Number of victims: 4 - 40
Date of murders: 1971 - 1991
Date of birth: 1945
Victims profile: Women
Method of murder: Stabbing with knife - Shooting
Location: Chicago, Illinois, USA
Status: Sentenced to life imprisonment. Died in prison on January 31, 2006
 
 
 
 
 
 

On June 1999, Chicago police indicted 54-year-old Ralph Andrews for the 1977 murder, rape, and aggravated kidnapping of 16-year-old Susan Clark. Not suprisingly, wherever Ralphie lived, bodies turned up to the tune of 20 dead women within a three-state area. Police said Andrews was always considered a suspect in the murders of Clark and two other women Amy Alden, and Arvella Thomas, who were fatally shot and stabbed multiple times, and their bodies dumped in Skokie.

On 1991, police said 41-year-old Virginia Griffin was murdered in her Rogers Park apartment. The knife used in the murder was in Andrews home. But authorities said Andrews recently began bragging to fellow inmates about Clark's murder. A special unit with the Cook County State's Attorney's Office then put a recorder in Andrewsą cell. He allegedly confessed to the murder, giving graphic details.

According to the federal indictment, Andrews also wrote out a list of all the victims he murdered. Alden and Thomas were allegedly on that list. Skokie police are not calling Andrews a serial killer just yet. But he has lived in Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illinois, and in all four states there have been unsolved murders which were committed in the same way.

Convicted killer, Ralph Raymond Andrews, 54, was charged with the Aug. 25, 1977, rape and murder of 16-year-old Susan Clarke, after he was secretly recorded in prison confessing to the killing. The tape has prompted authorities to examine his possible link to the slayings of two other teenage girls in Skokie, Illinois, in the '70s, and 20 to 40 unsolved murders in other states.

Andrews, who is serving a life term for a 1991 murder and sexual assault, reportedly admitted killing Clarke after abducting her as she returned to her home from a baby-sitting job. She was sexually assaulted and shot in the head, and her torso had been sliced open from the neck to the abdomen. He allegedly dumped her body, which had been shot and stabbed, in a vegetable garden near the Edens Expy. in Skokie.

He is also a prime suspect in the 1972 murder of Amy Alden, 15, found in the 4700 block of Old Orchard Road, and the 1978 killing of Arvella Thomas, 14, discovered in the 8200 block of Ridgeway Road, Skokie Police Sgt. Michael Ruth said. Andrews was a suspect from the beginning in Clarke's murder and the Skokie slayings, sources said. He was questioned in each, but denied being involved, they said.

Because the cases have the markings of a serial killer, authorities from Michigan, Indiana and Wisconsin want to see if Andrews can be linked to 20 to 40 other murders in those states, sources said. Andrews, formerly of Chicago, was a caretaker at Pottawattomie Gardens on the North Side.

He is currently serving a life sentence at Stateville Correctional Center. He was convicted in 1993 of the 1991 murder and rape of Virginia Griffin, 43. Like Clarke, Griffin had been sliced open and sexually mutilated.

About six months ago, Andrews reportedly started telling a fellow inmate about other murders he committed. The inmate tipped authorities, who then recorded his conversation with Andrews. Andrews has a criminal record related to attacks on teenage girls dating back to 1972 and served time on battery charges, Benjamin said. He was acquitted of attempted murder in 1973 in connection with the stabbings of two 15-year-old hitchhikers.

 
 

Suspected serial killer dies in prison

Man may have killed more women than Gacy

By Chuck Goudie - abc7chicago.com

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

A man who may have committed more murders than John Wayne Gacy will never be brought to justice for most of them. The ABC7 I-Team has learned suspected serial killer Ralph Andrews died in prison.

Over the years, authorities in Illinois have called Ralph Andrews a real-life Hannibal Lector. But even that seems to be an understatement for a man who proudly boasted that he assaulted, slaughtered and eviscerated as many as 40 girls and women in Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan. Andrews was serving a life sentence at Stateville for two of the murders when he died of natural causes.

Where Ralph Andrews went, evil seemed to follow. His FBI rap sheet began in 1961, stretched over 30 years and spanned the city, suburbs and mid-section of the country.

Andrews was imprisoned in 1994 after killing a 44-year-old woman in a Chicago park torturing her with a tent pole and stun gun, and stabbing her almost three dozen times. While at Stateville doing a life sentence for that crime, the Cook County cold case squad obtained a court order to secretly bug Andrews' cell, and on that tape, Andrews confessed to the murder of 16-year-old Susan Clark.

"Mr. Ralph Andrews is a wild animal, out of place, and he deserves to die," said Dick Clark, the victim's father, in 1999.

Mr. Clark was informed of Andrews' death personally by Cook County State's Attorney Dick Devine. Coincidentally, the teenage victim babysat for Devine's family.

In Andrews' jail cell, authorities found lists of women he claimed to have killed. at least 40 names. While he was a prime suspect in a half dozen killings, many are names of missing women for which there has never been any physical evidence.

Andrews said he buried some victims and dumped others in a septic tank in Michigan. Cook County authorities checked the tank but found no remains, although investigators say the system had been cleaned since Andrews was there.

Not all of Andrews' victims died. Betty Hanson called Andrews a "killing machine," even though she survived a stab wound to the heart. Seven years ago she told the I-Team that she could hardly wait for him to die.

"Have a nice trip to hell, because all your victims are waiting for you, and I couldn't wait to see them attack him like a bunch of piranhas," said Hanson.

For someone who vainly claimed to have butchered dozens of women, more than Gacy, Bundy, Manson and the nation's more prominent serial killers, Ralph Andrews' death in prison nearly passed without notice.

Andrews has been dead for nearly a year. He died January 31 and word is just starting to circulate. He died refusing to undergo the heart surgery that might have prolonged his life in prison. According to authorities, the man who stabbed so many victims was frightened to go under the knife.

 
 

SEX:  M RACE: W TYPE: T MOTIVE: Sex./Sad.

VICTIMS: Six

MO: "Ripper" of five teenage girls and one 44-year-old woman.

DISPOSITION: Life + 30 years on one count, 1993.

 

 

 
 
 
 
home last updates contact