When mass murder was outside humanity’s norm
The following retrospective was written two years ago by former Appeal staff member Harold Kruger in preparation for the death of serial killer Juan Corona.
His crimes were from another era, when mass murder was still considered out of step with the American ethos.
He was the man who, they said, put Yuba City on the map.
There were books, TV documentaries and much speculation about how one person could butcher 25 men. One documentary was dubbed “Machete Mangler.”
But in the end, like his crimes,
This timeline was produced for a retrospective series of stories published in 2010 by the Appeal.
Sutter County Hospital exam finds Juan V. Corona suffering from symptoms of schizophrenia. His brother, Natividad Corona, authorizes his commitment to Dewitt State Hospital in Auburn. Juan is considered “recovered” three months later and released.
Jose Romero Raya, 20, of Linda was beaten about DAILY
1956 1970
Juan Corona was a mystery.
Corona, who has been imprisoned since his arrest in May 1971, died Monday at the age of 85.
He had been denied parole at eight times following his two convictions on 25 counts of murder. The first conviction was tossed out, and he was tried again. And, not surprisingly, he was convicted again and sentenced to 25 life sentences.
In his declining years, Corona was in a wheelchair and was, at times, lucid, although things got worse as severe dementia took its toll. During his 2011 parole hearing, he admitted the killings, in grisly detail.
He had a known history of mental instability, dating back to the mid1950s when his brother, Natividad, had him committed to Dewitt State Hospital in Auburn, where he was diagnosed with “schizophrenic reaction, paranoid type.”
Corona had suffered a mental breakdown in the December 1955 Yuba City flood and believed he was living in a land of ghosts.
He received 23 shock treatments, before being pronounced recovered and released three months later.
Corona was deported to Mexico but returned to the U.S. legally with a green card. In the early 1960s, he became a licensed labor contractor, a job that would accommodate his killing spree.
The most prolific killer in Sutter County history murdered migrant workers without ties to the area, including four who were never identified.
The bodies of his victims were recovered from crude grave sites discovered in a weeks-long search of orchard lands adjacent to the riverbank. The murders took place between February and May of 1971. The Sheriff’s Department discovered the first body in May and stopped digging in early June.
All but one of his victims had incurred injuries to the head. There were slashing wounds and severe chop wounds with a machete. Most of the wounds typically appeared in horizontal lines across the head and face. Some had stab wounds in the upper left chest that penetrated the heart, lungs or aorta.
stadium. Minister from Twin Cities Rescue Mission tells the crowd that eight of Corona’s known victims had slept at the mission’s shelter.
Corona family asks public defender Roy Van den Heuvel to step aside and allow an attorney they had retained, Richard E. Hawk of Concord, to take over the case.
Corona taken to Sutter County General Hospital with complaints of chest pains. Corona will spend the next three weeks there. Autopsy reports reveal nearly every victim had been stabbed in the heart with a large, narrow knife and that the back of victims’ heads had been chopped with deep cuts forming a cross.
Coroner’s deputies issue public appeal in attempts to identify the last seven bodies.
Hawk moves to disqualify Judge J.J. Hankins from the Corona case. Motion is granted.
Butte County Municipal Court Judge William M. Savage is appointed by the California Judicial Council to take over the case.
Hawk says Yuba