Serial killer, Eric Edgar Cooke: ‘The Night Caller’
He came calling in an age when Perth was like a quiet country town and people slept with their doors unlocked.
Eric Edgar Cooke, known as “The Night Caller”, terrorised Perth in the ’60s with a series of random killings that baffled police.
On the evening of Australia Day 1963, Cooke randomly shot five people, killing three. Some died as he robbed their homes, another was shot at point-blank range when they opened the door to his knock.
When Cooke wasn’t shooting, he was strangling. By the time he was arrested, he’d killed eight people and attempted to murder 14 others.
The married father of seven was described as affable and charismatic, so when he was arrested on Father’s Day in 1963, his family were shocked.
Cooke, 33, who had a distinctive cleft palate, was the last person to be hanged in Perth, on October 26, 1964. He also confessed to two other murders that two innocent men were serving time for.
It was later discovered Cooke also made a hobby of stealing cars and running down random women. Several were left disabled.