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In the wake of the release of Netflix’s new documentary series Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer, screenwriter Ed Solomon has shared an interesting story about the pursuit for the killer, ultimately identified as Richard Ramirez. Before police knew who the Night Stalker was, Solomon, best known for co-writing the Bill & Ted movies, was briefly considered a possible suspect.
He told the story in a series of tweets you can read below, admitting he initially thought he was being pranked. “In August 1985 I was awakened by a call saying ‘Are you the Night Stalker?’ I hung up, thinking it was a weird prank,” he wrote. “But it kept happening. That’s when I learned–from a reporter on the other end–that I was a prime suspect in that grisly Richard Ramirez murder spree.”
He continued, “The reporter explained that my car was found at the crime scene, which made no sense because I looked out my window & saw it was still in the parking space of my Westwood apartment. I had to hang up because the police were walking up my driveway–but weirdly slowly.”
As it turns out, three years prior to this night, Solomon co-signed a lease on a car for his roommate at the time, which had the car registered to his address. Three years later, the friend gave the car away, but before the registration could be changed it was stolen.
“The guy who’d bought it was eating dinner in a Chinese restaurant downtown, where the car (a crappy red Toyota station wagon) was stolen–by Ramirez–and driven to the murder site, where it was abandoned,” Solomon tweeted.
According to the screenwriter, by the time the police got to his front door, they’d seemingly learned new information that pointed to a different suspect. “My entire ‘ordeal’ only really lasted–from initial call to tepid knock on my door–for about 5 minutes,” he wrote. “And there was never a sense–aside from the jarring first call, which I hung up on saying ‘Who is this?” and then ‘Ha ha ha whoever this is’ –of any real threat to me. Certainly because by the time they’d arrived they’d appeared to have already figured it out.”
Still, in telling the story Solomon now realized he’s cemented his own small place in the lore of the Night Stalker murders. “A friend just pointed out that now when people search my name they’ll also get ‘People Also Search For: Night Stalker,'” he wrote.
