3,576 articles
Richard Hauptmann
Bruno Richard Hauptmann, German carpenter in the Bronx, convicted 1935 and executed 1936 for the Lindbergh baby kidnap-murder; evidence included ransom money, handwriting, and ladder wood, with guilt still debated.
Richard Hickock
Richard Eugene Hickock (1931-1965), American murderer who with Perry Smith killed the Clutter family in Holcomb, Kansas, on November 15, 1959; convicted 1960, hanged April 14, 1965; subject of Capote's In Cold Blood.
Richard Huckle
Richard William Huckle was a British child sex offender from Ashford, Kent, who abused children in Malaysia and Cambodia while posing as a volunteer teacher.
Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility
Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility (RJD, RJDCF), California state prison for men on Otay Mesa, San Diego, opened July 1987, CDCR-run, Levels I–IV, SNY yards, only state prison in San Diego County.
Richard Kuklinski
Richard Kuklinski, "The Iceman" (1935–2006), New Jersey murderer convicted of five killings plus a police detective's murder, sentenced to consecutive life terms; his claims of 100+ Mafia hits were widely disputed. Not the Polish spy Ryszard Kukliński.
Richard Lee McNair
Richard Lee McNair (born 1958) is an American murderer and repeat prison escapee who broke out three times (1988, 1992, 2006), once by mailing himself out of USP Pollock in a mailbag pallet, and was recaptured in Canada in 2007.
Richard Lee Tabler
Richard Lee Tabler (1979-2025), Texas death row inmate executed February 13, 2025 for the 2004 Killeen murders of Mohamed-Amine Rahmouni and Haitham Zayed; also confessed to killing Tiffany Dotson and Amanda Benefield; triggered 2008 prison lockdown via smuggled cell phone.
Richard Matt
Richard Matt (1966–2015), Tonawanda, New York murderer and repeat escapee; with David Sweat he cut out of Clinton Correctional Facility's Honor Block in June 2015, triggering a $23 million manhunt ending in his death in Malone.
Richard Ramirez
Richard Ramirez (Ricardo Leyva Muñoz Ramirez), the Night Stalker, American serial killer and burglar who committed nighttime home invasions in California 1984–1985, convicted of 13 murders in 1989, sentenced to death, died of B-cell lymphoma at San Quentin in 2013.
Richard Speck
Richard Speck (1941–1991), American mass murderer who killed eight student nurses in Chicago on July 13–14, 1966; survivor Corazon Amurao identified him; convicted 1967, died in Stateville prison of a heart attack.
Richard Topcliffe
Richard Topcliffe (1531–1604), also called the priestfinder-general, was Elizabethan England's most infamous torturer, a Privy Council rack-master who hunted Catholic priests and read their books forensically.
Richard Wershe Jr.
Richard Wershe Jr., "White Boy Rick," Detroit FBI informant recruited at 14 in 1984, convicted under Michigan's 650-lifer law, served about 30 years, helped Operation Backbone, released July 20, 2020.
Richardson family murders
Richardson family murders: April 2006 killings of Marc, Debra, and Jacob Richardson in Medicine Hat, Alberta, by 12-year-old Jasmine Richardson and 23-year-old Jeremy Steinke; her sentence was capped at ten years under the Youth Criminal Justice Act.
Richthofen case
Richthofen case: 2002 São Paulo parricide of Manfred and Marísia von Richthofen, planned by Suzane von Richthofen with Daniel and Cristian Cravinhos; 2006 jury convictions, 39-year sentences, later regime progression, and landmark Brazilian media-spectacularization scholarship.
Rickey Ray Rector
Rickey Ray Rector (1950-1992), Arkansas death row inmate executed January 24, 1992 for killing Conway police officer Robert Martin; brain-damaged by self-inflicted gunshot, ruled competent under Ford, clemency denied by Governor Clinton during his 1992 campaign.
Ricky Ray Rector
Ricky Ray Rector (Rickey Ray Rector), 1950-1992, Arkansas man executed for the 1981 murder of Conway police officer Bob Martin despite severe self-inflicted brain damage; Governor Bill Clinton left the 1992 New Hampshire campaign to oversee his lethal injection on January 24, 1992.
Riding a rail
Riding a rail, also called being run out of town on a rail, was an 18th- and 19th-century American mob punishment in which an offender straddled a fence rail carried by bearers, often combined with tarring and feathering, distinct from Depression-era riding the rails.
Ridouan Taghi
Ridouan Taghi, Dutch-Moroccan leader of the Mocro Maffia cocaine network, arrested in Dubai in 2019 and sentenced to life in 2024 for five murders in the Marengo trial, now appealing.
Right to counsel
Right to counsel: the Sixth Amendment guarantee of a lawyer in criminal prosecutions, including court-appointed counsel for indigent defendants, established for the states by Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) after Powell v. Alabama (1932) and Betts v. Brady (1942).
Right to silence
Right to silence: a suspect's privilege against self-incrimination in criminal proceedings, also called the privilege against self-incrimination. Covers adverse inferences, ECtHR Murray case law, England and Wales CJPOA 1994, and the US Fifth Amendment bar on adverse inference at trial.
Riley Williams
Riley June Williams, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania woman convicted of civil disorder for the January 6, 2021 Capitol attack; charged but not convicted in Nancy Pelosi laptop theft; sentenced to 36 months, later pardoned by Trump.
Ring boy scandal
Ring boy scandal: allegations that WWF/WWE ring announcer Mel Phillips sexually exploited teenage ring crew boys in the late 1980s and early 1990s, leading to 1992 departures of Phillips, Terry Garvin, and Pat Patterson, and an October 2024 negligence lawsuit against WWE, Vince and Linda McMahon, and TKO under Maryland's Child Victims Act.
Riot Act
The Riot Act (1714) was a British statute letting officials read a proclamation ordering crowds of over twelve to disperse within an hour, on pain of death; repealed 1973, succeeded by the Public Order Act 1986 riot offence.
Ripper Chandran
Ripper Chandran (Muthukutty Chandran, റിപ്പർ ചന്ദ്രൻ, 1950–1991), Kerala serial killer who murdered 14 people in 1985–86 robberies, hanged at Kannur Central Jail on 6 July 1991, Kerala's last execution.
Ripper Crew
Ripper Crew, or Chicago Rippers: four-man satanic serial-killing group (Robin Gecht, Edward Spreitzer, Andrew and Thomas Kokoraleis) that abducted, mutilated, and murdered up to 20 women in Chicago, 1981-1982.
Riverton Prize
The Riverton Prize (Rivertonprisen), formally "Den gylne revolver" ("The Golden Revolver"), is an annual Norwegian award for the year's best crime fiction work, presented since 1973.
Rizzuto crime family
Rizzuto crime family, Montreal Sicilian Mafia clan founded by Nicolo Rizzuto of Cattolica Eraclea and led by Vito Rizzuto; Bonanno-linked, dominant in Quebec until the 2009–2013 war, Project Colisée, and Vito's 2013 death.
Robbery
Robbery is the taking of property from a person, or in their presence, by force or threat of force, a violent felony distinct from theft and burglary. Covers common law elements, Theft Act 1968, Hobbs Act, Stokeling, and US FBI/NCVS robbery statistics.
Robert Alton Harris
Robert Alton Harris, executed April 21, 1992 in San Quentin's gas chamber, was California's first execution in 25 years, for the 1978 kidnapping and murder of two San Diego teenagers; four federal stays and a Supreme Court order marked the case.
Robert Anderson (sex offender)
Robert Anderson (sex offender) covers several unrelated men: Robert S. Anderson (federal enticement, 7th Cir. 2024), Dr. Robert Anderson (University of Michigan, $490M settlement), plus offenders in Indiana, Northern Ireland, California, and Oklahoma.