Podcast Episode Details

Terrifying & True | Vampire of Sacramento: Richard Chase — Real-Life Halloween Horror Story

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Halloween horror stories—making spooky season terrifyingly real. 

Richard Trenton Chase, the “Vampire of Sacramento,” whose 1977–1978 crimes turned neighborhood fear into a citywide lockdown. We connect the early warning signs to the unlocked-door “invitation” pattern, the frantic manhunt and FBI profile, and the courtroom fight over sanity and responsibility. With clear sourcing and zero fluff, we trace how untreated psychosis, blood-fixated delusions, and institutional failures produced one of America’s most nightmarish true-crime horror cases.
Inside this episode

• Early warning signs: Escalating animal cruelty, delusions, and missed interventions.
• Method of entry: Why unlocked doors became his “permission”—fueling the vampire legend.
• Timeline of murders: From Dec 29, 1977 (Ambrose Griffin) through Jan 1978 home invasions marked by mutilation and blood-drinking.
• Profilers move in: How the FBI Behavioral Science Unit sketched a near-perfect suspect.
• Arrest & evidence: The apartment, the freezer, and what they revealed about ritual and motive.
• Trial, verdict, and death: The sanity battle, death sentence, and end on death row.
• Legacy & lessons: Media panic, myth vs. pathology, and what communities can learn.

If you’ve ever wondered how a horror legend becomes flesh-and-blood fact, this is the case.

We’re telling that story tonight.

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https://www.weeklyspooky.com/categories/terrifying-true/

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🎵 Music by Ray Mattis 👉 Check out Ray’s incredible work here !
👨‍💼 Executive Producers: Rob Fields, Bobbletopia.com
🎥 Produced by: Daniel Wilder
🌐 Explore more terrifying tales at: WeeklySpooky.com

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Published on 2 months, 1 week ago