USA: SERIAL KILLER CHARLES NG GUILTY OF 11 MURDERS

(25 Feb 1999) English/Nat

One of California's longest and costliest murder trials has finally come to a close, with its defendant being found guilty of 11 murders.

Serial killer Charles Ng went on a murderous sex-and-torture spree during the 1980's.

Fourteen years after investigators stumbled onto evidence in a cabin in the mountains, the case is closed and Ng is awaiting sentence.

38-year-old Charles Ng has been found guilty in one of the longest and costliest homicide prosecutions in California history.

The jury has convicted Ng of murdering 11 people, including seven men, three women and two baby boys.

The victims were killed in 1984 and 1985.

At least two of them were shot, but investigators were unable to determine how the others died because many of the bodies were burned.

The jury was deadlocked on a 12th murder count.

As the verdicts were read out there were sighs of relief from family and friends of the victims.

A woman who used to date one of the victims says she feels like a million-ton weight has come off her chest.

Ng, who is from Hong Kong, was accused of carrying out the slayings with Leonard Lake, who killed himself in 1985 after he was arrested.

On the stand, Ng denied killing anyone and said he didn't know Lake planned to kill either.

But jurors watched videotapes made by Lake and Ng showing the two taunting handcuffed and shackled women in 1985.

The women, one a supermarket clerk, the other a neighbour of Lake's were never seen again.

The male victims included Ng's co-workers at a San Francisco moving company.

They were lured to the men's cabin in northern California and killed so Lake could sell their belongings at flea markets and use the identification.

Authorities broke the case in 1985, when they suspected Ng and Lake of shoplifting.

Ng escaped capture by fleeing to Canada, but Lake was caught driving the car of a man who was last seen alive in 1984.

Police then went to the cabin in the mountains where they found trenches full of charred human remains and victims' belongings.

The extradition process to get Ng back from Canada dragged on for six years.

The trial finally began last October and the case will probably cost about $14 million.

Ng could get the death penalty when he's sentenced next month.

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