FAIR LAWN, NJ — One of the New York City area’s most notorious serial killers has confessed to another murder.
Police in New Jersey announced on Tuesday that Richard Cottingham, known as… “Deadly torso” He confessed to killing Alice Eberhardt in 1965.
The 18-year-old was found dead in her family’s home in Fair Lawn, a suburb about 12 miles (19 kilometers) northwest of Manhattan.
Investigators reopened the cold case in 2021, and “through countless interviews” over several years, extracted a full confession from Cottingham, “including details that were never publicly known,” the department said in a statement. statement.
Fair Lawn Police Chief Joseph Dawicki said Cottingham will not face additional charges when the department closes the case.
The 79-year-old has been in prison since his arrest in 1980. He is serving three life sentences at Southwoods State Prison in Bridgeton, New Jersey.
“Alice was a vibrant young nursing student who was taken from our community too soon,” Dawicki said in a statement. “Although we can never bring her back, I hope her family can find some peace knowing that the person responsible has confessed and can no longer hurt anyone else.”
Lawyers in New York and New Jersey who have represented Cottingham over the years did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment Tuesday.
Cottingham claimed responsibility for up to 100 murders dating back to the 1960s, although authorities in New York and New Jersey officially linked him to about a dozen.
In 2022, it is Confessing to killing five women In the Long Island suburbs of New York City in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
He was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison Murder in 1968 Diane Cusick is 23, but she received immunity from prosecution for the other four murders as part of a plea deal.
Cottingham was previously convicted of killing five other women, three in New York City and two in northern New Jersey. He has since admitted to killing several other people while behind bars.
He is known as the “torso killer” because he dismembered some of his victims.