For decades, Californians lived in uncertainty and fear as a rapist and serial killer waged chaos in counties from as far north as Sacramento to as far south as San Clemente, killing 13 people total and assaulting dozens more.

The serial killer went dormant in the 1980s, but survivors still traumatized by their experiences wouldn’t feel relief until 2018, when Joseph DeAngelo, known to police by names like the “East Area Rapist” and “Visalia Ransacker,” was identified, arrested, and officially dubbed the “Golden State Killer.”

For the survivors, it was the end of DeAngelo’s reign of terror. For Thien Ho, then a Sacramento County prosecutor and now its district attorney, it was just the beginning of what would become a life-changing and career-defining case. Ho documented his experience i

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