Nightmare On Campus: Taking Down The Gainesville Ripper

The FOX True Crime Podcast w/ Emily Compagno

Fox News

True Crime

4.8 • 708 Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2024

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

College should be a time for optimism, excitement, and new beginnings. But for students at the University of Florida, their fall semester began with fear and heartbreak. In August of 1990, five young students were found gruesomely murdered in Gainesville, Florida, beginning an intense search for monster known as “The Gainesville Ripper.” Attorney Rod Smith served as the prosecutor in the trial of Danny Rolling. He looks back at how he was able to secure the death penalty against Rolling and shares how one of Rolling's fellow inmates played a pivotal role in building the case against him. Rod Smith currently serves as partner at Avera & Smith LLP. Rod is a graduate of the University of Florida College of Law and previously served as state attorney of the Eighth Judicial Circuit. He was a member of the Florida State Senate from 2001-2006. Follow Emily on Instagram: @realemilycompagno If you have a story or topic we should feature on the FOX True Crime Podcast, send us an email at: [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	For many, college is a time for new beginnings. And for students at the University of Florida,
0:08.8	the city of Gainesville served as an exciting backdrop for which they would begin a new chapter of their lives.
0:15.5	But beginning on August 24, 1990, the feelings of optimism and hope quickly shifted to fear and heartbreak, as the
0:23.8	semester ahead would be plagued by a streak of horrific crimes.
0:30.7	It all started when two freshman students were murdered in their college apartment.
0:35.7	The bodies of 18-year-old Sonia Larson and 17-year-old
0:39.2	Christina Powell had been found stabbed to death,
0:42.6	sexually assaulted, and posed in provocative positions.
0:46.6	The following day, terror struck again.
0:49.5	18-year-old Christina Hoyt, an honor student at Santa Fe College,
0:53.7	was found sexually assaulted and stabbed
0:55.7	to death. Her corpse was mutilated and posed in a horrific manner. Then on August 27th, 23-year-olds
1:03.5	Tracy Paulus and Mani Taboda were killed in their home. Tracy had been raped and her body posed.
1:10.2	Students rushed home to their families.
1:12.6	Law enforcement swarmed in,
1:14.4	and the hunt for the monster known as the Gainesville Ripper began.
1:19.2	I'm Emily Campano, and this is the Fox True Crime Podcast,
1:23.9	Crimes on Campus.
1:57.3	Music Crimes on Campus. The five ghastly murders sent shockwaves throughout North Florida.
2:02.5	Law enforcement officers from varying agencies teamed up to create an intense investigation for the killer responsible for the nightmarish crimes. For a time, officers
2:11.1	focused on one suspect, Edward Lewis Humphrey, a University of Florida student with a history
2:16.8	of mental illness who had been
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Fox News, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Fox News and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.