Murderpedia has thousands of hours of work behind it. To keep creating
new content, we kindly appreciate any donation you can give to help
the Murderpedia project stay alive. We have many
plans and enthusiasm
to keep expanding and making Murderpedia a better site, but we really
need your help for this. Thank you very much in advance.
Ronald Adrin
GRAY
Classification:
Serial killer
Characteristics: Serial
rapist (8) - Soldier at Fort Bragg
Number of victims: 4
Date of murders: 1986 - 1987
Date of birth: 1966
Victims profile: Linda Coats,
24 / Tammy Wilson, 18 /
Laura Lee Vickery-Clay,
18 / Kimberly Ann Ruggles, 23
Method of murder:
Shooting
/ Stabbing
with knife
Location: Fayetteville, North Carolina, USA
Status:
Sentenced to
death on April 12, 1988
A native of Miami, born in 1966, Gray joined the U.S. Army at age 18 and was trained as a cook.
In 1986, he was posted to Fort Bragg, outside Fayetteville, North Carolina, and his arrival on the base unleashed a sudden reign of terror.
On April
29, 1986, 24-year-old Linda Coats was found dead in her trailer at
Fayetteville, killed by a shot to the head after suffering sexual abuse.
A university student enrolled in the army's ROTC program, Coats was
scheduled to receive her commission the week she was murdered.
A few
days later, soldiers on the Ft. Bragg military reservation found the
naked, battered corpse of Teresa Utley, a Fayetteville prostitute.
Abducted from the streets where she plied her trade, Utley had been
stripped and beaten, raped and knifed to death by her assailant.
On
November 16, 1986, two Fayetteville women were abducted at gunpoint by a
black man who raped them both, while threatening their lives.
Neither
victim reported the attack to police, but one staked out the
neighborhood with her boyfriend, fingering Ronald Gray as her attacker
on November 26. Still terrified, she kept the knowledge to herself.
By that
time, Fayetteville's resident stalker had struck again, abducting a
young woman on November 22, raping her and slashing her about the face
and body, leaving her for dead in suburban Bonnie Doone. A female
soldier was attacked the same night, at Fort Bragg, but both victims
survived, and their assailant remained at large.
He raped and stabbed another soldier on the base a few days later, but MPs had nothing that would bring them closer to a suspect. On December 12, a soldier's wife, 18-year-old Tammy Wilson, was abducted from her home in Bonnie Doone. Her naked body was discovered hours later by her husband, in some nearby woods. She had been raped and shot at point-blank range.
Three days later, Sgt. Michael Clay was called home from maneuvers to inspect the smoking ruins of his mobile home in Fayetteville. His wife, Pvt. Laura Clay, was missing from the scene, and five more weeks would pass before her body was recovered from the nearby forest. In the meantime, yet another female soldier was attacked on January 3, but she survived. Kimberly Ruggles, a 23-year-old Fayetteville cab driver, was less fortunate on January 7.
Officers were still examining her taxi, found abandoned on a city street, when searchers on the Ft. Bragg reservation found her body. Raped and beaten, she had died when her assailant drew a knife across her throat. The latest slaying prompted two surviving victims to report their own attacks, and one of them identified a suspect for police on January 8.
After six months of investigation, Ronald Gray was formally indicted by civilian authorities on 23 felony charges, including two counts of first-degree murder (Coats and Wilson), five counts of first-degree rape and first-degree sex offense, four counts of first-degree kidnapping,
two counts each of first-degree burglary and armed robbery, plus one
count each of second-degree arson, attempted first-degree rape, and
assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill.
Held in
lieu of $420,000 bond, he was subsequently charged, on August 7, with
two counts of murder (Clay and Ruggles) and two counts of attempted
murder on a military reservation.
On November 5, 1987, Gray pled guilty to all charges in Fayetteville, receiving three consecutive terms of life imprisonment.
Convicted on all remaining counts at his court-martial, on April 12, 1988, he was sentenced to death for the crimes committed at Ft. Bragg.
Michael Newton - An Encyclopedia of Modern Serial
Killers
Ronald Adrin Gray
(born 1966) is an American serial killer whose convictions include four
counts of murder, one count of attempted murder and eight counts of
rape. His crimes were committed when he was in the United States Army,
stationed at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
He was tried and convicted by military courts, and
was sentenced to be put to death. His execution by lethal injection
would be the first performed by the United States military since the
execution of John A. Bennett for rape and attempted murder in 1961. On
November 26, 2008, a federal judge issued a stay of execution stopping
the planned December 10 execution.
Early
life
Gray was born in Cochran, Georgia, but grew up in
Liberty City, a public housing project in Miami, Florida. He enlisted at
age 18 in 1984, and was assigned to the Target Acquisition Battery, 1-39
Field Artillery Battalion. At the time of his arrest, he was stationed
at Fort Bragg, near Fayetteville, North Carolina, where he was a cook
assigned to 3rd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd
Airborne Division. He held the rank of specialist (E-4).
During his court-martial, his mother Lizzie Hurd and
sister testified that he had been abused by his stepfather as a child.
Colonel David Armitage, a military forensic psychiatrist, also testified
that in Gray's early life, he had experienced:
fairly substantial socioeconomic deprivation,
multiple male figures in the home, multiple physical moves, living
in substandard poverty conditions, [and] circumstances where the
electric lights were turned out by the electric company because
bills were not paid. He had a step-parent [stepfather] at one time
who was extremely abusive to his mother and abusive to himself [Gray],
using belts on him to the point of inflicting injury, drawing blood.
Gray's crimes
On December 15, 1986, Gray abducted, raped, sodomized,
and murdered Private Laura Lee Vickery-Clay, age 18. On January 3, 1987,
he raped and attempted to murder Private Mary Ann Lang Nameth, age 20.
Three days later, on January 6, he raped, sodomized, robbed, and
murdered a civilian, Kimberly Ann Ruggles, age 23.
The first victim, Vickery-Clay, disappeared from Fort
Bragg on December 15, 1986. Two witnesses saw her at a local K-Mart with
a man later identified as Gray. Vickery-Clay's car, found the next
morning a block from her home, appeared to have been driven through the
woods, and the driver's seat was set back farther than necessary for
Vickery-Clay to drive. Three of Gray's fingerprints were found on the
hood of the car. On January 17, 1987, a soldier discovered Vickery-Clay's
half-naked, decomposed body in the woods in Fort Bragg. She had been
raped, sodomized, and shot in the neck, forehead, chest, and back of the
head. She had also suffered blunt force trauma to various parts of her
body. The murder weapon, a .22 caliber pistol that Gray had stolen in
November 1986, was found 60 feet from the victim's body.
On January 3, 1987, Gray entered the barracks room of
Private Mary Ann Lang Nameth under the pretense of needing to use the
bathroom. Once inside, Gray grabbed Nameth, held a knife to her throat,
and asked for her military field gear. Gray tied Nameth's hands behind
her back, removed her underclothing, and raped her. Gray then stabbed
her repeatedly in the neck and on the side of her body, and threatened
to return and kill her if she screamed. Nameth suffered a lacerated
trachea and a collapsed lung, but survived. When Gray's photograph
appeared in the news following his arrest for another crime, Nameth
identified him as her assailant.
On the evening of January 6, 1987, Kimberly Ann
Ruggles, a local cab driver, was dispatched to pick up a passenger named
"Ron" at Gray's address. In the early morning hours of January 7,
military police officers on routine patrol discovered Ruggles' empty cab
parked at the edge of the woods. Her nude body was discovered a short
distance away. She had been raped, sodomized, beaten, and stabbed seven
times. Ruggles' mouth was gagged with a cloth belt that matched a pair
of black karate pants other police officers had found in Gray's
possession hours earlier. Gray's fingerprints were on the interior door
handle of Ruggles' taxi, and Ruggles' fingerprints were found on money
in Gray's possession. Gray's footprints were also found at the scene of
the crime.
Arrest, trial, conviction and sentence
On August 7, 1987, Gray was charged with two counts
of murder (Ruggles and Vickery-Clay) and two counts of attempted murder
on a military reservation.
On November 5, 1987, Gray pleaded guilty in
Cumberland County Superior Court to 22 felonies: two counts of second
degree murder, two counts of first degree burglary, five counts of first
degree rape, five counts of first degree sexual offense, attempted first
degree rape, three counts of second degree kidnapping, two counts of
robbery with a dangerous weapon, assault with a deadly weapon with
intent to kill, and inflicting serious injury. He was sentenced to three
consecutive and five concurrent terms of life imprisonment for those
crimes.
Gray was also tried by a military court. The general
court-martial lasted from December 1987 until April 1988 and was
composed of commissioned and enlisted soldiers at Fort Bragg. Gray was
convicted of 14 charges, including the premeditated murders of Ruggles
and Vickery-Clay, the attempted premeditated murder of Lang Nameth,
three rapes, two robberies, and two counts of forcible sodomy.
On April 12, 1988, he was unanimously sentenced to
death. He was additionally sentenced to a dishonorable discharge, total
forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and reduction in rank to Private
E-1. On July 29, 1988, the Commanding General of the 82nd Airborne
Division approved the sentence. Gray was 22 at the time of his
sentencing.
Gray remained on death row at the U.S. Disciplinary
Barracks, at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, as a member of the United States
Armed Forces cannot be executed until the president approves the death
sentence. On July 28, 2008, President George W. Bush approved Gray's
execution, making Gray the first service member sentenced to death since
1957.
One month later, Army Secretary Pete Geren set the
execution date as December 10, 2008, and ordered that Gray be put to
death by lethal injection at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre
Haute, Indiana. The military released the news of Gray's execution date
on November 20, 2008. Army personnel will be responsible for conducting
the execution, based on an agreement with the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Appeals
Immediately following Gray's court-martial, the
records of the trial were forwarded to Defense Appellate Division and
received by them on August 8, 1988. Counsel filed initial pleadings with
the Court of Military Review on September 15, 1989. On February 13,
1990, that court ordered a sanity board, which, on June 30, 1990, found
that Gray was responsible at the time of the offenses and that he was
competent to understand his trial and the present appellate proceedings.
On July 20, 1990, the Government Appellate Division answered Gray’s
assignment of errors.
On December 27, 1990, Gray filed a motion with the
Court of Military Review requesting that court to order the Government
to provide $15,000 for an expert psychiatrist, a death-penalty-qualified
attorney, and an investigator. Oral arguments were heard on the motion
in January 1991. On March 12, 1991, the Court of Military Review denied
the motion. Gray renewed his request for a psychiatrist and an
investigator on August 7, 1991, but the Court of Military Review denied
it on August 23, 1991. On September 12, 1991, Gray filed a writ-appeal
petition requesting that this Court order the Government to provide
$10,000 and an emergency stay of the proceedings before the Court of
Military Review. On October 18, 1991, this Court denied the writ-appeal
petition and the stay application.
On December 16, 1991, Gray filed a
motion with the Court of Military Review requesting that court to order
additional medical and neuropsychological tests be performed by military
authorities. On December 31, 1991, that court granted Gray’s request and
ordered a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scan of the brain; a 20-channel
scalp electrode, sleep-deprived EEG; and a SPECT scan of his brain, as
well as intellectual, neuropsychological, academic, psychological, and
personality tests.
On February 18, 1992, a report based
on these tests was completed by Captain Fred H. Brown, Jr., Ph.D., a
clinical neuropsychologist from Womack Army Medical Center at Fort Bragg.
Brown stated in an affidavit filed with the appellate court that Gray
was sane at the time of the offenses and during the proceedings. On
March 9, 1992, counsel filed a petition for new trial based on newly-discovered
evidence of lack of mental responsibility.
On February 26, 1992, Gray filed a supplementary
assignment of errors, to which the Government responded on March 27,
1992. On April 8, 1992, the Court of Military Review heard oral
arguments, and on December 15, 1992, denied the petition for a new trial
and affirmed the findings and sentence.
On December 30, 1992, Gray filed a motion renewing
his request for funds for an expert investigator and a behavioral
neurologist. Gray filed a petition for reconsideration of this decision
on January 4, 1993. The Court of Military Review heard oral arguments on
the motion for funding on January 21, 1993, and denied the motion for
funding and the petition for reconsideration on January 22, 1993.
On February 11, 1993, Gray filed a motion and
suggestion for reconsideration by the court sitting en banc of the
denial of funding, and a motion and suggestion for reconsideration by
the court sitting en banc of the decision of December 15, 1992.
On March 11, 1993, the court denied both motions and
the suggestions for reconsideration en banc, but granted a motion
allowing Gray to file a supplemental assignment of errors (XXVIII-LVI).
The Government answered this assignment of errors on April 12, 1993. On
June 9, 1993, the Court of Military Review again affirmed the findings
and sentence. Gray filed a motion for reconsideration on June 28, 1993,
which the court denied on June 30, 1993.
With Gray's execution scheduled for December 10,
2008, Army spokesman Lt. Col. George Wright said on November 20 that
Gray had two legal options remaining: filing a petition with a federal
appellate court to stay the execution, or requesting that the president
reconsider approval of the execution. On November 26, 2008, a federal
judge granted Gray a stay of execution to allow time for further appeals.
Prior military
execution
Dwight Eisenhower was the last American president
before Bush to approve the death penalty for a member of the Armed
Forces convicted in courts-martial, Eisenhower approved the execution of
John A. Bennett in 1957. Bennett was hanged in 1961 for the rape and
attempted murder of an 11-year-old Austrian girl.
Wikipedia.org
SEX:
M RACE: B TYPE: T MOTIVE: Sex.
MO: Soldier at Fort Bragg;
rape-slayer of women age 18-24
DISPOSITION: Three consecutiva
life terms after guilty plea, 1987; condemned by military court-martial,
1988
This April
1988 picture shows Ronald A. Gray in handcuffs and chains,
escorted by military police leaving a Fort Bragg, N.C. courtroom.
