Patrick Kearney (born c1940) is a US serial killer who preyed on young men in California during the 1970s. He is sometimes referred to as The Freeway Killer, a nickname he shares with two other separate serial killers, William Bonin and Randy Steven Kraft.

He was the youngest of three sons and was raised in a reasonably stable family compared to most other serial killers. However, being thin, shy, prone to illness and scared to fight back, Kearney became a target for bullies at school. In his teens, he became withdrawn and fantasized about killing people.

Originally from Texas, Kearney moved to California after a brief marriage ended in divorce and eventually he worked as an engineer for Hughes Aircraft. He claimed to have killed his first victim around 1965, a hitch-hiker he picked up and murdered around Coney Island, Long Beach. He claimed several more victims before moving to Redondo Beach, Los Angeles, in 1967 with a younger man named David Hill, who became his homosexual lover.

The pair would frequently argue, and Kearney would go out for long drives on his own. It was then that he would pick up young male hitch-hikers or young men from gay-bars and kill them. He was primarily a necrophile, shooting his victims without warning then taking the bodies off to dismember and mutilate. Eventually Kearney would dump the victim along the freeway or in the desert, usually wrapped in garbage bags (leading some detectives to refer to it as the 'Fag in the Bag' case).

The final victim was a young man named John LaMay who came round to Kearney's house on March 13 1977. He was looking for Hill, who wasn't home, but Kearney invited him to watch television. Without provocation, Kearney shot LaMay in the back of the head and later dumped the remains in the desert. They were found on May 18. Because LaMay had told someone he was going to see Hill, police soon turned up at Kearney and Hill's home and questioned them. Although they co-operated, the two fled as soon as the detectives left. After a few weeks on the run, they gave themselves up on July 1.

David Hill, thirty-four, was eventually cleared of any involvement in his partner's crimes and was released.

Thirty-seven-year-old Patrick Kearney, on the other hand, made a full confession to his crimes, admitting to a total of twenty-eight murders. In order to avoid the death penalty, he agreed to plead guilty. Kearney was charged with twenty-one counts of murder, and as agreed, he pleaded guilty and was given twenty-one life sentences. Police are certain that Kearney was responsible for the other seven slayings he had admitted, but they did not have the physical evidence to charge him, and furthermore, they were satisfied that he would be behind bars for the rest of his life.

References

Angel of Darkness (1992) Dennis McDougal, Warner Books ISBN 07088 53420