Satanic Panic: A Death in the Manson Tunnel

Crimes of the Times

L.A. Times Studios

Christopher Goffard, Los Angeles, La Times, Los Angeles Times, True Crime, Chris Goffard, News, Society & Culture

4.6 • 42.8K Ratings

🗓️ 4 November 2025

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On the summer solstice in 1990, a UCLA student with an interest in the occult was stabbed to death in a railway tunnel in the San Fernando Valley. Rumors of ritual violence swirled in the era of the so-called Satanic Panic. Police investigating the murder of Ronald Baker found his killers knew him well. One of them had even carried his casket.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is an L.A. Times Studios podcast.
0:13.0	I share this on behalf of Ron's parents.
0:18.5	Ron was born at Santa Monica Hospital during a rainstorm on January 18th,
0:23.6	1969.
0:25.6	He was an easy-going, intelligent child.
0:28.6	He was thrilled to be accepted by his first choice of colleges, UCLA.
0:34.6	He was a science fiction and a Star Trek fan and had visions of becoming a space scientist or an astronaut.
0:44.2	He grew up in this church. This is a memorial service for Ronald Baker, a young man who had recently
0:50.9	been murdered in a particularly brutal way. He had 18 stab wounds, and his throat
0:56.9	had been slashed. Ron was a loving person with a witty sense of humor and a deeply inquiring mind.
1:05.8	When local teenagers found his body in a pitch black railroad tunnel above Chatsworth in the San Fernando Valley.
1:12.6	He had no ID and was initially John Doe No. 135.
1:17.6	The tunnel had a dark mystique. The words holy terror were spray-painted above the entrance.
1:23.6	People called it the Manson Tunnel. Charles Manson and his disciples had lived nearby at the Spahn
1:30.0	Movie Ranch. He moved to an apartment near Van Nuys and Victory Boulevards, where he could take a bus
1:36.1	directly to UCLA, or he could take the Victory bus to the Baker's house. Baker had been a skinny, sweet-tempered 21-year-old with a mop of curly hair.
1:47.8	People said he had no enemies.
1:50.2	He loved the Rocky Horror Picture Show sing-alongs and worked a candle-making booth at Renaissance
1:55.8	fairs.
1:57.0	He had written his sister a birthday card in Elizabethan English.
2:00.8	He'd been to the Manson Tunnel before and was known to meditate in the area.
2:05.8	He was also an avid environmentalist and recycler.
	...

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