Penniless native Mexican Juan Corona arrived in Yuba City, California, sometime in the 1950's and slowly built a more than respectable living as a labor contractor. He was respected and seemingly happlily married with children. But he was also a schizophrenic and a sexual sadist who truned to murder in the spring of 1971.

Corona found workers in the steady flow of migrant laborers coming out of his home country just plain vagrants that were looking for a paycheck. Most were men that were transient in nature and not likely to be missed. He would simply select a new worker, one that was owed money usually, kill them, nad bury them. The disappearances never raised any concerns. Workers often just up and left without notice.

A fruit farmer in the area found a hole dug on his property on May 19. When the man checked on the mysterious hole the next day, it was filled up. Even to s simple farmer it was obvious that this was more than likely a grave for someone or something and he called the police. Kenneth Whitacre was dug up from the earth, his throat and head hacked viciously and his upper body stabbed repeatedly.

A search for more graves turned up more than anyone would have imagined and by early June the grand total had reached 25 bodies, all men who had been seen with or had gotten their jobs through Corona's labor contracting business. He was arrested for the murders and tried and though there were murmerings of an accomplice, Corona was found guilty and given 25 seperate life sentences in January of 1973.

After barely surviving a stabbing attack in prison, Corona won an appeal for a new trial about a decade after the original. The basis was that he had been improperly defended and that new evidence would point to his own brother as the true murderer.The second trial was a money-wasting sham and Corona was sent back to the California penal system to continue serving out his life sentences.