At first they called him the East Area Rapist, the Original Night Stalker, the Night Predator.

Not even the dogs barked when he slipped into houses and back yards. Victims would be woken by a masked man shining a flashlight in their faces, ordering them to obey or die.

“Make one move,” he told one victim, “And you’ll be silent forever, and I’ll be gone in the dark.”

The haunting phrase, “I’ll be gone in the dark” formed the title of a book by the author Michelle McNamara published two months ago.

She called the suspect the Golden State Killer, after his California area of operations.

So obsessed had she become by her determination to catch him that some said the stress contributed her death from an undiagnosed heart condition, aged 46, in 2016.

It was perhaps no surprise that her posthumously published book became a bestseller. Because it was grim testament to the fact that despite being hunted for nearly half a century, after committing at least 12 murders and 45 rapes between the years of 1976 and 1986, the Golden State Killer was still at large.

He was, they said, “California’s most prolific uncaught serial killer”.

Until now.

On Tuesday, inquiries led police to a suburban house with an immaculately tended lawn in Citrus Heights, Sacramento County, California, to an inhabitant regarded by his neighbours as “a nice old grandpa”.

By Wednesday morning Joseph James DeAngelo, 72, had been charged with two counts of murder in northern California and four counts of murder in Orange County, in the southern part of the state.

If the prosecution can prove that the “nice old grandpa” DeAngelo is also the Golden State Killer, the East Area Rapist, the Original Night Stalker and possibly the Visalia Ransacker, it will finally resolve a mystery that has tormented, not to say tortured, Californian law enforcers for 42 years.

As was clear from the possibly prematurely triumphant statement of Orange County district attorney Tony Rackauckas.

On Thursday, way before any trial verdict definitively established guilt or innocence, Mr Rackauckas declared: “He’s been called the East Side Rapist. He’s been called the Visalia Ransacker, the Original Night Stalker and the Golden State Killer. Today, it’s our pleasure to call him ‘defendant’”

They first became aware of whoever it was that committed the crimes in the summer of 1976.

According to McNamara’s book, at 5am on 18 June 1976, police received a call from a 23-year-old woman in Rancho Cordova, Sacramento.

She was speaking into a telephone as best she could while lying on the floor with her hands bound so tightly behind her back that she had lost the blood circulation in them.

The masked man had attacked her in her bed, pressing a four-inch knife against her head and telling her: “If you make one move or sound, I’ll stick this knife in you.”

He bound, gagged and raped her, without once removing his gloves.

Over the next six months, it is believed, the East Area Rapist struck at a rate of more than one sex attack a month. By the end of the year he had forced, or attempted to force himself on eight women.

Jane Carson-Sandler was one of them.

World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 11 August 2020 French Prime Minister Jean Castex is helped by a member of staff to put a protective suit on prior to his visit at the CHU hospital in Montpellier AFP via Getty World news in pictures 10 August 2020 Locals harvest their potatoes as Mount Sinabung spews volcanic ash in Karo, North Sumatra province, Indonesia Antara Foto/Reuters World news in pictures 9 August 2020 Doves fly over the Peace Statue at Nagasaki Peace Park during the memorial ceremony held for the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombing EPA World news in pictures 8 August 2020 Anti-government protesters try to remove concrete wall that installed by security forces to prevent protesters reaching the Parliament square, during a protest against the political elites and the government after this week's deadly explosion in Beirut AP World news in pictures 7 August 2020 A protester throws a stone towards Israeli forces in the village of Turmus Aya, north of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, following a march by Palestinians against the building of Israeli settlements AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 August 2020 A woman yells as soldiers block a road for French President Emmanuel Macron's visit the Gemmayzeh neighborhood. The area in Beirut suffered extensive damage from the explosion at the seaport AP World news in pictures 5 August 2020 Damage at the site of Tuesday's blast in Beirut's port area, Lebanon Reuters World news in pictures 4 August 2020 A large explosion in the Lebanese capital Beirut. The blast, which rattled entire buildings and broke glass, was felt in several parts of the city AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 August 2020 A general view shows the new road bridge in Genoa, Italy ahead of its official inauguration, after it was rebuilt following its collapse on August 14, 2018 which killed 43 people Reuters World news in pictures 2 August 2020 Empty stall spaces are seen hours before a citywide curfew is introduced in Melbourne, Australia EPA World news in pictures 1 August 2020 People take part in a demonstration by the initiative "Querdenken-711" with the slogan "the end of the pandemic - the day of freedom" to protest against the current measurements to curb the spread of COVID-19 in Berlin, Germany AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 July 2020 Pilgrims circumambulating around the Kaaba, the holiest shrine in the Grand mosque in Mecca. Muslim pilgrims converged today on Saudi Arabia's Mount Arafat for the climax of this year's hajj, the smallest in modern times and a sharp contrast to the massive crowds of previous years Saudi Ministry of Media/AFP World news in pictures 30 July 2020 The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission lifts off at the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. The mission is part of the USA's largest moon to Mars exploration. Nasa will attempt to establish a sustained human presence on and around the moon by 2028 through their Artemis programme EPA World news in pictures 29 July 2020 A woman refreshes herself in a outdoor pool in summer temperatures in Ehingen, Germany dpa via AP World news in pictures 28 July 2020 Malaysia's former prime minister Najib Razak speaks to the media after he was found guilty in his corruption trial in Kuala Lumpur AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 July 2020 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un poses for a photograph after conferring commemorative pistols to leading commanding officers of the armed forces on the 67th anniversary of the "Day of Victory in the Great Fatherland Liberation War". Which marks the signing of the Korean War armistice KCNA via Reuters

At 6.30am on 5 October 1976 the then 30-year-old nursing student and air force reservist was sitting up in bed at her home in Citrus Heights, Sacramento.

Her Air Force officer husband had just left for work. Her three-year-old son was sleeping next to her.

She saw a light outside, then heard someone running towards the bedroom.

The masked man shone a flashlight in her eyes and hissed through clenched teeth: “Shut up, shut up, shut up or I’ll kill you.”

As he did so he scraped a butcher’s knife across her chest, leaving behind drops of blood.

The attacker blindfolded, gagged and bound both Ms Carson-Sandler and her son. He picked the three-year-old boy up and either took him to another room or placed him on the floor.

When he started untying her ankles, Ms Carson-Sandler knew he was going to rape her.

In 2014 she found the courage to write a book, Frozen in Fear, about her ordeal and how it affected her. Just last month Ms Carson-Sandler retold her story to the Island Packet newspaper in the hope that it would help bring the rapist to justice.

She told how after he raped her, the attacker returned her son to the bed with the words: “If you move, I’m going to come back and kill you.”

Leaving the terrified pair in bed, he went into the kitchen, opened the fridge and rattled pots and pants, for all the world as if he was cooking himself something to eat.

Then he returned to give Ms Carson-Sandler a parting message: “You looked really good in the Officer’s Club.”

The attacks continued: two in January 1977, two in February, two in March.

Certain patterns seemed to be developing. The rapist would always threaten his victims through clenched teeth, as if trying to disguise his voice.

As the “Officer’s Club” remark to Ms Carson-Sandler indicated, he seemed to stalk his victims before striking, even breaking into their homes days or weeks before the attack itself.

After the attack he might ransack the house, taking souvenirs, notably coins and jewellery. He might spend hours in the residence, even, as he appears to have done with Ms Carson-Sandler, cooking himself meals.

Sometimes the rapist left souvenirs taken from one victim at the home of another.

Eventually, he stopped confining himself to lone women and started attacking homes where men were present too. He would tie both the man and the woman up.

Then he would pile dishes on the man’s back. If he heard plates crash to the floor while he raped the woman, he warned, he would kill them both.

His victims ranged in age from 13 to 41.

And as he continued to attack and continued to escape justice, Sacramento County found itself living in fear of the East Area Rapist, the Original Night Stalker.

“He inspired vigilante-like patrols, attracted the attention of network news, caused safety lock sales to quadruple, pushed the county’s eastern suburbs to burn floodlights through the night and propelled hundreds of housewives into pistol training,” the Sacramento Bee recalled in 1981.

“This one man prompted what is believed to have been the most intense manhunt in the county’s history.”

If for some law enforcers the hunt for the Golden State Killer has become personal over the years, that’s because they remember how it affected their childhood.

“It all changed,” said Sacramento County district attorney Anne Marie Schubert, who was 12 when the East Area Rapist first started to terrorise her community. “The memories are very vivid. You can ask anyone who grew up here. Everyone has a story.”

And as news of the serial rapist spread from California to the whole of the US, the man himself appears to have turned murderous.

In May 1977 it was reported that the rapist told one victim he would kill two people if he saw stories about his attack on her.

It is believed that eight months and nine attacks later, he made good on his promise.

On 2 February 1978 newlyweds Brian and Katie Maggiore were walking their dog in Rancho Cordova. It is suspected that they came across the East Area Rapist. He is thought to have chased them down and shot them dead.

It is possible, however, that this was not the first time the East Area Rapist had killed.

Some suspect that, as his skill at entering homes suggested, he had begun as a prolific burglar before graduating to sex crimes.

Between 1973 and 1976, California’s San Joaquin Valley had been plagued by a burglar known as the Visalia Ransacker.

On 11 September 1975, a man strongly believed to have been the ransacker was nearly caught by journalism professor Claude Snelling, 45.

Awoken by noises in the middle of the night, Mr Snelling went to investigate and was confronted by a masked intruder in the process of trying to kidnap his 16-year-old daughter Beth.

The intruder fled, but not before firing two shots that killed Mr Snelling.

Today many believe the Visalia Ransacker and the East Area Rapist to have been one and the same.

And if the killing of Mr Snelling was not premeditated, it appears that other murders were – and that the attacker’s area of operations had shifted from north to south California.

In 1979 the police in northern California were relieved to note a precipitous drop in the number of sex attacks they were having to deal with.

But in southern California, a murder spree seemed to be starting. There were nine killings in Orange, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties between October 1979 and August 1981, and they were savage – not shootings, bludgeonings.

Like the one on Cockleshell Drive.

On Thursday 21 August 1980 Roger Harrington opened the door of his home in Cockleshell Drive, Irvine, and found a scene of horror.

His medical student son Keith, 24, had been staying at the property with his wife Patti, 27. Mr Harrington senior found the couple dead in their nightclothes under a re-made bed.

Keith had been killed by a blow to the bed. Patti appeared to have been subjected to a frenzied attack. The bedding around her was drenched in blood.

DNA would eventually link the nine killings to each other, and to the rapes in northern California.

The attacks, though, petered out.

After a rape and murder in Orange County in 1986, the Golden State Killer appears to have stopped.

He faded from the immediate concerns of law enforcement. Perhaps he thought he had got away with it.

But in 2016, 40 years after this serial rapist and serial murderer first struck and affected some of their childhoods, law enforcers decided they were going to stop at nothing to catch him.

In the words of Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones, a new investigative team was formed and given “virtually unlimited resources and freedom” to track down their man.

But for two years, they slogged away, seemingly to no avail.

And then, the investigators said, the breakthrough came at “light speed” in the space of six days.

So far, they have been relatively guarded about what led them to suspect DeAngelo.

Mr Jones said detectives with “dogged determination” were able to get a sample of DNA from something DeAngelo discarded, but the sheriff would not say what that item was.

It is understood that the genetic material was not a clear match, but there were enough similarities for investigators to return for more and they said they were able to get a conclusive match.

The suspect’s biography, as pieced together by news reporters, also seems to suggest that DeAngelo might have been in the relevant places at the right time.

And it offers a potentially chilling revelation. When the East Area Rapist first started to terrorise southern California, DeAngelo was one of those tasked with catching him and protecting the public.

He was a California cop.

He worked for the Auburn police department between 1976 and 1979, and before that was a police officer in Exeter, in the San Joaquin Valley, from 1973 to 1976 – at a time when the Visalia Ransacker was active in the area.

The authorities are now said to be investigating whether Mr DeAngelo can be linked to any crimes committed when he was supposed to have been on duty.

In 1979, the same year that a precipitous drop in south California sex attacks was noted, DeAngelo lost his job as a police officer.

He was caught shoplifting a can of dog repellant and a hammer from a Pay ’N’ Save store in Citrus Heights.

The authorities are now said to be considering the possibility that he was stealing the items to use them as tools in the crimes he is suspected of committing.

DeAngelo is thought to have moved into the Citrus Heights house with the well tended lawn in 1983.

By that time the Golden State Killer’s career of crime was almost over.

To his neighbours,Joseph James DeAngelo seemed like ‘a nice old grandpa’ (EPA)

In Citrus Heights, DeAngelo, a US Navy veteran who had served in Vietnam, seems to have fitted in tolerably well.

He built model planes, kept his house perfectly painted as well as his lawn well manicured. He is thought to have lived in the house with an adult daughter and a granddaughter.

And in all the years that the Golden State Killer had been active, despite all the thousands of tips offered by the public, the name DeAngelo had never come onto law enforcement’s radar – until last week.

In response to repeated questions, Sheriff Jones was adamant that McNamara’s recently published bestseller had not led them to the suspect.

But the book had closed with many saw as an eerily prescient “letter to an old man”, about how she thought it would end.

“One day soon,” she wrote, “You’ll hear a car pull up to your kerb, an engine cut out. You’ll hear footsteps coming up your front walk … The doorbell rings.

“This is how it ends for you.

“Open the door. Show us your face.

“Walk into the light.”

In fact, said Sheriff Jones, there was no ring on the door for the suspect DeAngelo.

Officers simply waited for him to walk out of his house.

“He was very surprised by that,” Jones said. “It looked as though he might have been searching his mind to execute a particular plan he may have had in mind ... but he was not given the opportunity.”

DeAngelo did tell the officers he had a roast in the oven, but they assured him there was no need for him to return to the house.