A homosexual drifter, 26-year-old David Villarreal was arrested in March 1981, after an informant tipped police to his involvement in a seven-year series of murders around Dallas and San Antonio, Texas. Picked up on March 10, Villarreal cheerfully directed police to the body of his latest victim, killed two days earlier, and tacked on confessions for crimes in which he was not yet a suspect. According to statements recorded by Texas authorities, Villarreal claimed his first victim in San Antonio, during 1974. Moving to Dallas in late 1978 or early '79, he scored number two, hammering a middle-aged stranger to death. In March 1979, he had been held for questioning in the murder of Ernest Garcia -- stabbed with an ice pick, then beaten with a board and concrete block -- but he was finally released for lack of evidence . A month later, he staged a double event with the slayings of 30-year-old Charles Moya and 32-yearold Tony Gutierrez, dispatching both victims by slitting their throats. More recently, in San Antonio, he had beaten 18-year-old Joe Duque to death on March 3, 1981. On March 8, he used a claw hammer to murder 72-year-old Robert Manley, the victim's body discovered on March 11 as a result of the killer's confession. Police reported that "sexual gratification was at least part of the motive" in Villarreal's San Antonio murders, while those committed in Dallas seemed purely mercenary, connected with various robberies.