Child Kidnap Suspect Phillip Garrido Now Investigated for Prostitute Murders

Aug. 28, 2009— -- Phillip Garrido sat quiety as he was arraigned today on charges that he kidnapped, raped and imprisoned Jaycee Dugard -- even as police from another jurisdiction began probing Garrido's home for clues to the unsolved murders of area prostitutes.

The bizarre twist came as a clearer picture of Garrido emerged: a man obsessed with his own strange vision of God, who carried around a machine he said allowed people to hear his thoughts, and who was like a "strutting peacock" when it came to the two young girls he fathered with Jaycee Dugard.

The latest shock in the case came when Contra Costa sheriff's Capt. Daniel Terry told the Associated Press that officers were executing a search warrant of the Garrido home in Antioch, Calif., in connection with the murder of prostitutes.

The bodies of several slain prostitutes had been dumped near an industrial park where Garrido, a registered sex offender, worked during the 1990s.

Garrido, 58, and his wife, Nancy, 54, were arraigned separately today on 29 counts of kidnapping, rape and imprisonment charges in relation to the 1991 abduction of Dugard when she was 11 years old.

Garrido sat quietly, looking at photographers as the judge ruled that he would be held without bail. His wife cried several times during her arraignment. Both pleaded not guilty.

The picture that emerged of Garrido is of a man who ran a printing business and did not hide the children he told police he fathered with Dugard, despite allegedly keeping them confined in a backyard jumble of sheds and tents, and never taking them to school or to a doctor.

"They are very, very beautiful blonde-haired, blue-eyed girls," said Timothy Allen, who got his printing from Garrido over the last 10 years.

Allen said Garrido brought the girls around about three times over that period, the last time a year ago.

"He was like a strutting peacock. He was very proud of these two girls," Allen said.

When Allen came over to greet the girls, "They were very shy," he said.

He remembered one of the girls was named Angel and the other girl's name had the word "star" in it, but Allen couldn't remember the name exactly.

The Girls Are 'Spitting Image' of Jaycee Dugard When She Was 11

The girls were clean and their hair was combed, but they didn't look their age.

"They looked very young, maybe 10 and 12, or 11 and 13," Allen said.

And their clothes, he said, were "weird little dresses. They weren't store bought. They were obviously homemade."

Allen said that when the news of Garrido's arrest broke, his bookkeeper called to him to look at the picture of Jaycee Dugard when she was 11, the year she was stolen.

"My heart sank," Allen said. "She was the spitting image of these girls."

The last time Allen saw Garrido was on July 29. Allen said the visit prompted him to remark to his staff that Garrido was getting so strange that they should find another printer.

"He talked all this fabulous stuff. New information would be brought forth from God, it would be mind blowing, going to be huge," Allen said.

Perhaps one of the kookier things about Garrido, who claimed on his blog that he could speak in tongues and control sound with his mind, was that in recent years he would carry around a box with earphones attached to it.

"He claimed that by putting on the earphones people could hear what he was thinking and that God was talking to him," Allen said.

"I tried it out," Allen said. "I heard the seashore."

"You hear? You hear it?" Allen remembered Garrido asking him.

Allen shook his head no.

"Then he moved his lips," Allen said. "I still didn't hear a thing. Then he whispered, and I said, 'I hear you,' and Garrido said, 'Yeah, that's it!'"

Allen chuckled a bit at the memory, but added, "I knew this guy was weird, that he was kooky, but not in an evil way."

Garrido's father, Manuel Garrido, told the AP that his son is "absolutely out of his mind" and blamed his use of the drug LSD when he was young.

Manuel Garrido said he hasn't seen his son in years and has never been to the house where the encampment allegedly was set up.

He said his ex-wife, Phillip Garrido's mother, has dementia and is not well. She also lived in the Antioch house.