Real Name: Wadada (last name unrevealed)
Aliases: Wadada Va Son, Gerald, Jae-Soon, Anthony Merris
Wanted For: Attempted Murder, Rape
Missing Since: December 1988
Case[]
Details: Wadada is wanted for raping and attempting to kill seventeen-year-old Sarah Beard. She was a freshman sociology student at the University of New Mexico. She lived near the campus in an apartment on Grand Avenue in Albuquerque. At 4pm on December 8, 1988, her mother, Susan, arrived there. Sarah had not responded to phone calls for nearly twenty-four hours and had not been seen since 1pm on December 7. Susan had obtained a key to the apartment from the landlord. When she entered, she found blood on the floor and the place in disarray. She says at that point, her heart was going "90 miles an hour". She was petrified. She called out for Sarah and looked around for her but could not initially find her.
Suddenly, Susan heard a rasping noise, like a death rattle, coming from the far side of Sarah's bed. She found her lying there, unconscious. She immediately called 911. She tried to remain calm and give them the information they needed, but it was very difficult for her. She says it was hard to talk and to not be hysterical. Sarah had been raped, beaten, and struck in the back of the head with a hammer no fewer than eleven times. Three of the hammer blows caused skull fractures. Her jaw was also fractured, and her inner ear was damaged. A nerve in her right eye was ripped.
Sarah was rushed to Presbyterian Hospital where she underwent three hours of emergency surgery. It was completed sometime around 1am on December 9. Susan and her husband, Jim, finally went home around 2am after talking to the surgeon. After getting some sleep, they called the hospital first thing in the morning. The staff told them that Sarah had regained consciousness. Due to her injuries, she could neither speak nor move her arms. But she seemed to be fully aware.
In an effort to communicate, Jim asked her to squeeze his hand when she heard the first letter of his first name. He went through the alphabet. When he reached "J", she responded with a faint hand squeeze. He says it was a great relief when he knew that she was able to communicate on some level. He was still scared because he did not know how much she would actually recover. However, he said the hand squeeze was better than nothing.
Encouraged, Jim and Susan decided to try again. This time, they hoped she would identify her attacker. Jim asked her to squeeze his hand when they got to the first letter of her attacker's first name. He also asked her to do so if she understood what they were asking her to do, and she did. Patiently, he went through the alphabet again.
By the time Jim reached "R", Sarah still had not squeezed his hand. He began to fear that her earlier response had simply been a fluke. But he kept going. Finally, when he reached "W", she squeezed his hand. He and Susan tried to think of his friends whose names began with that letter. They first asked if it was her friend, Will, but she did not respond. When they asked if it was her friend, Wadada, she squeezed Jim's hand.
Wadada, the man Sarah had acknowledged as her attacker, was known only by that single name. He was a transient and a "hanger-on" at the University of New Mexico. He fancied himself an artist and sponged off various students, apparently having no livelihood of his own. But police could not press charges on the strength of a hand squeeze. She needed to name her attacker. And no one knew if she would ever speak again.
Susan says the whole hospital stay was somewhat surreal. It was difficult to see Sarah, who had been a healthy, normal child, with her head shaved, tubes coming out of her, and being initially unable to speak. Finally, on Christmas Day, she was able to speak again. Three weeks later, Albuquerque Detective Ernie Rivera interviewed her for the first time. He asked her who attacked her, and she said that it was Wadada.
Over the next few weeks, Sarah improved dramatically. She was finally able to relate the details of the attack, at first haltingly, but then in a clear and confident voice. She says that the day of the attack, December 7, was toward the end of the semester. On that day, she was working on several final projects. She says she was in a bit of a panic trying to get them done. As she was getting ready to go over to the campus and do some work, she heard a knock on the door. It was Wadada.
When Sarah opened the door, Wadada came in. She told him that she had to go to class. He told her that he would not keep her for long. He asked her if she had a small paintbrush. She showed him where they were and told him that he could borrow any of them. She again said she had to leave and that she was in a hurry because her class started in twenty minutes. He then asked her where something was on campus. She told him that she would show him.
As Sarah turned around to put her shoes on, Wadada came from behind and grabbed her. He put his arm around her neck and held a weapon to it. He told her not to make a sound, or else he would kill her. She tried to go along with whatever he wanted, hoping that he would leave. He first demanded that she take off her clothes. She does not remember if he said that he was going to rape her or not. But she knew he was going to. She started screaming, banging on the floor and walls, and kicking everything she could, hoping that someone would hear her. Unfortunately, nobody did.
Sarah's actions only seemed to make Wadada madder. He hit her, pushed her down to the floor. and raped her. She said he was "crazed". For forty-five minutes, he continued to threaten her, chanting wildly and insisting that she do so with him. He told her to apologize for her sins and "purge" herself. He wanted her to apologize and accept responsibility for what had happened to her. She was unsure of what exactly he wanted her to do and say. She was too scared to question him.
At one point, during the chanting, Wadada picked up a hammer and struck Sarah in the back of the head. She remembers feeling a huge "slam" when he did so. After that, he struck her several more times. She then lay unconscious and bleeding for nearly twenty-four hours before Susan found her. Three weeks later, she spoke Wadada's name aloud for the first time.
Wadada is between 5'7" and 5'9" tall, weighing about 140 pounds, with a thin build. At the time of the attack, he was in his late thirties or early forties. He wore a light beard and his hair in small locks. As the above police sketch shows, his right hand is deformed, the fingers permanently crabbed together in a claw-like state. He has scars on the palm and back of both hands, and a burn mark in the center of his right hand. His right arm seems withered.
Wadada has used various aliases and listed his birthplace as Guyana. He has been known to live in Santa Fe, New Mexico; Miami, Florida; and Brooklyn, New York. He speaks with an accent that some have described as French-Caribbean, others as Ethiopian. He is apparently fluent in Spanish. He is believed to be a Rastafarian.
Police say Wadada is "capable of extreme violence and is believed to be mentally ill". He is wanted on charges of aggravated battery, attempted murder, and criminal sexual penetration.
Extra Notes:
- This case first aired on the February 2, 1994 episode.
- It was excluded from the FilmRise release of the Robert Stack episodes.
- Wadada was played by Jeffrey Anderson-Gunter.
- Some sources say police found Sarah after Susan called them.
Results: Wanted
Links:
- UNM student is beaten in apartment - December 9, 1988
- Police Search for Transient - January 26, 1989
- Where is Wadada? The Unsolved Rape and Attempted Murder of Sarah Beard - July 21, 2018
- SitcomsOnline Discussion of Wadada (1)