Some true crime books are written by authors who research a case years later. The Parking Lot Rapist comes from someone who was there.
Lee DeVore spent more than thirty years with the Fullerton Police Department in California, working throughout the department but spending much of his career in the Detective Division—as an investigator, supervisor, detective lieutenant, and eventually captain of the division.
It was during those years that DeVore became involved in the investigation at the heart of The Parking Lot Rapist: A Detective’s Account of How a Police Department Brought Down a Killer.
The case began in January 1976 with the murder of nineteen-year-old newlywed Gina Marie Tisher. What followed was an investigation into a series of kidnappings, sexual assaults, and murder that would lead Fullerton investigators to Kenneth Richard Hulbert AKA the Parking Lot Rapist.
For DeVore, this isn’t a case reconstructed solely from old newspaper clippings or court records. It is part of his own history.
And remarkably, that history resurfaced decades later.
While serving as Chief of Police in Twin Falls, Idaho, DeVore received a phone call from David Lee—a man he remembered as a little boy connected to the 1976 investigation. David was now thirty-six and wanted to speak with the former detective about the past and another murder he believed could be connected to Hulbert. The call brought DeVore back to a case he had never forgotten.
DeVore’s law-enforcement career continued long after the original investigation. After retiring from the Fullerton Police Department in 1994, he became Chief of Police in Twin Falls, where he served for another ten years. He also served as president of the Idaho Police Chiefs Association and held leadership positions in other law-enforcement organizations. He holds a bachelor’s degree in public administration from California State University, Long Beach, and a Master of Arts degree from the University of Redlands.
Now, in The Parking Lot Rapist, DeVore takes readers inside one of the cases that stayed with him.
Read The Parking Lot Rapist
The Parking Lot Rapist: A Detective’s Account of How a Police Department Brought Down a Killer takes readers inside the investigation from the perspective of one of the law-enforcement officers who lived it.
Beginning with the murder of Gina Marie Tisher, DeVore follows the investigation through additional attacks, the hunt for a suspect, Hulbert’s arrest, the building of the case, and the trial—while also examining the lives forever changed by the crimes.
For readers of true crime who want to understand not only what happened, but how investigators actually worked to uncover the truth, this is a story told from inside the investigation.
Get your copy of The Parking Lot Rapist from Genius Books.
