'60 Freeway Slayer' gets death

A man was sentenced to death Wednesday for killing six prostitutes whose bodies were found in cities along the freeway route east of Los Angeles.

There was overwhelming evidence that Ivan J. Hill, who has been dubbed the "60 Freeway Slayer," murdered the women, Superior Court Judge Larry Fidler said.

Hill, a 45-year-old former forklift operator, was convicted Nov. 17 of six counts of first-degree murder for killings committed in 1993 and 1994. He was charged in 2003 after DNA evidence linked him to the killings while he was serving time in state prison for unrelated crimes.

At trial, jurors heard a recorded telephone call to a police dispatcher in which Hill acknowledged killing a woman and said her body was in a park. In a second call, he warned: "Y'all better catch me before I kill again."

Defense attorneys said Hill had been badly abused as a child. The defense also said Hill also saw his father shoot his mother to death on Christmas Day in 1968.

Hill was convicted of six counts of first-degree murder for the killings of Roxanne Bates, 31, of Montclair; Helen Ruth Hill, 36, of Pomona; Donna L. Goldsmith, 35, of Montclair; Cheryl Sayers, 34, of Ontario; Betty Sue Harris, 37, of Pomona; and Debra Denise Brown, 33, of Los Angeles.