BERGEN COUNTY, N.J.—Notorious New Jersey serial killer Richard Cottingham, 73, who is serving more than 200 years in prison, has confessed to three cold-case slayings of local teenage girls from the 1960s, bringing his body count to nine.
Cottingham, known as the Torso Killer for the way he dismembered his victims, now admits to strangling Irene Blase, 18, of Bogota; Denise Falasca, 15, of Closter; and Jacalyn Harp, 13, of Midland Park, between 1968 and 1969.
That’s according to officials with the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office on Friday, Jan. 3.
“The Prosecutor’s Office investigations revealed that Richard Cottingham committed these homicides,” Assistant Prosecutor Elizabeth Rebein told the press.
She said that victims’ families “were immediately and confidentially notified when the cases were solved.”
Rebein explained there were no previous public announcements so as not to jeopardize continuing investigations.
“For similar reasons, there will be no further public comment on these or other similar continuing investigations by this office,” Rebein said.
Cottingham has been behind bars since 1981 for the slaying of six girls in New Jersey and New York between 1967 and 1980.
Records show Harp was killed on July 17, 1968, in Midland Park as she was walking home from band practice.
Blase was abducted in Hackensack on April 7, 1969, and found dead in Saddle Brook a day later.
Falasca was abducted in Emerson on July 14, 1969, and found dead the next day in Saddle Brook.
Cottingham, born in the Bronx, is incarcerated at New Jersey State Prison in Trenton. At last check he was eligible for parole in August 2025.
