All of you true crime fans out there, this article is for you. Or if you simply find murder cases interesting, this is for you too!

I recently started listening to a true crime podcast and found myself very interested in many murder cases they talked about. I thought I would share my top 5 that I found interesting and give a little synopsis. Feel free to look all of them up for more info!

Let's start the countdown.

5. The East Area Rapist Murders

To this day, the actual murderer in this case has never been identified. The East Area Rapist was also known as The Original Night Stalker due to the fact that he carried out his murders at night. From the mid-1970s through 1986, this serial killer and rapist raped over 50 people and killed 12. All of these cases were linked with DNA evidence.

He would break into homes with couples, tie up the man and woman, then rape the woman and tell the man if he stayed quiet, she would not get murdered after the fact. The East Area Rapist was known for calling his victims the night before and after the rapes, leading police to believe he personally knew all of his victims. Chilling, right?

4. The Disappearance/Murder of Kristin Smart

As with the last case, the actual perpetrator has never been identified, nor has Smart's body ever been recovered. Smart disappeared in 1996 after being seen with 3 people walking her home from a house party while extremely intoxicated. The initial suspect, Paul Flores, still walks free to this day. After her disappearance, police questioned Flores and found multiple suspicious clues linking him to her disappearance.

The day after her disappearance, Flores awoke with a black eye and told his roommate that, "Kristin was home with his mother." One of her earrings was found at his home, cadaver dogs indicated that a dead body had in fact been in his room and it was thought that he buried Smart in concrete that now sits in his mother's backyard. As of 2016, 20 years after her disappearance, remains were found on the college campus that she attended. The case is still being investigated today and forensics are trying to determine if they are, in fact, her remains.

3. The Murder of Sherri Rasmussen

In 1986, Rasmussen had been beaten and shot 3 times in her apartment that she shared with her husband. Police originally thought it was a burglary gone wrong, as there were electronics stacked up and the place was ransacked. The only clue they had was a bite mark on Rasmussen's arm. After running the DNA, they could not link it to anybody in the criminal system.

This case remained unsolved for 20 years until detectives finally listened to Rasmussen's father, who had stated she was hated by her husband's former lover, Stephanie Lazarus, also an L.A. detective. As it turns out, Lazarus had killed Rasmussen out of jealousy and used her police skills to basically unlink herself from the murder. She is currently serving a 27 years to life sentence for first-degree murder.

2. The Murder of Laci Peterson

In 2002, Peterson's family reported her missing to local police. At the time, she was 8 months pregnant with her and her husband's, Scott Peterson, first child. Scott had returned home from fishing in San Fransisco Bay to find Laci missing, but her father was the one to report it. After many suspicious clues, the police decided Scott was the prime suspect. It was also discovered that Scott had been having an affair.

In 2003, a body of a baby and woman washed up in (you guessed it) San Fransisco Bay and were later determined to be the bodies of Laci and her unborn child. While there were many suspitious clues linking Scott to his wife and child's murder, there was no actual DNA evidence ever found that could find him to be 100% guilty. The case was highly publicized, which made matters worse for Scott, as many people believed he was guilty. Regardless, Scott was sentenced to death and is currently on death row in California.

1. The Murder of Skylar Neese

In 2012, Neese went missing after sneaking out to go smoke weed across state lines in an isolated area with two of her best friends. The three of them had been very close and her best friends appeared distraught at her disappearance. Her remains were found in 2013. After an investigation, her two best friends, Rachel Shoaf and Shelia Eddy, were found guilty of stabbing her 50 times and then dumping her body across state lines.

Shoaf was the first to come forward, admitting what they had done. Eddy had tweeted, "We really did go on three", which referred to how her and Shoaf had counted to three and then began stabbing Neese until she was dead. They then dragged her body out of the car, set it on some nearby rocks in an isolated area and covered it with branches and leaves. Then they left, burned their clothes and went about their life as normal until Shoaf became overrun with guilt and turned herself in. The two are now in prison serving sentences for first-degree murder. Neese was 16 at the time of her death.

I hope that everyone who is a fan of true crime found these cases interesting. That being said, always keep in mind the victims and understand that these were brutal crimes.