For more than four decades, Michael Myers has haunted the big screen, but in the ’80s, art imitated life in the most horrific way. In 1982, Richard Delmer Boyer stabbed elderly couple Francis and Eileen Harbitz more than 40 times inside their home in Fullerton, California in a crime that he later blamed on Halloween II, the 1981 follow up to John Carpenter’s iconic 1978 slasher.
The case – which spanned a decade, included numerous trials, and marked the first time a feature film was submitted as evidence at a murder trial in the U.S. – unfolded on the night of Dec. 7, 1982. Boyer, then in his early 20s, entered the Harbitz’s home after the elderly couple, aged 67 and 68, invited him over for something to eat, UPI reported. Boyer, a friend of their son who had performed odd jobs around the home, proceeded to stab the elderly couple to death, Francis and Eileen suffering a total of 43 stabbed wounds between them. One of Boyer’s friends later testified, per the Los Angeles Times, that he had waited outside in his car when Boyer went to the home. He said that when Boyer returned to the vehicle, he had two wallets and was bleeding from several knife wounds to his thigh.
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Boyer was arrested following a tip-off from the couple’s son. Boyer’s first trial in 1984 ended in a hung jury. He was subsequently convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death following a second trial in 1984, during which Boyer claimed he had no memories of the murders and said he suffered a drug-induced flashback to Halloween II. Boyer told the court that he had gone to the Harbitz home while high on drugs, and while there hallucinated that he was being attacked by Michael Myers, the knife-wielding villain of the Halloween franchise.
Released in 1981 as a direct sequel to Halloween, Halloween II, directed by Rick Rosenthal, immediately picks up where the first left off with Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) hospitalized after surviving the 1978 Babysitter Murders. Michael discovers her location and begins a second bloody rampage, this time at the hospital. In the movie, Michael also breaks into the home of an elderly couple to steal a knife.
Although Boyer was convicted of murder and sentenced to death, in 1989, the California Supreme Court ordered a retrialafter determining that Boyer had been denied his Miranda rights and his confession to police had been coerced. Boyer was tried a third time in 1989, during which his defense attorney, James G. Merwin, argued that Boyer’s behavior was consistent with PCP and cocaine intoxication and the drug-induced hallucination caused him to “mix fantasy and reality” and believe his life was being threatened. Deputy Dist. Atty. Charles J. Middleton, however, called the hallucination account “a transparent attempt” to evade responsibility.
Boyer was ultimately found guilty a second time and sentenced to death. The People v. Boyer 1984 marked the first time in US legal history that a commercial motion picture had been submitted as evidence at a murder trial. The film was shown in court. The trial brought into focus and discussed the effects of violence portrayed in the media, a discussion that has now carried on for decades.
