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An inmate in Tucson, AZ willingly confessed to four murders during a recent interview, declaring that he did society a favor.
Ricky Wassenaar, known as “Rooster” in prison, is serving 16 life sentences, so he had no problem revealing his reasoning for the recent slayings.
Wassenaar was convicted of robbing a drug dealer in Tucson in 1986. He received a 15 year sentence and maintained that he’d been wrongfully convicted. After he served 10 years and 7 months of that sentence, he was released on home arrest. Within thirty-six days, he’d robbed a business. He was sent back to prison with a sentence of 28 years, no parole.
According to Wassenaar, things went south in the 2000s, when his mother became too ill to travel to Tucson from Michigan to visit. He asked to be transferred to a prison near her, and he said that after the request was denied, he became “enraged.” In 2004, Wassenaar used a guard’s uniform to gain entry into a gun tower in the center of the Lewis Prison, a high security facility in Buckeye, AZ. Wassenaar and an accomplice held the guards hostage, launching a 15-day hostage stand-off.
The notorious prisoner made the news again in April of 2025, when he was accused of killing three men in prison. Then, just days ago, he shared why he did it and claims he’d warned prison officials that it would happen.
AZ Family News reports:
Go back two decades, when Ricky Wassenaar was responsible for one of the longest prison standoffs in U.S. history. In 2004, he and another inmate held guards hostage in a Lewis prison tower for more than two weeks. One said she was raped.
Now, he not only admitted he is a killer but said he had plans to kill more for a good reason.
“What did you feel in that moment killing them. Did that feel good to you?” asked true crime correspondent Briana Whitney.
“Well, I felt justified,” Wassenaar told Whitney in a call from prison.
“Do you wish you killed more?” asked Whitney.
“Of course! Of course. Here’s the thing, Briana, I jumped the gun,” said Wassenaar.
His statements were concerning and alarming, but Wassenaar said there was a reason he did it. The victims, Saul Alvarez, Thorne Harnage, and Donald Lashley, all had something in common.
“They were child molesters. Alvarez had raped…had kidnapped…first, he came to this country illegally. Then he kidnapped and raped and murdered a 15-year-old little girl. I did society a favor by killing that f****t,” said Wassenaar. “The other two, Harnage and Lashley, were both sexual child predators that molested several victims. So, I did society a favor.”
According to local reports, Alvarez was convicted of first-degree murder. Harnage and Lashley were both convicted of child sex crimes.
Wassenaar said he’d hoped to kill more men, but he “jumped the gun” and started too early when the inmates were placed in a cage outside of the dining hall.
“If I would have waited until that chute was locked — that cage was locked, and we were all in there locked in — I would have killed at least seven. My goal was at least seven, but I was hoping for a baker’s dozen. I had several targets, all child molesters,” Wassenaar said.
Wassenaar said that prison officials were aware of his hatred toward molesters. He reports that in November 2024, he was assigned Joseph Desisto as a cellmate. Desisto was in prison for child molestation and abuse.
Wassenaar said he told guards that he should not have a cellmate.
“I can’t have a celly, I’m not prepared for that. I’ve been in my own cell for 21 years,” Wassenaar said.
Wassenaar claims he killed Desisto by strangulation, and that the Pima County Medical Examiner ruled the cause of death to be natural causes and underlying conditions.
“When I got back to the yard, the inmates couldn’t believe it because they all know that I killed that dude. All of the inmates knew. And they send me back on the yard, they said, ‘What the hell?’ and I said, ‘Man, there’s higher powers, higher powers at work here.’ It’s going to recur. It’s going to recur when they put someone else in my cell. So, I warned them at least a month,” Wassenaar said.
Wassenaar said he believes God wants him to kill molesters, and that he hopes his actions will dissuade would-be molesters.
“I’m their monster,” he said.
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