DUBLIN — A Bay Area serial killer callously sang “99 Bottles of Beer” as he was forced to sit in court and listen to the loved ones of the women he killed nearly 40 years ago.
David Misch, 63, may have gotten the result he wanted when Alameda County Judge Paul Delucchi kicked him out of court about two bars into the song. But he continued to whistle from an adjacent holding cell, as family members of two of his victims expressed anger and pleaded with him to reveal the location of a 9-year-old girl he allegedly abducted and killed.
Misch was convicted in December of murdering Michelle Xavier, 18, and Jennifer Duey, 20, two Fremont residents who had planned a relaxing evening of pizza and movies on the day they were killed. The murder occurred in a remote part of the Fremont hills in February 1986, and prosecutors theorize that Misch kidnapped them and forced them to the area with the intent to sexually assault them, then killed them when they fought back.
The prosecution’s case was largely centered on Misch’s DNA found under Duey’s fingernails, and a partial license plate of his motorcycle written on Xavier’s hand. Misch was sentenced on Tuesday to 50 years to life in prison, but still faces charges that he murdered 9-year-old Michaela Garecht in 1988, after allegedly abducting her from outside a Hayward corner store.
Misch is already serving life for murder, for stabbing a woman named Margaret Ball in 1989 in Oakland. All four killings had a sexual motive, according to prosectors. He has prior offenses dating back to his teens, when he was convicted of raping a woman who was employed as his neighbor’s house cleaner, during a burglary of the Santa Clara County home.
Misch was charged in 2018 with the Fremont double murder, and in 2020 with Michaela’s killing. During his lengthy stay at Santa Rita Jail, he has occasionally mailed letters to this newspaper complaining about the quality of food while incarcerated, at least once including shriveled up tomatoes in the envelope.
During trial, Misch testified that he was a cocaine dealer in the 1980s who made a living selling drugs out of hotels. He claimed that he shared a cigarette with Duey the night of the murder, but had told police years earlier that he witnessed her being abducted and attempted to intervene.