Notorious 'Gone Girl' Kidnapper Convicted In South Bay Home Invasions

PALO ALTO, CA — Convicted kidnapper and rapist Matthew Muller pleaded guilty last week to new charges stemming from a pair of unsolved, violent home invasions in Mountain View and Palo Alto over 15 years ago.

"This extremely dangerous person left a trail of traumatized and terrified victims," District Attorney Jeff Rosen said in a statement. "It took the collective courage of his victims and determined law enforcement officers to stop him. This nightmare is over."

• Related: 'Gone Girl' Kidnapper May Have Started Crime Spree At Age 16

Muller, now 47, was previously sentenced to over three decades in federal prison after pleading guilty to kidnapping Denise Huskins from her Vallejo home in 2015. The ex-Marine and Harvard graduate was the subject of the Netflix documentary series "American Nightmare," which charts a case that police initially believed to be a hoax engineered by the woman's boyfriend, which drew comparisons to the novel and 2014 film adaptation "Gone Girl."

Investigators later learned Muller had broken into the couple's Vallejo home, then drugged and tied them up, before taking Huskins to a cabin in South Lake Tahoe where he sexually assaulted her. Two days later, Muller drove Huskins to Southern California and let her go. Three months later, he was arrested after attacking a family inside their Dublin home. He pleaded guilty in 2016 to the Vallejo kidnapping, and later to the sexual assault charges.

Last month, the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office said forensic DNA testing linked Muller to home invasions and sexual assaults in Mountain View and Palo Alto committed six years before the Vallejo case.

According to court documents, Muller broke into a woman's Mountain View home in September 2009, attacked and bound her, then made her drink "a concoction of medications." Investigators said the woman persuaded him against raping her, and he fled the home.

Less than a month later, prosecutors allege Muller broke into a Palo Alto home, bound and gagged a woman, and made her drink Nyquil before sexually assaulting her. According to investigators, the woman convinced him to stop and he fled the home.

Both cases went unsolved until a new lead prompted cold case investigators to send the evidence from the South Bay cases back to the crime lab for further testing. Investigators said DNA matching Muller was found on straps used to bind one of the victims, and further investigation led to charges being filed in both 2009 cold cases.

Muller pleaded guilty to both charges last week, which each carry a potential life sentence. A sentencing hearing is scheduled for Feb. 21. He separately faces kidnapping and ransom charges out of Contra Costa County, where investigators this month identified him as a suspect in a 2015 home invasion in unincorporated San Ramon.

Muller is currently serving concurrent sentences at the Federal Correction Institution in Arizona, with a tentative release date in 2049.