Dana Sue Gray: The Shopaholic Serial Killer Who Terrorized California’s Retirement Communities

In the early 1990s, a wave of terror swept through the quiet, gated retirement enclaves of Southern California. Elderly women were being brutally murdered in their own homes by a killer who didn’t break in—she was invited. The woman responsible was no shadowy drifter. She was attractive, athletic, impeccably groomed, and drove a nice car. Her name was Dana Sue Gray, and she killed for the sheer thrill of going on shopping sprees with her victims’ credit cards.

A Troubled Beginning Behind a Perfect Facade

Born in 1957, Dana Sue Armbrust entered a turbulent family. Her mother, a former beauty queen and minor Hollywood starlet, was vain, volatile, and physically abusive. Her father left when Dana was two. Raised amid screaming matches and belt-whippings, Dana learned early to hide chaos behind a polished exterior.

As a child she stole money for candy, forged excuse notes, and threw violent tantrums. Yet she was also athletic, fearless, and driven. After watching nurses care for her cancer-stricken mother when she was 14, Dana decided nursing would give her the control she craved. She graduated nursing school in record time, became an expert skydiver, a skilled windsurfer, and an avid golfer. Friends called her a daredevil who lived for adrenaline.

In 1987 she married Tom Gray in a lavish winery wedding. The couple spent money like water—three cars, boats, an ultralight airplane—until bankruptcy loomed. By the early 1990s her marriage was collapsing, her Canyon Lake home was in foreclosure, and she had just been fired from her labor-and-delivery nursing job for stealing prescription drugs.

Outwardly, nothing seemed amiss. Neighbors saw a charming, beautifully dressed woman who waved cheerfully as she drove through the gates.

The Killings Begin

February 14, 1994 – Valentine’s Day Eighty-six-year-old Norma Davis was found dead in her Canyon Lake home, a utility knife in her neck and a fillet knife in her chest. There were no signs of forced entry. (Unbeknownst to investigators at the time, Norma was the mother-in-law of Dana’s own father from a later marriage.)

Two weeks later Sixty-six-year-old June Roberts let a polite woman into her home to “borrow a book about Hawaii.” The visitor strangled Roberts with a telephone cord, stole her credit cards, and went shopping.