Richard Speck left a nation in terror in 1966 when he murdered eight nursing students in a single night. Speck already had a lengthy criminal record of robbery, rape, and murder when he broke into the Chicago townhouse where the nursing students were living. He tied up and stabbed or strangled eight of the women before fleeing at dawn. Speck spent the rest of his life in prison before dying on the eve of his 50th birthday in 1991.