‘Speed Freak Killer’ Wesley Shermantine Dies In Prison

Published Sep 18, 2026 6:34 pm

Wesley Shermantine one of the notorious Speed Freak Killers—Photo California Department of Corrections

Sonora, CA – One of the notorious “Speed Freak Killers,” Wesley Shermantine, died yesterday in a California State Prison in Sacramento on Thursday, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

A medical doctor at SAC’s central health facility pronounced Shermantine, 60, dead at 6 p.m. The Sacramento County Coroner’s Office will determine his official cause of death.

Shermantine and his childhood friend, Loren Herzog, were accused of murdering over 70 additional individuals in and around San Joaquin County throughout the 1980s and 90s. As reported here, the two had ties to Calaveras County, and in 2012 remains were found in an old well on a Linden property once owned by the Shermantine family.

They were called the “Speed Freak Killers” because they were high on methamphetamine during their 15-year murdering spree until being arrested in 1999. Shermantine was convicted of four murders and condemned to death. Herzog was convicted of three murders, which were overturned on appeal after he claimed his confession was coerced. He instead pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter and was paroled in 2010 and died by suicide two years later in 2012.