Wayne Adam Ford was born on December 3, 1961, in Petaluma, California. He was the second son of an American father and a German immigrant mother. His family life changed when his parents divorced when he was 10 years old. After the divorce, Ford struggled in school and eventually dropped out of high school.

In 1980, when Ford was 19, he was involved in a serious accident. A drunk driver hit him, which caused a head injury. He was in a coma for nine days. After waking up, his relatives noticed a significant change in his personality.

To seek a new direction in his life, Ford enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. He served in the Marines for six years and was honorably discharged in 1985. After his time in the military, Ford married twice. Both of his marriages ended in divorce. His first wife, Kelly Pletcher, was pressured by him to have an abortion in 1981.

In the early 1980s, Ford began having emotional and psychological issues. By 1983, his mental health problems escalated. He was hospitalized multiple times and was eventually diagnosed with borderline personality disorder.

Wayne Adam Ford murdered at least four women between 1997 and 1998. At the time, he lived in a trailer park in Arcata, California, and worked as a long-haul truck driver. His first known victim was Kerry Ann Cummings, who was 25 years old when she was killed in 1997. Her body was found in the Ryan Slough near Eureka, California, on October 17, 1997.

Ford killed Tina Renee Gibbs on May 16, 1998, near Las Vegas. Her body was discovered on June 2, 1998, near Buttonwillow, California. Another victim was Lanette Deyon White, who was also 25 years old. She was killed on September 25, 1998, in Ontario, California, and her body was dumped near Lodi, California. The last confirmed victim was Patricia Anne Tamez, age 29, who was killed in Hesperia, California. Her body was found in an aqueduct in San Bernardino, California, on October 23, 1998.

On November 2, 1998, Ford turned himself in to the Humboldt County Sheriff's Department. He walked in with his brother and had a woman's severed breast in his pocket. Ford confessed to killing the four women and is suspected of having killed more.

He was tried and found guilty on June 27, 2006, for four counts of first-degree murder. In August 2006, he was sentenced to death. Ford is currently on death row at San Quentin State Prison in California.