Rodney James Alcala born Rodrigo Jacques Alcala ; August 23, — July 24, was an American serial killer and convicted sex offender who was sentenced to death in California for seven murders committed between and He also pleaded guilty and received a sentence of 25 years to life for two further murders committed in New York.
He was also indicted for a murder in Wyoming , although the charges filed there were dropped. Alcala compiled a collection of more than 1, photographs of women, teenage girls, and boys, many in sexually explicit poses. In , he was charged with the murder of a woman identified in one of his photos. Prosecutors have said that Alcala "toyed" with his victims, strangling them until they lost consciousness then waiting until they revived, sometimes repeating this process several times before finally killing them.
In , when Alcala was aged 11, his mother moved him and his two sisters to suburban Los Angeles. He attended various private schools during his youth before graduating from Cantwell-Sacred Heart of Mary High School. He was on the yearbook planning committee and on the track and cross-country teams. In , at the age of 17, Alcala joined the United States Army to become a paratrooper, and served as a clerk. During his service, he was noted by his commanding officer as being manipulative, vindictive, and insubordinate.
Alcala was disciplined on several occasions for assaulting young women. In , after what was described as a nervous breakdown —during which he went AWOL and hitchhiked from Fort Bragg , North Carolina, to his mother's house in California—Alcala was diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder , [ 13 ] and estimated to have an IQ of by a military psychiatrist. He was subsequently discharged from the army on medical grounds.
On September 25, , a passing motorist named Donald Haines called police after witnessing Alcala lure Tali Shapiro, aged eight, into his Hollywood apartment. Shapiro, who was residing at the Chateau Marmont with her family, was approached by Alcala on her way to school when he pulled up beside her in his car and asked if she needed a ride.
