Rodney Alcala was a good-looking young man. He was selected as the Bachelor No. 1 of The Dating Game – a blind date contest – with which he could easily sway women for his good-looks and smart brains! He was a heartthrob in the 70’s and had a lot of girls fall for him. Only later was it known, all the while during his days being a contest winner and a typesetter for The Los Angeles Times, he had the blood of many girls on his hand! He was a serial killer!
Rodney Alcala relocated to California in the 60s’
Rodney Alcala was born as Rodrigo Jacques Alcala-Buquor in San Antonio, Texas, on August 23, 1943. He moved to Mexico with his family when he was around 8 years old. His father abandoned the family while they were in Mexico. Alcala, his siblings and mother later relocated to Los Angeles.
In 1960, at the age 17, Alcala joined the army, where he served as a clerk. In 1964, after what was described as a nervous breakdown, he was diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder by a military psychiatrist and discharged on medical grounds.
Moreover, he claims to have a “genius-level” IQ and attended California State University, then transferred to UCLA. He graduated with a fine arts degree in 1968. After fleeing California, Alcala began using his John Berger alias to enroll at New York University, where he ended up taking a class with Roman Polanski.
Rodney Alcala’s first crime
Rodney Alcala committed his first crime in 1968. A motorist in Los Angeles witnessed Alcala lure an eight-year-old girl named Tali Shapiro into his Hollywood apartment.
Rodney Alcala fled to NYU
The girl was found in the apartment raped and beaten with a steel bar. However, Alcala ended up escaping. He fled to the East Coast and enrolled in the NYU film school using the name “John Berger.” During the summer months, he also obtained a counseling job at a New Hampshire arts camp for children, changing his alias slightly to John Burger.
The FBI placed him on their Most Wanted List in 1971. Some girls at an arts camp in New Hampshire recognized their counselor, who used the name John Burger. They reported him to the camp’s dean and Alcala was soon arrested. He ended up pleading to a lesser charge of child molestation and served just 34 months.
Alcala was arrested for violating parole
Less than two months later, Alcala was arrested for violating parole and
providing marijuana to a 13-year-old girl who claimed she had been
kidnapped. Once again, he was paroled after serving two years of an
“indeterminate sentence.”
In 1977, despite having a criminal record and being registered as a sex offender, he was hired as a typesetter by the Los Angeles Times in the midst of their coverage of the Hillside Strangler murders.
During this same time, Alcala managed to convince dozens of women that he was a professional fashion photographer, and photographed them for his “portfolio.” Most of his photos remain unidentified. Police are concerned that many are additional victims.
His past conviction for sexual assault prompted California police to interview Alcala in March 1978 as a potential suspect in the Hillside Strangler murders, another set of serial killings that occured in California in the 1970s. Alcala was cleared of those crimes. California law enforcement did not realize they had actually spoken with a different active serial killer.
Alcala once appeared on the Dating Game
In September 1978, Alcala appeared on The Dating Game, a TV show that had men and women interview prospective dates, sight unseen. At the time he was a convicted child molester, but the show did not run a background check.
Alcala was a tall and good-looking man who often told women he was a fashion photographer who wanted to take photos for a contest. His intelligence and charm could make him persuasive. During the trial, it was testified that he was so easy to trust and he had a way of talking to people that really put them at ease.
Things started to get worse. In the 1970s, Alcala killed Cornelia Crilley, 23, an air hostess. Crilley was raped and strangled with her own nylon stockings and stuffed it down her throat in her apartment in June 1971. In 1977, now back on the streets of New York, Alcala murdered 23-year-old musician and artist Ellen Hover.
Hover disappeared on July 15, 1977, leaving behind a calendar that stated she was meeting with “John Berger.” Her body was not found for almost a year but the disappearance was front-page news. Alcala pleaded guilty to these murders in 2012. He received a sentence of 25 to life, though it will only be served if California releases him from custody.
Rodney Alcala was arrested for abduction and murder in 1979
Now, in the meanwhile, Alcala was arrested in July 1979 for the abduction and murder of 12-year-old Robin Samsoe of Huntington Beach, California. He was convicted on these charges in 1980. Four years later this conviction was overturned as the jury had improperly been told about Alcala’s criminal record. Another trial in 1986 resulted in a second guilty verdict, but in 2001 this was also overturned on a technicality. While in custody Alcala wrote the book “You the Jury,” in which he argued he was innocent.
While preparing their third prosecution in 2003, Orange County investigators learned that Alcala’s DNA, sampled under a new state law which was – over his objections – matched semen left at the rape-murder scenes of two women in Los Angeles. Another pair of earrings found in Alcala’s storage locker matched the DNA of one of the two victims.
Next trial took place in 2010
At his next trial, which took place in 2010, Alcala was again charged with killing Samsoe. Part of the case against him was a pair of gold earrings linked to Samsoe that had been found in his Seattle storage locker. Alcala played clips from The Dating Game that he said proved he was already wearing gold earrings in 1978, but these didn’t convince the jury.
In addition to all these charges, he faced charges for assaulting and strangling four women in California in the late 1970s. All of these happened after his appearance in The Dating Game.
The later murders were of: 18-year-old Jill Barcomb, who was killed in November 1977, 27-year-old Georgia Wixted, 27, who was raped, beaten and strangled in December 1978, 32-year-old Charlotte Lamb, who was killed in June 1978 and 21-year-old Jill Parenteau who was killed in June 1979. Alcala opted to represent himself during the court proceedings. In February 2010 he was found guilty of all five murders. He was sentenced to death in March 2010.
Jill Parenteau who was killed in June 1979. Alcala opted to represent himself during the court proceedings. In February 2010, he was found guilty of all five murders. He was sentenced to death in March 2010.
Alcala was eventually charged in 2016 for the 1977 murder
In 2016, Rodney Alcala was charged with the killing of Christine Ruth Thornton in Wyoming, thought prosecutors opted not to extradite him to stand trial. By then, the authorities also believe he killed Pamela Lambson in the San Francisco Bay Area in the fall of 1977. However, DNA collected at that crime scene was too degraded to test, so he was not charged with the crime. Quite surprisingly and miraculously, not all of Alcala’s victims were murdered.
Some of Alcala victims survived his attacks. In 1968, a witness spotted Alcala driving off with Shapiro. Being concerned about it, he followed them to an apartment and called the police. The responding officer discovered Shapiro, who’d been raped and beaten with a steel bar but was still alive. Also, in February 1979, Monique Hoyt, managed to escape after Alcala raped her.
The final game began then. Following the disappearance of Samsoe, a sketch of a suspect was issued. Alcala’s parole officer saw it and recognized him. Police tracked down Alcala, who was arrested on July 24, 1979. Following Alcala’s arrest in July, 1979, police found hundreds of his photographs in a Seattle storage locker. These images, some of which were explicit, may include other Alcala victims.
Police worked hard to identify Rodney Alcala
Police released many of the photos to the public in the hopes they may identify the people in the pictures. Some people were alive and came forward. The photos aided in identifying Christine Thornton as one of Alcala’s victims. Christine was killed in Wyoming. Alcala was shown the picture of Christine, while in a prison hospital bed, battling “borderline dementia.” He traced Christine’s body with his finger and tapped the photo but did not admit killing her. He said, “She was alive when I last saw her.” Detectives took that as a confession.
If something is to haunt us as we reach the conclusion of this article on Rodney Alcala, it should be the death toll of Alcala’s murder spree. Alcala’s exact death toll is unknown. Some authorities believe he murdered around 50 people, others think he may have taken as many as 130 lives. If an individual got a chance to take 130 lives in 10 years, the working of his brain makes us astonished. He not only kept on murdering, but at the same time he was arrested several times, had a job at the The Los Angeles Times, was a contestant in a TV show, and did his graduation.
He was a man who did many things, out of which the most stood out was his murdering. Well, as well all understand and agree, the world has mysterious ways of working, which is not always rational for common human brains! Let us keep on hoping good for the world, and people may have a peaceful life.
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