Rodney Alcala Indicted in Murders of Four Los Angeles County Women

Rodney Alcala Indicted in Murders of
Four Los Angeles County Women

September 19, 2005
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contacts: Joe Scott, Director of Communications
Sandi Gibbons, Public Information Officer
Jane Robison, News Secretary
(213) 974-3525

SANTA ANA – Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley joined with Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas today to announce that Rodney James Alcala has been indicted for the murders of four Los Angeles County women in the 1970s.

Cooley said that Alcala, already facing retrial for the murder of a 12-year-old Huntington Beach girl in 1979, will be tried in Orange County for the Los Angeles murders.

“District Attorney Rackauckas and his staff met with me and my staff several months ago and we decided that the best place to try these cases is in Orange County, where the defendant is facing retrial on a similar murder,” Cooley said. “Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Gina Satriano was assigned to work with Orange County prosecutors. She presented the evidence to the Orange County Grand Jury that resulted in the Sept. 9 indictment.’

“A few years ago, the Legislature updated the law (Penal Code Section 790) and gave California prosecutors this important tool that allows us to consolidate and try similar murders in one county, instead forcing us to break up the cases and have costly multiple trials,” Cooley said. “This is especially helpful in serial murder cases. In Los Angeles, we have successfully prosecuted defendants who have killed in more than one county.”

Cooley also discussed the importance of DNA in the Alcala case. Three of the four Los Angeles County murders involve DNA evidence.

“DNA is one of the major investigative tools of our time,” Cooley said. “The Alcala case shows that DNA evidence can stretch back into time to help prosecute murders such as these that go back nearly a quarter of a century.”

Cooley praised the Orange County District Attorney for the lead he has taken in using DNA evidence, saying that Rackauckas and his prosecutors have “set the standard for all of us to follow.”

“The passage of Proposition 69, the new crime lab in Los Angeles and the continued advances in use of DNA evidence is helping us in Los Angeles County match what is being done here. I think the Alcala case is an example of the work that we are doing in Los Angeles County,” Cooley said.

Alcala was indicted for murders of Jill Barcomb, 18; Georgia Wixted, 27; Charlotte Lamb, 32; and Jill Parenteau, 21. The women were killed between November 1977 and June 1979 in widely separate areas of Los Angeles County ranging from El Segundo to Burbank.

The victims all were sexually assaulted. The victims were strangled or beaten to death. All but Wixted’s murder went uncharged. Los Angeles prosecutor Satriano filed a murder charge against Alcala for the Wixted murder in 2003. He was a suspect in the other killings and work by Los Angeles County Sheriff’s and Los Angeles Police Department investigators continued on the other cases.

Besides the murders, the indictment alleges the special circumstances of torture, multiple murder, robbery, rape, burglary and oral copulation. A decision on whether to seek the death penalty against Alcala for the Los Angeles murders has not yet been made.

sg

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