Transcript of Episode 642: Rodney Alcala: The Dating Game Killer (Part 2)

Hey, weirdos. It's Ash here, ready to share a little secret. Have you heard of WNDYRI Plus? With ad-free episodes in one week, early access, it's like having an all-access pass to our light-hearted nightmare. So come join us on the dark side and try WNDYRI Plus today. You can join WNDYRI Plus in the WNDYRI app or an Apple podcast or Spotify. You're listening to a Morbid Network podcast. I'm Raza Jeffrey, and in the latest season of The Spy Who, we open the file on Vitold Pilecki, the spy who infiltrated Auschwitz. Resistance fighter, Vitold Pilecki, has heard dark rumors about an internment camp on his home soil of Poland. Hoping to expose its cruelty to the world, he leaves his family behind and deliberately gets himself imprisoned. The camp is called Auschwitz, a headish place where the unimaginable becomes routine. Poletski is determined he needs to organize the prisoners, build a resistance and get the truth out. Except when the world hears about the horrors of the camp, nobody comes to the rescue. In the end, it's just him alone, with only one decision to make, accept death or escape. Follow The Spy Who on the Wondery app or wherever you listen to podcasts, or you can binge the full season of The Spy Who Infiltrated Auschwitz early and ad-free with Wondery Plus.

I'm Afua Hirsch. I'm Peter Frankerpen. In our podcast, Legacy, we explore the lives of some of the biggest characters in history. This season, we're looking at the life of the most famous Queen of France, Marie-Antoinette. Her death is seemingly more well known than her life, but her journey from the daughter of the Austrian Emperor to becoming the most hated woman in France is just as fascinating. We're going to look at the ways in which her story was distorted during the French Revolution and dig deeper into her real experiences in a troubled, difficult time. Marie-antoinette is one of the most well-recognized but least well-understood names in history. We're talking about how her death led to the way that she was spoken about in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Follow Legacy Now from wherever you get your podcasts. Or binge entire seasons early and ad-free on WNDYRI Plus. Hey, weirdos, I'm Ash. And I'm Elaina. And this is Morbid. Brought to you by allergies. Yeah. What the fuck? It's like winter. I didn't know that allergies existed in the winter. Yeah. It's not even like winter. It is winter.

It's like winter, and it literally really is. Yeah, I don't have a cold anymore, but I woke up with the worst fucking allergies. And it's not a cold.

I'm not sick. No, she's fausseting. The face is fausseting. Yeah.

It just is very infuriating.

I feel like you're making me think that I am sniffily, but I don't even know if I am. But now it's a weird placebo that's going on.

Yeah. You're feeling sympathy sniffles.

Oh my God, I have sympathy sniffles. I'm such an empath.

You really are. You're such an empath. No, I don't even am. Yeah. So I'm sick, but I might sound a little congested just because- You do, but not- Fucking allergies.

Yeah. Lilo, not full-blown Lilo is here. Yeah. But like her distant relative.

Yeah. Her cousin is here.

Yeah, exactly.

But I'm not the one that is going to be talking much. I am. That's good.

I'm going to be talking a lot because we are on part two of Rodney Alcala, who is- This case, man. Such a shit stain. I just have to say at the top of this, I have been having the worst time falling asleep just because this case. Oh, yeah. The details are just running through my brain at night, and I need to figure out a way to cope with that. Yeah.

It's... This case for you is probably like the Mores murderers were for me. Yeah. Where it was invading... A lot of times it invades my dreams, but that invaded my dreams in a way that I can't describe.

No, that's the thing. And I don't usually do the more brutal cases, you do. It's different because I'm not fully submersed and putting them together and then presenting them. This one, obviously, Dave helped immensely putting this together. I don't even know how Dave is sleeping at night. But then I was like, twist Testing things around, moving them around. I'm like, oh, God. Jesus Christ. Oh, it's awful. Yeah. But I do this thing where I had this therapist and she told me instead of focusing on... Because if I have a thought that I don't want to have, I'm like, no, no, no, don't think about that. Don't think about that. Don't think about that. But that just makes it worse because it's like telling a toddler not to do something. It just makes them want to do it more. And I think your brain is essentially a toddler. So I say, I recognize that I'm having that thought and now I'm going to move on to something else. There you go. And it does help a little bit. It does help? Yeah. So I hope that can also help anybody else out there.

I think I've told everybody about my method. I don't know if you have to have a divergent brain for it to work, maybe. You do.

You absolutely do. But it literally works for me. I'm not diverse enough.

Yeah, you're not divergent enough. No.

But yours is cool. It works. And it could work for the non-neurotypicals. Yeah.

If you feel it out there. If you picture whatever you're picturing in your head, it's usually a visual that will really get me. My brain will make a visual or I'll see a visual during research that just really fucks me up. Right now, I just got Oops, it's there. Like, I'm thinking about the Morse murders and a certain visual is coming into my brain. So right now I'm looking at it and in my brain I have one of those little dry erase board erasers.

Yes, erasers.

And I'm erasing it. And it's gone. And if it pops back up, then I say, oh, now we're on a computer, throw it in the trash. I don't have a backup, so I can't see it again.

You are interesting.

I actually told the girls to do that, and that helped my kids. They were having like a... Like nightmare. It was just one night where they had watched something, I think. And we didn't think it was going to be anything that would bother them, but you just never know what's going to stick with a kid. And I think it was like, I can't remember, actually. But they were like, oh, that this one scene in this movie or TV show where there was a wolf or something. They were like, what if there's a wolf in the woods? And I was like, what are you seeing in your head? And they just told me. And I was like, okay. And I was like, know on how on a computer you can erase something by putting it in the trash? And they were like, yeah. I was like, put the image in the trash. Maybe I'll try that. And then I was like, did you guys make a backup? Did you save another version of that image? And they were like, what? I was like, did you save another version of that image?

And they were like, no.

I was like, then you can't see it again because you trashed it. Yeah, that's something. And one of my kids especially was like, that worked.

I love that your brain just always stands on business.

Yeah, 100 %.

You're not a big admin early, but maybe that's why. Maybe you're doing so much admin in your brain. I am.

I'm putting the trash. I'm constantly doing admin in my brain. You're so weird. So, yeah, if you don't have a backup of it, can't get it back.

I have a backup of every horrible memory that I've ever had.

Keep throwing it in the trash. I'll try. And then you empty the trash. Where does it go? You hit that little button that says empty trash, and then you say, fuck, I can't get that back. Okay. You know? Yeah. You're your neurodivergent. Because you know how terrifying that is when you do that with something you need. You're like, oh, shit, I accidentally I've forever deleted that. That's what you do with those bad images because then you have that moment of like, oh, fuck, it's gone. And you're like, that's gone.

I also think you worked a lot of office jobs.

I did, yeah.

And I never worked an office job. And research. And Research. Research jobs. I feel like that's very right brain of you.

I think you just... It helps. It really does because it's so... It's so clinical.

Yeah, exactly.

That it's an easy way to do it. If you can get your brain in that place to visualize.

I'm going to have to try the trash one because I haven't tried.

It takes a minute to visualize that. But once you're able to visualize that, it is very helpful. So anybody out there, if you're having things that pop into your brain, whatever it may be, I'm not saying it will help you. I'm just saying if you can get yourself in that mindset that you can see that, like putting it into a trash or wiping it with a dry Eraser.

Go for it. Then it can be helpful. Or recognize that you're having the thought, let yourself have the thought and also let it pass. We've given you so many ways to get rid of your yucky thoughts. Yeah.

See, yours is very harrowing to me. That's harrowing.

That's therapy, babe. Let yourself have the thought.

No, thank you. That's where I- No.

Let yourself have the thought.

No.

See, for someone like me, if you don't let yourself have the thought, it's just going to try harder to get into the thought of your brain.

And see, that's where mine goes, no, don't let yourself have the thought, throw it in the trash.

No, I got to let myself. It's also like weird exposure therapy, I think. I don't know. I love it. Well, that's our brains for you. They're fucking weird. But here we are. You like us if you're listening most of the time. Hopefully, sometimes.

Most of you anyway. Most of you.

So let's get back into it. We're on part two of Rodney Alcala. In part one, we started in the middle talking about Rodney's appearance on the popular show, The dating game and how he was immediately off putting to female contestant Sheryl Bradshaw. We went over Rodney's early life, how he was abruptly discharged from the military after, I guess you could say some psychotic break, it seems. We went over his first attacks on many women. And of course, at the end, his capture in New Hampshire while he was working at a children's summer camp under the name of John Berger. John Berger. John Berger. Isn't that Sex in the City?

Isn't his Berger? His last name is Berger, and they call him Berger.

I think his first name is John.

Is it John? Now I need to look.

You got to look it up really quick. Jack Berger. Oh, Jack. Which probably is John.

Strangely, Jack is a nickname for John, even though they're the same amount of letters.

Even though they're the same amount of letters. Yeah. I'll never understand that. I'm sorry. I can't. Don't hate me. Don't hate me. Douchebag. I know. But back to the story. After years of searching for Rodney after the brutal attack on eight-year-old Tauly Shapiro, Steve Hodel there had finally captured the man whose crimes had so deeply disturbed everybody familiar with the case, especially Steve Hodel himself. However, what should have been a career highlight for Steve quickly turned into an absolute fucking mess, and ultimately a very serious disappointment. So the district attorney's office... Great. Yeah, great. The district Attorney's office was eager to charge Alcala for the attack on Tali, but there was a problem. The Shapiro family, like I said in part one, had left the country. Yeah, yeah. Understandably so.

Get her the fuck away from this.

Yeah. And they were difficult to get a hold of, again, understandably so. Yeah. And Tali's parents had spent the previous years doing everything they could to shield their daughter from any further trauma, which included talking about the attack.

Yeah, I get it.

And the fact that she doesn't remember anything like, about that.

They don't want to trigger any memories.

One, they don't want to trigger any memories. And two, they did their job and they did it correctly because she doesn't have any memories. That's amazing. So whatever her family did for her worked. Yeah. Maybe it didn't work out in a court sense It right here right now.

But it shielded her emotionally from what had happened.

It made her okay, and that's all I care about, personally.

Yeah, because she's able to speak about what she does remember now. Yeah. Which is like a very... I use the word harrowing before, but that's harrowing to do anyway.

I thought you were going to use that word because it's perfect. But the prosecutor tried to convince the Shapiros to return to LA and allow Tali to testify against Alcala, but the family did not want to put their eight-year-old daughter through that.

No.

And I don't blame them.

I I get it.

But without their main witness, who also happened to be Alcala's accuser, the district attorney had no choice to either offer him a deal or drop the case altogether because it just wasn't going to be as strong.

That sucks that that's the option. Yeah. You either traumatize this eight-year-old or lose the case. That sucks.

You can still present the facts without her there. Exactly. Of course, it's going to drive the point home harder if the actual, you see the actual girl is going to pull on your heartstrings.

But honestly, it shouldn't take that. It shouldn't take that. It shouldn't take her sitting in front of you.

Exactly.

The facts are the facts.

But I think they were just worried. Yeah, of course. And you can understand why. So unwilling to completely drop the case altogether. The DA was willing to allow, I'll call it, to bleed to the lesser charge of child molestation, which is fucking insane that that's a lesser charge.

That's insane to me.

Child molestation is a lesser charge.

We got to... We got to do We got to do better, guys.

He was going to plea to that in exchange for an indeterminate sentence of anywhere from one year to life in prison. This could go so many ways.

That's quite a stretch.

Given the circumstances, which we all know from part one, the prosecutor expected the judge to impose a pretty lengthy sentence, but was absolutely shocked when Alcala was sentenced to 1-10 years with the opportunity for parole after just one year.

That's honestly disgusting. It is. And it's despicable.

Ultimately, he would serve 34 months in prison for the attempted murder of eight-year-old Tali Shapiro.

This man abducted an eight-year-old and brutally assaulted And Samaritan tried to murder her. Yup. What the fuck is wrong with everybody?

And would have, if not for a good Samaritan.

Literally would have. She'd be gone.

Absolutely. She'd be dead. 100,000 %. So after he was sentenced and was writing out some of a sentence, a prison psychologist deemed him, quote unquote, considerably improved and recommended him for parole in 1974.

Well, they should be fucking ashamed of themselves.

Also, yeah, of course he's considerably improved because there's not women and children in prison for him to prey upon.

He should...

Oh. Considerably improved? There's no temptation for him.

Of course. He can't attack children in there.

So how does that even make any sense?

That's disgusting.

But the parole board's decision to release him after such a short time was obviously frustrating for Steve Hodel, who knew the full extent of what Alcala had done. He said, My impression was that it was his first sex crime, and we got him early, and society is relatively safe now. I had no idea in two years he would be out and continue his reign of terror and horror. I expected he was put away and society was safe. It is such a tragedy that so much more came after that.

And he did his job.

Yeah, he did everything that he had to do. That's somewhere smart. He tracked him down all the way to New Hampshire.

He was waiting. He was probably looking at this like he said. We got him. We got him early. Something awful happened for him to be caught. But hopefully that's the end of it.

And no more has to happen. But no, that's not the story. After his release, Alcala returned to living with his mother in LA and started supporting himself as a wedding photographer. Can you fucking imagine if this man photographed your wedding?

Imagine looking back on your wedding photos and being like, like those poor people. They're victims, Yeah, like I'm like, what the fuck? Yeah. How do you reconcile that?

I don't think you do. I think you have them redone at that point. To the parole board, he seemed to be adhering perfectly to the terms of his parole, but it didn't take long before he gave in to his worst impulses. One afternoon in mid-October, just two months after his release from prison, he was driving around Huntington Beach when he spotted 13-year-old Julie Johnson.

Oh, he's a fucking monster.

He's a predator. She was waiting at a bus stop outside a shopping center. Just as he had with Tali Shapiro years earlier, he pulled his car up to the sidewalk and offered her a ride. At first, she paid no attention to him. So he put on some charm and he said he had some great posters that he wanted to show her, which is so fucking creepy. The trick worked, though, which you can understand. It's a 13-year-old, and again, it's a very different time. Julie agreed to go with him on the condition that he dropped her off at school. But as they started driving, she noticed that the man who said his name was John Ronald had driven right past her school. When she pointed that out, he said something about needing to check out an apartment and promised it wouldn't take too long, and then he'd get her to school. Now concerned that she might be in trouble, she became visibly anxious and she couldn't sit still, which made He didn't even yell at her. He started yelling on her.

My God, this is horrifying to think about.

It's a nightmare. The jarring shift in his tone and the fact that they were getting further and further away from her school started to frighten Julie, and she told him to pull over and let her out. But rather than pull over, steered the car onto the Pacific Coast Highway, headed way away from downtown Huntington Beach. Oh, my God. This show is sponsored by Better Help. I feel like a lot of times we hear about people's red flags. Red flags are what we should avoid. But what if we focused more on looking for green flags in friends and partners? Like the good things about them, the way that they show up for the way that they do acts of service because that's your love language or just the way they take care of you. If you're not sure what green flags look like, therapy can help you identify them, actively practice them in your relationships, and embody the green flag energy yourself. Whether you're dating, married, building a friendship, or just working on yourself, it's time to form a relationship that love you back. I feel like in therapy, that was one of the biggest things I learned is what my love language was and what Drew's love language is because we have completely different love languages.

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So many people in my neighborhood I've noticed have Simply Safe, and I 10 out of 10 recommend. Visit simplisave. Com/morbid to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and your first month free. That's simplisave. Com/morbid. There's no safe like SimplySafe. When the car finally did come to a stop, they were in a remote area on the Huntington Beach Bluffs, which is about a 15 minute drive from where he picked her up. Fifteen minutes is such a long time in a situation like that. Oh my God. That must have felt like a hundred years for her. She tried to run as soon as the door was open, but he caught her by the arm and dragged her to an area near the edge of the bluffs, where he forced her to sit down and smoke a joint with him. Jesus Christ. Yeah. So as he just tried to make small talk with her at that point on the bluffs, luckily, a park ranger a few hundred yards below them spotted the pair and decided just to head up to see what was going on. Something seemed off to the ranger.

I'm so glad people are following their gut instincts with this guy.

Because you never hear that.

First, that Good Samaritan. Now, this Park ranger and the woman so far, and I'm sure there's more, but the woman for the dating game. Yep, Sheryl. Everyone This man must have omitted the nastiest vibes. But to the most... To people who are very in tune, maybe might not even realize how in tune they are to these things. Because obviously to other people, he came off as charming and normal and didn't give off bad vibes.

Well, and I think it's also the fact that he praise on young people. That's the thing. I don't necessarily trust their instincts.

They're not equipped to really be looking for those things. But to people who must have a little bit of something there, it's interesting to see how many people were like, what the fuck's up with this guy? Like, something is telling me to go look.

Yeah, something's up. He also looks like a fucking predator. He does. And he's also pushing young girls into weird situations. So not to take away from what you just said, because I completely agree. But it's also like, visualize a man in his mid 20s, pulling this girl along who's 13. You're We're going to be like, what the fuck is that? But it's just the fact that they actually acted, too. That's the thing. And later we'll see there were people who saw things and just looked the other way.

Which is fucked. And this guy, he's just seeing the smoke. He's seeing just two people sitting. So he didn't even see the whole dragging her down the beach thing. So he's just like, something's weird here.

He's like, what's up with this? So he carefully climbed up to the top of the bluffs and moved really quietly along the way to make sure he didn't draw any attention to himself. And when he got close, he could smell the weed in the air. So when he reached the area where they were sitting, he finally made his presence known and was like, hey, what's up here? And Alkala answered. He said, we were just hiking and now we're taking a break. But he had barely finished his sentence when Julie blurted out that Alkala had kidnapped her. Good for her. Brought her there against her will and was now making her, forcing her to smoke pot with him.

Oh my God.

Now, uncertain which of the two he should believe because he doesn't know either of these people. You know. I don't know. I know.

Believe the child. Believe the child. If they're saying they're kidnapped, like this is my PSA to everybody. If a kid says they're kidnapped- Believe the child. At least believe. If they're not, then egg on your face, I guess. But like, whatever.

But he arrested them both and brought them to Huntington Beach Police station. At the station, Rodney and Julie were separated, and they were each separately questioned. And Alkala stuck to his story, telling the officer that he and Julie had gone for a hike, and actually she was the one who supplied the joint and said they should smoke together. Wow.

He's just going to blame the 13-year-old girl?

Yeah, totally. Wow. Julie, meanwhile, stuck to her own story, which was the truth, explaining that she had accepted a ride from this man. He refused to drop her off at school, and he had taken her out in the bluffs against her will and also made her smoke weed when she didn't want to. Thinking that she might be lying in order to avoid punishment for being out with an older man and smoking pot, the officer also didn't know who to believe. But luckily, he ran a background check on Rodney Alcala, and the result came back identifying him as a fucking sex offender on parole. Yeah. So police released Julie to her parents, and Rodney was booked on charges of supplying drugs to a minor, kidnapping, and violating parole.

There's so many little layers to this one because, one, even if the girl is lying and she snuck out with an older man to do this- Why is this older man down to do that? That's the older man's fault. Because she's a child and he is grooming and fucking praying.

Are you praying upon her?

We're really like, I don't know who to believe here. I don't know. Let's look at the facts that she's with a grown fucking man. Let's go with it's his fault no matter what.

She was one of those hippy taps who was smoking weed.

And then this poor girl has been kidnapped from a bus stop when she was literally just going to school. And has been taken somewhere against it, like screamed at, taken somewhere against her will, dragged down the beach, forced to smoke pot. As a 13-year-old. And now she's to be interrogated and be released to her parents. And nobody even believes her. And nobody's believing her. I'm like, talk about trauma.

And a wake-up call to the fucking way that the world works. You're a woman, so unfortunately, people probably aren't going to leave you most of the time. They're like, damn. So fucked up.

That's crazy. Yeah.

He spent a month, Rodney spent a month, awaiting a hearing. And when he went before the judge the day after Christmas in 1974, for some reason, the kidnapping and drug charges were dropped. I got to go. Leaving only a parole violation. So he got a sentence of two and a half years at the California Institution for Men and Chino.

Are you kidding?

I am not. The legal system failed all of these women for a very long time.

In the most fucking rancid way. It's like this is... He kidnapped an eight-year-old, raped her, and tried to kill her, and you let him go. And then he does the same thing with He was planning...

God only knows what he was planning.

No one's going to tell me he wasn't planning on assaulting and probably trying to kill her. And you're just going to let him go. He's done it twice, but who would ever think- Let's drop those charges. Who would ever think he would do it a third time? Like, what? What?

It's unreal. That's insane. It's unreal. Oh, just wait for this next part. Oh, God. In July 1977, he was paroled from prison for the second time with the requirement that obviously he check in regularly with his officer on a weekly basis. Surprisingly, after just two visits, one, two, with the parole officer, Alkala, a registered sex offender with a history of violence and a known flight risk, was granted permission by that same officer, that role officer to travel to New York to, quote, unquote, visit some relatives. And a week later, he left California for New York. Where remember, he's already gone and terrorized women. They just don't happen to know that yet. I.

A bunch of bofoons are involved in this. Truly. A bunch of bofoons.

Truly. And a lot of women would still be here today.

Yeah, a lot of women suffered and died because of these fucking bofoons.

Up.

That's a bafoonery.

It's bafoonery at its finest.

That's wild.

It only gets worse. Wow. How Alcala spent his brief time in New York is mostly unknown, but it is strongly suspected that while there, he committed his second murder. Jesus Christ. That of 23-year-old Ellen Hover. She was the daughter of Manhattan nightclub owner, Hermann Hover. She was the last of New York's high society class, and her disappearance in July 1977 was a major news event across New York City. Given her social status and her family's wealth, investigators actually assumed that Ellen's disappearance would be followed by some ransom demand. Yeah. But when no demand came, they were forced to consider that she was most likely a victim of foul play. Early in the investigation, investigation, Ellen's friend Richard Middelmark told detectives that he actually had made plans with Ellen on July 13th to go to a Broadway show, the two of them. When he called to confirm, she told him that she was going to have lunch at Bloomingdale's with a photographer, and she expected to be home by 4: 00 PM that same day. She never mentioned the photographer's name, but in their search of Ellen's apartment, investigators found the name John Berg written on a calendar beside the date that she went missing.

John Berger. John Berg.

A friend who was with Ellen earlier that day said he spotted her talking to a, quote, tall, thin, shabbily dressed man who wore his long hair tied in a ponytail. Most likely Rodney Alcala.

I mean, that describes him.

When her friend asked who the quote unquote freaky looking guy was, Ellen replied, oh, he's all right. He's a photographer.

Oh, man. Yeah.

Nearly a year later, in June of 1978, investigators, actually with the help of a New York psychic, discovered the skeletal remains of Ellen Hover, buried beneath a pile of rocks in North Thierry town, which is a small town about 30 miles outside of Manhattan. She was far from home, too, which just breaks your fucking heart. Oh, that's so sad. Based on the condition of the remains, when they were discovered, arriving at an culturally conclusive cause of death was next to impossible. But the medical examiner did suspect strangulation to be the cause because there was damage to the hyoid bone. Based on the medical examiner's report, Ellen's missing person case was transferred to the Homicide Division, but there was little evidence to work with, and at that point, the case started going cold. Yeah. But don't worry, I will tell you that things work out there. Oh, good. I think it's part three we got to it. Okay. In the meantime, Rodney Alcala returned to LA late in the summer of 1977, where he would embark on a murder spree that would result in the deaths of at least six more women. And I say at least because to this day, they're still not sure how many people he killed.

Wow. Wow.

So when Rodney went back to California, he moved back in with his mommy and found a job as a typesetter with the Los Angeles Times, claiming on his resume that he had held several similar positions in the past. Uh, false, because during the time frames he provided, he was literally in prison. And apparently no one checked that up. No one checked that up. Yeah. Cool. But he quickly settled into the workplace culture. He amped up his charm. He mingled with the women in the office every chance he got. One of his former coworkers said he would talk about going to parties in Hollywood. It seemed like he knew famous people. But not everybody was so charmed. Another coworker, Sharon Gonzalez, told a reporter that Rodney would show her photographs from his portfolio of girls and young women, and many of those girls and young women were posed nude. She said he was very open about his sexuality. And when she asked him why he had taken the photos, this is disgusting. He told her that their parents had hired him to do so. Oh my God. No one's parents hired you to take naked pictures of their children.

Stop.

Are you kidding me?

Nobody hired you for that. What the fuck are you talking about? Jesus Christ. So while he was settling into his new job at the newspaper, on the other side of the country, 18-year-old Jill Barkham was on her way to LA from Oneida, New York. She was eager to start a new life on the West Coast. She was one of 11 children in her family. She was the middle child. And by the time she finished high school, she was very determined to just find an adventure far away from home. Like most young people from the suburbs, obviously, when she thought of one of the most exciting places to go in America, she quickly settled on Hollywood. So as soon as they were able to go, she and two friends from school packed up their car and they headed to LA that fall, which should have been ridiculously exciting. Yeah.

I mean, she's 18 Let's go.

Yeah, out on your own. On the morning of November 10th, 1977, George Newton, who was an employee with the Department of Water and Power, was cleaning debris from the side of Franklin Canyon Drive near the reservoir when he saw something strange in a ditch. When he got closer to take a look, he realized that he was looking at the dead, partially clothed body of a young woman. So he ran back to his truck and radioed dispatch, who called the police for him and reported the discovery. Now, that summer, were in LA, two young women had been sexually assaulted and murdered by a killer that the press had dubbed the Hillside Strangler.

Now we know Strangler.

Exactly. And those are episodes 256 and 258, if you want to go back to that coverage that Elaina So when they arrived at the scene at Franklin Canyon Drive, detectives felt pretty confident that they just discovered the strangler's third victim. Yeah. This next part is a bit graphic. I just want to let you know. The young woman was positioned on all four with her knees tucked toward her chest. She was nude from the waist down, and there was obvious evidence of a violent sexual assault. A large rock lay in a pool of blood on the ground next to her, and she, too, had been strangled with a blue rope that was knotted in three places. Oh, shit. And they also found two impressions in the dirt that appeared to be from a man's shoe. So at least they had that to go on. Detective Ron Lewis of the LAPD Robbery Homicide Division told reporters, It appeared that the body had been there for some time. It seemed like she put up a struggle and her killer had beaten her badly before strangling her, first with his hands and then with the rope. Jesus. And this is a little graphic.

Her pubic hair on the left side appeared to be singed, and there was additional evidence in indicating that she had been burned as well, likely with a lighter.

Holy shit.

Yeah. She suffered immensely.

This does feel like the Hillside Stranglers. It does. I understand why they thought that. It was the same.

Because it It's a little off for Rodney, but he's also starting to escalate. Yeah. The medical examiner did collect fluids from her body, but of course, DNA testing was at least a decade away at that point. Other than the footprints and the blood evidence, the scene was void of any evidence that would lead to the identity of the victim or the killer at that point. But fortunately, investigators got a match on the victim's fingerprints from a previous arrest in New York earlier that year. Okay. According to the report, Jill Barkham, quote, was known by several sex workers in Oneida who referred to her as Little Bit.

Oh, stop.

Yeah.

Oh, that makes me so sad. I know.

After contacting police in New York, investigators learned that Jill had only been in LA for about two weeks. Wow. Two weeks.

Wow. She goes across the country to start a new- This new adventure that she's so excited about.

Two weeks she'd been there. Damn. Within a couple of weeks, detectives in LA had connected at least 11 strangulation murders that they were attributing to what they thought was the Hillside Strangler, including at that point, the murder of Jill Barkham. Lieutenant Edwin Henderson told a group of reporters in early December, similarities tend to make us believe there's a connection between these murders. Eventually, as we know, police would arrest and charge Kenneth Bianca and his cousin Angelo Bwona, with the Hillside Strangler murders. But when questioned about the murder of Jill Barkham, both of them denied having anything to do with her death.

And you know they weren't going to deny it.

Yeah, exactly. In fact, the investigation until Jill Barkham's death would remain unsolved until 2004, when a DNA match to Rodney Alcala was made to the semen collected from Jill's body all the way back in 1977. Wow. Which is truly remarkable.

That really is.

But it's so sad that her family had no idea what happened to her for all those years. Yeah. It's the new year. I am so ready to get back on my BS baby, and that is coming in big time when it comes to food planning, meal prepping, that whole You know it's a crazy statistic, though? Over 10,000 chemicals have entered our US food supply, but the EU limits this to just 300 additives. Personally, I do not have time to sift through ingredient labels to see what's in the food, which is why I love using Thrive Market. One of my favorite features is the healthy Swap Scanner in the Thrive Market app. It's simple. You can scan any item, and instantly, they will suggest a cleaner, healthier grocery alternative. For me, that means swapping out those really sugary snacks for or high-quality swaps. Personally, I love those Chomps beef sticks more than life itself. Another thing I love is their smart cart feature. It takes the stress out of replacing junk food. When you create an account, Thrive Market asks the right questions and automatically builds a grocery cart tailored to your needs, filled with healthier alternatives to your favorite brands.

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Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah, that's probably just a coincidence.

And despite his insistence that he was definitely innocent, he refused to take a polygraph test. And detectives had no reason to hold him, so they had to let him go. Yeah. Lapd Detective Cliff Sheppard said there was nothing to hold him on because there was no body. So he was released because at that point they didn't have it.

Man.

Yeah So on December 16th, just two days after he was interrogated by the LAPD for Ellen's disappearance, the LA County Sheriff's officer received a call regarding 27-year-old nurse, Georgia Marie Wixon. According to the taller, Wixnid had failed to pick up a coworker for her carpool that morning, and she also hadn't shown up for work, and both of those things were very out of character for her. She always showed up on time. She was somebody that her friends could rely on. Repeated calls to George's apartment also went When answered. So after the call, Deputy Jeffrey Cannon was dispatched to just go do a typical well-being check. Yeah. Not expecting much there. No. When he arrived at Georgia Wixnid's apartment complex, Cannon was met by deputies Jack Neninger and Mike Power, and the three men made their way through the courtyard to George's apartment. The first thing they noticed was that a screen was missing on one of the three large windows at the front of the apartment, and it had been propped up against a building beside the window. That's against the building.

And that's how He's chilling to see.

And there was also a box positioned underneath the window. Somebody had obviously used it to climb through. And there were also scuff marks outside the wall that seemed like they were made by shoes or boots.

As he's climbing in.

So this person literally broke into her apartment. But when they tried the door handle, deputies were surprised to find that the door was actually unlocked. Inside the apartment, it was nearly 90 degrees. Oh. Yeah, 90 degrees and completely dark, almost pitch black. So they switched on their flashlights. Among the first things they saw when they swept their lights across the room was a dead body lying on the floor. They drew their guns and searched a different room in the apartment looking for the killer. Just have to be sure that he's not still there.

Yeah, you don't know if he's still there.

And of course, any additional victims. But once they secured the apartment, they called for additional officers and of course, the coroner. With the curtains open and the lights on, the deputies were able to see the full extent of the violence committed in Georgia Wixnids' apartment, and it was I can't imagine having to leave that scene and go about your life after that. Georgia was lying on the floor on her back. She was nude and completely covered and bruises lacerations and blood. A pair of tights were tied around her neck and nodded several times. On the bed next to her, there was a large blood stain in the center of her mattress, and there was blood splatter all over the bed frames and on all four walls.

Holy shit.

By her head, detectives found a claw hammer that seemed to have been used in the assault.

My God.

The autopsy report- He's far more brutal than I even anticipated. He's far more brutal than I ever even knew. The autopsy report included an extensive list of injuries, including significant trauma to her face and head, skull fractures, extensive lacerations covering her body, and a fractured and dislocated arm. So she fought like hell.

Yeah.

The medical examiner wrote, Almost every injury was inflicted while she was still alive and blood was still pumping through her body. Oh my God. Yeah, which is awful. The ultimate cause of death listed was ligature strangulation. Holy shit. So she even survived those blows to the head with a kuaia. Oh my God. Although his previous murders were obviously violent, the attack on Georgia Wixnade seemed particularly brutal by comparison. And unhinged. Unhinged, like out of control. Detective Cliff Sheppard said, I think he did that one to show that he could kill with impunity. Yeah, it feels that way. I think so, too. And I think he's like, look, you'll arrest me and I'll still go out and do it. And I'll go even harder than I have. It'll be worse. And you still won't catch me.

Yeah, because you just keep letting me go.

Look what I can do. Yeah. However, unlike his previous crime scenes, which were light on evidence, this time he had left behind critical evidence in the form of semen, blood evidence, and even a partial palm print. Oh, wow. Yeah. While the DNA and blood evidence, again, wouldn't prove useful for at least another decade, the palm print was the first piece of solid evidence that investigators could find, and all detectives needed was a hand to match it to. After the murder of Georgia Wix did, though, Rodney Alcologist returned to his ordinary fucking life.

God, this guy.

Yeah, just went back to his job at the Times, was taking photographs on the side for extra money, photographing people's weddings, which is truly unthinkable that he could do that and then go to a wedding ceremony and take pictures.

Wow.

In March of 1978, the LAPD's Hillside Strangler Task Force had narrowed down their list of suspects and were questioning those they believed could be involved in the brutal string of killings. And as a child rapist, his name was among those on the list. So police paid him a visit at his mother's house to question him. I just have to say, his mom must be like, what's going on? Police are showing up here all the time, but every time they show up, she tells them that he has nothing to do with anything. It's like, I get it. Like, that's your done. If the police keep showing up and he keeps being linked to this many things- You got to hold him accountable, my friend.

He did some shit wrong. Yeah. Like, come on.

I just needed to say that. So although he was ruled out as a suspect in the Hillside case, while they were at his home, they discovered that he was in the possession of a small amount of marijuana, so they arrested him on a petty drug charge just to keep him.

Yeah.

It earned him... That possession charge earned him a three-month jail sentence. So he spent three more months in jail and was released in late June of On the morning of June 24th, just days after he was released from jail, Zafar Shah, a resident at the Illinois apartment in El Segundo, made a truly brutal discovery. Shah had just entered the basement of the building to do some laundry when he almost stumbled over the body of 31-year-old Charlotte Lamb.

In just days after he was released?

Just days. Holy shit. Shah ran to the building's manager office, and together they called the police who arrived a little before noon. Upon arrival, Detective William Gainer was met by the building manager who took him down into the basement. Lamb's body was lying nude on the floor, a long shoelace tied tightly around her neck, and a piece of wood with a small amount of blood ladder was next to her head. It was very clear that she had been sexually assaulted. And among the more curious aspects of the crime scene, though, was that Lamb, who at that point had yet to be identified, didn't live at the Illinois Apartments and was unknown to the residents there. What the fuck? So that wasn't even where she lived. And this is an apartment complex laundry room. What? But not when she lives at. So strange.

That's so bizarre. It is.

Her body was taken to the medical examiner's office where an autopsy was conducted by Dr. Joseph Coggan. In his report, he noted that there was considerable trauma to her face and head. There were bite marks on the right side of her neck. Jesus. This is brutal.

He's a fucking animal.

There were lacerations over her entire genital area, and the ligature was so forcefully tightened that the cardilage around her voice box and thyroid was fractured and the blood vessels in her eyes were ruptured. Wow. This attack was... Wow. He's an animal. Like, he's A fucking animal. He's literally a wild animal. A demon. Holy shit. And again, according to the autopsy, the majority of Charlotte's injuries were inflicted while she was still alive. And the ultimate cause of death was the ligature strangulation.

Yeah, because I was I would say all that trauma from the ligature, she experienced all of that. Yeah. Holy shit.

Swabs of fluid and bite mark impressions were taken and stored for later analysis. Something they did do really well was keep all the... Even though they couldn't use the fluid evidence, the semen, that stuff, they did a good job of taking it anyway and storing it. It doesn't seem like a lot of things got lost along the way.

Which is great.

Yeah. Now, days after Charlotte hadn't shown for work and nobody had heard from her, several calls were placed to the LAPD to report her missing. At the same time, her car had been ticketed and was eventually impounded in Santa Monica. Between the two events, investigators were finally able to identify Charlotte Lamb as the body discovered in that basement. But now, how she had wound up there would remain a mystery to everyone for some time to come. Wow. Yeah. Investigators pursued this case for months, but the evidence was scarce and leads were pretty slim. That September, Rodney Alcala's life took a bizarre turn when he was recruited as a contest on the dating game. So this all of everything we've talked about so far has happened before he was even on the dating game.

That's bonkers.

And then he just goes on this- And he just goes on the dating game. Yeah. Like, what? If you're not familiar, it was a popular show back in the '70s and I think '80s, where a single woman would interview three men, and they sat behind a curtain, and she would just choose one of them to go on a date with. The show became known for its frequent use of very risque double entendras and thinly veiled illusions to sexual objects. It was a spicy show.

They would be like, sex.

They'd be like, but they'd say it different than that. They'd be like, sex, but not. Yeah. In this particular episode, Bachelorette Sheryl Bradshaw asked the hidden bachelors, I'm serving you for dinner. What are you called and what do you look like?

What a question.

Yeah, I think they were pre-written.

Very of the time. Yeah.

Bachelor number one, Rodney, replied, I'm called the Banana and I look really good. Peel me.

I hate this a lot.

I will fucking peel you. I hate this a lot. With a potato peeler. Yeah.

The dating game sounds like a nightmare anyways. Yeah, it truly does. If these are the answers you're getting, Where are the choices, my friend? Where are the choices?

Below ground level. Yeah. The response got a laugh out of Bradshaw in the audience, setting a light-hearted tone. And throughout the episode, Alkala did his best, his absolute best, to charm Bradshaw, describing himself as a long-haired photographer who enjoyed skydiving and motorcycling in his spare time.

What makes me crazy about this, and it's very horrifying, is all he's done up to this point, and he's like, I think I'll go on TV. Yeah. He just know he's like, Spotlight. And it's like, what?

And he did.

He didn't care that Spotlight was going to be thrust upon him. He was that convinced.

And honestly- He had every reason to be.

Yeah, he didn't have any reason to think he would be stopped.

The legal system showed him, you can be a fucking monster to children. Yeah. And you'll get away with it. And we'll let you out. And we'll let you out. You can serve a couple of years. It'll be easy. And then you get out and just get right back to it. Yeah. And then maybe we'll get you, but maybe not.

Maybe not. Yeah. It's just very disconcerning.

And this appearance on the dating game, obviously before Sheryl gets the weird feeling. And it's interesting that she actually, she picked him. Yeah. And she He was stunned by his charm in the moment. In the spotlight. In the spotlight when she can't see him. Exactly. And then she sees him and has a- It has a personal conversation with him. But it's a quick exchange. Even in that quick exchange, she sees him and she sees him for exactly who the fuck he is.

Because I think also the mask drops. Yes, big time. He's on TV. He's sitting there charming everyone. He's putting on a show. And then he goes in front of her and he says three words and she's like, You're fucking weird, and I'm good.

And I think, and this is just my personal thought, I think she saw his eyes, and I think she saw that there was something fucking dead behind those eyes.

Listen to your gut, everybody.

I can't imagine.

The people who did were the right ones in this story. Yeah.

His eyes are so fucking beaty and scary, and it breaks my heart that they were the last thing some people saw. Yeah. I hate this guy. It kills me. But like I just said, the audience loved Alcala. It seemed that Sheryl did in the moment, too, especially when she chose him to be her date at the end of the episode. She told the host, Well, I like bananas, so I'll take one. Meaning bachelor number one. As winners, Sheryl and Rodney were awarded tennis lessons and a trip to California's Magic Mountain Amusement Park. Can you fucking imagine if she had accepted that date and gone to tennis lessons with Rodney Alcala? And then an amusement park? And then an amusement park.

The amusement park alone. I can't. But with Rodney Alcala?

I can't.

And that's the thing. It's like, he probably would have killed Sheryl 100 %. I don't see him just going on that date. No. I see this as the next step in his like, let's see if I can do this.

Because it's upping the ante. Oh, I'll win this date with her.

Everyone will see it.

You know he went into that being like, I'm going to win. I know I'm going to because he's a cocky motherfucker. And he did. He did win. I think he thought, I'll just do this in front of America's face. I'll win this date and I'll kill this girl and I'll get away with it.

I'll kill this girl that everyone sees Ease me when the date was and they still won't catch me.

And I'll get away with it. I think that's exactly what he was planning.

But it's like, that is also like, that's a level of hubris.

Yes.

That is Greek mythology style. That's so wild because you're just like, I know that was your intention. Oh, yeah. But if you had gone on that date with Sheryl, and like, thank goodness, Sheryl. I'm so glad Sheryl got out of this. But I'm like, if you had killed Sheryl and everyone knew that you won this date with her and you were the last person with her, you would have been caught. That would have been the end.

But he had been caught so many times. But he was so sure. He was so sure because I do think he's a narcissist. And me, arm-to-ear diagnosis.

Well, and it's literally it's diabolical level of hubris. But again, that would have been it. That wouldn't have been one you can get of. You would have been the last person with that person.

You would think. But then you also have to wonder because he didn't even get convicted. Everybody knew what he did to Tali Shapiro at eight years old. Everybody knew. So that gave him the full-blown confidence to say, look what I can do to an eight-year-old girl in the middle of the fucking morning at a place where she lives.

And I got out in 30 something months.

Less than three years.

Yeah.

And went to go do stuff again. I got caught with a 13-year-old girl, and I just blamed it on her. I got nothing. And I got... Those charges got dropped. I just had to serve a parole violation for, I think it was three months. I think he thought this was going to be perfect.

No, he had every reason to think that this was going to be... I think my brain just won't wrap. I'm like, This is just like... It shouldn't. This is just like...

Yeah.

It's just like, whoa.

It's bonkers. It's just, whoa. I think he was a monster. And then I think the legal system even pushed him further into believing. It enabled him.

It enabled him, exactly.

It enabled him completely. Exactly.

It's just very shocking. It is. And poor Sheryl. I know. And poor Sheryl. And poor Sheryl just for being that close to this. You know what I mean? I can't imagine. I'm glad she got away from this.

Well, I just can't imagine how she felt when she found this all after.

Finding out what had happened to those poor women and girls before her.

Before her and after her. Yeah. Because he goes on another spree. This is just one spree. A few miles from the glass spires of Midtown Atlanta lies the South River Forest. In 2021 and 2022, the woods became a home to activists from all over the country who gathered to stop the nearby construction of a massive new police training facility nicknamed Cop City. At approximately nine o'clock this morning, as law enforcement was moving through various sectors of the property, an individual without warning shot a Georgia State Patrol trooper. This is We Came to the Forest, a story about resistance. The abolitionist mission isn't done until every prison is empty and shut down.

Love and fellowship. It was probably the happiest of everybody in my life.

The lengths will go to protect the things we hold closest to our hearts. Follow We Came to the Forest on the WNDY app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of We came to the Forest early and ad-free right now by joining WNDRI Plus. We know, when the show finished taping, like I said at the top of part, One, Cheryl started to feel like she'd made a bad choice, according to former Homicide Detective Matt Murphy. The moment where he comes around the partition and Cheryl Bradschall looks at him, there's a moment in her eyes where you can see she's being polite, but she did refuse to go on a date with him.

See? And he said I want to watch it back.

I've seen clips, but I've never seen the two of them interact.

The moment when he comes around the partition is very interesting.

Immediately after seeing Alkala in person, like we know, she went to Ellen Metzger, who is the show's producer, and she said, Ellen, I can't go out with this guy. There's weird vibes that are coming off him. He's very strange. I'm not comfortable. Will that be a problem? And again, thankfully, Alan Metzger assured her it was not going to be a problem. She was not under any obligation to go on this date. And Sheryl left the studio that afternoon, like we know, completely unaware that she narrowly avoided spending time with a brutal killer. Jesus. It turned out Sheryl Bradshaw was not the only person put off by I'll call a strange, very intense energy. According to Jed Mills, who was one of the other bachelors on the episode. I'll call his strange behavior and demeanor in the green room before the taping, he felt was very bizarre and very off-putting. Wow. He said, I'm bending toward the other guy to get away from him, and I don't know if I did that consciously. He was quiet, but at the same time he would interrupt and impose whenever he felt like it. And he was very obnoxious and creepy.

He became very unlikable and rude and imposing as though he was trying to intimidate.

Huh?

Yeah. And just to think that this other bachelor found himself pulling away from this guy physically.

This man was like, yeah.

Something about Rodney's energy made him move away from him, whether he meant to or not. Yeah.

That's creepy. Yeah. You know something's off when he He's even coming off as predatory to another man. To men. Yeah.

Rodney's failure on the dating game did not seem to affect his confidence in any way. In February 1979, just a few months after being rejected by Sheryl Bradshaw, Alcala He goes back out on the streets looking for a new victim.

And imagine being Sheryl, too. I didn't even think of this part of it. Being the woman you said, no, I'm not going out with him. And now he knows who you are. I know. And you're worried, he gave me the creeps. She doesn't even know what he's done. No. But it's like you were creeped out enough to not want to go out with him. I would be like, that must have like, wait on her a little bit just being like, is he going to follow me? Is he mad? Is he going to be weird about it. I mean, men get really fucking weird when they get rejected.

So it's like- Men get weird when they're rejected privately.

I can't imagine publicly. I can't imagine publicly. I'm sure she was very nervous about that. And then to hear later I'd be like, oh, my God. Holy shit. Yeah. No, you're so right. That's a whole different plan to work through.

He did stalk people.

Oh, yeah, I'm sure.

We'll find out in part three that he was a stalker.

Oh, I believe it. Yeah.

But like I said, just a few months after that, he was back out on the streets looking for a new victim. On February 13th, just the day before Valentine's Day, he was driving through Riverside, California, when he spotted 15-year-old Monique Hoyt hitchhiking, and he stopped and offered her a ride. His back seat was full of camera equipment, and Alcala asked if he could take Monique's picture, telling her it was for a contest and they could both win a prize if he entered and they both won. To the 15-year-old, he seemed like a quote, nice, charming, mild man, and he also came off as a legitimate photographer because he's got all this stuff with him. So she agreed to let him take her picture. By the time they reached Alcala's mother's house, he literally brought this girl back to his mother's house. This is a 15-year-old girl. Jesus Christ. Just going to state that for exactly what it is.

Christ.

The sun had started to go down and he told Monique that the next day would be better for pictures. So they spent the night together at his mom's house.

She's 15. She's 15.

Remember everybody. We don't know what happened, but she's 15. When they woke up the next day, he packed the camera equipment into the car and they drove out to the desert, desert area near Banning, about 80 miles outside of LA. So they drove for, you got to think, over an hour in the car together. Yeah. The first few photos that he took were simple posing shots. But before long, he asked Monique if she would be opposed to taking some nude photos, which he has no right to ask her because she's 15 years old.

Because she's a literal child.

And she can't consent to that. No. She did agree. But as she was lifting her shirt over her head, he struck her in the face with a large tree branch, sending her slumping to the ground where she blacked out. He hit her so hard, she blacked out. A 15-year-old. When she regained consciousness, this is brutal and awful, he was sexually assaulting her. But she had the wherewithal to pretend to still be unconscious while this was happening. But eventually, the pain and the trauma of it all became too much, and she started screaming. At that point, he yelled at her to shut up, stuffed her T-shirt into her mouth, and started choking her with his hands until she lost consciousness for the second time. Holy shit. When she woke up for the second time, she woke up and realized that her hands and feet were both bound. And now she looked next to her and saw that Rodney Alcala was lying beside her on a blanket, sobbing.

I can't with these fucking creeps who do this shit and then start to cry and stuff. And just start sobbing. You got to go.

I just can't imagine enduring what that girl endured at 15 years old.

And then watching this man sit there and cry next to her on a blanket. Like, what?

The level of confusion. She's also blacked out two times because he strangled her and hit her in the head. And then she wakes, the bizarre confusion of this all.

No, that would be so over the line of my comprehension that I couldn't even...

Now, remember, she's blacked out twice, but still relied on her instincts and turned to Rodney and started comforting him, knowing that she could maybe reverse psychology him.

Monique is fucking smart as fuck. Boss.

Smart as a whip. Boss. Yeah. She told him that she wanted to spend more time with him and said, Can we just go back to your house? Would that be okay? Wow. She also begged him not to tell anybody what had happened between them. She said, Just don't tell anybody and I I won't tell anybody.

She, and that's smart, too, because you're being like, I don't want anyone to know. I'm not going to tell anyone.

I would never tell anybody. She begged him, Don't say anything. He didn't respond to any of her questions, just remained completely silent But it appeared that this reverse psychology worked. He started untying her silently, though. I can't imagine.

I also just like, I'm really... I admire this level of collectedness because enable Being able to compartmentalize what's going on- And think that quickly. Whenever people, survivors will do this thing, I'm like, I just... That's so admirable to me because I have a lot of trouble not showing exactly how I feel about a situation. Me too. You're going to tell. If I'm pissed, I'm pissed. We have those faces. Yeah. And if I'm upset, I'm upset. And it's like, I have trouble bending my emotion to go the other way. And these people Just like, these women just are able to just zone in and think so clearly. It's very admirable.

When, meanwhile, your nervous system is probably the most fucking, is definitely the most panicked it's ever been.

Your nervous system is losing its mind.

Is out of whack. But your brain somehow, your mind and your survival instinct must just kick in. But the tension in this moment of him untying her, completely silent. And she's just sitting there hoping like, I'm hoping this is working. Yeah. She has no idea. They could walk down together and he could hit her over the head again and this could all start back up.

He's already horrifically assaulted her in every way.

They both just silently got dressed and returned to the car and started driving again the long distance back to Los Angeles, over 80 miles. Once they made it down the mountain and entered Banning, Alkala stopped at a fast food restaurant and he went into place in order. And he told Monique to wait for him while he went inside use the bathroom. Wow. As soon as... So he trusted her at that point. She got him to. She was able to convince him, I'm not going to say anything if you don't. And I'd like to spend more time together. Yeah. As soon as he was out of sight, she ran to the motel next door and started screaming for help. One of the motel guests called 911 while some other people brought her into their room to wait for police. So again, more good Samaritans here. Because some people hear people screaming and they're like, I don't want to get involved in that.

They're like, That sounds crazy.

Or I don't know what I heard, whatever. But these people heard her screaming, called the police and said, Come in here, you're safe. I love it. In the meantime, Alcala had returned to the car and obviously realized that Monique had escaped. So he got back into the car and just dipped, flood that scene completely. Piece of shit. When police got there, Monique gave a description of her kidnapper, and she knew his name, so she told them his name. After picking him out of a photo lineup of six images, investigators knew exactly where to find Rodney Alcala.

Of course they did.

At his mom's house, because that's where he lives always. He was quickly arrested for the assault the next day. In his interview with the detectives, he claimed that Monique had agreed to be photographed by him, and she said that she would, quote, simulate sex acts.

Jesus Christ. She's 15, so she can't agree to that.

He said eventually she changed her mind, and that's when he started choking her.

Oh.

Okay.

Oh, he's just like, you can understand why I started choking her.

She changed her mind and I got mad. So, you No.

After the child said she wouldn't do that. Yeah. Yeah.

He told the detectives that the situation had gotten out of hand. He never intended to attack her. He said, You're in an unreasoning situation. Your brain and you just don't seem to know what to do. You're not reasoning. You're not thinking. I raped her. So he literally told police outright, I raped her.

And it's like, I'm sorry, don't try to like, underplay it. Like, have a moment with everyone and be like, you know? You just don't know what you're doing. You know what I mean? It's like, no, most people do know what they're doing. I know exactly I'm doing. Don't try to be on a level with me. We're not on the same level. No.

So given his violent criminal history, the prosecutor asked the judge to set the bill at $50,000 for Robney.

Yeah.

For some motherfucking crazy for the last reason, the judge found that amount to be too high.

Are you kidding me?

For raping a child for the second time. Are you kidding me? For the second time. For the second time, everybody. And set on call as bail.

When I tell you the buffoonery here in the legal system.

I want to look at all of these people today and be like, Hey, you all got blood on your hands.

Yeah, I want to be like, How do you feel?

How does that feel?

Because they do. Do you guys sleep at night?

They absolutely do.

Do you sleep good at night? Why?

I'm like, Did you read the wrong transcript? You knew that he had already raped a child, and now he's being accused of raping a child again? Yeah. And you're like, No, 50,000 is too high. How about no bail? I don't know what all the rules are for bail, but obviously there was the option here to set it higher at 50,000.

He would have killed her. Absolutely. He raped her. He abducted her. He took nude photos of her.

And also literally was choking the life out, choked her to the point of unconsciousness at least one time and hit her in the face so hard with a tree branch that she lost consciousness a second time. Like, are you fucking serious, dude? So his bail was set at just $10,000, and his mommy wasted no time coming to his aid, believing that there must have been some terrible mistake.

No, and she's got to get it. She got to get a fucking grip. Agree. Is what she needs to do. Agree. You got to hold your son accountable. Let's be real.

100 %. On March 16th, Rodney was released on bail and returned to mommy's house to wait his trial, which was scheduled for September. That is disgusting. And that is where we're going to wrap for part two. In part three, we will see yet another flop of a legal system and many other women who ended up losing their lives because of that.

That is unthinkable.

You're reating. But luckily, he gets caught and apprehended and goes to multiple trials, which is really fucking annoying in and of itself, but it ends on a good note.

At least there's that.

I should say as good of a note as it can. Yeah.

At least some justice is served in the end? Yes. Okay. I mean, I No, he's...

I mean, bitch, he died.

I mean, bitch, he died. So justice was served.

Yes, exactly.

Damn. This is just such a fucking brutal and awful case.

And just full of failure.

Yeah. And these poor women and young girls are sitting there watching this guy get away with it each time. The ones who have escaped, who have survived him, are watching him literally do it again and again. And no one's listening. No one gives a shit.

And it's like we said, Sheryl Bradshaw, obviously, must have been terrified just for turning down a date. Imagine being 15-year-old Monique. You accuse him of rape and his bail gets set at $10,000, and he gets out. I can't. The man who raped you after beating you and strangling you unconscious twice is just out on the streets again?

I really can't. What do you... How do you...

How do you deal with that at all? How do you rationalize that in your brain?

I don't know if you can, to be quite honest. I don't think you do.

But there is, unfortunately, a lot more, a lot more horrific details to talk about in part three. He's not done. But again, it ends on as good of a note as it can. So Well, stay tuned for that. We hope you keep listening.

And we hope you... Keep it weird.

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