Alcala sentenced to death

The audience applauded and one man yelled “yes!” as the serial killer responsible for the death of a 12-year-old Huntington Beach girl more than 30 years ago was sentenced to death Tuesday, witnesses said.

Rodney James Alcala, 66, was given the death penalty for the murder and kidnapping of Robin Samsoe in 1979 and the murder of four Los Angeles women in the 1970s. Alcala was convicted Feb. 25 of five counts of murder.

“There are 36 people now that all agree that this man deserves to die,” said Robert Samsoe, Robin’s brother.

The jury deliberated for about an hour on whether Alcala deserved death or life in prison without parole.

This is the third time Alcala has been given the death penalty for the murder and kidnapping of Robin and the first for the four Los Angeles women — Jill Barcomb, 18, in 1977; Georgia Wixted, 27, in 1977; Charlotte Lamb, 33, in 1979; and Jill Parenteau, 21, in 1979. The convictions were twice overturned on appeal.

DNA evidence linking Alcala to the Los Angeles cases wasn’t uncovered until after the second appeal.

Alcala represented himself and maintained throughout the trial that he was at Knott’s Berry Farm applying for a freelance photography job when Robin was kidnapped.

He didn’t try to defend himself against the Los Angeles murders.

Although there was no forensic evidence linking Alcala to Robin, prosecuting the cases together allowed the jurors to see commonalities between them.

“With this many cases, you can see pathways, you see trends, that connect the cases,” said the jury foreman, who didn’t wish to be identified.

With another trial over and another conviction, Samsoe said he is “elated,” but was also looking at the larger picture of what happened to his sister.

“We need to get the word out there,” he said. “We have to stop our laws that allow child molesters to get out and do this kind of thing.”