Molester Resentenced to Death
A convicted child molester whose death sentence was overturned by the state Supreme Court was today resentenced to die in San Quentin prison’s gas chamber.
Rodney J. Alcala, 41, a Monterey Park photographer, stared straight ahead as Orange County Superior Court Judge Donald A. McCartin sentenced him to death for kidnaping and killing Robin Samsoe, a 12-year-old Huntington Beach girl, in 1979. Alcala was convicted and sentenced to death for the killing in 1979, but that conviction was overturned by the state Supreme Court last year because the judge had improperly allowed the jury to hear evidence about Alcala’s previous attacks on girls.
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