Murder of Dru Sjodin

According to police reports, Rodriguez admitted being near the Columbia Mall the night Sjodin disappeared, allegedly viewing the film Once Upon a Time in Mexico at the Columbia Mall Cinema 4. However, that movie was not playing at that cinema or any other theater in the area.[12] The police also found receipts of purchases that Rodriguez had made at several stores near the mall including one receipt for a knife which he had purchased at a nearby Menards store. Rodriguez apparently had two tool kit knives that could be purchased at only a particular home center store which was about one mile from the mall, but they were not purchased the day Sjodin disappeared and a purchase date for the knives was never established. Police found a tool kit knife in Rodriguez's car that was soaking in some type of cleaning solution inside a rear wheel well. Police also found a woman's shoe and a knife in the car that had blood on it that matched Sjodin's DNA.[2]

Sjodin's body was recovered on April 17, 2004, just west of Crookston, Minnesota, when deep snow drifts began to melt.[13][14] Crookston is also where Rodriguez lived with his mother.[15] Sjodin's body was found partially nude and face down in a ravine.[16][17] Her hands were tied behind her back and she had been beaten, stabbed, sexually assaulted, and had several lacerations including a five-and-a-half inch cut on her neck. A rope was also tied around her neck and remnants of a shopping bag were found under the rope, suggesting that a bag had been placed on her head. The medical examiner concluded that she had either died as a result of the major neck wound, from suffocation, or from exposure to the elements. Thousands of people had helped search for Sjodin, and hundreds attended her funeral.[6]

Because Sjodin had been taken across state lines, the crime became a federal case under the Federal Kidnapping Act.[17][18] This meant that Rodriguez was eligible to receive the death penalty if convicted, a possibility not allowed under North Dakota or Minnesota law, as neither states have the death penalty. It was the first death penalty case in a century to take place in North Dakota.[19] U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Keith Reisenauer and Norman Anderson prosecuted the case against Rodriguez. On August 30, 2006, Rodriguez was convicted in federal court of kidnapping resulting in death for the murder of Dru Sjodin, and on September 22, 2006, the jury recommended that he receive the death penalty.[20] On February 8, 2007, Rodriguez was formally sentenced to death by U.S District Judge Ralph R. Erickson. [21] He is imprisoned at the United States Penitentiary, Coleman in Florida.[22] Judge Erickson arranged that Rodriguez would be executed in South Dakota.[23]

Rodriguez later admitted his guilt in a death row interview with Dr. Michael Welner on June 28, 2013. In October 2011, defense attorneys filed a federal habeas corpus motion claiming that Rodriguez is mentally disabled.[24]

In 2021, the same judge who sentenced Rodriguez to death, Ralph R. Erickson, now a judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, overturned his sentence and ordered that a new sentencing phase be conducted due to "misleading testimony from a medical examiner and limitations on mental health evidence". The testimony in court of Michael McGee, the Ramsey County Medical Examiner, was “unreliable, misleading and inaccurate” and that Rodriguez's attorneys did him a disservice by opting to limit the mental health evaluation of Rodriguez which could have resulted in the possible use of the insanity defense by their client.[25]

On March 14, 2023, prosecutors announced that they would no longer seek the death penalty for Rodriguez.[26] Rodriguez was sentenced to life without parole on May 18, 2023.[27]