August 23, 1943 - Rodney Alcala
What distinguished Alcala was not only the confirmed death toll but the vast, unresolved archive he left behind — more than a thousand photographs of individuals whose fates remain largely unknown. His crimes spanned California and New York across several years, and investigators have long suspected the confirmed convictions represent only a fraction of his actual victims. The photographs, many recovered decades after his initial arrest, turned the investigation into something open-ended and ongoing, with identifications still being sought well into the 2010s.
From Wikipedia
Rodney James Alcala (; born Rodrigo Jacques Alcala; August 23, 1943 – July 24, 2021), also known as John Berger and John Burger, was an American serial killer and convicted sex offender who was sentenced to death in California for five murders committed between 1977 and 1979. He pleaded guilty and received two sentences, both twenty-five years to life, for two further murders committed in New York State. He was also indicted for one murder in Wyoming, although the charges filed there were dropped. While Alcala has been conclusively linked to nine murders, the true number of victims remains unknown and could be as high as 130.
Alcala compiled a collection of more than 1,000 photographs of women, teenage girls and boys, many in sexually explicit poses. In 2016 he was charged with the 1977 murder of a woman identified in one of his photos. Alcala is known to have assaulted one other photo subject and police have speculated that others could be rape or murder victims as well.
Prosecutors have said that Alcala "toyed" with his victims, strangling them until they lost consciousness then waiting until they revived, sometimes repeating this process several times before finally killing them.
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