Julie Connell, 18, and Michael Lyons, 8
Robert Boyd Rhoades
Facts of the Crime:
On May 16, 1996, Michael Lyons, of Yuba City, was kidnapped, sexually assaulted and murdered. Robert Rhoades was arrested the next day near the boy’s body.
Rhoades was sentenced to death in Sacramento County for Lyons' murder on September 10, 1999.
Then, after the Lyons conviction and sentence, Rhoades was identified as a suspect by DNA evidence linking him to the murder of Julie Connell, who disappeared on April 20, 1984 after she had gone to a park in Hayward to read a book. Her body was found five days later in a corral in Palomares Canyon near Castro Valley. Authorities say she was tied up and raped and her neck was slashed.
Rhoades was sentenced to death in Alameda County for Connell's murder on June 20, 2007.
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