A serial killer dubbed 'The Dating Game Killer' has died at the age of 77 while awaiting execution in California, authorities have said.
Rodney James Alcala died of natural causes at 1.43am on 24 July, at a hospital in San Joaquin Valley, California, prison officials said in a statement.
Alcala, who received his nickname after his appearance on US TV show The Dating Game in 1978, was sentenced to death in Orange County in 1980 for kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Robin Samsoe the previous year.
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That judgment was reversed in 1984 by the California Supreme Court and Alcala was granted a new trial.
Then in 1986, Alcala was sentenced to death a second time for Samsoe's murder. However, a federal appeals court in 2003 overturned the sentence and Alcala was given a new trial.
His DNA matched evidence in other murders and Orange County prosecutors indicted Alcala for the murders of four other women.
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In 2010, an Orange County jury convicted Alcala of five counts of first-degree murder and he was sentenced to death for the killing of Samsoe as well as the 1977 deaths of 18-year-old Jill Barcomb, 27-year-old Georgia Wixted, 32-year-old Charlotte Lamb, and 21-year-old Jill Parenteau.
According to a statement from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Alcala was extradited to New York in 2012 after he was indicted for the 1971 murder of Cornelia Crilley and the 1977 murder of Ellen Jane Hover.
He received an additional 25 years to life in 2013 after pleading guilty to the two homicides.
Alcala was charged again in 2016 after DNA evidence connected him to the 1977 death of a 28-year-old woman whose remains were found in a remote area of south-west Wyoming.
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But a prosecutor said Alcala was too ill to face trial over the killing of the woman, who was six months pregnant when she died.
California's death row is in San Quentin State Prison near San Francisco, but for years Alcala had been housed more than 200 miles away at a prison in Corcoran where he could receive medical care around the clock.
Prosecutors said Alcala stalked women like prey and took earrings as trophies from some of his victims. Investigators say the true total of Alcala's victims may never be known.
Featured Image Credit: PA