Miriam McKinley was a 65-year-old white female residing in Inglewood, a suburb of Los Angeles, California. In June 1976, she became one of several elderly women targeted in a series of brutal home invasion attacks. Ms. McKinley was found beaten, sexually assaulted, and strangled inside her home, her life violently cut short by an unknown assailant.
Her body was discovered in her garage, bearing signs consistent with other related attacks on vulnerable elderly women in the region.
At the time of her death, Ms. McKinley's age, gender, and ethnicity matched a disturbing pattern: white females in their mid-60s to 80s living alone. The perpetrator, later dubbed both the “Westside Rapist” and “Southland Strangler,” typically entered through unlocked windows or doors, assaulted his victims, and then strangled or suffocated them. Evidence suggests that many of these victims were overlaid with a blanket or pillow—an ominous marker of the killer’s modus operandi.
Ms. McKinley’s case remained unsolved for over three decades, leaving her family and community in anguish. It wasn’t until DNA technology advanced that investigators made a breakthrough. In March 2009, authorities arrested John Floyd Thomas Jr., an insurance claims adjuster and registered sex offender, whose DNA matched samples from several cold cases—including Ms. McKinley’s murder. The DNA link confirmed that Thomas had beaten, sexually assaulted, and strangled the 65-year-old white female in June 1976.
Following his arrest, Thomas was formally charged with multiple counts, including the murders of Maybelle Hudson Evalyn Bunner and Miriam McKinley all in 1976, plus several other killings spanning from the early 1970s through 1986. He faced charges of rape, burglary, and murder. There were no other arrests connected to Ms. McKinley’s killing; no accomplices were identified—John Floyd Thomas Jr. was the sole suspect and the individual held accountable by law enforcement.
In April 2011, Thomas pled guilty to seven counts of first-degree murder, which included Ms. McKinley’s death, as well as charges of rape, burglary, and special circumstances. He received multiple consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole. The once-unsolved death of a 65-year-old white female victim was thus finally closed, her killer held to justice decades after her tragic murder.
