Antonio Rodriguez: The Kensington Strangler
Overview
Antonio Rodriguez is an American serial killer known as the "Kensington Strangler." During a six-week period in late 2010, he raped and murdered three women in the Kensington section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The victims were found in vacant lots or other secluded areas within a relatively small section of the neighborhood, creating fear that a serial predator was stalking women along Kensington's streets.
Rodriguez targeted women who were experiencing addiction, poverty or other personal difficulties. He encountered them in an area known for open-air drug activity and commercial sex work, then led them to isolated locations where they were assaulted and strangled. Investigators ultimately connected the killings through DNA evidence, similarities in the victims' injuries and the distinctive way their bodies had been left.
Murders in Kensington
The series began in November 2010 with the death of 21-year-old Elaine Goldberg. Goldberg was a nursing student at Gwynedd-Mercy College who had struggled with substance use and was attempting to rebuild her life. On November 3, her body was discovered in a vacant, trash-strewn lot on the 2800 block of Ruth Street in Kensington. She was partially clothed and had visible injuries around her neck. An autopsy determined that she had died from strangulation.
Ten days later, another woman was found dead less than a mile away. Nicole Piacentini, a 35-year-old resident of Philadelphia's Port Richmond neighborhood, was discovered on November 13 behind an abandoned building on the 1900 block of East Cumberland Street, near Jasper Street. Like Goldberg, she had been partially undressed and strangled. The physical similarities between the two scenes immediately raised concerns, although authorities initially stopped short of publicly declaring that the same person had committed both murders.
Forensic testing soon revealed that DNA recovered from the Goldberg and Piacentini crime scenes came from the same unidentified man. The discovery confirmed that the killings were connected and intensified the search for the person the public and news media began calling the Kensington Strangler. Women living and working in the neighborhood were warned not to walk alone or accompany strangers into abandoned properties.
The threat became even more serious when several women reported surviving similar attacks. Some described being approached by a man who appeared friendly before becoming violent in a secluded location. The surviving victims reported being struck, sexually assaulted or choked. Their accounts helped police develop a description of the suspected attacker, but investigators did not yet have a name to match the DNA profile.
On December 15, 2010, the body of 27-year-old Casey Mahoney was discovered in a wooded lot near railroad tracks on the 100 block of East Tusculum Street. Mahoney lived in East Stroudsburg and was the mother of a young son. She had also struggled with addiction and had reportedly been trying to regain stability in her life. Her body had been partially undressed, and investigators determined that she had been sexually assaulted and strangled.
DNA recovered from Mahoney's body and the surrounding scene matched the genetic evidence collected during the first two murder investigations. Police now had forensic proof that all three women had been attacked by the same offender. Each victim had been killed within a relatively confined area of Kensington, and the bodies had been left in abandoned or concealed spaces where the killer apparently believed he would not be interrupted.
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