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FARGO, North Dakota (AP) -- A federal jury found a convicted sex offender guilty Wednesday in the kidnapping and murder of college student Dru Sjodin, whose body was found abandoned in a Minnesota ravine.
The verdict clears the way for the first death penalty deliberations in North Dakota in more than a century.
Jurors deliberated for less than four hours, then found Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., 53, guilty of charges he kidnapped Sjodin, stabbed her, raped her and dumped her body in a ravine.
Rodriguez stared straight ahead as the verdict was read. His mother, Dolores, wiped her face with a paper tissue.
Before Sjodin's slaying, Rodriguez had served more than 20 years for offenses that included rape and attempted kidnapping. He got out of prison about six months before the killing.
Sjodin's mother and father showed no emotion in court, but family members shared hugs later outside the courtroom.
"It's another step in closing the case," said Erin Hakstol, Sjodin's sorority adviser. "It doesn't bring Dru back, unfortunately."
On to death penalty phase
Jurors will return to court Tuesday to decide whether whether Rodriguez is eligible for the death penalty. North Dakota does not have the death penalty, but it is allowed in federal cases.
Rodriguez was charged under federal law because Sjodin was taken across state lines. Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty said in a statement: "If ever there was a case for which the death penalty should apply, this is it."
In closing arguments Tuesday, U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley told jurors Sjodin fought for her life and left "unmistakable" evidence about the crime.
Rodriguez's attorney said the government failed to prove its case.
Sjodin, 22, a University of North Dakota student from Pequot Lakes, Minnesota, was abducted from the parking lot of a Grand Forks shopping mall on November 22, 2003. Her body was found the following April in the ravine near Crookston, Minnesota. Rodriguez lived in Crookston.
Rodriguez defense attorney Robert Hoy said a medical examiner called by prosecutors as a witness could not say for certain where Sjodin died, when she died, or the cause of her death.
Wrigley told jurors that blood found in Rodriguez's car matched Sjodin's DNA, and it was found in a mist pattern, indicating Sjodin fought her attacker and was beaten.
"Ladies and gentlemen, Dru Sjodin battled him every step of the way, and she left us unmistakable messages," Wrigley said.
Just one defense witness
The defense called just one witness: George Sensabaugh Jr., a forensic science professor from California testified Tuesday that tests for sexual assault were not reliable.
Under questioning by Assistant U.S. Attorney Keith Reisenauer, Sensabaugh testified that he knew few details about the Sjodin case and based his testimony on information from the autopsy and lab work.
Prosecutors, who called 52 witnesses, had opened the third week of testimony by interviewing a medical examiner who said he believes Sjodin's neck was slashed at the site where her body was found.
McGee, the medical examiner in Ramsey County, Minnesota, said he found evidence Sjodin was sexually assaulted. The assault could have happened up to 36 hours before her death or after her death, he told jury Monday.
Prosecutors said Sjodin's hands had been bound behind her back and she was nude from the waist down, with a rope and remnants of a plastic bag around her neck.
McGee said that while the neck wound was the most likely cause of death, Sjodin could have suffocated from a plastic bag over her head or died of exposure. He said he could not pinpoint the exact cause of her death.
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