An Arrest

Posted on Tue, Dec. 02, 2003

Police arrest suspect

22-year-old UND student still missing

By Stephen J. Lee

Herald Staff Writer

Alfonso Rodriguez Jr.

A convicted sex criminal was arrested Monday night at his Crookston home and charged with kidnapping Dru Sjodin, who remains missing.

Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., 50, was arrested at 7:20 p.m. Monday on a warrant from the Grand Forks County State’s Attorney’s office and signed in Grand Forks District Court, according to Grand Forks Police.

He was charged with kidnapping, a Class A felony, and was held Monday night in the Tri-County Correctional Center in Crookston.

Rodriguez is described as 5 feet 4 inches tall, 159 pounds, with light gray hair and a medium build.

No news was released about Sjodin herself, except that the search will go on.

Sjodin, 22, is thought to have been abducted about 5 p.m. Nov. 22 while talking on her cell phone to her boyfriend, Chris Lang, in the Twin Cities area.

A signal from her cell phone was logged for 24 hours until 8 p.m. Nov. 23 on a tower near Fisher, Minn., halfway between East Grand Forks and Crookston.

That information focused the search for her cell phone to 15 miles from the tower, police said.

Nothing was revealed Monday about Sjodin’s location or whether she is alive.

“Out of respect for the Sjodin family and in the interest of the integrity of the investigation, no further information will be released at this time,” police said in a news release Monday evening.

Allan Sjodin, Dru’s father, said late Monday after news of the arrest, that “we are going to reserve comment until tomorrow morning. We want to assess the situation and set up for tomorrow. We are going to go about searching again tomorrow morning. That is the only comment I can give.”

About 30 FBI agents have been working the case, along with dozens of law enforcement officers from about 20 federal, state and local agencies.

On Monday, FBI agent Paul McCabe, at Sjodin’s home in Pequot Lakes, Minn., said, “They’re still holding out hope,” according to The Associated Press. “They’re focused on finding Dru.”

The Grand Forks Sheriff’s Department said in a news release Monday night that volunteers will be needed “for a ground search for Dru Sjodin” on Wednesday. The request was faxed by the Grand Forks County Sheriff’s Department about 35 minutes before the news release about Rodriguez’s arrest was faxed at 8:15 p.m. Monday.

Officials in the sheriff’s departments in Grand Forks and Polk counties reiterated late Monday that volunteers still will be needed for a search Wednesday. Volunteers are asked to report to Ralph Engelstad Arena at UND between 7:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.

The suspect

Rodriguez was released from prison May 1 to live in Crookston with his mother, Dolores, at 210 Adams St., Crookston police said.

He was termed a “Level 3 sex offender,” the most predatory of offenders, and a public meeting was held May 7 in Crookston to inform residents he had returned to his hometown.

Rodriguez grew up in Crookston and first was convicted of attempted aggravated rape and aggravated rape in 1974 in Crookston and sent to prison. During a furlough from prison in 1979, he attacked another woman, attempting to abduct her from a city sidewalk in Crookston. He was convicted of attempted kidnapping and aggravated assault in 1980.

He remained in prison from 1980 until May 1 of this year.

State officials say Rodriguez previously was known to one victim and attacked two other women who did not know him, according to state correctional officials.

Wayne Swanson, who prosecuted Rodriguez in 1980 and served as Polk County attorney from 1979 to 2002, recalled the case Monday night.

“He attempted to abduct a woman off the street,” Swanson said. “She fought him. He stabbed her. She did get away from him. She was not about to go with him. She was a pretty gutsy lady.”

Rodriguez was in his 20s at the time of the Crookston assault, and the woman was 35 to 40 years old, Swanson said. Rodriguez drove away after the woman fought back, but he was arrested later partly with the help of a sketch the woman made.

“The woman he attacked was a very good artist, and she drew a full head drawing of him, which I held up against him when I did the final argument – it looked like a photograph, it was that good,” Swanson said.

Rodriguez was sentenced to more than 20 years in prison for the assault because of his history of two previous sexual assault convictions, Swanson said.

“The judge determined that he was a very dangerous man,” Swanson said.

Rodriguez also used a knife in an earlier sexual assault, Swanson said.

“I think he used a knife in all of them,” he said.

According to the Department of Corrections Web site, Rodriguez has a “history of sexual contact and attempted kidnapping with adult females. Contact included penetration in two instances.” It also states that Rodriguez was known to one of his victims, but not two others.

Rodriguez’s father died in 1993 in Crookston. A native of Texas, Alfonso Rodriguez Sr., began working as a migrant worker in Crookston in 1946, according to his obituary published in the Herald. By 1962, he and his wife, Dolores, who had married in 1950 in Laredo, Texas, settled in Crookston. They had five children, including Alfonso Jr., who was born in 1953.

On May 7, Alfonso Rodriguez Jr. was the subject of Crookston’s first sex offender public notification meeting, as neighbors were told of his return to his hometown after a long time in prison.

Sonja Thygeson lives about four houses down from where Rodriguez moved in with his mother in May.

“I’m a widow, and I’m older, and I was scared, so I had my son-in-law come over and install a motion light after he (Rodriguez) moved in,” she told The Associated Press. “But I’ve never seen him do anything wrong.”

Milton Stave, who lives across the street, said, “There were a lot of frightened people around,” AP reported.

Michelle Blow works at a Crookston convenience store.

“It makes me feel a lot better about the arrest,” she told AP. “I was nervous about him from the start. I’m especially happy because my grandma lives right by him.”

She had seen him in her store.

“He’s short, round and very quiet,” Blow said. “This whole thing gives me the chills.”

Rodriguez was required to register for 10 years with law enforcement, informing them where he was living, what vehicle he was driving and where he was working. Shortly after being released, he was not working anywhere, police said in May.

Grand Forks Police said a news conference on Rodriguez’s arrest will be at 11 a.m. today in the police station.

Under Minnesota law, Level 3 sex offenders are those considered most likely to reoffend, and the most predatory of the three risk levels to which sex offenders are assigned.

In the case of a Level 3 offender’s release and relocation, law enforcement informs communities and neighborhoods, as well as families and individuals who were affected by the crime.

Rodriguez and other sex offenders, can be viewed on the Minnesota Department of Corrections’ Web site,