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(AP) - A federal jury decided Thursday that the sex
offender convicted of kidnapping college student Dru Sjodin,
killing her and leaving her body in Minnesota ravine is eligible
for the death penalty.

      The jury now must decide whether Alfonso Rodriguez Jr. should be
sentenced to death for the murder. That phase of the trial is
scheduled to begin Monday afternoon.

      The same jury of seven women and five men found Rodriguez, 53,
guilty last week of a federal charge of kidnapping resulting in
death.

      Sjodin, 22, of Pequot Lakes, Minnesota, was a University of North
Dakota student when she was abducted from the parking lot of a
Grand Forks shopping mall on Nov. 22, 2003. 

Her body was found the
following April in a ravine near Crookston, Minnesota, the town where
Rodriguez lived. Prosecutors said Sjodin was beaten, raped and
stabbed.

      Jurors were asked to answer eight questions in deciding whether
Rodriguez was eligible for the death penalty, including whether he
planned to kill Sjodin and whether he caused serious bodily injury
to two women he assaulted in 1974.

      U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley told the jury Rodriguez showed an
escalating pattern of violence and "shockingly evil" acts.
Rodriguez "terrorized Dru Sjodin in her last hours," he said.

      Rodriguez's attorney, Richard Ney, said Sjodin's death was
horrible but did not meet the legal requirements of eligibility for
the death penalty.

      North Dakota does not have the death penalty but it is allowed
in federal cases.

      The last state-sanctioned execution in North Dakota was a
hanging in 1905, said state Supreme Court Justice Dale Sandstrom,
who researched and wrote about the subject. 

Two others were
sentenced to hang but neither did, and the last man sentenced to
death by hanging was spared in 1915, Sandstrom said.

Gallery

Rodriguez jurors to hear death penalty arguments next

Rodriguez guilty in Sjodin case

Prosecutors outline case against Rodriguez

'Death qualifying' jurors in death penalty cases

Alfonso Rodriguez Jr. is eligible for the
death penalty for the killing of college student Dru Sjodin, a federal court jury has decided. They must now return for another phase of the trial to decide whether Rodriguez should be sentenced to death.

Jurors say Rodriguez is eligible for death penalty

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