HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — For 10 days in July 2018, a Texas parolee terrorized the city of Houston.
Jose Gilberto Rodriguez’s violent spree exposed cracks in the criminal justice system, devastated families, and set off a manhunt that became a race against time.
“We started to realize that the bodies were stacking up and in a very quick amount of time,” remembered Samantha Knecht, a prosecutor with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office. “We had to find the guy because we just knew that it wasn’t going to stop.”
The first victim, 62-year-old Pamela Johnson had been discovered in her Cypress home by her brothers. Then, there were two more murders, employees working alone at two separate mattress stores.
“Once he realized a business with a single worker was an easier target, he repeated the same M.O.,” Houston Police Department Sgt. John Stroble explained.
And detectives would soon discover more violent crimes.
“This guy within the span of about 4 days seems to have lost his mind,” said David Crain, a homicide detective with the Harris County Sheriff’s Office.
In the latest ABC13 Texas True Crime episode, Jessica Willey interviews the victims’ families and takes viewers inside the investigation with never-before-seen video. See how the search for Rodriguez came to a dramatic end and how his rampage led to greater parolee oversight.
“I can’t believe that someone could take that many lives and still be breathing,” Johnson’s sister Peggy Bosse, said. “He’s got a dead soul.”
Watch Texas True Crime: The Mattress Murders wherever you stream ABC13.
