Sacto 9-1-1: Cal honors student who was slain in Oak Park

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Sacto 9-1-1

The Sacramento Bee's Crime blog is a comprehensive report of crime news, trends and information for your community and beyond.

October 10, 2008

Cal honors student who was slain in Oak Park

From Bill Lindelof:

A UC Berkeley student who was killed outside an Oak Park barbershop will be honored today with a "memorial certificate" in lieu of a degree in recognition of the young man's academic accomplishments.

Rodrigo "Rod" Rodriguez Jr. (right photo), 21, was killed in Sept. 16, 2007, outside the barbershop where he worked as an apprentice barber while on break from UC Berkeley, which he attended on a prestigious Buck scholarship.

Police say the killers were targeting someone else for whom they mistook Rodriguez. One man has been arrested in connection with the homicide.

University of California regents will honor Rodriguez today in a ceremony on campus at UC Berkeley's School of Business. His parents will be present.

H. Faye Lawson, student advocate of Student Services at the Haas School of Business, said Rodriguez was a dynamic student who left an indelible memory of his strength and optimism with people he met.

"His legacy as a student and as a young man compelled this recognition of his work toward a Berkeley degree," Lawson said in a statement.

In addition to the recognition from the regents, his parents will receive an award from the University of Rochester. Rodriguez earned the Rochester award in 2002 when he was a student enrolled in the Mathematics, Engineering, Science and Liberal Arts (MESL) Honors Academy at the former Sacramento High School. He never received the actual award and certificate.

The award recognizes academic and extracurricular achievement, according to Jean Crowder, MESL director.

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Q: What happened to the people involved in the killing of Quinnisha R. Thomas? -- Three people wre convicted. What were their sentences?

A: As reported in The Bee, Deondre Terrell Hudson was a minor when he murdered his girlfriend, 18-year-old Quinnisha R. Thomas and her unborn fetus on Jan. 13, 2003.

Sacramento Superior Court Judge James L. Long, who called the killing "coldblooded," sentenced Hudson, age 18 at the time of sentencing, to prison with no hope of parole on June 22, 2004.

Hudson was convicted on two charges of murder of using a gun to kill Thomas, who was eight months pregnant with his daughter. He shot her execution-style as she walked through an opening in a fence behind a Greenhaven grocery store.

Kevin Duran Coleman, then age 20, and James Kaleo Ross, then age 21, previously pleaded guilty to acting as accessories to murder by helping Hudson dump the body in the bushes of nearby Sojourner Truth Park.

Coleman was sentenced to two years in prison, and Ross was sentenced to a year in jail.

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