Ricky Rodriguez

Growing up in the COG, Rodriguez was frequently exposed to adults engaging in sexual intercourse at Berg's home, as part of the group member's sexual "sharing".[3] When he was 10 months, Zerby and Berg requested that Sara, one of Rodriguez's nannies, start the creation of a document titled The Davidito Book. The book contains descriptions of sexual interactions between him and adults,[4] along with pictures of him alongside naked teenage girls, and present during the group's orgies.[8][9] One of his nannies, the personal secretary of Zerby, Angela M. Smith,[6] was included in the pictures,[2] in one of them she is seen undoing his pants, with the caption "Undressing ... for Sue!" (Smith).[3][10] The material also contained captions and text written by Berg commenting on the situation in a sexual manner.[7] Berg later ordered similar documents like Davidito that had been created to be purged, or references to sex taken out,[3] but former members were able to establish its existence by distributing the material via email.[4]

Davida Kelley, who lived with Berg from the age of 13, said that Rodriguez was sexually abused "[by] all the adult women. Most of them, at least", including Zerby.[11] According to an article by the Los Angeles Times, Berg reportedly had sex with numerous women in the group, and in an effort to prepare Rodriguez for the same when he became leader, he was put into "teen training", where he would have sex with multiple older teenage girls every afternoon. In 1986, the COG, now called The Family, banned sex between minors and adults, along with Flirty Fishing.[3]

Berg died in 1994,[2] therefore Zerby took full leadership of the group.[12] In 1996, Rodriguez moved to a Family-owned home in Budapest, where he met Elixcia Munumel. Munumel returned with him to Zerby's home in Oporto, Portugal, and lived with him there. In 1999 they told Zerby that they were going to Family's compound in Mexico, instead, Munumel went to England while Rodriguez traveled to the United States.[3] In San Diego, Rodriguez stayed at the non-for-profit charity The Family Care Foundation's headquarters in Dulzura.[13] Rodriguez sold a car that Zerby gave him so Munumel could rendezvous with him in Tacoma, Washington.[3] He married Munumel in a minister's home.[3][5] Rodriguez and Munumel, according to the latter, struggled with finances and experience in the outside world as they moved into a low-rent apartment. Rodriguez took a job on a fishing boat in Alaska, and began to take knife-martial arts lessons and spent time at a shooting range, trying to obtain a permit.[3]

According to the group, when he had officially left The Family, it was to pursue his education, and he was on good terms with the group.[2][14] But according to Munumel, Rodriguez began having reservations about Berg's teachings when they first met in Budapest; he noticed that they had contradicted the Bible, and expressed his frustrations to her about the group as a whole.[3] She said he heard stories from former members, and carried guilt because of his position as a future leader of The Family, which he felt contributed to the abuse of other children.[15] His friend, Celeste Jones, also said he was left angry because "there was no justice" to apprehend abusers in The Family. She also stated that Rodriguez pretended that he wasn't angry around members of the group, though the Tucson Citizen notes that he became more vocal around the time he started talking to former members.[16]

In 2002, he made a post on the Moving On website accusing Berg of abusing his daughters and granddaughter, while describing Zerby as apathetic and violent towards them.[4] Rodriguez met an ex-member, Sarah Martin, who became his friend on the site. She said he "carried this huge weight on his shoulders", never got over the 'Davidito' prophecy, and felt he had a need to "put an end" to Zerby's abuse.[3] Rodriguez also said that he thought about suicide since his "teen training", and stated that he hoped the group's leader's "evil legacy will die with the Family". In a similar 2004 post, he said he realized he couldn't move on, because "the first 25 years of my life will always haunt me", with the end of his post asking those "who have nothing to lose, such as myself" to help him with a plot for revenge.[2] He also admitted to his martial arts teacher, Kevin Schmitt, that he considered murdering members of The Family in the past.[3] A former member of the group, Rodriguez's friend Daniel Nathan Roselle, advised him legal recourse in 2004, but Rodriguez was concerned mostly with finding Zerby and Peter Amsterdam, Zerby's current husband.[2]

Zerby, and other Family members, had their locations isolated and their names kept secret with pseudonyms. Rodriguez, according to Munumel, spent years trying to find Zerby and his half-sister, Techi, who he wanted to take out of The Family.[4] In summer of 2004, Rodriguez left Munumel.[3] Later, they both separated, but according to her they continued to talk "every day".[17][15] Rodriguez traveled to San Diego, where he met Martin in person. Rodriguez had staked out a branch of the Family Care Foundation, according to Martin, who also said Rodriguez noticed Smith served on board the charity, in addition to being a member of Elderhaven, a nursing home his grandparents ran, in Tucson, Arizona. According to a statement made later by Munumel, Rodriguez also heard Zerby and Techi were going to visit his grandparents there at Elderhaven, during Christmas of 2003.[4][3] He stayed with his aunt, Rosemary Kanspedos, and her family in Tucson for a month. He also received a job from electrical contractor Mark Flynn, but according to him and his wife, he never gave him details about his prior life.[3]

Rodriguez made a video-tape on January 7, 2005, in his (North Side Tucson[18]) apartment. In the video, he discusses his thoughts of suicide and the desire he has to get revenge, describing himself as a vigilante.[4] Rodriguez shows numerous weapons and devices such as his Glock 23, KA-BAR knife, drill, soldering iron, and duct tape, some of them he declares are for torture. As he stocks magazines, he compares his struggle against Zerby's abuse to a war, and states his intent to make her pay. He declares that if he doesn't get her before he dies, he "will keep hunting her in the next life", or someone else will "pick up the torch". Rodriguez alludes to Smith as a person he intends to kill, and predicts that his upcoming attempt at retribution will result in conflict with law enforcement, but states that he has respect towards and no intent to harm the police.[6][2] He also confirms that his Moving On post in 2004 was to recruit someone in his plan, but in the end, he was happy no one with "nothing to lose" reached out.[2] After recording the video, he called Jones, expressing suicidal thoughts. She encouraged him to testify in a legal case, and said that "things will be taken seriously", but he told her he didn't believe her.[15][4] Rodriguez sent the video to Munumel, two of his family members, and Martin.[19]

The next day, he invited Smith to dinner in his apartment. After Smith arrived, she was stabbed several times in the arm, before he slit her throat.[6] Rodriguez left his apartment and drove until he arrived in Blythe, California, at midnight.[7] He rented a motel room, and began to call family members in Lakewood, Washington, notifying them of a body in his apartment, but not that he had committed the murder.[20][21] Rodriguez pulled into a parking lot near 14th Avenue,[20] where Munumel says he called her, notifying her that he had killed Smith and asked her to call the police. He also said to her that he killed her not to avenge himself, but his sister Techi and those still in The Family. He said that as Smith was dying, she "didn't understand what she had done wrong".[7][4] Rodriguez called the murder "the hardest thing I ever did in my life", and it didn't make him feel better.[22] Munumel also said he pleaded with her to commit suicide with him, before he ultimately said goodbye to her and hung up.[15] At roughly 2 A.M.,[21] he shot himself in the head with his handgun.[19][16]

At 8 A.M.,[21] a Palo Verde Irrigation District employee had seen Rodriguez's body in his car with a gunshot wound to his head and called the Blythe Police. The police detective thought Rodriguez only committed suicide, however, he picked up Munumel's call from Rodriguez's cell phone, and she told them of the murder.[3] Blythe Police then notified Tucson Police Department officers that Smith's body was in his apartment.[18] Rodriguez left no suicide note.[21] Detective Sgt. Mark Fuller, who was in charge of the homicide detail, assumed that the reason Rodriguez killed Smith was because she was responsible in his abuse, but because of elusive details regarding her involvement in his childhood, at the time of the murder, authorities could not pinpoint the true cause.[16] According to the police, there was no evidence that Smith was tortured for the location of Zerby.[22] Tucson Police Department spokesman Sgt. Carlos Valdez said Smith died shortly before her body was recovered,[18] and Rodriguez left 12 hours prior for Blythe.[21] Smith's birth name was Susan Joy Kauten, and her name change would have delayed the time that her family was notified of her death if she was not carrying her cell phone, which gave her birth name.[3]

A San Diego memorial for Rodriguez was held on March 26. In her eulogy, Munumel said that while "he chose a path that no one could share with him," he knew she loved him. More than 100 people, who had been associated with The Family, attended.[23]

Canadian Professor of Sociology Stephen A. Kent believed Smith's murder was the cause of Rodriguez's frustration due to his lack of justice for his abuse.

Rick Alan Ross, from the Cult Education Institute, was unsurprised by Rodriguez's actions. Ross, who interviewed numerous former members of the group, such as Berg's daughter and granddaughter, noted the many suicides of those who left, as they suffered "tremendous amount of pain" from being in "one of the most horrifically abusive and destructive cults in American history".[19] Stephen A. Kent, a professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Alberta, said that while Rodriguez was unjustifiable in the murder, one "can understand his frustration and rage" as "he and others from that generation" had never saw justice "from all the abuse they suffered."[24] Don Lattin, a journalist and author, spent two years studying Rodriguez's motives for the murder, published in his book Jesus Freaks. He believed that Rodriguez was a "time bomb" waiting to go off, as he showed anger but also guilt for other victim's abuse. Lattin noted that the reason the abuse wasn't accounted for was because "there's a statute of limitations as "A lot of this happened a long time ago" outside of the U.S., and noted the name-changes of the group's individuals: "So even the victims, the kids themselves, often don't know who abused them."[11]

After Rodriguez's death, many former members of The Family brought forth similar allegations of abuse.[25] Roselle was sad, rather than angry, that the murder-suicide took place. He said that "the only way anybody's listening" to the stories of abuse within the group "is that Rick and Angela died".[2] He also said that Rodriguez's suicide brought the total of his peer suicides to 30,[26] but that he considered Rodriguez's case of abuse as one of the worst cases from the Family.[17] John LaMattery, a former second-generation leader, said that Rodriguez's death was "a monumental event" in the group's history, and predicted that the Family would "spin it" in an attempt to disregard unfulfilled prophecies, saying they were in "damage control".[16] He also believed Rodriguez killed Smith because he couldn't find Zerby.[7]

Numerous members of the Moving On website expressed their concerns about the incident. Editors of the website described the situation as "a horrible tragedy, and something that we sincerely hope is never repeated".[19] Staff at Palo Alto's Restoration Hardware, Smith's workplace, had remembered her as a kind person, and her boss stated "There was nothing creepy about Angela."[19] The Safe Passage Foundation, a non-profit foundation, was established partially as a result of Rodriguez's suicide, in an aim to protect minors from "high-demand organisations" and to provide them with support and resources to leave those groups.[27]

In an internal memo, Zerby told followers in the group that reports were trying to "make Ricky look like a hero and role model" instead of a perpetrator of a crime.[9] Peter Amsterdam urged in a memo, sent to an estimated 12,000 followers, to disregard media reports and internet news about the situation. Amsterdam said in the memo that Rodriguez was "overcome by the enemy and forces of darkness," and Zerby is "the sweetest, most loving person I know." He also believed people were "exploiting this tragedy" to hurt him, Zerby, and the family in an effort to "tear down our work for the Lord".[16] Techi stated in a letter that after learning about Rodriguez's death, she became "severely disturbed", and stated that he wasn't an angry person when she knew him.[7] The Ricky Rodriguez Memorial Site (RickyRodriguez.com), managed by The Family, was created for Rodriguez and Smith, along with "never before published photos" of Zerby and "messages from Jesus".[14]

Claire Borowik, the spokesperson for The Family, said both deaths were tragic, but stated that media reports portrayed Smith as an offender and Rodriguez as a victim. She claimed that Smith was never Rodriguez's nanny, but had only visited him, and The Family gave him "ample financial and emotional support" when he wanted to become independent.[28] Borowik also compared Rodriguez's upbringing to "a nudist colony", and cited scholars who argue that similar sexual practices did not harm children.[4] In regards to the 'Davidito' prophecy, Borowik said the Family "knew that Davidito wasn't fulfilling that prophecy" because prophecies of the group were always "dependent on man's choices".[6] Borowik also accused former members, those she called apostates, of failing to move Rodriguez in "positive directions," and wanting "to do damage to our movement."[4] She criticized Lattin's book for "inaccuracies, misconceptions and erroneous conclusions" in addition to "sketchy research".[11]