Victims 6 | Date apprehended June 26, 1995 Name Rory Conde | |
 | ||
Other names The Tamiami Trail Strangler Span of killings September 17, 1994–January 12, 1995 | ||
Criminal penalty Capital punishment Similar Daniel Conahan, Judy Buenoano, Paul Durousseau | ||
Rory Enrique Conde (born June 14, 1965), a.k.a. "The Tamiami Trail Strangler", is a Colombian serial killer who killed 6 prostitutes in Florida. He was sentenced to death on March 7, 2000.
Contents
Personal life
Rory Conde was born on June 14, 1965 in Barranquilla, Colombia. His mother died of tetanus when he was six years old. Conde and his sister Nelly were then raised by their paternal grandmother. When Conde was twelve, they moved to Miami to live with Conde's father, Gustavo Conde. Conde did not like his father and thought he was emotionally abusive. Conde's future wife, Carla Conde, thought that Rory's outbursts were a result of sexual abuse at the hands of his father.
Rory and Carla were married in 1987, when he was 21 and she was 15, eventually having two kids. Rory was an abusive husband and had a stint in jail in 1992 as a result of a fight with Carla over Rory bringing girls over. They later moved to a condo off the Tamiami Trail. They stopped having sex and Rory would disappear at night. In July, 1994 Carla moved out to her parents' house with the two kids. Rory threatened to kill her if she dated anyone else.
Murders
On September 17, 1994, Conde killed cross dressing male prostitute, Lazaro Comesana. He later said that he killed Lazaro after finding out he was a man during sex.
Conde then killed two more prostitutes, Elisa Martinez on October 8 and Charity Nava on November 20. On the back and buttocks of Charity he wrote "THIRD! (A happy face dotting the 'i') I will call Dwight Chan 10. (A reference to WPLG anchor Dwight Lauderdale) [See] if you can catch me. (Using two eyes instead of the word 'See')"
Conde then killed three more prostitutes: Wanda Crawford on November 25, Necole Schneider on December 17, and Rhonda Dunn on January 12, 1995.
He strangled his victims to death and would have anal sex with the corpses afterward.
Aftermath
Conde was arrested on June 19, 1995 when Gloria Maestre, a prostitute he had bound head to toe, made enough noise to attract neighbors while Conde was in court for a shoplifting charge.
He was sentenced to death on March 7, 2000 for the murder of Rhonda Dunn. He later pleaded guilty to the murder of five others and was sentenced to five consecutive life terms without parole on April 5, 2001.