'Serial killer' who shot author Lois Duncan's daughter in 1989 is indicted for her death


A suspected serial killer has been indicted for the murder of Lois Duncan’s daughter nearly 33 years after she was shot in the head while driving home from a friend’s house.

Paul Apodaca, 54, was officially indicted on Monday for the July 1989 murder of 18-year-old Kaitlyn Arquette after admitting to Albuquerque, New Mexico police officers that he was the man who killed her and two other young women in the late 1980s.

He was previously convicted in 1995 of raping his 14-year-old stepsister, and was arrested on a parole violation in July, when he allegedly confessed to the violent slayings as he spoke about his hatred for women and provided detectives with information that only the killer could have known.

Apodaca is now being charged with first-degree murder in Arquette’s death, as he also faces charges for the deaths of University of New Mexico student Althea Oakley, 21, and Stella Gonzales, who was just 13 when she was shot and killed. 

He has pleaded not guilty to at least one of the charges lobbied against him, according to KOAT, and now remains in custody at the Lea County Correctional Facility as he awaits trial for Oakeley and Gonzales’ deaths.

Apodaca is due back in court on Friday for a detention hearing as his lawyer insists he is innocent of the murders and only gave the confession because he was intoxicated and not mentally well.

Paul Apodaca, 54, was officially indicted on Monday for the July 1989 murder of 18-year-old Kaitlyn Arquette

Arquette was shot in the head on July 16, 1989 when she was driving home from a dinner with a friend

Paul Apodaca, 54, was officially indicted on Monday for the July 1989 murder of 18-year-old Kaitlyn Arquette

Arquette's mother, famed 'I Know What You Did Last Summer' author Lois Duncan spent years searching for justice in her daughter's death

Arquette’s mother, famed ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ author Lois Duncan spent years searching for justice in her daughter’s death

Arquette’s death made national news after famed ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ author Lois Duncan penned a nonfiction book about the mysterious slaying in 1992, entitled ‘Who Killed My Daughter?’ and hired a private investigator to look into the circumstances of her daughter’s death.

Throughout the years, the family received several theories about Arquette’s death, with some suspecting a so-called Vietnamese Mafia running car insurance scams was involved, according to the Albuquerque Journal. 

Two men were eventually indicted in her death, but the then-District Attorney dismissed the case without prejudice because the evidence was insufficient to prove that they were involved beyond a reasonable doubt. 

But for years, the Journal reports, Arquette’s family thought Apodaca might have been involved in her July 16, 1989 death. 

Duncan wrote a nonfiction book about the mysterious slaying in 1992, entitled 'Who Killed My Daughter?'

Duncan wrote a nonfiction book about the mysterious slaying in 1992, entitled ‘Who Killed My Daughter?’

Arquette was driving home that night after having dinner with a friend in the city’s Old Town when she was shot twice in the head, causing her to drift between lanes and crash into a light pole.

Witnesses on the scene at the time described seeing a Volkswagen Beetle near the scene. It was driven by Apodaca, who was then 21. 

During an ensuing investigation, Pat Carsito, who was hired by the family to investigate Arquette’s death, said he had suspected Apodaca was involved.

Carsito told KOB 4 last year that he had actually visited Apodaca while he was serving 20 years in prison for raping his underage stepsister.

‘He gave no hesitation that he was at the scene,’ she said. ‘He was again, pleasant [and] cooperative.’

However, Carsito noted, there were ‘two times when he wasn’t.’

The first was when she asked him who was with him at the time, to which he reportedly replied: ‘What do you mean somebody was with me, who said somebody was with me? Nobody was with me.’

The only other time he was not ‘pleasant and cooperative,’ Carsito said, was when he asked: ‘How did you find me?’

‘They were interesting words to me, like you weren’t supposed to find me.’ 

Now, Kaitlyn’s sister, Kerry, told KRQE their mother is ‘here,’ ‘looking down’ after years of searching for justice in Kaitlyn’s death. Duncan died in 2016.

Althea Oakeley, a University of New Mexico student, was Apodaca's first reported victim on June 22, 1988

Stella Gonzales was killed months later while walking with a friend

Apodaca is also facing charges for the deaths of University of New Mexico student Althea Oakeley, 21, left, and Stella Gonzales, 13, right

Apodaca is also facing charges for the deaths of University of New Mexico student Althea Oakeley, 21, and Stella Gonzales, 13. 

Authorities say Oakeley was his first reported victim, when she was walking home  from a fraternity party on June 22, 1988 after having an argument with her boyfriend.

Apodaca reportedly told investigators that he was working as a security guard at the Technical Vocational Institute – now Central New Mexico Community College – that night when he saw Oakeley and began following her.

He said she smiled at him, and then he attacked her in the aftermath, according to the Albuquerque Journal.

Just a few months later, on September 9, 1988, Gonzales was shot and killed when she was walking with a friend near Tingley Beach. According to police, ‘the two girls were confronted by someone in a car’ who ‘fired shots’ that struck Gonzales. She later died at a nearby hospital in south Albuquerque, Law and Crime reports.

Apodaca reportedly also admitted to authorities in July that he was driving by the girls when he shot her, according to KRQE.

He was ultimately arrested by University of New Mexico police in July 2021 on a parole violation as a registered sex offender, and shortly after he was taken into custody, police report, he confessed to killing the three young women and raping three others during the same time period. 

One of those, from 1993, had been stuck in the rape kit backlog and had recently received a match through the CODIS DNA database. The case is now being being reopened.

Detectives said Apocada had information about the deaths that only the killer could have known.

‘Paul Apdodaca is a serial killer in our view, and he picked his victims seemingly at random, but they all shared one trait: They were women,’ Albuquerque Deputy Commander Kyle Hartsock said when he announced the first of the charges against Apodaca in August.

‘They were women in vulnerable circumstances at the time who were seemingly alone, and that was his only reason, opportunity and his own perceived hatred of females at the time.’

His attorney, Nicholas Hart, however, argues that Apodaca was intoxicated when he made the confession,

He released a statement on Tuesday saying: ‘The District Attorney’s Office has only been interested in litigating this case in the press because they know how incomplete and empty these investigations have been.

‘So it is no surprise that another spurious indictment, surely to be followed by dubious and incorrect public statements, has been handed down.

‘We look forward to show the court and a jury that Mr. Apodaca is not guilty of these allegations.’ 

Apodaca has yet to be officially charged in Arquette’s murder, but in August, a grand jury indicted him for Oakeley’s murder, and in August he was indicted for Oakley’s slaying. 

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