There could hardly be a better follow-up story to that recent post about the importance of forensic science. A recent story from WPXI (read it here) details the multiple murder convictions of a California serial killer. Rodney Alcala's first known crime was in 1968, when he abducted an 8 year-old girl on her way to school. He brutally beat her with a lead pipe and raped her repeatedly but was caught thanks to the quick action of a witness to the abduction. That witness likely saved the little girl's life, as Alcala's next victims were all murdered after being raped and tortured in various ways.