Bee reporters answer questions about area crime news, trends and other issues.
QUESTION: Back in the late 1990s, I was a student at Center High School in Antelope. Around that time a male student that was in the high school band was arrested at his home for the killing of his female neighbor in the Antelope area. Whatever happened to him and that case? Was he ever charged? Did he go to prison or a mental institution?
Submitted by: Delia, Carmichael
ANSWER: You likely are referring to Michael Andre Rogers, who was arrested in the Aug. 10, 1999, slaying of his neighbor Kimberly Ann Ochoa.
Ochoa, 29, had been married just three weeks when she was found strangled, stabbed and beaten in her Antelope home. According to stories in The Bee, a trail of blood led from the crime scene to Rogers' bedroom.
Investigators said he attempted to cover up the slaying by dousing the crime scene with gasoline and cleaning fluid, but firefighters arrived before the fire caused major damage.
Rogers, who was 15 at the time, was found unfit for juvenile court and pleaded no contest to murder, burglary, arson and attempted rape. He was on probation for a previous attack on a 19-year-old baby sitter.
Rogers was sentenced to 42 years to life in prison. According to the plea agreement, he was to spend the first 10 years and 8 months of his sentence in a state mental hospital. Then he was to be transferred to prison to begin a 32-year-to-life term.
According to an online roster of California State Prison inmates, Rogers, now 28, is in California State Prison, Los Angeles County, in Lancaster.
Have a Sacto911 question? Submit it here.
About Comments
Reader comments on Sacbee.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Sacramento Bee. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "report abuse" button below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.